The Daily Beast Podcast - Has Any American Killed More Americans Than Donald Trump??

Episode Date: September 11, 2020

So Donald Trump copped to it. He told Bob Woodward that he knew how deadly the virus was—and downplayed it anyway, encouraging MAGA nation to act as if COVID-19 was a cheap Chinese knock-off of the flu. “It's remarkable that in these interviews, the President of the United States confessed to fucking manslaughter,” Molly Jong-Fast says on the latest episode of The New Abnormal. The lawyers might debate whether Trump has any criminal culpability. But to Rick Wilson, there’s no question about Trump’s moral responsibility. “No American has killed more of their fellow Americans in this country than Donald Trump, except for Robert E. Lee and Jefferson fucking Davis. No one has a body count to rival Trump's. He knew it. He knew it was there. He did it. He let it happen. It is the most unbelievable and horrifying outcome that we can imagine.” Molly adds, “Mike Pence was at a pro-life event the other day. And I was thinking about the irony, right? This administration has killed 100,000 plus plus plus people. And they're talking about embryos. Like, it's almost beyond parody.” Mike Schmidt, the Pulitzer-winning New York Times reporter, joins Rick and Molly to talk about his new book, which examines some of Trump’s closest confidants—to stop the president from using his power. “What is that human experience to be one of those guardrails and those containers? What is that like? What is the human experience of standing between the president and the abyss?” Want more? Become a Beast Inside member to enjoy a limited-run series of bonus interviews from The New Abnormal. Guests include Cory Booker, Jim Acosta, and more. Head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com to join now. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hi folks, it's Rick Wilson, and welcome to The Daily Beast's The New Abnormal. Hi, I'm Molly Jongfast, a left-wing pundit, and editor-at-large at the Daily Beast. I'm also an editor at The Daily Beast, a former Republican political strategist, best-selling author, and full-time troublemaker. We're here to have fun, sharp conversations with some of the smartest people in media, politics, business, and science that help make what's happening in the country and the world clearer. I'll try to keep Rick to the minimum number of F-bombs and try to keep our... kids, pets, and other wildlife sounds from invading our respective bunkers. Molly Jong Fast. How are you? I'm good, Rick Wilson. How are you?

Doing well, thank you. I noticed this in the last 24 hours that Bob Woodward caused some trouble with the White House. Wait, tell me more. Who is this Bob Woodward? Just an unassuming young fellow, an up-and-comer, if you will. A young kid just trying to make his name in the mean streets of Washington's journalism business. No one's ever heard of him before, but for some reason, he was able to get the big interview with Donald Trump. Not one, but 18. In fact, it was 18 interviews with Donald Trump. And it's remarkable that in these interviews, the president of the United States confessed to fucking manslaughter.

Yeah. Criminally negligent homicide. I'm no lawyer, but I play one on Twitter. This confession from the president to Bob Woodward that he knew in January, it wasn't the flu. He knew in January it was coming. He knew it spread through the air. He knew over and over and over again. February 6th.

And came out and his national security team on January 28th told him, this is the most consequential thing you will face in your presidency. All these things. And so he ignored it. The side-by-side ads write themselves. You put them next to Donald Trump going out at the podium. It's almost disappeared. Like magic, it will go away.

We're down to almost three cases, maybe zero. I'm going to admit it's five. We've got to get back to work, liberate Wisconsin, blah, blah, blah. The amazing thing is this guy made the most basic bitch Washington, D.C. Fuck up of all. He thought to himself, I'll play Bob Woodward. He thought he was going to get Bob Woodward on the phone and charm him. And without no one in the world, no one who spent 30 fucking seconds in D.C.

woke up and said, Woodward got one over on Trump. That's shocking. Because, of course, it was entirely unshocking. This guy just gave America the clearest thing you could ever hope to see. And look, I know most Trump supporters. He could have said, I'd not only ignored it, I like it. And they'd still go, oh, Mr. Trump, I'm going to vote for him. But you know what?

