Bulwark Takes - Trump Throws Multi-Billion Dollar Tantrum

Episode Date: May 30, 2025

Sam Stein and Will Saletan discuss Trump’s $20 billion demand in lawsuit against CBS over 60 Minutes' interview edit of Kamala Harris, and the bizarre legal claims and plaintiffs behind it.

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Dip approved by ketchup, tiny barbecue, honey mustard, honey mustard, Sprite, McFlurry, Big Mac sauce, double dipped in Buffalo and ranch, more ranch and creamy chili McCrispy strip dip. Now at McDonald's. Hey guys, Sam Stein, managing editor at the Bulwark here with Will Salatin to discuss the Trump lawsuit against 60 minutes over editing that is happening. It's actually a lawsuit against Paramount a couple of news stories that broke over the past 24 hours that have both perplexed me and to a degree I've been humored by one of them. The main story was from Wall Street Journal Paramount has offered Trump $15 million I believe to settle this lawsuit.

Let me just let's say Trump wants I believe $20 billion, which is extra $20 billion for CBS is editing of this transcript, which they didn't you do that for every interview, but whatever Paramount says here's $15 million. Trump says no, I want 25 plus. I want an apology from CBS as well. And although by the way, I'm going to threaten another lawsuit. So it looks like that's going pretty well. First, we'll do that one. And then I want to get to the variety story about the Trump side of the equation, which I think is hysterical for a number of different reasons. But what did you make of what I think is

essentially just a shakedown and in another way, you can call it a form of bribery to get this merger done. But what do you make of it? Oh, Sam, it's totally a shakedown. It's totally. By the way, for anybody, if you, if you guys heard Sam say what sounded like a million, he said billion. Like we need Mike Myers in here to like $100 billion. This is like kind of like the Trump trade negotiations where he's like 145% terrifying you 145% tariffs on China. And that is basically an embargo. They deserve it. Then like a week later, he's like, that seems really high.

Let me just jump in for a second. And that was because there was something that happened yesterday. It just really tickled me where they're they're asking about this. And he's like, and he just basically pulled down the curtain. He's like, I say crazy numbers like just because I because it's part of that. He's like 145 percent. Even I was like, that's insane. It's like, oh, yeah, no kidding.

And it's gone. Sorry. No, he has this kind of lobotomy thing where he was like, that's insane. It's like, oh yeah, no kidding. Hey, go on, sorry. No, he has this kind of lobotomy thing where he was like, you know, somebody told me the tariff was like 145 and that just seemed like a nutty, that's way too high. 145% is very high and it won't be that high. Not gonna be that high. Like dude, who do you think did that?

Do you read your own social media account? It was crazy. So he comes into this media lawsuit stuff with the same attitude. Like he comes first, by the way, it was like 10 billion. Then he got mad, he was like 20 billion. And then it turns out they're negotiating for 25 million. So that's like a thousand fold reduction, but still,

he's like not happy with. By the way, Sam, are we in agreement that the correct number here should be zero, zero dollars? Of course. It's absurd. I mean, just so people know, like the editing that they did, if you actually look at the transcript versus what they showed, also, they showed the part of the transcript that they cut out in a separate online video. Like it's all out there. And every TV interview, literally every TV interview is edited. I mean, Trump goes on Fox news all the time.

It's edited. They don't play his entire rambling incoherent answers. They edit it because they have to compress it into a timeframe. None of this is abnormal, but Trump had his feelings hurt. Yeah. Yeah. I'm, but just to be clear, we're talking about a guy, Trump, who literally just posts fake stuff, fake videos.

He posted a, what was the latest one? He hitting Bruce Springsteen with a golf ball, you know, like, they just fake stuff and he puts it up there and then he's suing media companies because they truncated it. And Sam, you're totally right about this. It's not like the full Kamala Harris thing hasn't been released in transcript that the longer version hasn't been posted. It was just like they posted the whole thing in one place and then another place they did truncated version.

