Bulwark Takes - This Is A TOTAL DISASTER For Kristi Noem!

Episode Date: June 5, 2025

Sam Stein joins Tim Miller to discuss a growing scandal involving a fake assassination threat, a DHS press release that was never corrected, and a system built to punish first and ask questions later....

Transcript
Discussion (0)
Starting point is 00:00:00 Rural communities are being squeezed from every side. From rising health care costs to crumbling hospitals, from attacks on public schools to the fight for paid family and medical leave, farmers and small businesses are reeling from the trade war. And now, Project 2025 is back with a plan to finish what Elon Musk started. Trump and the Republicans won rural votes, then turned their backs on us. Join the One Country Project for the Rural Progress Summit, July 8th through the 10th.
Starting point is 00:00:36 This free virtual event brings together leaders like Senator Heidi Heitkamp, Secretary Pete Buttigieg, Governor Andy Beshear and others for real talk and real solutions. Together we'll tackle the most urgent issues facing rural America. Register today or learn more at ruralprogress.com. When everyone's chasing the same finance positions,
Starting point is 00:01:03 chartered business valuators stand out. CBVs are an elite group of trusted professionals, doing everything from deal advisory to litigation support to succession planning. CBVs are a preferred hire in investment banking, private equity, consulting, and many other areas with the potential to earn seven figures at the pinnacle of their careers. If you're starting your career in finance, back here with managing editor Sam Stein. We have just a jarring story that combines kind of the horror of the Trump immigration regime with the absurdity and like, veipish incompetence of the Trump administration,
Starting point is 00:01:48 all in one package with a little kind of assassination conspiracy, a little cruelty and a dollop of assassination conspiracy on top. So we're getting a lot there. So the time story, which we'll put up here, if you want to read the whole thing, an immigrant was accused of threatening to Trump, prosecutors say he was framed. Here's the short of it. We have an undocumented immigrant in Wisconsin, and the Department of Homeland Security put out a press release saying that this person had threatened to kill the president
Starting point is 00:02:17 and then self-deport myself back to Mexico. Kristi Noem went on to saying, thanks to our ICE officers, this illegal alien who threatened to assassinate President Trump is behind bars. Here's the problem. The guy, Ramon Morales Reyes, was not the person who wrote the letter threatening to assassinate the president. It was another guy, Demetrius Scott, who is apparently a thief, and he was going to, you know, be going to trial for an alleged robbery charge. The Milwaukee County prosecutors have called in Reyes to testify against the thief.
Starting point is 00:02:54 I guess he had been an eyewitness. And so, Scott, the alleged thief, decided that one way to silence the person that was going to testify against him was to write these letters threatening to assassinate Trump and pretending to be the undocumented immigrant and then saying in the messages like I'm unda, that's why, that's why the letter said I will self deport myself back to Mexico. It said that because he wanted them to know FYI blinking light, you Trump administration, you hate these immigrants. You hate the Browns. I go after this guy and, and Christie known bought it hook line and sinker.
Starting point is 00:03:32 I mean, that's the thing. That's the story that she bought a hook line and sink. The like the stupidest stupidest setup. I mean, actually it's not that stupid. It's kind of like perversely disgusting, but whatever, like to be duped that quickly and then to run out to the cameras and be like, we got them, we got them. And then to not admit mistakes. It's just how excitable they are, right? Exactly.
Starting point is 00:03:54 Just anything to like get in front of a camera and to issue a press release and to talk about how you're doing God's work by deporting these people who are threatening, you know, the president. And then to have no fucking shame or I would say to have no confidence to admit that you screwed it up and to just restore, try your best to restore balance. They've not done anything like that.
Starting point is 00:04:18 In fact, the press release they put out with the forged note, it's a forged note, is up on the DHS website currently as we speak. I mean, think about that. They know this note is a forgery used to set up someone in a like criminal conspiracy and they're not even taking it off the government website. No issue, no correction issued. They're just going to let it ride. It's just disturbing. Yeah, of course they're going to let it ride because they don't want, cause cause they don't want to do anything that undermines their narrative. Why is that? Of course. Why of course are they going to live? Well, because they don't apologize for anything. Yeah. But surely hold them to like some standards. We should, we
Starting point is 00:04:57 should. I'm just saying that it's of course, cause it's like, it's not surprising, right? Cause they, they don't want anything to undermine their narrative and they don't really care. It was a forgery. They were using this as a PR thing anyway. Do you think these folks were really concerned? The like the blind letter accusing an assassination, like that person was gonna come after Trump. I mean like the real threats to the president, if you're an actual person that is gonna try