If you're not a hardcore brainwashed cult MAGA member, Donald Trump just confessed to letting 200,000 people die and not preparing this country and lying and lying and lying and lying about it for weeks and months on end while the virus got worse and the death toll mounted, and we tallied the loss at 200,000 people by the end of, I don't know, middle of next week. And with the fall COVID season coming to hit us harder, all those things we didn't do, like staying shut down long enough,

like mandating social distancing and masking early enough in the process, that Trump turned into social warfare, cultural war issues, are going to cost us another couple hundred thousand lives because he knew. And hashtag Trump knew is trending still after two days for a reason. Trump knew. And I know I'm repeating myself a little bit, but I mean... See, I thought he might have known, but I wondered, because I always think of him as very stupid,

that he might not have known how bad it was or that it was airborne. But the fact that on February 7th, he knew it was airborne, it could kill young people. It was five times more fatal than the flu. I mean, that sort of shit. shocked me, and it's on tape. We'll never look back at the COVID crisis again and have any doubt. That's one of the most important things here. This is unspinnably bad for Donald Trump.

It is unspinnably bad for Trump. There's nothing good that will come of this for him in the history books. You can't go out and say, oh, he was trying to keep the country calm. Bullshit. He was trying to minimize it for his own political benefit, and it is one of the greatest travesties. No American has killed more of their felon. Americans in this country than Donald Trump, except for Robert E. Lee and Jefferson

fucking Davis. No one has a body count to rival Trump's. He knew it. He knew it was there. He did it. He let it happen. It is the most unbelievable and horrifying outcome that we can imagine. You live in a city that was incredibly hard hit by this that was on the front lines of this crisis in ways that few other cities in America experienced. And Trump is very quick to blame Cuomo and New York State government. But I mean, now you have a lot of kind of know, New York got blindsided because that fucking guy lied. Well, we saw that reporting, like, two weeks ago about Jared, realizing that Blue State were getting hit harder by COVID and deciding to let them die.

I would be shocked if there isn't some email or some WhatsApp of Jared being like, let them all die. That's the thing I keep thinking about is when this is all over. Imagine what we're going to end up seeing, the emails, the paper trail, especially from like the private servers. I mean, I think it'll be really shocking. Well, I mean, look, all we know for a fact that all these idiots use WhatsApp and signal and private emails, which I was told for short years ago was a crime for which one should

be locked up. But, you know, call me crazy. I remember that too. I mean, it's funny. You think about it. Like Mike Pence was at a pro-life event the other day or an anti-choice event. And thinking about the irony, right? Like, this administration has killed 190,000 plus, plus people.

And they're talking about embryos. Like, it's almost beyond parity. So I think it'll be interesting to see what happens. I don't know how, I mean, the fact that he knew, he said he knew early February, and then two days later was saying it would go away. Well, there's two, there's two lines of defense. One is the Kaley Mandasity line defense of he was trying to keep the nation calm. Oh, you mean?

the same guy who goes out and screams like, Black people are coming to burn your suburb down and you're going to be murdered and eaten by Antifa. That calming voice of reason, that steady hand at the tiller of state, fuck you, Kaley. And the other excuse that I'm hearing from people that support the president is,

well, you know, you guys are cherry picking now. He did all these good things. He was an engaged and clever executive, minimizing the damage. It could have been so much, worse. I mean, you know what I love is the one thing they can point to? The one thing is the travel band with China, which by that time, I mean, as we know in New York, the COVID that we had actually came from Europe. Right. Right. Your COVID was bespoke European COVID. The best kind of COVID. COVID

that's not from a shithole country. I mean... I'm also a little bit... I mean, I guess I'm not shocked because they're such cowards, but aren't you a little surprised that not a single Republican in power? has said anything like, you know, he needs to resign? I mean, nothing. No, I'm not surprised about that at all because the profiles in chicken shit. These guys have all decided, they've all made their, they've all made the call that keeping silent on Trump will prevent them from having the worst thing that could ever happen, which is a bad tweet from the president.

