Pod Save America - CTRL-F 'Trump' in the Epstein Files

Episode Date: July 25, 2025

Your suspicions were correct: according to The Wall Street Journal, Trump’s name is in the Epstein files—and the Attorney General told him so all the way back in May. Trump responds with more lies, obfuscations, and distractions, accusing Barack Obama of treason, and sending Tulsi Gabbard out to try to prove the case without the benefit of facts or specifics. Dan and Jon discuss all the latest, including DOJ’s overtures to Ghislaine Maxwell, Trump's awkward stunt at the Fed building, and two federal judges ordering the release of Kilmar Abrego Garcia as he awaits trial. Then, Tommy sits down with Senator Mark Warner to discuss Trump’s treason accusations and what the intelligence community actually concluded about Russian election-meddling in 2016.For a closed-captioned version of this episode, click here. For a transcript of this episode, please email [e-mail] and include the name of the podcast.

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monitoring plan and get your first month free. That's simply safe.com slash crooked world to claim 50% off a new system with a professional monitoring plan and get your first month free. That's simply safe.com slash crooked. There's no safe like simply safe. Welcome to Pots A of America, I'm Jon Favreau. I'm Dan Pfeiffer. On today's show, we're going to talk more about the treasonous coup that our old boss almost got away with, if we not for Telsey Gatton. Talk about the president arguing with the Fed chair about line items in our renovation project while wearing construction helmets on live television.

Also gonna talk about why a man who was serving time in Venezuela for a triple homicide is now somewhere in America, thanks to the Trump administration's recent prisoner exchange, and then later you'll hear Tommy's interview with the top Intel committee Democrat Mark Warner on the latest Tulsi nonsense and lots more. But first, as much as we all want to talk about the many pressing challenges facing

this country, Donald Trump has again made headlines about his decades-long friendship with child sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein. You may remember that last week Trump got asked what he'd been told by Attorney General Pam Bondi about her review of the Epstein files. Here's what he said. What did she tell you about the review and specifically did she tell you at all that your name appeared in the file? No, no. She's given us that your name appeared in the file? No, no, she's given us just a very quick briefing and in terms of the credibility

of the different things that they've seen. And I would say that, you know, these files were made up by Comey, they were made up by Obama, they were made up by the Biden, you know, and we went through years of that. Specifically, did she tell you your name was in the files?

No, no. That was last week. And here's the Wall Street Journal headline from this week. Justice Department told Trump in May that his name is among many in the Epstein files. That's right, Pam Bondi told the president that he and quote, many other high profile figures were named

hundreds of other names in the more than 300 gigabytes of Epstein related material they have But that they felt the files contained quote unverified hearsay about Trump and all those other people The story which has been independently confirmed now by the New York Times and CNN among others was sourced to multiple senior administration officials though the journal specifically cites FBI director Kash Patel as someone who's been privately telling other government officials that Trump's name is in the file you always want your FBI director

to be the office gossip that is that's the person you want to trust with the nation's, the top law enforcement official, you know, he's got loose lips, loose lips sink ships there, Cash Patel. The president seems to know where this is all going. A witness leaked to Playbook that Trump said in the Oval, quote, they're going to accuse me of some funny business. And that even though he claims he didn't do anything wrong, quote, they're going to accuse me of some funny business. And that even though he claims he didn't do anything wrong, quote, they're going to fuck me anyways.

Delicious. Uh, what do you think, Dan? How does this explosive revelation that we all saw coming change the nature of this almost three week old scandal now? I would hope that this changes how everyone, ourselves included talks at things about this scandal because we've had a lot of fun about with this. We're going to have fun about it on this podcast. I hope it is. There's something amusing about it, but I feel like everyone has been treating this kind of from a perspective of amusement, like, ah, look at these conspiracy

pushing grifters who've been hoisted on their own petard, right? Where the real crime here is hypocrisy and deception, right? That they, they said they released the Epstein files, but they didn't do it. Trump's breaking a campaign promise. Ha take that dog that caught the car, all of that. But I think we do really have to take a step back. And I know this is going to sound like hyperbole. I know it will, but I truly believe it that this scandal now with this

revelation, this scandal now should be treated like Iran Contra, Watergate, other major political scandals, because what we have here is the president of the United States, the attorney general, the intelligence community, the FBI director, and the Republican Congress, all part of a conspiracy to cover up information about the president of president United States relationship with America's most notorious child sex trafficker. And lying about it. Right.

And he lied. He lied to the American people either by direct order or by implicit request. The intelligence community, we have intelligence professionals like the most, what's the theoretically be the most, one of the most apolitical parts of the government concocting a bullshit report we're gonna talk about to try to distract people from the political fall of this. We have the Republican Congress shutting down and going home for a month because they are so afraid to vote on a measure

that could shed light once again on the president of the United States relationship with America's most notorious child sex trafficker. Like this really is a giant deal. Like we need to know what is that hearsay Trump's worried about in the files? What is in there? What do we not know about Trump's relationship? Like what, what other steps have been taken to try to cover this up?

Have there been efforts to alter or destroy the records? Right. What, what other government officials have hit it? Who else has been lied to? Like this is a big deal and it should be treated as a big deal in my view. Did you hear Mike Johnson say in an interview that we don't know, you know, when we get the documents, the deep state might have doctored

the documents. Yes. They put Trump's name in there. Yes. That's the next thing. Cause the deep state did it. Trump has been leading. He has been, this is one of the clues that you

and I took as evidence that Trump knew his name or at least suspected his name was the Epstein files. So as he kept saying, how are we going to know the real maybe coming in Biden and whoever else doctored them to put his name in there. Right. And now they're first. So first of all, their initial reaction to the story from, uh, Steven Chung, the communications director at the white house, uh, was, oh, this is a fake fate. Another fake wall street journal story.

Then the journal reached out to, and I think the Times first, reached out to Bondi and DOJ, and they said, well, we just briefed the president on what was in there, and we didn't find anything worthy of prosecution or further investigation, carefully chosen words. That was the next explanation. They also had an explanation that, carefully chosen words, that was the next explanation. They also had an explanation that, oh, well, we knew his name was in there because in those binders that Pam Bondi handed out to all the right-wing crazies who came to the White House that started this whole thing, Donald Trump's phone number was in there and everyone knew

that. Donald Trump's phone number was in there and everyone knew that and it's like, okay, okay. Well, if Trump's name's in the files and it's just completely benign, why not release it? Why did you have to lie about it, right? If all that's in the files about Trump is what is publicly known about Trump, which is that he used to party with Jeffrey Epstein and hung out with Jeffrey Epstein and Jeffrey Epstein went to his first wedding

and there's pictures of them together. And we know that he flew on his plane a bunch of times. If it's just that, that's just verified in the documents. I mean, it's not fun to have that come out, but it's already known. So why cover it up? Yeah. I mean, the, the chain of events here is they were planning to release the files. They were on Pam Bondi's desk.

They released that first tranche that had his name in it. here is they were planning to release the files. They were on Pam Bondi's desk. They released that first tranche that had his name in it. At that point, they did not say, we're not going to release more because after that went out, Pam Bondi said, these are on my desk for review. She reviewed them, found something that she thought would be quite embarrassing to the president and they changed their plan and they've continued to believe that the massive amount of political thought they've been getting now for almost three weeks is preferable to whatever they believe is in the files. So as you mentioned, Mike Johnson tried to bail him out by literally just like sending everyone home

for the summer early, school's out, everyone get out of here, no vote. They were gonna take a vote to try to compel the DOJ to release more information. Not even compel them. Just since you just said- That was the unbinding one. Right, I said a sense of Congress

that they would be nice if they released it. And they couldn't even do that. And yet, yeah, and yet his gambit sort of failed because the House Oversight Committee found there were enough Republicans on the House Oversight Committee, I believe three, voted with all the Democrats to subpoena the Justice Department for the files and they took that vote just before they left town in a move that surprised I think just about everyone. The committee also subpoenaed Epstein co-conspirator Ghislaineaine Maxwell, to come testify before Congress.

