The Daily Beast Podcast - This Is Trump's Sinister Plot Against His Own Aide

Episode Date: October 16, 2026

Michael Wolff and Joanna Coles ask whether Susie Wiles is running out of time as Trump reportedly calls around to ask what people think of his chief of staff. Wolff explains why that question can be the kiss of death inside Trump’s White House and predicts what could happen after the midterms. They also take on new press secretary Katie Zacharia’s rocky debut and the questions surrounding her claims to be a lawyer. Then Wolff offers a theory about Kimberly Guilfoyle’s abrupt exit as ambassador, her split from Don Jr. and what she might do next. The conversation turns to Elon Musk, Ukraine’s access to Starlink and Trump’s pursuit of a deal with Putin, before Wolff makes his case for what Trump wants from the world’s richest and most powerful men. #ad https://quo.com/beast Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Unlock unlimited free grocery delivery with PC Express Pass. Shop online and get the same low No Frills prices delivered. Get your first year of PC Express Pass for just $2.50 a month. Learn more at no frills.ca. Hold music. Not exactly what you want to hear when a pipe just burst in your basement is flooding. And your vinyl collection is getting soaked. And your cat just floated by on a sofa cushion?

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This asking around thing that he calls up people, and he's actually even done this to me, everybody knows that the asking around about is the kiss of death. That means you have to say, well, you know, I think there's some issues there, Mr. President. It begins to undermine people. So does that mean the end of Susie Wiles? And I expect that it does mean that after the midterms, she will be Toast, Susie Toast. What he is doing is sending the signal that Susie Wiles is out. He's poisoning the Susie Wiles ground.

Michael. Joella. We're both in winter cardigans. The fall is wrapping its arms around us. Gee, I don't know. That's very dramatic. Well, what a dramatic day. It actually isn't quite wrapping yet. I mean, the sun is still, the sun is still strong, right.

It will hit near 70 degrees out here at the beach. So I'm not giving in to fall yet. Okay, so Michael's happy in the Hamptons. I think we're taking from that. Happy in the Hamptons. Everyone is happy in the Hamptons. Ever was paradise. Paradise, Michael. Okay, we have a lot to get to. Is Susie Wiles on the way out? Did Katie

Zachariah, the new White House Press secretary, obfuscate her legal background? Turns out she didn't pass the bar exam. Will she pass Michael Wolfe's exam? We've got Kimberly Gill Foil and your excellent piece on substack. There was a fantastic line in there I'm going to get to. Poor Ukraine. Just terrible, terrible scenes coming out of Ukraine. James Talariko on the CNN town hall stage. And, well, I mean, you know, it's just a lot to get into. All of this is on the cusp of the midterms. It's all on the cusp of the midterms.

That's right. And we'll be right on the cusp of the midterms next Tuesday in L.A. at the Terragam Bullroom, October the 20th, 7 p.m. there or be nowhere, tickets on Ticketmaster or Beast.com slash ITH. Michael, we haven't figured out what we're going to talk about yet. No, but before we get to that, and actually we should probably not do that here because we should do that offline, as they say. But Hollywood.

So several last week, week before last, we were dissing Harry Emanuel's book. mildly dissing. Were we dissing it? I think you said you weren't going to read it. That's all. Well, I think that qualified as a diss. And Ari called me up and said, and I quote, I've read all your fucking books. You better fucking well read mine. So. That sounds quintessential, Ari Emanuel. So, so instructed, I did read the book. And actually, it's fantastic. It is. I mean, I'm a kind of a connoisseur of Hollywood Yarns. And this is, this is really up there with, with some of the best Hollywood books. And the thing I always like about Hollywood and Hollywood books, it's a distillation of the worst people on Earth. I mean, it is, it is human behavior at its rock bottom. And,

and Ari, well, one of the nice things. things about Ari or one of the horrifying things about Ari depending upon how you look at it is that he is vivid in his descriptions of the lowest common denominator of human nature. And he delivers it here. What is the lowest common denominator of human nature? Very low, very low. And that's this, I mean, the Hollywood thing is, is unlike politics where they pretend it's something else,

and it's always cast in a civic light, there is, they're in Hollywood and Washington are quite similar, but it is Hollywood and the true, the best Hollywood books always get to the heart of the matter that people are craven, despicable, and would do anything to get what they want. Okay, so Ari Emanuel famously known, I think, as a bully in Hollywood. Is it fair to say he just bullied you into reading his book?