They've decided that that escaping that terrible fate is the most important thing they can do in their political careers. And by the way, apparently this was one of those things where Woodward didn't just have to make, once the people knew he was writing the second book about the Trump administration, they beat down his door to talk on the record, which is also kind of crazy. This moment where the president of the United States confesses to having lied to the American people, and not about some bullshit, not small ball thing. I agree.

I mean, he lied about killing people. These people are still defending it, which is kind of amazing. But you have to think, like, a Ben Sass, like Ben Sass won his primary. Right. Why won't Ben Sass do the right thing? Fox. Fox. And that's the answer.

Fox. He's just scared of her getting met. They're scared of Tucker. They're scared of Trump. And that fear of the mean tweet and that fear of Tucker Carlson going on the air and saying, apostate traitor, X, Y, Z must be destroyed. He has betrayed the dear leader. You know, whenever I see Tucker going into those crazy, like, hisy fit things that he does,

it reminds me those like Lord Hawa, those World War II German propaganda. broadcast where they'd get an Englishman who would say things like, Winston Churchill is probably dead. He is a fat old man anyway. Or the North Korean lady in the Hanbach who screams out, The Dear Leader! It's become like a parody of authoritarian propaganda networks, but these guys are scared shitless of them.

Wait, by the way, do you know that Trump tweeted that people should stop underestimating Kim Jong-un and that he's in good health? You know, I'm just glad he's got his priorities in line because you know who's not in good health? 200,000 fucking dead Americans, that's who's not in good health. Jesus Christ.

Hey, Molly, did you hear from the Woodward book that great quote from Brad Parscal? Parskeau was so proud of the campaign. He was managing that he said they'll make movies about us someday. Yes, Brad, they will. But they'll mostly be called

things like behind bars. Brad after dark. I think it's going to be more like the made-off story, right? And like secession. Let's just keep this number very clear in your head.

They've spent almost a billion dollars. They have piled up a billion dollars in a giant pyramid of money and set it on fire, a la la the joker. Listen to me, you can't expect Brad to drive his own car. You know, Molly, I've been at very high levels in many, many campaigns. You know what I've never had in a campaign? What? Car driver. Well, that's because you don't have a spectacular beard like Brad Parskow.

I like to think my beard is spectacular. but in a different kind of way. And it's, no, I can't rock a footh. Because, of course, being a bald fellow, I'm unable to do so. I will say this. That conceit on Brad's part just blew me away because this is a guy who has, by the time he gave that quote to Woodward in the process of writing this book, he'd already blown through half a billion for nothing.

For nothing. Well, you got to pay the girlfriend. Well, how else is Kimberly Guilfoyle going to afford her opera lessons? Right. How else is Laura Lee Trump going to keep herself in whatever she does to avoid thinking about the fact that she's married to Eric? Right, exactly. And of course, whatever degree of the skim goes to the Trump family,

there was an outside group last week that reported that they think about 170 million of it has somehow gone into Brad's pockets. And I guarantee you, the Trump family, the Trump criming enterprise, is not letting Brad keep 170 large. Ah, ha. Oh, you don't think so? No, pretty sure. I think Jared said, yes, you need to make your monthly wire to My Pretty Blonde Pony LLC and the Caymans from Brad.

I would love to see some financial numbers inside the Trump campaign at some point because I've been told that the office is so packed with people. Their staff burn must be $20 million a month. Do you think Sheldon Adelson will write another check? I think he did for the Superpack. I think that toy came from Sheldon. But the super pack is hand-a-mouthed right now. Well, that's very sad. I really have spent a lot of my day today weeping quietly into a wifu pillow to...

