The Bulwark Podcast - Sarah Matthews and Jason Horowitz: Trump Propaganda and Italian Fascism

Episode Date: September 23, 2026

The cozy White House Correspondents' Dinner, where Trump joked around with reporters, was only in July. But now he's ripping away press credentials and setting up state-run media. Sarah scolds the WHCA for bending the knee to Trump to begin with. And recent Italian history even foreshadowed the Trump era. Jason, in his new book, explains how Silvio Berlusconi learned how to become the central character in the media. The more he was talked about, the more powerful he became—and the more his opposition became trapped. Plus: a case study of Giorgia Meloni, her love of the hobbits, her opposition to Trump, and the rise of far-right populism in Italy. Also, a little hopium for Texas turning blue. And today's Republicans will always choose power over the interests of women. Sarah Matthews and The New York Times' Jason Horowitz join Tim Miller.show notes: Brendan on watching six straight hours of Trump TV Sarah on MAGA world trying to save Max Miller Jason's new book, "The Italian Job" Catch Tim's TNL rant on George W. Bush Nicole Bassett's Oregeon state senate campaign site BJ's Lounge in NOLA Go to https://zbiotics.com/thebulwark and use THEBULWARK at checkout for 15% off any first time orders of ZBiotics probiotics.

U.S. voters abroad. Have you got your ballot yet? All states are now sending ballots to overseas voters. So if you want to vote this year, you should request your ballot right away. Go to votefromabroad.org and click request my ballot, as to receive it by email. Questions? Ask our support team directly. Don't miss this chance to shape the future. Don't delay. Vote fromabroad.org. Hello, welcome to the Bullwark Daily. I am your host, Tim Miller. I got a great email, an uplifting email this morning from a little bit. listener Nicole Bassett who said that, yeah, in part because of some rants that I've done on this show, she decided to jump into an R plus 19 state Senate district in Oregon. And I do truly believe this. I just think that there are not enough people running in some of these local districts that you think are Republican, but where folks might be getable this year because

they're so unhappy with Trump. And so I'm happy Nicole jumped in. You can go find out more about her at Bassettfororgan.com. Appreciate her. We got a doubleheader for you today. In segment two, it is Jason Horowitz, an old friend of mine. We're going to talk about fascism in Italy and the bulwark Pope. But up first, couldn't be happier to welcome back to the show, a contributor to the bulwark doing our TikToks and more. She's also sparring with Scott Jennings on CNN a lot and really getting some good reps in there. She used to be Deputy White House Press Secretary in the first Trump administration. It's Sarah Matthews. What's up, Sarah? Hey, Tim. Thanks for having me back on the pod.

I had you to do it. I wanted to chat with you a little bit because I feel like sometimes, you know, I like, I get into my insidery gossipy side about politics and like there are a lot of people out there. They're like, what the fuck are you talking about, Tim? And I think that's particularly potent when you get into these kind of media stories around what's happening in the White House. And so that would be interesting since you were there as deputy press secretary to talk about like just like the basics of what's happening here with like the, you know, with Politico and CNN and MS now getting kicked out. Like, what does that mean?

Like, do these guys have an office in the White House? Like, how do you get a seat in the pool? Like, maybe just going to run through for people, like, what actually happens and then why it's significant? Yeah. So you can be credentialed White House media and not necessarily be part of the pool because the purpose of the pool is that it's just a select number of reporters

who are on duty to follow the president's movements that day. And that's because you can't have all of these hundreds of credentialed White House media in the room at every event. You can't squeeze them all into the Oval Office. You can't take them all on Air Force One. And so it becomes this group of around 15 to 20 reporters. And it's all split up between you have print reporters who are putting out a pool report of what the president is doing and saying throughout the course of the day. You have a TV camera crew that is there that is recording all the video and audio. and then they're sending that and sharing it to all the other TV networks,

a radio reporter, still photographers, the list goes on. And so you have those reporters who are on duty to be part of the White House press pool that day and then just share and disseminate what they are gathering from the president's actions that day. And the reason that this is important is because the White House is sending out its own information. They send out their own transcripts. They publish their own photos and video and all of these things. But the White House gets to choose and be selective about what they are sharing with the public. And so that's why you need an independent White House press pool that is there gathering what is actually happening.

Because they can tell you, here's what happened when the cameras were off. Here's who walked into this meeting or left this meeting and give you all these details that maybe the White House wouldn't be so willing to share. And what we've seen happen, actually, that's been interesting, even before Trump's ban on Politico and CNN and MS now, is that at the beginning of Trump's tenure in Trump 2.0, the White House actually took control of the White House pool. Typically, this was decided by the White House Correspondence Association. They would set the rotation for who was a part of the pool each day. But when Caroline Levitt took over as a press secretary, that was probably the biggest change that she made was that she said, no, we're taking that away from the White House Correspondents Association. And we're going to be deciding who those pool reporters are. And that gave them substantially more power over how the president was covered. And that's why we're seeing, you know, these new media seats sometimes be part of, which I would, you know, say is bullshit, fake news, my interpretation of fake news. But these kind of fake outlets like, O-A-N-N and, you know, newsmax and where it's completely biased. But Caroline took control of that and set what the pool, who the pool reporters were.

And now we're seeing what the consequences of that are, of Waka even giving a little bit of power to the White House, where now the White House is banning certain press from not just being part of the pool, but not even having access to the White House in general. I think this is why, like, this is just important in a layman's way, right? because it's just like it kind of layers the propaganda upon propaganda, right? And this has been happening slowly, right, where you're inviting in these more new media people. So it's like now OIN's in there and now Newsmax is in there. Now Lindel TV has a seat, right?

And like all of this like nonsense, right? And so they're in the road. And so the White House is putting out one thing. But then the people that are there to monitor it are basically in league with the White House. Right. And so they're like still some people around, you know, but like this has been like a gradual move away from it. And to me, like, that ties into like the other thing that they just launched yesterday, which was Trump TV. It was a great article our guy Brendan wrote in the bulwark.

He had to suffer through six hours of Trump TV. Luckily, they're not good at propaganda yet. It's extremely boring. And Brendan, I think, wanted to start doing self-harm after a few hours. But like... Brendan needs a race for everything that Sam puts him through. Go read his article. But to me, like, everything, this is all in service of just like building to more and more of just a

full propaganda effort that looks more like how things look in in authoritarian countries. And like, we're not there yet, you know, but like that is the trajectory this is going. No, it's a slippery slope. And I think that even if you don't watch CNN or MS now or read Politico and you don't care about these journalists that are being affected by this ban, you actually should care as an American because this is an attack on the free press and the purpose of a free press. is so that we can have an independent media body that is holding our government to account. And our government is operating in our name.

