Morning Joe - NYT: Homeland Security missions falter amid focus on deportations

Episode Date: November 17, 2025

NYT: Homeland Security missions falter amid focus on deportations To listen to this show and other MS podcasts without ads, sign up for MS NOW Premium on Apple Podcasts. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

The beef market is a very specialized market. It goes in long cycles, and this is the perfect storm, again, something we inherited. And there's also, because of the mass immigration, a disease that had been rid of in North America made its way up through South America. You know, as these migrants, they have brought some of their cattle with them. So, you know, part of the problem is we've had to shut the border to Mexican beef because of, you know, this disease called the screw worm. So we're not going to let that get into our supply chain. Huh. Treasury Secretary.

I mean, he's a soybean farmer. Yeah, he would know. So he would know. It's sort of like raw hide. Yeah. Round them up, brown. Did they walk the cows over the border? Yeah.

Don't try to understand them. just rope them up and brand them. Okay. So we've, I mean, how many, how many, how many, how many scenes? I mean, it, during the Biden administration, we all get sick of it, you would see somebody coming from Mexico and then have like about 200 head of beef, trailing behind them. Riding a cow. Right into war.

Right in the war as, overwhelming the border patrol, just the cows would come through. The border is quite porous, obviously. Well, if you can get a hundred cow over at a, but you know, he's a soybean farmer. Don't expect soybean farmers to understand ranch. He's not a cattle rancher. Okay. Obviously not.

No, but concerned about the screw world, though. Aren't we all? True. You know, the thing is, though, it really just shows just how unsurious these people are. Like, you, you have the vice president of the United States blaming the housing crisis on illegal immigrants. You have the Treasury Secretary blamed. naming it on, I guess, Hispanic cattle rustlers, so the beef, the beef crisis. I mean, they're just, they're just not serious.

What is serious, though, is this. New York Times, you actually have children, children being left alone without their parents because you have the administration so obsessed on, on, on, their numbers and Stephen Miller thinks this is a good idea. This is... Stephen Miller thinks this is a good idea and Donald Trump lets it happen. Can we zoom in on this picture please? Donald Trump lets this happen where children, here's a two-year-old,

are left without their parents because they're trying to meet quotas that we said from the beginning and we'll say it again. Quotas that will never, ever be met. It's... This is America at 2025. It's that image and that headline why Donald Trump's numbers on immigration are so underwater. This was supposed to be a signature issue. Americans are saying that's too much.

Maybe that thrills the hardest core faction of his base. But we know that the numbers they set out, the millions they want deported, not going to happen. And that though Americans, you know, in 2024 show this, they want the southern border to be managed better. And it is. And it is. But this sort of, that seems to some be the cruelty of some of these deportations where it's just, your neighbors, your friends, your parishioners at church, the guys on your sports team and their kids, that they're the ones being moved out and parents being deported, leaving their

children behind. It's a humanitarian moment and as well as a bad point. Yeah, I will say it again. Different word for it. I could save you a lot of pain and misery in the administration if you just listen to us. You don't have the money to do this. you don't have the ability to even meet Biden's numbers. Why? Don't you have the ability?

Because so many people came over the border during Biden's presidency, and they were right there at the southern border so they could round up thousands of people in a day and deport them whenever they wanted to do that. So instead, they're going town to town, city to city. They're busting into schools. and grabbing teachers?

They're busting into carpool lines, grabbing mothers. This is grotesque. Asking people if they were born here, often detaining citizens by mistake. I mean, how many citizens have been detained here? It was the front page of the Chicago Tribune this weekend, that you actually had, again, more American citizens being detained. It's really, it's just, it's staggering. And, and Americans want a secure southern border. They do not want what they're saying.

And we've got David Rode here. David, David, I think one of the most remarkable things I've seen in American politics coming from clergy, probably the most since Jerry Falwell decided to get involved in politics in 78, 79, and I'm not comparing the two here. One of those remarkable things I've seen is Pope Leo, Catholic bishops, Catholic priests doing something unbelievably radical. I'm sure the White House thinks this is radical Republicans. They are quoting Jesus Christ, and they are quoting Jesus Christ from the pulpit. And they are showing how on Christ-like these ice raids are where they're ripping children from their mother's hands.

