158. Who’s Really Running Trump’s Foreign Policy?

15:49Katty Kay:I mean, we've missed the mark on deficit spending, but we've generally had the right ideas. And so I just think that there's got to be more nuance to what Newsom's saying, because if he really wants to win the nomination and win the election, he's got to get some moderate Republicans in addition to the independents to vote for him because this stuff is going to be very close. But that was my reaction to Newsom in contrast and comparison to Rubio.

16:17Anthony Scaramucci:I mean, let's talk about the Democrats because it was a striking scene to see Senator Chris Murphy of Connecticut, Governor Gassel Newsom of California, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Senator Ruben Gallego and Senator Mark Kelly of Arizona, Governor Gretchen Whitman and Gino Raimondo, all Democratic hopefuls making time in their very busy schedules to attend the Munich Security Conference to show themselves on the world stage. I mean, partly they were going there, as you and I found in Davos, we met Democrats who were going there in order to say, look, America hasn't abandoned you. There is another way.

16:51Anthony Scaramucci:Gavin Newsom said it directly. Donald Trump will be gone. Don't think this is permanent. He's becoming a lame duck. He's got three more years and then things return to kind of normal. So you had the Democrats there giving that message, kind of promoting the traditional American alliance message. But also, let's be honest, there in order to show that they had foreign policy credentials and national security credentials and show themselves on the world stage because those clips will then be part of their own campaign platforms when they run in 2028. So forget aisle caucuses, forget the New Hampshire primaries.

17:23Anthony Scaramucci:It all starts in Munich. Apparently, it happens three years before the actual election. But that's why they were there. On Gavin Newsom's message, I actually thought the most interesting thing Gavin Newsom said was not when he was speaking at the speech. It was in a he gave lots of little interviews to people. He was very happy to get his name out there. He wanted to be covered an awful lot. He was sort of dominating the spotlight there. But one of the things that I thought was interesting that he said he acknowledged that he was in Munich to learn. He said, I'm not trying to give foreign policy advice.

17:54Anthony Scaramucci:I need it. That, to me, showed a politician with political skills, because going to Munich with all of these foreign policy experts and say, actually, I'm still learning and you guys can teach me things. I thought for a politician who sometimes dismissed as being a little too perfect, perfect height, perfect hair, perfectly kind of, you know, presented. I mean, I'm sure it was studied vulnerability, studied openness, but I thought it was pretty effective.

18:25Katty Kay:So I'm going to push back and give you a different point of view and tell me what you're thinking. I think that it's the wrong form for them.

18:33Anthony Scaramucci:They shouldn't be there at all.

18:34Katty Kay:They shouldn't be there. It comes across as global elite optics to me. It also comes across as like you're freelancing foreign policy a little bit. You know that America is overseas and we can't speak with one voice. Now, I recognize that Trump's voice is not their voice. And I recognize that with Trump having a 58 or 61 percent disapproval rating, it may not even be the voice of America on foreign policy. But I think playing domestic politics on foreign soil in an environment like this in the United States is a bad move. Just me personally.

19:13Anthony Scaramucci:You don't think that's a kind of old school type of thing that you that you don't talk about foreign policy on foreign soil and you stick with the president? And I just feel like that's gone out the window. These guys are there to get attention.

19:26Katty Kay:I don't really necessarily have a problem with that. I have a problem with the optics of it as how it's going to be viewed in places like Ohio, Arizona, Michigan. It reinforces this perception that we're torn related to our foreign allies and nobody's addressing the domestic anxiety. They would have been better off having a Michigan domestic conference. to juxtaposition the Munich Security Conference. They would have been better off having an Ohio domestic conference where they all got together.

20:01Anthony Scaramucci:The risk for them is they wouldn't have got much attention. That's why they do it, right? They go because the press is there. They can get attention there. They can break through. All of these people are trying to break through at the moment.

20:14Katty Kay:But it looks performative, Cady. Listen, I'm with you. I'm with you. But like it could be for the average voter in America. It could be the wrong type of attention. Right.

20:25Anthony Scaramucci:What are you doing abroad? Yeah.

20:27Katty Kay:It could be for the media. It could be for the media elite. Good attention. It could be for.

20:32Anthony Scaramucci:Yes, I get that.

