Breaking News from Pod Save America - NEW: Trump Secretly Hid In A Catering Truck Because Of The War He Started

Episode Date: August 11, 2026

Jon Favreau and What A Day host Jane Coaston react to new reports that President Trump hid in an airport catering cart in order to take a secret flight on a military jet out of Turkey after July's NATO Summit. They respond to Trump’s disparaging comments against Somalians and then unpack his interview with Wayne Allyn Root where he suggested he could declare a national security emergency around the upcoming elections. CHECK OUT OUR SPONSOR: ZIP RECRUITER - http://ziprecruiter.com/crooked Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jane, what's up? Oh, you know, just thinking about national security, the security of journalists. Just normal thoughts I have on a Tuesday. Well, then you're in luck because we have a couple clips to respond to today. And the first is based on a huge scoop from the Washington Post. The Donald Trump flew home from the NATO summit in Turkey last month on a secret plane due to a credible Iranian threat against Air Force One, which he allowed to fly home full of staff and reporters as a decoy without anyone on the plane knowing it.

Here's a clip of Trump escaping out the back of the plane on a catering cart. Okay. So there he goes. He's on the plane. Normal. Okay, okay. Now you've got to. Oh, no.

Okay, they've highlighted it for us. No, we're really. Media boards the plane. Unwitting dupes. And then there's the airport catering truck in the back there. And it is going into the rear of a C-32A. And then that plane took him to London, where he got back in the old Air Force one, de-plained on the stairs so that no one would be the wiser.

So not the beautiful Qatari gift plane. Then he got on the Katari gift plane to go from London. back to D.C. Honestly, I'm impressed. What do you think about this whole story? I have a lot of thoughts. Top one. Now, do you recall the attempted shooting

at the White House correspondence dinner? I do. Do you remember Trump's reaction afterwards when he was asked about it? No. So there are lots of pieces to this. He said that, you know,

everybody was very brave, but Secret Service had to keep telling him like, sir, keep your head down. And he was like, I just wanted to look around. I just wanted to see what was going. going on. So the fact that Trump went along with this and also because I was like, you know, the back of a catering truck can't be very comfortable. I am certain that there were numerous moments where he's like, but, but I don't want to. I want to see what's happening. What's going

on? What are you guys doing? Like there is an element where I'm like, he is a man, he's an 80-year-old man. And I don't know if you have recently had to convince an 80-year-old man to do anything. Especially that one. Yeah, like this one. Yeah, I'm more, I'm kind of impressed at Secret service got him to do any of this. We do have some stills of him in the in the catering cart. There he is. There's some McDonald. See there that's what he wants right? Yeah exactly. Now he's doing a little Titanic there sort of got his hands up and there he is. Ah. So this is an example of AI being good. Yeah. The internet has just been making all kinds of AI of AI of Trump doing his own kind of Taylor Swift. Right. Exactly. In the cart there. Yeah. Now now so we can pop out. Yeah. I do think the

story raises a few questions. So the journalists, the journalists went on the decoy plane, the Air Force One, which was apparently under threat from a surface to air Iranian missile. And no one told them about it. Nope. That seems a little dicey. Especially Jake Tapper pointed out on Twitter that like he's gone to Afghanistan. He's been on planes where like there's a threat. And typically you go with the president. The president would presumably maybe want to keep you alive. Maybe. Potentially. But like, you would go along. And in this case, they did not. And they had no idea. I mean, are they finding, like, they would be finding out now. Right. Because, yes. Anytime this has happened before, right, they at very least, the very least,

they would brief the press as soon as the threat has passed. Right. But that did not happen at all. Apparently, Rubio stayed on the Air Force One. So maybe Marker Rubio was like, well, now he clearly knew because he's also the national security advisor and was probably involved in the decision along with the Secret Service. Secret Service makes the decision. Also, they consulted with some national security officials, at least that's what the reporting said. But so it's Rubio, some White House staff, and a bunch of reporters just sit and ducks on that old plane. And later that day, when Trump was on the flight on the Qatarie Giff plane back to D.C., he did talk. reporters, one of the reporters were asked why they had to close the shades.

And Trump said, quote. You're probably in a dangerous flight because of the sleaze bags that we have to deal with. And then he said, but if I go, you go, right? Perhaps someday you want to change professions. But now we know, he wouldn't have gone. He wouldn't have gone. They would have gone. He wouldn't have gone.

Yeah. Which is like sort of just being a dick. Yeah, like. Like knowing what he knew, he was just like, yeah, but you know, we were all going down together. No. No. No. You would die a horrible, terrifying death, which is among the many reasons I dislike flying because.