Yes. And is it also, how did he know that you hadn't read his book? Oh, because he listens to the part? I mean, it was my confession on the podcast. So he knows all, sees all, including us. So maybe the question is, will he come to the telegram ballroom on Tuesday night? Well, he should come. He should come.

He absolutely should. Yeah, if you've read his fucking book, as he put it, then he should come to our live show. We don't know what we're going to be talking about because the world is turning so fast. We'll be talking about whatever's going on that week and also giving some perspective. about what we think will happen in the midterms. Yeah, well, I think we'll also be talking about what we always talk about, what's going on inside Trump's head, what motivates him, what did he get up this morning or next Tuesday morning, thinking and then acting on, irresponsibly acting on, uncontrollably acting on. Okay, well, this is inside Trump's head, the podcast. We go there three times a week. Feel free. Well, please, subscribe to the podcast. The reason that we can have these crazy conversations, well, the truth

is they're not crazy. But they're conversations unlike anything you will get elsewhere about what is going on with Donald Trump, how he runs America and the impact he's had, the outsize impact he's had. Please press the subscription button. Share with your friends, share with your frenemies, share with your political adversaries. Let it lead to a conversation. As we're recording this, We're recording this on Thursday morning. It's just come in over the wires that Donald Trump has nixed the live streaming of the execution. Okay. So this is the first time I am hearing this.

But just let me rush to rush in here to point out that this is exactly what we said would happen. Right. That there was no chance that this was that he was going to carry this out. This was just a news cycle gambit. And just to, you know, that thing. And I'm not sure, I'm not sure we said this the last, I think I forgot to say this when we were discussing this the other day, that he does this thing, a constant, one of the constant things that goes on behind the scenes is Trump saying to AIDS, put it out there. Just put it out there. AIDS are going, but, but, but.

And he says, just put it out there. And this was clearly one of those things. And clearly every single person in the media fell for it. Do you think he said that? Or was this Pete Haxeth just running his mouth? Because Pete Haxeth said it during a podcast. Yeah, no, I'm sure that he said to, he said to Hegsseth and just put it out there.

Oh, okay. So you think Donald came up with the idea, gave it to Heggis. Well, somebody may. Hegsteth may have said something about it. And then Trump said, oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Let's just put that out there. So does this look bad for Hegsseth? Hegsth's put it out there, apparently owned the idea.

J.D. Vance swoops in and says, well, he won't be watching it. I saw one poll that said eight out of ten Americans hated this. idea. So is Trump now coming in over the top of Hexas? I don't think that this was ever, there was ever in anybody's imagination or playbook that this was going to happen. This is just Trump. It's just the Trump White House. Put it out there. Not going to happen. We don't care if it's going to happen. We'll, we're going to take the, we're going to claim the news cycle on this, put it out there. there. So is there any reverberation for Hegsseth over this? Because he seemed to have owned the

idea. Yeah, I don't think so at all. I think Trump is probably very pleased with this whole thing. We got it. Everybody, it commanded, it commanded headlines for, what, two or three news cycles. Great. Okay, you're right. I'm still looking, I'm still looking for logic. and there is no logic. The logic is, and let me, you know, and I spell this out all of the time, but let me do it again, because it's very hard for people to grasp. Attention is zero sum. If Trump, if the Trump White House gets it, other people don't.

We're in the middle of the midterms now, everybody fighting for attention. So we're going to say we're going to execute someone. a live stream and execution. Headlines. He gets the headlines, someone else doesn't. And then it goes away. So days from now, a week from now, two weeks from now, nobody remembers the live stream execution that never was.

And what a waste of energy there was around it and people running around saying this undermines American values when all it is is a play for attention. Donald Trump. Yeah, so why doesn't? We're in the 10th year of this. How come the New York Times doesn't have a headline which says Trump promises live execution that will never happen? I don't know. But what they did have yesterday was an incredible photo of Donald Trump in Marine 1 with Katie Zachariah and Natalie Harp. I think we can flash the picture up on screen. And I'm mesmerized by this photo.

