The Daily Beast Podcast - Lame Duck Trump Can't Deny Epstein Shockers: Wolff

Episode Date: July 19, 2025

Michael Wolff joins Daily Beast Executive Editor Hugh Dougherty to unpack a new Wall Street Journal report that could spell real trouble for Donald Trump: a 2003 birthday note to Jeffrey Epstein alongside a nude sketch. Wolff clarifies Trump's deep and well documented relationship with Jeffrey Epstein—and why MAGA media, led by Bannon and Tucker Carlson, won’t let it go. As Trump scrambles to distract with bizarre stunts and conspiracy bait, even his allies are rattled. This time, Wolff warns, denial might not save him. Wolff, who’s chronicled Trump’s rise in four bestsellers, describes a man entering his “lame duck phase,” besieged by rivals and a serious newly revealed medical condition. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

He's annoyed that people, his people, are the ones really meeting the drama on this issue. And I think he's a little afraid. Welcome to the Daily Beast podcast. I'm Hugh Doherty. I'm keeping the chair warm for Joanna Coles while she enjoys some very well-deserved rest and relaxation. And just to answer some questions that have popped up in the comments, who is this guy and what's with his accent? It's horrible. Looking at you, Lex Chess, 6453. I'm the executive editor of The Daily Beast and I come to New York by way of Fleet Street

and originally and proudly I'm from Scotland. There's going to be far more interesting things to comment on in my accent today because we are talking in a time of incredible crisis for Donald Trump, a crisis that has first of all been caused by the Jeffrey Epstein files and Trump's fracturing relationship with his base. Just in the last few days he has called his MAGA supporters stupid, weaklings and a accused him of buying into bullshit. But on top of that, his doctors have admitted that he has a geriatric health condition, I'll just remind you, his 79, called Chronic Venus Insufficiency.

So at a time like this, who better to turn to than Michael Wolfe, the best-selling author of four books on Donald Trump, and a man who Jeffrey Epstein wanted to write a biography of him. He's the Daily Beast podcast in-house expert on this administration, the man at the head of it, and the one voice that everybody wants to hear from in a time like this. Michael, thank you so much for joining us. There is just so much to dive into. Just dive in.

We spoke last, I believe, five or six years ago, but really only a couple of days. And Trump seemed to be able to maybe strong arm is base, maybe make MAGA back down. And it seems like the opposite has happened. What has been going on? Well, Donald Trump just gets deeper and deeper into this. And his much vaunted ability to vaunt past anything that's troublesome and do this by creating often new trouble. New trouble that neutralizes or obviates the old trouble has not been working. Now, I have a theory, though, about one of the real.

reasons why this is not working, which is that this may kind of formally be the beginning of his lame duck phase, which is to say Donald Trump is not going to be able to run for president again. This is his second term. Other people will try to take his place as the leaders of the Republican parties and the leaders of the MAGA movement. One of the things that they will have to do is diminish the front rudder. And that front runner, of course, would be J.D. Vance. So what a set of these figures in the MAGA movement are doing, Steve Bannon, Tucker Carlson, all people who might well

want to run for president themselves or who certainly will want to have an influence on what figures emerge out of the mega Republican universe to run for president. And in order and in order to claim that that leadership role, they have to distinguish themselves from from Donald Trump and from J.D. Vance. Well, here is one of those things that does it. Jeffrey Epstein. The president has now put himself in a very unpopular position of saying, you know, pay no attention to that, to that, to that Epstein. Epstein, who? And, um, and these other figures across the Maga spectrum are now claiming this as their mantle. And it's the beginning. I mean, it feels like the beginning of an issue that can distinguish them from the president and his team.

There's so much to unpack there about a lame duck Trump, about MAGA. I want to get back to the idea. The idea of Trump is a lame duck. It's almost like the fact that dare not speak its name. Trump has never addressed being a lame duck. What is this, what would that, what's going on inside his cycle? right now as he presumably comes to some realization. Well, I don't think he is coming to a realization of that yet.

And if so, then he is now trying to think of ways to surmount that ways to again change the subject and put him back as the central figure here. but the reality is he is a lame duck. I mean, or he will be. I mean, look at this on a continuum here. He will become more and more and more of a lame duck. But it comes pretty fast in the second term. And because, I mean, the end is there.

