The Daily Beast Podcast - Rudy Giuliani: Steve Bannon Is Being ‘Tortured’ in Prison

Episode Date: August 25, 2024

Giuliani told Mike Lindell that Donald Trump’s former chief strategist Steve Bannon is being unfairly treated in prison. Plus! Journalist and author Casey Michel joins the podcast to talk about their new book, Foreign Agents: How American Lobbying and Lawmakers Threaten Democracy Around the World. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hi, I'm Andy Levy, former Fox News and CNN-HLN guy and current cable news conscientious objector. I'm a former libertarian who now sits comfortably on the left. Hi, I'm Danielle Moody, former educator and recovering lobbyist. But today, I'm an unapologetic, woke commentator on America's threats to democracy. And I'm producer Jesse Kedin, and I'm here to make sure things don't go too far off the rails. We're here to have fun, smart conversations with some of the most knowledgeable and entertaining people in politics, media, and beyond. Our goal is to try and make sense of our current crazy world, our new abnormal, and hopefully even make you laugh through the tears. Welcome back to another bonus episode of The New Abnormal, and we thank you so much for being here.

Today we're joined by author and journalist Casey Michelle, and they are here to tell us all about their new book, Foreign Agents, how American lobbyists and lawmakers threaten democracy around the world. But first, let's have some fun. Are you guys ready to listen to some clips? Yes, James. Clips, Seamus, clips. Clipped, Seamus. Okay.

This is my week, so I'm going to do clips, and that obviously means that I'm going to ignore anything that Jesse would have advised against. So the first one is obviously going to be a clip from Survivor. I'm kidding. So, I don't know, we have talked about it in the past, is that the right wing is really having a hard time finding, like, things to criticize Kamala on, on, like, a personal level. They don't have the he's old as they did with Joe Biden.

And so we're getting weird things like, she's wearing converse. How dare she? or her laugh is strange. You know, I'm waiting to find out what type of mustard she uses. You know what I mean? And one of the things that I think was the most interesting I saw this week was that Elizabeth Hatsopack, formerly of The View, and formerly of Survivor Season 2, the Australian Outback, she came in fourth,

went on Fox News to complain about a story that Kamala Harris about how when she realized Donald Trump was going to be elected, she sat in stunned, silence, and ate an entire bag of Doritos. Now, I don't know about you, but that is actually an incredibly relatable story. So here's Hasselbeck making it well why she's not qualified to be president. You just talked about Kamala Harris, supposedly eating a bag of Doritos so emotionally charged after hearing this. That's the commander-in-chief potentially. That's the emotional response of the leader of the free world is to binge eat a bag of Doritos.

Are you kidding me? Can you imagine Putin how he deals with things chugging down a bag of sour patch kids because he's depressed about something not going his way or back of the day? Soleimani? What is he binging on Fanias? I doubt it. I doubt that's the actual response of an elite leader, whether you agree with what they're leading or not. Could she imagine then possibly the leader of the free world throwing a bottle of catch up at the walls? Following the January 6th incident, which was reported by a number of people who were in the room where it happened. Does that seem like the temperament of somebody who should be running the country? I don't fucking think so. She needs to

have a seat. How do you make this move from Survivor to like a notable person that I should be listening to on the esteem of the office of the presidency? Sit down. Fox News is your answer to that. Yeah, you're right. Yeah, she needs to, much like the characters on Lost, she needs to go back to the island. This is just embarrassing. And like you said, to say that with a straight face and to either actually have outrage about it or to feign outrage about it, given what we went through from 2017 to early 2021, is nuts and shows no recognition of reality. And so I don't care if she really feels this outrage, she's not to be mean, but she's even dumber than I thought she was.

And if she's feigning outrage, she's even more pathetic. than I thought she was. So it's kind of lose-lose here. She did come in fourth, so she already lost. Yeah, you're fair. Okay. Yeah, I mean, look, she was adorable on Survivor. I mean, that's like the one season I watched. But yeah, go away. All right. So Jesse may be not here, but it doesn't mean that his presence won't be felt

because he did definitely text me something and say, I had to play it for you guys. I'm not going to do too much preamble on this, but I do want to say, because Jesse's not here, I can make a sports metaphor here. There's always the who you got, who's going to take your last shot in the NBA final, who do you need a bottom of the ninth, two outs, all of those. And I think it's really funny that this is basically the Trump campaign's two guys. Who do I need to dispel things to get people back on our side to really save the situation? Here's Mike Lindell and Rudy Giuliani talking about how Steve Bannon is handling prison. Who unfortunately can't hear this broadcast, which is an outrage.