And so we should care about what they're doing. And that is what's so scary about state-run media is that we wouldn't be getting this independent account of everything that's happening. And for now, it seems like some of the media networks are banning together to push back on this ban. We saw that the TV networks all said that they weren't going to carry trans. Trump's remarks at the United Nations because of him banning CNN and CNN was supposed to be the TV pool reporter that day. And I don't know how long that will last. Obviously, these networks are challenging it in court. And I think it's going to very much be struck down. It just depends on

how soon and how quickly that can happen. But these media networks for now are banning together, but we're not sure how long that will hold and that will last. And I mean, It's my frustration with them with them because they all seem to kind of bend the knee a bit. I mean, I think back to them even hosting the dinner, the White House correspondence dinner with him. I mean, it's just such a slap in the face to the free press and then something like this happens. And it's not a shocking thing to me at all. It's just crazy to me. They went to that dinner still.

It's one thing and one night. It's like in retrospect, you went to this fucking cozy, jokey dinner with the guy and then a couple of like, what did you think was going to happen? Yeah. A couple months later he's going to take your credential away. There's still some. I mean, Caitlin, he gets to other places where they don't have as much control as they do inside the White House. So they did have Caitlin Collins up in the orchestra. I got a kick out of that.

Trump was like yelling at her. I'm surprised CNN is here covering me. You shouldn't be here. You should not be here. So I did like watching him flail on that. All right. I want to talk about a couple of things. I was seeing some music last night.

And right before he came on, I was able to get a little jolt of energy that it wasn't from the alcohol. It was from like just a big, hefty snort of opium when the Texas pole came off. It was just a big fat line of opium came right across my phone. Marist poll in Texas. Legit pollster, Taurico 50, packs in 44. I think it's the first Taurico 50 I've seen, at least in a legitimate poll. I get a little bit worried when he's like up 47, 43 because a lot just might mean that he just can't get to 50. Maris has been pretty good.

You look at the last three cycles. They've been off about two points on average. So, you know, again, we could be in. a Seltzer situation. She also was pretty good for a while, but this is a huge trend of polls. It's not one outlier. And for like a really solid pollster there in Texas to have Talrico up six, are you getting high on Hopium with me? Where are you at? I think I'm getting high with you. I think that this seems like the perfect storm for Texas to finally go blue. And it took a lot of factors to get there. You know, you look at the state of the economy and Trump's leadership and how frustrated

voters are with him. But then you look at who Tala Rico's running against. I mean, Ken Paxton is just a dream candidate for Democrats to be running against just so corrupt, so unlikable. I mean, even John Cornyn and George W. Bush are fundraising for Republican Senate candidates, not including someone from their own state. They're not fundraising for Ken Paxton. So even Republicans within the own party are against this guy. And so, Then you put up a Boy Scout like Tala Rico. I think that it really is just a perfect storm. And I think there's a chance that Texas goes blue.

You're saying there's a chance. I did a big rant about Georgia W. Over on the next level feed. So if people want to feel my rage and how incensed I am about George W.'s fundraiser, nice that he didn't do Paxton, but that he was doing the other people, you can go check out the next level. I don't know. Disappointing to see him put party loyalty. over the country.

Yeah. In the spirit of compassionate conservatism, I'm going to fundraise for a bunch of people that are voting for Donald Trump's gulags. Anyway, I don't know. Not for me.

That's people that supported the gutting of pet par. Okay, go to the next level. I already did 10 minutes on this. I just want to get your take on. I always, whenever you're on, I kind of like to have your temperature because I feel like you're me

from five years ago, where I still kind of had a temperature on what was happening in Republican operative world because people still talk. Nobody talks to me. And so, you know, you have a few tentacles still left since it was a more recent departure. Give me a vibe check on, you know, how people are feeling in your life about kind of the state of,

you know, Trump. Yeah. People are often surprised to hear that I still have connections into the Republican Party and Trump world. And, I mean, it's just a product of having worked in Republican politics for so long. And yes, there are a lot of people who don't fuck with me anymore and I'm happy that they don't and I don't fuck with them either. But there are some people who still talk to me and we'll talk shop and they know how bad things are. I mean, they see the writing on the wall.

They know that November is going to be brutal. And they privately say things to me like, God, all this is so bad shit. Like just the other day, I had multiple people text me about Trump TV and the state-run media. I mean, it's basically state-run media. And I had people who work in the administration and on Capitol Hill, who work for Republicans,

who said to me, this is insane. And I've had conversations with them about, you know, Trump's decision to launch the war with Iran and all these things where it's like, these are unforced errors on his part where they're self-inflicted wounds, that he has made this situation so much worse for them. And they're frustrated.

And so, yeah, I have a lot of people who privately say to me, Sarah, I love your bulwark videos. And I'll watch them. You'll never see me liking any of them. But just know that I support you and that you're right. And I'm like, oh, thanks. Profile and courage. You can't even do it like. I try not to hold the staffers.

Think about our soldiers fighting the war in Iran. Think about the soldiers on the USS Lincoln and what they're doing. And you won't even like my Instagram post. There's this polling puck yesterday that sent you. I want to just talk about for a sec. where has this been this big change it's kind of became a common poll question over the last 10 years did I get a sense for Trump's sway within the party like are you more of a Republican or more of a Trump fan basically is the question and in January of 25 after he wins it's 60 Trump 36

Republican this could be answered that question this week the poll that came out was 34% Trump 56 Republican so a flip this is just within Republican voters of course I think that's interesting. There's some ways to look at that in a hopeful way. It's like many people are like, I've had enough of the crazy. There's another way to look at that, which is like of the 56, maybe like some of those people are like, I'm not Trump because I'm more of some other, you know, more even populist, nationalist version of the party.

I'd like to dig into that a little more. But I wonder like what your reaction is to that and if you're sensing any kind of vibe shift there. You know, it's like when I initially saw that, it gave me hope and I got excited about it. Yeah. And then reality starts to set in a bit and I try not to get too excited about things anymore. And that's just I've become so cynical about our politics in today's Republican Party. And so I look at that 56% and I think how many of those people would still vote for Trump if he were on the ballot today? probably nearly all of them.

And but maybe I'm wrong. And I hope I'm wrong. And I hope that, you know, this is a sign that the Republican Party is healing and that they're moving away from this cult of personality and that they've had enough of Trump. But like, I think about what did it take to get here higher gas prices. That was what it took for you guys to get here to flip on him. I mean, beggars can't be choosers. I'm happy if people are identifying. But that's not encouraging.

Yeah. I'm happy if people are identifying more first and foremost as members of the Republican Party than a Trump supporter. That is a good thing. But I'm not completely sold yet. Maybe I need to see it to believe it. And, you know, I think November will be really telling of if it's a, you know, total, just wipe out blue wave or if it's closer than we think. You know, obviously last election, they thought there were going to be bigger blowouts and there weren't. And so I don't know. Like, I'm trying to be positive, but it's really, hard when I've become so cynical

over the years. But I think it's a good thing. Well, there's good reason for cynicism. Yeah. Good reason for cynicism. I agree. I don't know. It's an interesting data point to monitor. Like we can just leave it there rather than getting excited about it. Zbiotics. I got to tell you about this game-changing product. I drink

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There's this line that is a book coming out. And the book is called America's Path Back to Moral Leadership. That seems like what somebody who's running for president would title their book to me. And again, when you look at that 56 and start to think, where could the party go? You know, people will talk about Vance and Rubio and all this. Is it crazy to think that like RFK might try to be a vessel for Trumpism? Is that crazy to you? No.