I mean, first of all, I mean, Trump looks as if he's in one of the shape of him, makes him look as if he's in one of those Victorian bath chairs. Why do you remember, you know, people would perambulate along Brighton in the UK or the south of France with an elderly relative, usually with a big sort of blanket over their knees? And then you've got the two women, the two blonde women, both with, I think, hair extensions. I don't know about Natalie's, but definitely Zachariah's hair. And the two of them just sort of simpering and grinning away at him. And let me just note for the historical record that Doug Mills, the New York Times photographer, is Trump's favorite photographer.

That everything often, often the tableaus are composed for Doug Mills, that Doug Mills has given a seat to get the best or a position to get the best shot of that tableau. So this is, you know, well, if not staged, again, Doug Mills was given the access to get this shot. Falls, the season that everyone gets busier, more calls, more customers, more chances for something to slip through the cracks. And staying ahead means having just the right system not working harder. That's why today's episode is brought to you by Quo, spelled QUO. It's a business phone system built, so you never miss a call. All your calls, texts and voicemails live in one place so anyone on your team can pick up a conversation, see the full history and respond fast. Quo's optional built-in AI agent, handles after-hours calls, answers questions, and even books appointment, so you never

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Exactly. Exactly. Remember Trump's lawyers during his various indictments and trials. I may not have the smartest legal team, but I have the hottest. So again, this is a thing. It's really, you know, and go back to all those years, those Jeffrey Epstein years of pursuing models, courting models, having models on his arms. This is fundamental to his identity. Well, what did we think of Katie Zachariah?

Did you see her first performance? The world saw her first performance. Thoughts? I mean, she appears to have been given the job 24 hours before she was required to address the press. You know, I mean, I think that there's things that are probably obvious here that she, that they offered, they probably offered the job to a number of other people before they got to her. And then, because I've seen Trump do this, I am sure. in frustration, he was given a set of pictures of young women who might fill this spot. He saw her and go, and he went her.

Let's do her. Let's do her. And she's 41, so she's not as young as Carolyn Leavitt, who was in, I was 27 when she started, I think, and leaves big shoes to fill. fascinating detail that she's been telling everybody she's a lawyer. She was asked where she went to law school. Trump asks her where she goes to law school, and then she mumbled something about China in China, which Trump looks bemused by.

Where did she take the bar? Okay, where did she take the bar? You're quite correct. And yeah, and that was the response that went around the world. I mean, of all the things that she could have said, she said the most discordant, that was the most discordant answer. Where did you take the bar? China. China?

China? The state of China? I mean, every journalist in the country has been trying to figure out where she went to law school. And, of course, it turns out that she failed the bar. But she went to law. Just, just it's not everybody knows where she went to. So she went to law school. at Pepperdine University.

So it's really the question of, was she, did she pass the bar? Is she a member of a bar in one of 50 states? Not China. Well, it turns out no. Turns out no. It turns out no. And of course, it seems highly unlikely that she did bar exams in China, and as she did them by a sort of postal course.

Now, let me just, just, it's worth pointing out, There is no requirement, not only is there no requirement that a press secretary be a lawyer, most press secretaries are not lawyers. So how this even became a question, how this became an issue is just another fuck up. She doesn't have to be a lawyer. It doesn't, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, germane to nothing. Now, partly this starts, I think, because Trump introduced, Trump says she's an attorney. Right. And why? Did someone tell? She self-identified as a lawyer.

Yes. So he probably picks this up and that's where, that's, that's how it became an issue. but it certainly didn't have to be an issue. Right. Well, and of course she immediately became the story. Yes, and it just goes to the level of preparation here. Nobody fought this through. I mean, yes, she probably wasn't vetted, and so somebody could have said,

what are you saying? You're representing yourself as a general counsel. What do you mean to say here? So nobody knows, nobody knows that. Nobody knows. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. I think she's a lawyer. Oh, yeah, I think she's a lawyer.

Well, to be fair, on her bio, on her Instagram, she says, I'm a lawyer. She says attorney. No, no, I know. There's a, there's a whole thing that she doesn't say attorney. She says lawyer. Okay, maybe she says lawyer. And then there's another. And so, so she's, she's splitting hairs and nobody cleaned this up before.

