Bulwark Takes - Trump’s Lies Exposed by His Own Administration

Episode Date: May 7, 2025

Tim Miller joins Nicolle Wallace on MSNBC’s Deadline: White House to discuss Donald Trump’s abuse of the Alien Enemies Act, his targeting of critics like Miles Taylor, and his administration’s purge of military leaders.

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covered a bunch of stuff that I wanted to share with you because we hit three different important topics. The first one was this DNI analysis of the threat of Trento, Aragua, and whether it could possibly plausibly qualify under the Alien Enemies Act the Trump administration is using to deport these Venezuelans and send them to the fucking hell prison in El Salvador? And the answer is obviously not. And so I talked about the political implications of that. I'm going to talk to Jim Himes, who's on the Intelligence Committee later. So check back on the feed and subscribe to the feed. And this is an interview with Jim Himes who can kind of talk about the technical elements to this and what exactly is happening with the intelligence. But on the political side, I think it's going to create real problems for their argument, at least as far as sending future Venezuelans to El Salvador. We're not sure how much it's doing for the ones that are there currently.

So we get into that. We get into all the Hegseth drama, just, you know, the firing signal, the incompetence. And on top of that, we get into there's this interview with Miles Taylor, who I'd worked with on Republican voters against Trump back in the day, about how he's being targeted by the president and the ramifications of that. And that stuff is pretty heavy. So all three very important topics. Check it out. We'll be back here for more Bulwark content soon. We'll see you then. Now, a new memo from Donald Trump's own National Intelligence Council directly contradicts his claims that the Alien Enemies Act was vital to

protect our national security because, as he said there, quote, they invaded our country. In his proclamation announcing he was invoking the Alien Enemies Act, Trump said this, TDA is undertaking hostile actions and conducting irregular warfare against the territory of the U.S., both directly and at the direction, clandestine or otherwise, of the Maduro regime in Venezuela. Now, according to his own intelligence community, that was not the case. The Maduro regime probably does not have a policy of cooperating with TDA and is not directing TDA movement to and operations in the U.S. Venezuelan security forces have periodically engaged in armed confrontations with TDA, resulting in the killing of some TDA members. Trump also said this,

quote, TDA has engaged in and continues to engage in mass illegal migration to the U.S. to further its objectives of harming U.S. citizens. That, too, was contradicted by Donald Trump's own intelligence community. The memo says this, quote, intelligence indicating that regime leaders are directing or enabling Tren de Aragua migration to the U.S. is not credible. It probably would require extensive coordination and funding between regime entities and TDA leaders that we would collect. Now, this damning piece of evidence that Trump's own intelligence community found little evidence

for invoking the Alien Enemies Act comes as a second judge ruled that Donald Trump's use of the Alien Enemies Act was not, quote, validly invoked since respondents have not demonstrated the existence of a war invasion

or predatory incursion. Joining our coverage, MSNBC political analyst, host of the Bulwark podcast, Tim Miller. Also joining us, former top official at the Department of Justice, MSNBC legal analyst, Andrew Weissman. Andrew Weissman, your reaction. I want to make sure people understand there are people in jail for potentially the rest of their lives in El Salvador based on the government's actions, sometimes mistakenly, meaning they took the wrong person against an existing court order, that is Mr. Abrego Garcia, where the court is valiantly trying to get him back. But there are plane loads of people who are sitting in prison based on the government invoking the Alien Enemies Act and violating the law because the Supreme Court has said in a 9-0 decision that those people had a

right to due process, to be heard. And this document, the one that you have outlined, Nicole, is why. It is a document that shows that their own administration said that there's no way to tie the actions of this gang, even if you can show that the people that you've extracted from this country and shoved into a prison with no due process, even if you can show that they're part of this gang, the law does not apply. And so it's really a lesson to why you want due process, that there's a legal fault here, there's a factual fault here. You have judges in this country, district court judges up to the Supreme Court of the United States saying this is lawless activity. And you now also have a document that shares a lack of candor with the court by the administration when they're standing up trying to invoke this law and saying black is white. And so this is really a remarkable document. But to just begin where, to end where I began,

people are in jail as a result of this really egregious error. Tim Miller, what do you think happens now? Yeah, we're a little bit in Groundhog Day here, right? Because I agree with every single word that Andrew said there up to the very last one, which was error. And error implies it was a mistake, and I don't really think it was. I think that this is what the administration did the first time. This is what they're doing this time, which is Trump wants to do something. They create a series of lies and fabrications and exaggerations to justify or rationalize whatever Trump wants to do. And then they get sued. Then they go to court.