The inevitable exists. And it takes a lot. People have to position themselves for this. This is going to be a struggle on the part of many, many people. And if you let it go too late, you're going to be out of the game. Takes us to something that you mentioned Steve Bannon. And Steve Bannon just a few weeks ago was standing up and telling the MAGA loyalists at a turning point or CPAC, I believe, gathering, that we should look for how we get Trump a third term.

how quickly has the knife turned or how quickly has the one turned here? Well, as I've, you know, that was, that's baloney. There's no baloney like Bannon Bologna. And he never, he never meant that. He never took that seriously. And that was just a kind of, a kind of tip of the hat because we all have to bow to, to the great man. But the great man is going to fall.

And Bannon knows this. Bannon is looking for his opportunities. Bannon has, as long as I have known him, heading on for 10 years now, has wanted to be the president in the United States.

And if not the president of the United States, the kingmaker of the president of the United States. And he did that once and he wants to do this again. And that starts now. So the other person that is absolutely essential to this is the

other elected person in this is J.D. Vance. What is life like now for J.D. Vance? Well, he, you know, he comes out of the MAGA movement. He was the guy who was elected put in the vice president's

slot as a kind of sock to the MAGA dies. He was supposed to keep the MAGA people under control. And But the problem with that is that he is now put himself, he is the guy that the other MAGA people have to take down. Not so much Donald Trump, but J.D. Vance. And J.D. Vance is now stuck. What can he do? He can't come out and say, you know, you're whitewashing the Epstein business.

He's he's towing. He must tow the Trump line. It seems a bit like the crisis, or at least the difficulty that engulfed Kamala Harris, when she was so closely tied to Biden. Of course, it engulfs all vice presidents. And the other, I've been doing a very quick bit of research, and it seems there are very few two-term presidents who were succeeded by a third term of their own party. And Michael, I'm sure your president, essential history knowledge will be ahead of me here. But I believe that H.W. Bush was the only

sitting vice president who managed to succeed a two-term president, which doesn't seem to give much hope to J.D. Vance. Well, you know, and I've always said that that the one thing Trump cannot have happen is for another Republican to become the president in the United States, because then what is Donald Trump. What he wants is, I mean, what will happen is that whoever is the Republican nominee, Trump will undermine that person will lose. Trump will go back to Mar-a-Lago as the once-in-future head of MAGA and the Republican Party. And he will sit in Mar-a-Lago and would try to run an alternative.

of White House in presidency. In the meantime, he's clearly going to try to distract. And I just wanted to run through some of the flack that he has thrown up in the last few days. He's claimed that Coca-Cola is going to be remade with cane sugar, something that Coca-Cola

itself has not offered any confirmation of. He's dispatched Pam Bondi to the real Alcatraz, claiming that he's going to reopen it for the worst of the worst. and he has gone after Rosie O'Donnell. He's told wild stories about his uncle, allegedly educating the Unabomber. Is that what you expect to see

that this is going to get this distraction attempt? Yeah, I mean, I think obviously he will do anything possible to move on from here. The question is, can he? The question is, will the story let him move on? And I think that he is in a corner. I mean, I think it's the indicate the, the, the, the, the, the fact that we are still discussing this is a, is a measure of how tight the corner is. You know, and, you know, and I, you know, and I partly think that, that, that, that people understand or people are starting to understand that, um, how, how significant.

Jeffrey Epstein is to the Donald Trump story. And, you know, the Wall Street Journal report that has come out with this birthday greeting from Trump to Epstein on his 50th birthday. So that would have been in 2003 is part of, I think what we could see, a drip, drip, drip, that relationship. This relationship existed. It existed for more than a decade. And for reasons having to do with Trump's talents for denial, he has most of the details of this relationship have been hiding in plain sight, but have not become prominent parts,

prominent pieces of this discussion. And I think more and more we are going to see, see people pull out pieces of this, of this relationship and begin to understand how important it was. Now, of course, Trump, when the Wall Street Journal released this, Trump said, I didn't do it. That's not me. Again, Trump, very good at denial. It doesn't matter what it is. he will just deny.

I remember once Bannon said to me that if the, if the Russian P-tapes actually ever came out, it wouldn't hurt Trump because he would just say, that's not me, even if it was glaringly obvious that it was him. So, but I'm not sure that he gets away with it this time because it is actually in character. He was, they were. best friends for all of this time. It was Jeffrey Epstein's 50th birthday, and Trump responds with banter about their central mutual interest, which is women, all perfectly in character and all going

back to this idea that we are coming face to face with, that, that these guys had carved this incredibly strong relationship, carved a life together over the 80s and 90s. So to clarify, the note says, happy birthday, may every day be another wonderful secret. And then there's a drawing of a naked woman. I mean, this is what the Wall Street Journal reports. So the question of what does secret mean?