Into your my pillow. How many weeks has it been since the Trump administration took office? Do you have that number off the top of your head? A billion? A gazillion. Since I was a century, two centuries. Right. Since you were just a young slip of a girl,

frolicking across the meadow. You know what? Every week has been such an enormously important accomplishment of the Trump administration. Is it in all the weeks they've had, we've had so many, so many. the, let's just call it right now, like, let's call it 200 weeks, whatever it is, right? 190 weeks, I don't know. Every week has been such a great infrastructure week for this country. But eventually, eventually the gods became angry and there is no infrastructure week,

and there never will be one. And their anger has been shown by a blood red sky across California heralding the Trumpocalypse at long last. Yeah, the state's on fire. And of course, their electrical grid is fallen apart from this train. Their public lands are burning to a crispy ed. blood red sky. So I think that's an omen that we should generally not see. I mean, it is interesting. You know, we talk to Senator White House, and there is such a parallel between what the Trump administration did with coronavirus and what the Trump administration is doing with climate.

Like, ignore the scientists, ignore the science, know the consequences, ignore them anyway, and then be faced with carnage. Well, it is a grave moment for California right now. And look, Some of this is climate. Some of this is their growth pattern they engaged in over the years. Some of it is that they're not just raking the forest, Molly. I mean, obvi. And some of it is the lenientia this year. It's just, it's a, the situation is terrible.

But have you seen a single shred of presidential leadership on this question? The answer would it be, of course, no. Yeah, but there's no federal leadership. I mean, we still don't have a mask mandate. We do not. We do not. So, hey, Molly. Yes.

When you wake up at night screaming in a cold sweat after having a dream about Ruth Bader Ginsburg being mistakenly eaten by wolves in Rock Creek Park and a Supreme Court justice vacancy opening up before the end of the election. When you wake up in terror and the whole family runs into the room and says, Mom, Mom, what's wrong? And you say, I dream Donald Trump named Blank to the Supreme Court. Tom Cotton. Tom Cotton. Why? Tom Cotton.

Wait, you think Tom Cotton's more frightening than Ted Cruz? Tom Cotton is worse than Ted Cruz. And I hate Ted Cruz. And Tom Cotton is worse than Ted Cruz. But Ted Cruz on the bench, he would probably grow, like a really super long beard. Ted Cruz may be aesthetically unpleasing to you, but Tom Cotton immediately,

as soon as he learned about his fate, whatever Trump announcing that he would nominate him into the Supreme Court so that Junior could run in 2024, he tweeted out, Ro must go. So, you know, there used to be a world in which Senate nominees would pretend not to be, activist that time has passed.

Clearly. But I love Tom Cotton because he's a horrible, horrible, horrible person who wants to go to war with China and Russia and Iraq and Iran. And your moms. Right. Free U.S. citizens at protest. Yeah, that's a classy move. I like that one.

That's the one that really speaks to me. One of my favorite Tom Cotton opeds was when he wrote that Trump had a good idea buying Greenland and it made a lot of sense. Tom Cotton for the Supreme Court. Then there was Tucker throwing Lindsey Graham under the bus. That was amazing. It was delicious, wasn't it, on the fish ticks and fascism power hour? Because so much blowback is happening about these Woodward interviews,

Tucker went on last night and had a full-on rant about Lindsey Graham saying, why would he have done this? He opposed everything the president stands for. Lindsay Graham is like little shinebox boy for Donald Trump. Right, but now Lindsey Graham is the big state. And now he's off the reservation with Tucker. I mean, poor Lindsay can't catch a break. First, I run an ad about him featuring a fox being eaten by maggots.

It wasn't symbolic or anything. Certainly not. And then Tucker goes after him. The guy can't win for losing right now. No, he can't win for losing. We're delighted to have Mike Schmidt join us today. Mike is a two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning American journalist at the New York Times and the author of the new book, Donald Trump v. the United States.

