Trump Ruins WH Thanksgiving Pardon With Awful Speech

26 Nov 2025 · 21 min · 11 chapters

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In short

Criticism of Donald Trump’s annual White House Thanksgiving turkey pardon speech, arguing he used the ceremony to insult Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker, spread falsehoods, and escalate political rhetoric.

Guest backgrounds

No guests are mentioned in the provided transcript.

Key claims

Trump called Pritzker “a very fat slob,” joked about sending pardoned turkeys to a “terrorist confinement center in El Salvador,” claimed Washington, D.C. had no murders in six months, said “religion is coming back,” and predicted gasoline would soon hover around $2/gallon. The episode also claims Trump falsely said last year’s turkey pardons were invalid due to “Auto pen” and bragged about job and AI leadership despite recessionary indicators.

Notable examples

“Gobble and Waddle” jokes; “largest prison in history” reference; murder counts in D.C. (June 15, July 15, Aug 8, Sept 5, Oct 8, Nov 5); gas price comparison ($3.05 cited).

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 Thanksgiving Pardon Controversy

0:05 to 0:30

Discussion on Trump's controversial remarks during the Thanksgiving pardon ceremony.

“Build your own multi-view, choose up to three streams, and follow player spotlights.”

Trump's Thanksgiving Pardon Controversy

1:30 to 1:58

Discussion on Trump's controversial remarks during the Thanksgiving pardon ceremony.

“I didn't think the pain from the shingles rash would affect simple everyday tasks like bathing, getting dressed, or even walking around.”

Trump's Thanksgiving Pardon Controversy

2:01 to 4:26

Discussion on Trump's controversial remarks during the Thanksgiving pardon ceremony.

“clicking through slides, scrolling spreadsheets?”

Trump's Attacks on Politicians

4:26 to 6:30

Analyzing Trump's derogatory remarks towards Illinois officials.

“And there was once upon a time where the president was a respected tradition and you would show your kids these ceremonies.”

Trump's False Claims and Rhetoric

6:30 to 8:32

Examining Trump's misleading statements about crime and religion.

“Some people say, oh, why would you mention that?”

Discussion on Trump's Thanksgiving Speech

8:32 to 11:16

Exploring Trump's bizarre comments during the turkey pardon event.

“Ever have one of those moments where your body reminds you it's not 25 anymore?”

Trump's Promises and Misleading Statements

11:16 to 14:03

Analyzing Trump's claims about safety and job creation in America.

“We could make Chicago a safe city in a period of four weeks, in a period of eight weeks, nine weeks, 10 weeks.”

Trump's Thanksgiving Speech Analysis

14:03 to 15:00

Discussion of Trump's Thanksgiving speech, including his jokes and remarks on Biden.

“That was the one part in Pam that was good, right?”

Fact-Checking Trump's Claims

15:00 to 16:46

Examination of Trump's claims about gas prices and their factual accuracy.

“You remember last year after a thorough and very rigorous investigation by Pam Bondi and all of the people at Department of Justice, the FBI, the CIA, the White House Counsel's Office, and the Department of Everything.”

Public Sentiment on Rising Prices

16:46 to 18:56

Discussion on how Americans feel about rising prices across various sectors.

“Yeah, always better to me to drive than to fly, Sandra.”
Show all 11 chapters

Public Sentiment on Rising Prices

21:16 to 21:46

Discussion on how Americans feel about rising prices across various sectors.

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Transcript

Automatic transcript. May contain errors.

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1:52don't learn the hard way like I did. Talk to your doctor or pharmacist today. Sponsored by GSK. Are you one of those media strategy people clicking through slides, scrolling spreadsheets? Yes? Good. This is for you. Because on Spotify, there's an audience that's different. Locked in. Loyal. Invested. They're called fans. Fans don't just listen to music. They feel seen by it, like it belongs to them. So when your brand shows up on Spotify, that's who you're talking to. And you're right next to artists like me, Lizzo. So are you ready to talk to fans? Spotify advertising. You're among fans. Donald Trump just ruined the annual Thanksgiving pardon.