Right. Well, it's also, is it possible that Susie Wiles, didn't know, Susie Wiles being Donald Trump's, of course, chief of staff. Is it possible that she didn't know he was going to announce Katie Zachariah until he did? Yeah, no, it's very possible. I mean, I think my description of this, I would stand by. It's others passed and then in frustration he said her, her. Great.

Okay. Well, a lot of speculation that she's not going to last as long as Anthony Scaramie. He was White House Communications Director and he was out in 11 days. And the question is that the internet was alive, the interweb, was alive with speculation that she would not last that long. Yeah, well, we'll see. I mean, I'm eager and that her next news conference will be well attended and well watched. Megan Kelly went on a tirade about her outfit saying that she was trying too hard, which I thought was a bit rich from Megan Kelly,

who wore famously spaghetti straps when she had dinner with Vladimir Putin before she interviewed him. And then she wore for her coverage of one of the Republican conventions. I mean, she looked very strange. She looked as if literally she was wearing a nightdress. She said that she had every right to do that, which of course she does, But then it's very weird when she attacks Katie Zachariah, who was wearing sort of perfect corporate wear, I thought. This morning, my wife and I were going through old,

tracing back Katie Zachariah on the internet. And she was, if you go back, she's a conventionally, she's a conventionally pretty woman. But, you know, a not unusual. blonde, nice, nice looking, pre-makeup. And then you see this transformation of her over time in which the face becomes just incredibly glossed and kind of... Well, Mar-a-Largoed, right?

She's become Mar-a-Largoed in the way that Kimberly Gilfoy has done. No, and that would have been one of those things to absolutely. appealed to Trump. Trump would never appoint the way Katie Zachariah looked 10 years ago. So she had to go through this transformation into a Fox star. I mean, that's always the Fox really created the Mar-a-Lago look. Fair. So one person who hasn't succumbed to the Mar-a-Lago look is Susie Wiles. You predicted at the beginning of this year that you thought she wouldn't last post November, so post the midterms. There was a piece in Politico this morning saying that Trump is doing that thing that you always talk about of him calling around and just trying things out on people.

So what do you think about Susie Wiles? How's Susie doing? What do you think about Susie? So how is she doing? What are you hearing? Well, I mean, let's go back to what it doesn't matter how she is doing. It's a matter, matter of how she is, what Trump's impression at the moment, what's in Trump's head about Susie Wilde. And it's asking around thing, which is, let me, I think I was no, I was certainly the first person to paint that portrait of what he does, which is really peculiar, that he calls up people.

And he's actually even done this done this to me. And he says, what do you think about so-and-so? You know, what do you think about, what do you think about Steve when that would have been Steve Bannon? And actually, that's what he did say to me. And everybody knows that the asking around about is the kiss of death. That means you have to say, well, you know, I think there's some issues there, Mr. President. And then he will tell you what the, I absolutely agree.

Then he will go on. And the other effect of this, the asking around, is that it begins to undermine people. So this gets spread from one person to another. What did he say? Well, he was asking me about, you know, whoever. I'm sure he's now asking around about Katie Zachariah, but he is apparently asking around about Susie Wiles. So does that mean the end of Susie Wiles? And I, you know, I expect that it does mean that that after the midterms, she will be Toast. Susie Toast.

Susie Toast. So do we have a sense of, is he yet asking who, what about so and so to fill her shoes? Yes, he apparently is asking about this person or that person, but that really doesn't mean he's actually asking about that person. What he's done, what he is doing is sending the signal that Susie Wiles is out. So he's poisoning the Susie Wiles ground. Unlock unlimited free grocery delivery with PC Express Pass. Shop online and get the same low, no food. Frills prices delivered.

Get your first year of PC Express pass for just $2.50 a month. Learn more at no frills.ca. Susie Wiles must note this. Of course. Right. So why doesn't she just say, you know what, Mr. President, thank you so much. I think I'm going to leave you to your own midterms. Well, because she won't.