Mike, it is so great to have you with us. Mike, can you talk with us a little bit about the tapes? This is like just another thing, right? Or do you think this moves the needle? Look, how many times in this story have we thought there were something that was really going to move the needle only for it to just get washed out with the tide of the next day? And I think the rule, more than the exception, has been that things come and go. And that this president has an ability to endure, whether it's with his base or whether it's the

personal pain on himself, he indoors through this stuff in ways that I just have not. never seen before. So I don't know. Is it a game changer? It's like maybe, but history doesn't show it. One of the stories that was really very buzzworthy last week, and you know, since we live in Mayfly timeframes, which seems like 10 years ago, was about the mysterious trip to Walter Reed. And could you tell us a little bit about what happened with that? And also the reaction of people in the White House once you reported out that particular story. It was the ultimate and sort of Trumpian moment. You spend all this time working on a book, and then I had this fact in the book that says that when Trump went to the hospital last year during impeachment, that Mike Pence was told basically to

stay loose, stay on standby. The president may need to go under anesthesia. And what that did, that fact did, is it raised even more questions about that hospital visit. But in classic Trump fashion, instead of ignoring it, he made an even bigger deal. And what he did, did is that he brought it up and he started obsessing about it and turning it into something else and saying that I had reported that there were stuff about a stroke. There's nothing in the book about a stroke. And it just highlighted this thing and it turned it into this bigger thing than I think a normal politician would have just ignored it and it would have gone away. Can you talk to us about McGahn? So Don McGahn, I think, and I write about in the book, I think is the most remarkable character of the Trump era because he did three just remarkable things.

He was in charge of the ambilical court between the president and his base with the judges, which allowed Trump to behave in the way that he has without facing immense political consequences from the base. He was a chief witness against his client in an existential threat to the presidency, the moment of the judge. And he was a chief container of Trump, someone who stopped Trump from hurting himself, hurting the office of the presidency in the country. And what I try and write about in the book is what does that human stay with all of those forces on them? And what really shows is that McGahn stayed because he believed so much in the judges and that he knew he had a once and a never again opportunity to remake the federal courts. And to do that, he put up with a lot of behavior that most people wouldn't. So can you go through with us some of the things that Trump wanted to do that McGahn stopped? I remember reading up when you wrote about how Trump wanted to prosecute Hillary and Comey. And McGahn put the brakes on that. Trump did not understand how prosecutions were. Shocker. And sort of the ultimate standoff with McGam. And in April of 2018, wants to basically order Sessions to prosecute Hillary and Comey.

And if Sessions doesn't want to do it, Trump says he's going to do it himself. Trump said today he's the country's chief law enforcement officer. He's not, the attorney general. And he wanted to take matters into his own hands and prosecute these people. And there's a difference in that type of behavior than the normal Trump obstruction behavior. And I'm not minimizing the obstructive behavior, but the obstructive behavior is getting in the way of an investigation. It's making it harder for investigators to do their work. In this case, the president wanted to proactively use his power to target a rival.

And that is a different new, unusual use of power, something extraordinary, and that differentiated itself from his other behavior in the Mueller report. It always struck me that early trance of lawyers, Don McGahn standing out among all of them. They must have gotten up in the morning every day and thought, how does this guy not understand how any of this works. Isn't that like one of the fundamentals here? He just has a complete disconnect with the reality of what the office entails. Someone once said to him, Article 2 gives you unlimited power. That's the only thing that's stuck in his brain. Correct. I think that's right. I think that I write that early on in the presidency, they were surprised that he didn't understand things like the filibuster and that

he couldn't just do things unilaterally and that he needed Congress to come along. He didn't understand the separation of powers. And then in another part of the book, I write about a broader thing that he didn't understand because the idea of loyalty, the idea that someone like John Kelly was going to be loyal to the Constitution and the rule of law, but at the end of the day, it was not going to be personally loyal to Trump. And I read about how Trump asked John Kelly to be his FBI director right after he fired Comey and says to John Kelly, I need you to be loyal to me, echoing the loyalty oath that Comey said Trump tried to put him through. And Kelly, after spending time as his chief of staff for a year and a half for however long it was, basically said Trump, you know, has told others that Trump

