Bulwark Takes - Tim Miller: Cover-Up Shows Epstein Is Trump’s Weak Spot

Episode Date: September 9, 2025

Tim Miller joins Stephanie Ruhle on MSNBC’s The 11th Hour to take on the looming Democratic showdown over a potential government shutdown, Trump’s slipping poll numbers on key issues like immigration and trade, and why Democrats need to pick smart fights that define the stakes heading into 2026. They also discuss the Epstein cover-up allegations, what Trump’s actions reveal about his political vulnerabilities, and how Democrats can leverage oversight to keep the pressure on. Watch The 11th Hour with Stephanie Ruhle – https://www.msnbc.com/11th-hour

Hey, everybody. I just did a late night shift one-on-one with Steph Rule. I got grilled on a bunch of stuff. And I kind of expanded my thoughts from this morning with Bill Crystal about this Democratic shutdown fight coming up. I think that it's just super important that the Democrats take this opportunity to really define the debate going into next year. And I think that a lot of people are going to try to frame this up as they should fight or not fight. And it's like, well, no. I mean, I think most of us agree

they should fight. There'll probably be some, I don't know, who knows, there'll be a couple of zeros over on Capitol Hill who think that the Democrats should just cut a deal or whatever. But I think most people, at this point, the Democrats have woken up to the fact that they need to punch back. I mean, if for nothing else, for their own dignity. The question is to what end, right? Because if eventually the government shuts down

with the Democrats deal, then I probably seven of them are going to fold eventually, okay? So if you go from that premise, it's like, all right, well, how do you frame this debate up? What do you ask for? That's the key question. I'll go deeper into this in the next week or so with some folks who really, I think, are more steeped in like the options and what that looks like from a polling standpoint, from policy standpoint. I throw out a couple ideas on MS. but MS, those of us

who are on the inside we just call it MS. Because it's about to be MS now, MS now. Just whatever. If you don't know

what I'm talking about, just you'll figure it out eventually. But those ideas that I pitched don't necessarily have to beat them, right? Like they're going to figure out what is in line with their values, what is popular,

what, where are the MAGA Republicans vulnerable? Where might there be some Republicans that would agree with them? Right? Like, don't give them stuff to bail them out, right? Find wedge issues.

This is fucking politics. Find wedge issues. Find areas where, you know, you are stronger on the policies, where it's going to create issues internally within the Republican coalition, choose those issues, and say, come on, put up or shut up. I think that's really the path forward. So we give them some other political questions as well, including Epstein. So stick around for that.

Subscribe to the feed. I'll be back later. See you all then, peace. Whether it's Trump's use of the National Guard, threats to investigate political rivals, or his family's business deals, the New York Times, Ezra Klein, warns, this is not normal, writing in part the following.

I'm quite certain that this moment deserves real opposition, that Democrats, morally speaking, should not fund a government that Trump is turning into a tool of personal enrichment and power. It is absolutely the case that Democrats could lose a shutdown, but whether they are doing it right now, What they are doing right now, it is not called winning. Tim Miller, host of the Bullwark podcast,

and the former communications director for Republican Jeb Bush, joins us to discuss. Tim, I read this Ezra Klein piece and I said, you are the man I wanted to discuss this with. Do you think he's right? And the only lover for opposition is the government shut down? Well, no, I don't think it's the only lever. I think it's an important lever that the Democrats should use.

And I agree with Ezra. directionally, that it's important for the Democrats to use the opportunity to fight and to fight for something and to demonstrate to their voters and to not even voters that didn't support them, that there are issues that they are passionate about, that they're going to fight for working people in particular when it comes to the cuts we're seeing from this administration. At the end of the day, it's tough, right? You have to make a strategic choice, right? You're playing against an opponent here. You have to understand where they don't actually care if they shut the government down, right? I mean, Donald Trump kind of wants to shut the government down, possibly. So, you know, there's a little asymmetry here when thinking about the strategy,

and I think Democrats should be smart about it. But my view to any Democrat that would ask would be, look, you have to fight over this. I would pick a couple of issues that you're really passionate about and say, these are our red lines. Look, if you want us to help you keep the government open, then you have to make sure that we reinstate some of the Medicaid cuts, or don't fund ICE officials unless they show their face, or, you know, whatever. You could pick. There are a million different things. That's kind of the job of Hakeem, Jeffries, and Chuck Schumer. But they should have something clear that the American people

