Breaking News from Pod Save America - Everything Trump Touches Turns to Sh*t (w/ Anthony Scaramucci)

Episode Date: July 10, 2026

Trump's Former White House Communications Director Anthony Scaramucci joins Alex to discuss Trump's shocking physical decline, the new Iran strikes, the jet chaos, Trump's tacky White House renovations, and how everything Trump touches turns to shit. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Here we go. Someone's already claiming this is our year. Someone else said that last year too. A round of Jameson, Ginger, and Lime arrives at a table. Smooth enough for kickoff, smooth enough for extra time. New friends pulling up a stool. Debates about whether that was a handball.

Cheers rising like a roar around the room. Because match days are about the shared moments. How did Jameson to your match day lineup? Jameson, it's what you bring. Please enjoy our products responsibly. Here to break down this extraordinary week, aren't they all? In Trump news is former White House communications director Anthony Scaramucci. The Mooch is live.

Welcome. First of all, it's a big honor to be on here, Alex. Thank you. Trump sucks for everything, but he's great for the podcast business. Another horse shit shit show for him, lots of mania, lots of dispopulation. The guy Mark Rudder, though, he's the one that I love the most. He gets the, he thinks he's a Trump whisperer, but I think he's a Trump whisperer. but I think he's a Trump suppository.

So he's the one that gets the award for the week. The NATO Secretary General Mark Ruta, who is known in certain circles as a Trump whisper. I don't think Trump suppository is something that he's officially or popularly known as, but you can claim that. You can trademark that, I guess. I mean, it has been an extraordinary week in global affairs, and by extraordinary, I mean, tumultuous and wildly unfocused. And now, apparently, we're back at war with Iran.

And with that comes the looming specter of continued elevated gas prices, political crisis here at home. And also brings to the fore the fact that the president has no control over the situation. And I think, you know, I want to talk about the jet for a second, Mr. Scaramucci, because, you know, you were in the confines of this White House. You know what this president, what his, I mean, at least you have at least a glance, a more upfront, if even glancing understanding of his. ego and how monstrous it is. The president's using this jet that was gifted to him by the cutteries. It is clearly not secure enough to be flying in the skies because he flew the new jet to the NATO summit but then had to leave in his old jet. And that is, according to the New York Times, there's renewed, elevated threats against the president and his life. And the Secret Service

has advised the president not to fly the new, or advised the president not to fly the new plane due to security concerns. Reporters who were on Air Force One leaving Turkey were told to close their window blinds, which is what you do in a war zone. From what he said about the security threats, I think Trump thinks this is kind of cool. Here's him speaking at NATO about the threats against his life. You should have told me that years ago, maybe it wouldn't have run. It's a very dangerous profession. No, I'm number one on the kill list for Iran. I don't really care because I'm doing my job and I'm doing it. I hope better than anybody's ever done it. First of all, I am obviously like you and, you know, do not support political violence, find it reprehensible. And I do pray for

the president's safety. So even if I don't agree with the president, I don't like his policy, you have to defeat the president in the intellectual marketplace of ideas as opposed to through political violence. Second point I would make is, yes, he's trying to make it sound cool. That is part of his brand. You know, the fight, fight, fight when the shots were fired in Butler are all part of his brand. And I get that. And he's very good at disassociating himself. And I think maybe that's something sometimes you need to be president, because if you're sitting there looking at the existential danger, remember, if you're the vice president of the United States, Alex, you have a one in five chance of being president. You just look at the math. So, you know, so, you know, so, you know, you

if you look at the existential danger, then it's hard to do the job. And so, you know, probably most presidents have to do some disassociation. But the problem with what's going on here is the Trump effect. And so the Trump effect is I'm going to clean up the reflecting pool in front of the Lincoln Memorial. And then it's going to come out with sea moss and, you know, all kinds of algae growing in it way worse than it ever was. I'm going to attack the White House. I mean, it's like if Liberace smoked crystal meth or said, you're going to live in a crack house. Let's just, we're going to blow up part of the house. We're going to destroy the lawn with a UFC fight.