Though it seems like Trump's DOJ is trying to get to her first. It's like a fucking mob crime movie. Trump's personal lawyer turned deputy, Attorney General Todd Blanch, is visiting Maxwell in jail today, Thursday. And she reportedly, according to her brother, has new evidence to share and wouldn't you know, Dan, she's

also reportedly interested in a pardon. No, no, no. Amazing. Two totally unrelated things. So the co-conspirator of the child sex trafficker who's currently serving 20 years in prison has probably a lot more to say because she was never interviewed by the Justice Department on any of the Epstein files and before she can testify to Congress she gets a visit from the

president's former personal lawyer turned deputy attorney general who's gonna meet with her first knowing that she wants a pardon and that his boss, the president has the power to give that pardon. What do you think is going to happen there? She going to be a straight shooter? Seems totally above board. Like if you can't trust a convicted child sex trafficker, who can you trust, honestly?

But like you've nailed the exact, the problem here, why this is such potential corruption, it's such a massive scandal is that you have Ghislaine Maxwell, a convicted child sex trafficker, who wants a pardon meeting with the just official who just happens to be, by chance, Donald Trump's personal defense attorney. Okay. And we know that Trump has dangled pardons before. The Mueller report concluded that Trump's public communications about Roger Stone when Roger Stone was being prosecuted for crimes

related to the Russiagate, was consistent with the idea of dangling a pardon to try to interfere with his cooperation. He specifically dangled, he almost explicitly dangled a pardon in front of Paul Manafort when Paul Manafort's plea deal fell apart. There is a report, an unverified report, but a report nonetheless that in 2017, Congressman Dana Werbacher went to meet with Julian Assange with a pardon promise from Trump if Assange

would say Russia did not hack the election on Trump's behalf. So we have seen this before, right? We don't have any evidence that's what's happening here, but we have very real reason to be suspicious. And these people have lost all benefit of the doubt. Yeah, I'm waiting for Todd Blanchard to come out of that meeting and be like, Oh, just

found out from Jolene Maxwell that Donald Trump, he was actually the one that said, Jeffrey, Jeffrey enough with those girls. I'm going to report you. Those girls look too young. And you know who else was there and said, I don't care, Bill Clinton. Yes.

And that's what I'm waiting for. And when Obama was on Epstein Island, he told them about the pending treason plan. Yes, exactly. Yeah, he had it right in his pocket. So I'm sure that Trump and Johnson are just hoping this thing blows over by the time Congress comes back in September, now that they've escaped early. What do you think? It's hard to see how the fundamental

political dynamics change here, which is the overwhelming majority of American people want disclosure of the Epstein files. The Republicans in Congress are caught between wanting to be with not just the 80% of Americans who want this, but the part of their base who very strongly wants it and not getting on the wrong side of Trump. Democrats are gonna continue to offer this amendment in the House Rules Committee. And if they cannot pass a rule, they cannot pass a bill because it's gonna require,

if you don't pass a rule, then you have to pass, you need two thirds of the House to pass the bill. So they can barely pass it with 50% of the House. And so I don't see how it fundamentally changes. Like ultimately they're going to have to pass something or there's going to have to be some promise and disclosure to make this political dynamic change. Of course, there's going to be a million news cycles between now and when the house gets back and I'm sure we won't be talking about the Epstein scandal, every pod

from now until then. Don't be so sure but who knows? But like I do think they're all gonna come back and you're right like it's I guess Maxwell is gonna testify in August, right? So they'll come back for for that testimony But like I don't know. I don't see how they get past I don't see how they keep all the files at this point Maybe they just decide to I mean, you know, these people lie break how they keep all the files at this point. Maybe they just decide to, I mean, you know, these people lie, break the law, cheat all the time, so who knows, but. They can fight the subpoena in court.

Like, I mean, the DOJ has a long history of doing that, sometimes for reasons that are legitimate, because they're fear that it would, in a legitimate situation, mess up an ongoing investigation. That's obviously not the case here. Eventually they're gonna have to vote. Maybe they vote to compel,

maybe they, or they just, or the Romans are forced to vote to town and sort of eat their spinach there. Yeah, and again, and we've talked about this before, like there are good reasons, even in this case, for the withholding of some information. There's videos of the victims, and also, you know, there's rules about like,

you don't wanna release a ton of hearsay about people if they're not incriminated in something. Now, I think you can also make an exception for the current president of the United States, uh, if it might be implicated in something. So, like, there are good reasons, I'm sure, that there are courts to litigate those reasons, but yeah, they can certainly, of the however many, 400 gigabytes worth of material, they can probably release a little bit more. They can at least release the parts

that mentioned Donald Trump's name. Yeah, that'd be one thing. Yeah. That'd be one thing, particularly if there's, if there's nothing in there that he finds that's incriminating, right? If there's no quote unquote funny business, then what's the big deal?

Right. Did you see, by the way, that this old video that's been circulating, I saw it, Midas Touch tweeted it out from 2010, and it's from the Epstein deposition where he gets asked about partying with Donald Trump. Not only did I see it, John, I said it to you. I can't remember who sent me what anymore. Yes, yeah, now I know.

Let's listen. Have you ever had a personal relationship with Donald Trump? What do you mean by personal relationships? Have you socialized with him? Yes, sir. Yes? Yes, sir.

Have you ever socialized with Donald Trump in the presence of females under the age of 18. Though I'd like to answer that question, at least today, I'm going to have to assert my fifth, sixth and 14th amendment right answer. Have we just, is there just too much bullshit out there about Donald Trump, too much scandal that we somehow, that this was out there and it just wasn too much scandal that we somehow, that this was out there and it was just wasn't a big deal at some point because

everyone just assumes that Donald Trump is a fucking predator. Yeah, I think that I think there is this assumption that I mean this is a very very gross way of looking at the world but because Donald Trump has survived politically and mixed all of the accusations, E. Jean Carroll, the Access Hollywood tape, all the reporting that came out after the right before the election of the accusations, E. Jean Carroll, the Access Hollywood tape, all the reporting that came out right before the election of the women he had sexually assaulted or involved with sexual misconduct with, those, and he survived all of that, then none of this stuff would matter.

This video is such an artifact of history because if you follow Where Might Have Touched Got It From, it's from a 2016 Daily Wire blog post detailing Donald Trump's long gross associations with Jeffrey Epstein. Yeah. Now Ben Shapiro fully on board, fully on board. Let's talk about the politics and what Democrats should do now. Our friends at Data for Progress asked, uh, likely voters last week, what new

story they'd heard and seen the most about recently. The leading answer by a large margin was Epstein 37% said they'd heard quote a lot about the story that was up from 25% the week before When asked why they think Trump hasn't released the files 46% said it's because they contain information that could incriminate him given that and a lot of other polling that has not been so good for Trump on the Epstein drama. How do you think Dems should handle this issue over the next few months? I think our goal should be to keep the issue in the news as much as possible without putting

too much spin on the ball. Right. I've seen other testing which shows that the most effective messaging and the most effective online posts are not Democrats talking about it. It is clips of Republicans or people who previously supported Trump, podcasters, influencers, criticizing Trump for this. That's the most effective medium. So when we think about how we,

like if we are messaging, if you're an elected official and you're thinking about how to use your platforms, that's one way to do it. If we're thinking about it in the context of how all of us are messengers, people in our lives and you're sharing things in your group chat, the only way to do it. If we're thinking about it in the context of how all of us are messengers to people in our lives and you're sharing things in your group chat,

the better thing to share is the clip of Andrew Schultz talking about this on Flagrant, then it is some Democrat ranting about this on MSNBC or Positive America or anywhere else, right? It's like the thing about someone whose motivations are not automatically questioned, even in an issue on this one where they're quite sincere. I think it's also just a proof point

that's worth bringing up when making other arguments that are also true about Trump, which is, you know, he's lying about this, what else is he lying to you about? He promised transparency on this and is not fulfilling that promise. What other promises has he broken to you? He's protecting elites here. What else is he doing that promise. What other promises has he broken to you? He's protecting elites here.

What else is he doing that's protecting elites? Like there's just everything that's bad about Donald Trump, that Donald Trump is doing to hurt people, to let people down, to disappoint people, to break the promises he made during the campaign. Like it's all in here in this scandal. And I think as we go on to talk about other issues, reminding people that this happened and that he's lying to them here and he's hiding stuff from them here

and he's covering this up, it's just another good proof point to drive the argument home. Yeah, you have to do this without sounding like you were created in a talking points lab. Yeah, I know, some of them it's already, it's getting there. The argument here, right,

these are not the words to use, right? But the argument we want to make, so tie this to a broader narrative that Trump is, embodies a corrupt political system that protects the politically connected and the rich and powerful. Don't use those words like that because that sounds like it was,

I'm sure that that sentence tests fucking phenomenal, but it's not how- I'm sure it's in a lot of press releases right now. But like, that's the point you wanna make, right? Where like, think about that way. Just make it like a human. Make it like a human. And then like, it is connected to tax cuts for rich,

paid for by cutting Medicaid and food assistance, but how you make that connection should be like a little more natural than trying to jam it into 240 characters, right? For your ex post or whatever else. I mean, it just fits in with everything he's done in the last six months. It's like the guy's fucking accepting $400 million jets from the Qataris. And I forgot about the jet. I was going through all the things.

