Trump Loses It as US Economy Crashes during War!!!

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2:06Ben Meiselas:Donald Trump has walked right into a death trap of his own, making a global economic catastrophe the same way Donald Trump bankrupted his casinos. He's doing it now with the United States economy and the global economy caused by his unlawful and disastrous war against Iran. There was a moment when Treasury Secretary Scott Besant this past week was doing that interview with Sky News. He was spewing the Trump propaganda and saying, there's no cost that I would be worried about when it comes to this war against Iran. Donald Trump should be able to spend as much money as he wants. I will endorse it all.

2:55Ben Meiselas:Or you have a Besson saying, we obviously knew the Strait of Hormuz was going to be blocked by Iran. We prepared for this. We wanted this. When he was spewing all of that propaganda, he got a call from Donald Trump in the middle of his interview with Sky News. And it looked like he saw a ghost. It looked like he literally saw a ghost. I'm going to show you that video in just one moment. Then he goes back to the interview and he can't even speak in sentences because behind the scenes, things are going down that are deeply, deeply worrisome. and Besant knows it. He knows what he and Donald Trump have just unleashed, this economic death spiral the same way Donald Trump has bankrupted casino after casino.

3:49Ben Meiselas:Just look at what Bank of America is saying right now, right? A fairly conservative financial institution that doesn't usually release hyperbolic headlines, okay? Here's what they said on Friday. The markets are starting to look like the run-up to the global financial crisis. Now, what about the S &P? What are they putting out? Donald Trump's war in the Middle East could have longstanding effects on the U.S. economy and credit conditions. Now, let me show you when Treasury Secretary Scott Besant got a phone call from Donald Trump during his interview with Sky News. He left in the middle of the interview.

4:28Ben Meiselas:Let me show you what went down. Let's play this clip.

4:32Donald Trump:I listened to you on the...

4:38Donald Trump:Oh, okay. Okay. No problem at all. See you shortly, Mr. Secretary. Mr. Secretary, I have to say, it's a first, I'm sure, a last as well, that an interviewee been pulled away to go to the Situation Room. How is the president? Was he stressed? No, the president is in great spirits. The Iranian mission is proceeding well ahead of schedule. And I have to tell you, well, that I'm a teenager who's considering military service, And I could give this team my highest compliment from President Trump to the head of the Joint Chiefs to the Secretary of War. I would say that I would trust my child's life in their hands.

5:35Ben Meiselas:Now, before he got that call, I just want to show you some other stuff that he was saying during that interview where he was like, it was always part of our planning. This is what he's been telling people. It was always part of our planning that the United States would have to deal with the Strait of Hormuz being closed. That's just what we knew was going to happen. We always thought we need this international coalition to escort the tankers. Okay, well, then why would you tariff the entire world and turn all your allies against you? That makes no sense at all. Here, play this clip.

6:11Donald Trump:You're starting to think, if this does keep persisting as it is, that the Navy has to go into the Strait of Hormuz to help ships get through, which would have a big effect. Look, that was always in our planning, that there's the chance that U.S. Navy or perhaps an international coalition will be escorting oil tankers through. There are, in fact, tankers coming through now, Iranian tankers, I believe some Chinese flag tankers have come through. So we know that they have not mined the straits. And was that what you were just discussing in the situation room? We were discussing a plethora of things.

6:51Donald Trump:And is it your belief that the volume of ships going through the Strait of Hormuz will be improving immediately from now? It is my belief that as soon as it is militarily possible, the U.S. Navy, perhaps with an international coalition, will be escorting vessels through.

7:14Ben Meiselas:I remember a few weeks back what he was saying, how 2025 was about setting the table. 2026 is going to be the banquet for the American people. This is your banquet, Scott Besant, Treasury Secretary Scott Besant. This is your banquet. Here, play this clip.

7:33Donald Trump:I think, as I've said many times, 2025 is about setting the table. 2026 is going to be a banquet for the American people. The economy is taking off. We saw 40 ,000 new construction jobs. Everyone says to me, oh, where are these factory jobs that you planned? And unlike what you and I see in the financial markets, you can't push a button and build a factory. There's lead time, but what we are seeing is big commitments to these factories that are going to be built. First, we'll get the construction jobs, and then the factory jobs are going to come. So I think we're going to see the tremendous groundbreaking.

8:14Donald Trump:So I think we're going to see a lot of factory completions this year.