She's, she'll wait until after the midterms. That's just, that's just what you. do if you're remotely have a scintilla of loyalty. But I would do remember Nikki Haley in before the 2020 election. So weeks before the 2020 election, she bailed from her job at the UN. And why did she do that? Was it was the girl to make some money? No, I think the goal was not to be taken down by this ship. With a Nikki Haley, where is she now? Well, and obviously then she went on, she broke from Donald Trump

and believed that she could have an independent political career as a candidate for president, which didn't go very well. As I say, where is she now? So skids under Susie Wiles, possibly the skids under Katie Zachariah in record time. And of course, the skids have well and truly been pulled out, if that's the right expression, under Kimberly Gilfoyle. In Katie Zachariah's first press conference, she announced that the astonishment of the press course sitting in front of her when asked about Kimberly Guilford. She said, well, we've asked the ambassador to resign.

You had a wonderful column on Kimberly Guilfoyle in Substack this week, which talked about her retailing her influence, which I thought was a wonderful line. And of course, you've talked before about watching her go full basic instinct on Sean Hannity's plane on the way down to Roger Ailes' funeral, which again is just a sort of mind-boggling scene. How did I ever find myself in that situation? Well, thank goodness you do because you've got a very good book out of it. And we've been able to talk about Kimberly Guilfoyle ever since. But what do you think she does now? Does she have stuff on the Trumps? Was this – I'm still sort of fascinated by why now and why they came after Kimberly.

And it seems to have come from all sorts of angles. I mean, disgruntled ex-staffers. Let's add another component to this. It did. I did. Remember. So the Wall Street Journal has three successive stories, each more devastating about Kimberly Guilfoyle.

But let's just go back a bit to Don Jr.'s wedding. To Bettina Anderson. And remember that there is a, that there was a leak involving that wedding when it was revealed that that his reception was being paid for by a Russian oligarch. And they have since tried to cover that, smooth that over. They're going to return the money. But that was a, you know, that was a pretty devastating revelation. So are these connected?

How might they be connected? Well, one of the ways that they might be connected is that the leaker of about the Russian oligarch might have been his former fiancé Kimberly Guilfoyle. And this now might be payback for that. Or let's recast this in another way. This really isn't about Kimberly Guilfoyle. This is about Don Jr. Let's get Don for any number of reasons, including heading off any possibility or hoping to head off any possibility that he might be a 28, 2028 contender.

So you're proposing that it's possible Kimberly Guilfoyle leaks the details of John Jr's wedding that his father didn't attend to Bettina Anderson, who was her right. who overlapped with her, a sort of payback. And then his camp leaked details of Kimberly Guilfoyle misbehaving in Greece. I'm just putting it out there. What a nightmare to be a member of that family. What an absolute nightmare to be involved with any of them that this is how they behave. Fascinating. Absolutely fascinating.

Of course, it's all alleged because we don't know if any of it's true, but it does make a sort of weird Trumpian sense, doesn't it? No, and I'm really fascinated by this, the Trumpian character, which Kimberly Guilfoyle would have come to epitomize. And it is, you know, in a way, is back to the many of the characters that Ari Emanuel describes in his book. It's without pretense, without shame. I want what I want, and I'm going to do anything.

I have to do to get it. And the only sort of difference between Hollywood people and Trump people in this is that Trump people are kind of so unsmooth about it, so inept, so gross. Well, they're less attractive, too. I mean, the veneer of attractiveness in Hollywood actually allows people to get away with things. Well, there are a lot of ugly guys in Hollywood, I'll tell you that. Well, that's true. I was saying, but there are a lot of, you know, the interesting thing about Hollywood and the interesting thing when you spend any time there is that the people are, for the most part, more attractive. You know, it's a place where people run on the beach. It sort of does have an element of Baywatch about it, certainly more attractive than they are in D.C. I mean, I think you're just saying that they have better plastic surgeons than the Trump people, because the Trump people certainly seem to have terrible plastic surgeons.