I don't think it's crazy at all. I think there's going to be a lot of people who throw their names in the hat. and I think RFK is certainly one of those people. We know he obviously has presidential aspirations and he probably sees a lane for himself where people are moving away from, you know, just that poll, we were just talking about people are moving away

from identifying first and foremost as a Trump supporter and so he'd think he might be able to capture some of those people maybe. I mean, there's been murmurs of Pete Hegsa wanting to run and like him calling around. and which is absolutely hilarious to think about. But I think there's a lot of people who are going to throw their name in the hat.

But yeah, that's a pretty interesting title for a book. Even if it's just that 36%. That's like a lot of power, whatever it is, 34%. It's a lot of power that Trump has a sway over all those people. And that's why JVL is always like it's going to be another Trump. And yesterday, Stuart Stevens, is like, I think J.D. is going to solve that problem by making Ivanka as VP. Anything is possible in this crazy-ass world. I think that that's interesting.

And there's something about, I feel like it would play to Trump's ego, though, that's like, maybe my successor should be a Kennedy actually. Well, we know he's trying to put his name on his building. Yeah. He also has heard today. Apparently, he's looking at putting his name on Ford's Theater. It's just like it's all fucking so crazy. Anyway, that's something that I was looking up.

We're going to fucking rip his name off a Ford's Theater, though, if he tries to put it on there. Rip his name off of everything, tear down the arch. I mean, I want it. I want it all gone. I just make it fucking stop. I'm so freaking it. I can't even believe that they're trying to put his name on Ford's Theater. It's actually something you would think is straight out of the onion, but no, it's real.

And what was craziest to me is that it was AIDS who created a list of potential places that Trump could attach his name to. What that says to me is that he's having tantrums in the White House and he's lashing out at them. And so they're trying to think, okay, how can we make the boss feel better? okay let's find different buildings that we can put his name on you know obviously he's had uh two judges now strike down him adding his name to the kennedy center so uh they're trying to come up with with anything but i mean it's just it's like java the hut chung come up with a list no literally go to go to chat gbt what kind of my name on um all right final thing you wrote a little while ago about max miller your experience with this son of a bitch you got a tip yesterday that uh the

Republican House super PAC, CLF, is putting 5 million in to that one house race to try to save them. So it's not just that they're like not stepping away, like Democrats said on Platner, like even Republicans did back in the day on Todd Aiken. It's not even like that, but they're stepping away.

It's not even that they're just saying, you know, good luck, Max. It's like they're saying we're putting in resources that could go to any Republican in the country and we're going to put it into this race to try to get this guy credibly accused by multiple Republican women that you know of assault and battery, we're going to try to make sure he can stay in Congress. And it's pretty unbelievable. No, that's not true. It's pretty seconding.

It's very believable. It's very believable, but it doesn't make it any less sickening. And yeah, I wrote about this recently for the bulwark because I'm from Ohio. And where I grew up is just a town over from that district. And so Northeast Ohio is somewhere that I love. If you know any Ohio and you know that they have a weird obsession with Ohio. Like, we love Ohio and love being from there and are so proud. And so it makes me sick that a man like him is representing my state. And having known the women who have credibly accused him of domestic abuse and just even the allegations that there are against him from his ex-wife, you know, things like he held a gun

to her head. He broke their two-year-old daughter's collarbone. And that's not enough for someone like Speaker Johnson or CLF to say enough is enough. I mean, I'm going to get credit where credits do. There are some Republicans who have come out and said that Max Miller should step aside, like obviously Senator Bernie Marino, who has a vested interest in this because his daughter is one of the women who has accused Max Miller because she's his ex-wife. Senator John Houston has also said the same. But it just shows you how the Republican Party is just rotten to its core because anything has become excusable in the Republican Party's eyes

if you're helpful to the party. And so clearly they're worried about holding on to their majority. And that matters more than if it comes down between women and power and holding on to power, they are going to choose power every time over. women and it's just sickening and it's why someone like a max miller can survive and thrive and rise in the republican party and i thought what was most telling about what max miller said when he did interviews when he was facing all this pressure to um you know step out of the race when it was before the deadline uh where they could replace him on the ballot he said on jake tapper show on cnn that um he felt

inspired to stay in the race and fight because he watched Donald Trump do so in 2016. So that just goes to show you that he learned that lesson that the Republican Party is willing to support people like this who are credibly accused of violence, whether that be sexual assault in the case of Donald Trump or domestic violence in the case of Max Miller. And, God, the guy's just such a piece of shit. And it just makes me so angry hearing that they're putting five. million behind him, but they clearly see that there's a chance. And I really hope that the people of Northeast Ohio don't vote for him because I actually think that he has a strong opponent in that

race too. Yeah, Brian Poindexter, good candidate. Yeah, great candidate. So I think that, you know, hopefully we'll see him prevail. But I don't know. Obviously, if they're putting money behind him, they think that there's a chance that he could definitely still win. But that just tells you everything about the Republican Party that a guy like that who is credibly accused of breaking his own two-year-old daughter's collarbone and throwing boiling water on his wife and holding a gun to her head could still get reelected in today's party. But I mean, that's what Trump has done to this party. And it's become so warped that they, they care more about holding onto power than actually putting up people of moral good character.

Well, you got some good daughter points tucked into your article because I saw it. he said that your mother, who is living back in Ohio, was looking at jobs in district offices and mentioned McNulty. Or you're like, don't do it, mom. Don't do it. Yeah, my mom had worked in congressional offices in the district, her whole career, working for a number of different Republicans in different seats across Northeast Ohio. And she had been working for Anthony Gonzalez, actually one of the few who voted to impeach

Trump after January 6th, really, really good man and such a loss for the party. He got pushed out after that. But then, yeah, she got asked to interview for a job with Max Miller. And I was like, absolutely not. But thankfully, she was in full agreement. It didn't take much convincing. So good to always be looking out for mom. All right.

You know, payback. She looked out for you a lot. Speaking of Ohio, we're there. I'm there on Friday in Dayton. We've got two days to our fundraiser and benefit show for the Haitians in Springfield. Come hang, everybody. There's still tickets if you live somewhere around. there. It's a Friday night. You can come drive, make a little weekend out of it, the Borg.com

slash events. We opened up a new section because we've got so many people wanting to come, which I really appreciate. So come on down, see us in Ohio. Sarah, thanks for coming on. Thanks for having me. All right, up next, grab a glass of San Gio Vazi. Maybe a little pasta. It's Jason Horowitz. Stick around. Ever notice how the second you Google something, suddenly every ad you see is about it? or if you're talking about something and every ad you see is about it.