8:17Ben Meiselas:Now, one of the articles that I think really resonates right now is this one right here from TS Lombard, Global Watch. and it says it takes two to taco. So the ball is now in the U.S. court. Iran is still shipping its oil and has no incentive to negotiate while those revenues flow. So really, Treasury Secretary Scott Besson, you prepare for this because China is able to use the Strait of Hormuz. You have Iran using the Strait. They're getting their oil out. So Donald Trump, what, bombs the Karg Island and thinks that that's going to make a difference. But guess what? Donald Trump may have been able to taco in the past.

9:03Ben Meiselas:Donald Trump always chickens out when it would come to his tariffs against the world that he would make this social media post, that social media post. But right now, Iran sees Donald Trump as weak. China and Russia see Donald Trump as utterly weak and pathetic. And they view this as an opportunity to restructure the global world order to have the United States in a much, much weaker position. I mean, you've got Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, two of the dumbest people serving as the main envoys to the United States who botched the negotiations with Iran. They're out there like partying with the Russians in Miami as we're now removing sanctions on Russian oil and allowing Russia to make billions of dollars while they provide Iran with resources and intelligence and capabilities to strike American troops and American interests in the Middle East.

10:05Ben Meiselas:What the heck is going on there? You know, then you have people like this guy, Jameson Greer, the trade representative. I mean, this is a idiocracy for us to see. I mean, take a look as Jameson Greer was asked on CNBC about returning the tariff money that they stole from the people in their trade war against the world, which turned all of our allies basically against us because we started a trade war with everybody all at once. And the Trump regime stole our money and the Supreme Court ruled against them. So, Jameson, can you please return our damn money because you stole it? And the way he describes it as, well, if we get our money back, that would be a windfall.

10:54Ben Meiselas:What do you mean to be a windfall? You stole our money, you frauds. Just a bunch of frauds right there. Here, play this clip. Ambassador, would you and the administration encourage companies that had higher costs during this period to seek refunds, that paid tariffs to seek refunds?

11:12Donald Trump:And I ask because I've talked to a number of CEOs who have thus far been holding off seeking those refunds, worried potentially about the possibility for retribution for seeking such a thing. uh well i if i were these companies uh and somehow they get this windfall the most important thing and the smartest thing they should do is give it as bonuses to their workers the whole reason the president imposed these tariffs was to try to reshore to fix our massive imbalance in trade that we've experienced over many years because of china vietnam the eu and others if the companies are going to get this windfall they should pass it along to their workers as a bonus or a raise because that's the purpose of the program.

11:53Donald Trump:It's always been the purpose of the program, and the American people should get it, and the companies should give it to their workers.

11:59Ben Meiselas:And then just more line from Jameson Greer on the Iran war. Oh, I think it's all going to be resolved in a few weeks. It'll all be done in a few weeks. Here, play this clip.

12:10Donald Trump:What is your expectation for how quickly this war in Iran is going to end? And if it doesn't, what do you think the global impact is going to be? Well, I think that we're talking in terms of weeks, right? When I speak with Secretary Hexeth or the president or others, they're much closer to it. But obviously, you can't talk about trade without the Iran war coming up and the effect of oil and gas and what that means. I think we're talking about a matter of weeks. Our expectation is that any effects we see will be short-lived. But we want to watch this, right? You could see other effects that affect cycles that we tend to see in commodity markets.

12:51Donald Trump:So we're watching it very closely, especially if there are particular spikes or if there are areas where we think we have more resilience.

12:59Ben Meiselas:Now, apparently what their plan is just bankrupt everything and then bail out everything, right? You had Brooke Rollins, the agriculture secretary, now saying because our farmers are additionally suffering because the fertilizer prices are through the roof right now, if they're even able to access fertilizer, because a lot of the fertilizer comes from the Middle East. She goes, yeah, well, maybe do another bailout for the farmers. So when you did the tariffs against the world and China refused to buy American soybeans, You had to do a bailout there. The input costs for farmers basically made it, you know, everything that the farmers were doing was a net loss right away.

13:41Ben Meiselas:So you had to bail them out there. Now you screw them over by starting this war against Iran. And now one of the impacts is that fertilizer is not coming in, or if it is, it's so expensive. And so another bailout, everybody, another bailout while they give$40 billion to Argentina, while Donald Trump's rushing to do a state visit to China. I mean, what the hell is going on here? Here, play this clip.

14:10Scott Bessent:Yes, we'll take questions. Just to start, are you considering another bailout for farmers who are concerned about the rising price of fertilizer given the war?

14:17Donald Trump:Yeah, so I appreciate that question with what's happening in Iran, what that means for specifically nitrogen urea, which is one of the key components of fertilizer. Our farmers are moving into planting season right now. So the president is very aware of these challenges and these issues. We are very close to having an announcement on some solutions on what that looks like. We're looking at every potential avenue to keep the fertilizer costs down as these farmers are going into planting. season. No big announcements yet, but it is coming. I have been in conversation with the Hill on that as they're looking at additional funds for our farmers.