2:34So just be a normal, wholesome tradition. You're part of the damn turkeys. It should be pretty easy. Not for Donald Trump, who used the pardon ceremony, again, which is supposed to be fun and lighthearted, to attack Governor Pritzker of Illinois by calling him a very fat slob. Here, play this clip. Of every newspaper, it's out of control. The mayor is incompetent and the governor is a big fat slob. He ought to invite us in, say, please make Chicago safe. We're going to lose a great city if we don't do it quickly. Make. And then Donald Trump goes on to talk about how So instead of pardoning these turkeys, he was thinking about sending them to the terrorist confinement center in El Salvador.

3:28So he's making jokes about sending Americans unlawfully to concentration camps in foreign countries. That's what he's doing right now. Here play this clip. But instead of pardon, some of my more enthusiastic staffers were already drafting the paperwork to ship Gobble and Waddle straight to the terrorist confinement center in El Salvador. And even those birds don't want to be there. You know what I mean. Those are tough. I'd like to thank the president of that country. They do a rather efficient job. It's going to be the largest prison in history. I've never seen anything like it. And a lot of people are behaving on our streets now.

4:07You know, Washington, D.C. is a safe, it's considered a safe zone. This was one of our most unsafe places anywhere in the United States. It is now considered a totally safe city. I won't tell you about murders. We're having murders, like a lot of murders, on a weekly basis. We haven't had a murder in six months. And there was once upon a time where the president was a respected tradition and you would show your kids these ceremonies. This is just awful, awful. Here he is further attacking Pritzker and saying that he's fat, he's a fatso, fat slob. I shouldn't call him a fat slob, but he's a fat slob.

4:48Here, play this clip. You're not going to have these crimes that are making the newspapers and the front page of every newspaper and television story, news story, will make Chicago a safe place very quickly. I looked at the various cases, granting mercy discovering that uh the terrible trauma that everyone's going through and i had a little bit of a pritzker joke i was going to talk about pritzker in size but when i talk about pritzker i get angry because he's not letting us do the job so i'm not going to tell my pritzker joke they have a very cute little joke you know some speech writer wrote some joke about his weight uh but i would never want to talk about his weight i don't talk about people being fat I refuse to talk about the fact that he's a fat slob.

5:37I don't mention it. Then Donald Trump goes on and starts lying about the fact that there's no murders in Washington, D.C. He said that we haven't had a murder in six months in Washington, D.C. There's actually been a lot of murders in D.C. 15 in June, 15 in July, 8 in August, 5 in September, 8 in October, 5 in November. Here, play this clip. Murders, we're having murders, like a lot of murders, on a weekly basis. We haven't had a murder in six months. And it doesn't sound good even to say that we haven't had a murder in six months. But when you are averaging one and even sometimes two a week, and you haven't had one in six months, you can walk with your family down the middle of any street, go to a restaurant, you won't get in.

6:27They're opening new restaurants all over. then donald trump says that he brought back praying and that because of him people pray again and that now religion is back and religion was gone before it's stupid just stupid stuff right i mean it's just like i don't care what political party you're from this is just dumb here let me show it to you let's play this clip anything like it but we have more people working we have more people praying the churches are coming back i don't know if you've been reading that story but religion is coming back to America. Some people say, oh, why would you mention that?

7:03To me, that's a big deal. He then lies and says that gasoline is going to be$2 a gallon. By the way, prices are surging on basically everything. To be fair, gas is basically the same this year as it was last year. It's not dramatically lower. It's the same. Even though there's more oil pumping, the price is the same. So that tells you something too about who's making some money off this. But anyway, play this clip. In a long time, egg prices are down 86 % since March and gasoline will soon be hovering around$2 a gallon. Then again, Donald Trump can't just do anything normal without attacking Nancy Pelosi or Chuck Schumer.

7:47And he goes, you know, I was going to call the turkey Pritzker because it was fat. And now I'm going to call it Nancy and Chuck, but I would never pardon them. Ha ha ha ha. They would never get a pardon. I wouldn't care what Melania told me. What are you talking about? Play this clip. That's going to be saved. The turkeys being pardoned today go by the names of Gobble and Waddle. When I first saw their pictures, I thought we should send them. Well, I was going to, I shouldn't say this. I was going to call them Chuck and Nancy, but then I realized I wouldn't be pardoning them. I would never pardon those two people.