I forgot about the jet, the crypto scams. We're talking here Thursday. He's off going, he's going to go play fucking golf in his golf course in Scotland this weekend. He's, you know, he gives the big tax cuts to the rich people as all, he's always around his fucking rich friends. He's jacking up prices on everything that everyone buys from overseas.

He, the inflation's up, prices up. He doesn't give a shit about people. He gives a shit about himself. And if you're rich and you're one of his buddies, he'll protect you. overseas, the inflation's up, price is up. He doesn't give a shit about people. He gives a shit about himself. And if you're rich and you're one of his buddies, he'll protect you. And if not, he won't. And he'll probably go after you for some people. Democrats have been trying to make this point for a decade now because it's so obvious.

The guy shits on a gold toilet. Like he's not a man of the people. There's a reason that is broken through here because one, it's a violation against his own base as opposed to a violation against the liberal values. It's too often we, too often we attack Trump through our view of the world. And this is one where he has violated something through his view of the world. And then the other reason is conspiracy theories are the currency of the internet. Like there's a reason that Jeffrey Epstein's conspiracy theory is such a gigantic deal because it's been living online for years now.

And so now you have the combination of a issue that already had a lot of currency online being jacked up combined with real, like real news breaking from traditional news sources and high levels engagement from across the local spectrum. And so it, it is breaking through to people in a way that a lot of our policy-based arguments have not because they don't reach outside of that political news bubble that we struggle to get out of. I just think everyone has always known about Trump, that he is a rich celebrity and has been for a long time. And the reason that a lot of people still like him or view him as like, you know, a hero of the working class

is because they've seen him as a traitor to his class, right? He's a, he goes against the establishment that he used to be part of, right? And he's taken on that, he's taken on the elites, who he knows. And so that has sort of protected him against the fact that he's just, shuts in a gold toilet, like you said. But if he's seen as actually, oh no of protected him against the fact that he's just shuts in a gold

toilet, like you said. But if he's seen as actually, oh no, maybe he is part of that establishment. Maybe when push comes to shove, he does protect those elites that he hangs out with because he actually does care about them or doesn't care about them, but he cares about himself. And he's just part of that culture. They don't want to think he's part of that culture, but look what he's doing in the Epstein case. Sure looks like he's protecting the establishment. So I do think there's like a story that makes sense to people, because it's true. ["The Daily Show Theme"]

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and unlimited talk and texts, delivered on the nation's largest 5G network. That's Warren G. Yeah. Warren G. Harding, Kenny G., some other guys named G, George Bush. I don't have anything to add. Okay.

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breaking the bank. Get this new customer offer and your three-month unlimited wireless plan for just 15 bucks a month at mintmobile.com slash crooked. That's mintmobile.com slash crooked. Upfront payment of $45 required equivalent to $15 a month. Limited time new customer offer for the first three months only Speeds may slow above 35 gigabytes on unlimited plan taxes and fees extra see Mint Mobile for details So Trump of course realizes that if he wants to change the subject He's got to make sure he turns up the crazy to like an 11 or a 12. He can't be just doing your standard issue conspiracies.

You really got to turn it up, which is why he spent all week accusing his predecessor of a crime that's punishable by death. Let's listen. The leader of the gang was President Obama, Barack Hussein Obama. Have you heard of him? This was treason. This was every word you can think of. And you should mention that every time they give you a question that's not appropriate.

Just say, oh, by the way, Obama cheated on the election. I have great respect for Tulsi and the documents they found on President Obama. Frankly, it was an Obama thing, but it was the people that worked under him also, working with him. So many, you wouldn't believe the documents they found on Obama. They just, they were, they were, his pockets were stuffed with them, and they all said, treason plan.

Step one. Step one, here's how I'm gonna do the coup. You might be wondering what the actual allegation is. Unfortunately, the administration official who cooked it up can't really explain it either. Here's Tulsi Gabbard not answering questions from CBS's Ed O'Keefe about the years-old information she's trying to repackage as a new scandal. The Senate Intelligence Committee spent several years looking into this and unanimously agreed in a bipartisan fashion, Secretary of State

Rubio was a member of that committee, that there was no political interference. There was a years long Justice Department investigation into this as well that also concluded no political interference. So help us from a 50,000 foot level explain what do you now have? I'm not asking you to take my word for it. I'm asking you and the media to conduct honest journalism and the American people To see for yourself President Obama Directed an intelligence community assessment to be created

To further this contrived false narrative that ultimately led to a years-long coup to try to undermine President Trump's presidency And if you believe that those two previous previous investigations missed that or covered it up? I'm telling you to look at the evidence. Look at the evidence and you will know the truth. You think she has looked at the evidence? I'm not so sure. I don't think she can explain the evidence. I guess the crime is the creation of a false narrative.

I didn't know that a false narrative could be a coup. But there wasn't even the creation of a false narrative. I didn't know that a false narrative could be a coup. But there wasn't even the creation of a false narrative. I know, we can get into it. There's like so many, there's so many steps that you have to get to. I mean, it's wild. But anyway, Lindsey Graham and John Cornyn, they're also calling for Trump's DOJ

to appoint another special counsel to conduct another investigation into Russiagate because apparently the several investigations conducted by Trump's party and Trump's DOJ in Trump's first term weren't enough. As for Obama, his spokesperson issued a statement that said, quote, out of respect for the office of the presidency, our office does not normally dignify the constant nonsense and misinformation flowing out of this White House with a response But these claims are outrageous enough to merit one these bizarre allegations are ridiculous and a weak attempt at distraction

What do you think Dan do you think do you think they can they can will this scandal into existence just by repeating treasonous coup and and false narrative and manipulated intelligence over and over again? I don't think we should call this a scandal like I don't even know what else to call it like a crock of shit like it's not a scandal suggests that there is an allegation of something there's a at least credible allegation of something there's there is they can't even explain the allegation. It makes no sense.

This is the most easily debunked thing in the world. And the shortest way I would do that is, how could it possibly be a scandal when, how could it possibly be that Obama was trying to steal the election from Trump when during the election, the FBI was investigating Trump and told no one, but the FBI instead announced an investigation to Hillary Clinton three weeks before the election?

It's all part of the plan. Yeah, it's, I mean, it's, it's so stupid. Can they get, um, MAGA media to report on this and talk about it and maybe take some attention away from Epstein there? Sure. Can they get the base who was, who wants to believe everything Trump says to believe this? Yes. Can they make anyone take it seriously? Other than that? I don't think so. Yeah, I don't think so either. It's wild. I mean, I guess I'm not surprised that Tulsi would do this. She doesn't seem like the brightest bulb. And obviously Trump yells treason. It's not the first time Trump has accused Barack Obama of treason. I don't know if anyone remembers. He's done it multiple times before. Probably won't be the last. He likes to do that when he, you know, that's his card to play when

things get really bad. You got to go right for Obama. I don't think it's the smartest move to accuse the most popular political figure in the country of treason based on a concocted scandal that no one can fucking understand. But, you know, he's trying. It's funny, I was home and Emily was like, what is the whole Obama thing? And I'm like, okay, well, I go, it's bullshit, you know? And she's like, yeah, but like, what are they trying to say? And I started explaining it and within 10 seconds,

she's like, I don't know what you're fucking talking about. I can't, just move on. And that is what is benefiting them is that it is, once you start explaining it for like 10 seconds, it becomes so fucking confusing because you have to go back to season one and you have to have everyone remember what happened with Russiagate and the hacking of the DNC and the WikiLeaks and

the disseminating of the emails and all this bullshit. And it's just, and I, just to explain this, to talk about it, to try to rebut some of it on Twitter have gone down the rabbit hole and whew, it is like, it is PTSD, man. I mean, just it's worth when I saw the tweet this morning of John Cornyn from Lindsey Graham saying that he and John Cornyn were calling her a special counsel. I was like, Oh, this isn't a big deal. And then it took me a minute to remember that they, they actually

appointed a special counsel. They already did. Named John Durham to do this exact thing. And he found, he basically affirmed the conclusions of the Senate intelligence committee report and what the Obama folks put out and that there was no conspiracy to hurt Trump

in any way, shape, or form, other than some paperwork problems in the Carter page, and I totally forgot, FISA warrant. Well, Tulsi's like, and there was a meeting then that Obama called in December, and it's like, yeah, everyone knows about that meeting. That was a public meeting, as Ben mentioned on Pod Save the World,

he wrote about it in his book, this meeting. And then it's like, and then in that meeting, he directed his national security team to develop an intelligence assessment that pulled together everything they knew about Russia and then manufactured this narrative. And it's like, okay, so then what did they find a month later?

