Bulwark Takes - Trump Appoints “Alpha Male” Twitter Troll U.S. Ambassador?!

Episode Date: July 11, 2025

Trump’s latest ambassador pick is a self-proclaimed “alpha male” who tweets about going to Hooters, eating an absurd amount of steak, and detailed stories where “everyone clapped.” Sonny Bunch and Will Sommer deep dive into the wild rise of Nick Adams from Australian bird-hating deputy mayor to MAGA TikTok influencer, and now to being appointed U.S. ambassador to Malaysia.

Welcome back to the Bulwark. I am Sonny Bunch. I'm the culture editor at the Bulwark. I'm very pleased to be joined today by Will Sommer to talk about what is possibly the craziest. And then, you know, we're using, there's a lot of options to choose from here. But I think probably the craziest ambassadorial pick that I can remember, certainly in recent memory. Will, who is the new ambassador to Malaysia? He is, I guess, Twitter power user, Trump, Slavish devotee and self-proclaimed alpha male, Nick Adams. Judy has called me to serve my country overseas, not in the uniform of combat, but armed with

the pen of diplomacy. I don't know anything about Nick Adams besides what I see on Twitter, right? On Twitter he has this kind of persona as being a true alpha male. You know, he tweets about going to Hooters and having wings for dinner because that's what a real man eats for food. I always thought this was a bit. I always thought he was doing a bit, like kind of a kind of a parody, but not really like an earnest parody. Is that not the case? Well, I mean, I think it is a bit, but one that he also seems to believe in. I mean,

he's kind of for folks who weren't aware of this guy, and this is truly I feel both a sense of amusement, because it's really not that big a problem, I guess, but also a sense of dread that this is where the country's at. And like, even all the news we've seen from this administration the past five months or so, I saw this and I just thought, oh no, you know, this is bad. So basically, if people aren't aware of this guy, this is a guy who goes on Twitter and kind of has, you know, he does lectures and whatever. And he's almost like a child's idea of an alpha, like just like a big, like burly man. He's an Australian guy.

He became a citizen, I think four years ago or so, a citizen of the United States. So he talks in a big Australian accent. He's a burly guy. He says things like, oh, I want to go to Judas with me, mate. So just give me the morning for an alpha male. You want to eat as much steak and as many eggs as possible.

Indefinitely, you are plunging without a shadow of a doubt. So just give me the morning for an alpha male. You want to eat as much steak and as many eggs as possible. Indefinitely you are plunging without a shadow of a doubt. Alphas go in the birthday suit. They plunge. Mika, my friend won't let me go golfing today. And so he's that's his deal. And you might say, well, I miss the part about where he's a, you know, an experienced diplomat or he's an expert on Malaysia.

I did miss that actually. Could you explain to me his his background here? What's the what is the diplomatic background that he's bringing? That's because I mean look I know these political appointees are often big campaign donors people who get these ambassador jobs but this is really wild. Trump in the first administration appointed him to the board of the Wilson Center, which is like a foreign affairs operation. And so I guess he has like some some claim to foreign policy credibility there. And you know, there's a Washington Post profile of him last year that said he took that apparently relatively seriously. But this is a truly bizarre character. He's kind of like a like a less malignant Andrew Tate in terms of his talk about like being a man and stuff like that.

If you imagine, I mean, that's who Trump now has made the ambassador. That's an interesting way of phrasing it, like a less malignant Andrew Tate. Because again, I always thought that this was kind of a... You know, people have characters on Twitter, you know, and sometimes they're just exaggerations of things they actually believe you know sometimes they're They're full put-ons. I always thought this was closer to the the full put-on Range of the spectrum, but I guess not it does also raise a very troubling truth about our time Which is that you know we used to say the internet is not real life We used to say the internet is not the real world and that is just

Not the case anymore. Yeah, that's exactly. I mean, this is a guy who has posted his way into being an ambassador I mean his he has this devotion to Trump. He would say Trump is the ultimate alpha male Donald Trump is an alpha lion and through that he has sort of worked his way I mean, this is a can I just get into his backstory here? I mean this guy's he's a very like kind of a very Trumpian figure. And again, comparing him to Trump or to Andrew Tate is like a little unfair to Nick Adams because he he doesn't seem quite as evil. You may perhaps I shouldn't say evil, but like quite as nasty of a fellow. But he does. I mean, he speaks

very unpleasantly about women, I would say, in a bit more of a jokey tone. But his story is that he was in his early 20s when he became the deputy mayor of a town in Australia. And he did these very kind of Trumpian publicity, kind of like 80s Trump things where so the avian flu was going around. And he said, we've got to kill every pigeon in town. And then he had a press conference and there were no pigeons around. So he said, oh, my gosh, I got to run into this bird feed store. And he poured out all the bird feed around the press conferences before it started. So then the pigeons were everywhere and people were like, well, maybe we do have a pigeon problem.