They are going into schools. They are tearing teachers out. I mean, this is the Catholic bishops and Pope Leo, this is, this is a game changer. I know, now people of people outside the faith community may not understand this. But this is a game changer. And Pope Leo saying, oh, really, you call yourself pro-life just because you're against abortion, but you support this inhumane treatment of immigrants? No, no, no.

Those two don't square up. There's the ethics of it. And then there's also a genuine national security challenge and danger here. There was a separate time story this weekend about the Department of Homeland Security being completely transformed and becoming, in essence, the Department of Deportation. And there's been a huge drop in sex trafficking investigations, child exploitation investigations. It's 33% lower so far this year than it has been in past years. The FBI is the same problem.

Agents are shifted over to these investigations of immigration cases. So it's a tremendous change. And this is the department that was set up after 9-11 to protect the country. country. This is yesterday's New York Times, head lead story about it. Yeah. All of these people that ran around going, oh, sex trafficking, oh, only Donald Trump can stop sex. Oh, Tom Hanks and Oprah Winfrey and all these other people are child predators. They are literally, literally this story shows that they will be getting phone calls from people saying A hotel owner is saying sex trafficking is happening out of my hotel.

And they go, we're sorry, our agents have been reassigned. They can't help you. They're girls that have been missing because of sexual abuse. And they've said, Mika, they can't help because they're trying to reach a quota. They will never reach. So human trafficking, sex trafficking, out the window. Right. out the window. So speaking of trafficking, just, we're going to get right back to this because there is, of course, the Christian answer to Trump that we're looking at as well. But the Epstein files are creating a rift between Trump and even his most loyal supporters. We're going to look into that. Marjorie Taylor Green, what's going on with her. Also, the president has taken a complete 180 on the release of these documents. We're going to talk about why and also talk about his tariffs.

It appears that he's acknowledging that his tariffs are raising prices on everyday items for Americans. Opinion columnist for the New York Times, David French, is with us. And CEO and co-founder of Axis, Jim Vandehi, joins us this morning as well. So, David, continuing the conversation that Joe was having with the other, David, you're writing about sort of this response to Trump on all of this. Tell us about it. Yeah, I think Joe's exactly right. I think that was a very important moment when the Catholic bishops came out, really with almost one voice.

I think the vote was 216 to 5 to condemn this crackdown that, as Joe's been saying, is indiscriminate, it's brutal. It's a masked police force. It's diverting from other parts. of the law enforcement apparatus, all to pour into this just campaign of absolute brutality. And it's not just a campaign of brutality, in some cases, is extending into actually confronting religious freedom and religious liberty. You've seen priests denied entry to facilities to conduct communion. Down in Texas, you've seen aggressive legal campaigns against Catholic institutions that have been providing food and clothing and shelter to migrants. And so this is this kind of

campaign is not something that the American people signed up for. It is not something that they like when they see. And sadly, because it's empowered by so many evangelical Christians who voted for Trump, this becomes also part of Trump's religious movement. And it requires a religious answer. And that's what we saw from the Catholic bishops appealing to these scriptural principles about duties of care for all people. And I think that this moment, this line in the sand moment is very important. Yeah, and you know, the crazy thing is, David, and you know this. You grew up in the church.

I know what I grew up in the church, not the Catholic Church, Protestant Church. But there's no ambiguity here. Like, if you read the red letters, if you read what Jesus, there's literally, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, there's no ambiguity here. You can start at the sermon of the Mount on the Mount, and look at that. You can look at Matthew 25, where Jesus talks about separating the sheep and the goats. And when you take care of the least among these, you take care of me. You can look at who Jesus surrounded himself with, whether it was while he was out preaching

or whether he was eating in somebody's home. You can look at all of it and to the right to the point. And again, you can't be a Christian and not understand what Pope Leo was saying. when you read the parable of the good Samaritan. Jesus said love your love your love of God and also love your neighbors. Someone asks, who is our neighbor? Jesus picks the most despised foreigner he can find. He picks the Samaritan.