No. Let me ask you something. How do you think, if this had been Joe Biden in the catering cart for Barack Obama, how do you think the right-wing media would have reacted to the president ducking out on the catering cart to escape the Iranian threat while everyone else was on the. Jenny Johnson would have ascended to the right hand of whomever his father is, whom assuming is Donald Trump. The degree to which, I mean, the right-wing understanding of who Donald Trump is is something that people have been trying to figure out now for 11 years. But like the understanding of Donald Trump being this extraordinarily brave, masculine person

who after the assassination attempted. Fight, fight, fight, right. but also this person who basically is like, I got to get on a catering truck, which, like, let's be clear here. He is the president of the United States. As far as I can tell, secret service, their job is to keep him alive, keep him safe.

They did their job. It was the right thing to do the caterer. It was a good, yeah. My, my, I mean, I have many questions about this. I have questions about how journalists had no idea. And also about the fact that, like, we are well aware that how this would be positioned in right wing media, which would result in, God knows how many dumb hearings from dumb people, would just be like, oh, my God.

What a coward. What a coward. This, you know, he risked a male. There would be like some. Low tea president. There would be a first person story from some daily caller reporter being like, why did Joe Biden put my life at risk? I have children. It's all very sad.

Like, there'd be a whole thing. Yeah. And we know that there won't be a whole thing. But I think the other thing. that I keep thinking about is like, this is the kind of, you know, part of why the Qatari plane, let's keep in mind that, you know,

going back to the Qatari plane, which I keep bringing up, the New York Times was like, hey, this plane is not as secure as they've been saying. And the DOJ was like, uh, we're going to need your phone.

We're going to need to talk to everyone you want to talk to. We're also going to need to look at your phone calls with your own parents. And then, you know, a judge was like, I'm sorry. What? No, that's ridiculous.

So like, these are all things that the administration has said repeatedly that, you know, the Katari plane is fine, but now it has to be under repairs because it's just not as nice as it should. We know now that none of that's true. And so I think like the security concerns, the very real security concerns, because it keeps coming up in some reporting that Trump facing assassination attempts or assassination plots from Iran, as far as we know. Like that's something that Trump thinks about all the time. That's something that has come up in how the war has been fought.

That's something that's come up in how he is thinking about this war, how he's thinking about why we got into this war in the first place. As a great Jud Legum pointed out, it is one of these 17 reasons we have been given as to why we're at war right now. Well, but also I'm surprised that the Iranians were able to mount any sort of assassination threat because we were been reliably told that their military has been decimated, their leadership has been decimated. There's also a lot of, like, anyone who's asking questions about this,

it's like, the president was, there was an assassination threat in the president. How dare you. It's like, oh, the assassination threat that came from the fact that the president tried and successfully assassinated multiple Iranian leaders from Soleimani onto the Ayatollah. Which? Yeah, guess what? When you assassinate another country's leaders, they're probably going to come for you. Yeah, no, that's, um, there's a, um, there's a,

saying that in war, the opponent gets a say. And it turns out that when you kill someone's father, as far as we know, wife, at least one child, maybe, just maybe, they may try to kill you, which like, yeah, not ideal, but that's kind of how, like, this, there's an idea of that would be the means by which Iran would attempt to respond to, you know,

bombing them a whole lot. Like there is something, there were a couple of people who posted kind of after, the initial few weeks of the war. Remember how it was supposed to be like a four to six week war? I remember that. Where basically it's like, you can just do things. It turns out blowback isn't real.

And I'm like, oh. So the Iranians can just do things too. Yeah, everybody gets to do things. Pod Save America Breaking News is brought to you by ZipRecruiter, with everyday interactions becoming increasingly impersonal. Someone going just one extra step can be huge. Like when my doctor takes the time to call me with test results instead of sending them electronically.

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Try it for free today at ziprecruiter.com slash crooked. That's zip recruiter. com slash crooked. ZipRecruiter, meet your match on ZipRecruiter. All right. Second clip, Trump was in the Oval Monday where he was asked a totally normal question about what advice he'd give Republicans running in November.

And here's what he said. They come from countries that are not great. They come from, let's say, as an example, Somalia. They come in and then they tell us how to, how our constitution, how our declaration of independence, how it works. It doesn't work that way and they're not smart. They have no aptitude. They have nothing going and they're telling us how to run our country.

We have jihadists being elected all over the place. We have this, whether it's communism, jihadism. It's a lot of friends of mine called up. He said, you know, really, you should use the word jihadist because that's what's happening. Great advice. Great advice. Use the word jihadists to describe. candidates who were non-white with progressive views on issues.

