Bulwark Takes - Explaining "Never Trump" to David Pakman

Episode Date: April 25, 2026

Tim Miller joins David Pakman for a wide-ranging conversation on Trump’s unraveling, the “MAGA betrayal” moment among anti-war influencers, and what comes next for the right. They discuss why some of Trump’s loudest supporters feel misled, who actually drives conservative media, and how Never Trump has evolved into something broader. Plus: how to talk to voters who are starting to reconsider—and what a post-Trump GOP might look like.Tickets for our Bulwark Live shows in San Diego and Los Angeles in May: https://thebulwark.com/events

Hey, everybody. It's Tim Miller from the Bullwork. The other morning I was on with David Pacman over on his substack. And we don't get a lot of Pacman over here on the Bullwark YouTube channel. So I thought you guys might be interested in hearing a bit of our discussion. It kind of asks me, you know, what is the state of never Trumpism at this point? we talk a bit about the news and the ways in which things are unraveling for the Trump administration. It's a good combo where we get to flip it around and have me in the answering chair. So I thought you guys would enjoy it. We'd share it with you here. So stick around for me and David Packman.

Tim, it's always good to see you. Good to catch up. I was just checking out your recent appearance on Pierce Morgan, where you told this pastor, like, listen, this is me. this is my editorializing. I am not going to treat you differently because you're calling yourself pastor. I'm going to evaluate what you say objectively. I'm curious, do you like doing those

the Peers Morgan appearances? Yeah, it's funny. I wish I had done more prep for this one because a lot of people saw this video. I think, and maybe part of this because I didn't do prep because I was just like, I don't know, Doug Wilson, I know to be a hateful pastor that is an influencer of Pete Hegseth,

and I know that he's done a bunch of anti-gay stuff. I don't follow his work that closely, and I didn't even know I was going to be on with him. My peers' Morgan policy is when I feel like I have anger, I want to get off my chest, I just say yes. You know, I say no, usually, but I'm like, if I have something I want to vent about, I say yes. And so I just said yes blindly.

I was like, whatever, you can put on whoever you want. Trump is such a disaster right now. It's not like I'm worried about debating any of these things. And so in this particular episode, it was kind of boring because the pastor couldn't articulate the pastor, couldn't articulate a defense of Trump in the war. And so then we end up getting into theological stuff. And I don't know.

I just think I should call you Doug. And I feel like that felt right in the moment. Watching it, it felt very right. It felt very right. Do you think, you know, now we've seen all of these, I don't really want to call the Mea Culpas, but we've seen all of these around the whole, Trump's the anti-war guy stuff.

We've seen words like betrayal used by some of the Manosphere podcasters, and I never would have guessed that this was going to happen. Is your sense that they truly believed the whole I'm the real anti-war candidate thing and that now they're genuinely surprised? Or is your sense that they went along with it because they thought it was useful for getting Trump elected? Yeah. I think they're both.

And it's hard to know what's in anybody's heart. So, you know, I can only judge based on what I've seen of people's content and what I know about them. But I think some of the Manosphere guys feel really betrayed and for good reason. Like I watched Andrew Schultz podcast for one example. He's a guy that had Trump on. I ripped him at the time. He gave a very friendly interview to Trump. You know, they challenged him a little bit.

But it was it was really soft and almost fanboyish. And, you know, if you listen to his podcast now or Tim Dillon, who's another comedian who is for Trump, if you listen to them for long enough, it's like this, maybe they're snowing me, but this feels real. Like I think that there's a category of people that genuinely were sick of all the

foreign wars, thought that Trump was kind of an outsider who has not beholden to the military industrial complex and that he wouldn't get us into as many stupid wars. And he didn't last time. Obviously, we can debate the margins of what that means, what he actually did and didn't do in the first term. But, like, you know, he didn't start, he didn't do anything like Iran in the first, in the first term.

