The Daily Beast Podcast - This Is Why Trump Revels In Incompetence

Episode Date: February 15, 2026

Michael Wolff and Joanna Coles unpack the spiraling fallout from the Epstein files, Ghislaine Maxwell’s calculated silence, and the widening circle of elites caught in the “Epstein class,” before turning to something even more alarming: the Trump administration’s brazen willingness to lie in plain sight. From the El Paso airspace shutdown and the balloon-versus-drone fiasco to Fox News alumni now running Cabinet departments at odds with one another, they examine whether the chaos is incompetence—or a deliberate governing strategy built on fear, loyalty tests, and all-or-nothing stakes. As prosecutions stall, investigations fizzle, and reality itself seems negotiable, Wolff argues that the disorder may be the point—and that the risks are existential. Is this simply dysfunction, or is there a dangerous method behind the madness that we’re only just beginning to see? Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The larger question is, does the incompetence have a purpose? This is the thematic point of this administration over and over and over again. I am going to do it, and I am willing to risk everything to do it, to break the establishment or be broken by it. And that is still the thing, the stakes that are going on here and going on now into this election year, he creates this existential structure, that he understands that in order for him to succeed, everybody else must be defeated, everybody else must die.

We are in this all or nothing radical, dangerous, mortal condition. Michael. Joanna. Joanna. I mean, what did I miss? And from your sickbed? From my sick bed. A glorious robe.

Do you want to stand up and go off? No, I do not want to stand up. But of course not. Yes. Yes. For infrequent visitors to this podcast, where we try and figure out what an earth is going on inside Trump's head, I've been off this week because I had my second hip. I was going to say transplant, but it's actually replacement. So actually I can't stand up right now.

and I've had very little sleep, so I may not make a ton of sense. But I will say I had the most bizarre experience, which is I woke up from an anesthetic. And somewhere in the background, and I wasn't sure if it was a radio, if it was a podcast or whatever, I could hear the very familiar sounds of that wobbly voice. Bobby Kennedy saying, I'm not afraid of a germ. I snorted coke off a toilet seat. And I thought I must be, I must still be under anesthetic. This cannot be true that our Minister of Health and Human Services would be saying such a thing.

But in fact, he did. Well, which begs for more details. The toilet seat was where? Right. Was this? How long ago was this? It may not have been that long ago. interesting.

And what a minister from the Health and Human Services, what do you think you can catch off a toilet seat? Let's go back to the most fundamental question. Well, especially if you're snorting something off it. I mean, Kurt Anderson has that wonderful story of buying Coke from RFK Jr. at Harvard. and then having made the purchase, going back to his room, and RFK Jr. calling and roaring at him because he'd taken his straw,

and he believed that his particular nasal juices, I guess you would call them, nasal fluids had with the cocaine created their own kind of proprietary crystals in the straw, and he wanted them back. Well, you know, I can add a slightly other dimension there. when I was traveling with Bobby Kennedy during his uncle's presidential primary campaign. This was in 1980s, so we were both young men.

But frequently, at stops at, and this was in the south, this was in Alabama, actually. And we would go around Alabama. I actually have no idea from this van. point what we were what we were doing there. Did this seem like was Alabama then a possible Democratic strong, I don't know. But I do remember we would stop at these roadside places in Alabama

gasoline stations, but they were also kind of sundry stores and snack bars and God knows what. But on quite a number of occasions greater than just one, let's say, he would disappear with the young woman who he might meet. And I see in mind's eye, and I could have embellished this, these comely young woman in the South manning the gas pumps. and he would anyway disappear to wherever you might disappear in a gasoline station. And I've long thought about the lack of sanitary conditions in which you're doing whatever you have to do in the bathroom of a gasoline station. Oh, good Lord, good Lord. No, all I can think of is the whale juice is dripping down the car window that his children talked about after he soared the whale off ahead. that he ran into on Newport Beach or something.

Anyway, it was a strange thing to wake up to. And as you kindly alerted viewers and listeners to why I was absent, was I had... Was I not supposed to do that? No, no, no, it was totally fine that you do it. I always just think... Oh, my God, the hip replacement is out of the bag. No, no, no, it's totally fine.