As we watch the religious leaders walk past, do nothing to the man beaten up on the side of the road, business people walk past the beaten man on the side of the road. Jesus picks the Samaritan. The very man, his audience, hated the most and said, he took care of you here. He took care of your kind. He is your neighbor. And so he says, he's saying, take care of the foreigner. The foreigner is your neighbor. neighbor. This is so unambiguous that it's, it really, it's one of the things that I know you found most maddening. I found most maddening. And a few of the people I grew up with in the church found most maddening with everything that's been happening over the past year.

Well, you know, and the Trump administration does something kind of very diabolically clever when you call them out is they try to present this as if the two options are what they're doing with this masked, brutal force that's engaging in large-scale race. racial profiling that's brutalizing even American citizens and legal immigrants in many cases. They're saying it's this or it's open borders, as if this is the only alternative to some sort of wide open border. And, you know, the Catholic bishops acknowledge nations are allowed to have borders. A controlled flow of immigration is an important reality. However, if somebody is here suspected to be here illegally or here illegally, they're still entitled to be treated with decency

in humanity. I mean, they still have human rights. And this is the thing that is so frustrating to people as they understand that, yes, we need border enforcement. We absolutely need to control our border. But at the same time, controlling our border does not mean brutalizing people and depriving them of their human rights. We're living through an era, honestly, we're going to look back on with national shame the way people are treating. And the reports of conditions and detention facilities are continuing to come out. There have been reports from the Seacot facility where people were deported to without due process that outright torture took place there. It's just extraordinary. You can have a controlled border without dehumanizing people. I would tell you, if evangelical churches

do not follow the lead of what the Catholic bishops are doing right now, they will look back on this time period with the same shame that they look back on the civil rights era when too many preached about the status quo and try to justify segregation and try to justify the dehumanizing of black people. It's their choice and it's time they move. Okay, so this is an extraordinarily important issue. but we haven't gotten to our top story of the day. Right. We're going to do that.

We've got the Epstein files. We've got Jim Vanda High. He's talking about the split in the MAGA movement and so much more. Right. So we're going to get the very litus on the vote to release the Epstein files and also the riff within the MAGA base about that. Morning Joe will be right back. Matthew's Gospel chapter 25, which says Jesus is very clearly at the end of the world. we're going to be asked, you know, how did you receive the foreigner? Did you receive him and welcome him or not? And I think that there's a deep reflection that needs to be made in terms of what's happening.

20 past the hour, we're going to get to the latest on the Epstein files right now. But first, just to put a pin in the conversation we were just having, we had the reporter on from the New York Times a while back, this extensive investigation into the conditions at Seacott, the prison in El Salvador, where all these people were just disappeared off the street, chained, shaved, and sent there. And that report found that half of those people had not committed any crimes. And the stories of torture and sexual abuse that has come out of what happened to these people, This is what our government did to people in this country. And again, this administration glosses over it as much as they gloss over January 6th. Something to think about. And this is what Americans accept.

Certain Americans accept. That's where we are. But less so on the Epstein files. President Trump is now calling on House Republicans to support the release of the Jeffrey Epstein case files. He made that request, which is a very sudden reversal from his previous position on social media last night, writing that Republicans should vote to release the files because, quote, we have nothing to hide. And it's time to move on from this Democrat hoax perpetrated by radical left lunatics. This change, of course, from the president comes ahead of tomorrow's expected vote on the House floor, aimed at forcing the Justice Department to release all of the files. To become law, it would still need to pass in the Senate and be signed by President Trump himself.

This turnaround from Trump notably follows a failed pressure campaign to sway Republican lawmakers against pursuing the release of the files. Now, earlier yesterday, Republican Congressman Thomas Massey of Kentucky signaled there was growing support for the measure among the GOP in the House. I think we could have a deluge of Republicans. There could be a hundred or more. I'm hoping to get a veto-proof majority on this legislation when it comes up for a vote. I am winning this week with Rokana.

