The Bulwark Podcast - Jim Acosta: Trump Can't Take the Heat

Episode Date: March 5, 2025

Once upon a time, presidents used to take tough questions from the press, but the current White House occupant can't handle any scrutiny from cantankerous reporters. And on his sad and sulking days, he needs warm and fuzzy Newsmax in the press pool to envelop him with flattery. Meanwhile, the joint session of Congress address has become basically pointless, SCOTUS blocks Trump's usurpation of power by one single vote, and at Trump's behest, the CIA is punishing Zelensky because he won't cooperate with the administration's disinfo campaign.  Plus, Democrats need to show voters they are genuinely furious. And if you've thought about running for office, now is the time to jump in—particularly in districts the Dems have tended to ignore. Amanda Litman and Jim Acosta join Tim Miller. show notes The Jim Acosta Show Amanda's 'Run for Something' When reporters rallied around Fox after Obama White House tried to shut it out

Hello and welcome to the Bulwark Podcast. I'm your host, Tim Miller. Many of you have been asking, what can I do? What can I do? All right. In segment two, we're going to talk about a tangible thing I think people should be looking at doing to combat Trump's threats to our Democratic Republic. But up first, former chief White House correspondent for CNN. He's now an independent journalist and host of the Jim Acosta show on Substack. It's Jim Acosta. How you doing, bro?

Hey Tim, good to see you again. Hey, good to see you too. For our audience's benefit, you know, every once in a while, I like to give them a reprieve. I'm not playing any clips from last night's presidential address, you know, having to hear the voice. It was an interminable one hour and 40 minutes. I fell asleep. I'm just going to be honest.

I fell asleep. I dozed off before I even made it to the Ukraine section. I am kind of with the view that these things, even when it's not Trump, are basically pointless in the modern era and they have very little impact. So I'm wondering what your assessment is of that and if there's anything you saw last night that you think might matter even on the margins. Yeah, I did a sub stack right after the speech was over with Michael Fanon.

And Mike says to me, he says, Jim, I love you, but fuck you for making me watch that. And I said, that's fair. I said, honestly, that's fair. I mean, it was a bullshit of Palooza. I mean, this is what bullshit of Palooza. This is what we expect from Trump now. And I kind of agree with you, Tim.

I think this thing has just turned into, you know, he-haw. I mean, I think the next president would be well-served to just do it from the Oval Office. Or like, what did they say in the olden days? You would just like send a letter down on a horse down Pennsylvania Avenue. You know? Just send the letter. That's where I'm at. Yeah. Just send the letter. Just send the letter. That's where I'm at.

It kind of annoys me. I don't know. This is maybe a meta commentary about the media, but just like the pomp and circumstance of it all. I mean, we're here in Trump 2.0. I mean, he didn't obviously respect any of the traditions at any point. It's like, why should we continue to have respect for it? It's like, oh, and they're kind of,

there's the first lady and she looks beautiful today and here comes the cabinet. I don't know, the whole thing is just kind of like, to me it's like, this is from another era and it's a fake. It feels fake, I guess. It is. And I loved hearing from the people last night who were saying, can you believe Congressman Green

and what he did and, you know, after Marjorie Taylor green and Lauren Boebert and their antics from whatever last year, the year before every year for that matter, and Joe Wilson, you live from when Obama was president. I mean, honestly, when Donald Trump is up there and he's referring to Elizabeth Warren as Pocahontas, why is anybody getting their knickers in a bunch over, you know, what the decorum is of the ceremony. It's just complete bedlam at this point. Right. This is where I'm on the Federman side. I'm a rare person on the Federman side. I'm

like, just wear sweatpants to the program if this is what you're going to do. You might as well. No sense putting on your suit for this. Okay. There are a couple of minor things I think is just worth mentioning because they could have some impact. Trump said that Elon Musk, his shadow president, heads up Doge, and then there's a big, well, very lengthy applause on the Republican side for Elon, who kind of stood above like a Vita waving down on everybody. There's already been a filing with the court about this because, as you know, the White House technically says that Amy Gleason, a woman

that lives in Tennessee, is really running Doge. And so again, I think they're possibly making themselves vulnerable to legal ramifications as far as getting these cuts through. So maybe a minor impact in that last night. I don't know. What did you think about that and, Yvonne, broadly? Yeah. This is like the usual suspects who is Kaiser Soze and who is this lady from Tennessee that's heading up Doge.

I mean, but this just goes to, and Tim, I saw this the first time around when I covered Trump and Trump 1.0. I mean, one of the things that folks should keep in mind as a saving grace in all of this is silver lining is the sheer incompetence that the Trump team brings to just about everything that they do. And the Doge project is no different. I mean, yes, it's led by the world's richest man, and he's built these successful companies to some extent.

And, you know, but at the same time, look at when they put this wall of receipts up on the website, and David Ferenhold over the New York Times is picking them off one by one. Nope, that one's not true. That one's exaggerated. They counted this one three times. It's sort of like your uncle where you have to, everything he says, you have to divide

by six. I mean, that is the Trump administration and that's Donald Trump. It all flows from him. The bullshit flows down from him and everybody does what he does. It starts at the top. Yeah. There's a little more legal news on this, but just a couple of other things in the speech. The thing that did strike me before I dozed off was no economy focus.

I literally, I keep, I literally, this is not an exaggeration. This is not the Joe Biden use of literally. He literally spent more time on trans youth sports. Whatever you think about that issue. He spent more seconds speaking about youth sports, whatever you think about that issue. He spent more seconds speaking about that than he spoke about cost of living issues. You know, he had somebody in the crowd who was, you know, got hit in the head by a trans volleyball player. I guess, you know, he had Riley Gaines was in the crowd.