But what was so nice was I just got hundreds of comments from people, either with their own hip replacement stories or giving me lots of advice about resting or walking or all that stuff. Anyway, I really appreciated what I wanted to say. It gave me great sucker reading the comments when I was sort of lying there, feeling a bit sorry for myself,

which have no reason to do it because now I've got a second new hip and soon I will be limboing on the podcast for people just to show how flexible I am. You and I are going to be running together. We're never going to be running together. I'm like, That's never going to happen.

Have you actually ever jogged? Have you, do you run? Yeah, I've spent most of my adult life, Ronnie. I find that incredibly difficult to believe. Like the roadrunner, there he go. Michael Wolf on the move. So the other thing that I missed was Gillesne Maxwell, Gilem Maxwell giving evidence or in fact not giving evidence.

And the first thing I noticed, which I'd like to point out, is that in the videos we've seen of her in Camp Brian, where she was moved after her two days of being interviewed by Todd Blanche, number two at the Justice Department, formerly Trump's personal lawyer. So moved from a harsh jail to an easy jail. Right. The pictures we've seen of her walking around with her dog and indeed even carrying an umbrella on the days when it was raining,

have her with a sort of longish bob. in the testimony she was giving or not giving, and I'll read what she said in a moment, she had a completely different haircut, which I think is a wig that I have actually seen her wearing. And I've only met Golan once. I met her at a friend's 50th birthday party where she was wearing a wig. And one of the things that she did with this wig is she wears it and then she would sort of slightly move it. So you're kind of peering at her. It's a very creepy attention-getting thing to do, and it's very slight.

So she would sort of scratch her head, and then the entire wig would move like a centimeter. Anyway, I recognize the wig. This was a positive thing you're saying? This was a tactical. I think it was a psychological game. In the way that she did psychological games with people at Oxford, you know, she was well-known for her sex games at Heddington Hall, which is where she grew up. Heddington Hall. Hedington Hall.

And she would have, you know, Oxford students back there. She eventually got into Oxford. I think the first two times she failed, but she got in on the third attempt. And she would do these parties where she blindfolded the men, asked the women to take their tops off, and the men were spaced to identify the women by their breast shape. And then she would do the reverse for the women, where she would apparently,

blindfold the women and then the women would spend some time with a member of the male anatomy and they would try and guess which one it was, which man it was. And we know this, dare I ask, how? We know this because I have friends who are at Oxford with her.

Okay. And I have another friend who is at Oxford with her who says that she would often come up to him and just put her hands straight down his pants. Did your friend who was at Oxford, this was a woman? Well, one guy told me about it and one woman told me about it. I'm not sure they did participate in them, but they talked to other people who did participate in them.

And as one person said to me, peer group pressure when you are a student at Oxford is very high. Well, when you were a student in any school. Yeah, and I would say peer group pressure continues. used to be high. It's one of those things that we think dissipates after college, but it really doesn't. Peer group pressure in the office is incredibly high. Peer group pressure, as we've seen from Epstein emails, is very high. But I just wanted to go back to Gillen for a moment, because I wonder if she is more or less likely to get a pardon. I think she was sitting there fairly optimistic

she was going to get a partner. Let's go back. I mean, you were going to read, but perhaps you should do a reading of her saying nothing. Well, I thank you for asking. I think I could do that. So this is Speaker 1. The time reads 10, 14, and the majority's time will begin now. Miss Maxwell, were you a close friend and confident of Jeffrey Epstein? And Ms. Maxwell goes, I would like to answer your question. But on the advice of counsel, I respectfully decline to answer this question. And any related questions, my habeas petition is pending. in the Southern District of New York, I therefore invoke my right to silence under the Fifth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. And then she does this again when she's asked, Ms. Maxwell, did you at any time play any role in Jeffrey Epstein's activities involving the recruitment, grooming, or trafficking of young women or girls? I invoke my Fifth Amendment right to silence. So why is she so intent on refusing to speak? Because she invokes the Fifth Amendment like 30 times.

Well, when you, just on a technical point, you can't pick and choose your questions. In other words, if you're going to invoke your Fifth Amendment right, you have to do it for everything. Oh, you do? It's just consistent. I didn't realize that. You can't say, oh, I'll answer that, I'll answer. You know, that's that. And if you do answer one line, that can be interpreted as waiving your Fifth Amendment right. So it's just everything you have to do there. Okay. Well, she certainly pulled it on this one.