But I think it's, I think it's, it's, it's more than that. I mean, it is really this, this, this ethos. I mean, it's a very kind of desperate ethos that the world is a bad place. And, and you can, you have to get what you, what you get is what you take. And very much within the Trump world, that's the, that's, that's what you always sense. And even maybe more particular to Trump world, we will never have this kind of opportunity again. We must do it now. And the Kimberly Guilfoyle thing, which kind of predates Trump because, you know, she's married to Gavin Newsom, but then she comes to New York, gets involved with Fox News and then sees this opportunity within Trump world.

and it, you know, it has seemed to pay off for her at several points, including that she almost, but not quite, became the president's daughter-in-law. And then failing that, she became in the, and, you know, a United States ambassador, also an incredibly unlikely outcome. Well, and there's a sort of, I mean, Democrats aren't going to like me saying this, but there's an element of Pamela Harriman about her too, isn't there? I mean, she's a much cruderversion of Pamela Harriman, who is much more sophisticated. But also got an ambassadorship, was also married to, well, she married Winston Churchill's son, right?

She did. She married a governor of New York. Right. Yeah, no, I mean, Kimberly Guilfoyle is not an unusual character in politics or, at a certain level of American life, the only thing that is different about her is, might seem to be a complete lack of pretense. I don't care. I don't care. Who knows what. I am, I am out here getting what I can get and I don't care who knows it. So what is, what's her next move? Well, I mean, the question is, does she have, does she go into,

into revenge mode or in actually it's more complicated because she would ask herself, how do I monetize my revenge? Or how do I monetize not seeking revenge? So the question will be for her is how do I how do I monetize? And that will be over and above the emotional need for revenge. And it may well be, I mean, I would suspect now, I think maybe we discussed this, that she's negotiating with them. And they will have to deliver something to her in order for her not to seek revenge. Right, because she must know a lot. Revenge is going to be her chip right now. How does she play that? How does she monetize restraint or active revenge?

Exactly. So at any rate, we can safely say we have not heard the last of Kimberly Guilford. We have not. And we are here for it, Michael. The moment she makes any further noises or moves, we are definitely here for it. And I really, I recommend your substact column on her because it's beautifully written and it just gets at the heart of what a novelistic character she is. And what I meant by the attractive thing in Hollywood was just that so many people go there

to be actors and to, you know, to act out their fame craving and to be to be taken seriously as an actor for the most part, you have to be attractive. Unlock unlimited free grocery delivery with PC Express Pass. Shop online and get the same low, no frills prices delivered. Get your first year of PC Express Pass for just $2.50 a month. Learn more at no frails.ca. So the war, Michael. I mean... Okay, no, I think this is so beyond put it.

I think we can, everything that we've discussed, we can, we can now sort of, in this show, we can put aside. And that's all, you know, I mean, fascinating, but ultimately not, not remotely as consequential as what we discuss now. which is Elon Musk, a private citizen, essentially closing, threatening an independent nation, more than threatening, squeezing an independent nation. So we have a couple of things on Elon. And let's go back. Elon, in 2024, Elon put up $300 million to help Trump win the 2024 election. $300 million in the context of politics of one man putting up that much money is unheard of.

That is, that $300 million was the largest individual contribution to a political campaign in history. Okay. That then bought him basically the position of the second most powerful person in the White House and gave him the right without accountability to stormroll through the U.S. government burning and slashing, which he did right up until the point that the power he was that the power he had assumed started to rival Trump's own power. And they had a fight, then he was out. Now Elon Musk is back putting up just about $300 million again in the midterms. So we can assume that he is not doing that out of the goodness of his heart. He wants power. He is buying power. And he is paying so disproportionately for it that he wants disproportionate power.

which he will wield with the heaviest of hands. The backdrop here is Trump, who is also trying to cut off Ukraine and trying to pressure Ukraine into making a deal with Russia. And Trump is doing this for a variety of reasons, including his desperate last minute hope to bring oil prices down. and to be able to claim that he's the peacemaker in Ukraine before the midterm elections, but also because he has had this longstanding aspiration to, I don't know, bond with Vladimir Putin, to do business with Vladimir Putin, which Musk also has. So you have this, this, this, a moment on kind of a trend. transparent moment of these two authoritarian oligarchs trying to have their way at the expense of

a country and of a people and of and of, you know, the international order. Freedom in Europe. I mean, Elon Musk yesterday issued a statement saying this wasn't his decision. It was the Pentagon's decision. Kastarshield, which is the defensive technology that the Ukrainians use, is paid for by the Pentagon. Yes, I think he is doing the bidding of doing Trump's bidding here. But I'm, but this is Elon Musk, believe me, Elon Musk doesn't do anybody's bidding that

he doesn't want to. Well, and of course, the irony is Trump doing this shocking deal to buy Russian diesel to offset the prices of diesel in the U.S., which have gone up because of his disastrous war with Iran. I mean, Iran yesterday, you know, well, this month in October alone, has blown up 14 ships trying to get out of the Strait of Hormuz. Right. So there's actually a couple of things here, interesting things here. One of which is that this is another Trump bullshit deal.