He's talking about trans for awhile. And then like, he quickly pivots to the economy and he's like, Joe Biden really fouled up the economy, right. And then he was moving straight on to Gulf of America I mean he barely talked about it and I thought that was pretty telling since that is like I think his most real vulnerability at this point. Yeah and Tim I mean the takeaway I woke up with this thought this morning and that is you know he never really is going to be the president for all of us he's never

really going to be the president for all Americans and then you know I've made a few wisecracks at the top of this, but I'll get serious here for a moment, because I know, Tim, you care about this too. You worked on behalf of John Huntsman, who was a serious Republican back in the day. And it's a real damn shame what has happened to the Republican party. They're standing up and applauding,

taking Greenland from Denmark. They're standing up and applauding, taking Greenland from Denmark, they're standing up and applauding, taking the Panama Canal, even though Donald Trump is not committing boots on the ground and doing either of those things. And so what is he talking about here? This was sort of like Donald Trump takes us off to fairyland. It was like a Cash Patel bedtime story. And I think a lot of people are rightly appalled by what they saw last night. You talk about the way he was going after the trans community, the LGBTQ plus community,

the way he was going after African nations. I mean, almost every one of the bits of waste, fraud, and abuse he was outlining as part of the Doge cuts dealt with people of color and far away countries, the so-called shithole countries that he's talked about in the past. And it just occurred to me, you know, taking that all in, and I know you fell asleep, I was bored quite a bit at times, but when I woke up this morning, I just thought, you know, he's just never going to be the president for all of us. And that's just a damn shame. Pete And the way that it's coated the party, party, you're right. I did notice this.

The most boisterous cheer, I think, was for the Gulf of America. I know it wasn't in the room. And to me, that just says, again, whatever. Honestly, I'm living down here on the Gulf of Mexico and I dare you to sue me, Eagle Ed Martin. But again, it's just, that's not serious. That's not about caring about your fellow Americans. It's a troll. What they were cheering for was not that they were excited that the body of water's name

changed. They were cheering because they want Jim Acosta to be sad. You know what I mean? They want like liberals to be mad, right? Like in that, and that's what they like. Pete Slauson And also taking jabs at Mexico. Pete Huston Yeah, right. Pete Slauson I mean, you know, it's one of his favorite punching bags. I used to say during the first term, it's the three Ms the Mexicans the Muslims in the media And you know this time around I mean you can add a few more to that list And I just think that the constant, you know railing against wokeism and so on

It's just sort of scoring cheap points. It's beneath the dignity of the office It's beneath what the office should be. And you were talking about the economy earlier. The most news he made last night is when he said there's going to be a little bit of a disturbance from these tariffs kicking in. That was a full acknowledgement right there that Americans are going to feel pain. And one of the things you're already starting to hear coming out of the financial markets today is, oh, well, maybe Donald Trump is going to have some carve outs for some of these tariffs on Canada and Mexico.

They already know that he has stepped in it with this, you know, grandpa makes up economic policy on a bar stool stuff that he spews out there. This is the kind of stuff that Americans are already fed up with. That's why they're erupting at town halls for Republicans in deep red districts. And I think it's just the beginning of that. Yeah, and that's why he's back underwater in the recent poll average for the first time. One more thing on the degradation

of my former party last night. Lindsey Graham sent this tweet. Yeah. My take on President Trump's address, inspiring, funny, compelling, and the Democrats' worst nightmare, Trump 2028. Now, again, it's a troll, and so you hate to play into their games, but here's the problem, is that so many times things that were trolls became real.

The Muslim ban was a troll at the start, and then he did it, right? And so, they are playing a very dangerous game by even doing tongue-in-cheek Trump third term stuff, I think, because this guy is going to be 81 and a half years old when it comes time to get down to business on that in 2028. Are you sure he's not going to take you seriously, Lindsey Graham? Because I'm not. And he's barely making any sense now. I'm not talking about Lindsey Graham. I guess I could be talking about Lindsey Graham, because I'm not. And he's barely making any sense now. I'm not talking about Lindsey Graham.

I guess I could be talking about Lindsey Graham, but I mean, my response to Donald Trump wanting to run for third term is the Democrats should think about getting Barack Obama out there. It's like, okay, well, if you're going to do it, we're going to do it. And we're going to put Barack Obama out there and then see what happens. I agree with you. It is a little scary when they engage in that kind of rhetoric. It is a troll, but I, I agree with you. It is a little scary when they engage in that kind of rhetoric. It is a troll, but I

Agree with you. It has to be taken seriously. I mean Trump to me is kind of a he's like a fusion reactor of hatred He generates it and he thrives on it. He feeds off of it. And at some point I'm a foolish optimist I just think that the spell is going to be broken and We saw this during the first Trump term, during Trump 2.0, 1.0, I should say. His mishandling of COVID, again, it gets back to what I was saying earlier about the sheer incompetence of what they do. They do eventually trip over their own feet. And so yes, it's painful.

Yes, it's not fun watching what he was doing last night, but I really do think as much as he likes to call people like me the enemy and you the enemy, he's his own worst enemy. We're gonna go a little deeper with the Dems with Amanda Lippman in the next segment. But I just, any sense for what their reaction was last night, I kind of think it doesn't really matter what they do in a setting such as that. But, you know, a lot of people had feelings about it, whether it was Al Green shouting at them or the little signs that some of them made.

What would you make about the Democratic response? Again, after Marjorie Taylor Greene and Lauren Boebert and Congressman Wilson, it's sort of like, at this point, what more can anybody do? Okay, Congressman Greene gets up and walks out and a number of other Democrats did it. If that's what they want to do, that's fine. I think you could also just not show up. I mean, what would that image have been like last night if the entire Democratic Party just didn't show up for the State of the Union speech? I mean, I don't know. It's tough. And the Democrats are in the wilderness right now. You've seen your party in the wilderness after 2012 when Mitt Romney lost, and they're trying to figure

out what to do next. And then Donald Trump comes along and picks up the mantle. I think this time around, my sense of it is that the Democrats are going to be led by the people instead of the other way around. And you're already starting to see that. You're starting to see people say, Dems are not doing enough. They're not getting out there and making more of a stink out of what's taking place with Doge.