So there was no cover up anybody who wanted to see the full version. This happens to us in journalism all the time. There's a short version and then there's a long version. And did I mention the part where Trump's whole speech that he gave on Memorial Day at Arlington Cemetery has been magically deleted from the White House website? Like they're- $25 billion lawsuit right there. I'm filing it tomorrow.

It's insane. I mean, it's insane because yeah, no, no, the obviously what's happening here is that Paramount wants to, to, uh, have a merger, uh, with what is it? Skydance or something like that. Yeah, Skydance. And this is a bribe, basically. They're saying we're going to put 15 million at least into Trump's pockets or whatever, you know, library he puts together,

by the way, that library is going to be plush with a plane and everything, but they're going to put that money into it. And in exchange, the agreement will be that you allow for this merger to happen. That is bribery. And this is bribery. And someone was putting it on blue sky or somewhere else. And I forget who it was, but they're like, Democrats just come out and be like, we, you know, that's prosecutable bribery. You're bribing a public official. Now, I don't know if that would ever, you know, translate, but at least like level the threat and make paramount think twice about what they're doing.

Oh, yeah. Yeah. So there are apparently three Democratic senators who have alleged that this is bribery. And so we have the directors of Paramount being they're now anxious, according to the report, about whether they're going to be criminally liable for bribery if they pay this, obviously extorted. I mean, it's extortion on one end and it's bribery on the other because they have $8 billion in the merger at stake in before the FCC. So 25 million, you know, it's kind of change. It's a it's a schmear. It's a it's a schmear, right? It's a schmear on the bagel. Now you're speaking my language. Yes. Okay. What kind of bagel are we talking about? We have to work on the point here. This is a definitely kind of some kind of bagel. So

the Wall Street Journal story has a great line, great section. And let me, let me just read you this one sentence. It says, so the directors of Paramount, the executives and everybody, they're anxious about where they're going to get liable for bribery, but their argument is quote, by settling within the range of what other companies have paid to end litigation with Trump, some Paramount executives hope to minimize their liability. So we're talking about the range of what other companies have paid.

In other words, Sam, it's a whole racket. Other companies, Disney, Meta, X, they've all paid off Trump in similar situations, right? So basically, it's like the law firms. There's an understood bribery extortion level for everyone Therefore it just with the nice you to do it too. Exactly. That's everybody does it No, they I mean this is all happening in the context of the law firms that have actually not settled winning in court and it seems very clear to me that

If Paramount were to just say no, we're not gonna let we're gonna fight this suit, which they're doing I should say they are doing this at the same time that they're negotiating. They're gonna prevail which brings me to the variety piece so like I said, there is a separate Avenue here where Paramount is in fact trying to dismiss this case against 60 minutes on grounds that it's the most ridiculous thing possible and The Trump team has filed a motion to deny the dismissal and it's so funny, but some of it I just can't really comprehend. I'm hoping you can unpack it for me. So this is an actual paragraph from variety. And I just, I've been trying to like wrap my head around it because I'm having trouble making sense. I'm going to read a verbatim and

then I want to get Will to sort of explain it to me. It goes like this. A key point of Trump's legal argument is that the edited versions of the 60 minutes Kamala Harris interview represent commercial speech and that as alleged in the president's lawsuit, CBS competes for advertising with Trump's media businesses, including Truth Social's parent company, Trump Media and Technology Group, which is majority owned by the president. With the edited Harris interview, CBS conduct includes news distortion, constituted commercial speech, which cannot be by any reasonable interpretation be found to have constituted editorial judgment, and that speech damaged plaintiffs, the filing says. I mean, I really don't know what the fuck that means I'm hoping you can explain it

so I can't claim to understand all of the technicalities of this but I can tell you what the upshot of it is that sentence that paragraph shows that what Trump is claiming that all these major media that he's suing for various things, they're all his financial competitors, right? It's all commercial. It's a run of TV network. He's claiming that it's a, they're in competition with Trump, with a Trump media and technology group, um, which is the, you know, the parent company of True Social.

