The Daily Beast Podcast - How Trump's Threats Have Left Him Exposed: Wolff

Episode Date: February 20, 2026

Michael Wolff and Joanna Coles untangle a week where chaos seems to be the point, including the stunning arrest of Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor in the widening Jeffrey Epstein fallout. Meanwhile in Wash...ington, Trump gathers his Board of Peace to bankroll his grand vision for Gaza while facing a far more combustible reality: a potential military showdown with Iran that he may neither want nor be able to control. As European partners keep their distance and troop buildups raise the stakes, Wolff and Coles probe whether Trump is orchestrating strategic distraction—or simply caught between looking weak and starting a war. With scandals colliding and global order wobbling, is this all part of a master play, or are we watching events slip beyond Trump’s grasp? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript
Discussion (0)
Starting point is 00:00:00 He's got himself in somewhat of a serious pickle here. If he doesn't go at this point, I mean, he kind of really looks weak. It's very complicated. I mean, Iran is a big country. It's a formidable military power. People in the White House always talk about his reluctance to go to war. He's not going to go to war because it's too complicated for him. You know, he doesn't like to listen to generals.
Starting point is 00:00:31 He doesn't like to be confronted with information. War is an information-heavy activity, to say the very least. Michael! There is a sense of there's too much going on. I can't keep on top of it. I wake to a... I have a very bad night because I'm still sleeping off this... this surgery and it means you can only sleep on your back. I'm a side sleeper. This is too much
Starting point is 00:01:05 information, but I had a very spotty night and I wake up. Medicated still on the, I'm, I'm weaning myself off, I'm weaning myself off, but. I don't think you can tell the difference, can you? Well, anyway, you could go down a path in which there's no return. We're not going to do that. But I've been weaning myself off, but my point is a terrible night's sleep and I wake up to what feels like a hallucination, which is a text chain full of, oh my God, oh my God, oh my God, Andrew, the first member of the British royal family to be arrested for 400 years unless you count Princess Anne who got briefly arrested when her dog Dottie bit two children and she was eventually let go with a fine. But the previous arrest,
Starting point is 00:02:00 Was King Charles I first? Make the point here that this must be a British text chain. No, it was an American and British text chain. In fact, I had texts from people on the West Coast who were up when this thing happened and who were just kind of crazed about it. They're indulging your Britishness. Maybe. In, you know, I mean, as an American, you know, Prince Andrew or their former Prince Andrew, could we care less? I'm just asking.
Starting point is 00:02:36 I don't think anybody in Britain will get any work done at all today because this is such a big story. The Queen's favourite son arrested for giving Jeffrey Epstein proprietary business information. I get it. And that's another interesting. aspect of this. So he's not being arrested for a sexual crime and the entire focus of this scandal relating to Prince Andrew has, of course, been the sexual end of this. He's been, he's been arrested now for a financial crime. Do we know the details of this financial crime? It's really passing information that he had as a British trade envoy. And of course, the job was created for him, a bit like an occupational therapy job by Prince Philly
Starting point is 00:03:28 because they knew that Andrew out on his own was dangerous. And we should point out that he did do, he did pay over, or his mother paid over, I think, 12 million pounds to Virginia Dufre as a settlement to get this thing done. And the point there would be? Well, the point would be that there was a sexual accusation here that he had slept with Virginia. But he is not the point. That's not a, he was not arrested for that. He was not convicted for that.
Starting point is 00:04:01 He did not admit to that. So what we have now... No, he just gave over a check for 12 million pounds. There's an admission of something. Totally. You know, and whether that is a PR thing, whether that is an admission, it's not an admission, actually, but it is a, you know, we don't know. But the point is he is not being prosecuted for that.
Starting point is 00:04:24 That would be one thing. And, you know, they could have prosecuted him for that. But they are now prosecuting him for this other thing. So this is, so we have to ask, is this the Al Capone thing? You know, Al Capone was was not prosecuted for the murders, the tortures, the, He, well, everything that he should have been prosecuted for and was instead prosecuted for on a tax charge. Right. He didn't file his taxes.