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And also sometimes you are traveling. You want to watch something that's just blocked that happened to me last year when we were in Toronto and I was trying to watch the LSU Ole Miss game. another loss. And, you know, I got to see it. I got to see the loss. Thanks to our friends at Proton VPN. Wasn't their fault. All they did was bring it to me. You know, they brought the entertainment to me. It was Brian Kelly's fault that it didn't bring me joy. Proton VPN is a secure VPN service designed for people who want to prioritize their digital privacy and security.

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Go pre-order it now. He's now the bureau chief in Madrid for the Times. Some good jobs. Some good posts. It's my old friend Jason Horowitz. What's up, man? I'm great, man. Great to be here.

Great to see you. I bet you're good. You know, you've got to spend the last decade that I've been slogging through the Trump era in Rome, Madrid, you know, prancing about Europe, covering Steve Bannon, flying to Prague. It's not a bad life. You know, they're not exactly hard luck assignments, but they're interesting. They're more interesting than you're different. When you first reached out about the fact that you're having a recording it and I was like, God, I don't know, man. a month from the election.

I'm not sure we can do Italian coverage. But in the intervening time, I've become more and more fascinated with Maloney. And I just think that she's such an interesting character, and I want to do a deep dive on her. So we're going to do that. But first, you came to the blog podcast. We're going to do a little TDS.

That's vaguely related to the book, because you do mention your interregnum, and I'm back in America when we met, when you're covering American politics. Of course. He interviewed Trump a couple of times. And there was one thing, I feel like I have a stored encyclopedia of all the Trump things in my head, but I'd forgotten this when I was paging through the book that you once asked Trump what his dad would think about him running for president.

What did he say to that? Yeah, it was a strange answer. So we were in his office in Manhattan, and it was one of his really, really long interviews. And it was about his dad, ostensibly, because I, before taking the wrong job, I really could. covered Trump in his family life and sort of what made him him. Anyway, his answer to that was he totally would have allowed me to do it. And the word that struck me was allowed. And, you know, Trump was already in his 70s.

And it was just an odd way to frame, I was expecting he would have been proud of me or he would have had some thoughts on it, but allowed me. And it just was a tiny window into this very complicated relationship that Trump had with his father, trying to please him often, often. not pleasing him, and something that continued after his father's death and maybe still now. Yeah, I kind of wonder, I feel like the two things that could have taken the world on a different trajectory was Fred loving him a little more, or Donald going into the theater business. Like, if he had just owned a couple theaters on Broadway, I feel like he would have been much more

fulfilled. I don't know. What do you think? I would have had a better time. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, his brother, I did a lot of work on his brother, too. That was a sad story. And, yeah, it's a complicated family.

They're the time for alcoholism. Yeah, yeah, essentially. And which Trump says is one of the reasons he doesn't drink. But, you know, in reporting that story, they weren't very nice to him. This brother who really just wanted to fly airplanes and didn't want to be in the family business and things like that. And who was in a juror? I think he was in a Jewish fraternity at Lehigh, if I remember Kirkcoy. It was a bizarre world.

Yeah. So that was my Trump ancient history. But it's sort of important because it's good to have that sort of base and no ham and just sort of, it applies to other things you've seen. Taking us to Italy, the one, I think, parallel before we get to Mone, is Burlesconi. And I think even back even in 2016, you know, a lot of times people are grasping around for Trump comps. You know, you go to Hitler. A lot of people immediately go to Hitler, even his current vice president. And I don't know that's like the most app.

And of the kind of modern day politicians, I feel like Berlusconi is the one that had the most parallels. But you covered them closely. Why don't you talk a little bit about the similarities, differences, what could be learned from the Burlesconi experience? Yeah. So, I mean, on the surface, there's so many similarities, right? Even the complexion, right? They're just both went for this sort of tangerine look, you know? And hair, obviously, is an obsession for both of them.

Brulisconi lost his hair and then one year had much more hair than he ever had. Right? It looked like sort of tar had been dumped on his head. Trump clearly has hair issues. I don't know what to call it. I remember once actually in Maralago. I was in Mara Lago and the butler snuck me into Mara Lago when he was running for president. And he took me everywhere, showed me everything.

The one place that was off limits was where Trump went and did his hair. I was like, that was like the inner symptom, the holiest of holies, where no one could go. And I was like, all right, I know my bounce. But the similarities between Trump and Bolusconi are, I mean, they're not just physical, even though ones are tall, ones very short. Their biography, right? Their BMI is pretty similar, though. Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly.

And though I think that Broseconi didn't like a well-done cheeseburger. Yeah. I was like his go-to meal. I think if you look at their biography, they both. come out of real estate world, right? They were both builders first. And then they both had incredible sense of media, right? Trump sort of as manipulating the media from the outside and Broliskone, as someone who became a true mogul, bought up tons of television channels and magazines, sort of from nothing, right? He created a broadcast network by essentially having people run around

the country with videotapes and play American soap operas at the same time to get around the And very innovative, but media was, was he realized that that was, the television was the way to go. So there's all these sorts of similarities. It's kind of like a Murdoch Trump mashup, you know, a little bit. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And Bralusconi and Murdoch also have like a long storied relationship and they ended up hating each other. But with Trump, I felt a certain point of the comparisons became a little too easy, right? just because they had these enormous appetites,

just because they, you know, were sort of fast and loose with the law, right? And there was plenty to criticize on both. There was a difference. And I think that the difference, what we're seeing now, especially in the second term, is that Burles-Skony for all of his enormous faults, right? And he came into power essentially to protect his business empire. But he didn't seem to have limits. And as someone, you know, great historian once told me,

Don't mistake Broseconi as a defender of democracy, right? He's not like your go-to guy. But at the same time, he sort of believed in the European Union project. He believed in democracy bid time. There's a difference between believing in democracy as in like we should have fair elections and believing in the project of liberal democracy, rule of law, you know, all that kind of stuff, that Brolisconi was hostile to, yeah. Exactly.

His heroes were Reagan and Thatcher, right? Brolisconi's heroes, right? And he was a child of World War II. Bombs were dropping near his house. He did not want to go back to that. He viewed nationalism as something sort of scary. Now, we can talk about, and we should talk about, how he dealt with that nationalism in his own country.

He brought them in, and that's essentially we'll get to Maloney. But his goal was to sort of neuter them, right? Because he feared them for Laskoni in the end. He didn't want to go back to Mussolini. And I think that when you listen to Trump now, And I'm not saying Trump wants to go back to Mussolini, but clearly they have very different, very different views of the borders of democracy. And I think we're always seeing new ones with Trump, obviously. I mean, Trump's not at all scared of fascism, I mean, or nationalism.

And he doesn't see any have any obligation to neuter the kind of more nationalist wing, kind of the opposite. I mean, he has various areas where they disagree and he thinks that they're weird. But I don't think he thinks that neutering the project in any way. is of service to him. I'll go back to that relationship with the fascist, but just I want to touch one more thing on the similarities. So it was more political that struck me reading it. You wrote this.