Well, a month later, they find that Putin conducted an influence campaign aimed at the election with the goal of undermining faith in the democratic process and hurting Clinton's candidacy and her potential presidency. The dispute is, so no one disputes that part, right? Even Tulsi is in her stuff now is not disputing that Putin interfered in the election, which it seemed like she was at first, but when you read the report and now what you're saying, they agree that Putin interfered. Their dispute is that Putin didn't interfere to help Trump. That's the conclusion

that the Obama intelligence assessment came to that they have a problem with. And they think that this conclusion, that Putin didn't just interfere in the election, but he interfered with the intent of helping Donald Trump win. That that, that narrative, which is false, which Obama knew was false, is what I guess led to Trump firing Comey, which is what led to Mueller becoming the special counsel, which is what led to the Mueller investigation, which is what then led to no charges against Donald Trump and his presidency continued on. I honestly don't know. And it's like, oh you know how we knew that Putin interfered not just to undermine democracy but because he

wanted to help Donald Trump? Because he fucking told us. He admitted it later. And also they're like, well, some people in the Intel community weren't sure that Putin wanted to interfere to help Donald Trump. And it's like, you know what I had forgotten about until I read Glenn Thrush's excellent piece on the New York Times website? Is this gonna, please tell me this is the New York

Times story. Yeah, well, it linked to another New York Times story from 2019 that I hadn't even read. I was talking to Tommy about. Apparently, the CIA, and this is just a fun spy story, but the CIA decades ago cultivated an asset in Russia that ended up working his way up through the ranks of Russian officials until he was a senior official

who regularly saw Putin. And so like we had this guy, we had a CIA agent inside the Kremlin that was seeing Putin regularly. And it was so secret that apparently when Obama was president, and I know this from the New York Times piece, I am not, I didn't know this at the time. I didn't know this until last night,

but this was a 2019 New York Times piece, that it was so secret, the existence of this source in the Kremlin, that it didn't even appear in Obama's intel briefings, that Brennan sent it to him separately in an envelope, just to him, to let Obama know what was actually going on because they didn't want anyone else to know. And this was the source that first said, later confirmed by a million other pieces of intelligence, which Tulsi leaves out, this was the source that said that, oh yeah, Putin wants to help Trump. He has a preference for Trump. So the idea that some

other asshole in the intel community is like, I don't know if we have the evidence. Well, clearly they did. Clearly they did. And by the way, the reason we all know this now is because since we had to have the intelligence assessment out there, all of a sudden everyone got worried in the CIA that this guy was going to get found out by Putin because Putin likes to kill people who do that. And so they extracted him from Russia. They brought him back here and I guess he's here somewhere in the United States. It's very the Americans, Dan. I just thought it was a cool side story for all this.

I don't have a source in the Kremlin, but you know what? Now we have none. That was one of the problems. We lost our big source in the Kremlin. But the piece of evidence I have that Putin wanted to help Trump was that he- Besides Putin telling us later. Well, that's one clue, if you will.

But also he only hacked Hillary's campaign. Well, that was the other- That was just like a, just if you're like looking for clues. Well, no, no, Dan, you gotta, you see, you gotta go down the, you gotta go down the rabbit hole. He hacked, according to Tulsi, the reason he hacked Hillary's campaign is because he decided that Hillary was definitely

gonna win, that Trump wasn't, and so he was holding stuff back to undermine Hillary's presidency. There's always another reason. And look, that's possible. He probably did want to undermine her presidency and he might've even thought that she was a shoe in like the rest of us did, but that doesn't mean that he didn't want Trump to win. That didn't mean that he didn't try to interfere to help Trump win.

Well, then he would have held it, held the information back to after the election. Right. Well, he held some back. That's right. But he didn't. He didn't. He used it all. He didn't. No, he used it all. He didn't.

And if we all remember, uh, what happened in the summer right before Russia threw WikiLeaks, dumped all of the Clinton emails. Oh, I remember. Ding, ding, ding, ding, ding. Do you remember? Well, what happened? Did Trump stand before the world and call on

Putin to hack the Hillary's email server? Did that happen? Yes, he did. Specifically call on Russia to do that? He did. He said that out loud. Kids, you can Google that. You can look on the YouTubes.

You'll find some great clips from 2015, 2016, of Trump saying, Russia, if you're listening, I would love you to dump emails. And guess what they did? In a short time after, they dumped the email that they hacked It is so funny and then you get of course we watch Fox in our office all day and you get all these people and They're like yes, but then Obama they said that he colluded and there was collusion above us like no No, no, no, no this whole Obama treason coup thing the intelligence assessment didn't say anything about Trump's relationship

or the Trump campaign's relationship with anyone in Russia. There was nothing about collusion. There was nothing about their relationship. That just wasn't in the intelligence estimate, which none of these fucking MAGA influencers know because they're too stupid to look at the fucking information. I have had this like weird fantasy

over the last couple of days. I'm like, I- I cannot wait to hear what comes next. I have had this, like, weird fantasy over the last couple days. I'm like, I... I cannot wait to hear what comes next. I just want to... I am dying to debate one of these people who is taking this seriously, just any time, any place, come on Pod Save America. The only thing I won't do is do, like, a three-minute hit on Fox where, like, someone just yells over me and then they cut the commercial.

But I would sit down on a podcast with Matt Taibbi, any of these folks, Megan Kelly, any of the jokers on Fox, anyone in the administration, I guess, if they want, and talk about this because this thing would fall apart in five minutes, five minutes. Would you debate 20 Russia conspiracy believing mega guys at the same time? This is my way of trying to get on, see Austin smiling, he's so excited.

This is my way of trying to get on Jubilee. And look, I thought I was debating Russiagate. Suddenly I got a bunch of Nazis around me. Anyway, anyway, it's weird because look, the treasonous coup, we've known about this and Trump says that the evidence is overwhelming that he's just guilty. It's been happening.

It's, it's now been going on for a week, over a week. They still haven't arrested Obama. What's going on? Where's the arrest? Where? I don't understand. You got the FBI, you got the, the department of justice, where's the warrants.

You, oh, the DOJ, DOJ came up with a strike force. Ooh, put out a press releaseJ came up with a strike force? Ooh, put out a press release. We're developing a strike force. Strike force is gonna look at the evidence. Okay, guys. I just wanna come back to the fact that you just disclosed that you've been having this fantasy

about being on a podcast with Charlie Kirk. I know, I know. I just, it's just so, it's, I guess it's like my, I'm still, I shouldn't be this naive, this far into this, but it's just wild watching them be like, they seem genuinely like outraged that this is such a scandal and they can't believe this. And I'm like, did you read, did you read the documents?

Did you even look at it? I'm the more cynical of the two of us. Although you're rapidly catching up, but not in this exact moment, but I just want you to know that if you do this, there's not gonna be a point where one of these people just says, you know what, John, you're rapidly catching up, but not on, not in this exact moment, but I just want you to know that if you do this, there's not going to be a point where one of these people just says, you know what, John, you're right. I know, I know, I know Dan. That's why that's usually when I move on to the next thing. Okay. Cause then I'm like, it's not going to, I can say whatever I want, but it's just not going to work. But we'll see.

What do you think of Obama's response? Cause I mean, like I will say, I'm like, okay, I'm glad it didn't, I'm glad in response, that sort of standard and official like didn't come from him and came from a spokesperson. Because if he speaks about it, I would like him to have some fun with us. I know it's a serious topic, but I think he should have some fun with it. It's not a serious topic.

That, well, that's what I'm saying. Like I, I'm sure everyone needs to take it seriously because you know, it's like Trump is running the government and law enforcement and, uh, there's no I'm saying. Like I'm sure everyone needs to take it seriously because you know, it's like Trump is running the government and law enforcement and there's no more independence and you know, so it's a real, it's live AMO here. But I don't know, I think that Obama should mock it because it is very mockable.