20:33Katty Kay:They're experts. Good attention. But if I'm a steel worker in Pittsburgh or an auto worker in Michigan, I really want to know what we're doing to improve my disposable income and to make my sons and daughters lives better than my life. That's really what I want to know. And even if they didn't get the attention, the notion that they did it and they stayed on it. See, one thing they could learn from Trump is repetition, right? You know, we learned in elementary school repetition is the mother of memory. But they could be pounding the domestic agenda and they could be having these, quote unquote, Michigan domestic conference, Ohio domestic conference and promoting this and doing town halls with CNN and others.

21:18Katty Kay:I think it would scare the daylights out of the Republicans because the Republicans have not delivered on a domestic agenda, Kat. I mean, we're going to talk about the economy, I guess, later in the show. And even though the stock market is up, like I said to you six months ago, the policies that Trump is putting in place is actually hurting the people that more or less voted for him. And that's the irony of it. So to me, if they focus on those people, I think they can win back many of them.

21:47Anthony Scaramucci:I think that's true. I think it's also true that you can't run for president of the United States with zero profile on national security and international affairs.

22:01Katty Kay:Bill Clinton did it, as you remember. Bill Clinton did it, but you may be right. But I think in this world... Today in 2026, yes. I think I agree with you.

22:08Anthony Scaramucci:And one person who didn't do herself any favors was Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who actually went with quite an interesting, you may agree with it or you may not, but went with a kind of theory of the case of global affairs based on income inequality. But had such a weak performance when she was asked that key question about whether she would send American troops to protect Taiwan. And I listened to the whole thing. And I think the answer is so excruciating that you should take a listen. Would and should the U.S. actually commit U.S. troops to defend Taiwan if China were to move? You know, I think that this is such a, you know, I think that this is a, this is of course a very longstanding policy of the United States.

23:09Katty Kay:and I think what we are hoping for is that we want to make sure that we never get to that point and we want to make sure that we are moving in all of our economic research and our global positions to avoid any such confrontation and for that question to even arise.

23:28Anthony Scaramucci:The risk for somebody like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez or any of these democratic hopefuls is that you turn up on the global stage and you don't do yourself any favors because that clip will be as it is being at the moment. It's kind of going viral online, particularly being promoted by MAGA types who love the fact that she messed up, but it was a mess up. It showed her not particularly adept at that kind of field. Now, okay, you could argue that Donald Trump has compared Ukraine and Russia to two kids fighting in a playground or has told Iranian protesters that America would be with them when they weren't necessarily.

24:00Anthony Scaramucci:And so he's messed up a lot as well and said things that are contradictory and incomplete. I think you have to have some foreign policy credentials and I guess that's why they were going there.

24:10Katty Kay:So, Cady, I hear you on AOC, she did damage herself and she's not ready. I'm not one of her advisors either, but I would say to her, hey, listen, you're great on messaging, you're great on social media, you're great on movement mobilization, but if you're going to be the president, you have to negotiate with political opponents and you have to develop some centrist-like coalitional support. you're not going to get there on the hard left lane solo. You may get there in New York on the hard left lane, but to your points that you've made earlier on these shows about Mickey Sherrill or the woman that won in Virginia, Abigail Spanberger, you got to have more of that.

24:54Katty Kay:You got to manage the intraparty factions and she's not doing that. And so, so, so for those reasons, I don't think she's ready despite her charm, her charisma. She's a formidable and very successful politician. But I think the presidency requires something else. And again, hate Donald Trump, but he built quite a Republican coalition in the two times that he won the presidency.

25:16Anthony Scaramucci:I think the key there is she's not ready. And I think even despite, you know, her policies on income inequality around national security, that clip showed she's not ready. If you can't have a good answer to a fairly obvious question about Taiwan, then you probably shouldn't have your finger on the nuclear button and be America's commander in chief, at least not yet. And I think that's why it was useful. For me, I found that that's why it's useful having them go there. By the way, the Democrat who's getting the most attention, as all of these aspirational types that are rushing off to Munich, it turns out all you really have to do is go courtside at an NBA All-Stars game and catch a ball efficiently.

25:58Anthony Scaramucci:Because if you can do that, you get a standing applause. And if your name is Barack Obama, you're still the Democrat that actually all Democrats really love.

26:05Katty Kay:The aliens are real Barack Obama.