Starting point is 00:04:58 So is that what's going on here? Or is there this other thing that's going on here, which is that everybody is trying, I mean, I mean, the, the country, Britain, your country is in an entire kerfuffle. The government is in a kerfuffle. the palace is in a kerfuffle over this epistle. I think it's kerfuffle. I think it's kerfuffle. I think you've introduced an unnecessary L. That might be true.
Starting point is 00:05:29 But it could be that in America, it's kerfuffle. It's so not kerfuffle. It's not going to fluffle in any country. And not even the run bunch of countries that have turned up for the Board of Peace, which will come to in a minute. For you, it's kerfuffle. It's kerfuffle. Kerfuffle.
Starting point is 00:05:50 Okay. Well, let's... But please continue. Possibly in New Jersey, it's kerfuffle. It's never been. I'm sure in New Jersey, it's kerfuffle. But to continue, so the palace and the government are in trouble over this and are in a rush to place blame somewhere else. And Andrew is a, you know, and why not Andrew?
Starting point is 00:06:22 Now, the interesting thing to me is that everybody has known about Andrew for as long as I can remember. He's a money grubbing, pussy hound, waste roll who's never done anything with his life. Do we know more about, is, has the Epstein story. revealed more about him. Well, I think what's happened is that the Epstein files have given the police and those close observers of this case email evidence that this appears to have gone on. Of course, he hasn't been officially charged yet. That's expected to come over the next 24 hours. And I know this.
Starting point is 00:07:10 The emails make this all the more vivid. but does it tell us more about Andrew than we had previously known? I think it tells us that he was cheaper than even we realized and that for room and board on the Upper East Side at Jeffrey Epstein, he was willing to give up information, which he got in his privileged role as UK business envoy. Right. I am assuming that people thought the price was a bit higher than that,
Starting point is 00:07:40 But in fact, he just loved having a free place to stay. This feels to me, and we'll see when this comes out in the details of this indictment, and they're pursuing a similar investigation against Peter Mandelson for similar kinds of things. We will see if this has the feel of a real financial corruption scandal, or if this is just, you know, we've got to pin something on this. on this guy, you know, let's just, we can't let him get away with this, put this on him. And the two cases may be different. No one is suggesting that Prince Andrew, or formerly Prince Andrews business acumen is anything to be admired. In fact, the fact he was so desperate to stay free
Starting point is 00:08:31 at Jeffrey Epstein's, and the fact he seemed to be asking for loans from Jeffrey Epstein. and so was Fergie, his ex-wife. He would always say that he was a money grubber. Right. Which everyone, again, everyone has known this for a long, long time. Right. With Peter Mandelson, who was business minister at the time, the fact that he managed to tell Jeffrey Epstein,
Starting point is 00:08:57 a full 24 hours in advance that Gordon Brown was going to resign as prime minister, is genuinely confidential inside information. Yeah, no, and that's, I mean, Peter Mandelson was operating from the high levels of government. You know, Prince Andrew was clearly not operating from the high levels of government, clearly was operating from nowhere except that this, this, the peculiar status that he had as, as a son of the queen, which, which gave him no authority, no portfolio, no respect. Even. Right. I mean, he was known as Air Miles Andy because this job was created for him by his father to keep him out of trouble. They all knew that he was, as you say, a pussy hound. That makes me feel uncomfortable. That's when he was known as Randy Andy. Randy. Andy. So he went from Randy Andy to Air Miles. Andy. So he has been a joke for his entire life. Well, he briefly had a period during the Navy where I think he wasn't a joke. I mean, he was in the Falklands War, briefly for Falklands War, all the Malvinas, as the Argentinians called it. 45 years ago. Yeah, but after that, he has, he's done very little with his life, unfortunately.