know what they're fighting for. And if they have that going for them, they should do it. Well, according to a new NBC poll, he's below 50% approval on some of his top issues, right? border security deportations trade and inflation like those are honestly the core group of things that i would say thrust him into the white house the second time what does that signal to you well it signals that folks like aren't that happy uh there's at least there's some group of folks that voted for him that are not that happy with the way that the stuff has been executed i think i've said a couple of times maybe on this show so on some others that had he just got in there and done nothing, right? He just gulfed and renames the Gulf of Mexico and whatever, you know,

change the Rose Garden to the Panera patio, whatever else he wants to do. Those numbers would all be higher, right? Like, it's the one big beautiful bill that's not popular, the tariffs aren't popular. Some of the immigration stuff has been popular, but some of it has been deeply unpopular, you know, particularly, as I mentioned, the masked agents, like grabbing people off the streets and the degree to which they've gone after people who aren't criminals, even though some of his voters thought that he was just going to focus on criminal migrants. So I think his execution on the policies, on like the substantive policies have been bad and broadly unpopular. Now, not catastrophically unpopular. He's not like a Bush-Katrina numbers there, but the numbers are

still not good and they're going the wrong direction. Democrats have made redistricting a big part of their midterm messaging. What do you think about that? I think that it's important that they fight to the nail on the redistrict. I don't think that people care that much about redistricting, qua redistricting is like a topic that you're going to put into TV ads. And some people care, obviously. People that are very engaged care. You know, watching this probably care. But, you know, regular voters, I think, are going to be motivated more by some of the other issues that Trump has offered them, particularly, you know, cutting taxes for the rich while cutting Medicaid and some of the other things that I've mentioned already.

So I think it's important that in each of these blue states, they try to squeeze every seat out policy. And they fight, you know, fire with fire here with the Republicans on redistricting. But, you know, I don't know that those kind of more esoteric concepts are like the top issue that you should be focused on in campaign messaging, if that makes sense. The racy birthday message, the president allegedly sent to Jeffrey Epstein his birthday book, Body, yes. That's not a word I've even, I can't even remember the last time I used it until this article came out. the White House, it's still denying its Trump signature. Where do you think this thing's going to go? And from a political

standpoint, do you think it's going to continue to hurt Trump, or will people grow fatigued by this? Yeah. Well, look, I've never been on the view of this. It's like the silver bullet that Epstein thing's going to take him down that some people have said. I do think that they're obviously covering something up. I think it's bad

politics for him. And he is acting like it's bad. He knows it's bad politics. Just watch his actions. I think there's a group of his supporters who really genuinely care about this, whether that's in the manosphere or some even on the MAGA right, that have made this, like, pedophile sex trafficking ring, like central to their personality and their interest for the past eight years. I think he could lose some ground with them. And I also just think that obviously this has become a major problem for him, or else they wouldn't be covering it up. So not maybe a major problem to, like, oh, the end is near for Trump,

but something that's like a political issue they've got to manage. And you look at this Royal Street Journal story out today, and now we've seen the picture of this letter we knew about. We also see this other thing, which is like a check, I guess one of these big checks, like the publisher's clearinghouse checks that it was like a gift from Trump to Epstein, where he's talking about purchasing a woman from him. Again, we've just seen this one picture, so we don't know all the details, but that's very creepy and suspicious.

I would just say this. There's been a lot of criticisms, including for me, about the Democrats not fighting as much as they could over the course of these nine months. You have Robert Garcia getting in there at Oversight Committee. The Dems are now demanding that we have oversight on this cover-up. We're already seeing some of the fruits of that, right? Like, they're obviously covering something up. There's more information about Trump's relationship with Epstein.

And the longer this goes on, the more of this stuff will trickle out. Republicans have been very good at leveraging this when they've, you know, using their oversight and they're in the Biden years and Obama years. and I think you're seeing some of that now from the Democrats. And I suspect there will be more to come out. We wouldn't have known about this big check until today if it wasn't. I just appreciate that you referenced a publisher's clearinghouse check. I recently called it a Star Search check and realized everyone around me was too young to know what I was talking about.

Am I old now? Did I make an old guy reference? At least I didn't reference the bobsy twins. Trump represented reference the bobsy twins the other day. I was like, what is that? I googled it was from 1905. I'm like, then you have to be with my dad who is not joining us tonight.