And then we're going to have Liberace come in, you know, and decorate the Oval Office. I mean, I don't know. I mean, so to me, all of it is tied into each other. And the plane is an example of that, right? It's an unfinished plane. We have an unfinished fractured east wing. we have an unfinished now reflecting pool. And so this is Donald Trump.

If he touches it, it's going to turn to dog shit. But, you know, the inside of the plane is quite nice. You know, it's obviously nicer. I'm assuming you've flown on Air Force One in my ill-fated career in Washington. I flew on it three times. Wow, that's impressive, given how quick the turnaround was. So you've been on it. I was only there for 11 days, okay?

I flew on the plane on a Friday, a Tuesday, and a Wednesday. How do I know? I was only there for one Friday, Tuesday, and Wednesday. But anyway, I, it is what it is, but it's an old plane. Right. And there are two new, I will say there are two new Air Force ones that are being constructed to security specificity. Yeah. He just rushed the cuttery jet because I guess there's like lie flat seats and warm nuts available right after takeoff or whatever. I mean, but the reality is it's a security concern. I mean, it's always been a security concern. I think that there was genuine concern about the, the safety of a plane donated by a foreign government being used as the president's aircraft.

It makes him. It makes him and makes us look bad. But I think that the point I'm making is that this is the definition of Trump. This is unfinished business. The reflecting pool, the east wing, the plane, the Iranian war. It's all emblematic of the unfinished nature of Donald Trump. And also, there's something also happening to him where you, You can see it in his posture and you can see it in the decline of his muscularity. He's shrinking and he's got an unsteady gate now if you're looking at him. And you can see it in his phraseology. He's down to a lot less words.

He never was a big wordsmith, but he has contracted his vocabulary by several thousand words now. And so he's saying the same things over and over again. I think, listen, the message for this whole thing is there's two and a half years ago, about 950 days to go here. But who's counting? Yeah. I mean, it's 84 Scaramucci's in case you want to know in political terms like Scaramuces. 84 Scaramucci's left in the Trump's second term.

And I would just say, we've got to wait them out. And if you're in NATO, you've got to wait them out. You've got to think like Mark Carney, though, is a great article in the Wall Street Journal about Carney going to Europe and saying, hey, can't count on this guy. He's a knave to Vladimir Putin. So we got to get together. We got to start working together and build a better alliance than we once had. And so the repair job that's going to have to happen for the next president is monumental. Whether as a Democrat or Republican, it would be absolutely stupid for the next president not to want to have an alliance with Europe and not to want to protect free people around the world. Remember, we have 5.8 billion people on the next president. The next president, not to want to have an alliance with Europe and not to want to protect free people around the world. Remember, we have 5. In the world, this are fellow travelers on this planet that are living under some form of autocracy. And so the United States has to be part of the movement for liberality and freedom. And so after this guy leaves, hopefully someone will take that stage and retake that mantle of leadership. It's going to be complicated, though, right? I mean, NATO is, as you say, they're trying to

calibrate what the right posture is, whether it's, I mean, if you're Ruta, it's one of appeasement. If you're Carney, it's much more antagonistic. Who does Trump, talk to the most. Okay, so that's a trivia question. So what Western leader does Trump talk to the most? Answer is, well, that would be more corny because he's the one that he respects. And so he laughs at Ruta, just so everybody knows, he takes Ruta's obsequious call me daddy text messages and he shows him to people on truth social. And he mocks Ruta and he mocks his cabinet members. You know, he goes to his friends privately and said, can you believe these jackass cabinet members are so obsequious to me? He probably doesn't know that word.

Can you believe these jackass cabin members are kissing my ass on national television? And he laughs about it. So the people that stand up to him are the ones he respects. Ask Gavin, you know, Trump will keyboard warrior bully Gavin and call him names on the keyboard. But then when he sees Gavin, he's all bright and a bushy-tailed and flattering of Gavin. So that's Trump. You know that and I know that about him. He only really respects the people that are pushing and shoving.