Both enjoyed an opposition that played into the savior complex trap. Berlusconi critics didn't know how to respond to his bonho-mey and humor. They often appeared mealy-mouthed kill joys in comparison. That felt kind of like an attack on the bulwark. But I was looking at it. Never. Or at least an attack on the Democratic Party. You know, that is if you could get back into a time machine to 10 years ago, you know, would be the section that I would pull out and, you know, go to the Clinton campaign headquarters or whoever and say, guys, like, this is a lesson you need to learn from this guy.

Because we did walk straight into that trap that the Borlusconi opposition fell into. Yeah, it was something with Burlesconi, so over and over and over again, the more they talked about him, the bigger he got. Right. And he did it, he did not mind it at all. And he also, his skin was less than Trump's, right? He could take a joke a little bit. He could play the game. But he knew that the more everyone was talking about him, the more they were hitting him,

the more Berlusconi was the central character on the Italian stage, the lesser room there was for everybody else. The real problem was that in the meantime, the left did not come up with, you know, solutions and policies and messaging that actually reached the people that they were trying to convince. And Berlusconi had a message that was very different from Trump. Trump's. He was much more optimistic. You know, one could argue it was, you know, he was full of it.

Sure. But it was an optimistic message about prosperity and, you know, Greater Italy, whereas Trump's, I think, we've seen is not exactly about optimism. U.S. voters abroad. Have you got your ballot yet? All states are now sending ballots to overseas voters. So if you want to vote this year, you should request your ballot right away. Go to vote from abroad.org and click request my ballot, asked to receive it by email. Questions? Ask our support team directly. Don't miss this chance to shape the future. Don't delay. Vote from abroad.org. On the kind of the relationship of the fascist, so as Broscone is in, you have kind of this rise, and I don't know, I guess maybe there's some parallels here, and you can always over-extend,

but like we're kind of seeing this right now in the Trump movement, where there's a rise of like an even fascistier wing. You know, you talk about Betbe Grillo as an example of that, and it's kind of this sort of comedian clownish right-wing national. S-type, and I don't know if that's Tucker for like straining these metaphors, but, you know, I'm just curious, like, how that, like, developed and, you know, in these sorts relationships, there's always a question of, like, who's using who, you know, and was Berlusconi using the nationalist to kind of maintain a more stable power or kind of the other way around and then kind of take us from there to Maloney? Yeah, so this sort of popular surge that starts around 2010, is in a way in response to Berlusconi, right? Because there's a zillion trials. The corruption is pretty apparent.

And this is the time also of Bunga Bunga, Bunga, I don't know if you remember, which was this wild sex scandal, where Bolasconi has having what he called elegant dinners in his palace, which the accusations were full of women. There's some shirt. I'm going deep into my memory bank.

Weren't there some shirtless pictures? There were some shirtless pictures or very open-shirted pictures. Well, There was one picture, oh my God, I'm remembering this now. There was a picture from his vacation resort in Sardania with all these different leaders. I think it was the check leader. Sorry if it wasn't the check leader. And no one was wearing clothes, right?

It wasn't shirts. It was just no gross. Right? Yeah. And there were women there who I'm assuming were not their wives. Yeah. Right? And or daughters.

So that was sort of the Berlusconi vibe. But in Italy, it was like, that's the Burlesconi vibe. It wasn't surprising anybody, right? that part wasn't driving everybody crazy. The part that was driving everybody crazy was that there was like a financial crisis. And instead of, you know, having a steady hand on the wheel, the guy has one hand texting like a girl in Naples, right?

And so that was really the problem that the country had with Brolis Scorni at that time. And so out of that rises this enormous upswell of populism. And that's this guy, Beppe Grillo, who was this blogger, essentially in comedian, he harnessed all the anger in the country. And it was this real old school sort of populist uprising. You know, his big calling card was like, Vafam Kulo Day, which means go fuck yourself day, essentially.

And they would read off all the names of the people on trial in Brollosconi's government and the whole, you know, hundreds of thousands of people screaming, va fun kulo, right? And so it was like a real populist movement. And that has not gone. Or right left horseshoe. So I think horseshoe, right? And actually, according to them, nothing, because they were never even a party.

And they also didn't believe in representative democracy. They believed in the internet. So it was this weird sort of futurist. Things that we see now, I sort of saw in Italy years in advance. And one thing that I constantly kept thinking is like, the more I reported on this place, the more the sort of land of the past started feeling like this land of the future. Because everything I started seeing sort of came back around. Beppe Grillo was this basically was with the futurist and there was populist

futurism and this whole thing. And they actually ended up getting into government. And it wasn't a very successful government because they weren't very competent. But it revealed this hard right populism in the country, even if they were maybe left, maybe right, who knows. but it revealed that it was really there. And so then Italian politics essentially became a competition for who could get that vote, who could get those people who were like come out of the work.

Who could get the Joe Rogan voter. I mean, we're doing this right now, basically. It's exactly what we're seeing now, right? And so there was this competition for that. And so Italian politicians became very good at appealing to those people. Okay. So is Maloney then, I'm trying to remember, like is there, you know, another figure before her on the populist right that emerges.

Yes. Yeah. So there's one more step before you get to Maloney. At first, there's this guy named Matteo Salvini. Oh, right. And he is this, you know, also very brash, populist. Comes from a northern separatist party. Actually started as technically a communist in the Italian North.

But his original sort of ideology was just northern Italy should secede. from southern Italy because southern times like stink, literally smell like dogs, you know, just terrible things he was saying. But then he realizes that nationalism is the way to go after Pepe Grillo. And so he needs a new enemy and looks further south. And so you have Africa and you have the migrant crisis and that's what fuels everything. Yeah. So he has this a really strong few years and is actually in government with five stars, this very odd government where you have the futurist populace with the nationalist northern separatists, but that's Italy, like, you just get these experiments.

Right. But he flames out in a sort of hysterical way because he's so into his power that he sort of moves the seat of government from Rome to a beach up north where he's hanging out with his, like, bros and drinking caperinas, and there are, you know, like women on,

they call them Kubisti, like basically go-go dancers dancing to the national anthem. And that was just like, okay, this is over. I mean, if we're going to descend to Italian idiocracy and copy everything, having the next, you know, leadership,

try to move the capital to Miami and hang out. I don't know. That's fine. It's better weather. You know, at least we'd have Caprinia. Eventually, this guy in Salvini flames out. The government breaks. You have this small period

where you have extremely competent technocratic government with this guy of Adiosia. who is still to this day in Europe, sort of seen as the savior of Europe, saved the Euro, competence, competence, competence. It's another Italian experiment. But that falls for two, and then we get to Maloney. And Maloney is there not because she's more right-wing than anybody or better at something

than everybody, but Maloney was the only one who hadn't been given a chance yet. And Italians love to give people a shot. And so they looked to the place that had been off limits for a very long. long time since World War II, which is the true Italian far right. She comes out of neo-fascism. She is, she's the real deal. I mean, she went to like this strange, I was reading the book, I was like, I knew nothing about this. As a teenager, she was in kind of like a Mussolini youth group that was themed like the Lord of the Rings. So, yes, essentially, yes. So it's kind of like Jewish summer camp, but for Nazis. And they do cost, they do some coast. They do some coast

They do some hobbit coastline. Instead of Ben and Jerry's. They eat. So I've talked to Georgia Maloney about this at length. And it seems to me there is nothing she enjoys more on Earth than talking about the hobbit. Right? And I'll tell you why. And it's actually sort of fascinating.