Starting point is 00:10:24 So the issue, the larger issue for the British government is how to, and to some extent for the palace, is how to survive the Epstein scandal. Right. if you're sitting down with in in in Westminster or you're sitting down in the palace you have to think what are we going to do we got to do something we got to we got to we got to throw somebody overboard here we got to pin this on somebody with this has to be we can't ignore this so so off with his head so let's arrest him so it's just I can't tell you what an enormous story this is in the UK. And of course, it's still not clear that the Prime Minister Kier Starber is out of the woods with his own career. Let me ask you why it's such a story
Starting point is 00:11:16 in the UK. Here is this person, Prince Andrew, who is, he's insignificant in the modern British state. He doesn't, not even a part of it in any way. Holy dismissed, wholly discredited. somebody who, I mean, he's literally just there on the circumstance, the hapless circumstance in this case of his birth as not the first son. He doesn't become anything. And so why are the Briths in such a... Well, firstly, he's paid for by the public purse. So he's, I mean, you know, we, well, the British taxpayer finances the royal family.
Starting point is 00:12:08 And also, big question marks over King Charles. In a sense, this is his Nixon moment. What did he know and when did he know it about Andrew's involvement with Jeffrey Epstein and Andrew handing over official British information? One of those moments of which we have seen in again and again, where a kind of popular emotion rises to say, to challenge the monarchy? Yeah, I think so. And I think William, who's very clearly...
Starting point is 00:12:40 Paid. Well, I think he's more than pained. I think he's probably appalled by Andrew. And you could see in that extraordinary vignette where Andrew is trying to make contact with William and Kate on the steps of the Duchess of Kent's funeral. that William doesn't want to talk to him, won't have anything to do, turns his head, Princess Kate's sort of face is furious.
Starting point is 00:13:05 William is desperate. William is desperate about his job. He is looking at this and saying, and saying, you know, my job is at risk here. Yeah, it took Prince Charles 74 years to ascend to the throne. He promptly told everybody he'd got cancer. His time is limited. He's living with cancer.
Starting point is 00:13:27 It's not apparently curable, but it's treatable and it's livable with whatever that means. But the assumption is that he's not going to be there forever. William is limbering up in the corridors of wherever he is, Windsor Castle, for the role. And William is appalled and understands that this could be very bad for the British Royal Family, that it could actually go the way. This is, this goes the way of, of, in, in, um, past examples of, of the royal, the central royal family, the line being willing to shun other members of the family who are, um, who, who, who might compromise the, the, the, um, the, um, the, um, the legitimacy. Yeah, totally. Or the, or the, or give them bad PR problems.
Starting point is 00:14:20 Yeah. Yeah. So again, it's a perilous moment. Perhaps the last perilous moment was the death of Princess Diana. But this feels like a genuinely perilous moment. And King Charles is very prominently saying, no one is above the law. The law must take its course. And so what do you think will happen?
Starting point is 00:14:39 How does this play out? I think Andrew is charged. I think he's charged with giving away official information to Jeffrey Epstein. So he was put in the old Bailey and we see this. He has to stand there in that weird change. I think he'll stand there and deny it like he denied it on that terrible news night thing. Where he said, I can't understand it. I can't explain it.
Starting point is 00:15:08 But we will see a trial. Do they plea bargain in the UK? He can plea bargain. He might accept some sort of plea deal where he gets a custodial sentence. But it might be that we're. We'll see him in the old bail. I think it's unlikely. They're going to want to avoid that.
Starting point is 00:15:24 He's going to have to do some sort of plea deal. Or maybe he does community service, except the local community don't want him living there. There have been all sorts of posters around Sandringham where he's been banished from Royal Lodge, where he was living with 30 bedrooms, to the much smaller marsh farm, which it nevertheless is being renovated for him because he said he didn't like the state of the bathrooms or the kitchen. And all sorts of local people have put posters up saying, we don't want Andrew here. But I'm assuming that I spent a number of weeks in a trial in the old Bailey.
Starting point is 00:15:56 I liked it. The British courts are amazing places to sit and watch things unfold. What was the case you were doing? Hacking. Hacking gave when Rebecca Brooks was Murdoch's key lieutenant was on trial. Wow. Well, I've covered many a court case that the old Bailey and. I actually was held in contempt.