You know, I think that the, that, I mean, I think she was in a difficult legal position, which is that she gave this testimony to Todd Blanche in the fall. And no, in the summer. In July. In July. Yes. And, you know, and that was a setup. And let's recall the context here.

The Wall Street Journal published. a birthday letter that Donald Trump had written to, had written to Epstein, and which was included in a birthday book prepared for Epstein on his 50th birthday, 50th birthday? Yeah, I think so. 1993. Yeah, because she got the idea. No, it's his 50th, I think, because didn't she get the idea from her parents whose 60th

birthday party she'd done? Yeah, but it was 1993. So it would have been his, actually his 40th birthday. Okay. I can't do math at the moment. I haven't had enough sleep. But at any rate, at any rate, it was a letter of, you know, a semi-salacious letter hinting at dirty deeds they might have done together.

Highly, if not, incriminating, certainly not helpful to Donald Trump. he immediately denied ever writing that letter, although the entire birthday book has come out, filled with a hundred or more such letters, and he is the only one who denies writing his. And Peter Mandelson, the British ambassador to Washington, got fired over his. And we can come on to that more because he's almost brought the entire Labour Party down with him. Exactly. So, but at any rate, the White House immediately is assumed this letter was leaked by the Maxwell camp. Lawyers, family, we don't know. Somewhere, somewhere it came from Galane Maxwell, who was in possession. She had organized this book of this book of letters. So this makes

complete sense that it might have come from her. The White House panics. They send top Blanche, the number two in the Justice Department and Donald Trump's former personal lawyer, down to Florida to interview Galane Maxwell about, well, really about, about what she knows about the Epstein case, but probably more specifically what she knows about Donald Trump and the Epstein case. She, and what she says is, I love Donald Trump. He, I never saw. him do anything. He's the most upright person I've ever met and on and on and on. And I think she offered, didn't she offer him congratulations on being elected president? It's a pay on to all things, Donald Trump. So, and then she's, after that, she's immediately

moved to this more comfortable prison. And we, and the assumption is that more things are, More good things are coming her way from the Trump White House, most notably a pardon. And considering all of the other people he's pardoned, why not Galane? Especially because she's delivered something for him. Most of the other people just deliver money, but she's delivered something potentially greater than money. An exoneration on the issue that has most tenaciously dogged him. Epstein, Epstein. So that happens. And then these files are released and she's called to testify before Congress. Now, that puts her in a difficult position because she doesn't know what Congress

has. She doesn't probably know what is in these. Nobody knows what's in these three million, these three million new pages, three million on top of the last million. So she could very much be caught in what's called a perjury trap. And the one thing she doesn't want to do is be caught in a perjury trap, but the other thing she doesn't want to do is to be caught in a situation where she has to backtrack on what she has already offered given Donald Trump because she is still counting on a pardon. And of course, one of the things that did come out in the 3 million

files was a note that had gone from Donald Trump to the chief of the Palm Beach police after Jeffrey Epstein had been arrested the first time. So Donald Trump's sort of riding on the back of it, saying that Gillen Maxwell is an evil woman. So when he later says, and I think this is recounted in one of your books, oh, she's, you know, she seems like a nice girl. I wish her well. he seems to be having his cake and eating it both ways too because he knows she's got stuff on him. But remember the 2000, so he says that evil remark in 2006, right? Right, right.

But that is off the back. Remember, as I've recounted here, Epstein believes they have this fight over this piece of real estate in Palm Beach in 2004. Epstein believes, and in that Epstein, Epstein bids $36 million for a house. He takes his friend Trump to advise him on moving the swimming pool, that old thing. How do we move a swimming pool? That's always impacted you that moving the swimming pool.

And then Trump goes around his back and bids $40 million for the house. Epstein believes Trump doesn't have $40 million. Therefore, he's fronting for someone. Epstein threatens lawsuits, threatens to go to the press, and at which point Epstein believes, and as he said, Trump dropped a dime on him to the Palm Beach police because Trump was fully aware and had been for quite a number of years what was going on at Epstein's house. So therefore, they got into this terrible, terrible fight with each other. So it sounds to me like, this 2006 statement is just part of that. He's had, they've had this breach in this, in their long friendship. They are now enemies. You know, there's nothing that creates such enmity between a certain kind of guy,