And so I think that some of those guys feel betrayed. And I think that we should engage with them on that level and, like, take their, take their flip at good faith. I think that their partisan hacks, too. You know, I got, like, Tucker called Trump a demonic force in a private text message five years ago. Like, Tucker knew what he's signing up for, okay? Like, Tucker wants power and influence. You know, anybody that's in kind of that Fox News,

mex type, you know, Ra, Ra, Republican Party world. You know, some of them maybe, you know, were just, it kind of doesn't really matter what they thought Trump's foreign policy was going to be. They were going to be for him no matter what. You know what I mean? Like they were, they just wanted Trump to win and

Kamala to lose because they're team jersey type guys. And so, you know, I get a little flustered when I see people sharing the Tucker stuff because I'm like, man, in the same interview where he's talking about how he feels bad about going along with Trump. he feels betrayed. He's also talking, he's like making fun of my colleagues, Catherine Rampelot

the Bullwork and saying that, you know, she, uh, she, she was totally crazy to be in support of lawsuits to, to break up segregated country clubs. Like, he does this whole rant in support of segregated country clubs in the same podcast. And so it's like,

I worry that people hear Tucker talking about this war and they think that he's an ally and he's not. Um, and so I think he's a, he's a different case than some of the guys who, aren't political experts, went along for the ride, got snowed, got conned, and, you know, now are rethinking. Yeah, I think I generally agree with you about how we should be, like, talking to and dealing with those folks. One of the things I've said is we should welcome them reconsidering, and that's great. But I think, and I'm curious, your view, I think it's important also to mention this was not unpredictable.

And we know that because there were dozens or hundreds of us that were predicting that this was exactly what was going to happen. So I think that it's important both to say, hey, you're not like shunned and blacklisted forever because you are now revisiting your views and saying, hey, I made a mistake. But also, let's not pretend that there was no possible way that anybody could have seen this coming because there was. Yeah. Look, I think the way I think about this is, you know, if you have a friend or a cousin, or an uncle or an aunt in your life who is mirroring that Tim Dillon, Andrew Schultz turnabout on this, you know, and they are the type of person that you fought with a couple of times on your group text or over a holiday, but you know, whatever, but you still are, you know, it's somebody that you care about, right?

And you're on other side, what would you say to them right now? And maybe you'd say to them, you know, like, I had some points. I think it's important to consider that you're being, you're getting bad information from the media outlet. that's your following. You know, you'd think about how would you talk to them in a way that wouldn't make them say F you.

Right. Right. You know, different families are different, different personalities are different. But it's somebody that you care about and you're not the type of family that likes to yell at each other. There are certain families like that.

But if you're not that, you wouldn't go to them, you know, you wouldn't go, go to the next bar, family barbecue and be like, eat shit, Uncle Chris.

Like, you know, like I told you, dunked on you. You know, like that wouldn't be productive. So I feel that way about this. Like, yeah, it's important to mention that part of the reason why these guys got snowed

is because they bought a bill of goods from Donald Trump and the people around him and the big media influencers around them, including Tucker. And so they should be wary about that next time. And they should think about who was telling them the truth and who wasn't. I think that's totally fair to say and to bring up and to bring up if, you know, we get invited on. I'm trying to go on those shows. And that's kind of what I would say to their audience. Just like, you know, it's important to update your priors when you find out that somebody's been lying to you.

And so hopefully that is what happens in certain cases. We're seeing it in the polls. So I do think it's happening, naturally. Who do you think is the most influential or are the most influential right-wing commentators right now? And I know that I could just look up audience size, but I mean more in like an agenda setting sense, the way that for a while, like Rush Limbaugh had this agenda setting power as to like, what are going to be the two or three things that this week or today are the things that we're talking about? Does that still exist on the right-wing messaging machine or has it kind of become

fractured? It's become so fractured. I think there were to learn a lot in the next year to answer that question because, you know, I think that in the pre-Trump era, you know, there were a bunch of people clamoring for different roles and different types of influence. You know, there's the more of the neoconset, the more of the let's moderate on things, the more of the heart on immigration, you know, said. And obviously, Trump won, you know, kind of making the case that, you know, we should care about America first and crack down on immigration and, et cetera. We all know what happened there. And then Trump became so popular, he kind of became a cult, right? And so, they're really, like, the only way to agenda set, so to speak, would be to influence Trump himself.