They stand up to him. Yeah. And I think that that's the sort of classic wisdom of all bullies. You got to punch him in the nose because the more you, you know, kiss the ring or you kneel to them or you capitulate to their desires, the more they're going to take. And that's a classic example with John. By the way, what we've learned, the courts have generally held on Trump. Yes, they've given him some things. He's gotten broader immunity powers and he's gotten certain things.

But they walked away from the E. Jean Carroll case. and they told people go scram on birthright citizenship, we're going to adhere to the 14th Amendment. And so this is closing in on Trump a little bit, and this is way better than what you saw in Russia or even Hungary. And so the system is going to hold on Trump. The question is, are we going to get another nut job in the position that's going to do more harm to the system?

And so that's something I don't know, but I'm optimistic about it. Yeah, I mean, the question of, of Nut Jobs, the ghost of Nut Jobs future is very much, very much one that will litigate in the course of the next couple months. Potsave America Breaking News is brought to you by Act Blue. With so much at stake, campaigns need the right foundation. For over two decades, Act Blue has been the go-to platform powering Democratic candidates across the ballot by providing the digital tools to fundraise, organize, and win.

And this year, they've launched an organizing platform built specifically for the people doing the work, Act Blue Field Tools. This all-in-one platform handles texting, phone banking, and can focus on what actually wins campaigns, real, meaningful conversations with voters. Act Blue never sells your data or your personal information so you can stay focused on what matters most, donating, organizing, and helping Democrats win. This November, the elections could come down to just a few hundred votes. The work that wins those races starts this summer, and it starts with you. Get started at actblue.com slash crooked. I do want to focus on something you just said a minute ago about Trump's decline.

Because I think, you know, there's behavior that we know there is irrational and erratic behavior that's just part of the Trump brand, that's just part of the DNA. And then there's the behavior that I think is born of an increasingly adult mind. And I think one of the, and you talked about Liberace smoking crack. And the decor is Liberace on crack. And I couldn't agree with you more. A Christian Met family moved into the White House and blew the place up. I was thinking late stage autocrat, but it's like if you've been to, I mean, my family is from

Burma or any of these autocratic repressive regimes, they love gilding things. They love gold. They love the flaunting the ill-gotten gains that they've amassed. And they love the sort of obvious signal that it means they're very rich and powerful. And I don't know if you've seen the white. I mean, I'm sure you've seen these. You have seen these pictures because you characterize it as Liberace on Crystal Meth. Like it, the White House is looking absolutely insane. New York Magazine reporting today that Trump spent Wednesday night dumping more than a dozen videos of renewed U.S. strikes on Iran to Truth Social, which is, I suppose,

his version of foreign policy. But midway through this posting spree, Trump took a break to share an update on his latest White House renovation, which is a West Wing sign over the West Wing because he just wants people to know where the West Wing is located. over the past eight months, similar gold signs have gone up outside the Oval Office, the Rose Garden, and Trump's new presidential walk of fame. And sometimes they've even doubled up. There's like a sign above the sign. Last month, he said he was going to hang a golden eagle on the Truman balcony. Is, like, pardon my French, but what in the actual fuck? Is he getting lost? Is that why we need the signs? I don't think it's that. I think he's a, I think he's a, repressed guy. Okay. And I think he's hiding identity issues and he's having a hard time, which he expresses it in anger. He expresses it and tries to emasculate the people around him. You know, nobody's safe from Donald Trump. You know, I predicted at the beginning of the term, he put J.D. Vance

in the woodchipper, like in the movie Fargo, Vance is halfway through the woodchipper. And Trump does things that are pretty meditated to hurt people like flowing robe Jesus on the eve of the communion book coming out, which is to get Vance to attack the Pope, which is, hey, I'm your God, Donald J. Trump, not the Pope. This is the sort of stuff that Trump does to people. So there's a lot of anger, a lot of repression. I think the decoration is a cultural trigger. So he knows that the left will be triggered by him. And he knows that he can manipulate the left by doing crazy stuff. And somebody asked me last week, they said, well, who runs the Democratic Party now? He's I know who runs the Democratic Party. He said, really, who? Donald J. Trump. He runs the Democratic Party.