We're forcing this vote, and it's going to happen. I would remind my Republican colleagues who are deciding how to vote. Donald Trump can protect you in red districts right now by giving you an endorsement. But in 2030, he's not going to be the president, and you will have voted to protect pedophiles if you don't vote to release these files, and the president can't protect you then. This vote, the record of this vote, will last longer than Donald Trump's presidency. And there's no way Republicans could have voted now on this. There's so many Republicans that would have found themselves on the wrong side of their MAGA base, let alone everybody else.

And, you know, we said last week, everybody that was saying, oh, this is dead in the Senate, really? Now, if you're up for election in 2026, Donald Trump had to know, they're not going to want to vote against this. Like, are they're really going to cover up releasing files about a predator? This was not President Trump having a change of heart because he thinks differently. This was him facing political reality. He was going to lose. He was going to get rolled on this. And we were hearing over the weekend.

Has that happened? Not this term. This term? No, this would be the first time. This is an act of defiance. And let's remember last week, the White House and the president himself tried furiously to change the minds of the four Republican voters. they knew were going to vote yes to release this. You know, who did last week, Marjorie Taylor Green, Larbobert, and the rest, including

Congressman Massey there, they were unsuccessful. And they then recognized that over the weekend, it was picking up steam. And I think the congressman is right, that this was going to be a deluge. Now that the yes was going to happen, all these Republicans suddenly had the freedom to also jump on board, vote yes. And Trump was going to look really weak, beaten by his own party like this. So that's why he's sudden about face last night after his return from Marley. I go this weekend. And Jim Van der Hei, this follows up on what you wrote about yesterday, and that is

this MAGA split. And the fact that it's quite significant, whether you're talking about the Epstein files, whether you're talking about Gaza, whether you're talking about, again, really surprisingly last week, Donald Trump saying, yeah, we need foreign workers. We got to have foreign workers. I mean, the split was wide and growing. And then, of course, the Tucker Carlson, up also splitting the MAGA movement in half. Yeah, I mean, six months ago, if you thought about MAGA, it was by far away the most ascendant, powerful part of the media ecosystem. And it really is a metastasizing hot mess right now. Almost all the leading figures in MAGA that had big followings on YouTube, podcasts online are at war with each other. They're at war over things like

anti-Semitism, nativism, misogynism, racism. They're trying to, you know, you play out their rivalries in public. They're trying to bury their enemies within MAGA. And you're starting to see real substantive splits with Donald Trump. And where this matters, it really is over America First purity. There are a lot of activists who love Donald Trump, who think it's crazy that we spend this much time bombing ships on the shores of Venezuela when you have prices going up for working class Americans.

And remember, Trump won as the champion of that working. class. The truth is he's a creature of the uppermest of the upper class, right? He loves to hang out with moguls and rich people and CEOs and gild the office and take his golden bar from the Swiss as they try to get their tariffs lowered. And this is starting to cause real angst. And it might not topple Trump. I think the Epstein thing, it's one of the, like, how could you possibly be against voting for it, right? Like sometimes these things you can squint and you can understand both sides. On this one, you can't. You're going to be what you're going to be for, pedophiles and anti-sex trafficking and sexual exploitation of women and young women. That's kind

of a nutty place to be in American politics or morally. I mean, look at these four bullet points right here, Jonathan O'Meer. If you get, let's find the two most maga-ish people out there. Marjorie Taylor Green and Steve Bannon. Every one of these things, they want the Epstein files release. They have said it from the very beginning. Bannon and Marjorie Taylor Green has said, no, we need Americans filling high-skilled foreign worker jobs. This is what Steve Bannon went to war with Elon Musk about months ago. Donald Trump now is taking the anti-Maga position on that.

threatening military interventions in Venezuela and now Nigeria people's heads have to be spinning the whole fortress America, America first, after, of course, everything that's happened with Israel in Gaza, and then denying that there's an affordability crisis, which is hitting a lot of people in red state America the hardest. Yeah, this is the first moment where it feels like Republicans, and particularly those in the Amaga movement, are starting to look past Donald Trump. They're trying to say, like, okay, what comes next? What comes next? Who's going to be the heir to this? Obviously, extraordinarily powerful political base here. That, like, you know, we're seeing some jockeying. What does Mago really mean? And you're right. There's the Marjor

Taylor Green and Steve Bannon side. We see J.D. Vance trying to make, quietly make some moves as well. We have others who are trying to come on the other side of it. Like, the Republicans are starting to look at each other and say, this is going to be a little different. How do we embrace it? And right now, we keep saying the first six, seven, eight months of the president's term, Republicans largely in lockstep. But here, because he has gone against sort of the Maga Creed in many ways, we're seeing some of the Republican Party feel like I have a little freedom to disagree. Right.