And so in that way, who had influence? It was like the Fox hosts because you watch Fox, or the people that had his phone number, right? Like, those are the people that have, and that's been the case now for like nine years. You know, I mean, Tucker can claim that he has some agenda, sudden capabilities and et cetera, but frankly, time and again, up until basically Epstein and the war,

the Republican base went along with whatever Trump wanted. And so there was no outside influence. You're starting to see that taper off now, you know? And I think that it will be interesting to see kind of who emerges. Obviously, Tucker is trying to make a, case for more of America First, like, like real, authentic, you know, real communism has never been tried.

Real America First has ever been tried. Like, I'm going to do it the real way. You know, you'll see Ben Shapiro. It's still, I think, waning a little bit in influence, but has a ton of influence with the White House, more of a traditional, hawkish, you know, foreign policy side of things. And so I think that's kind of where the stuff is going to net out.

And I don't think that you can understate still, like the influence of Fox. And Fox, it's an older audience, but Fox still drives a lot of the conversation on the right. And the big anchors there still do. The bulwark and I have a lot of overlap in terms of audience, which I think is interesting. Where do you, like, are you a Republican? Are you on the right? Are you conservative at this point?

Do you consider yourself center-left? Like, where do you see yourself kind of in this atmosphere right now? I think it's different within the bulwark, right? And, like, you know, the funny thing about never Trumpism, I'll answer the question, but just to give a little background. I was just a joke about this. My colleague Amanda Carbenter has since left the bulwark, and she's working for a protect democracy, which is an awesome organization. But me and Amanda were on opposite sides of every primary, our whole lives, you know, growing up. Like, I always worked for the moderate candidate.

She worked for the Tea Party candidate, like in short, right? And so, you know, we had certain things we agreed about, obviously. But we were on different, had different sort of ideologies. And so when you start a never-trumper outlet, like, they're going to be, there's going to be that, like, proliferation. Like, among this original crew, like JVL is like, I think probably most left and like Sarah and Mona or more, I think, still kind of see themselves with small C conservatives. Now we've added a bunch of people who aren't even really never-Trumpers. They're just people that are experts in various areas. So, you know, I think it's different throughout the publication.

Me personally, I've just kind of embraced the fact that I'm a liberal, this small L sense. Like, and that in a certain world, like, would have put me on the center right. And I think these days kind of puts me on the center left, right? And I think that the way that things have changed, that's going to be. Especially conceived as you are not authoritarian. And this current MAGA movement is extremely authoritarian. And like small L liberal quite literally places you opposed to that.

Yeah, and direct opposition to them, you know? Yeah. And so, yeah, I think whether that, uh, It kind of means a belief in basic fundamental American values, democracy, pluralism, you know, but all, you know, free speech, free trade, right? Like free trade is a Republican issue a while ago. You know, more open immigration policy. That was the Bush position, right? So certain things have changed.

You know, I've changed on some things. I've moved a little left on a few things. But, you know, in a lot of ways, the way that the parties made up have changed. And, you know, I kind of see us hopefully trying to carry that banner for small liberalism. and when times when there are forces on the left that are trying to act in illiberal or lefty authoritarian fashion, like we'll critique that. But obviously, I think we're right now kind of just in a big tent fight

against right-wing authoritarianism. And then I think if that gets defeated, which it's looking better than it's looked in a long time that it could be defeated, you know, we can kind of hash everything out after that. Speaking of left-wing illiberalism, since you mentioned it. There have been a lot of interesting pieces lately

about, you know, just opinions as to to what degree should the more communistic, socialistic, we like the Venezuelan regime, Cuban regime wing of the left should have in the broader left-wing ecosystem. Some of the pieces center specifically around Hassan Piker, although some of them are more kind of broad in their thinking.