And I think the implication is straightforward. They lived a life that they were, they lived a life in a Demi Mon life, a life on the, on the, on the wild side, on the less than respectable side, on the, you know, a nightlife is what they, is what they, they lived. You know, then there's been some, some talk, I think, I think, I think Tina Brown suggested that, that, well, Trump is not interested in, in, in young women. And that's, that's actually a failure to understand what is actually being discussed here, what actually went, went on. Yes, Trump is not interest. I think it's safe to say there's no indication that Trump is interested in, that Trump is a pedophile, that he's interested in in prepubescent girls. And I'm not sure there is actually that case against Epstein either. They were interested in what they call models. How old were models? You know, well, they're not prepubescent. And they're they certain ones. look like they could be of of of age but these are in the model world generally girls between 16 and 20 is that you know that was the 80s so inside what I'm hearing is

sheepishness everybody seems to understand that this is this is is a that this is a problem and it's um and and what can they say um you know they people understand the people inside understand like we are outside beginning to understand that trump and Epstein had a relationship um had a long relationship that they were quite likely quite possibly very uh it was a deep friendship And that's a fact. And nobody really, and the people inside don't know what all of the implications of this. So it's like, you know, we don't want to think too much about what might be here.

And then, you know, this is going to come back to the MAGA guys. You know, they have this, they have this in their teeth. I can't see a scenario for them letting this go or why they would want to let this go. This is, you know, I mean, this is super red meat for them. And that's also the power of the MAGA media complex too, isn't it? That this has been amplified and echo chambered in a way that keeps the MAGA base engaged,

and they want to hear more of that. Something that, of course, Donald Trump has benefited from but now has bounced back on him. Does he actually know what's happening inside the MAGA media world? Well, that's a, I'm trying to put my head into, into Donald Trump's head right now. That might be an uncomfortable place. Yes, well, well, it's a place that I'm somewhat used to, alas. But, I mean, Donald Trump never quite thinks that way, because it's all about what he thinks, not what someone else thinks.

And that's a handicap he has here because he had, in order for him to understand what's going on, you have to get into that, think what they're thinking, but he doesn't do that. It's so, so he doesn't. So I would say my conclusion is, no, he doesn't exactly know. I mean, he's a reactive guy, and he'll react to the headlines. and his reaction to bad headlines is to create other headlines, which is what is going on now. But again, we are in this very, very unlikely and confusing position,

that MAGA has gone out, they have created this issue, and it is an issue in which the most vulnerable person may well-be Donald Trump. And is there any parallel? Has he ever been in that mess before? Well, you know, he's been in this, in, God, he's been in so many messes that I'm sure there's a, there's a mess for every occasion. There's also a tweet for every occasion famously.

Obviously, though, the worst mess that I think that he has been in, in his political career was the grabbed them by the pussy tape and that almost brought him down and and to this day I'm kind of a

gag that he in fact got out of it. He's he surmounted that and you know so so who knows it's it's it's Donald Trump

this is this feels to me like it has a this could be a very serious wound the Jeffrey Epstein wound in which you might be able to limp on but you don't

recover from but I could be absolutely wrong about this and Trump magic prevails and again Epstein who? Michael we're just going to take a very quick break to hear from our sponsors. We love our sponsors. Thank you so much

and we are back. You mention a limp, and I think that's just the right moment to link to the latest medical news about Donald Trump. This is a man who, we have known so little about his, about the truth about his medical condition. And everybody will remember that he was photographed with swollen ankles at the Middalen Stadium in New Jersey where he was watching the soccer World Club Cup championship. And as a result, a few days later, the White House has released what is probably the most transparent description of his health that we have ever had, saying that he now has been diagnosed with chronic venous insufficiency, and that he had heart scan, an echo cardiograph, to check on his heart health. That's got to be a big psychological thing for Trump to admit, hasn't it? You would think. I mean, I know that during the campaign, there was a moment where a lot of reporters

and photographers caught him with very puffy lobster hands and he was subsequently asked about this at a news conference this was actually after

he had a meeting with the teamsters leadership in Washington came out he had a news conference and he said and somebody said you know your hands we saw pictures of your hands and you know they were really puffed up and and we just want to know what's going on with that. And he hesitated. And then he said, it must be AI.

And just for the record, we don't believe it was AI, did we? We saw it in plain sight. For him to make that admission, is that a sign of his understanding that he's 79 and he's frail? Or is it possibly also a distraction? Again, yeah, I don't, you know, I mean, it was a I found it to be a notable, a notable admission. But, you know, of course, he's 79 years old. And, and, you know, I mean, it is obviously true. How then how does Donald Trump wrestle with mortality? It doesn't seem that he's likely to be self-reflective.