So the Georgia Maloney story is this. She's 15 years old. She's in a working class neighborhood of Rome. She was a complicated family history. her father left. She's raised by a single mom who to earn extra money starts writing romance novels under a pen name, Josie Bell. And writes like a hundred of these books. Maloney told me they were all actually didn't make much money, but they're hysterical. I actually know one woman who collects them now. Her goal in life is to get all 100, whatever, Josie Bell books. Anyway, so Maloney is 15 years old

in this working class neighborhood, something is going on in her life. She's unhappy. She wrote at the time, but she was overweight, she was quiet. She knocks on the door of the neo-fascist party in Italy.

And that's a very odd thing for a girl in this neighborhood to do, right? So that to me is still one of the big questions, the why question. She's never really explained that she talks about

because of the corruption in the country and they had just killed a, you know, a crusading prosecutor the mafia had and she felt that they're really the only people standing up for it with a neo-fascist. Maybe, but I'd just feel like there's something else.

She gets into this party, and in this party, there are no heroes allowed anymore. Think about it. Like, if you're a neo-fascist in the 1990s and you're a teenager, who are your heroes? You're not allowed to have Mussolini as a hero. There's all these sort of creepy ideologues who wrote these very strange esoteric books, one guy named Julius Evela, who's, who Bannon actually knows quite a lot about. Yeah, I was just going to say, I only know about that because I saw his fucking book in Bannon's basement when I was writing about him.

Yeah, and I've talked about Evel a lot with Bannon, but Evel is like a very scary thinker. Even the Nazis were like, I think Evel is a little far out there. They're like, we can't really do this. But anyway, so they're reading all this weird stuff, but they don't have like a text, a founding text that they can really get behind that isn't taboo. And then a version of the Lord of the Ring appears in Italy in the 70s, right? And they glom onto this big time. And so by the time Maloney is there as a 15-year-old in the 90s, this thing has become like biblical. Right.

So the Lord of the Rings for the hard right in Italy is not just a story about like elves and dwarves and hobbits, which when I read it to my kid, it was. When I watched the cartoon when I was a kid, that's what I thought it was. For them, it is basically the story about them, about, you know, people who are alienated and who are victimized and who are really just people, like good people, the hobbits, who now have to defend, you know, their identities, right? Dwarves are dwarves and elves are elves. And no one should, you know, no power should change that. No sort of European Union or overarching power should stop a dwarf from being a dwarf. So they extrapolate from this fantasy novel

all the sort of political feelings that they have and it becomes their most important text and hurts. And one last thing on it, she actually, when she'd get on the phone with her friends, like in the party, their code names were like Frodo. And she dressed up as a hobbit. She'd go into schools to try and get kids to like get over to the right wing a little bit

because Italian high schools, public high schools are extremely political. So to show that, like, hey, we're here too, they'd like dress up as hobbits because they thought that that might be more sort of perspressive. Anyway, so it was a weird scene. Yeah. They don't know it. He called, you know, the briber listeners like hobbits and deplorables and the guys in their basement. Like, he kind of appropriated that as like, if you're a weirdo, you know, we're taking over, you know, these, whatever, you know, more dressed the bankers and, you know, the people that look down on. you, et cetera. There's like a little bit of that.

Yeah, they did this weird thing also in the 70s before Maloney's time where they actually started these Hobbit camps. If you were like a young neo-fascist, you'd go to the Hobbit camps and, you know, you'd be into fantasy and stuff like that, but you'd also be into really hard right politics. And their anthem was this song, which was actually from the movie Cabaret, from the play cabaret. It's the scene, I don't know if you remember where some of the Nazis youth get up and they're singing this song about the brighter tomorrow, I think it is. And it's a very ironic dark scene in the movie. They just took it and they were like, yes, this is us. And that became their anthem. And so Maloney still like remembers that. She went to a sort of reiteration

of that the 1990s. So that's where she's coming from. Yeah, it's kind of like the anime fascists now that you see online. U.S. voters abroad. Have you got your ballot yet? All states are now sending ballots to overseas voters. So if you want to vote this year, you should request your ballot right away. Go to vote from abroad.org and click request my ballot, ask to receive it by email. Questions? Ask our support team directly.

Don't miss this chance to shape the future. Don't delay. Vote fromabroad.org. Okay. Well, let's fast forward to her taking over. She takes over as prime minister. And I think the conventional wisdom was that this is like Orban, right, that she's going to have an Italian Orban.

obviously, you know, there are always little differences, but like that that was the direction we go. And she, like, gradually, it goes a different route. And, you know, again, like I said, why I wanted to have you on, one of the thoughts I had a couple of months ago is, is like, do I like Maloney kind of? I'm just going to read you a list of the things that she's been doing recently. She denied the aircraft for the Iran War. She's been pro-Nado. She's been pretty good on Ukraine, all things considered. Defended Pope Leo against Trump, fought back at Trump, called him a liar.

And none of this stuff is anything to do with Italian domestic politics. I feel like an average person in Urpena that doesn't probably do anything for you. But like for me, I'm looking at all that going, this is kind of like a best case scenario. So what am I missing? How did that happen? Can you just kind of talk us through that trajectory? One thing that's important to understand before getting the specifics of it is sort of Italy as a whole, as a country, right?

It's actually a pretty conservative country. It does all these experiments, right? It'll try Berlusconi. It'll try five stars. It'll try the super technocrat of Draghi. It'll even try the super far right candidate in Maloney. The deal is, once you get in, you're normal, right? Don't change anything.

Don't mess with our inheritance laws, right? Don't mess with our taxes. It's a very conservative place. You can do whatever you want. You could say whatever you want, but don't do much. And in fact, I think the main criticism of Maloney is that she's not actually doing much. So it wasn't exactly shocking to me that once she got in, she was immediately moderating, right? She moderated her language.

There are certain things on immigration and things like that. She's tough, right? She's definitely right wing. But I mean, the right wing stuff she's still doing is, you know, like hijab laws, like, you know, dealing with Islam, immigrants, LGBT stuff, immigration. And maybe there's other stuff. Which if you're Maloney in Italy, which is a pretty conservative country, it's really easy. right? Like it's give a little bit of red meat every now and then to your base

but broadly people are going to agree with you you know she's not she's not advocating anything really beyond the pale right so she throws some red meat and everyone sort of she still has good numbers you can't adopt as you know gays can't adopt in Italy but I think that was always true I don't think that she changed it was hard I mean she has made it

a crime she has made it a crime so she's criminalized my family So it's not nothing. I mean, it's not nothing. It's not nothing. Okay. So I just want to acknowledge. I'm not like standing Maloney here.