26:08Anthony Scaramucci:We're going to talk about that with our founding members. The aliens. Oh, or maybe they're not for real, actually real. He had a good weekend. Barack Obama is still the one that they all look to, which must hurt if you're Gavin Newsom or AOC or any of the other types who are there. I think that must be pretty tricky for them. But they would have liked the poll numbers quickly before we go to break. I do think it's worth bringing that up. The latest Economist YouGov poll shows a swing that I don't think, Anthony, I have ever seen in American politics a swing this big in a particular group of people.

26:44Anthony Scaramucci:The poll that was released just a couple of days ago shows that Trump's approval rating among young voters, people ages 18 to 29, not us sadly, but anyway, young voters, has cratered since he took office last year. It's dropped by 51 points. Have you ever seen a swing that big in a group of people in the space of one year from approval to disapproval of somebody? That's pretty dramatic.

27:11Katty Kay:Just a sports team. The disapproval rating on the New York Jets, I think, has swung like that over the years. And perhaps there are British football teams that have had the same thing. But I think that's something to really look at, Caddy, because Trump is super frustrated by this. so much so that gallop who has a lot of government contracts has now said no more on approval rating polling we're not going to do it anymore because they don't want to upset king trump but you know if you go to pew research and these others if you're sitting at 36 37 i mean my reaction this is terrible for me to say but i'll say it so who the hell are these 36 that are actually supporting this nonsense you know i want i want to go out and interview every one of them But I still think given the damage he's done internationally, the damage he's done to the economy, I still think that the 36 % number is surprising.

28:10Katty Kay:If the stock market rolls over and you have this underlying surface cracks in the economy that we're going to discuss, plus a poor stock market, which may not happen because the Fed will likely cut rates into this environment. But listen, he could end up with a 25 % approval rating before this thing is over.

28:28Anthony Scaramucci:Okay, we're going to take a break and come back and dig more into those economic numbers.

28:58Anthony Scaramucci:And what I love is that you can preload it, right, Anthony? With photos, you can personalize it. So even if your mom isn't great at tech, you can make it easy for her.

29:06Katty Kay:That's right, Katya. You can preload before it ships, add a personal message, share photos instantly. Aura Frames, the perfect gift every time.

29:15Anthony Scaramucci:For a limited time, save on the perfect gift by visiting auraframes.co.uk to get£35 off Aura's best-selling Carver Matte Frames. That's the one I have. Named the top frame by The Independent by using promo code POLITICSUS at checkout.

29:30Katty Kay:That's A-U-R-A frames.co.uk, promo code politicsUS. This deal is exclusive to listeners, so order yours now to get it in time for Mother's Day. Don't forget to add politicsUS at checkout. Terms and conditions apply. When you want your spring break to feel like... And your kid's pool day to feel like... And your hotel bed to feel like... Ooh, and room service to feel like. Because at Hilton, hospitality feels like.

30:05Anthony Scaramucci:Your cabana's ready. Would you like fresh towels?

30:07Katty Kay:It matters where you stay. Book now at Hilton.com. Hilton, for this day. I'm R.J. Decker, the private investigator, uncovering the sunshine state's darkest secrets. Tuesdays, it's the premiere of ABC's hottest new crime show. R.J. freaking Decker as I live and breathe. He's a private eye. It's not a standard murder. It's something bigger. And a public mass.

30:34Anthony Scaramucci:Trying to get some back to prison today?

30:36Katty Kay:You go to prison one time and suddenly it's all the jokes. R.J. Decker, series premiere, Tuesdays on ABC and stream on Hulu.

30:51Anthony Scaramucci:Anthony, I know you've signed up as a founding member to the podcast, but do you also follow us on your app? If you guys never want to miss an episode, especially with all the craziness in American politics right now, just hit follow on your podcast app. On Spotify, it's follow. On Apple, it's that little plus at the top, just to make life easy. All right, back to the episode.

31:15Katty Kay:Welcome back to The Rest is Politics US with me, Anthony Scaramucci. Caddy, we're going to talk about the economy. So we've been talking about it over the last six months. The core headline, Caddy, is that there's a soft landing. But if you really look at the data, there's not a lot to celebrate. Inflation is still north of 2%. The unemployment rate, while it's ticked down to 4.3%, there's something called the U6 unemployment rate. And I just want people to understand this in America because there are lies, there are damn lies, and then there are statistics, Caddy. And so what ends up happening is we lower that number because if you've looked for a job for a year and you have not found a job, then you fall off of the unemployment roll.