Well, I was just going to say, not the most introspective guy in the world. I think he wrestles with mortality by believing that he is immortal. And he maybe thought he'd proven it to himself, of course, at Butler, which is almost exactly a year ago. But that also speaks to come back to, you know, what has really been happening this week

is the sense of this might be a lame duck presidency, that health issues, a lack of support. Sorry to interrupt, but I'm just caught by the glaring how much, you know, we are now, we are now six months into this, and he has dominated this entirely. I mean, he has almost, it is as though he has gone into this, into this presidency, determined to defy lame duckness. And he was going to do this by just pure, by being a pure, action figure every day. He would dominate. He would, he would crush. He would humiliate. He would, he would change the nature of the known world. But even doing all that, you know, the timeline is the timeline. You don't defeat it. And he is going to run up against it, if not now.

than six months from now, if not six months from now, six months after that. But that would be the limit. I mean, he is, and let's be perfectly, let's just name it. It is a political, an inescapable political condition. He's a lame duck. Can he, does he even believe himself he can run for third term? I mean, no, no. He doesn't, he can't.

He won't. On top of that, let's go to the other point. We're discussing here. He's 79 years old. And he would be 82 or 3 if he was running for rerunning. And obviously not running limping because of the ankles. Yes. I mean, he's already the oldest man to be elected to this office. Let's not even discuss. That's a distraction, a third term. So let's just go back again to what's happening inside MAGA.

JD Vance is handicapped. We talked about Bannon. The other name you mentioned is Tucker Carlson. what are people talking about with Tucker and how how believable is he as a candidate? Well, I think that I don't know how believable he is as a candidate. I mean, he's believable as a as a mega star and opinionist. you know, he's almost like a dream candidate who might well, if he were to run, everyone wakes up and said, this is crazy. But remember, in this world where Donald Trump has been elected president, what's crazy? Tucker has always, or for a long time, has toyed with this. He's toyed with this openly with me, among others. and and you know

and I think I think I think to him is well why not see if this is possible why not play it like this you don't have to run but maybe maybe he will and what's the thought process

of your JD Vance what do you do about somebody like Tucker I don't think you do anything now I mean I think all you can do is be loyal to your patron and and assume that that is already an advantage so large

that these other people sniping at your heels will ultimately be irrelevant. Now that may be the case but of course is not necessarily the case. So are there other people out there that MAGA that want to be or are in the MAGA movement that we should keep our eyes on? Yeah, well we'll have to discuss this at at length some other time. I mean I think that

you know one of the interesting things is that the Republican Party so dominated by Donald Trump, there really has not been much of an opportunity for other people to emerge. And we are, but now we may be, we may be witnessing that opportunity. So to take it back to Trump, what's going through his head as he sees that opportunity, as he sees people emerging? He's annoyed. I mean, we see him every day, you know, he's pissed off about this. He's, um, he's pissed off about the, Jeffrey Epstein thing, which he thought he had long ago put to rest. He's annoyed that people, his people, are the ones really beating the drum on this issue.

And I think he's a little afraid about, you know, about about what might be out there. And he's also, he's been a master of capturing media attention. And one of the things that was perhaps most noteworthy, as the White House, acknowledged his health issues, they also complained that no cable network and by which they included Fox News had covered many of his recent events. Well, they always did that. That's always been a pattern. You know, he has these, these, these events which are entirely unnewsworthy. They're just boring. They're just, you know, the president coming out and shaking hands with some, some more or less worthy,

uninteresting figure, and it's like, well, why doesn't the press cover this rather than what's covered the most recent controversy? I mean, this is just something that they, that they, that a self-pitying Trump says. And presumably that we're going to hear a lot, lot more from him because he becomes less

interesting as a lame duck. Yeah, well, I think we're just beginning to to sort of feel around that experience. I mean, we don't, you know, I mean, Trump has been the guy who has dominated the political news for 10 years. And so what is it like when he begins to fade? Well, you know, he's going to, he, but trust me, he is going to fight against that. and um um but um but you know there's there's a certain certain um poetry to this point in the story when the inevitable happens michael the only inevitable in trump world is that we need you back

here to talk about the next development thank you so much for joining us uh there is no he might be a blamed up president but there is no shortage of drama but he's he's he's He's our lame duck. He is our lame duck, and we are inseparable from him. Thank you for joining us. I will see you soon. Thank you. Michael, thank you.

There is no better voice to hear from about this extraordinary time in Donald Trump's presidency. It could be the end of the beginning. It could be the beginning of the end. To find out what happens, you know where to come. Subscribe to us to The Daily Beast. It's so easy. Go to www. the Daily Beast.com

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