And so there are certainly members who will take issue with that and say, hey, wait a minute. I'm out there. I'm, I'm whipping things up. But the party as a whole just looks to be lost right now. My sense of it is, is some sort of populist figure within the party or on the fringes of the party, or maybe an independent may take the party in a new direction in the way that Trump did with the Republicans. I agree with that. I mean, that might not happen, but I think that the, the populist is prime for that, for somebody picking up the mantle and demonstrating they can be a fighter and a leader

and going any number of directions. We'll see if somebody actually does it. Delete Me makes it easy, quick, and safe to remove your personal data online at a time when surveillance and data breaches are common enough to make everybody vulnerable. DeleteMe does all the hard work wiping you and your family's personal information from data broker websites. DeleteMe knows your privacy is worth protecting. You can sign up and provide DeleteMe with exactly what information you want to

lead it and their experts take it from there. I guess since the election, but even since the inauguration, I have noticed even more, it kind of spam attacks on me, somebody that is in the public eye, that's annoying people a lot of times. And so having a service like Delete Me that is consistently looking at what is out there

and updating it and scrubbing it is something that's going to be increasingly valuable for me in the years ahead and I assume valuable for many of you. So, take control of your data and keep your private life private by signing up for DeleteMe. Now at a special discount for our listeners. Today get 20% off your DeleteMe plan by texting BULWARK to 64000. The only way to get 20% off is to text BULLWORK to 64000. That's BULLWORK to 64000. Message and data rates may apply. So we have a couple of news items this morning I want to talk to you about. The Supreme Court

upheld a lower court's order that would force USAID, the State Department, to pay $2 billion that was owed to contractors for work that had already been performed. They put the stop payments on. This is not about future AID payments, but at least it's back pay. To me, it's interesting because we're going to have a lot of these skirmishes at the Supreme Court because of the extra legal and illegal actions of Trump and Musk. And so it ends up being a five-four ruling with Roberts and Coney Barrett. So on the one hand, you can kind of look at that and say, okay, well, it's good that the

contracts that the United States made have been upheld. On the other hand, you're like, boy, pretty tenuous there that it was only a one-vote majority. I don't know. What do you make of that? I mean, yeah, a couple of things. Donald Trump not paying his bills. Who would have thought that that would have happened? You know, geez, is there a track record there? I can't remember. What does Google tell us? The Supreme Court is an interesting dynamic, an interesting part of all this. You know, the fact that it was five to four, to me is sort of pathetic in a time when we

didn't have a hyperpartisan Supreme Court judicial branch, perhaps, you know, it would have come down in a much more decisive way against what the administration is trying to do. I mean, I mean, let's just be real about this. Donald Trump is trying to become a dictator in this country. There's just no question about it. Maybe it's an American form of dictatorship where he knows he can't get away with everything.

The people around him know he can't get away with everything, but he's going to give it a hell of a try. And for some of the people on the Supreme Court, I'm not going to mention any names, to go along with this is disgraceful. And to me, it's no wonder, you were talking about poll numbers, it's no wonder that confidence in the Supreme Court is, I think, near an all time low, if it's

not an all time low. And I tend to agree with, you know, when Biden was on his way out, not to say, I know, it's probably not fashionable these days to praise anything that Joe Biden does or says. But when he was talking about term limits for the Supreme Court, I mean, I've long felt that that needs to happen. It is ridiculous that you can put hyperpartisan people on the Supreme Court in their 40s and hope that they live for another 50 years. To me, it's just sort of a gross exploitation of the checks and balances and trying to find

loopholes to rig a system that's supposed to protect all of us and uphold the rule of law. You say the American former dictatorship and what he's trying to do really, they think that he has unlimited Article II powers for the executive branch. It doesn't matter what Congress actually passed legislation as far as funds are, and supposedly they have the power of the purse, but we can actually do whatever we want and we can just stop payments. We can stop things that have been approved by Congress, signed by previous presidents. We can do whatever we want.

Then the question is, does the court allow that? Right? And if the court doesn't, then eventually that becomes kind of the next step, right, of this question of, are they going to try to defy that? Luckily, we have not reached that point yet, but I just think when you look at these things and there are just cut and dry cases like this that end up five-four, we'll see where Amy Coney Barrett ends up,

but it's hard to imagine that she won't end up on the other side of this when the circumstances are slightly less egregious. You're absolutely right, and I think that's where the rubber is going to meet the road here because if the courts say, no, you can't do this, and he keeps defying the courts, what do we do at that point? I mean, I don't know if anybody has really answered that question.

And you know, the last time around, at the end of his first term, you know, we were all pretty damn lucky that he left the building. And you know, my concern this next time around is, you know, no matter what happens in the upcoming election, you know, he's just not going to want to give this up. I was with him on January 20th, 2021. I was at that ridiculous departure ceremony that he had at Joint Base Andrews. It looked like a dictator going off into exile. I was with him on Air Force One for that last flight to West Palm Beach.

Really? I guess I didn't know that. I was. I was in the pool that day. Yeah. This is before they were kicking people out of the pool. Who else was in the pool? Who else was in the pool that day? Was it Steve Holland? Gosh, it was a lot of the regulars, the AP writers, all the people that they don't let in now, were all there. But CNN had the pool seat that day. What was that like?

It was surreal. And a couple of jokes were made. You know, Jim, I hope you make it the whole flight, you know, you know, do you have your parachute? And my hope the whole time was that he was going to come into the press cabin and talk to us. But he hid in his little area of Air Force One didn't come back to talk to us. So and sulked exactly.ed, exactly. And my thought the entire time was, Jesus Christ, we got so lucky here. We got so lucky that he got on the goddamn plane

and went back to Florida. Because who the hell knows what would have happened if he had just stayed, or if the people who had stormed the Capitol on January 6 had gotten worse. I do worry about what is going to happen to this country if and when he has to relinquish power, hopefully when. And I wrote a little bit that day for my old place. I thought about writing a book about some of this stuff because that day to me was sort of like when we were all sort of hanging by a thread.

And thank goodness, I don't know if it was some, you know, ounce of shame that was left in him. Probably not. It was maybe Ivanka talking to Kenny on the... I don't know. But I was there at Joint Base Andrews when Don and Eric were crying. It was just a whole scene. And I just kept saying to myself over and again, Jesus Christ, we got so lucky here that he just actually left. Pete It's not very masculine, the tears over losing an election. Pete I just thought – Pete It's like the child, daddy lost!