32:05Katty Kay:But if you build in the U6 number, it's closer to 8%, which means that there's a lot of people that are out of the labor participation market now, which is a depressing thing for the United States. So the reality, Caddy, is things are a little bit worse than the superficial numbers are showing. And a lot of this has to do with Trump's tariffs. It has to do with the tension overseas. It has to do with the complaints by American manufacturers, Caddy, that need products from overseas that they're paying for. And again, I'll use the example of Boeing. If they're going to make an aircraft here in the United States, 60 % of the parts are coming from overseas and they're now incurring those taxes, if you will.

32:56Katty Kay:So what do you make of the economy and what are you hearing inside the Beltway?

33:00Anthony Scaramucci:I hear from people in MAGA world that there's quite a lot of frustration, that they feel they have done all of these things that ought to be juicing the economy, particularly around the big, beautiful bill. They send a lot of money out into the country. they're hoping that the tax rebates that americans are about to receive in the post which should be something like thirty six hundred dollars higher than the average tax rebate which is usually around three thousand dollars that people will feel richer and they'll start spending i mean what you hear from people in the president's circle is it's going to get better it's going to get better it's going to get better we have primed the economy for a midterm rally effectively that we know it was bad last year, but very soon Americans will start feeling that it's better because these tax cuts and the tax rebates will filter through and people will have more money in their pockets.

33:52Anthony Scaramucci:But then you hear from companies from the private sector exactly what you're just saying, which is that a lot of companies said they're actually about to start raising prices. They swallowed a lot of the tariff cuts, as we've said before, but you've now got companies like Levi's, McCormick and Company are saying that actually we're going to be raising prices on things like jeans and household goods and industrial products a lot more than we normally would at this stage in the year. And so prices could actually be of general household things could actually be about to go up further. When you look at those polls that we mentioned earlier, Anthony, the big drop off has been around the two issues of immigration, obviously, and the activities of ICE around the country, but also around the economy and prices.

34:35Anthony Scaramucci:So I don't know if the president can the president you tell me this you've spoken about this. Can they do something to turn around this perception that the thing he ran on successfully he hasn't actually managed to deliver on.

34:49Katty Kay:I think it's going to be tough. I think we have the affordability issue, which is really weighing on the average person. I think the other the other big issue, which we have to address is the labor market. So he's thrown the people out of the country. And so it's had a chilling effect on GDP. If you actually just look at the labor numbers, we need more workers. We had the workers in the country. He's throwing them out of the country. You know, the global pressures on tariff and trade are injecting a tremendous amount of uncertainty into the market and the supply chain. And so, listen, he's growing modestly.

35:27Katty Kay:But, Kat, you probably saw the poll over the weekend. would you rather have Joe Biden back as president? 60 % of the people said yes. And so if you look at the numbers, and this happens to presidents, by the way, when Biden was in office, he had a 40, 45 % approval rating.

35:43Anthony Scaramucci:We live in an era of low approval ratings for leaders everywhere, not just in America, but in the West as well.

35:49Katty Kay:Exactly. So I'm not really suggesting that, just telling people how unenthusiastic people are about political leadership, particularly here in the country. But remember, Biden pushed the CHIPS Act. He pushed the infrastructure bill. He pushed clean energy incentives. Trump is dumping money into people's hands. Yes, the tax refunds will be better, but he hasn't done anything structurally. Like he can't get to the podium and say, okay, listen, I've made a five-year investment. We've used some of the government's money to rebuild manufacturing centers, or we invested in jobs training or retooling people that are delivering pizzas or working for DoorDash.

36:31Katty Kay:We're going to teach them how to use AI and get white-collar jobs. He hasn't done any of that. And so the economy is vulnerable, and it's going to be offset by rate cuts. I'm not saying that the stock market is going to implode or anything like that, but we're talking about the average person. You've mentioned a K-shape economy where a group of people are doing very well, Caddy, and then another group of people are doing poorly. And so the question is, is the group of people that are doing poorly going to turn up at the polls and vote the Republicans out? Because remember, they own this. They've got the House, the Senate, and the presidency.

37:12Katty Kay:And so it'll be interesting to see what happens.