So, but, but Sam think for a minute about what this means. If he can sue all media companies because they are all financial competitors, then number one, that gives him license to violate the First Amendment. If every media company is a competitor of yours and you get to claim that they're getting some kind of commercial advantage against your company

or they're hurting your company when they mess with editing, that's just a blanket authorization to violate the first amendment. How did the how did the how did the edit of the interview create a commercial advantage? I'm guessing that's what the lawyer is going to ask. It's not a different wavelength in my brain is accustomed to so I just have a job.

Fine. The other part of this that really like was kind of hilarious to me. There's two other parts. One is that they claim that the 60 minutes editing of the Harris interview quote, led to widespread confusion and mental anguish of consumers, including plaintiffs regarding a household name of the legacy media, apparently deceptively distorting its broadcasts and then resisting attempts to clear the public record. So look, well, you are, you are a consumer.

Tell me the level of confusion and mental anguish that you felt when you found out that the interview was edited. Were you in bed for days? Was it true? Did you have trouble eating? I'm here for you. Did they not call us snowflakes? Did they not call? We're like the snowy boys, you know, like we can't, I will admit though, I will

admit I had trouble sleeping for a couple of days when I, it was a dark place I went to. No one is going to say this in court, but I wish the response brief from the, from the Paramount side simply said to the Trumpers with their mental anguish, cry harder. This entire MAGA movement based on not caring about, they don't care about anyone's feelings. You know, facts don't care about your feelings, but now it's mental anguish. Oh my God. All right. The last thing I want to talk about is, and I had no clue until I read this, Ronnie Jackson apparently is a co plaintiff with Trump and his media company. What the fuck?

I don't get it. Where did that come from? I do not the fuck? I don't get it. Where did that come from? I do not know, except that they're using it. So they're using Sam as a doctor that diagnosed the mental. I don't want to get I don't want to get the bulwark into legal trouble with all the things that can and should be said about Ronnie Jackson. The idea that you know, Ronnie Jackson is a plaintiff in this case has about as much merit as the idea that Ronny Jackson is a qualified doctor. He's like,

his whole shtick is basically, remember, this is the guy who for four years gave completely baseless diagnoses from TV of Joe Biden. I find it absolutely, just like you do, inconceivable that this man has prostate cancer after just leaving the White House. Right. That was his whole thing. Oh, Dr. Jackson's got, so he's a total faker. But Sam, they're using this Texas statute about, you know, a consumer statute that it's misleading

to do. Ah, okay, so that's... Which is, again, hilarious coming from Trump who, you know, posts all kinds of misleading stuff. Can I flag one other thing here that really worries me though? We've now had, basically what's going on here is the corporate bosses of these media companies wanna settle, because they're business people.

And they have no backbone. They're looking at the bottom line, we wanna do this merger, right? Meanwhile, the actual news people, like the CEO of CBS News, they're bailing. They're just like, I don't wanna have any part of this. ABC, you know, they settled with Trump. Stephanopoulos wouldn't issue an apology, the Trumpers, Trump is holding out for an apology. That's what he wants. And if he gets that, Sam, that's worse than any amount

of money. Because what he's trying to do is rewrite history, right? He wants the truth, he wants the record to say that they admitted that they were that he's been wronged, just like he did with the law firms, every law firm that settled he goes out at the White House and says, you know, they settled with me with me. That means they admit they did wrong. Don't admit you did wrong. You didn't. He's trying to buy their integrity. That's exactly. He's trying to buy history. He's trying to buy the truth. Yeah, no, it's a serious I mean, we spent a lot of time laughing and it's good to laugh during the stuff

But it's a serious fucking thing and if Paramount does settle The damage they will have inflicted on their own company and its integrity and reputation Will be astronomical is it worth that eight billion trillion whatever fucking merger? But we will never apologize no, definitely not fuck that. All right. Well, thank you so much, man. We got to do this more often. I mean, this is just too too much fun.