Pete Exactly, not the strength that they like to project. Pete What happened when you landed? Did they, like, they just, because he doesn't have the beast anymore, what, he just had like a limo waiting for him and he went to Mar-a-Lago and you guys were off duty or you stayed outside Mar-a-Lago like what happened? Yeah, I forget all the terminology, but you know, once the inauguration happens, Air Force One becomes a different plane. It has a different designation. Air Force One is technically the other plane that was taking going to be taking Biden around. But at that point, he landed at a

General Aviation Airport in West Palm Beach. I remember he and Melania came off the plane they both went their separate ways and Then he got into a Secret Service limo and then he left and we were all yelling questions at him He just wouldn't take any of our questions the only contact that we had had was with a press aide named Margo Martin. And I won't forget, I sort of forget the exact words, but I won't forget the thrust of what she was saying,

which is, you know, he's not very good at sitting still. And I just thought to myself, yeah, he's, you know, and I try to tell people, you know, at that time I said, you know, because it was fashionable for folks to say, that's it, he's done, we don't have to worry anymore, yay. And I was like, nah, this guy's not done. He's not done. Right, you guys, so we had a big party on Saturday

for my husband's 40th. And you know, at social gatherings, there's some people that are looking for an alternative to alcohol, that wanna enjoy the music that DJ87 was pumping through my living room, enjoy camaraderie with friends, enjoy the Mardi Gras spirit, but without the hangover. And several people turned to the Soul beverages that were in my fridge. This podcast is sponsored by Soul. If you listen to the show, you've heard me

rave about Seoul's out of office gummies. Well, the team at Seoul just launched their new out of office beverages that are perfectly microdosed with hemp derived THC and CBD to give any situation that vacation vibe. The out of office beverages not only come in two mouthwatering flavors, raspberry lemonade and cucumber melon lime. They also offer two different doses, the 2.5 THC and the 5-milligram THC. So you can feel the freedom to choose with 6, 12 or 24 packs and drink your THC any way you like. I got to tell you that raspberry lemonade was pretty yummy. I dabbled in that myself over the weekend. So out of office

beverages give you that warm, fuzzy, euphoric, microdose feeling without sending you to the moon. You can crack one open after a hard day work, wind down with your favorite TV show, or share a six pack with your friends at your next hangout, whatever floats your boat. So if you want to feel your best, head to getsol.com and use code thebullwork for 30% off your order. That's 30% off your order using code theBullwork. One last time, GetSol.com and code theBullwork for 30% off. You're mentioning the press, so you were there because you're in the press pool, right? We have this news about how they've changed the way it works now, instead of the White

House Correspondent's Association deciding who gets to be, you know, on the plane in those moments. And the point of this is that the whole press corps can't be on the plane, right? So you choose representative outlets. Just explain to people like how that process works and why it's so alarming that they've decided to change it. Yeah, I mean, you know, the way I try to explain it to folks is, you know, you obviously can't have a couple hundred members of the press on Air Force One or in the Oval Office. It would just be total chaos. And so what the White House Correspondents Association tries to do, what the networks

try to do, is put together a pool of reporters. And Tim, you know how this works, but I'll explain it. So there's one representative for the TV networks every day. There are a couple of wire service reporters like the AP and Reuters, and then you have some print reporters from like the New York Times, Washington Post, Bloomberg, that sort of thing, and that forms the pool.

And they represent the larger White House press corps. They're with the president when he's at an event, behind the scenes, talking to people. They're on Air Force One in case he comes back to the press cabin. They're in the Oval Office in case he makes some remarks. And because we can't put all those things out live

at all times, the people in the pool put together a little note on their phone. They send it out to the WHCA, which blasts it out to everybody in the press. That way everybody has near instant information as to what is going on with the president pretty much at all times. And then at the end of the day,

they'll put out a note that says, okay, the White House has told us we don't expect them to do anything else today. You have a good night, that's a wrap for the day and so on. And we've sort of relied on this system for years now, going back multiple presidents from both parties. And what Trump has tried to do just in recent days, and some of this goes back to when I was covering the White House, first time around, they took away my press pass and I had to

go get it back. This time around, it's sort of that approach, but on steroids. When the AP said, well, we're not going to call it the Gulf of America, we're going to call it the Gulf of Mexico, because that's the damn name for the thing, he kicked them out of the press pool, which means no more Oval Office, no more Air Force One. And now they've, they've gone even further, Tim, as you know, and they've said, well, we're going to decide who is in the press pool, which is absolutely ridiculous to think that.

And it's part of the reason why we saw the other day in the Oval Office when Zelensky was in there with Trump, you heard that moron ask the question, why aren't you wearing a suit to Zelensky? Brian Glenn. Yeah. So you're going to end up with sick of fans. And Marjorie Taylor Greene's boyfriend is shouting a question at the Ukrainian president. That's just the opposite.

Which I hear is at the top of his resume. I think that's the thing that he's like, well, first of all, you know, I used to work at a Dairy Queen, but above that is who I date. But anyway, I'm succumbing to Tom Fuller here here, but we do Tom Fulary. It's It's just a joke. I mean, that's how they do things in totalitarian countries Tim We can't have the leader of the free world doing this Yeah, well just you telling the story about him leaving I think to me like puts a prime point about Why this matters cuz on the one hand I could see people are like, who cares if it's the AP

or if it's, you know, the first day, it's not like they put just the craziest people in like, they're like, we're going to replace the AP with Axios. You can't get mad at us for that, right? But the thing is, they will know when there are things happening that are sensitive or controversial or whatever, right? And it's like, okay. And so if the White House Correspondents Association is deciding who's in the pool, then it's like whatever, right? And it's like, okay. And so if the White House Correspondents Association is deciding who's in the pool, then it's like neutral, right?

But if they think something bad might happen that day, or it's the day where Mr. Trump's gonna be sad and sulking, they can be like, okay, well today we're gonna put in Newsmax and, you know, Matt Gaetz has a new podcast, he can be in the pool and whatever, right? The blaze, or yeah. Yeah, and like that kind of shows the concern. Yeah, there's no question.

And you know, there's just something wrong. And they said this during my press pass case, the Justice Department lawyer said this in court that the White House should be able to pick and choose who covers the president. And you know, it's just silly. It's just not how we do things in this country. And the way I describe it to folks, and yes, you're absolutely right, folks may not care about who gets kicked in and who's left out and blah, blah, blah.

Why don't you be big boys and girls and just deal with it? The problem is, is that, okay, Trump gets away with it. Now the governor of Missouri wants to do it. Now the mayor of Los Angeles wants to do it. Mayor of Los Angeles says, hey, I don't like the way the LA Times wrote this story about the way I handled the fires. Get them out of here.