Starting point is 00:16:22 What for? For writing something, apparently in the UK, you're not allowed to write about a trial when the trial is ongoing. Well, that's not true. That is exactly true. Well, you might have been given privileged information, but of course that people write about trials
Starting point is 00:16:42 as the trials are ongoing. How would anybody know the trial was ongoing? Exactly. Exactly, but you actually cannot do that. You cannot make, I mean, there's some, you can say some things, but you can't say other things. Like, hey, that person might be guilty. Well, no, you can't say that. You can't say that.
Starting point is 00:16:59 Well, in my country, you can. Yeah, you can't say that in Britain. While we're sitting discussing the future of the British monarchy, the future of world peace hangs in the balance as Donald Trump pulls his board of peace together in D.C. You know, and I went down the list of people who are attending the members of his Board of Peace. Yeah. And it occurred to me that the members, actually, the only members, comprise what Donald Trump used to regard as the shithole countries of the world. So the shithole countries have come to his aid. Well, and I'm sure perhaps the countries that he stopped war between.
Starting point is 00:17:51 But what is this Board of Peace, which I think is being held at the Trump Institute of Peace? In D.C. In D.C. What is it supposed to do besides make ease? No, it's supposed to raise money. Don't you remember there was going to be a billion dollar membership fee? Yes. No, well, that's the cost to enter this. August board, but the boards then the purpose of this board, I mean, the purpose could just be to raise more money, as the purpose seems to be of everything, particularly in the diplomatic
Starting point is 00:18:29 sphere. But is there in a more acceptable function that has been outlined here? I think isn't the function to rebuild Gaza and to support the rebuilding of Gaza into, as we know the new Riviera. Possibly. Is that what is going on here? Is that what they are talking about? It's to implement his vision for Gaza to help him build. But we don't know what that vision for Gaza is other than there was a brief moment in which it was going to be the Riviera. Right. That was the starting point. But since then, I think it's fair to say that Trump has broadened the scope for it to be the biggest, most important. board in the world of world peace and world history.
Starting point is 00:19:20 Of the least important people in the world. Yes. Now, this is going on at the very moment that a war-like force of really some consequence is enveloping Iran. Right. So we're, I think, creating the biggest buildup of troops since the war in Iraq in 2000. and when was that to 2003. And Trump is, will he, won't he, send in troops or bombing missions to Iran? And does he want regime change?
Starting point is 00:19:58 I mean, I think he's got himself in somewhat of a serious pickle here. You know, if he doesn't go at this point, I mean, he kind of really looks weak. And he's already, he already looks like, he's already backpedaled this quite, quite a bit. Remember, he invited all of those protesters into the street under the banner, basically, of his protection. Right, help is on the way, is what he treats social. on the way warnings to the Iranian regime. If you attack the protesters, you will have to answer to Donald Trump. Then, of course, they did attack the protesters at a level beyond anyone's imagination.
Starting point is 00:20:53 And Trump did, what did he do? Nothing. So he's there. He's up against that. I mean, he was explicit on this point. And then he didn't do it. And all of those people died. Yeah, I think we've got between six and eight thousand people were shot dead.
Starting point is 00:21:14 Yeah, seriously, under his watch, they died. So here he is now. Now he could back off again. But what does that make him look like? Or he can go forward. But the problem of going forward, which is why he didn't go forward the first time, is that it's very complicated. I mean, Iran is a big country, is a formidable military power, even degraded as it has been in our previous attacks and in Israel's attacks.
Starting point is 00:21:47 But nevertheless, you know, when people in the White House always talk about his reluctance to go to war. I mean, and this is sort of as a good thing, it's been portrayed. He's not going to go to war because it's too complicated for him. You know, he doesn't like to listen to generals. You know, all of the generals are kind of McKinsey train guys. He hates that. It's boring to him. It's PowerPoint.