rich guys as a fight over real estate. So, um, I read that at this point as more of that, of that, um, of that campaign, specific campaign that Donald Trump is now engaged in against Jeffrey Epstein. So the other thing that Glenn Maxwell has in jail is happily a puppy because I think they train puppies perhaps for the blind or for socially anxious people. Anyway, she has a puppy, but she may need that companionship because I can't believe that she's going to be near to getting a pardon. I mean, perhaps she gets a pardon on his way out of the door. Yes, well, of course. But even that. That's a, that's a, that's a, three years away. In jail for 20 years. So if she gets a pardon in

three years from now, two years from the, or whenever it becomes convenient for Donald Trump, or whenever he feels he has cover, she has, well, that's a, that's certainly a big plus for Gale and Maxwell. A big plus for Gellon Maxwell. And of course, the fallout for Epstein continues. is Kathy Rumler, the General Counsel at Goldman Sachs, lost her job. The CEO of D.P. World, which is a company that owns lots of ports around the world and overseas ships coming in and out that's lost his job. Ports. Ports are a very important nexus in international, in the movement of international money and power. And I once went, had dinner with Jeffrey Epstein in his, in his, in his

apartment, apartment in his 20,000 square feet in Paris on the Avenue Fouche, Fouche, Fouche, Fouk. Avenue Fouche, I think. In a place where nobody lives except, except wealthy Americans. No, not even wealthy Americans. I think it's mostly Middle Eastern. It's the entire street is dark all the time because nobody actually lives there. But at any rate, I had dinner there with Jeffrey Epstein and the guy who runs the port of Djibouti. Oh, I remember you telling us this. Yes.

And that must be, I think the port of Djibouti, all ports are dubious places. But this port, the port of Djibouti, may be the most dubious place in the world. Billions, trillions of dollars goes through these places. Yeah. Well, the other thing I was hoping to do, and I haven't been able to, because I haven't yet left the house, was don a blonde wig and do my impression of Pam Bondi, losing it, losing it in front of the oversight committee, with a whole row of victims sitting behind her. And she appeared to have entirely lost the plot on who her audience was. I guess her audiences were always saying was audience of one. But this was a, if she'd been going after CEOs, if she'd been going after bankers, it would be one thing.

But to go after the victims of Jeffrey Epstein felt very misplaced. Yeah. Well, obviously it was. But if your audience, if you have an audience of one and that person is the president of the United States is Donald Trump, who just wants to see you attack, attack, attack, then I think she's probably, she comes out on the plus side of this. if the plus side is just pleasing this one person. I don't know what happens to any of these people when the focus of their lives and careers involves pleasing other people

who they have all radically displeased. Right. Well, it was a fascinating performance. I mean, I wasn't sure, and I wrote a column to this effect, because I suddenly felt very hyper after the operation and I needed to hammer something down. But I wrote a brief column for The Daily Beast on whether or not she'd actually miscalculated with Trump

because Trump doesn't like nasty women and she came across as very nasty. In your absence when I was doing this podcast the other day with Hugh Docherty, the great executive editor of The Daily Beast, I've totally forgot to thank him for holding my place. Thank you, Huey. And we talked about your column and I disagreed with it. Oh, good. Good. Well, we can have another fight about it.

I really felt, I mean, you're absolutely right. Trump does not like uppity women and he does not like women who don't smile, as we all know. And he does not like women who are not submissive, except when they are acting on his behalf. Then they become, then he really likes a ferocious woman. You know, all the prosecutors that he's appointed, I mean, he likes actually. he likes actually, I mean, his ideal woman is a woman of Kearney, a comely, or as he would say, hot. I guess there aren't too many people who say comely anymore. Right. It's a very 19605 word, which is his favorite place. Well, he doesn't say it. I say it. Oh, you say it?

He says hot. Yes, he has never said comely. He would look at, if you said comely to him, he would look at you. strangely. But, you know, he likes a very good-looking lawyer who is submissive to him, but who is capable then of going into court and blasting everyone who he believes ought to be blasted. So I think she comes out on top here with him. I thought we ran and the Beast a very good piece of once again Pam showing her pre-organized insults for me. people, which seemed she was sort of shuffling them around. And it was either you were going to be a

loser politician or you were a failure, which I liked. I wondered on his phone calls, though, when he calls afterwards to get. Let me just, well, maybe you're getting to that. Sorry for the Well, I was just going to say, what, do, did you just apologize for interrupting me? That's never happened before. You're only doing it because I'm back having had an operation. It's a, it's a moment of sympathy, I'm going to eke out for some time. I wondered on his calls when he's calling to ask how it plays whether or not anybody said, oof, she was a bit over the top. That wasn't advisable.