I don't want this. Oh, oh, courts have a problem with that? Donald Trump did it to the AP, so that means I get to do it too. And so then what the hell, do we have a free press anymore? Right, slippery slope. And Tim, one of the things that you should take a look at

and maybe already have is when Caroline Levitt put out the note about we're going to pick the people in the press pool, they said, well, but the networks will continue to be able to go in there and get their video and everything. So they know that Donald Trump is so addicted to being on camera and being on TV that it's like, oh, well, we're not going to mess with the networks. The networks could come in. Never mind.

Don't worry about that, guys. You'll come in and get your pictures. But we'll screw with the AP. We'll screw with this little guy over here and so on. Right, because he doesn't read. So not as much of a problem. Just with the Sharpie when he just writes out, I hate this story, you know. Yeah. This is too important to not mention today.

Just this morning, we have news that CIA Director John Ratcliffe said that the US has paused intelligence support for Ukraine. He said Trump has a real question about whether President Zelensky was committed to the peace process and he said, let's pause. There was a story out of the UK, it's a tabloid story, so we'll see this as an ongoing news story, but that US also told the UK that they can't share intelligence. I assume Prime Minister Stammerer will tell them to pound sand, assume if that is true. But this to me is even more alarming than the military aid issue because A, it's immediate, right?

Like they already have a lot of the military aid that we've sent them. And B, it could cause problems like as we speak on the battlefield, if Ukraine isn't able to get information about what's happening with the Russian troops. So, I don't know. Any thoughts on that and the broader treatment of Ukraine? Yeah. I mean, to me, I agree with you. That is a very chilling development. And if we're not going to be sharing intelligence with the Ukrainians when they're fighting for their survival, what are we doing here? And it just seems like every time, and I've noticed this since covering them during the 2016 campaign,

every time Russia is involved in the equation, every time Vladimir Putin is involved in the equation, for some reason, that's where Trump goes. That's how Trump sides and comes down on things, is with the Russians and Vladimir Putin. And it's just the damnedest thing. And maybe one day the mystery will be solved, the Scooby-Doo mystery will be solved,

and they'll pull the head off of whoever, and it'll be old man withers from the haunted amusement park. But to me, I just don't get it. And maybe we're all gonna figure this out one day, why Donald Trump is just always partial to Vladimir Putin at every turn. And the sad state of affairs in all of this is that the Ukrainians have been courageously fighting for the survival of their country.

I remember speaking with a Special Forces soldier on one of my shows a couple years ago and she brought me a metal coin that was made from the metal of a Russian tank that was blown up in one of the battles over there. Then she was later almost killed in an IED explosion. I've met a couple of fighter pilots. Their code names were Moonfish and Juice. They couldn't give their real names. They've both since died since I interviewed them.

And it's just the tremendous toll that this country has gone through. And to think that the United States of America is just going to throw them to the lions, to me, is disgraceful. It's going to be something I think this country and all of us are going to regret for many, many years. This just gets to trying to put out the defense shield for Trump 2.0 in Europe, which is what they're trying to do right now. How can they run out the clock on Trump's term and protect Europe and protect Ukraine

in the process. And it may just involve these other countries doing the intelligence sharing that we're not willing to do. And it's just a damn shame. All right. I'm going to take the lens back here because the whole controversy around you regarding CNN is like, this guy's too mean to Trump. He has Trump derangement syndrome, right? Like you're, you're criticizing the

president, like you got to be more fair. And to me, a lot of this is related to the fact that nobody has memories of anything before 2015 anymore. We all have this mass amnesia. And I went back and watched an old clip of you. And I got to say, you're looking a little more tan now. You look a little more confident. You're like you're you're blossoming in your 50s But we're gonna pull up a little thank you. Yeah, Jim Acosta 40 somethings Jim Acosta now talking to Barack Obama Okay Earlier when you said that you have not

underestimated ISIS's abilities This is an organization that you once described as a JV team That evolved into a force that has now occupied territory in Iraq and Syria and is now able to use that safe haven to launch attacks in other parts of the world. How is that not underestimating their capabilities and how is that contained, quite frankly? And I think a lot of Americans have this frustration that they see that the United States has the greatest military in the world.

It has the backing of nearly every other country in the world when it comes to taking on ISIS. And I guess the question is, and if you'll forgive the language, is why can't we take out these bastards? Big wind up there. You knew the bastards was coming and maybe we're a little nervous.

But I mean, a fair, very tough Obama. You could tell Obama didn't like it. He's her own thing halfway through the question. Like that's how shit used to go. Right. And there's nobody screaming around back then, whenever that was, I think it was 2014 about saying like, Oh, Jim Acosta biased. Jim Acosta has Obama derangement syndrome. And so I really did. I had a bad, it's true. How do you deal with that asymmetry? What do you think in this media age,

how we navigate where we've gotten to? Well, of all the clips you could have pulled, I'm glad you pulled that one, Tim. There were some ones that you could have pulled. You had some clunkers? Probably. I'm sure people thought that was a clunker too, but yeah, you're right. It is disappointing. I do remember that day. I think the daily caller and a bunch of these places that like to come after me

were like, Jim Acosta destroys Obama and all this stuff. And I'm like, I just, I mean, I just, I used to have this philosophy and that is. I grew up with blue-collar parents and they don't mince words. I used to think, what's the kind of question that my dad would ask, what's the kind of question my mom would ask, or the people at my dad's grocery store, my mom's restaurant, what's the kind of question they would ask? Put it in those kinds of terms.

I remember at the time, the White House press team for Obama, they were furious with me. And then I think Jeffrey Goldberg with the Atlantic or somebody did an interview with somebody on the Obama team, might have been Ben Rhodes or somebody at that time. And I think Jeffrey Goldberg said, well, yeah, that's all well and good, but why can't we get the bastards? And then later on, Ben Rhodes said to me, he said, because we had a conversation about this, he said, you know, Jim, when you asked that question it actually made us think well, how are we? Communicating the successes that we're having on the battlefield against ISIS Eric Schultz He used to work for Obama would send me emails every now and then and say hey

We got one of the bastards when they would blow somebody up with ISIS and so I you know, I I think that sometimes a tough question, even maybe a slightly pugnacious question can do some good. And it's why we should have reporters there willing to ask these kinds of hard questions, not why are you not wearing a suit today when Elon Musk two days earlier was wearing an Occupy Mars t-shirt in the Oval Office. I just think we're well served when somebody is doing kind of the Sam Donaldson thing or the Dan Rather thing.