I think the best part of the response was the last line, which is these findings were affirmed in a 2020 report by the bipartisan Senate Intelligence Committee led by then chairman Marco Rubio. Who's been so quiet, so quiet Dan. We have not heard a word. This I don't understand. We have not heard a word from Marco Rubio.

The Marco Rubio Secretary of State last I checked, right? Yeah. Last I checked these- And National Security Advisor. Is he also head of the National Archives too? And he's the archivist, yeah. He's the archivist is the best part. But does it the State Department do a briefing

every single day? Yeah. Yeah. They were busy at the briefing, also not answering questions about why the guy convicted of triple homicide in jail in Venezuela is now set free in America. I don't know what Tammy Bruce is doing,

the spokesperson at those briefings. But certainly not answering questions about whether the Secretary of State stands by the committee report that he I don't know what Tammy Bruce is doing, the spokesperson at those briefings, but certainly not answering questions about whether the Secretary of State stands by the committee report that he led that said Putin did interfere in the election on behalf of Trump. There is an entire group of people whose job it is to go, who are reporters who go to work every day

at the Department of State. When Marco Rubio travels, when he gets some time off from his archiving duties, he travels with reporters. I assume at some point he's gonna have to answer this question. I'm sure being the archivist, he has access to all of that information.

Do you think he has access to the Epson files? Okay. Marco's got it all. He's got it all. It's just, it's just sitting there. Anyway, if anyone can find Marco Rubio and ask him the question, get an answer out of him. He's just deep in the stacks right now. Marco Rubio, if anyone can find Marco Rubio and ask him the question, get an answer out of him.

He's just deep in the stacks right now. Marco Rubio, if you're listening. You can either answer this question or debate John Faber on a podcast, your choice. Paz de America is brought to you by Quince. If you're not into chasing trends, but you are about stuff that fits right, feels good, and actually lasts, then you're going to love Quince. Their lightweight layers and high-quality staples will become your everyday essentials. Quince is the kind of stuff you'll actually wear and repeat, like a breathable flow-knit polo, crisp cotton shirts, and comfortable lightweight pants somehow work for both weekend hangs and dressed up dinners.

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Trump always needs villains to blame for his own failures. This is why we're doing the treasonous coup right now. But it's become a lot harder now that he controls everything. So it's hard to find someone else to blame, which is why he's been trying to pin inflation and high prices on Fed chair Jerome Powell. So we talked the other day about how Trump seems to realize he can't fire Powell unless it's a four cause that's what the law says at least. So, uh, his goons have been cooking up this

allegation that Powell has spent so much money renovating the fed building. Uh, I can't do it with a straight face. It's so stupid. It's all of this, the stupidest scandal, that it might be a crime or at least cause for him to fire Powell. So I guess to get attention for this ploy,

Trump decided to visit the Fed headquarters today, Thursday, which presidents don't usually do. And it's all under construction. And I just, it was just on before we started recording this. And so there's this live shot of Trump and Jerome Powell and Tim Scott, because I guess he's on the relevant committee. And they all got helmets on, they all got construction hats on,

and they stopped to talk to reporters, and the reporters were all sick of fans, apparently. I don't think there was a real reporter in the pool, we can get into this. Apparently not. But the first question is like, oh, Mr. President. president isn't aren't there so many budget problems and and and hasn't the Fed spent too much money on this renovation project blah blah and then this is what happens on on live TV let's listen it looks like it's about 3.1 billion went

up a little bit or a lot so the 2.7 is now 3.1. And... He's not aware of that. Yeah, it just came out. Yeah, I don't know. I haven't heard that from anybody, the Fed. You just added in a third building is what that is. That's a third building.

Well, I know, but it's a building that's being built. No, it was built five years ago. Are there things the Chairman can say to you today that would make you back off some of the earlier criticism? Well, I'd love him to lower interest rates. But other than that, what can I tell you? You are Jerome Powell. You are the chairman of the Federal Reserve.

You are responsible for setting the interest rates for the country, for our monetary policy. and you are in the middle of a construction site arguing with the President of the United States over line items in a building reno. I just... and had to correct him and was oh sir that the number that you're saying there that's a building that's already been built. Trump's like, I don't know, I don't know what you're saying. Like, what the fuck? It is so stupid.

It's like ham-handed jaw boning of him, and Trump feels like he's in his element because he's at a construction site, and he's kind of somewhat incoherently talking about how buildings are built in basements and reverse bathtubs. There's like a lot of discussion in there about this stuff. And the one thing you can take away from this is that Jerome Powell thinks that Donald Trump

is the dumbest person who's ever walked the face of the planet. And he cannot hide that sentiment for one second. No, and he was, through most of it, he's like trying to look up, like I don't know. I think he was hoping someone would like extract him from the situation. Like one of those overpriced beams would

fall on his head. That was the look on his face. Like, what am I, how did I get here? What am I doing here? Did he just, I mean, I don't know. I'm curious about how he ended up there. Did he decide he had to go because Trump was coming? Did Trump invite him and he didn't want to say no?

I mean, I'm glad he was there to correct the record on the random. It was a great thing that Trump had it on a piece of paper in his pocket so that Jerome Powell could then look at it on live television and tell him he's an idiot. I know. I was, I was worried for Powell for a minute because I'm like, who knows what this paper says or where Trump got it? Like if I was Jerome Powell, like he presents you with the paper or with a random number on it, you're going to be like, I was worried for Powell for a minute. Cause I'm like, who knows what this paper says or where Trump got it? Like if I was Jerome Powell, like he presents you with the paper or with a random number on

it, you're going to be like, I don't know. But, but clearly Jerome Powell knew that it was, he knew what the money was. It was a five year old building. Also to your point about Trump with the construction hat and how he's the, the Fox people, uh, as they were cutting to, uh, him arguing with Powell, they're like, and there he is with the, he is in his elements

with that construction hat on. He is a builder folks. He is always, he's been a builder. He's confident there. This is what he does. This is who he is. Now let's listen. So anyway, yeah.

So he, you know, in front of the Fed chair, he's yelling about interest rates. He also said later, so later at some point they get, they get back to Trump. They ask him more questions. Powell has left at this point. Uh, Trump says he doesn't think he's going to, he's not going to fire Powell now because he thinks

it would be too much. It would be too big of a move, too much, too much turmoil. Um, he says he has two or three other people in mind for the job when Powell's term ends. And then they shout a couple other questions at him. Of course, they shout a question about Obama's treason. We heard that clip when he said that they found all sorts of documents on Obama and the imaginary search. And not a single question about Donald Trump

being in the Epstein files. Not one question, Dan. Truly insane. Like I know no one cares about this, but this is the moment when it matters that the White House now picks, hand picks the reporters who travel with the president. Cause I don't know who was in this pool.

I haven't seen a list, but it appears to be either, it appears to have only been pro-Trump reporters, right? Because we know the wires services aren't in there anymore because the AP is banned and they just got rid of all the wire services away to get around the AP banned. We know that the Wall Street Journal is not in there because they've been banned from the press pool for the temerity to report on the president of the United States. And so I assume that, because there, all the questions were all friendly and there was like

a whole bunch of questions about the renovation. Like a lot of them, like, did you see anything when you walk through there, did you see anything that seemed overpriced? Yeah. It's just like. Did you, did you see, did you see any crimes? Yeah.

When you were walking with the, when you were walking with the chairman, did he, did he happen to commit any crimes while you were walking? Like how, the biggest story as you see, not just like in politics, but in the country is Donald Trump being in the Epstein files. He's in front of the press for an extended period of time and no one asked him about it?