14:55Donald Trump:So at this point, everything is on the table. This president is convicted. He is resolute. He will stand with our farmers. He knows that it's national security issue and we're on it. So more to come on that.

15:09Ben Meiselas:And with the horrible fourth quarter GDP numbers, with the horrible economic data that's coming out, You have Ron Johnson and all these MAGA Republicans saying, you know why the fourth quarter was bad? It's the Democrats' fault. It was the Chuck Schumer government shutdown. It's like, to be quick, Chuck Schumer government? What are you talking about? Here, play this clip.

15:32Donald Trump:America, GDP was down in the fourth quarter. Why? Because of Schumer's shutdown. So not only are they not helping us clean up the mess, they're doing everything they can to frustrate our efforts, to interfere with President Trump's efforts to clean up their messes. It's really despicable.

15:49Scott Bessent:Yeah, great, great point. You're right. GDP was down from the expectation. It was supposed to be 1.5 % growth. We got growth of 7 tenths of a percent.

15:58Ben Meiselas:Meanwhile, you have the Labor Department, which is run by an individual who's under investigation for engaging in horrific personal misconduct, whose husband was, like, banned from the Labor Department building for allegedly sexually harassing people at the labor department. They're putting out videos of Donald Trump dancing to the YMCA. And it says that Friday feeling when wages are going up and prices are coming down for American workers, as we put it on the Midas Touch Network, we post it on our social media. Yeah, I guess that's the Friday feeling when you lie. What are you talking about? Wages aren't up.

16:39Ben Meiselas:Prices aren't down. Let's be very clear. America engaged in an unlawful war against Iran while we already had a massive affordability crisis here at home where people couldn't afford things. Trump promised he was going to make things more affordable on day one. He made things far worse. People can't afford homes. People can't afford groceries. People aren't able to get jobs. People were suffering here. And Donald Trump was covering up a child sex trafficking, ringing the Epstein files. So then Donald Trump starts a war with Benjamin Netanyahu in Iran. Now everything that was horrible already is now a million times worse.

17:21Ben Meiselas:I mean, if we weren't talking about the war every day, assuming Donald Trump didn't engage in an awful war, we would have been talking about how bad our economy is with Donald Trump's tariffs against the entire world, which after the United States Supreme Court struck down and said that Donald Trump's IEPA tariffs are unconstitutional or unlawful, in violation, Donald Trump then used another law illegally, just invoked the Trade Act of 1974 to impose more tariffs against the rest of the world to start launching investigations into all these other countries and to treat them as hostile nations to screw with the United States, Mexico, Canada agreement, to screw with all these international trade agreements, rip them to shreds.

18:10Ben Meiselas:And now when we need allies, guess what? Treasury Secretary Scott Besson, which international coalition is going to join you? And by the way, you think the Middle East nations are going to be allied with the United States the way they were before after they see how you have not helped them at all and you thrust them into this war? You think that the Asian nations are going to want to do a lot of business with the United States now as you're taking away their weapon systems to move it to the Middle East because you were unprepared. You think that that's what's going down? And I'll just show you my friend, Justin Wolfers.

18:47Ben Meiselas:He describes how the trust and the relationships with the U.S. and the world have been utterly shattered as a result of this war. He goes, even if this war ends quickly, all of the trust has been shattered right now. Here, play this clip.

19:01Donald Trump:The president at a press conference, in a press interview today, looked like he was more or less declaring victory. By the way, the president's rhetoric and reality are two very different creatures. But if he were to declare victory, he packs up, goes home. It's a very short war. Your beauty, life can get back somewhat to normal. It'll never get all the way back to normal. The rest of the world will remember what happened. people will have to plan their businesses understanding that at any given moment the president could start a new adventure that adventure could disrupt the world disrupt international relations and disrupt their business so that's the look this could be over fast new thing story let me tell you the other it's history history tells us that almost every time the u.s has gone into war it is dramatically underestimated how difficult it is to win and how long it will Let me remind you, just before, just in the early days of the Iraq war, Donald Rumsfeld famously said, we might be there five days, could be five weeks, I doubt it will be five months.

19:59Donald Trump:And it turned out to be much, much longer than five years. So when someone says on the one hand it could be measured in days and the reality is in years, that says they underestimated it by a factor of 365. If you want to think about that, just think about when someone in Washington tells you the cost that this war could impose, realize that multiplying that number by 365 remains a possibility.