Because Donald Trump is a white cue ball on the billiard table of Democrats. He smashes into them. They break in pieces. They don't know how to fight together in a coordinated strategy. And then they create a Frankenstein monster by the name of Platner in Maine. This is because there's a reaction formation to Donald Trump. Rather than getting in a room together and saying, my God, we have an existential crisis going on in the country. And even though you're a Democratic socialist and I'm a moderate Democrat, can we pick one person to rally behind and stop our ego bashing of each other? They won't do that. And so Trump knows that. So the decoration stuff is also a cultural trigger point for him. He knows you and I are going to talk about it. He knows

the Democrats are going to be inflamed by it. And the fact that they put this guy platinum up, and I said this repeatedly on our podcast, me and Caddy Kay, I said, this guy should have no business being the nominee of anybody's party. And the fact that the Democrats are fighting against Trump and then put him up is a sign of gross hypocrisy. So he blows up on them, which was easy to predict. But it's a reaction formation to Donald Trump. Why don't you get your, you know what, together, Get your messaging together. You have the country. The guy's got a 60 plus percent disapproval rating.

They beat them in 20. They could have beaten them in 24, but they're running around with their heads on fire, you know? My name is Peter Parker, but I'm also Spider-Man. This July, we're faced with a threat. That can be anyone. The world may have forgotten Peter Parker. I'm just a neighbor, friendly neighbor.

But he hasn't forgotten. gotten them. Sometimes Spider-Man has to do the hard thing. That's my responsibility. Talk to Banner? I didn't know you could get that big. Spider-Man, brand new day in theaters July 31st. Yeah, I mean, that's a pretty elaborate, um, trigger, like, trigger experiment to be gilding the White House to just get you and me pissed off about it. I tend to think, I mean, perhaps it's that, but it's also. Well, he's also Liberace. Yeah. He loves Gilding. But he wants you to talk about it. He wants me to talk about it. But he also wants to focus on it. I mean, he's the one that's throwing it in the middle of foreign policy tweets relating to a war that we're now re-engaged in. And he's the one that focuses on the size of himself. Yeah, the reflecting pool size. I mean, he's a real estate developer in decline. And I don't know enough about the aging brain, but I think he sees on the things that bring you comfort and bring you joy and shine. tiny gold things bring him joy.

It's, I mean, in some ways, the most basic elemental obsession. It seems to me, because the White House is now covered in these strange glued on coins and filigrees and signage, perhaps because he needs direction. I don't know. Alex, one of the best non-words ever, which I constantly use in complete sentences, is misunderestimate. Yeah. And this came from George W. Bush. Yeah.

Oh, I remember it. So do not mis-underestimate Donald Trump's need to trigger liberals. Do not mis-underestimate that. And so you should look at everything that he's doing from the visage of narcissism, sure, is it going to make me money, am I going to get attention or some type of glory, and am I going to trigger liberals? Okay, those are the things that there's nothing else. That's it.

Okay, he's got a decision in front of him. Those are the three pallets that he thinks about. before he acts on the thing. All right. This is, I mean, from the horse's mouth. It's great to hear this. Do you have direct and very extensive experience with him in? I work for the guy for nine months.

I thought he was nuts, but I didn't think he was this nuts. Well, that then brings me to this. Okay, I have two more questions for you. One is you said everything that Trump touches turns to shit, which I think is a widely held understanding and belief. I wonder what you made of this week in Trump News. He intervened in the U.S.-Belgium game in the knockout round of 16. the U.S. lost.