Starting point is 00:22:20 And he doesn't like. He doesn't like to be confronted with information. War is an information-heavy activity, to say the very least. Well, and he's not well-supported by Pete Higgsath, the Secretary of Defense slash war. No, well, but the general, I mean, there are a lot of obviously competent generals in the United States chain of command who are there and they're on the line. I mean, it's, you know, I mean, if failure will be blamed on them, plus they know, the people who are being put in harm's way. This is their job. And so they take this very, their job very seriously and they take their job of informing the president of all of the
Starting point is 00:23:12 variables here. In other words, the risks because, I mean, this is kind of a blame situation. The commander in chief has to make the ultimate decision and the ultimate blame is on him. So they rush, and I have seen, I've witnessed some of these meetings. And they are thorough. They give you vastly more information than anybody would want. And Donald Trump wants no information. So it's a difficult moment for him to go forward in attacking Iran on a pretty massive scale, I think, is the implication here. But it's also not what the Maga base want.
Starting point is 00:23:59 This is the last thing they want. They don't know where Iran is, like the president. They can barely find it on a map. This is not what he ran on. And it's really of, you know, is he doing this again? We've asked this before, but is this a wag the dog policy to get away from what happened in Minneapolis, to get away from the nonsense that didn't play well of Greenland, to get away from Venezuela that everybody's forgotten about,
Starting point is 00:24:26 to get away from the economy. I mean, I think that is. A fast bombing attack, yeah, you could say that. But it builds up like this. I think he's caught in the middle of this. You know, he can't back down because then he's going to look weak. He doesn't want to go forward because it's so complicated. Couldn't he back down by saying we threatened it?
Starting point is 00:24:47 They backed down. This is another, you know, potential war I've resolved. Yes. I mean, I think that he will look. for something like that. But, you know, this is pretty weak and it's pretty transparent. As it was this time, I mean, the Iranians are, you know, they really don't cooperate so that they might do something and then they go back to doing the same thing that they've
Starting point is 00:25:12 said they wouldn't do, including shooting people all over the place. So, I mean, I think it's difficult at this point to say, oh, yeah, we've sat down with the Iranians and we have an understanding. I love them. You know, I mean, Trump would come out and, I mean, as he did with the North Koreans, you know, we're, you know, love the guy. I don't think that can happen in this situation. And I don't think, I think it's going to be very difficult for Trump to come out with a credible result here and say, you know, we went eye to eye. The Iranians blinked and this is what we've gotten.
Starting point is 00:25:56 You know, I mean, listen, he says whatever he wants to say. And if he does not really want to go forward, he will say something like that. But I think it's going to be a difficult sell. Well, it's doubly ironic that he's meeting with his Board of Peace. And perhaps more importantly, we should point out who's not at the Board of Peace or who hasn't sent high up representatives. The UK hasn't France, hasn't Germany, hasn't Sweden, hasn't Norway, hasn't. In fact, the countries that he wants to be there aren't there.
Starting point is 00:26:29 And as you say, he's got the shithole. Yes. And all of those countries, which are all of the mainstay of Western European nations, are now, I don't know, pretty much our, well, they're being converted very quickly into our enemy. Well, I don't know if they are enemy, but they are viewing America with much more skepticism. They know they can no longer rely on it. And they're not going to pay the money. They don't want to be fleeced by Trump. I think the antagonism is mounting up almost on a daily basis.
Starting point is 00:27:06 And, you know, whereas the antagonism before would have been at Russia or China or the Iranian, you know, whatever, that standard view of the world in which, you know, whatever. However, that standard view of the world in which the Western European nations were our allies in everything, in history and in the world order, has so vastly changed. Just in the course of this past year, it's come tumbling down. Well, as Mark Carney, the Prime Minister of Canada, said there's been a rupture in the global order. And then this goes on again. And this is now come up with the, with Trump's threats to break the treaties, the North American treaty, which exists between Mexico, the U.S. and Canada. So essentially he is the people who he is arguably most antagonistic to are the Canadians, how that has come up. I mean, that's...
Starting point is 00:28:25 Well, I think that he's probably jealous of Mark Carney, right? Mark Carney is everything Trump wanted to be and isn't. I mean, I think that there's a whole range of things, including this idea that Canada should be part of the U.S., which is logged in his brain. in a serious brain-wormy way. And I'm not sure that he can get out. I mean, it is, you know, he looks at a map and says, and says, and people in the White House describe this with, I would read their attitude as, well, clear-eyed.