That's what we're calling them jihadists now. Was the friend Hugh Hewitt? Like, I like that we could, I'm like, was it Hugh Hewitt? Did Hugh He should call him jihadists? Like, I'm just like, we could probably figure out who called you. Like this, I mean, I know he takes calls from literally anyone. But like, I'm going to force people to remember things that happened three years ago, which was very challenging. So you remember three years ago, there was an effort on the right to join forces with Muslim American families who might be more conservative-minded.

Because if you go back even further, Muslim Americans before 9-11, before the extra of the year 2000, tended to vote Republican. Muslim Americans, big supporters of George W. Bush's gubernatorial campaigns in Texas, for example. There was an effort to join forces because everybody was very worried about LGBT material being in schools. Remember the grooming thing? I haven't forgotten. I'll never move on. Everyone involved was terrible. But there was a whole thing of like, oh, we're all going to come together because we all have this shared thing about how we're very mad about this issue.

And it happened in Maryland in Montgomery County in Virginia, I believe that there was a whole effort. and that led to a Supreme Court case about this very issue. Well, apparently everyone involved in that effort died, I guess, or exploded or disappeared. Yeah, it really is where I'm like, but it's like I'm the person who doesn't need post-it notes to remember things. I'm like, I was there. I remember. I mean, you went back a couple years. I was going to go back to, I don't know, the 2024 election, even in the years since Trump has taken office again, when there was many new cycles.

decrying and clutching pearls over anyone who called Trump or anything his administration was doing fascist, any kind authoritarian dictator. It was horrible to ever call Trump to say the effort around Trump. How dare you? That is a horrible thing to do. But now the president of the United States is calling Abdul al-Said a jihadist. He thinks that's funny. Yeah, so he thinks it's funny.

And I've been really interested. I mean, you also see this with Mamdani, though Trump is like, he's also very attractive. He's a hot jihadist. But also this idea of like, oh, no, no, this is all like, you know, when Mamdani hosts pride events at, you know, city hall or something like that. Like, oh, that's just undercover jihadism. I'm like, look. From what I understand about jihadist movements, which very much, they don't. they don't do a lot of pride events.

Like, you know, they were not like, you know, some of bin Laden was not emailing people in 2011 before being murdered in a cave being like, I've got to do some pride events. Yeah, jihadism and wokeism are not two flavors that go together. No. It's also funny where you just, you hear people using terms where you're like,

you didn't really look. You heard the term like red-brown alliance at one time. It just were like, you're gonna repeat it a bunch. And I'm like, oh, sweetie, honey. No. So also like this entire thing, it's like, oh, we're going against these crazy people. Because that's like basically Trump wants to use all of these terms as interchangeable because it's just like crazy people. Right.

Jihadist, communists. Yeah, it's all the same thing, just crazy people. But that all relies on all of these candidates running against like bizarre Paul Ryan. They are not. Like Mike Rogers decided one day that he was like, I got to get. I got to get real weird. And now he's trying to do this like, I'm actually just a normal person thing. And I'm like, no, we know. I'm a normal person who still thinks that the 2020 election was stolen and also probably my election that I lost in 24. Yeah, which is so weird how they just, you know, Democrats, we are so capable that we can just now steal very individual elections. It's amazing. And wow, we should be using that power all the time. But yeah, no, there is a, like, Trump seems for a while, I thought.

at some point that he had to be aware of his own unpopularity. He's not. He has no idea and he does not care because he believes, like his whole self understanding is that everyone loves him and thinks he's great. If he loses the midterms, it's the, people are mad at Republicans. Right, because he's like,

how could anyone possibly vote for these crazy people? And I'm like, well, in some cases, they're not crazy. And in other cases, people are making the calculus that they're like, yeah, this guy seems kind of weird, but this guy running to be governor of Colorado said he killed people. as children. And you endorse the My Pillow guy in Minnesota. So like, you know, there's a little bit of like, I've seen your crazy. Crazy's coming from inside the house. Yeah. All right. Last

clip here. We got Trump somehow had time last night to call into the Wayne Allen Root show on Real America's voice, which if you've never heard of it, good for you. Trump has done this show like 16 times. Yeah, Wayne Allen Root, if I recall, also said back in 2016 that Jewish-American Americans view Trump as their savior, which messianic. No, no, that's not how this works. But okay. For savior in Judaism, but sure, great. Sure.