I ran the Bureau of Prisons in two capacities. First, I was absolutely in charge of it as the Associate Attorney General. for two years under Ronald Reagan. And then I was the chief of staff of the guy who was in charge of it under Gerald Ford. I do not remember prisoners of his category, not having access to television for occasional shows, special shows. Every once in a while a prison would get nasty.

I remember having to secure the rights for lifers to see the Pope. Imagine not letting see the Pope. I mean, that's ridiculous. Steve Bannon, and let me tell you this, Steve Bannon is not being treated the way other prisoners are being treated. His case has been moved from the Bureau of Prison to Crooked Attorney General Garland's office. And they're calling the shots because contacts that I have in the Bureau of Prisons have told me they've been taken out of the case.

So he's being, let's say, tortured. And he'll be out. I'm sure he'll be able to talk all about it. But boy, this election is about a fascist regime. And Steve Bannon is prime number one victim. The only true thing he said there is this is an election about a fascist regime. regime. Yeah. Yeah. That was good. That was accurate. Nobody needs to hear from Rudy Giuliani again on any subject. So the fact that this guy who was the mayor of New York who ran for president, who served as a associate attorney general or whatever under a president, is now reduced to sitting there and

talking to Mike Lindell. I mean, I don't know what more you need to know. He's a lap dog. He's a lap dog. Yeah. He needs to go where he can be fed. Well, speaking of lapdogs, great transition. There used to be a trend a few years ago on the internet. It was guys posting their wins, which then got turned into guys posting their ls. Now, this is actually, first off, a video tweeted out by the Charlie Kirk. Charlie Kirk attended the DNC. And he said, within 30 seconds of walking into the United Center, I was confronted by this guy.

Apparently, he's the president of the Young Democrats of Georgia. Now, I'm going to say, whatever you want about the argument that's going to be, occurred and Charlie Kirk only has one thing to say in response to anything being levy at it. So I just want you guys to hear this. And remember, this is him posting his wins. Because we have a Republican governor and Republican Secretary of State in Georgia. What's your name? He said Parker. My name's Parker. We have Republican Governor and Republican Secretary of State in Georgia that proved our elections. And Donald Trump said that wasn't constitutional. Donald Trump tried to undermine our Constitution. I just walked in. I'm here to

just learn. Hey, you're an anti-patriotic, anti-constitutional person crashing our party. So let me ask you one question. I got one question. I got one question. Donald Trump called the Secretary of Georgia and told him to find him some votes. What is a woman? Oh my God. That is so fucking weird, y'all. Maybe you should meet one. I'm married a woman.

Same. Oh, my God. Wait, he posted that as a win? Yeah. Yo, they really are fucking weird. Like, that's not a win. That's not a win. Mm-mm.

Yeah. I mean, these people are. are they are just the biggest losers and they absolutely, they cannot function in normal society. And that's really what this all boils down to is they are trying desperately to create a society in which they can actually function, but they can't. Well, continuing the reality show theme, I think we can all remember the show The Biggest Loser, but here is another reality TV host who had his feelings hurt. But somebody gave Russia years ago, before me, all of our

plans and specs for hypersonic missiles and they built them and we didn't he said Bill Clinton it could be it might have been in all fairness

might have been a little after Bill Clinton I used to like Bill Clinton can you believe it it could have been Barack Hussein Obama perhaps we should ask him now he was very nasty

last night I try and be nice to people you know but it's a little tough when they get personal please again remember please sir don't get personal talk about policy let me ask you about that we're going to do a free poll here the two questions should i get personal should i not get personal ready should i get personal

was it a show of hands because i didn't hear her response that said yes get personal he just wants to talk policy oh okay it was it it was an overwhelming response that he should get personal yeah yeah because getting personal and attacking people does something to those motherfuckers like day-to-day lives. It helps them in some way. It puts more money in their pocket. It puts more food on their table. As he said, it's not really Trump's style, you know, to get personal and nasty and give insults. And, you know, he tries to be nice to people, Danielle. You could learn a little bit from this. Yeah. Yeah. No, he just wants to talk with Putin. Fuck that guy. Wrong segment. I don't care. Forever sticks. I like that we're bringing the Hussein back for