Starting point is 00:05:17 to assassinate the Trump, you don't write like, dear sir, I'm an illegal Mexican man and I'm coming to get you. Like that's not- Here's my address, come get me first. Yeah. Like that's not my address. Come get me first. Like it's just not legit. So it was never a legitimate thing from the start. And they were just using it for PR purposes. And look, look how also using it to try to intimidate people. This was in the press release. All politicians and members of the media should
Starting point is 00:05:40 take notice of how these repeated attempts on president Trump's life and tone down their rhetoric. Just like this fake, like, Oh, like you guys need to tone down your rhetoric. All right. I'm a sanct being sanctimonious about this. It is what is behind all of the, like the reason why they have to do cloak and dagger about the assassin and the legit assassin and butler and like kind of pretend, you know, how they play these word games or it's like, Oh, they were going
Starting point is 00:06:09 to get Trump. They were going to get the Trump because they want to make it seem like these shadowy, you know, far leftists or immigrants or, you know, Palestinian sympathizers were the ones going to have to get Trump when really it was just like some white guy that was looking for attention, right? Right. And then they get you in this situation where you and I and others are out there and we rush to defend this guy who's been clearly set up and his life has been completely upended in dramatic fashion. They get you in a situation now we're defending this guy and like, ah, but he has some associations that are troubling and problematic.
Starting point is 00:06:44 He's been arrested a couple of times for other stuff. Sure. Look at you defending this. He crossed the border illegally and you're defending this guy and he was involved with this guy who's clearly a criminal and we don't really know if he didn't write that note. And it's like you get put into a situation where you're supposed to be defensive when in reality they fucked up. They made the big mistake.
Starting point is 00:07:05 They should own up to it. This is happening all the time where it's like, oh, someone took the wrong turn on a road and didn't have their single on and they pulled them over. It's like, they're out of the country. Is this really what we're going to base deportations on? These petty crimes are in this case, a completely set up crime. It puts you in an incredible bind if you want to defend the system. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:07:27 The department's statement here about Reyes is he will remain in custody. It's like this guy's obviously going to get deported. Is there any doubt? Yeah, no, there isn't any doubt, but it's just important to say it explicitly. The setup worked. Like the criminal conspiracy worked. That's the thing. They're going to help this guy get off the fucking, not off the charge, but they're helping the guy who committed the crime. That's the thing they they're gonna help this guy get off the fucking
Starting point is 00:07:49 Off it not off the charge, but they're helping the guy who committed the crime. It's crazy It is really something it's not the best of the brightest in these organizations and Did you see that gnome is kind of there's another article out there that gnome and is blowing through her budget and like they're really Worried about appropriations, but they can't stop spending money because they have to ramp up this shit. Yeah. Well, she's getting private on this top on the hill. I mean, like they're again, they're breaking the law. Like you're not allowed to do this. I asked James Comey about this on the pod a couple of weeks ago. And I was like, what was it like at the FBI? Like
Starting point is 00:08:18 if you wanted to spend money on an initiative that it hadn't been appropriated. And he was basically like, look, you have some discretion, you know, within limits, like there are pots of money that you're like, okay, we can use this. But he's like, when it comes right down to it at the end of the day, if I went way over, I have to go back to Congress or I couldn't do it. Right. We're held in contempt, right. They bring it over to Congress and these guys just don't care. So it's just, you know, Noem is way overspending her budget on a bunch of stuff that is largely farcical. I mean, and really cruel as well, but also just a lot of fuck ups. A lot of fuck ups and photo ops and trips to the border that totally are necessary,
Starting point is 00:09:01 dress up down in El Salvador. It's just show. It's all designed to get press releases. Yeah. Marsha Blackburn, I saw popped in on this as well. So there's a big, no, just a, just, she was also like, look, we have to get out this migrant that was trying to assassinate president Trump. I mean, so like, there was a follow on effect of this too, because that's what they want out there. I will just encourage people, you have, but this this puts you in you should be on guard for any announcement that they make.
Starting point is 00:09:27 You just have to be because you can't really take what they say at face value. You should verify and authenticate and be skeptical of it. It doesn't mean that they're not going to be right. They might be right. But like you can't, anytime they have an announcement around this stuff from here on out, and probably beforehand, you need to be skeptical of it. Yeah, judges and courts are finding that out as well. Sure.
Starting point is 00:09:47 Okay, brother, there's another update for everybody. Subscribe to the feed, we're monitoring this stuff so you don't have to and we'll be back here soon, I'm sure with more Elon drama. So we'll see you all then. Probably.

There aren't comments yet for this episode. Click on any sentence in the transcript to leave a comment.