did not understand the loyalty issue. He didn't understand that the generals were going to be loyal to the rule of law and to the Constitution and not him. What was the thing that in all this research you've done? And you've had a very good access to folks inside the White House. What was the thing that shocked you the most in all this coverage? What was the moment that you were just like, whoa? I think the idea of prosecuting Clinton and Comey was pretty remarkable because it just showed him going on the offense in a way that we hadn't seen before. And once you get into that area of the president trying to direct the prosecution, trying to use his powers to target a rival, that was a realm. Not to diminish the obstruction stuff, but it's just an obstructive behavior. You know,

he was trying to throw sand in the gears of the investigation against the law and raised all sorts of questions. But to go on the offensive bail, that's the kind of stuff that you think happens in other country. You don't think that happens in the United States. It's something that that is the idea of imprisoning opposition parties. That is something that certainly in my lifetime is talked about in the rural countries or in dictatorships. And that type of behavior and McGahn's ability to contain him and to try and stop that, I mean, it doesn't look like Trump had the power to do it anyway, but that's sort of a remark. This White House is sort of famous for lying to journalists and lying to each other. How do you get around that? That's a really,

a good question. It's like, and that's something that my colleague, Maggie Haberman, who I idolize, has to deal with all the time. It's like, how do you, when you get down and you're in the depths and the bowels of Trump's world, how do you figure out what's truth and what's not and do it in a way that protects yourself? She does it far better, I think, than anyone else does. But I think that this was not why I made the decision, but I think it sort of helped me is that I didn't want this to be like a Trump book in the classic sense of like, this is all about Donald Trump. I think we know at this point, who Donald Trump is and what he's all about and what he does, but certainly how he behaves. So what I was trying to capture is like, for all of America is really, focus on our president

to use their power. In this instance, the people around the president are trying to stop him from using his power. And what is that human experience to be one of those guardrails and those containers? What is that like? And you certainly get to see Trump in his unusual abnormal use of power in the book. But what is the human experience of standing between the president and the abyss? If you're the 911 operator, there's no other 911 operator, If you're the FBI director, there's no other FBI director to call. If you're the White House counsel, no other White House counsel to call. So what is that phenomenon like to stand between the president and the abyss?

When you're the only thing standing between the most powerful person in the world. And the fact that Trump is president is what creates this. And I was trying to capture that and saying, hey, I don't think we've really seen this a lot in American history. There's an opportunity to capture it. Let's try and capture it. You know, I keep coming back to the way you covered McGahn in this book. And he's a fascinating character, smart guy. In your interviews with him, and he was confessional by the end of it about kind of knew what had happened to him as an enabler.

How many other people are, because another senior White House official one time said to me is, you have to understand, Rick, there are two kinds of people that survive around him. The people that just keep their heads down and kiss his ass and the people who, for whatever reason, are his pet for that moment. McGahn himself, though, I keep coming back to that moment you describe what he's like, I, you know, I damaged the whole office of the president. I did this. Do you think there are other people who have had that sort of revelation moment? Because I don't see a lot of others who've come out of this thing and said, Good Lord, look what I did on the record like that. Trump is sort of this like human MRI machine for your soul.

And he sort of comes along and he sort of reveals who you are. And I'm borrowing that from, that's a Maggie line. But sort of adapted a bit to try and explain, you kind of get to see like Comey was never going to bend. McGahn was going to bend, but he was going to only bend so much. And what, what does that like? I don't know if this answers your question, but there's a certain thing as like at a certain point in me writing a book you have to sort of end the book. And the thing I realized about the Trump story is that it starts to sort of repeat itself because it's basically like he wants to do something and will the people around him do it. How will they react? How do they balance the idea of staying or leaving? And will they go along with it?