I'm just saying compared to the baseline of like an Orban Mussolini mashup that we're talking about. It's better than that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But I think on the geopolitical issues, I think you're right. And I think that she has been, she's been moderate because Italy wants their leaders to be pretty moderate. Right. And they like the idea of her being the sort of bringing the sort of. to first Orban, which sort of worked a little bit.

Like, she got him to do some things in the European Union that he didn't want to do. And then it was Georgia Maloney's going to be the bridge to Trump. And that worked a little bit less well. Because, you know, she tried to build a relationship with him. He said all these, like, effusive, sort of embarrassing things about her, about how fantastic she looked and things like that. She went along with that. It got kind of psychosexual, though, for like both when he was praising her,

and then when they had a breakup, it was like he was trying to act like she was a single, white female stalking him. There's a lot of weird stuff from the Trump side. You have to know George Maloney. She's just not going to take it, right? So when he did his usual thing, like, oh, she's stalking me. She did this very sort of funny direct-to-camera thing where she's basically just went at him really hard and said, we don't understand why you insult your allies and you cozy

up to bad guys and, you know, really hit him. I think she does this very Maloney thing at the end. She goes, and one thing you need to understand, you know, we in Italy, We don't beg to anyone, right? And, like, with the eyes out, and it was just like, okay, that's the real Maloney. She's back. And so the bridge is over, right? Which sounds like I'm talking about the Bronx, but I'm talking about, like, Georgia Maloney and Trump.

And so I think that what she has done is two things that I think are really important. And I think the jury's still out on this, whether this is good or not. So going back to Berlusconi, Burlesconi's big innovation, if you get rid of all this sort of scam, and everything like that. In order to govern the first time when he made it in 1994, he needed more support. So he brought in what he called the fascists. He said, we're going to legitimize them. We're going to constitutionalize them. They have been not allowed to participate in real Italian mainstream politics since the Second World War. Burles Goni brought them in betting that he would basically moderate them. So then we get to Maloney. And the question is, is Maloney? Is Maloney

the proof of that, right? Like, has she proven Berlusconi right that he took the far right and over a long process of decades, he produced a Georgia Maloney who was, you know, knocking on Hobbit doors when she was 15, but is now, you know,

a very mainstream center-right leader in Europe, if you could argue. The only thing I would say, though, is the second point, which is George Maloney coming into power also does another thing. So Italy likes its, politics, very moderate, it has enormous guardrails about what you're able to do. Other countries

don't, right? Other countries allow you, have a much stronger president or prime minister. You can do more things. Right. George Maloney is a pioneer for those people. So if you look to Germany and AFD, if you look at Le Pen in France, they point to George Maloney. And they say, well, you could do it in Italy. Why can't we do it here? And is she still playing footsie with those leaders? I know that she plays nice with McCrone and at the, you know, EU meetings and stuff. But as she's doing stuff behind the scenes to boost them like J.D. Vance does here, for example. I don't think she is. I think, well, I think she and, she and McCrone legitimately hate each other,

but they'll play, they'll play nice, but they legitimately hate each other's guts. She's always been a little weirded out by the AFD. And Le Pen is different, but she's always sort of kept some distance from them. Also, she's very sort of wise. She sort of sees what might be a bridge too far sometimes and keeps distance. But I think the big question with Maloney is, has she, and I guess you could say has Brosconi earlier, have they opened the door to something else in Europe? And the return of nationalism in Mitterrand, I think in France, one said if nationalism is war in Europe. Yeah.

And I would say the Bruliscone plan failed and that he got used by the fascists. And just because Maloney ended up chilling out does not prove his theory right. Because, like, it could have gone the other way, right? And I do think you're seeing this now with us. And in some ways, Maloney in herself and her party represents, like, what I think are the two post-Trump possibilities for the GOP, which is that, like, the best possibility is what Maloney is now, which is, like, somebody that does nationalist culture war issues at home because I just think that's baked in. But does not do Trump's craziness abroad, like, closing up to dictators and creating wars with Canada, right? I think that's the best case scenario, but like a bad version is whatever, the Bepe Real or whatever, right? I mean, maybe not him exactly, but like some more, you know, somebody that channels the populism and is even more of a true believer about it, you know?

And I don't think that Trump or Rosconi had any control over what that monster becomes. Like, that's, you know. Right. And I, yeah, I mean, I think it would be naive of us to say, like, well, Maloney's been okay for a few years, for four years. So that's, it's okay, everybody. Let them all in, right? But I think that it is a data point, right? It is something like it's a real example, but I don't think it's like a settled example.

I think that we will now see as the politics evolve here, was this maybe, you know, like I said before, is this just opening up the door to something that we're going backwards for, you know, that's maybe dangerous. You also covered the Vatican where you're there. So I want to close with a little talk about the Bullwark Pope, Pope, Pope Leo. We don't have any proof that he's a Bullard Plus subscriber, but a lot of the things. demographic signs point to it. I feel it. I feel it. And you wrote about like being there and seeing like the American Pope come out. And, you know, you kind of covered this. And a lot of these similar ideological fissures

were happening in the church that was happening outside. You know, where you're covering it, you had the rad trads and like Cardinal Burke, which is more whatever, whatever, if you want to call it Bannonish. I hate to keep like invoking him, but whatever, like that side of the church. And, you know, you had Pope Francis, obviously, it came from the more liberal. wing and I don't know. I mean, who, I don't think anybody really knew. I didn't know, certainly, like what would succeed him and, you know, certainly could have been somebody and more of a Benedict Tmoles. And it ends up being Leo, but was both kind of an ideological successor, but also American, which carries so much with it. So what was, just take us behind that

transition and what you were seeing there up close. Yeah, sure. So, I mean, I've been covering the Vatican for 25 years. And so I've covered four popes. And the one rule was that you can't have an American pope. Because there was too much power in one place. And so it was sort of a given. There was a couple of Vatican truisms. One was that if you've been promoted, you've really been fired.

I doubt it's the other one. That's how they get rid of people. Yeah. So, I mean, covering Francis, first of all, was really, you know, it was sort of thrilling and fascinating because he had this, amazing project and he, you know, he was very political, right? I think everyone knows that he was political, but he was a really political guy and really did not like, also did not really like the United States, I don't think. I didn't trust it. You know, I will say that my one like reporting

success ever, he was on my short list. So, Leo, so, you know, that's something. It's the one time I've ever gotten a election. Do you have him in the pool? No. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I lost. So, you know, I was, so, you know, I was there. I had a feeling it was going to be that day. And I called my wife, who was with their kids, and they were with her kids and my kids, our kids. And they were like, you know, two kilometers away. And I was like, get here now.

And she was like, no, there's time. I was like, there's no time. It's going to happen right now. In fact, you know, so they were in the piazza too when he was announced. And my son says that he was standing next to an Italian priest. When Leo came out, as the American Pope, there was a priest next to him, an Italian priest. And he was like, what? Right?