And so far, they haven't really paid a price. Well, you look at Thomas Massey, he hasn't paid a price. We'll see what happens with Marjorie Taylor Green. I doubt she'll pay a price. I mean, there's always the argument. If you go after Republican presidents from the right, you're safe. here, these people that are going after Donald Trump are going after him, you know, from the more MAGA-ish base. Right.

It's not like they're saying, hey, you should actually pay attention to what Jesus says on immigration. No, they're not doing that. They're saying release the Epstein files and stop talking about going to war in Venezuela or Nigeria. So I want to talk about Marjorie Taylor Green in just a moment. But on releasing the Epstein files, two questions for you, David Rode. First of all, it seems Pam Bondi does exactly what the president tells her to do, and this issue is no different. But also, why couldn't since she does, and you can tell us more about that, why doesn't he just tell her to release them? That's the question, and it's such an obvious thing.

So easy. Yes, and it's if you just look back months, it's extraordinary how this has been mishandled by this administration. Why has it? Because I think Donald Trump himself is afraid of what's going to be released. And to be fair, and we'll talk about this more, but there was a statement way back in July where Pam Bondi and Cash Patel and career FBI people said we've gone through these papers, there isn't enough evidence to criminally prosecute anyone. But there's a ton of embarrassing material, I'm sure, and that's what Trump is afraid of. But from her saying, oh, I've got the client list on my desk to Friday, the president posted on true social. He wanted these Democrats

investigated. We're going to have Bill Clinton and Larry Summers and Reid Hoffman. Four hours later, the Attorney General of the United States announces that the U.S. attorney here in Manhattan is going to launch a criminal investigation of those Democrats. That is just extraordinary. In no time in American history do you have an attorney general essentially announce a criminal investigation hours later because of the president. sort of whims and to distract the public. David French, I hate to sound like a broken record here. But Republicans in the Senate, Republicans in the House, should see this and be absolutely

horrified. What happens when a Democratic president comes in or, as I always say, some crackpot independent billionaire with no ideology, just somebody who's power hungry and comes in and starts talking about the arrest? boy, we should arrest Republicans. And then an attorney general is placed in there, somebody who maybe worked for this tech lord's company. And he immediately starts saying, okay, I'm going to go after and start arresting Republicans. Where are the Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee calling this out not for the sake of Democrats, but for the sake of themselves?

And for the sake of Republicans three years from now, this is so unbelievably reckless and so unbelievably un-American. Yeah, I mean, look, this is this is a movement that is ruling as if it's never going to lose power. This is a movement that is ruling as if all of the precedents it sets will only apply to the other side. And that is an incredibly dangerous assumption. We're going to have an election in 2028. And if the Republicans succeed in remaking the presidency and Republicans in Congress allow the remaking of the presidency, that's going to make every president we have from this point forward more dangerous than the president that preceded them because they're just going to become more and more and more powerful.

So we're at a moment here, I think, Joe, where the American constitutional order needs to reassert itself. and that constitutional order is supposed to put Congress first amongst the branches. Not uncheckable. Congress can still be checked, but it's Article 1 for a reason. But right now it's as if it doesn't exist, as if it's handing everything over to a president, and as if they think that that president will always be hospitable to them, that president is always going to be supporting them. No, when you set these precedents, when you allow a president to get this powerful,

you can't control what comes after. It is so short-sighted and it's remarkably dangerous. It is so dangerous. And Jim Bandah, you know, once presidents get power, it's not like the next president voluntarily gives it up. So, again, these are extraordinarily dangerous precedents where you have a president tweeting something. And a couple of hours later, an attorney general jumps to attention and says, yes, I will now begin an investigation against a former president from another party. I agree with a level of concern on all of those and the dangers of the precedent. I will say, if you want to have an optimistic take on it, the American people are watching this. They are making a judgment.