And you know, I'm going to keep doing it. You're just worried that's gone. I mean, I just think CNN's in such a tough spot right now. I mean, you know, Fox obviously is totally in the tank. MSNBC is rejiggering the networks nobody's watching. I mean, I have somebody who just left that world. Like, how worried are you that like that, that type of just no bullshit, willing to challenge a politician no matter who?

Like, do you worry that's just like kind of gone? It's not gone, but it may be going away. And the problem is, is that in this environment, everybody is suspicious of everybody else's motives and you can't just be, you know, a king tinker, a son of a bitch reporter who likes to ask tough questions. I think that it's okay to have people like that. We need that in American society. I grew up with Ted Koppel on Nightline and, like I said, Sam Donaldson shouting questions

at Reagan at the White House. I always thought that was a good thing. These days, they want to run you out of town on a rail if you're doing that sort of thing. But Tim, honestly, all of this, you know, give Obama some credit. He answered the question. He took the question without blowing his top and taking away my press pass. One of the problems that we're in right now

is that Donald Trump cannot just take the hard questions. He cannot handle the heat. And he wants to act like a dictator. And that is just a different kind of experience than we've ever had before with the president. Ronald Reagan wasn't throwing Sam Donaldson out of the White House and he wants to act like a dictator. And that is just a different kind of experience than we've ever had before with the president. Ronald Reagan wasn't throwing Sam Donaldson out of the White House

because he was yelling questions to Reagan as he was getting on Marine One. Some of this flows from the guy at the top. And if he just can't handle the hard questions, you've just got to wonder, can he handle the job of being president of the United States? And I think he just he just proves over And over again he cannot yes. He's the luckiest son of a gun out there

There's no question about it that debate can be put to the side I think it's also not up for debate that he just cannot handle Scrutiny he's never been able to handle it and it's always going to be a problem for him And it's that means it's gonna be a problem for us Yeah, fortunate part is like he's convinced so many people that the scrutiny is bullshit too. And that's the hardest part to fix. I think in fairness, I mean, Caitlin's still in there asking tough questions.

Sure. You know, I do think having people in there asking tough questions is a more useful use of time than like having four people shout at Scott Jennings. That's just one man's opinion. That's just one man's opinion. But do the tough questions even stick, you know, if he has pulled the wool over. And I think we have to be careful of giving them what they want when they're going after the press.

And that's why I have said, if this continues, they continue to abuse the press and throw them out and that sort of thing. There has to be some sort of collective action on the part of the press, you know, if they really care about having those TV networks. It's gonna require Fox though. Yeah. There's no collective action on the part of the press. You know, if they really care about having those TV networks in there. It's gonna require Fox though. Yeah.

There's no collective action without them. You know, that's true. And people can go do a Google and find out what rest of the White House press corps was standing up for Fox. When the Obama White House was giving them a hard time, the rest of the White House press corps got together and said, no, no, no, you're not gonna keep Fox out of stuff. I mean, that will be a telling moment.

If the networks say, listen, unless you let the AP back in there, you're not getting your TV pool every day. And then let's see what Fox does. My sense of it is they may go with the networks on this and say it's time to back down. But, you know, like you said, we're not on Earth One anymore. Yeah, we'll see. Tim, I know you come from a good place in all of this.

It's gratifying for me to see you out there doing the work that you're doing. There are enough of us who care about this, and that's the important thing. There are enough of us who care about this, care about the truth, care about holding elected leaders accountable. I generally think we're going to be okay in the long run.

We're just going to have to outlast this moment. All right, I appreciate it. Jim Acosta, check him out. The Jim Acosta Show and his sub stack. He's a free man now. Thank you for coming on. It's like the Shawshank Redemption. Thanks for coming on the podcast.

Up next, Amanda Littman from Run for Something. All right, we are back. She's the co-founder and president of Run for Something and author of the forthcoming book When We're in Charge, The Next Generation's Guide to Leadership out this May. It's Amanda Litman. What's up, girl? I'm hanging in there. How are you doing, Tim? Well, I'm alive.

I'm here. We're all here. I'm doing my best. I didn't make it through the whole speech last night. I had to watch Alissa this morning. I guess I was a little tired after a big Mardi Gras weekend, but it was also really fucking long. But we're doing our best. I've been wanting to have you on. Unfortunately, Donald Trump makes it hard to get off of doing just the news because there's so much shit happening. But you're doing some work that's more long lead that I want to talk about. But before we get to that and running for something, I did want to put your strategist hat on.

You did some of that for a little while and ask you what you thought about the Democrats' various responses last night, AOC and Jasmine Crockett, like I'm not going, some of them, she's on Instagram, Al Green shouting, some gals are in pink, some people are holding signs, some people are doing nothing. What would you make about of it? You know, I think the only goal of the responses, any of the responses to the speech last night had to be making a bigger spectacle than the speech itself. And none of them really succeeded in doing that.

So a little half for you. Yeah. I don't know. I'm kind of of the view. Here's my counterpunch to that. Me and you are usually aligned on this. I want more is more. Get out there.

Swing and miss sometimes. It's okay. Donald Trump misses a lot of pitches. He got elected twice. But be out there. That said, on a night like that, it's gonna be tough. Like what are you gonna do that's not gonna be kind of cringe? Like it's very challenging to kind of think of something

that'd be actually useful. And to me, it's almost like, I just probably wouldn't have even shown up and then woken up this morning and gotten on social media or gotten on the Bohork YouTube or got whatever and just started going you know about the economy about Elon about all the other things that are on message like what was it kind of a loop was it like a battle they couldn't win I guess I think you know I

think you're probably right that there was no nothing like in the room or even an online they could have done in the moment. But I kind of wish that if they were going to try something they had like made a bigger deal out of it or at least been more organized. There's like one off holding up the signs, the pink suits, the sort of like boring speech after which was so late at night that who watches that anyway. Like it was probably a lose-lose. But if they were going to try I wanted them to go bigger. To the speech afterwards, Alyssa Slotkin,

I had to get your take on this because as a former Republican, you know, I was like, this is pretty good for me. But I do wonder how somebody that's in touch with Democratic grassroots thought about it. I want to play one clip for Alyssa Slotkin. After the spectacle that just took place in the Oval Office last week, Reagan must be rolling in his grave.