8:25I wouldn't pardon them. I wouldn't care what Melania told me. Darling, I think it would be a nice thing to do. I won't do it, darling. Ever have one of those moments where your body reminds you it's not 25 anymore? Maybe it's the slower recovery after a workout or the way your joints creak like an old floorboard. And don't get me started on how much worse it is in the winter. It's like my energy goes into hibernation. Aging is a reality for all of us, but our actions determine how we age. That's why I use Qualia Senolytic to help keep my cells healthy and my body feeling youthful. Zombie cells are real and they're aging you.

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9:37My energy feels steadier, recovery is quicker, and mentally I'm more dialed in. Experience the science of feeling younger. Go to To qualialife.com slash Midas for up to 50 % off your purchase and use code Midas for an additional 15%. That's qualialife.com slash Midas for up to 50 % off your purchase. Your older self will thank you. And thanks to Qualia for sponsoring this episode. And he goes on this weird rant about how this year's turkeys are the biggest turkeys ever. And they've never been bigger turkeys before. And he goes on and says that these turkeys are eating beef. He says that the turkeys, that these are beef eating turkeys, by the way.

10:19Okay. Okay. Record size. Never been bigger. Never been bigger turkeys in the world. Here, play this clip. These are two of the largest turkeys ever presented to an American president. Over 50 pounds each. It's the largest we've ever had. Those are big turkeys. Are they as good as the normal size turkey? Better or as good? Do they tend to be a little fatty maybe? No? He said no. He knows the turkey business. Anyway, despite their size, Secretary Kennedy has formally certified that these are the first ever Maha turkeys. I don't know if I agree with that. These are Maha. In other words, they could be fat, but they're still Maha.

10:57They've been fattened on a steady diet of grass beef to allow the smoothies and all of the other things that they've been eating for this occasion. This was a really big occasion. but they've eaten every fattening food that you can eat we work like we wanted to really make them special and they really are they're like record setting i've never seen a turkey that big before are they violent at all will they attack as i walk over because if they were i'll stay right up here but as and he uses the speech to talk about how he wants the national guard to invade chicago after calling pritzker fat let's play it just fine and i want to thank the national guard i want to thank pete hegseth the job you've done here is incredible and i hear you having the same kind of success in memphis tennessee we had an even worse situation and memphis crime is down 64 percent in three weeks and by the time you have four or five weeks you're going to have it down almost where there won't be crime and we could do that in chicago by the way if they would let us if the mayor was a low iq person but he should understand this this is a very serious thing you saw all the crime that took place last night the night before the woman with the burning they burned the woman to be talking about that now they burned this beautiful woman riding in a train a man was arrested 72 times 72 times think of that and they'll let him out again the liberal judges will let him out again but we're ready to go you know we've been uh moving toward chicago we have a governor that thinks it's wonderful that only like seven people were killed this week but we are uh moving toward doing we're gonna if crime gets it's horrible what's happening Chicago.

12:51We could make Chicago a safe city in a period of four weeks, in a period of eight weeks, nine weeks, 10 weeks. It would be totally safe. And the people of Chicago want us to go there. And if you look at. Then Donald Trump says America is leading in everything. Jobs are pouring back into our country. Play the clip. We're leading in AI. We're leading in everything. Our auto plants are pouring back into our country. Wait till you see the jobs coming with them. But many of them are under construction, but Lee's done a great job in getting those approvals. I appreciate it very much. FBI Director Cash Patel has been very busy doing a great job also.

13:31Thank you, Cash. So we have the highest jobless claims since the Great Recession at this point. And jobs are heading in the wrong direction. There's basically a manufacturing and construction recession right now. About 80 % of the country is experiencing recessionary conditions. Consumer confidence has never been lower, but there he goes and just lies over and over again. Then Donald Trump goes and starts talking about Hunter Biden and auto pens. And it's just, dude, shut up. Here, play this clip. Where's Hunter? No, Hunter's was good. That was the one part in Pam that was good, right? The rest of them are all invalid.