Look at what happened in New Jersey. Look at what happened in Virginia. Look at poll after poll about what's happening with Hispanic voters. It looks like in some of them you see a 20 to 30 point swing away from Donald Trump. Look what happened in Indiana and Missouri where they tried to bully the legislature to do redistricting. And a couple of Republicans stood up and said, hell no, we're not going to do it. Look at topic after topic that Trump ran on and then kind of legislated and governed differently. And you see them underwater by 20 to 30 points on a lot of topics.

This is what I don't understand. Like every member of the House, every member of the Senate, they have to know their election is coming up in less than a year. And you look at Mikey Sherrill, somebody who even Democrats had ran a terrible race. That's what they said. It's not what I'm saying, Governor-elect. That's what they said. She won by like 12, 13 points. You look at Virginia.

Every single county broke against Trump, broke for Republicans. You look at Bucks County, Pennsylvania, historic local elections. Chris Matthews saying entire county commissions, going Democratic probably for the first time in 100 years. You look at what happened in California. I mean, I can talk, we can go on and on and on about what's happening across the country. There is a backlash, and yet the administration is acting, and these Republicans on the Hill, most importantly, are acting like Democrats will never be in charge again. I don't know where they were last Tuesday night, but the message the American people sent, you're right, is a rejection of everything they've seen over the last year. never underestimate the power of these bubbles these information bubbles that people live in listen

if you're a republican and you live in washington you eat at the same restaurant you sit in the same room you read and follow the same uh people on x you go to the and listen to the exact same podcast and you start to think that everything that you believe is how the rest of the american people believe and you become so fearful that if you don't have this group think that you're going to get pelted in your social media feed or when you go back home or you're going to get death threats. You see a massive increase in the number of death threats. And that's why you have this group thing, which you always tend to get in politics. But in the new information ecosystem, it becomes even more powerful, more seductive and harder to break from. So only now

when you start to see leading figures break with Trump, do you start to have even a little bit of courage to start to do it. But I wouldn't overstate that. I would expect that you're going to see members of Congress other than on issues like the Epstein files, continue to vote for Trump because they fear Trump. I don't think they're going to break with him on many topics. You haven't seen it other than a few outliers for all of those very reasons. And if they do that, I think you're right. If you just look at the polling at a non-ideological way, it looks like they could get clobbered in the off-year elections because the American people, especially independents, overwhelmingly are saying, I don't like this. I like it that you shut

down the border. I hate it what you're doing at these restaurants or what you're doing indiscriminately in a parking lot. like it that you're standing up to other countries, I don't want to pay more for my coffee. I don't want to pay more for my meat. And now all of a sudden you said it wasn't tariffs, but then you had to do specific reductions in tariffs so my meat costs less. They're not dumb. People can see what's going on.

And then they start to render a verdict. And I think that's what you see unfolding right now. David Rhodes, final word. I'm just, this is incumbency. This is the president feeling to deliver on what he promised people. And then it's this overwhelming power, he assumes, from both strikes in the Caribbean to announcing, you know, on social media criminal investigations. Okay. So senior national security reporter for MS Now, David Rode, thank you very much. Thank you, David.

Adding to this, coming up, we're going to talk about what's going on with Marjorie Taylor Green and why it matters. Also, the former president of the University of Virginia has put out a scathing 12-page letter. Did you read that? detailing his resignation and the role the federal government played in his decision. Investigated reporter for the New York Times, Michael Schmidt joins us for more on that. And before we go to a break, a quick check on the Travelers' Forecast with Accuweather's Bernie Rainer. Bernie. Good Monday morning, if there's such a thing as a good Monday.