Amazing. All right, Root had a pitch for Trump. Let's listen. So let me put an idea in your head, okay? Because it's so hard to get the Senate to do anything, now they're on recess, they don't get anything done if they never get the Save America Act done. You have the right to declare a national security. emergency for elections. And the Supreme Court ruled in 1983 under Reagan, that INS versus

Chata, that if you declare a national security emergency as the President of the United States, they can't challenge it. It can only be overturned by a two-thirds vote of both houses of Congress. So if you do this in the next month, we will get photo ID, proof of citizenship, and a limit to mail-in ballots. And you don't even need the sense. Okay, I'll leave it at that. All right, we'll leave it at that. Stranger things have happened. Also, did you know.

I have led an insurrection against the Capitol, so that was a, that would be strange. Also, did you notice that I can't tell if Trump is dressed like him or if he's dressed like Trump? Because it really is a column A, column B. So things that can't happen. No, that's no. For a thousand. No, that's even. That can't happen.

That cannot happen. Trump, one, Trump, Trump, one, Trump love. playing an eternal game of yes and where he's just like very interesting idea. Stranger things have happened because he's thinking about the content. And, you know, as content creators, well, but also, but also there is that 17-page draft executive order that was circulating, claiming that, you know, China interfered in 2020 and there. So he did that whole prime time speech.

I forgot about that. Yeah. Did you notice how like everyone looked at what they had and everybody was like, like, Oh, so this is like nothing, and you have nothing. There is nothing. Steve Bannon told his audience last week that everyone should block out the last week of August because it's coming. Something around this.

Is that where he's going to take off one layer of shirt? Just like, you know, we're fine going to get down to layer five or something like that. So this like declare an emergency or whatever? This has been floating around. Yes, no, of course it's been floating around. In the White House as well. No, I mean, of course it has because the White House and the craziest shit you ever heard in your life are just like now one thing. There's no one to be like, hey, like maybe you're a little too online for your own good.

But let's go back to the idea of this, which is that one, it can't, it be unconstitutional. I know Trump doesn't care. So that's kind of like not a limiting principle here. But like courts care and even the Supreme Court cares. Even this Supreme Court. Even this Supreme. Because part of why his tariffs got knocked down earlier this year is that he attempted to do the tariffs. as responding to a national security emergency.

And the Supreme Court, Justice Roberts, was like, maybe, you know, I think Congress should get to have a say. And there should be fewer times in which you can just declare there to be an emergency when there is a one. Let's also keep in mind that like elections are state led and they're led by localities. And there are like 170,000 different localities that are gonna be running elections

and have been running elections. And that one is right in the Constitution. That's not even a law. Yeah, that's just like. It's very clear that the states get to administer the elections. Yeah. And so like also that all of this hinges, I mean, we've both talked about the Save America Act a lot. A lot of this also hinges on his understanding of like this just being like if we have this, we will never lose another election. But also I'm like, you're aware that an election in which only people with passports can vote is an election that will probably be won by Democrats. Just maybe by even more. Yeah. than they would. otherwise. Yeah, no. I'm aware like more like I think we're now at like 50% of Americans have passports but you will never guess what what kind of people are less

likely to have passports and which groups of people are more likely to have passports. Trump certainly will never get let never guess no no a lot of these Republicans. No this is a it's interesting also because Trump has so much time to call into shows with people like Wayne Allen Root, who, by the way, also was, like, a giant, like, birther promoter. Oh, yeah. Like. He's crazy from way back.

No, he's, you know, we're talking like orly teets eras. He's vintage crazy. Yeah. Oof, that's sweet, sweet vintage crazy. But, like, this is another thing where it's, like, somebody telling him something, and he's like, that's very interesting. I'm very intrigued. Stay tuned.

But I think that that is more about attempting to scare people and wanting people to be afraid. And I think it's very important. And like, you know, I'll say it. Others should say it. Voting in the midterms matters. You are safe to vote. If you're not safe to vote, somebody is going to try and ensure that you are safe to vote. It is important that you vote.

It is important that you vote for so many reasons. But also because Donald Trump doesn't want you to. And we're Americans. We have oppositional defiance disorder as a rule. And when someone tells you that you should be afraid to do something, I think you should do it. Except for climbing Mount Everest. Don't do that. Don't do that.

To borrow a line from Donald Trump in 2024, election's got to be too big to rig. Exactly. That's why everyone's got to go vote. Precisely. Thanks, Jane. And everyone else, please consider subscribing to Pod Save America on YouTube.

It's free. All you have to do is just click that subscribe button right there. And then that'll help us continue to deliver great content like this into your feeds so that you get less Wayne Allen route and more me and Jane. Thanks, everyone. Thank you.