Starting point is 00:29:01 That he looks at a map and sees Canada as connected to the United States, this long border that we share. I mean, he says this, he is this obsession about, session about borders. And he may not know anything else on a map, which he does not know, which he doesn't. But he does see, here's the United States and here's Canada, and we all speak English or mostly, and why aren't we together? Well, there's a certain logic to that.
Starting point is 00:29:32 Why aren't we together, except that it's a completely different country? Yes. So there is no logic to it, except the logic of. looking at a map and not understanding what you're seeing on the map. Exactly. Exactly. All right. Now, most importantly, we've got lots of comments about my Melania bucket.
Starting point is 00:29:51 Some people don't realize that it's ironic. A few people said it was outrageous. I needed to get rid of it immediately. Some other people jumped in and said, no, it's ironic. But I do need suggestions of what to do with it. The Melania bucket, this was the 1299. Did you get popcorn in there? I got popcorn in here, which I immediately.
Starting point is 00:30:10 poured out because it looked suspect. But this is the 1299 Melania bucket of popcorn that I'm assuming she got 70% of the back end. There's a picture of her here. But I'm up for interesting ideas.
Starting point is 00:30:24 I think we could do something interesting with it. So I'm just... I think so. I think we should... We could solicit all kinds of ideas for the Melania merchandise company, which is shortly being rolled out.
Starting point is 00:30:39 Oh, it is? Yes. So it's not just. just Donald Trump's name on things. It's... Oh, it'll be Melania's name on things. It's dueling names. It's Melania.
Starting point is 00:30:50 She's, you know, she wants to change, wants him to change the name of Lincoln Center to Melania Center. Are you being serious? I'm not being serious. Oh, I was going to say that, that, that, I had, I was going to say it that bypassed me totally. But now that I've said this, isn't it a... It's an excellent. The idea. Why does Lincoln need all these memorials? He, you know, Melania should have one. And we saw when the press on Air Force One asked whether or not he'd given her any flowers for Valentine's Day. He said,
Starting point is 00:31:25 oh, it's complicated, but she's working very hard between Russia and Ukraine. So I'm sure she is. Yes. I'm sure she is. But really, I mean, the business that she is working to grow in New York, And let me emphasize it is in New York because that's relevant to, relevant to my case against her. Is a, you know, is a broad marketing, merchandising, branding, licensing operation of which she is the centerpiece of. So, Michael, we have another big haired girl in charge of something which she doesn't appear to have the perfect background for. I'm talking about Chamberlain Harrow. What a fantastic name, Chamberlain.
Starting point is 00:32:13 She's 26. Trump has appointed her to the Commission that will oversee the rebuilding of the East Wing. And of course, before she was elevated to this role, she was the receptionist at the White House, known as America's receptionist. You know, I used because I spent a long time sitting in the West Wing and chatting with the various Trump receptionists. So I have a sort of fond place in my heart. She looks just like all the other young women
Starting point is 00:32:49 that work in the White House who wear those shift dresses with the boots and they have magnificent hair. I'm thinking of Natalie Hart, Margot Martin. Some of them are mini versions of Melania. Carolyn Litt, of course. Leverett as her. Yeah, they all, and the hair is all, it's always loose hair. Oh, yeah, of course.
Starting point is 00:33:11 It's worn down. It's not tied back or anything. Yeah. And she has a degree in political science from the University of Albany at State University of New York. She looks very sporty. Oh, yeah. No, no. She literally, she looks like everyone who has sat in that desk in the, in the West Wing.
Starting point is 00:33:32 Yes. I mean, and the hair is familiar, the grin is familiar, and she's 26, and she has no background in the arts whatsoever, and she's now part of the commission that is overseeing the renovation of the most important building in America. Well, I think that is, I mean, I mean, it's very clearly what he has, what he has set up, this is called the fix. She's the fix, part of the fix, that he has to get certain approvals there from the, from the, a theoretical commission overseeing the renovation of the East Wing, but he has now stacked this commission so that the commission will have do what he wants done, which is to erect and completely inappropriate structure in that space. It really is remarkable when you look at the plans for it. This is a 90,000 square foot building on a 45,000 square foot building,
Starting point is 00:34:29 on a 45,000 square foot White House and West Wing. I mean, it's just remarkable. I mean, it's almost as remarkable as Prince Andrew, formerly known as Prince, being arrested. And again, we've just forgotten about this. I mean, I think it is. And the point of the point of this is that for it to be not to be integrated, not to be something that would seamlessly become part of this structure.