It astonished everybody. He's like, what? We can't have this, right? So it was shocking. I think, as far as who Leo is and what he's doing, I think he's very much in the footsteps of Francis. I really do. Just so that those of us that have, you know, sometimes it's like we have such an American view of everything and everything's about us and all this. But like, there was some sense out there that, like, you know, you said this rule, there was this rule that was this rule that wasn't.

it was going to be the American Pope, and it was something like that it was because of what was happening here, that there was a feeling that not only was it okay, but that was maybe necessary. Is that too much, do you think? Or is it, you know, it's one of these things where is it about like these big meta narratives or is it more about, you know, favor trading and vote count and, you know, among the cardinals? Well, he checked a zillion boxes, right? He's, he sort of ran as a Peruvian, right? Because, you know, he's, he also has Peruvian citizenship.

And a lot of the Cardinals didn't even know he was American. They were like, wait, he's American. Because he presented as proving his Spanish is flawless. His Italians great. But like, he feels himself in a Latin American context. I do think that the European Cardinals especially didn't really understand what was happening in America with Trump. And I think the idea of having a native who understood America from Chicago, that didn't hurt.

Yeah. Right. I also think it didn't hurt to have an American who understands, you know, fundraising and money. And I know this sounds sort of like a put down on the Vatican, but competence and like management, sometimes, I mean, it's a little unchowerable to Leo, but sometimes he, like, struck me as like a Microsoft VP, right?

He was just like extremely, he's just extremely competent. The successor to Steve Jobs kind of thing. Yeah, well, not even Steve Jobs, but just like middle management, right? Like, but... That was the successor. Like, the person you always put in after the founder, you know, who comes in. Yeah, I remember when I was, like, talking to some Cardinals about him and lots of other people, because I had to find out everything about him.

And it was very hard to get, like, a meaty anecdote. And one guy was like, well, I have something really good on him. And I was like, all right, finally. And it was like, he's, you know, in a meeting, he listened. really well. And I was like, he gives good meeting. That's, that's it, right? So, you know, it turns out, and I think what we're seeing in real time is the guy growing to the job, right? And which is really interesting. He's young, so he's taking his time. But I think Trump accelerated his timetable, right? I think by calling the Pope, like, soft on crime was, like, weird. And that sort of brought

Leo out of his shell a little quicker probably than he wanted. But he just seems like he's growing into the job with AI, which is central to what he views as his mission. He's named himself after the prior Leo was during the Industrial Revolution. He sees that this will be just as destructive to the labor force. And he wants to basically be that poke. So, you know, he's an interesting guy. is from this chair, the bulwark pope, were so far, no disappointment. All right, I need some tea.

They didn't give you any good anecdotes about Leo, but could you give me a good anecdote about the gay lobby in the Vatican? I just want to know something. Just give me something. Oh, yeah, sure. All right. Well, let me see the best ones.

So I hung out, I hung out once with this guy who was terrific. He's a fluent Latin speaker, right? And so he came up, he was a priest in southern Italy, realized he was gay and then was like, all right, I can't be a priest. This is like, you know, I'm living a lie.

But as right as he's about to quit, he gets a call from the Vatican, like the top office in the Vatican. And so he goes to Rome and he goes into this great office. He's in the Latin office of the Vatican. And he just told me, and who knows if he's telling him, like, I believe him.

But like, you know, I'm not, you know, it's tough to verify. But he said, I don't know if this is the gay law. But he almost was a gay lobby. Like he said he did so much damage in the Vatican. He slept with so many gods with the Vatican that he put the number at like, oh, 80%. 80% of the Vatican. I was like, that seems high.

Gays are known to exaggerate a little bit. You know, we're known to add a little flair to something. But even if it's 60% of the Vatican, that's a lot of sex. But he was great. And you told me all the nicknames that all the Cardinals give each other. It was a, it was a, it's like a fun. Sexual nicknames? Not even.

Like, one was the devil, right? Because it was one cardinal who, you know, we can't name, but we started to know who was. And then just sort of being catty about, you know, the hairstyles of nobles who come to meet the Pope. It's a great scene. It's clearly not the whole Vatican. And this guy, it was fantastic. But, you know, I think he had maybe a little bit of an agenda. Okay.

But when he got there, well, you didn't finish the story. He got called in and then what happened? Did he get promoted? So he got fired. He got busted looking at stuff on his computer that he shouldn't have been looking at. And one of the Cardinals, who was his mentor, if I'm remembering this correctly. So it was like, you got to know when to look at the computer and then when not to look at the computer. Which it wasn't like, don't do it.

It was like, come on, man. I'm not in the office, you know. But I think that he got walk away money from the. Vatican. If I remember correctly, maybe even the Pope. So, you know, Francis famously, who am I to judge, actually, you know, live there. Give me here some of the Italian. What was the, what was the Chajan? Was that how you said it? All right. So Fracajine is, okay, so Francis let us not forget when he was alive was still a very old guy from Argentina. Yeah. And so my read on the, okay, so for Chachine is basically a made up Roman slang word.

word for, and I guess it's bags, right? It's bad, right? Def slur. But like the Cardinals were all using him, right? And I think what, I think it was a trap. This is my, I don't know, I didn't report this out, but my guess is it was a trap that the conservative cardinals were saying, like, there's just too much for Chajania, there's too much for Chajunay.

And he, and Francis always sort of wanted to be sort of down with the Romans, right? Because he only read the Roman hometown newspaper. So I think he was just like, it's a cool Roman term. It's like a slang term and he used it. It's like when I start saying mugged or stuff. You know, I'm trying to pick up Gen Z words and don't know it. Yeah, yeah. And it just sounded bad.

And it was bad. It was a slur, right? And so he says it the first time. And I actually know that like he got called in by people I know who were trying to smoke, like you can't say that. Like it's a slur. It's bad. It's bad.

Right? It's like explaining. you know, the grand uncle or something. But then, and he's like, yeah, so I got it, I got it. And he came back and said it again. Right? And that's when everyone was just like, oh, this guy's just like, I mean, this is not ideological. This is just an old guy.

Yeah. But there it was very fun. I appreciate it. Jason Horowitz, the book is The Italian Job, a reporter's memoir in Rome. Is that right? I'm going from memory. Is that the right subtitle? Like it's American Reporter's.

Memoir in Rome or a memoir of an American reporter. I don't know. Basically, I'm an American reporter. You don't know your own subtitle? It's the Italian job. The Italian job. Go get it. It's out in two weeks. That's Jason Horowitz. I appreciate it, brother. It's good to see you. Good to see you. All right. Thanks so much to Sarah Matthews and Jason Horowitz. Really appreciate it.

Thanks to my guy at BJ's Lounge. If you ever in New Orleans, you'd go check out BJ's lounge. He did me a solid last night. And everybody else will see you tomorrow on another edition of the Bullwark Daily. Peace. I'm still fighting for you. The Bullwark Daily is brought to you thanks for the work of lead producer Katie Cooper, Associate producer Ansley Skipper, and with video editing by Dante DeChico and audio engineering and editing by Jason Brown.