Even, I was thinking, even if you had a bunch of like MAGA media influencers who have been talking for years about wanting to see the Epstein files. You'd think that maybe one of them would have asked a question about it. They wanted, they know what's going to tell the pool. Well, hope they had a good time. Okay. We got a few developments on Trump's increasingly unpopular deportation regime. Two federal judges ruled on Wednesday that Kilmar Obrego-Garcia must be set free while awaiting trial on questionable, to put it generously, human smuggling charges in Tennessee and that ICE couldn't just grab him and deport him during that time

when he was free waiting trial. DHS spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin called those rulings, quote, lawless and insane before reiterating the government's position that Obrego-Garcia will Garcia will quote never walk America's streets again. His attorneys are taking that promise seriously which is why they supported the government's requests to keep their own client locked up for another 30 days because under the Trump regime an immigrant like Abrego Garcia is safer in jail than on the streets where ICE can disappear him. And yet one person, the Trump regime apparently has no problem letting walk the streets, is a

dual Venezuelan-American citizen who had been serving 30 years in prison in Venezuela for committing a brutal triple murder in Spain. This guy was one of the ten prisoners that the Maduro regime released in exchange for the 250 or so Venezuelan immigrants Trump disappeared to an El Salvador prison without due process, where some now say they were tortured and abused for 125 days. Many of them had come to the US legally, had no criminal record, and were accused without evidence of being gang members. Meanwhile, the State Department has so far refused to answer questions on the whereabouts

of the triple murderer we traded them for. They've only said, cause through a Rubio statement that he's just, he's somewhere in America right now. That's all we know. So much for getting rid of the worst of the worst, huh Dan? Yeah. Like I imagine that there is no legal basis to do anything with him other than set him free. He's

not convicted of a crime in the United States, but the disparity between how Comey-Burgessia is treated, how people walking the streets of America are treated by these mass dice agents and this individual just uncovers the fundamental lie at the core of Trump's immigration policy, which is it is not about crime. It's not about keeping America safe from criminals. It's not about getting the criminals out of here. It's about getting the immigrants out of here. Undocumented, documented, naturalized citizens.

It is very clearly about trying to change the composition of what America is to make it less diverse. That is what Stephen Miller believes. That is very clear because if you stand on stage and you say, we're going to get all the gang members and the killers out here, and then we just bring killers back while taking people who are law-abiding, hardworking people who have been parts of their communities for years and disappearing them to torture prisons and to Somalia and Libya and other places around the world, which makes it very clear what this is about. And also how much money, how many agents, how much time is spent going after

dreamers and farm workers and people who are here legally and sometimes American citizens that could be directed towards people who have criminal records, people who have committed violent crimes, whether they are undocumented immigrants or even other immigrants or American citizens or whoever, right? Like there is a opportunity cost to what they are doing in terms of keeping people safe. There was this whole story about how a Customs and Border Patrol officer was shot.

I guess they were off duty and it was an undocumented immigrant shot them. And everyone was like, this is Eric Adams' fault and Kathy Hochul and the policies of New York. But I was like, well, why was that undocumented immigrant that shot the CPB officer? Why was that person free on the streets? Why didn't she have more resources and more manpower

trying to get that person? Oh, because you were shipping people without a criminal record to fucking El Salvador, to a prison where they got tortured? Is that why? Because you were like running into farms to grab farm workers and their kids and send them away? Why don't you put resources where they belong

and actually going after violent criminals? I don't know, that's an idea. We now are learning more about the torture and abuse in Seacott because of interviews with some of the men detained there that were just published by, there's one story in the Washington Post, one in the Atlantic.

They describe being beaten and taunted by guards, denied legal counsel, forced to spend days in a cell known as The Island, where they were deprived of water and slept on the floor in a nearly pitch black room. Like, you know, we were talking about this this morning before on the show, and it's like, I don't, it's a horrific story.

There's nothing we can do about it now because it's already in the past. They are still going to ship people to third countries, to port people to third countries. So who knows if there are other CICOTs in the future, I don't know if they're going to send people back to CICOT or what, if that's over, or they're just going to now do South Sudan or wherever.

But like, is there a world where the Trump administration officials responsible for this face accountability? do South Sudan or wherever, but like, is there a world where the Trump administration officials responsible for this face accountability? I hope, I mean, I, everyone should read these stories, these accounts, because they are so horrifying and the idea that our country chooses to send people to these conditions. This is not supporting people and having them end up in those conditions. We are cutting an agreement with a government to

ensure that the people that we kick out of our country are tortured. That is a deal that Marco Rubio made and has defended and is proud of and America does not have the most stellar human rights record, but we should be better than this. I would hope that the people involved in this will be held to account over the course of time, right? That they will be, you know, be seen as the immoral villains that they are, that they will be prized in public life, that they will spend the rest of their time sort of defending themselves and exploiting themselves to their children, their grandchildren, their neighbors,

everyone else for what they did in this moment. Do I think they're ever going to face, have any sort of accountability that measures up to what they've done here? No, I don't think that. The one thing I would say, right, because this, it is so dark, but I just would, and this is, there's not much solace here,

but if you look at the polling, the American people reject this and they reject it pretty strongly. Donald Trump's immigration approval rating has dropped like 17 points since March. There was a CBS pullout this weekend that asked people specifically about how Trump was handling deportation facilities,

which I think in people's minds includes CICOT and he's 16 points underwater. Right? There are way too many people in this country who are okay with what is happening and that should make us question a lot about who we are as a society, but it should make people feel a little tiny bit better

that the majority of Americans reject this. And I will also say, when we started talking about this, when this started happening, there were a number, maybe most, elected Democrats and others, Democratic strategists, other people were saying, this is another distraction, he wants us to talk about immigration, he's baiting us into this, and I get it,

I get what the immigration polling was after the election. I've been critical about the Biden administration and how we handled immigration in the 2024 election. I've been critical about, you know, the Biden administration and how we handled immigration in the 2024 election. But I would just say, like, we're heading in, if we head into the midterms, Democrats should talk about this issue. Not only because, as you said, it is now the politically smart thing to do. The public is on our side here. Fundamentally that's what Poles should tell us, that the public is on our side. But it's also just, it's not just the morally right thing to do, it's the morally right thing to do because it

is the foundation of what the country should be about. Right? That this is a place where you get due process, where you are innocent until proven guilty, where you are not tortured, where you are not, you are innocent until proven guilty, where you are not tortured, where you're not sent to a place to be tortured. There's one guy in the Atlantic piece from Venezuela, he was like a DJ, he came here and he gets caught up by ICE and they're like, oh you didn't complete your asylum application and blah blah blah and where would you like to be, you know we're going to deport you and he's like, I want to be deported back to Venezuela. Like my family's back there and it like, I wanna be deported back to Venezuela.

Like, my family's back there, and it sucks that I'm being deported, but like, that's where I wanna go. All these people, all the Trump people, all the people that wanted deportations, you'd think that that's what they wanted, right? Okay, this guy was here, he didn't do it the right way, didn't finish his asylum application, send him back to Venezuela.

Put him on a plane, he tells his family he's coming back to Venezuela. Put him on a plane, he tells his family he's coming back to Venezuela. Put him on a plane, shut the windows, everything's dark, when the plane lands, he's in El Salvador. That's the first time he knows he's in El Salvador. And he's not even in El Salvador and set free in a country he's never been to

and doesn't know. He's locked up in this prison and tortured. What is the fucking legal rationale for doing that? I do not understand. I do, it seems illegal, it seems unconstitutional, and the people who perpetrated it should face legal accountability. I just, it's crazy.

I just don't, I don't understand. Un-fucking-real, Stephen Miller. Good shit. All right, when we come back from the break, you will hear Tommy's conversation with Senator Mark Warner about the Obama accusations and what the intelligence community really found. But one quick thing before we do that, we got a new episode out of our subscription show Inside 2025. Our friends Kate Shaw, co-host of Strict Scrutiny, and Ian Bassin, head of Protect Democracy, former colleagues of ours

from the White House, talk about what it's really like to work in the White House counsel's office. They're great lawyers, Kate and Ian, kept us all out of trouble until now that we'll all face tragedies of treason. They get into all the challenges government lawyers face and how Trump is shredding norms at the Department of Justice. To hear the full conversation, get bonus content, and support progressive media, head to crooked.com slash friends, or subscribe on Apple podcasts. When we come back, Senator Mark Warner.

["Positive America"] Positive America is brought to you by the NPR Politics Podcast. Man, talking about politics all the time can be challenging. Take it from us. There's a lot. Things change a lot. The stuff you hear from the White House can be incomprehensible. Sometimes there's just too much coming at you all at once and it can feel challenging. But that's why the NPR Politics Podcast is where we go to decode what is going down in Washington and what every decision out there might mean for you and for me.