Or they have an expert somewhere within the administration, in this case, maybe in the intelligence department, that writes a memo that is actually knowledgeable about this. It's not trying to backfill whatever insane thing Trump wants to do. And either in court or in an internal government document, they write what the truth is, which is completely opposite. And anybody that knew anything about Venezuela before this knew that Maduro was not directing Trenda Aragua to invade the country, right? And it was a ridiculous lie. So in some

reason, in some ways, this memo is interesting because it's the government admitting it, right? But it's just the government admitting the obvious fact that everybody already knew, which was they were creating this lie to create a rationale to send people to El Salvador because they wanted to do it because they wanted to scare people because they're cruel, for whatever other, because Stephen Miller wasn't hugged as a child. Whatever the rationale is, that is what was happening here. So what happens now is we go through the same same regular moral we did every time the first time, which is they're going to lose in court.

We wait to see what the Supreme Court says. They stall. You know, they don't want, they never admit fault. They don't want to bring anybody back. And, you know, they do a tap dance where they're like, well, the court says this, the court says that. But now they're in the custody of Bukele, and we can't do anything about it. So I don't know. And like the answer is how much pressure can be put on them to fold. If you look back to the first term, like the child separation, eventually they stopped. Right. But like the kids that were separated were already

separated, you know? And so I think they probably end up losing here and have to stop doing this. What happens to Andre and Neri and the people that are in that hole in El Salvador for no reason? I think that's a more complicated question. He's made the case that airing my grievances about him as president wasn't just mean or unfair, but that it was an act of treason, which is punishable by death in the United States. You don't need a permission slip in the United States to criticize the president. It is not classified to criticize the president of the United States. And any suggestion to the contrary is truly un-American. And what I worry about is that they will try to use this tactic,

this bludgeon of the bully pulpit of the presidency, to go shut people up by threatening them and getting them to settle. That's Miles Taylor. He's speaking out for the first time since Donald Trump signed a memo last month accusing Taylor of leaking classified information and ordering a review of his work.

Now, let's be clear, there is zero evidence for what Trump is accusing Taylor of doing. Taylor is vowing to fight back against Donald Trump's politically motivated retribution campaign in court. He also detailed the chilling and dangerous reality, though, of being targeted by the president of the United States. We were told by security experts to go update our last will and testament. That's a real conversation you have to have with your wife. As someone says to you, look, I think by the president calling you a traitor, you're exposing yourself potentially to violent retribution from his supporters. You and Hannah should go update your wills

so that your daughter is going to have a named guardian. Tim, these are not campaign trail threats or promises of retribution from the podium at a rally. This is now the government of the United States. Yeah, it's a direct order that the president made of his department of justice to investigate these folks there's already real consequences that are happening and you just heard miles talking about the security considerations we can't imagine what the costs of all that are um we mentioned i think when i was on last week about chris krebs uh the other person that was targeted via executive order had to leave his job uh because he worked worked at a cybersecurity company that does business with the government.

So there's already ramifications happening, even if they don't get indicted on false pretenses or any of the worst case scenario type stuff, right? Like there are already real ramifications and it's happening at the direction of the president of the United States, not some mid-level person in DOJ with a grudge, which wouldn't be good, right? But that'd be a scandal you could deal with. It's the president of the United States directing this. And I keep trying to think of a parallel with Miles as maybe a closer one. Think of your colleague when you

were in the Bush administration, Scott McClellan, who ends up writing a book and is critical of the Iraq war, et cetera. He did that at some risk to himself, whatever you think about his position or President Bush's position. It is unimaginable to think about George W. Bush then in response to that, saying that McCaul needs to be investigated. That's like telling John Ashcroft or whoever was attorney general then that they need to investigate this man. Like the degree of scandal that that would have been in that moment. Leading the nightly news every night, right? And so we are really in unprecedented times and there are real ramifications to it. No, diversity is not our strength, Hugh. I mean, this is the kind of thing these generals