Barack Hussein Obama. It's been too long. Mm-hmm. Folks, I am very happy to welcome to the new abnormal journalist and author Casey Michelle, who is the author of Foreign Agents, How American Lobbyists and Lawmakers Threatened Democracy Around the World. Casey, I think what's interesting, and I want you to be able to dig into your book at a 50,000-foot view for all of us, which is that we throw around, right, the term foreign agent. conjures images of, you know, the James Bond era of spies and espionage and all of these things. We've heard different people in and around Donald Trump's circle referred to as double agents and foreign agents and some have actually been charged for those things. Talk to us about why we need to kind of move away from the fiction around this and kind of the page six sensationalism around this

and really understand the threat to democracy that people pose. Sure. Yeah. And Daniel, obviously, thanks so much for having me today. I mean, at the very 10,000 or 50,000 foot level, the reason that we need to move beyond the kind of sensationalism of this, of these foreign agents operating in and around Washington. In recent years, you know, obtaining the highest ranks and accessing the highest rungs

of the American political establishment, you know, one of the clearest reasons we need to move beyond the kind of sensationalism is because at the end of the day, these practices in Washington have become so normalized in recent years in recent decades that if anything, we've kind of lost sight, lost perspective of just how notorious, just how nefarious some of these networks operating are. I know you just mentioned Donald Trump a moment ago. I'm sure we'll get more into him as we move on, but it really wasn't until the rise of a figure

like Donald Trump. And not only all of his suspicious and shady and ongoing. in many cases, foreign financing links, but also the people that were in his inner circle, the people that he brought with him directly into the White House during his first term in office, and who knows, potentially in his second term of office, if he wins this November, all of these people in his orbit. It was unlike anything we had ever seen in American history in terms of their own linkages to foreign regimes and in terms of how these individuals and these networks that Trump brought with him, had transformed into mouthpieces for, accessories for, and in many cases,

the kind of point people for, the pointment for, the most notorious, the most heinous, the most despotic regimes around the planet, injected directly into the White House itself. Again, this was unlike anything we had seen in American history, but what Trump was doing was kind of just extending or amplifying these networks that had existed in Washington for years and years, and that many people on both sides of the political aisle had just, just thought was kind of normal at this point that you have entire fleets of, of lobbyists, of PR specialists, of consultants who are just gallivanting around the world, signing up all of these dictators as their clients and then representing them in Washington. And it wasn't again

until Trump came along that folks, I think, finally sat back and realized, wait, wait, wait, we've let things get out of hand. We have to do something about this. I guess I want you to explain to us because this is not something that is necessarily new. It just found a right conductor in Donald Trump. Like, we have heard for decades how Vladimir Putin in Russia has operated, that he kind of taps in and as he was the mastermind behind the misinformation and disinformation campaign in 2016, that there are people that he taps, like a Mike Flynn, who was prosecuted for his involvement in Russia and his double dealings.

But this is not something that is new. So what made Donald Trump? the right host, and I mean the host like for a virus, the right host for this type of invasion in our democracy. Yeah, Daniel, that's a great question. And certainly something historians are going to be looking through for years and generations to come. I mean, I think there's a couple answers to that. There's a couple responses to that. One is looking at how Trump emerged, where Trump emerged from, that is to say, Trump rising from not only the private sector in and of itself, of course, He wasn't necessarily a political operator, let alone a politician before his rise to the presidency,

but most especially his relationship with and his financing from the luxury real estate market in the United States of America in particular, which certainly I, plenty of others, other journalists, other researchers, plenty of folks of The Daily Beast itself, have identified as one of the key entry points for dirty money, illicit wealth from regimes around the world looking to park their money, hide their money, and then use that money at the end of the day to affect policy in Washington and elsewhere. And Trump was really the kind of test case for how these regimes could use the luxury real estate market in the United States for their own ends, for their own benefits. And I know Russia certainly gets plenty of attention. I mean,

I write about Russia plenty in this book, especially Russia's broader history pre-2016, of trying to interfere in American politics. But it was hardly limited to Putin himself or the oligarchs the criminal networks around the Kremlin. I mean, you had regimes in Azerbaijan, in Kazakhstan, in Haiti, in Congo, Brazzaville, and Indonesia. I mean, over and over around the world, if you had an autocratic government, the odds are they had some kind of financial overlap. They had some kind of financial investment in not just the American real estate sector at large, but Trump properties especially. You know, that's one element for how Trump became the kind of conductor or the, you know, again, kind of key case study or a right person at the right time