Do you think that there's a decision here, to be made by whoever as to like what involvement should that wing of the left have in Democratic Party politics? Or do you think it's the sort of thing that's just going to be decided naturally by voters? I think part of this is going to be decided naturally by voters. I guess I'd say this. I think that the elites have less influence on all of this than they want to think. And I can tell you that from experience. And I worked on the Republican autopsy, which basically was saying that the Republican Party should be more.

more, you know, traditionally liberal in the sense of, you know, appealing to different types of demographic groups and, you know, being more open on immigration and women's rights. So, like, that was the advice that the elites of the Republican Party were giving to the party in 2012, and the voters put that in the toilet and, you know, wiped their ass with it and said, no, we want Donald Trump. We want authoritarianism. That could that happen on the left? Sure.

I think there's a ton of differences between the makeup of the Democratic base and the Republican base. One's much more educated, you know, one's much more democratically diverse. So I don't think the same exact thing would happen. But, like, in principle, the power in our system right now comes from the people that make up the party, not the party elites. There are certain things they can do to shape it, but not as much as they think. And so if you accept that, like my advice to party elites is to say, okay, well, rather than thinking about the Democratic base as I should fight with the parts of the base I disagree with because I think that's a losing battle. why not think about how do you engage with the parts of the base that I disagree with on some things, but find areas where we can find common ground and build trust together, right?

And that is like my argument about this, Hassan, Piker and all the lefty socialist stuff. Like I think Hassan's crazy when he's talking about the USSR and China, like crazy. And if Hassan ran for president, I would be against him. I would now, you would not be my choice for president. But his audience has a lot of legitimate grievances about the way that the U.S. has managed foreign policy. and the way that the U.S. leadership has succumbed to corporate elites and not been responsive to, you know, concerns about the rising costs of health care. And for me, if I, my advice to Democratic elites is to like engage with that, you know,

if you're a center-left democratic elite, let's say, engage with that part of the base and say, hey, I hear you. I also don't think we should be in stupid wars. I also think that we should go after the tech billionaires, you know, who are hurting the economy. I also think that we need to change the health care system to make it, you know, more affordable, give you an option, a public option, whatever your position is, right? That's how I think would be smart politics. And I think that, you know, rather than, you know, doing the finger wagging, you have a bad

position on whatever, on China. It's going to like, okay, well, that's just going to make them not trust you. That's going to, I think, lose your power. It seems at least potentially that the idea of a focus on anti-corruption and anti-cronyism might not only work to pull over some disaffected maga-types in upcoming elections, but maybe there would also be some appeal to this further left that sometimes dabbles in supporting some authoritarian regimes. I don't know. I'm just thinking out loud. Well, sure. Or just to be able to name who you think you want to fight,

you know, who is the enemy, right? And if you're making the case to people that Trump said he was going drain the swamp. This has been the most corrupt administration ever. And so I want to root out the Trump corruption, but I also run to root out the corruption of all the other people that have undue influence on our politics. Like look at how much money A, it is crazy. You just look

at the people that are spending big money in primaries right now. It really is. It's pro-Israel, pro-AI, pro-cropto. And I don't know. I think that you could have a pretty compelling message to some disaffected magas and to some disaffected left people.

that just says, you know, we are not going to hand our government over to the tech billionaires. And also if you want to throw in the foreign Arab states, they're trying to buy off our politicians. Like, we're not going to sell our government to the big tech billionaires and to Israel and UAE and Saudi. And I'm going to fight it. And we're going to put new rules in place to prevent them from influencing our government. And I care about that. I'm not just going to, like, say it one time or put out a statement. Like, I'm going to talk about this.

Like, this is a pernicious force in our government, and we need to root it out. Okay. You know, the details on that. Some people are like more about some stuff than others. But I think just as a big message, yeah, I think that feels like that should appeal to people. Last thing I want to ask you about in thinking about the Republican primary for 28, you know, one of the question marks around this is that Trump seems increasingly lacking confidence in his ability to decide is advanced. or Rubio that I want to push.

That's a separate question from whether he will be so diminished in power by the time that decision comes that no one will care what Trump's opinion is on whether it should be Vance or Rubio or somebody else. Do you have any insights for us from inside in speaking to your former colleagues, maybe, as we might refer to them, of the way that the people not in Trump's inner circle are thinking about how that next Republican primary is going to be influenced? Yeah, I mean... I think that a lot of them are in uncharted waters on this.