peddle. Diversity is our strength. No, no, it's not. They know it's not. They know that our strength is our unity. I would say over a third are actively complicit. And then you have a lot of grumblers who are sort of going along trying to resist the nonsense as much as they can, but they're not fundamentally changing. Hi again, everybody. It's now five o'clock in New York. It's not just Elon Musk and Doge slashing the federal government. A new announcement by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth outlines his plan to slash as well, announcing yesterday a 20 percent reduction of four-star generals and admirals, a 20 percent reduction of general officers in the National Guard, and a 10 percent reduction of overall general level officers in the military. As the New York Times reports, this continues, quote, the wide swath of job reductions and firings that have marked Hegseth three months at the

helm of the Pentagon. According to the latest study by the Congressional Research Service, there are around 800 generals and admirals across the military. So while getting rid of bloat in an institution can be a good thing, the severity of HEGSS cuts is raising concerns. Jack Reed, the top Democrat on the Senate Armed Services Committee, released a statement that reads in part, quote, I have always advocated for efficiency at the Department of Defense, but tough personnel decisions should be based on facts and analysis, not arbitrary percentages.

Eliminating the positions of many of our most skilled and experienced officers without sound justification would not create efficiency in the military. It would cripple it. This comes as more questions are being raised and swirling about Hegseth's use of potentially unsecure channels to communicate. The Wall Street Journal has brand new reporting on how the secretary used multiple signal chats for official Pentagon business. According to people familiar with his management practices, Hegseth engaged in at least a dozen separate chats. The reporting continues, quote, in one case, he told aides on the encrypted app to inform foreign governments about an unfolding

military operation, the people said. He also used the non-governmental message service to discuss media appearances, foreign travel, his schedule, and other unclassified but sensitive information, two people said. The former Fox News host set up many of the chats himself, sending texts from an unsecured line in his Pentagon office and from his personal phone, the two said. Tim Miller, I know it's like year nine, we've stopped asking where are the Republicans. But when it comes to the operational security of the military, where are the Republicans? You know, it's like so many vectors on which you could ask that question right now. You know, like for me, the economic one, I think is the strongest one. Like where

are the free market Republicans when Donald Trump's trying to run a centrally managed economy, like it's a department store and to get to choose prices as if like he's, you know, like a mid-level, you know, Soviet autocrat. So that's one that jumps out to me. Like on this one, we've just seen them fold so many times and time again, right? That unless there's an acute issue, right? Like if they aren't going to stand up for Ukraine, right? If they aren't going to stand up for Ukraine in the face of Russia, why are they going to put their necks out over a signal chat?

You know, I think that's like, I think that's really what it comes down to. Like, they've made a bet that they're not, that there's no political value in sticking your neck out. And it makes me think of James Lankford, who, you know, you had to give him credit when he tried to do the bipartisan immigration deal. He's the Republican senator from Oklahoma. He was on CNN, I think, last week, and he had this line that really stuck with me. He's like, there's two kinds of checks and balances we can do. I can hold a press conference, or i can go privately to the administration and there are a lot of people going to the administration privately and like that's what these guys think they all they can do i they've neutered themselves as you mentioned earlier

when it comes to actual legislation like they could pass legislation sanctioning russia or giving more weapons to Ukraine or creating new rules around, you know, classified documents. Like they could do that. They're allowed to legislate. But they just have decided to abdicate that completely. And I think that that's as true in this case as in all the others. This is from The Washington Post reporting. Since becoming defense secretary, Hegseth has ever seen a purge of senior military leaders that has alarmed many national security experts, including former defense secretaries. Among those fired were the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General C.Q. Brown,

the Navy's top officer, Admiral Lisa Franchetti, General Timothy Haw, who oversaw the U.S. Cyber Command and the National Security Agency. They have been criticized by Trump supporters for being overly focused on diversity initiatives or being insufficiently loyal to the president. That feels like, you know, the opening salvo, but now news of these sort of across the board cuts, 20 percent cuts of generals and admirals. What will the effect be on the military? As an outsider just looking at Pete, I wonder this, right? You know, if you do this 20% cut, Pete Hegseth, who's been a total disaster and everything isn't done, is not the person you want overseeing that. If you're looking at it from a pure, like, McKinsey standpoint, we just want efficiency in the government. And so it does make you wonder, like, what is the real

reason, right? Like, there is a pretense. We're looking for a pretense to get rid of folks. And is that pretense that they want to get rid of folks that they don't think will go along with unlawful orders? Is there a pretense that they want to get rid of people who are DEI, you know, who are diversity, right? Like, it could be a series of things, but it takes you to a very dark place when you look at it through that prism. And that's, like, how I assess this,

because it certainly is not just that Pete wants a smaller military, right? There are other motivations here.