for why something like this could explode in front of all of us and make us all realize just what a threat these networks are. I think there's another element that's particular to Trump himself. And that is just the clear lack of any kind of ethics, any kind of moral backbone, any kind of willingness whatsoever to say no to frankly anyone, any regime, any oligarch, any, even on the ground American, American firm, American individual, who, already had pre-existing links with these regimes, you know, so long as they were able to finance Trump's buildings or Trump's properties, or so long as they were willing to finance Trump's campaigns, or at the end of the day, so long as they were willing to publicly defend Trump,

he, as far as I'm aware, never said no to any of these people. And again, it's not just the regimes that we're talking about in Moscow or Beijing or Hungary or elsewhere, but it's also the Americans like Mike Flynn, who you mentioned a moment ago, plead guilty for being a foreign agent. And in his case on behalf of not just the Russian government, his own financial entanglements there, but also Turkey. And again, figures like Paul Manafort, who I focus especially on in the book. Folks may remember him. He was Trump's 2016 campaign manager. But he was really the kind of key person creating the foreign lobbying industry as we know it before he turned to helping Trump in 2016 and certainly everything we've seen after that.

Let's dig into Paul Manafort because he is a really interesting character. If I'm not mistaken, remind me because so many people. have received pardons and so many people around Donald Trump have gone to jail. Manafort was one of the ones that did receive a pardon. That's correct. Yes. Talk to us about, one, his criminal legacy. And the fact is, is that we're hearing his name again as somebody that is around the Trump 2024 campaign, believe it or not.

Why was he a focus of your book? Yeah. He's a focus of my book, Daniel. And it's also a great question because as far as I'm concerned, he, his story, his efforts, his legacy really are the key, again, case study in looking at how the foreign lobbying industry not only exploded into the multi-billion dollar industry that it is now, also how those lobbyists, those elements of that industry then wormed their way into, again, the highest rungs of the American political establishment. There really was no better story, no better figure than Paul Manafort for highlighting how this industry has exploded,

and then how it ended up directly accessing the White House and the most powerful American politicians themselves. So just as a quick primer for folks who may have forgotten, because certainly there's been plenty of news since 2016. Paul Manafort made his name in the 1980s and the 1990s, really reforming the American lobbying sector, really kind of creating the American lobbying sector in a domestic sense that we know now. There was another researcher or another journalist who had a great line where it was really Paul Manafort, who kind of created the swamp as we know it, which is, again, one extra layer of irony given how much support he's gotten from Trump in the recent years. By the 1990s, the 2000s, Manafort then took his talents abroad and started whitewashing the reputation, started opening

doors for, again, really the worst regimes on the planet in places like the Philippines, places like Nigeria, in places like Somalia, Democratic Republic of Congo. Again, these kleptocratic dictators who've been in power for decades, realized Paul Manafort could be their best friend in Washington, and he proved them right over and over and over again. And most notoriously, he ended up in Ukraine in the early 2010s, helping launch this pro-Kremlin autocrat to power in the early 2010s. Folks may remember the Ukrainian revolution in 2014, which ended up tossing that budding autocrat out of power. And finally, sending Paul Manafort out of the country, into hiding until Donald Trump came along in 2015 and 2016 and realized he needed someone to steer

his campaign. He needed someone to steer his ship. And lo and behold, Paul Manafort was there and more than happy to do so. And again, the book goes into far greater detail about how Manafort pitched himself as someone who could do this for free, someone who would launch Trump to the White House. And oh, by the way, don't look too far into Manafort's links with things like Russian oligarchs or the Russian state or Russian intelligence itself. Again, There are far more revelations about those relations with Manafort and Russia in the book. But the kind of spoiler of Manafort's story is that it all ended up blowing up in his face when Ukrainian investigators and journalists realized Manafort and his kind of broader network had been taking tens of millions of dollars hiding it offshore from the Ukrainian populace from the Ukrainian people. And that ended up resulting in multiple court cases in the United States where Manafort was found guilty, not just.