And I do not know that, but I guess with high confidence that the thoughts that went through Jim Comey's head or Domagant's head on how to stay. stop and contain the president, John Kelly, among similar in that situation. My guess is that Deborah Birx and Fauci go through the same thing. It's like they probably say, well, I probably, my guess is that Fauci says himself, and I need to be here because if I'm not here, then there's going to be a Fox News analyst who replaces me. And I think that in a certain sense, change, but it's a very similar thing. And you've got to put your pencil down at some point. I said to myself, I said, you know, Comey's sort of the first example of this. And McGahn is sort of the ultimate example of this. And I can go did it as long as he could and basically gave in as much as he could

and then ultimately threw up his hands and left. And I don't think that the containers of the first two years, let's use McGahn and Kelly as examples of them. There's a lot of stuff that went on the first two years that wasn't great, went wrong, and severely damaged the president. And so I don't think they should be absolved of anything. But look at the Ukraine call, the call to the Ukrainian president. Does that call happen if McGahn and Kelly are there? I don't know. But I think that you've seen more behavior in the second half, what's called the second half of the presidency, in which the president is even less contained. Not that Kelliam again had a hold on everything because a lot of stuff went on that, but I think that it has gotten more severe in the second half. So the character of the people around Trump now, there are fewer and fewer, at least in my assessment, strong people and experienced people that he even has any.

business or even has any inclination to listen to on anything. He seems to be driven right now completely by his whims and his desire. He doesn't seem to be getting a lot of solid counsel. Is there anybody around him who's playing any kind of guardrail role at all that he can point to? I'm sure there are. And I'm sure there are things that he's wanted to do around the virus that he hasn't done. And I'm sure that he feels boxed in some by Fauci.

But on the flip side of it, he's sort of been in search of, and it's sort of become a cliche now, but he's been in search of his Roy Cohen for his entire presidency. He's been in search of that person who was going to do what he wanted to do. And he certainly has found that and built Barr. And it was a presidency long search for that person. And he finally found that person. And that is sort of the remarkable thing is that Barr has shown an ability to move around on the chess board in ways that certainly Jeff Sessions couldn't. And many people that Barr sort of has figured out how to do things that the president wanted and in ways that have pleased the president. And the president has been searching for that. He has been open about that. And the private conversations that have reported in the book,

report in the newspaper that are in the Mueller report, show that he has sought out that person. He sees the attorney general as a lawyer who should be working for him. And he found that in Bill Barr. And for Trump, that has been incredibly powerful and important. I do have any thinking about Bill Barr's motivation? Of all the people who, if you could really sort get inside their who they are and what they do that I would love at this point to know. I think I've sort of given up, I'm not sure that if you got inside Trump's mind, you would be able to understand it. But like, what is Barr's calculation? Like, what is bars calculation? Why does he do the things that he does? And what is the end goal? And does he simply think that

Trump has been wronged? Does he, is he trying to basically placate Trump with stuff that he thinks is not important. That may be important to Trump to fight him on the bigger things? I don't know. And that, to me, is like, the most remarkable thing. If you said to me, you could answer one question in the moment. It's like, what's Fars calculation? Why does he do what he does? Michael, I could not agree with you, Morris. I was a super junior, junior, junior guy in the George H.W. Bush administration.

And I asked somebody who was one of my mentors, I said, hey, when Bill Barr's come, and my friend said, he's an institutionalist, he's bolted down, he's not crazy. This is great for Trump. This is going to be steady for the nation. And I asked him a few months later, I'm like, dude, what the fuck was that? And there's like a character change. And maybe the Maggie MRI theory is the variation on that is that I think Donald Trump brings out something dark in everybody around him. And whatever Barr's supercharged executive power fantasy is, I feel like that has something to do with the way he has behaved towards Trump.