No, they would only do that if he called them and said, do you think she was a bit over the top? But what I was going to say is those insults. Some of those come from him. He calls ahead of time and says, I want you to say that that person is. is, you know, is this or that. You know, say that person is, you know, pick your insult. Right.

A loser politician to Thomas Massey. Right. So fascinating. Well, it'll be interesting to see what the, I mean, the victims must be beside themselves after that. It was just a shocking display. And I don't know. I mean, it was just horrible. And a word now from our sponsors, gratefully.

And Michael Wolfe and I are both here inside Trump's head. Meanwhile, Casey Wasserman has put his agency up for sale. Casey Wasserman, who is the chairman, who's the chairman of the 2028 Olympics in L.A., who lost two of his clients because he has a big sporting and talent agency, lost Chaparrow. Did you know who Casey Wasserman was before this? I did because he's a big figure in L.A., and I know people who know him. and obviously Lou Wasserman was his grandfather who started MGM. Yeah, one knows who Lou Wasser.

I've never heard. I mean, there's a lot of these people in this whole Epstein thing who are suddenly prominent figures who I've never heard of, who most people have never heard of. Poor Cathy Rumler, for instance. Right. Kathy Rumler, I didn't know until... Yes.

Well, except that she was Obama's general counsel. Yeah, but nobody knew who. Who do you, you know, who's Trump's White House counsel now? Do you know? No. You know, there is a formal position in the White House, you know, the White House counsel. But it's an important position, but it's a position that nobody really necessarily knows who holds it. Right.

And you certainly don't know. A whole list of these people, you know, who is this guy? Who is this Tish person? I mean, one knows the Tish is because. because they're billionaires in New York and in fact maybe his sister or cousin or somebody is now the police commissioner. Jessica Tisch.

But Steve Tisch, who knew? Again and again, this is this, this interesting thing. And I guess it turns out that these people are all wealthy. But, you know, there's some guy, some left, some lefty who goes around. He has a lot of, he has a particular notable hairdo, kind of like Donald Trump. And he talks in talking about now the Epstein class, which has become a kind of. That's interesting. The Epstein class is a whole group of them.

Yeah, it's a kind of a kind of trope. Although, but, but, but, but a lot of these people we have never heard of. And the other thing about the so-called Epstein class, which is, I think, not commented upon enough is actually how different all these people are. What was, I mean, the real question or one of the central questions about Jeffrey Epstein is how did he attract these people across such a wide spectrum? From the chair of the Nobel Peace Prize to the General Council of Goldman Sachs, although she wasn't that when they met. I think she was still Obama's chief counsel when they met, right? Yes, I think so. Which is, and then you've got Leon Black and you've got Larry Summers. But then you have Noam Chomsky, you have Woody Allen.

New Chomsky seems the least likely of it. I remember studying his books at university. There's a whole set of not particularly likely people in this mix. I mean, you can call them a class, but really, you know, there is the Dalai Lama, although the Dalai Lama seems to be protesting that he wasn't really there. But I believe that I saw the Dalai Lama at Jeffrey Epstein's house at a at a UN week gathering. Well, and it's possible he went without realizing he was at Jeffrey. So sometimes if you're caught up in a sort of moving feast of people at something like the UN General Assembly Week, you might go to a reception at someone's house with actually without knowing who it is.

Possible. But then I remember Jeffrey Epstein talking about a dinner with the or that either he had or was organizing with get this, the Dalai Lama, Noam Chomsky and Woody Allen. We could do a Broadway play. That's a hit play. Yeah, that is a hit play. And also then you have Deepak Chopra, and you've got Peter Ateer, who's become an unlikely spokesperson for free speech at CBS.