I mean, the amount of diesel fuel that we would be, that the U.S. would be getting is inconsequential, actually. But what it does symbolically is it is sanction-breaking. We have these sanctions against Russia. We have, we have, these sanctions involve a moral position. It's a moral position which we have argued with much of the world. You have to do this. We are doing this. You have to do this.

We all have to do this. And this is now sort of thrown into the crapper. Right. And something that actually America had held fairly tightly actually and haven't broken them. And of course, this is just a remarkable deal that he's done with Putin. And probably, as you say, it's such a small amount of diesel. it probably won't have any impact on prices whatsoever. But it goes back to this thing, you know, what is the relationship, one of the most confounding things about the Trump era and Trump's political career?

What is it with Trump and Vladimir Putin? Is it just not that the Russians helped him out during his business lows? I mean, you've talked about how the Russians, how Trump, you know, when Jeffrey Epstein and Donald Trump fell out, over a piece of real estate in Palm Beach. Jeffrey Epstein had offered 36 million, I think, for the property. Trump gazumped him with 41 million and then sold the property two years later for 95 million, which suggested that he was laundering money for somebody. The person who bought the property was a Russian, unheard of for properties to double in value like that, especially at that end of the market.

I mean, is it not as simple as they just kept bailing him out? Well, I think that that's part of it, but I think that that misses the broader picture. The broader picture is this Trump wants access to this kind of money on this kind of scale. Trump wants to be an oligarch. Trump responds to oligarchs. Trump is, I mean, that's the world in which he would like to live and move. And at this point, as the presidency comes to an end, this is his opportunity. Well, maybe his last opportunity.

And he is going to get like Kimberly Guilfoyle, although poor Kimberly is at a, you know, I'm kind of her sums. An impasse? No, Kimberly, her sums are embarrassingly small. If she had asked for,

she asked somebody for $100,000 to pay off her Amex. If she had asked for a hundred million, well, she would be in a, she would probably be embraced by the Trump team.

That's what Trump is looking at, access to this kind of money. I mean, what people often the world's unbanked money. Mm-hmm. So he's going to segue from being president to oligarch. He doesn't give a shit about the rest of the Republican Party.

He doesn't care who follows him. He wants nobody, in fact, to follow him. And he's doing his best, weirdly, to lose the midterms, it seems. Yeah, well, I don't, I'm trying to think if that does he really want to lose the midterms? I think it's true that he doesn't really give a shit about. about this. But on the other hand, I think he could wake up on the morning of November 4th and find himself in a new world, which he doesn't, he's not prepared for that he won't be able to understand. And the final, the final chapter begins.

delivery with PC Express Pass. Shop online and get the same low No Frills prices delivered. Get your first year of PC Express Pass for just $2.50 a month. Learn more at no frills.com. We're often saying that people around Trump have an audience of one, and that's Donald Trump. Does Donald Trump have an audience of one, and that's Vladimir Putin? No, I don't really think so. I mean, I think. I think. I mean, I think. I think that he wants a bond with Putin because Putin is a model that he is drawn to. The authoritarianism, the fact that he has been able to achieve such control over his own political fate, but also just the money.

He wants the money. I mean, Trump is, remember, and it's always important, Trump is a simple machine. Give me the money. I just want money. And you can see everything that has happened, especially in this second term, it's just about the money. Put up the money. You want a pardon, put up the money. You want a deal, put up the money. You want, you're a company. You're a company. You want favorable treatment, put up the money. And it's not complicated. Trump is an oligarch. Why hasn't that been more of a conversation? And as you say, it's why he surrounds himself with these people and thinks these people are wiser than anyone else.