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Give politics a chance with the NPR Politics Podcast available wherever you get your podcasts. I'm here with Senator Mark Warner of Virginia. As the vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, he's been following Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard's wild claims that Barack Obama is guilty of a quote, treasonous conspiracy. Senator, thank you. Welcome to the show. Well, thanks, Tommy. Yeah, it's a wild time, man. It's a wild time. It is very weird. So President Trump is clearly desperate to change the subject from his cover-up of the Epstein files to literally anything else. That's why he's pressing the treason

button. So that's why he accused Obama of treason earlier this week. That's why they trotted out Tulsi Gabbard to the White House briefing room to claim that Obama twisted intelligence information to say that Russia's interference in the 2016 election was designed in part to help Donald Trump win. She claims that this is proof of a treasonous conspiracy. Here's a quick clip from Gabbard's bizarre briefing Wednesday. The implications of this are far reaching and have to do with the integrity of our democratic republic. and have to do with the integrity of our Democratic Republic. It has to do with an outgoing president taking action to manufacture intelligence,

to undermine and usurp the will of the American people in that election, and launch what would be a years-long coup against the incoming President of the United States, Donald Trump. Senator, let's just start big picture. What's your response to Gabbard's claims there? Bullshit. I mean, it's ludicrous. Remember, Tommy, and you know this, but the Senate Intelligence Committee, when I was vice chair, it was run by Republicans. We did a three and a half year investigation.

We had people like Tom Cotton on the committee. If there had been any evidence that any of the things that Gabbard just said, you don't think the Republicans would have blown up. We had a bipartisan unanimous report that said, you know what? Russia got into some voter files, but didn't mess with the vote count. But clearly, they had an influence campaign. Clearly, they had a preference. I mean, Putin had an influence campaign. Clearly, they had a preference.

I mean, Putin himself acknowledged in 2018. And the irony of this, hypocrisy is beyond the word. There's this worldwide threat hearing where all the intelligence community, once a year, public lays out. In Gabbard's own worldwide threat analysis, it still said Russia still does malign foreign influence, tries to reflect elections, and to try to bring out kind of like the greatest hits from the 2020 campaign.

As you said, you said it's desperation on trying to distract people from the Epstein files. Yeah, it's exhausting. I mean, it just feels like we've done this over and over again. You know, you mentioned this Senate Intelligence Committee report. I mean, it just feels like we've done this over and over again. You know, you mentioned this Senate Intelligence Committee report. I mean, I was reading it this morning.

It's like 1,000 pages long. It's comprehensive. It was developed over the course of years. Can you tell me about now Secretary of State and National Security Advisor and seven other jobs, Marco Rubio's role in putting together the Senate of the report? I believe he was chairman of the committee during the production of some of this work, right?

Well, this had been something that, originally Richard Burr was chairman. He had some issues, so he had to step aside. But what was so, I thought, cool about the report was, it was so straight down the middle. When people came to get interviewed, and we interviewed everybody. They didn't know who was a Democrat, who was a Republican. It was researched extensively.

No one has contradicted its conclusions. Clearly, there was a major influence campaign. Russia does this historically. We should not be surprised. The irony, and again, in many ways, was that the Trump intelligence officials at that point in 2018, 2019, 2020, like all knock-a-sonic, you know, they set up major election monitoring groups. And because of the Trump intelligence community, we were better protected in 2020 than we were in 2016. And now, Gabbard trying to bring out this whole line of hits, and finally, that's the thing that I also want to raise. A week ago, she'd made these accusations

based upon a totally partisan, you know, Devin Nunes, the former house chair. That was bad enough. Yesterday, she took a report that was so classified that in the first Trump administration, when people threatened to release it, people like Bill Barr threatened to resign because it would reveal sources and methods. And that's kind of the holy grail.

We don't want folks who are working with us to get exposed. She dropped this report yesterday without any redactions. I think it surprised the heck out of the CIA because I think they were going through a redaction process. And it just shows that, you know, there It just shows that she has no regard for the integrity of the workforce of the IC. On top of that, she has no regard for our ability to work with allies around the world because who in the hell is going to work with us this on top of the Signalgate scam? This is long-term damage that you can't just say oops. We made a mistake

Yeah, I want to ask you a little bit more about that house Intel report that she dumped out yesterday in a minute But just a little context for listeners like so one important reform the intelligence community made after the Iraq war debacle was Reports no longer just say the CIA believes X or Y now says how confident they are in that assessment So a low confidence assessment could be something like, you know, we have fragmentary or, you know, not fully vetted information whereas a high confidence assessment could be something like we believe X foreign leader thinks Y because the NSA intercepted a phone call where this person said as much, right? So given that context, like what is the ICs in your level of confidence that Putin directed the 2016 election interference and did so in part because he wanted Trump to win?

My confidence is extraordinarily high. I mean, you know, but remember, this should not be a high hurdle. Remember Donald Trump in the campaign saying, gosh, if the Russians have got the WikiLeaks stuff, leak it. If the Russians have got bad stuff on Hillary, leak it. I don't think there was, we ever reached a conclusion that there was actual collusion between the two, but the idea that there was an effort and that Putin had a clear choice and had a, as you know, Tommy, a long-term animosity against Hillary Clinton because she'd actually spoke up for Russian Democratic reforms in the early like 2011-2012 time frame. So, and the irony is that factual basis of what

we determined, not about my Republican colleagues, have said well, you know, I've now come to the conclusion that's not true. Right. And some of it is just so blaringly obvious. I mean, the GRU, Russian intelligence, they hacked the DNC, and then they dumped those emails out through a carveout. They hacked a top Clinton aide named John Podesta. They dumped his emails out, too.

They gave stuff to WikiLeaks around the Access Hollywood tape release to distract from that. I mean, the Senate Intel Committee report found that no single group of Americans were targeted by the IRA's social media campaigns more. That was the Russian sort of group based in St. Petersburg, Russia that did a bunch of, you know, online bots and things. They were targeting African-Americans.

Obviously those are the heart and soul of the Democratic Party's base. The two top performing intentionally false reports on Facebook were Pope Francis' endorsement of Donald Trump for president and WikiLeaks confirmation of Hillary Clinton's sale of weapons to ISIS. It's pretty obvious here who they wanted to win based on just that fact pattern. Remember as well, they had a fake Black Lives Matter site subsequently. They had, there was the one that was kind of, I thought almost funny, they had a site that said

Tennessee Republican Party, but it was just, I think, TEN, and instead of TENN, and it had more followers than the actual Tennessee Republican Party's official site. So, you know, the GRU's sophisticated. They took advantage of kind of our openness. The fact that this is being relitigated at all at this point and Gabbard is making even more outrageous claims. I mean, there's never been a director of national intelligence that has politicized intelligence

product. Again, share with your audience. She actually had her henchmen fire some of the most senior intelligence professionals because they wouldn't bend the knee and change the report about the Venezuelan gang, Trandot Ologua. Now, these are a bad guy gang,

the Maduro government's bad guys, but this notion that they were completely all connected, the IC told truth, and then they fired people. And then she's tried to look at all of the personal chat between everybody in the IC, trying to, you give up certain privacy protections if you work for the IC, but do you really want your personal chat looked at depending on how loyal you are to Donald Trump?

This has never happened before. She was like on the Charlie Kirk turning point convention last Sunday, trashing the workforce. We are in such uncharted grounds with her behavior. That, you know, again, I don't think it, her claims got much attention since, you know, subsequently later in the day it came out that Trump's at least in some of these Epstein files.

We don't know what. I'm not saying that's bad, but it's, you know, the irony, again, is this is the guy who spent his whole campaign saying we've got to disclose this stuff. And now it seems like he's, you know, trying to hide and obfuscate every way he can. Yeah. The idea of taking all these sort of classified, highly classified, like intra-CIA communications where CIA officers are talking about named assets and collection techniques and sources and methods, and then creating a database of all of that for Tulsi Gabbard for the Russians and for the Chinese

to directly target seems like the dumbest thing I could imagine. It's also worth noting, I keep bringing this up, Evgeny Prigozhin, the guy who ran the Wagner Group, this now deceased oligarch because he decided to drive his tanks at Moscow, which was a bad idea in Russia. In 2022, he confirmed that Russia interfered in our elections. He said, gentlemen, we have interfered, are interfering,

and will interfere. He was prosecuted. He was indicted by the Trump administration in 2018. He was sanctioned by Trump's Treasury Department for his connections to this Russian troll farm and Russian interference. The Trump administration, the first time around, certainly thought that Russia was interfering and there was really no debate over who they preferred in the election.