No, and then you have the whole technology community. Right, right. And the finance community, and then Les Wexner. What is he doing in the middle of all this? Right, and then you have the international community, possibly Putin, the guy who runs the port of Djibouti. Peter Mandelson. Peter Mandelson, who was the business minister and called Jeffrey Epstein when he knew that Gordon Brown,

the then prime minister, would be stepping down the next day. And then we discover that Peter Mandelson called Gordon Brown, the British Prime Minister, smelly. I mean, these strange juvenile nicknames they had for each other is so strange. And then, of course, you're in the middle of it, writing it all down. Yeah, no. Writing it all down. No, I mean, I was in the middle of it because, I mean, for, I mean, certainly one reason to have a front seat at this most extraordinary story, possibly the most extraordinary story of our time.

And again, this thing, how were all of these people brought together by one man? And how did he persuade them to do what appears to be, in some of their cases, illegal things and also very foolish things? Well, I'm not sure that we've seen. I mean, that's one of the things in these three million pages, a lot of embarrassment, a lot of. lot of things that people would not want to be heard to say, to say, but not a lot, at least not transparently, a lot of obviously illegal behavior. We don't see that. It may be there. People are going through this now with a still with a fine-toothed cold, and these are three million pages, so we don't exactly know. But most of what we've seen is not illegal. Yes,

embarrassing. Yes, foolish, yes. Bad judgment. A lot of bad judgment we're witnessing. Yes. I mean, bad judgment in hindsight, but also, of course, prompting the question, what is in what is in most people's email? I mean, that's the other, the thing, the nature of the medium to see, to see all of these conversations which were clearly not designed, not to be not to be seen, were written. off the cuff, we're written to please him, we're written. I mean, we all know the context in which emails that we would rather not be, have exposed, are, are written. The emails I find the most disturbing are the ones from Jess Taley, who was at J.P. Morgan, and then Jeffrey Epstein helped him get a job as CEO of Barclays Bank, where they, you know, Jess Taley's

said, oh, I don't have any emails with Jeffrey Epstein, and then miraculously, 1200 emails surfaced in which there were various conversations about Snow White. And, you know, will there be another Snow White? Will I see Snow White again? How Snow White? Which is difficult to interpret other than, as I'm assuming, some sort of young virgin. It's also grim. But there is serious stuff going on at the same time. I mean, the other thing that I kind of woke up to was the closing of El Paso Airport. I think this is an extraordinary story. I think this is a story that's not going to go away. I think it's a story that is, that is, gets to the heart of the entire Trump administration, which is, and on the one hand, an absolute bald, audacious willingness to.

to lie about anything, to even lie in the face of knowing that you're going to be caught, lying. Right. Lying in the face of video evidence that we see is not what you're talking. Yeah. I mean, it's just, it's, it's, I can't, I find it almost inexpressible in its, in, in, in the transparent view into this. and into what these people are thinking. And the other aspect of it is their rank, utter, astounding incompetence. So this whole thing about the Defense Department giving this anti-laser drone fighter to Homeland Security, who then gives it to customs and the customs and border people, in the face of the FAA saying, don't do this.

This is dangerous. And this is to fight the cartels, right? That is some kind of laser. Theoretically. Who knows? I mean, it also sounds like little boys with a weapon. We want it. We want it.

Who's going to do it? Who's going to fire it? We want to fire it. And the FAA saying, no, there are airplanes up there. This is dangerous. And the defense homeland customs and border people then utterly ignoring the FAA, taking this weapon, firing it anyway, not at a drone, it turns out, but at a balloon. The FAA freaking out and then closing the airspace for 10 days. Then the White House ordering, then the White House saying, no, it was a drone invasion from the cartels, which was.

and that lie will be exploded within minutes. And then ordering the FAA to reopen the airports. And we still don't know if this is safe. In whose hand the anti-laser drone is now lies. Who's holding it? When will it be fired again? Will it be fired again? And this pictures, you know, two old Fox hosts together,

Sean Duffy in charge of transport and Pete Hegzeth in charge of the Department of Defense slash war, two people that may have been fine as weekend co-hosts but have no business running a government department. No business. Sean Duffy, whose loudest proclamation has been that we should all dress up when we fly. Right. But they're on opposite sides now, which is that other interesting thing, which is, It seems logical that we could look forward to, and perhaps it is happening now, of the people inside of the Trump administration, whose whole point in life is merely to be loyal to Donald Trump, now find themselves at odds with each other. That's when things really start to fall apart. And once more, a commercial break. The Trump author Michael Wolf and I are rambling around inside Trump's head. And meanwhile, we've got Don Lemon, who, again, they've lied about why he was arrested.