We all want an end to the war in Ukraine, but Reagan understood that true strength required America to combine our military and economic might with moral clarity. And that scene in the Oval Office wasn't just a bad episode of reality TV. It summed up Trump's whole approach to the world. He believes in cozying up to dictators like Vladimir Putin and kicking our friends like the Canadians in the teeth. He sees American leadership as merely a series of real estate transactions. As a Cold War kid, I'm thankful it was Reagan and not Trump in office in the 1980s.

Trump would have lost us the Cold War. On the one hand, Reagan loving boomers are going to vote in the midterms. So there's something to be said for that. On the other hand, what do you think about the Reagan hagiography from the Democratic response? The target audience of that was no one under the age of 48, 47. Well, excuse me, it caught me. There's a handful of nerds, of NeverTrump or nerds who are in their early 40s that it

hit. That's okay. I don't, certainly not under 40. A few NeverTrump or elder millennials and that's about it, which is fine. That's an audience that needs pandering to too. Not my cup of tea and I think not quite speaking to a lot of the democratic bases right now, but that's okay. Not everything has to be for everyone. What'd you make of the like, senders, I want to give them credit for stuff. It's like, do more, do more, do more. And then they do more. And people like that all

these guys doing these shit that ain't true videos. And I would play that for you, but it doesn't really work in audio form. You have to go onto your Instagram to see it. But, you know, where it's basically like all the senators had a similar script about the way that Trump and Elon have been lying. What did you make about that? What did you make of that? You know, I think it's good to give them credit for trying stuff.

And I saw that, like, Elon and a bunch of the right-wing influencers were lifting it up, which means they were all lifting up, you know, visual images that were like shit that ain't true about Trump and talking about prices. So in that sense, I think it's good to like farm a little outrage. Is it the most effective social media content? Probably not, but baby steps in the right direction

is better than like baby steps in the wrong direction. All right, I'm with you. Is there anybody out there that you think you've been like, they've been really nailing it the last two months? I think AOC pretty typically is one of the better ones in which it seems so authentic. I think Chris Murphy's stick is not always for me, but it does seem true to him and I appreciate that.

He seems genuinely furious and is communicating that in a way that really works. Other than that, I think we've still got a lot of like wide open field for people to step up, which is again, chaos is a ladder, climate Democrats, just fucking climate. That phrase is right. Genuinely furious.

When people ask me like, what do you want? I'm like, I want you to be genuinely furious. There's a lot of things to be furious about. And I actually don't care if it's the thing that I'm furious about. And not all the Democrats need to be furious about the same things. Some Democrats, you know, like you can be furious about whatever it is that you think your constituents are furious about or whatever it is that animates you as a politician and try to bring people along with you.

And like that I think has been the thing that when people are like the Democratic base is unhappy to me that is what is missing, right? They're like, we are really fucking mad. Like, just be mad too. Like also do stuff, but just be mad too for starters. Well, it's because when they're not mad, it makes us feel like the crazy ones for being mad. I don't want to be gassed.

Like my rage is not misplaced. It is not invalid. It is totally legitimate. And if my elected leaders aren't showing that or if they're like, oh, calm down, we're going to talk about the price of eggs. There's not an election for this shit for another 18 months. Be mad right now and then channel my fury into something good. But be mad with me, it will make me feel better.

I agree. Feelings do matter. Maybe I'm a millennial postmodern. I want to talk about Run for Something. You've been doing this, how many years you've been doing this for? Since Trump's first inauguration days, we're going on eight years. You've been doing the Lord's work. We do also get feedback from people like, what should I do?

What should I do? And I think there is a sense of frustration of like, how can I be helpful? I want to help. And there's phone calling, there's some other things. But I wanted to highlight what you're doing because I think it's so important. I just want to set the table at this because I think it's not that it hasn't been important in all of the eight years before that but I think it's as important as ever right right now like in this moment March of 2025 and here's why I say that. I just made a list from my memory this morning when I woke up I'm

sure there are other examples of this but of of wave elections, of kind of weird things that I remember happening. I was in Iowa in 2006. This was a Democratic wave election. This guy, Dave Loebsack, who was a professor at the University of Iowa, who had no money and was a far left lib, like ends up winning a district that nobody even ran ads in. Right? Like he just was on the field and he ends up being in Congress. 2009, Scott Brown. Everybody remembers that. Massachusetts, Senate race. The Republican wins.

Now he might seem like a typical MAGA Republican, but he ran then as a heterodox centrist, populist Republican. 2018, you were around for all this. Doug Jones. Kendra Horne wins in Oklahoma City. Joe Cunningham wins in Charleston. Max Rose in Staten Island. Susan Wilde is still around. She's a great congresswoman, wins in our district in Pennsylvania. Allred wins in George Bush's district in Dallas, and then it ends up becoming the Senate candidate. It doesn't win, but like you can see the long-term value there.

Like these people won in unsuspecting places. But in order to win in unsuspecting places, like you have to try, right? And I think that this year, in 2026, if the Trump thing is as much of a shit show as we all expect it's going to be, people are going to be able to win in unexpected places. And so you got to be out there to do it. I gave a bunch of congressional examples, but you do this like all the way down the

ballot. So like talk about your, do you agree with me that like this is going to be the most right time and do you feel like folks are, are going to respond to it? I think that we have to like, we Democrats have to mentally and practically prepare to win big in 2026, which feels like an insane thing to say right now. And the way we do that is by preparing to field as many candidates as possible for as many of these races as possible. And that recruitment work is happening now. Now, you know, in 20, I think it was 2018, we worked with a woman running for state ledge in Georgia and the pretty rural Georgia in a district that a Democrat had never competed in in the like 50 years since they had drawn these maps.