14:12I don't know what the hell you're going to do about that. But that's now we're going to take a little of the joking. That is a mess. Then he says he thinks this is funny that he goes, we're approving nuclear power plants in a week. Ha ha ha. Great job, Lee Zeldin. Let's play this clip. Howard Lutnick, Linda McMahon, Scott Turner, administrator, Lee Zeldin, who's done a great job. A nuclear power plant gets approved in less than a week. OK, I'm only kidding, but pretty close to that. And we have more. Where is Lee? Stand up, Lee. One of my great superstars. Thank you. I'm not sure that's something to brag about, not going through the requisite approval processes.

14:53It's not really sure why it's funny. Then Donald Trump says the White House is the department of everything. And then he goes on to attack former President Biden and says sleepy Joe Biden, that the turkey pardons are not valid because of auto pen do just be just can you just pretend for like 30 seconds to be dignified i mean do we need to like to say like can we do a cardboard printout of mom donnie just put the cardboard printout next to donald trump and and here play this clip. You remember last year after a thorough and very rigorous investigation by Pam Bondi and all of the people at Department of Justice, the FBI, the CIA, the White House Counsel's Office, and the Department of Everything.

15:46We have a Department of Everything. You know what that is? I think that's called the White House. into a terrible situation caused by a man named Sleepy Joe Biden. He used an auto pen last year for the Turkey's pardon. So I have the official duty to determine, and I have determined that last year's Turkey pardons are totally invalid. As are the pardons of about every other person that was pardoned other than, where's Hunter? Now, while Donald Trump is giving that speech, let's talk about what they were saying on Fox. Even Fox had to fact check Donald Trump. And they said, really, gas hasn't gone down at all.

16:29It's pretty much the same this year as it was last year. But they're like, people have conflicting views about gas prices. There's no conflicting views. Trump and the Republican lie about it. And then there's the truth. And the truth is, to be fair, the gas prices didn't go up. They're about the same, but all the other prices went up. That's the truth. Let me show you this clip. Let's play it. Yeah, always better to me to drive than to fly, Sandra. But, you know, gas prices. Well, what about that one behind me? Yeah, that's the most expensive gas in the state of Pennsylvania. Four dollars and nine cents, the average gallon.

17:02Right. You're about a dollar more than the national average. And, you know, people have conflicting views about gas prices. The administration says it's lower than it was. Others say it's higher. Well, the reality is, well, you see it right there. It's pretty much the same as it was last month, last year,$3.05. That despite the change in energy production and energy prices, 13.7 million barrels a day pumped the last month we've got data. And that not only is a record in the US, but an all-time record in the history of Earth. And then meanwhile on CNN, here's what they're talking about. how people are feeling right now.

17:42Let me just show you. This is the sentiment out there. Let's play this clip. I mean, just your costs are up versus a year ago. Groceries, 85%, utilities, 78%, healthcare, 67%, housing, 66%, gasoline, 54%. The bottom line is this, Americans feel like prices are rising in each and every single part of their lives, rising ever climber, and they just don't feel like Kate Baldwin, that they can catch a break. The Treasury Secretary, in new comments, kind of dismissed the impact tariffs is having on inflation, also saying that prices are going to be coming down in weeks. Some of the prices are going to be coming down in months.

18:18What do Americans think about that? Yeah, they think he's full of it. That's exactly what they think. I mean, just take a look here. Tariffs rising prices are raising prices right now. I'm going to cover Kate's side of the screen, 71 percent. How dare you? How dare I do that? 84 percent of Democrats, 74 percent of independents and even a majority of Republicans. when you can get a majority of Republicans to agree with majority of Democrats, you know that the pain is being felt by the American public right now. The Treasury Secretary can try and tell the people something, but they can feel in their pocketbooks.

18:49They simply put, don't buy what he and this administration is selling them when it comes to tariffs. There you have it, folks. Let me know what you think. Very bizarre indeed. Hit subscribe. Let's get to 6 million subscribers. We appreciate you.

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From the publisher

MeidasTouch host Ben Meiselas reports on Donald Trump ruining the annual Thanksgiving Pardon Ceremony tradition by losing control during the speech and injecting his own bizarre and deranged behavior.

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