Another good, good example. We have these lies. We have the lies in Minneapolis. Bald lies and lies that were almost immediately proved to be lies. Then Don Lemon gets arrested. You know, everybody in the White House is cheering, you know, make lemons from lemonade. or whatever they were saying. And then that now, there's now video evidence of that. No, they lied about that. That's going to be. So that will be thrown out.

And all they will have accomplished is to elevate Don Lemon in his new social media life. Right, right. And then we've got, I mean, I was lying in my hospital bed going over all the things that have not been resolved. So the East Wing not being resolved. Kennedy Center is it ever going to come back? No, you know, there's new plans that were just released on the East Wing. Oh, really? Which you should look at.

And it's, I mean, the, so the East Wing will overshadow in every respect, the White House itself, will block the White House from view. It is as bad as it could possibly be, as vulgar as it could possibly be. as inappropriate as it could possibly be, as, you know, dumbass as it could possibly be. And I wonder if the next president, depending on who she or he is, takes it down. Well, you can't. I mean, that's what Donald Trump is, counts on here. You can't, you build these things. Donald Trump is built a lot of rotten buildings in New York that are still there. decaying, nobody takes them down.

And again, you know, it's like the Kennedy Center thing, as we've discussed. You know, you remake these things, you tear them down, you remake it, and you, it's just, you can't remember what was there before. Right, what was there before. I mean, the past is very fragile, and, you know, and you wipe it away, it doesn't come back. Right. I was also remembering his story that his uncle taught the Unabomber, which just came out of nowhere. I mean, you know, and he said, oh, yeah, my uncle, very smart guy, used to teach the Unabomber.

And what's going on inside Trump's head that he comes up with these stories? And I understand exaggerating when you're a teenager or even maybe when you're in your 20s and you're trying to impress someone. But when you're the president of the United States, hey, you shouldn't have to try and impress anybody. and B, you're going to be caught out and the sort of brazeness of it, the terrible birthday parade. Again, but this is this is this is the point and it's the serious point and it's the point that nobody can quite get their heads around this willingness to remake reality and then to insist upon it and not in any way to be caught out having done it. You know, the election, the election was stolen from him. Well, we know that it wasn't stolen from him. We know he didn't win.

Everybody knows. Literally, everybody but possibly this one person knows that he lost the 2020 election. But no. I mean, it's either this remarkable ability to stay in character or he's a crazy man. I mean, he has departed from reality. Yeah, and Tulsi Gabbard is supporting him. him in that. And then we had the paving over of the Rose Garden. But that's one of the interesting things. She is not. She knows. I mean, let's,

she knows that they lost the election, but she's going through the motions. All of these people who say this, they know, they're perfectly well aware. Which makes it even worse. Which makes it even worse. And is all his failed investigations against James Comey, against Tish James. I mean, it's just the incompetence is stagnant. It's staggering. Without question. But the larger question is, does the incompetence have a purpose? So it is incompetent to say prosecute these enemies when with any reasonable thought, you would understand that these prosecutions are not going to go forward.

They are going to be thrown out in court. But what is the effect anyway of even insisting that this administration and then taking the steps to prosecute these people? Well, you know, obviously, obviously fear, obviously. And in this other sense of the world divides between Donald Trump and the people who are not. not on his side. So he makes this. This is the the thematic point of this administration over and over and over again. And this willingness, you know, this all or nothing sense, I am going to do it. And I am willing to risk everything to do it, to be the guy who comes out to break the establishment or be broken by it. And that is that that is still the thing.

the stakes that are going on here and going on now into this election year, I mean, this is again very real. He creates this existential structure that he understands that in order for him to succeed, everybody else must be defeated. Everybody else must die. And he understands how high the stakes are because if he doesn't succeed, he's going to die. So this is a, this is a I mean, we are in this all or nothing, a, you know, a radical, dangerous, mortal condition. A radical, dangerous, mortal condition. Okay. Well, on that note, I think we need to turn to our in-house limerickster.

Garfried, Garfried, you kept me sane when I was reading several of your limericks. The lawsuit, this is the first limerick, a reporter named Wolf caused a stir, suing Melania, bold as it were. With Epstein's dark past and questions amassed, amassed, he's demanding sworn answers from her. Very good, I thought. And then, there's another one, which is one on the same theme, from someone called Helms Park, 2675. Once was a model called Nouse, who hid the route to her spouse. But a wolf called Michael ended the cycle with lawsuits of cat and mouse. Very good. Thank you.