They're really all over the place. And so ultimately, his pursuit of sort of MAGA stardom in the United States appears to have cost him whatever political career he had in Australia. But, you know, he seems to be doing well for himself. Obviously, he is. He's now going to be the ambassador. I mean, he's it truly is a guy who just posted relentlessly. And now he's here.

Let that be a lesson to everyone out there. Never give up on your dreams. Always keep posting. And eventually, eventually it'll pay off. Uh, you know, we should, we look, Malaysia is not obviously the most important strategic alliance with the United States. It's not a small country, but it's not enormous either. What should we expect from the, whatever the Malaysian court of St. James is, I don't even

know what the, I don't know what you call it. What should we expect in the diplomatic realm with Malaysia going forward here? Well, you know, it's funny you mentioned that he seems to be playing a character or what have you, because he put out this video, people became aware of this because he put out a video today that looks very stately and saying, you know, citizenship calls people to different roles and I have been called to foreign service and now I'm off to Malaysia. You know, I think a lot of people thought it was a joke, but then the White House, you know, put out a statement saying it was real. So one wonders how much does Trump think because this guy is Australian, that, you know, Malaysia is relatively close to Australia, so we should send him over there. I mean, I will say the current ambassador is like an actual diplomat. It's a guy

like a long-time Foreign Service staffer who speaks many languages, stuff like this. So it's an interesting thing. I mean, one wonders as well how the Malaysians will take him. You know, in a way it would be sort of like if we sent like Johnny Bravo to your country. You know, he's always like, you know, he's very similar to that. Sure. Sending Johnny Bravo overseas as a diplomatic mission is, that should be a series. That actually, you're pitching something great here. I guess my final question, and maybe you don't know this, because you're not an expert on Malaysian cuisine or the restaurant scene there.

Is there a Hooters in Malaysia for him to have food at? You know, that's a great question. You know, yeah, let's get into the whole Hooters thing. I mean, he does seem very like, he reminds me in some ways of Jacob Wohl, if people remember that right-wing provocateur. He's very into these sort of like trademark bits and into telling stories that no one could possibly believe. Like he has this one, he tells this report for the Washington Post. He said something along the lines of like,

busty, highly educated Latinas. And then we went to the gym and I busted out a new personal record on the bench. Everyone was cheering and all this stuff. And then when the report, and you know, the Latinas were cheering me on. And then the reporter says, well, like, could I contact them?

What are their names? He says, oh, I can't expose them to the fake news, all this stuff. He's also someone who I think enjoys baiting people. And, you know, as much of his engagement, I think perhaps most of it came from people just, you know, oh, I hate this guy, this idiot. You know, he doesn't get it. And, you know, he seems to at least get some of it.

I mean, he's always saying, you know, let me he he in terms of golf, he'll say, you know, my girlfriend, I don't want her bothering me when I'm having a foursome with the boys. And people say, a foursome? You know, what's this guy talking about? I just keep coming back to the idea of K-Fave. You know, this is a favored, it's an old professional wrestling term. JVL, Jonathan V. Last at the Bullwork uses it a lot.

And I think it's a pretty good way of understanding, you know, who is being serious and who isn't at any given moment and who considers himself, you know, a quote, smart mark and can see through the kayfabe and who can't. And I always just kind of assumed that this guy was, you know, partaking in that, partaking in that on a higher level. And it's not clear to me if doing the kayfabe is what got him the job or if nobody in the White House understands what's...

I just, I can't fathom it. I can't fathom it, Will. This has broken me in a way that even Mecca Hitler couldn't it's a it's a lot to take in Do you mind if I I saved a couple things I wanted to discuss here He's because this guy he puts out so so much content, you know He wrote a book called alpha Kings that explains some amount of his wealth I guess he does a lot of these double entendres So he says, you know things like going to the butcher and he'll say I love watching Mario handle my meat and you know,

But people for what it's worth he he resonates with a certain audience It seems like a lot of MAGA guys appear to take him as a sort of like like a mascot or like Kind of this again like a cartoon character. Yeah. Well, we do we live in cartoonish time. So that makes sense So best of luck Malaysia do we live in cartoonish time so that makes sense. So best of luck Malaysia. Don't do it. You know maybe you guys can take him for a while. Yeah. Well thanks for explaining the Nick Adams situation to us. Make sure you go sign up at thebullwork.com for Will's newsletter false flag. It's great. He goes into all sorts of stuff like this on a regular basis. You can't understand what's happening in Washington DC if you're not keeping track of the online right, because once again, uh, the

internet has crept up on real life in a way that should make all of us very sad. Yeah. Well, I'm going to get back to posting. I'm hopeful. I've got my eye on an embassy, uh, the tropical locale. Excellent. Good, good luck.