37:13Anthony Scaramucci:Whit Ayres, who's the Republican pollster who you know well, Anthony, made a really good point over the weekend, which is that when a president's job approval rating is below 50 percent, the average loss of seats in that midterm election is 32. So President Trump's job approval rating sits at around 40%, you know, if you take an average of all the polls out there, which suggests they're in for a hammering, according to WIDAIRS, in the midterm elections. And the thing they have to do is they have to, it's exactly what you're talking about, is that K-shaped economy, because who are the people that are losing vote support amongst?

37:53Anthony Scaramucci:Young people who are struggling the most economically, and Hispanic voters who are not traditionally in the top 1 % of American voters. So also the people that are struggling in the economy. Before we go, one of the things that you thought he might try to do is by getting Kevin Walsh in to cut interest rates, that that would help juice the American economy in the American stock market heading into the midterms. Is that going to happen? And will it have the effect that he wants it to have?

38:20Katty Kay:I think so. You know, our economic team is expecting now four rate cuts by the end of the year. Of course, we've got to get rid of the criminal investigation against Jerome Powell. I really do believe, Tom Tillis, that that nomination is not going to go forward in the committee. He's going to vote against it. So remember how this works. It's got to go to the Senate Banking Committee. It's got to be approved by the committee and then put down on the floor for a vote. And Tillis says, hey, I'm not doing that until you get rid of this criminal investigation. So, you know, we'll have to see what happens there.

38:57Katty Kay:But my guess is, is that criminal investigation will slink away. You know, it's preposterous that there's actually a criminal investigation against Jerome Powell. It just speaks to how bad everything is. You know, I know we have to go, but the corruption index in the United States has gone up. And I want people to think about that. We're not enforcing the Bribery Acts. We're not enforcing the Emoluments Clause against the president. And, you know, there's a stink going on in the economy, which is also going to affect the economy, Caddy. So if you bring ICE agents into blue states, you're going to scare people.

39:37Katty Kay:It's going to slow down economic innovation. If you're going to grift people, people are not going to trust the system as much as they once did. It's all connected. So will rates go lower if Warsh gets into the job? And I predict he will get into the job. Yes. Will that act as a buffer for the stock market? Yes. But the president and his team is going to have to pull back on these tariffs. And you know this, and I know this, the reason why that Supreme Court decision on the tariffs has been delayed is Roberts does not want this to be a 5-4 decision. Okay. He's not going to get it to be 9-0, but he's looking for 7-2.

40:15Katty Kay:and he's lobbying those justices to make that happen. And so that's coming down the pike. So there's a lot of economic uncertainty. If you're an executive and a capital allocator, you're sitting there saying, geez, I don't know if the tariffs are gonna stay in place. I don't know what's going on with ICE. I'm worried about the bribery and corruption that's going on in my own industry. Should I also be a briber and a corrupt person to make more business for myself? I mean, he set up a true disaster for the American economy and it's starting to hurt him and you can see it in his approval ratings.

40:52Anthony Scaramucci:And you can see it in the value of the dollar as well. I mean, it's hard to know exactly which of those plays what role, but it's all certainly playing some sort of role. That is all we have time for today. Clearly another busy week shaping up here in the United States. Thanks so much for listening, everybody. If you would like to become a founding member, please do so. We'll be taking your questions. We'll be looking at Epstein this week. And you can send us your questions and we'll answer them every week as well. And get our special series on Donald J. Trump, which is coming up soon. Thanks for listening, guys.

41:28Katty Kay:Thanks, guys. We'll see you soon.

41:35Katty Kay:Thought Sweetgreen was just salads? Think again. There's a new way to do sweet green. Wrapped and ready. These handheld wraps pack bold flavor and 40 plus grams of protein into something hearty, satisfying, and built for life on the go. From craveable sauces to satisfying textures, they're designed to keep you going without slowing you down. So put that fork down. Try the new wraps today in app or at order.sweetgreen.com. Available at participating locations only.

42:07Anthony Scaramucci:Rinse knows that greatness takes time, but so does laundry. So Rinse will take your laundry and hand deliver it to your door expertly cleaned.

42:15Katty Kay:And you can take the time pursuing your passions. Time once spent sorting and waiting, folding and queuing, now spent challenging and innovating and pushing your way to greatness.

42:24Anthony Scaramucci:So pick up the Irish flute or those calligraphy pens or that daunting Beef Wellington recipe card and leave the laundry to us. Rinse. It's time to be great.

43:03Anthony Scaramucci:price plan options available. Taxes and fees extra. See full terms at MintMobile.com.