Windy and chilly across the northeast today, temperatures 30s and 40s, Accuether, real field temperatures below freezing, a few flurries and slippery travel across interior sections of the northeast. The southeast is just sunny and nice. It'll be that way all week. Travel delays today, watch Boston, New York City, and Philadelphia due to the wind. To help you make the best decisions and be more in the know, make sure to download the Acuether app today. while the walls come down when they do I'll be right behind you so glad we've almost made it so sad of it the most hurtful thing he said which is absolutely untrue is he called me a traitor and that is that is so extremely wrong and those are the types of words um used that can radicalize people

against me and put my life in danger. We'll see what happened. Her life could be at danger because of the rhetoric. Her life is in danger? Who's that? Marjorie Taylor Green, she says. Marjorie Trader Green. I don't think her life is in danger.

I don't think, frankly, I don't think anybody cares about her. And he calls her for good measure, traitor, which again, he just doesn't understand, John. He just understand. It's like, you know, we talk to Jonathan Coral where he'll say you should be arrested two times. Then he'll go over, talk to him afterwards. Hey, how you doing? And, you know, it's sort of like he's almost like he's playing a game for the cameras. Then he goes off camera.

But he doesn't realize when he says that to John Carle or Marjorie Taylor Green or calls other people traitors. There are unbalanced people out there. And suddenly you have a lot of people who are getting death threats, manifestos, and they have to have security. And the congresswoman has broken with him on a couple of issues, criticized him on a couple of issues in recent weeks. But most notably, the Epstein files. And Trump, as he always does, tries to assign nicknames. And he was kind of like workshopping nicknames on social media. Originally tried to call her Marjorie Taylor Brown that had to explain because green like rots, like leaves rot and therefore she's brown.

And he abandoned that for instead Marjorie Trader Green, which maybe that sounds better to his ear, but it's significantly more dangerous. It is the kind of thing that wouldn't, as she, the congresswoman is right. And to her credit, she said over the weekend, she's like, look, there have been. times where President Trump has criticized others, put them in harm's way. I didn't say anything. I should have. Now that I'm in the potentially the target here, I recognize how scary and frankly reprehensible that is. A really big turnaround. For her to say, I recognize I've said things that could be now I get it. Yeah. No. And Jim Vanda High, again, this goes back to the fracturing of MAGA. Marjorie Taylor Green, you know, over the past month or so, she actually has been.

speaking out for things that are constituents in Dalton, George, as I've been saying for a long time, I know the area very well, that they care a great deal about, whether you're talking about Medicaid, whether you're talking about, you know, health care subsidies that they desperately need so they can take care of their children, whether you're talking about the affordability crisis, you just go down the list. And she's actually been speaking out saying, hey, we need. need to, you know, we need to take care of these issues or else we're leaving our own base plane. That's the MAGA base. I mean, it's just like, you know, you talk about an affordability crisis, it's hitting these red states hardest right now. Right. The whole idea of America

first resonated with a lot of people legitimately. It might not actually be Trump's motivating ideology, but for a lot of those people, it is. They really believe that you shouldn't spend any time focused on things overseas when you have working class Americans who can't afford their groceries or can't get good health care coverage. I mean, Jim, Jim, there's an affordability crisis in Donald Trump. Americans have seen Donald Trump across the globe. Now, some of those trips, I've said, very important trips that he had to make and the peace, possible peace in the Middle East.

There's some very important things. But Americans see that. They hear about Argentina. They hear about Argentina beef. They hear about these boats, and we're spending how much money blowing up boats, which in New York Times suggesting this weekend, that some innocent fishermen were killed in those attacks. Then he's talking about possible invasion of Nigeria. And if you're in Dalton, Georgia, you're sitting going, what in the holy hell is going on here? This isn't America first?

I just think American people are smarter than politicians give them credit for sometimes because they realize if you're going to sit back and you're going to sit back and you're going to. going to rank the topics that matter most, is drug smuggling, if it is happening from Venezuela, making its way to the United States, a top five topic? It's probably not a top 1,000 topic. So then they wonder, why the hell are you spending your time there and not trying to figure out why my health care premium just went up 15 to 25 percent, or why my grocery bill is so high, or why our schools continue to underperform compared to our international rivals? And if you look at MAGA, they're very much motivated. by that. That is the heart of this dispute that they're having internally. It's stop paying