You mentioned this House Intelligence Committee report. Tommy, could I just add one other thing? This is again, some of the irony. The Trump intelligence officials, the head of the NSA, Paul Nakasani, Gina Haspel at the CIA during that time, they worked very aggressively so that we had a more secure system in 2020. And they knew and fully acknowledged

what the Russians had done. And do you remember this? This is again a blast from the past, but this guy Chris Krebs, who ran the cyber assistance, the cyber information security agency, literally got fired because he told the truth that our election was secure in 2020. So again, relitigating this now and trying to bring Obama. That's absurd. The Vatican's seen new lows, but it's pretty wild. But and trying to bring Obama. That's absurd. With that, I could see new lows, but it's pretty wild.

But let's go back to the report, sorry. Yeah, no, I mean, there is this House Intel Committee report, I think it was written by now FBI Director Cash Patel back in, what, 2017 or something. What is this report? How does it differ from the Senate report you worked on? Well, what happened was the House Intelligence Committee was, the Democrats and Republicans didn't even talk to each other during that time. And there was a guy, Devin Nunes, who was the chair, he now runs one of Trump's business

operations. And there was no attempt for any kind of unbiased. They literally went out and cherry picked individual items the report you had no credibility but what they also did that was so dangerous and since the report is out you know they they literally with names redacted but still quotes of information that if you were that g r u or f s b the russia's got you know and i've arrived in until i just you could look back and so who

would know that conversation, you could look back and say, well, who would know that conversation? And you could have people's lives in jeopardy. This is so beyond the pale. And the proof point of that was they tried to release this report at the end of the first Trump administration, and everybody pushed back to the point that people threatened to resign. And now, with no forewarning or effort to kind of redact and protect those sources and methods,

she dropped this like a bomb yesterday. And the amazing thing is, I guess people are so jaded that it's not gotten the attention I thought it would get. I have tried to guilt my Republican colleagues on the end of committee, like how much more of this stuff are we gonna put up with before we say, you know, this has nothing to do with partisanship. It has to do with the fact that we've got to protect the men and women who worked for

us in the intelligence community and those countries around the world that share info with us. So is your concern that by releasing this report, the FSB or the GRU could target individuals who in the past provided the United States intelligence about Russian government thinking or could go after ongoing operations? I actually believe that the reasons for classifications, I'm going to talk about that, but I am going to say this was such a dangerous report, Trump officials in the first administration threatened to resign if it came out.

Fair enough. And I think this is a clear violation of what we call sources and methods. And you can explain that to the audience, which does mean at the end of the day, yeah, people's lives could be in jeopardy. Yeah, so Tulsi Gabbard, like Tulsi, she's an odd duck.

Before she got the job, I sincerely believed she was motivated by trying to keep the United States out of wars in the Middle East because of her service in Iraq and her experience there, and also concerned about the United States intelligence community being weaponized or politicized. Now, whether that was true or not, I do think it was something she talked about a lot. Since this time, since getting the job, she's now let Trump ignore her claim that Iran had not decided to get a nuclear weapon and then contorted her views to fit what Trump wanted to do.

And now she's clearly weaponizing the intelligence community to punish Trump's enemies and help distract from the Epstein story. What are the implications of her actions to the IC, but also just the United States? Yeah. Well, remember, Tommy, this is like, imagine you're a senior spy at the CIA. Remember the whole way that Trump came in and those first few weeks.

So you imagine if you've been doing that job for 30 years and you're suddenly said, we got a new president and here's the plan, Russia's our friend and Canada, Canada is the enemy. Right. You go, that's wackadoodle, but that's where they came from. And what happens, we hear almost daily from the intelligence community about morale being low, the number of people that have taken buyouts that you can't replace overnight. And I just really worry as well.

The signal gate, the Israelis were saying, we don't want you having that kind of secret information. And yesterday the word came out that HexF got the information from a secret document. Obviously. I'm not surprised at that. Right, yeah. But it makes people say, I'm going to think twice before I share information. There's no official agreement where countries sign a document that we're going to share intel. It's based on trust.

Right. And I've had leaders of some of our biggest allies in the intelligence world say, Warner, what's going on? These people getting fired? I worry, I have no evidence of this, let me be clear, but I worry that we might not get intelligence shared. And now with this dropping of this report yesterday, in the business, people's heads are exploding. And we will never know that this is like a unknowable fact, though. If somebody doesn't share with you, you don't know. There's not a way you can trace that.

But I have heard huge concerns. That is the kind of thing that, say we made a mistake, you still burn trust. And that's ultimately the coin of the realm in intelligence. Yeah, and they're burning it fast. I mean, to your point, the Washington Post reported yesterday that the Defense Department's Inspector General now has evidence

that the information disseminated by Pete Hegsath in those signal chats, which is a commercial app, it's not appropriate for classified information, was clearly marked as classified. It was a designation called secret no foreign, which is the secret level of classification, and it cannot be shared with foreigners. Hegsath, the Pentagon,

they've denied this many times, but it was obvious to anyone who's ever worked with the Pentagon or seen sort of like military planning operations that those are always classified at the secret level, especially if it's prospective, it's happening in the future. What does accountability look like? I just had one thing there too, Tommy. What was wild was, and Gabbard was on that call as well. Gabbard was actually in a foreign country and didn't go to a skiff. Amazing. Which is a secure place you could make a call. But I've challenged her and Hegseth. You don't believe this was important information. Come down to Norfolk or Virginia Beach. I've done town halls down there. And 20% of the audience either knew someone or had a family member

that was on the USS Truman. The Truman's ported, that's the aircraft carrier that launched the attack against the Hooties and it's home ported in Norfolk. I said, come and explain to those friends and family that this didn't put their loved ones in harm's way. People were, I've seen folks pissed before, but this was a level of anger from people that I think had been traditional You know Republican supporters. Yeah last question for you So Tulsi Gabbard the last question of her little press briefing

Was she was asked whether she is aware of any connections between Jeffrey Epstein and US intelligence or any foreign intelligence agencies She said quote. I haven't seen any evidence or information that reflects that and quote that struck That struck me as odd because, or odd phrasing, because Tulsi is one of the few people in the world who has access to information that would allow her to say definitively yes or definitively no, especially when it comes to connections to US intelligence like the CIA. I'm not sure if you've seen this, but it is taken as an article of faith in the kind of MAGA media world that Epstein was running a blackmail operation either for the CIA or more likely for the Mossad or maybe both. Do you know anything about reporting about potential Epstein ties to US intelligence

or Israeli intelligence? I do not, but I've heard those rumors and you you would have thought, as the director of national intelligence, since she was coming up, she must have known she was gonna get asked that question. And you are right, she could ask the question and get a response quicker than I could. And even I'm viewed as gang of eight, which is supposed to get all the information

because that's the speaker and the ranking members and the Intel chair and vice chairs. But yeah, it was again odd in my mind too that she kind of seemed to punt on that. Yeah, very odd. Well, Senator, thank you so much for helping us try to debunk this thing. Trying to explain to friends and acquaintances why what Trump is saying and what Tulsi is alleging doesn't make sense because it's so absurd. Their allegation is like, aha, here's intelligence that says the Russians didn't hack and change

vote totals. Then you're like, but Obama never said that. The White House administration. None of us ever said that. No one said that. None of us. But the thing, and I know that what kind of gets lost in all this and what the information coming out that Trump is somewhere named, and we don't know

what that means. But the part that's making me a little crazy is, again, this kind of dropping classified information without regard to the consequences, disrespecting the workforce. 13 years ago, 14 years ago, I didn't know that much about the intelligence community, but man, I've come to really believe that they are non-political patriots. They just want to try to do the right thing. And we know when we try to cook the books, that's how we got into a rock. So I'm going to stay at it, and I hope you will as well. But thanks so much for having me on. Thank you so much for joining the show.

That's our show for today. Thanks to Senator Warner for coming on. If you want to watch the full interview, it's up on the Pod Save the World YouTube channel. And while you're there, please subscribe if you haven't already. Also subscribe to the Pod Save America YouTube channel. We've all been talking about this chart all week of the YouTube channels that saw the fastest growth. Fucking Benny Johnson at the top of the list, exponentially more than the next one, that is absurd. When people search for news and information

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So, uh, please do that. Tommy will be back in the feed on Sunday with CNN media reporter Brian Stelter to talk about Trump's attacks on the media, the late show getting cancelled, and lots more. Talk to everybody soon. Have a good weekend. Bye, everyone. If you want to listen to Pod Save America ad free or get access to our subscriber

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