I really, Trump has changed, like, the way that Republican primary politics worked from my first job as an early teen in the 2000, as an intern through 2014, was basically the same. You know, like there are establishment guys, there are Tea Party guys. Like you said, there's radio, there's Fox. And, like, you tried to influence and you tried to get a plurality, right? And then Trump came through a Kool-Aid man through the wall. And it's like for the past 10 years, the only way to succeed in Republican Party was to be the Trumpiest person. Like, you know, even people that didn't like Trump privately would pretend like they would and their TV ads, right?

And that's how you gained power in the party. So now they're all looking around and saying, okay, well, he's a lame duck. You know, maybe he leaves. Maybe he endorses somebody. But is he popular enough for that to carry the same weight? And I think that a lot, some people will make the bet that it's like, you know, I'm going to stick with Trump until that bet doesn't work. And that's not a crazy bet.

You know, past results is the best predictor of future. You know, past actions, best predictor of future results. And so I think a lot of people do that. But I think my opinion is that I think that there will be a lane for somebody. This wouldn't be my cup of tea in particular. But that's somebody that says, you know, Trump was on to some stuff. but he got too co-opted by the interest groups in D.C. And I don't think this is true, by the way,

but I'm just saying that to Republican voters, I think this is going to be a compelling message of change. That's just like, there was a lot of stuff he did that was good. He got co-opted by these bad forces. I am a true independent force. I learned lessons. I watched this for the last 12 years, you know, and I saw the ways in which Trump, you know,

went along with whoever the boogeyman is, Rubio, or Elon or, you know, whoever they decide is right boogeyman. and I am going to, you know, offer a different type of America, first, different type of MAGA. To me, that is the only way to dislodge him. I think that somebody going back and saying, I'm going to do Nikki Haley republicanism again.

It's just not going to work. Like, part of the reason is a big part of the people that like to Nikki Haley or Republican are Republicans anymore. Like going back to the Buller Coalition. Like, a lot of those people at this point are so grossed out by the Republicans that people used to vote in Republican primaries 10 years ago, they're going to be happy to vote for Pete or less more, or less a slot, whoever ends up being kind of that lane in the Democratic primary.

They're not going to vote in the Republican primary. And so there's no base for that type of politics. So I just think that like what Marjorie Taylor Green and Tucker are doing are a little bit extreme versions of this, but maybe like a little softer version of that, I think could work. Would you ever run for something? My text messages aren't great, David. And we've been talking a lot.

We talk a lot. I mean, somebody was, somebody clipped to me out of context the day, some MAGA guy. I was making it, I got a question from a viewer that was like,

would you kiss Cory Lewandowski if it meant that Kamlo was president? And I was like, I would do unspeakable things to Cory Lewandowski. If I think they'd put it in such a way that it made it look kind of like a threat. Anyway, I just, you know, I've got a long tracker.

So I don't think so. But you never say never in life. I'm really happy living here in New Orleans. Maybe I get bored with podcasts. and I decide I want to do something down to New Orleans so I could see that in my future, but no, I'm not fucking. What about you? Why don't you run?

You're an actual, you actually have a party. So you should do it. It's not, um, it's not really interesting to me. Too much oversight, too many people controlling my time. You know, I like my flexibility in doing what I want to do. Yeah. Think about it. All right.

Life is short. I guess no one ever knows. Are you a citizen? Wait, wait, where were you born? Are you born? I can never be president because I was natural. You're naturalized. So you could run for, you could be, you could run for mayor.

Who knows? Mayor of New York. Maybe that's the way to go. All right, listen, for my audience who's watching, make sure you're following and subscribe to the bulwark on substack. They're killing for the bulwarks audience. If you don't have a total rejection of me, I would be flattered for you to subscribe to my substack as well.

Tim, always good to talk to you. We'll do it again and keep up the good work. Later David, we'll see you, brother. Take care. Bye.