The president basically went to the head of FIFA Gianni Infantino and suggested that the red card that the star U.S. player, Fall Balagan, got was not given honestly, was a bad call. And then subsequently, FIFA let Baligan playing the game. The U.S. lost. We know what happened. It was not a great moment for both U.S. sports and U.S. politics. We have news today from Politico that 72 members of the European Parliament are demanding an investigation into FIFA after it lifted the red card suspension of our U.S. player.

It is like there are not a lot of things that you can get 72 European members to agree on. This is a rare moment of unity. Unity. And when you talked about the sort of the context of NATO and the global community versus the United States, It seems to me that this is just a touchstone. This is an example of how eroded the goodwill is towards the United States, how diminished our standing is. I break it up into a couple categories. The NATO thing is Vladimir Putin.

He's got something on Trump. Trump's got his checklist of what he needs to do. He goes to these NATO Beanie's. He spouts off about Vladimir Putin and he spouts off about Greenland to antagonize everybody. And he wants to diminish NATO. That's what he wants to do. And that's on the Putin checklist, separate from this. This is about what is the most attention-getting thing in the world happening right now? Oh, that would be the World Cup. It's 10 times the size of the Super Bowl. How do I insert myself into it? Remember, Trump's got four things. Money, attention and glory. How is it going to help me and how am I going to trigger the liberals? Those are the four things. And so he wanted to be part of that story. And so, The way to inject himself into that story is to do exactly what he did. And it was very controversial.

It hurt our brand. Everything he does hurts our brand. And the big problem with all that is you live here, I live here. The World Cup was going swimmingly well for the Americans. The Europeans were here. Other people around the world, maybe people from Burma. The people all over the world coming in a United States, say, say, whoa, nice people. Looks like they got pretty affluent suburbs.

Country's not so bad, even though Trump is a number. running the country. And then he's got to insert himself to try to blow us up again, okay, and set back the brand. So, you know, unfortunately, you probably had 800 million people, not me. I was rooting for the U.S., of course, but you had 800 million people probably rooting against the U.S. that were like quietly cheering them on because they were an underdog team and they were doing pretty well. So Trump took the air out of that. And again, this is the shit that he does. And of course, I was at the finals game three at Madison Square Garden, the only game we lost in the finals. Oh, you were there? Yeah, because the Orange Maniac was there and he cast a curse on these guys. So, you know, the Trump

curse lives. He screwed up the reflecting pool. God only knows that that ballroom or something there will be eventually built. He destroyed the lawn with the UFC fight. If he puts the eagle up, because the eagle looks just like one of the Nazi eagles, if he puts the eagle up, I think that's going to be a very bad look, but again, hopefully somebody like a Thune or somebody pick up the phone and call them. We know it's not going to be McConnell calling them, but maybe somebody like Thune, pick up the phone and call them and say, hey, could you take the Nazi Eagle down, please, you're making us all look bad. But I mean, there's such cowards. That's the thing I don't get about it. And that's the thing long remembered

will be the cowardly acts of the Republican Party. Forget about the Democrats. They're in disarray. Trump owns them. But the Republicans hate his guts. They tell you privately how much they hate them, but yet they won't do anything. They won't do anything. It is a sad state of affairs. It is our state of affairs as a country. We continue to be the United States, even while Donald Trump is running the show.

We're going to be fine, Alex, but this guy's not a lot of damagement. Anthony Scaramucci, it is a real pleasure to have you on your debut appearance on Runaway Country. I hope I get invited back. Yeah, I'm sure you will. We need the inside dope. We need the inside dope. Well, you know, I'm telling you what I know. And the irony is since my podcast started, I talk to more MAGA people now than before, you know, because they want to get the information out there, you know.

And by the way, they know he's nuts. Just so your viewers and listeners know the people working for Trump know he's nuts. Okay. And they fake liking him. There's very few people on planning. at earth that liked Donald Trump. I think it's important for people to know that. Yeah. Well, I mean, not surprising, but still important to hear. Anthony Scaremoji, thanks for your time today. Have a great week and good to be on, Alex.