And he's just got this ultra expansive view of executive power. This is where I go right around on bars and try and understand. Like, if that's the case, I think that the reaction to Trump with whether Trump, whether Trump will is whatever happens with Trump, is that there's going to be a movement, certainly by Democrats, to limit the powers of the presidency. So if he believes so much in executive power, does he want to use power in a way that is just going to sort of give ammunition to Democrats down the line when Trump's gone and Barr's gone, whenever that is, in a way that sort of the post-Watergate reforms tried to hem in the president. Now, maybe there's a calculation here in constitutional law,

whatever that I'm not considering. But my guess is that there will be a push to do that. So if you're using executive powers in new and aggressive ways, then I think you have to think maybe it's going to be hemmed in at some point down the line. Well, the expansiveness of Barr's view of executive power is something I think we're going to have scholars are going to write about for a generation at this point. That is one thing you write about it. The guy is like a cockroach. He's a survivor of all these scandals that would knock out an ordinary president. You've got to give him grim props for that, I suppose. Look, I think if most politicians, for whatever reason, said the thing that they said about John McCain on the campaign trail, which Trump said about, if they said that, I think most politicians

would have come out the next day and said, I cannot believe I said that. I'm retreating from public life and I'm going to spend the rest of my life trying to atone for what I said. My guess is, and instead, Trump was emboldened by it. And to me, that's just always a stark example of just ability to do things that other politicians wouldn't do. And to try. trek on despite massive criticism and saying things that I'm pretty sure most politicians would have gone home from. Before we get into things, we have a fun little treat. There are so many insane things happening in the world right now, and two episodes a week

just aren't enough to cover it all. So, the new abnormal is going to release a limited run series of bonus interviews over the next few weeks for Beast Inside members only. We'll release a new one each Sunday. But listen carefully. Only Beast Inside members will have access to these. So head over to the new abnormal. Dot the DailyBeast.com to become a beast inside member now.

That's new abnormal. dot the dailybeast.com. My fuck that guy is all of the guys who write for the Federalist and the guys who write for the New York Post and the people who have to defend Trump who said after this tape came out yesterday, they said, we all knew this already. None of this is new. Fauci is defending him. Ask yourself if you're defending the person.

President of the United States killing 200,000 Americans, ask yourself, like, how do you sleep at night? They are my fuck-that-guise. So who is your fuck-that-guy, Rick Wilson? My fuck-that guy is Chad Wolf of the Department of Homeland Security. Come on down. Chad Wolf, temporary acting, adjunct, sort of kind of provisional pseudo. Isn't he illegal? I think he needs to be shipped home. You've got to go, build the wall. Send Chad Wolf home to his native land of Dushbagistan. Some of them, I assume, are good people. They're not sitting there. best, Molly, and Chad Wolf is by far not their best. It was revealed this week that DHS has another whistleblower who has come out and said that Chad Wolf personally ordered him to stop reporting on

Russian interference in the 2020 election, quote, and I know audience, you'll be shocked to hear this, because it made Donald Trump look bad. Really? Why? I can't imagine why Donald Trump would be sensitive to having the intelligence agencies of this country report that sources and methods are revealing to them that Vladimir Putin is helping Donald Trump get reelected. I am shocked why they would do that. Chad Wolf, you are today's fuck that guy. On that note, we'll wrap up this episode of the new abnormal from The Daily Beast. In future episodes, we'll be talking with smart folks from The Daily Beast and beyond from media, culture, politics, and science who will help us understand what's happening to our country and the world. We hope you'll subscribe to us

on your favorite podcast app and share the show on social media. We're just getting started and don't want you to miss an episode. If you'd like to follow us on Twitter, I'm Molly JongFast, and he's the Rick Wilson. Thanks so much for listening, and we'll see you again on the next episode. Want more great listens? Check out our comedy podcast, The Last Laugh, and our star-studied The Daily Beast podcast at the Daily Beast.com slash podcasts. If you enjoyed this episode, consider becoming a Daily Beast subscriber. Subscribing is the best way to feed the beast and support all of your podcasts as we cover what might become the darkest time. head to the DailyBeast.com slash membership slash podcast and sign up today.