of skirting foreign lobbying laws, but of things like bank fraud, tax fraud, so on and so forth. And he ended up jailed, right? This is the president's campaign manager who ends up in jail for years because of these crimes. And Daniel, as you mentioned, at the outset of this, lo and behold, right before Trump leaves office, he says, well, at the end of the day, I think we should pardon Mr. Manafort. He did nothing wrong. By the way, he continues to support me. And Manafort gets out of prison, and his record has been wiped clean. And we lost track of him until very, very recently when he popped up at the RNC just a few weeks ago. I mean, that is just extraordinary. And the reminder that you gave us about the war in Ukraine,

the previous one, the upheaval of the country, this would be then some of the reasoning, I would assume, behind Donald Trump's anti-Ukraine sentiments and what has now been taken on as a party platform, that they don't want to provide Ukraine with the resources that they need to continue to fighting against Putin to maintain their independence. And this is part of a larger Manafort scheme. Yes, Daniel, you could not have said it better. This is one of the core arguments of the book itself is that Manafort is the central character for understanding how it is that figures like Donald Trump and now much of the Republican Party itself came to have not just just kind of a general generic pro-Russian bent, but a specifically anti-Ukrainian bent itself,

all of the evidence that we have on hand, whether through my reportage in the book or other revelations elsewhere, is that Paul Manafort was the very first American to peddle this idea that it wasn't Russian interference in 2016, the hacking campaigns, the leaks, the social media accounts, so on and so forth. In reality, it was Ukraine that was behind this massive interference campaign, all of it aimed at thwarting Donald Trump's rise to the presidency. This is Paul Manafort as the first person peddling these lies. And of course, Donald Trump lapping it up and then amplifying it for all of his followers and his supporters.

And look, again, that was, what, eight, nine, almost ten years ago at this point. And of course, plenty of history has happened since then. But if you track these things back to how Trump first began talking like this and eventually how the Republican Party transformed into this anti-Ukrainian. bulwark, much of it rests at the feet of Paul Manafort. It is like the more that you, I guess, pull on this thread, this thread of foreign agents, the more that everything starts to become undone. Can you speak to us, Casey, though, why, even though we see the dots, and you've written

this book that is helping to connect the dots to why these foreign agents are a threat to our democracy, why this is something that isn't front page news on a regular basis. Why this isn't something, particularly as Donald Trump, could be less than 80 days away from becoming president of the United States again. We already know about, you know, the documents that he stole. We already know about his love letters to dictators, that this level of seriousness is not considered when we're talking about all of the ways that Donald Trump and his ilk are unfit to serve this country. It has been surprising. almost shocking to me in recent weeks and in recent months, how little attention and how little

concern and of course how little coverage in much of the mainstream bigger publications in the U.S. has been paid to Donald Trump's, in many cases, again, ongoing links to regime after regime or oligarch after oligarch abroad and what potential openings and what potential threats that poses to, you know, American democracy writ large, but even particular elsewhere. of things like American foreign policy, American trade policy, American economic policy. I mean, it really kind of cuts across the board all these different elements that it touches on. And I mean, on the one hand, okay, maybe things have been normalized. Maybe folks are tired of hearing about this.

Maybe there's just too much news elsewhere. And of course, every day does seem like it's bringing something new. But it is really surprising to me that it has kind of faded into the background. And even when it does break into the front page news cycle, it's not even necessarily about Trump himself. You know, I'm thinking just a few weeks ago when we saw the conviction of not someone in Trump's orbit, but the sitting senator from the great state of New Jersey, Bob Menendez, who is a Democrat, who was the very first member of Congress both charged with and eventually convicted of, conspiring to act as a foreign agent, not doing it on behalf of Russia or China, but in his case,

too again on behalf of the dictatorship in Egypt. I mean, that did break through to the news cycle, break through the new cycle to the front page. But again, that was maybe for a day or two days tops and just receded almost immediately. So I mean, Danny, I'm just kind of echoing your point just now. I don't know why it hasn't landed more regularly on the front page. But I will say maybe more optimistically that if you had been telling me 10 years ago when I was a broke graduate student poking around in this space and wondering what the foreign agent's registration act was and why folks weren't paying more attention to things like foreign interference writ large. If you told me 10 years ago that you and I were going to someday be having this conversation

or that I'd written a book on the topic and there was actually interest on the topic and every once in a while it broke through to the front page, I would have been absolutely shocked by how far we've come. So I guess maybe it's a matter of perspective or chronology. We have come a long, long way from where we were, but we're still not where we need to be. Well, you know, Casey, that is why I am grateful for you taking the time to stop by the new abnormal and for writing this book that I think is really important because folks need to really understand what is at risk, not only in this election, but with having people that are in high

post positions that have no oath that they've sworn to this country that they plan on upholding, that are only there to enrich themselves and will do so by any means necessary. Folks, the book is Foreign Agents, How American Lobbyists and Lawmakers Threatened Democracy Around the World. Casey, thank you so much for making the time for The New Abnormal. Really appreciate you. Thanks so much, Daniel. Hope you enjoy checking out this episode of The New Abnormal.

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