All right. So what's the latest? Has anything happened since you spoke to Huey? Well, now we're just so papers are filed. We are now waiting for, and there's, I actually had a long discussion with my, with my lawyers yesterday. And I confess that sometimes in these discussions, I lose the procedural plot of what happens next

and this happens in order for that to happen. And then this happens. And then there's a ruling, I think. But to jump beyond that, it is, we're at the point where the judge in federal court has to make two decisions. two crucial decisions, whether to dismiss this whole case, which they've asked her to do. And just this judge is a Trump appointed judge. We have no reason to believe that she is not in any way anything other than fair-minded, but she is a Trump-appointed judge.

So she will do that. She can dismiss this. I don't know. I don't know how, but that would be her prerogative. And then we would go to the Second Circuit and appeal that. But the other question is that she can send this case to Florida, where they are on stronger. They believe that their law is more on their side. and they probably believe they have more juice with the federal bench in Florida.

So, and then there is actually a third thing that she can just remand the case to where it began, which is in state court in New York. And, oh, and then there is another thing, which she could, because we are saying, and we have laid this out very specifically, here, all the evidence that indicates that Melania Trump is a citizen of New York. She may have a driver's license in Florida. She may vote in Florida, but she spends her time in New York. All her connections are in New York, or as they say, her heart is very clearly in New York, as is her body. And, but if the judge does not accept that on the face of what we've presented,

then we have asked for the judge to approve discovery, which is then that we can go through all of the documents of Melania Trump's life to show where actually she spends her time and has invested her heart. So that's what we are waiting to hear. I don't get any clear sense of how long this will take, but I suppose the next number of weeks we will have some kind of initial resolution. And I did see that Huey had referenced the piece in Puck talking about how actually this could turn out to be an incredibly important case. And it's been simmering away on the back burner, but suddenly people are beginning to pay a time.

attention. Yeah, I mean, totally. I mean, it is remember. And, you know, there's another thing that happened, you know, I think yesterday there were reports that the federal government is asking the social media platforms to identify the accounts that are anti-ice. I mean, let's just think about this for a second. This is a kind of a kind of brazen. you know, we don't give a fuck effort to go to inhibit free speech, not only inhibit free speech, but to identify the people who are speaking and then to go after them. So we are among all of the other things going on with this administration. The, it's efforts to inhibit expression. and free speech are kind of should be at the top of the list. And this lawsuit of mine becomes potentially a way to fight back against this, to hold them to account, to use the law, to say, no, no, no, no, no, no. You can't.

There are laws against this kind of intimidation. Well, and also it's the thing that all these Silicon Valley guys say, which is that therefore the freedom of speech is sacrilege, nothing must come, nothing must interrupt that. And then, of course, it feels very different when they're presented with a demand from the Trump administration. It would be very interesting to see who stands up. I mean, again, in this Trump way of turning things on, you know, of creating this inverted reality, yes, we think that social media platforms should not regulate. speech. And that now gives us the wherewithal to see the people who are saying the things

that we don't like and we're going to get them. Right. Right. Oh, goodness me. All right. Well, Michael, I think I need to retire back to bed, actually. That's quite a lot of stimulation for one morning. We will be back on Tuesday, of course. And thank you to, thank you to everybody who left comments. please continue to leave comments about anything we've spoken about today, particularly if you know what you could catch off a toilet seat if you're snorting, cocaine or anything else that you happen to be snorting that our Health and Human Services Secretary is done. So the good news is we have so many Bee Beast tier members now. There are too many names to read out.

And we really appreciate your support. Thanks to our production team, Devin Rodgerino, Ryan Murray, Rachel Passe, Heather Pissarro, Neil Rosenhaus. Want more great listens? Check out our comedy podcast, The Last Laugh, and our star-studded The Daily Beast podcast at the Daily Beast.com slash podcasts. If you enjoyed this episode, consider becoming a Daily Beast subscriber. Subscribing is the best way to feed the beast and support all of your podcasts as we cover

what might become the darkest timeline. Head to the DailyBeast.com slash membership slash podcast and sign you. up today.