And he looks as if he's going to get his own way. What's he made? 2.2 billion last year. And I'm sure he'll make the same again this year. The unfathomable thing is why people don't seem to care very much. I don't know. I mean, perhaps because the sums are so great that it's almost impossible to comprehend. You know, $100,000 to pay off a credit card, people understand that level of corruption.

Billions upon billions of dollars, it becomes a different world. You know, Elon must $300 million. It's, it's, you know, I'm tempted to say, you know, you cash your your vote against Republicans in, in on November 3rd or voting begins many places now because that's a vote against Elon. But that's a misunderstanding. You know, democracy doesn't really know how to deal with 300. million dollars. Three hundred million dollars is its own power. And, and that's what, I don't think anybody has kind of come to terms with this. Nobody has come to terms with the level of money that is now in, in, in so many private hands. Right. Right. Well, did you see anything of James

Tala Riko, the Democratic, hopeful for Senate in Texas. He did a town hall on CNN last night, Wednesday night. Did you manage to see anything? Yeah, I did. And I thought he's, you know, I thought he's attractive. He's impressive. He's, you know, kind of a, you know, refreshingly normal. He struck me as a, you know, kind of maybe in older fashion Democrat as somebody who's,

you know, who's a guy who has serious thoughts about policy issues, who's trying to work through things. You know, a socially liberal guy, a kind of less liberal when it comes to other issues, particularly Texas-related issues. You know, he seems credible, plausible. and in any other world than the Trump world, likely. And in the comparison to Ken Paxton, who is perfectly, who is another Trump figure, who is Kimberly Guilfoyle just in another in another in another in another guys, you know,

I mean, corrupt and he doesn't care who knows he's corrupt and doesn't have a serious policy bone in his body. and is just about gimme, gimme, gimme, gimme, gimme. I thought it was very relaxing watching James Tullerico because you didn't feel he was word-saliding it. He felt that he was very agile, quick on his feet. They had one part of the town hall where they had individuals from the audience come out and sit and argue with him on a certain point.

And I thought he seemed so harder to have prepared answers, my point being there. And he seemed good. I thought he was flexible. He's intelligent. He's articulate. He's obviously thought things through to your point. But also, I didn't feel anxious watching him.

There are so many Democratic candidates that you feel anxious for because they seem terrified to say what they actually believe. And he didn't have any of that. And neither does John Ossoff. No, this is a close race in Texas, very close. and he could still lose this. And the Republicans have, I mean, they have two things going for them. They have, they have devoted an enormous amount of money to this, to this race.

And then they still have this shameless ability to, to pull out these culture issues, which have, I mean, it's sort of unbelievable that they have, in effect, that they have real power. So J.D. Vance going to Texas and suggesting that that Tala Rico is gay. And for all I know, Tala Rico may be gay, which, but this is in the, you know, in the context of Texas politics, that is going to move a lot of votes. I wonder how Scott Besson, the Treasury Secretary, feels about that. Well, he feels, and he's glad he's not running for anything. And maybe he thinks, well, if it's going to win a Senate seat and keep the Senate,

then that's... Scott Besson is also Kimberly Guilfoyle in another form. Gimme, gimme, gimme, gimme. This is my opportunity. I will never, it may never come my way again. Trump is an opportunity, and that is what literally everybody around Trump says. There is nobody, let's remember this, nobody who says, had Donald Trump, what a great guy.

They say Donald Trump is my fucking opportunity, and I'm going to take it. And that's why I like talking to, Michael, the American presidency for sale yet again. We'll be back on Saturday with another episode of Insompson. Trump's head. And then, of course, Tuesday will be live. We'll be live in L.A. at the Tehram Ballroom, October the 20th, 7 p.m. Please come. Please come meet us. Maybe meet Ari Emmanuel. Ari, you're going to have to come now. You're going to have to come. Michael, I'll see you on Saturday. Fantastic. Enjoy your warm summer day in the Hamptons, your paradise in the Hamptons. And Michael, do you want to thank our troops?

Everybody who makes this possible, whose names I am always forgetting, Ryan, John, Heather, Rachel, and Neil, thank you. Don't really forget them. See you on Saturday. But I have to grasp for them. But I grasp for your name, too. 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.

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