attention to Israel, stop paying attention to Nigeria, stop paying attention to Venezuela and focus here. And it really ticks them off, especially the Steve Bannon's of the world, when every single night the president is either on the phone or dining with tech moguls or what they call the corporatist. But it is. It's CEOs. It's rich people. It's kind of gilded society. And they hate that because they want them focused on the working class. But that's Trump's comfort food. It's where he likes to be. And I think even these images now, we think nothing sticks, but even these images of gilding the White House or taking these gifts, you know, people might laugh them off. But over time, it starts to build, and people start to wonder, is the government paying

attention to the things that I care about? If the answer is no, you lose elections, you lose popularity. And I think that's what's unfolding in real time. And for the first time, we see an authentically rattled Trump. I don't know that he feels he has that certitude in terms his thumb on the pulse of where the country is right now. And also those fancy dinners at Marlago, which are getting a lot of play. They just don't fit into what's happening today. The Great Gatsby things and

tearing down to the eastern of the White House and having a gilded gilded ballroom. It really is. Yeah. It's just absolutely crazy. So I want to show our viewers Marjorie Taylor Green's

remarkable turnaround on rhetoric. I'm here for it. Take a look. Congresswoman, you posted on X that President Trump is with his comments, fueling a, quote, hotbed of threats against you. Obviously, any threats to your safety are completely unacceptable. But we have seen these kinds of attacks or criticism from the president at other people. It's not new.

And with respect, I haven't heard you speak out about it until it was directed at you. Dana, I think that's fair criticism. And I would like to say humbly, I'm sorry for taking part in the toxic politics. It's very bad for our country. And it's been something I've thought about a lot, especially since Charlie Kirk was assassinated, is that we, I'm only responsible for myself and my own words and actions. and I am committed, and I've been working on this a lot lately to put down the knives and politics. I really just want to see people be kind to one another. And we need to figure out a

new path forward that is focused on the American people because as Americans, no matter what side of the aisle we're on, we have far more in common than we have differences. And we need to be able to respect each other with our disagreements. David? That's amazing. I go to a fellow Southern Baptist. I'll take it. And you know, like me,

First Baptist Church, Pensacola, if Dr. Plites had to make us sing 16 verses of Just As I Am, he would. And when people went down to the front and gave their lives and asked for forgiveness of their sins, everyone would rejoice, even if we were last in line at Morrison's.

So, like me, like me, I said, I'm all here for. We're here for it. And just because I've said so many stupid things through the years that, you know, I would, you know, I would ask and have us forgiveness for. Then when I hear that from somebody in anybody, I'm sorry. I know there are a lot of people that are, yeah, but, yeah, but, yeah, but, you know what I say? Yeah, but okay. you know what this is great one at a time let's let's actually embrace this and hope it sticks yeah when i saw that my jaw hit the floor and i i was it was so remarkable to hear two of the

most rare words to ever hear from a politician i'm sorry that was amazing that was remarkable and i hope that this is a a sense of conviction that settles on her and sticks with her? Because honestly, Joe, some of the most powerful moments in public life are when some of the worst actors recognize their wrongs and correct them. That is a situation that can have radiating cultural impact. When somebody who's been a big part of the problem, and let's be clear, she has been a big part of the problem, looks at the American people and says, I'm sorry, that's a powerful moment. That is not a moment where we should be attacked, her right now for the things that she's done in the past, this is where we should be affirming

her for repenting, truthfully, humbly, literally saying the word humbly, we should be applauding that. And we should be circling the wagons around that and saying, this is the way forward. We're going to have disagreements. I still disagree with Marjorie, Taylor Green, about a million things. But saying, I'm sorry and doubling down on kindness, this is something we should be absolutely affirming. Yeah, because we all, at some point, need that forgiveness ourselves. Absolutely. Opinion, calmness for the New York Times, David French.

Thank you so much. His new piece on a Christian answer to Trump and Trumpism is online now. Take a look at it. And CEO and co-founder of Axis, Jim Vandahai, as always, thank you. And Jim, I apologize for all the times. I bring up what you did to me. We don't have enough time. Accentage.

Okay, stop. I forgive you. I forgive you, my friend. Okay, idiots. The Axis report on Maga's metastasizing mess is online now.