Starting point is 00:35:04 The point is for it to stand out, for it to be the Donald Trump ballroom, which will dwarf everything else. So the only thing that we will see is when we see the White House is Donald Trump's ballroom with a very big Donald Trump name on it. I can guarantee. It's just crazy. And also the arch, which they're currently budgeting 100 million for, but like the Ballroom, will I'm sure grow quickly.
Starting point is 00:35:35 And then that will block the view from the Washington Memorial to Arlington Cemetery. No, no. And this is just part of a part of, I mean, to say the least, part of this pattern of dominance of one man, the government of one. wanting him, wanting this, wanting everything to memorialize the fact that this is a government of one. A government of one and six million Epstein files still to be trawled through. Which, you know, I mean, I think we are back and let's, I mean, it's interesting to come back to this. I think that this is working out for him.
Starting point is 00:36:23 You think that the Epstein file. in fact, turn out to be good for him. Because they're bringing everybody else down. They turn out to be a distraction from Donald Trump. So I think what he looked at with enormous trepidation, they're going to come for me because I'm all over these Epstein files, turns out because of the luck of Donald Trump, which one should never underestimate,
Starting point is 00:36:47 to have thrown up so much smoke about so many other people that at best he's one of, of many and actually kind of for the first time in his life, lost in the crowd. Wow. Lost in the crowd. Well, if you have been, Michael Wolf is not lost in the crowd. Inside Trump's head, the podcast is not, I hope, lost in the crowd. Thank you for joining us. Leave your comments for us on YouTube. Subscribe to The Daily Beast where you can keep up to date with everything that's going on and it's hard to keep up with everything that's going on. I mean, I was thinking this morning, you know, a terrible story of eight dying in a ski avalanche in Lake Tahoe, which would normally dominate the news.
Starting point is 00:37:33 The former president of South Korea about to be sentenced to life imprisonment for inflicting a brief period of martial law. Again, something of dominating. For doing things that are not dissimilar to what Donald Trump is doing. Right. Absolutely. So he must be watching that, although he's probably not watching it because he's thinking, well, why wasn't he stronger? He should have just been more dominant with martial law. And of course, the terrible story of Nancy Guthrie, who's just disappeared.
Starting point is 00:38:05 And Keystone Cash Patel's FBI seemed to have no clues whatsoever. So in normal times, these stories would all dominate the news. But of course, we're not in normal times. We're in Trump times. And he dominates the news. And I should say, subscribe to Michael's substack, Howl, which I gather you've got another piece up on Epstein today. I haven't read it yet. It's not up yet. That's why you haven't read it. Oh, that's why I haven't read it.
Starting point is 00:38:35 Yes, and I'm slightly wavering on it because it will ruffle some feathers, but hell. Can I ask whose feathers? Most. That's my specialty. Most feathers will be ruffled. Okay, most feathers will be ruffled. All right, well, I shall look forward to reading it post-haste then. Perhaps you could send me an early draft. Do I not get any benefits as being your co-host on Inside Trump's Head? I think I should get early drafts of your column.
Starting point is 00:39:11 In minutes. Okay, and I've written a column. I've written a column about the seriousness of Prince Andrew, formerly known as Prince being arrested, and Peter Mandelson and Watson's in store, and how this remarkable story continues to spread. And as you say, it may be gone Donald Trump's good luck that there are so many other people implicated
Starting point is 00:39:30 that he for once doesn't stand out in the crowd. So the good news is we have so many Bee Beast tier members now. There are too many names to read out. And we really appreciate your support. Thanks to our production team, Devin Rodgerino, Ryan Murray, Rachel Passer, Heather Pissarro, Neil Rosenhouse.

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