There had never been a Democrat on the ballot there. She ran, she won because as it turns out in a year where there's a wave election, giving people an alternative will allow someone else to show up and like actually take power. We have had this happen so many times over the years where we'll have the first or only Democrat to run in that race five years, 10 years ever, who will if not win come within a point or two and all of a sudden in the next cycle that district is a competitive race. It is like the most basic building block of actually party

building and of competing in these elections is to get a good candidate on the ballot. And it's not that hard. That's like the thing with running for office. It is hard work. It takes a lot of time. It takes a lot of effort, but it's actually not that difficult in terms of like logistics and communication.

That's what Run for Something is here to do is we help people figure all of that out once they've decided this is a step I want to take. Yeah, I like that you said about this, because you never ran it. When we moved here to New Orleans, I kind of looked at the state house map and I said to my husband, I was like, now, if you want to run for state house, we could move to Kenner, which is in the New Orleans suburbs, because the Democrats don't run a candidate there. And I'm like, I'm pretty sure that in a wave year, a Democrat could probably win in like the New Orleans suburbs.

Like that's like, they'll call me city congressional example I gave. Like there are places like that where there still is a lag. The other thing I wanted to just get your take on, because I think sometimes people like assume they can't do it or assume they shouldn't. I think that this is gonna be a good year, like across the spectrum. I talked to never Trumpers all the time. We're like, I want to primary

my Republican. I'm like, no, like depending on where you live, like just run as a Democrat. Like you could just switch parties and run. You can have some different views. And I think that's probably true for populist lefty Democrats too. Right. Like, so I'm not even like, obviously I would prefer the never Trumpers run, but I think across the board, you know, having different types of views, particularly if they reflect where you are, is a good thing, I think, in these types of off years. What do you think about that? I think that's absolutely right. I mean, especially when we're talking about state, local, or even congressional races, like you've got to run for the place you're in. We should generally be aligned on values. Like run for something has an endorsement process. We want to make sure we're all generally aligned on what we believe, but there's a lot of different ways to actually put those values into practice depending on the community

and what they want and what the mechanics of the office are. And that I think when we people are talking about like no litmus test, that's the flexibility we need to be at right now. Yeah, you had some former Republicans, right? Like have been one run for something candidates. You know, we have folks who really cross the spectrum. Basically, everyone we work with aligns as a Democrat or would align as a Democrat. A lot of these races are technically nonpartisan, but we've got folks ranging from like the most, you know, DSA types New York City Council candidates to like pretty conservative school board candidates

in places like Alaska or Kansas or in Texas, as long as they're all on the same page about what we're trying to accomplish, which is really like a pro-democracy, pro-education, pro-working families, pro-climate change is real and we have a responsibility to do something about it type approach, we can get behind them. Pete Besides Congress, Congress might seem daunting for people. So, like, at these lower levels, what other types of races? You mentioned school boards, state-ledged, is there anything else that you're working with? Dr. Kate Snell So, we're thinking about state house, state

senate, city council, which especially when we're talking about housing, which I think is going to be one of the biggest issues in the next couple of years, city council or municipal offices, county commissions, which often in plenty places actually oversee elections. So if we're looking ahead to 2028, those are the kinds of pro-democracy positions we need, library boards, hospital boards, mosquito abatement districts, coroners, about 1,300 counties elect coroners. There are about a half a million elected offices in the United States. Most of them are not Congress, and most of them are totally winnable if someone is willing

to put in the work and knock doors. And they're way more interesting, I think, and more fun than being a member of Congress. What about the recruitment side? And obviously you guys are doing some, some people are coming to you, folks are listening like I'm not going to run, but everybody has a network. Do you have any advice on that as far as like recruitment, figuring out the offices, finding people. Yeah, so run for something as a site, runforwhat.net you can go to.

You can look up at your exact address what offices are up for you in 2025 or 2026. Fun fact, since election day, nearly 25,000 people alone have done that, gone and looked up what offices they might want to run for and started thinking about running for office. Our total pipeline is only about 200,000 or a little less, so huge number in just the last couple of months. Once you do that, you'll start getting materials from our team about

how to figure out which office is right for you and how to raise the money. But if you're able to identify the problem you care about solving, if you're able to point to how the office you run for will give you power to solve it, and then why voters should want you to win, which is different than why you want to win. You want to win because winning is great and losing sucks. Voters want you to win because you're going to do something for them. Everything else we can teach you. What have you seen so far out there? You mentioned a lot of people have come to the site.

There's a lot of conversation about them as being depressed. Do you feel like you're getting the level of interest in running that you did in 2018 more or less? So in 2017 and then again in 2018, we had about 15,000 people each year sign up to run for office. We're about to exceed both those years total in just the first quarter of this year. Wow.

It is record numbers. And we're seeing actually most of that come in since inauguration. And basically every time Doge starts firing people or shutting down federal government offices, you see another conversation or the terminations, we see hundreds and hundreds more people come into us. At the last couple of weeks, we've been averaging between 500 and 600 people a day thinking about running for office.

Awesome. All right. Where do people go for more information? Runforsomething.net. You can learn more about us. You can give us money. You can volunteer. You can sign up to run and get all the information. Do you have any other hot takes you want to share?

You're always out there doing goody two-shoe stuff. Maybe you want to let loose on something before you go? You want to feel my big rage today. I think this was one of those things yesterday. If you want to run against a octogenarian or septogenarian democratic elected official, especially in a primary, I think this will be a really good year to do it. Okay.

Primarying also. I also think it's going to be a good year for primarying. That's a good place to leave it. Amanda Libman, thank you so much for all your work and for coming on the pod. Let's hang out soon. Thanks, Tim. We'll see you. Everybody else, we'll be back here tomorrow for another edition of the Board Podcast.

See you all then. Peace. Do you wanna hear about the deal that I'm making? You, it's you and me And if only I could, I'd make a deal with God And I'd get him to swap our places Be running up that road, be running up that hill Be running up that road Be running up that hill Be running up that building See if I wanna be cold You don't wanna hurt me But to see how deep the wood lies Under where eternity was under There is thunder in our hearts Is there so much heat for the ones we love?

Well tell me we both matter, don't we? You, it's you and me It's you and me, you won't be unhappy If only I could, I'd make a deal with God And I'd get him to swap out places They're running up that road They're running up that hill They're running up that building

Hill See, if only could Se fonde coro