The Daily Beast Podcast - Truth About Trump’s Miserable Mar-a-Lago Christmas

Episode Date: December 28, 2025

Michael Wolff joins Joanna Coles to peel back what Christmas looks like inside Donald Trump’s carefully staged world at Mar-a-Lago — a holiday less about family and warmth than performance, attention, and control. From the bored, rope-off table at the center of the patio to Trump’s late-night torrent of Truth Social posts, Wolff maps how even Christmas becomes another arena for validation. They examine Melania’s rare flash of animation beside her father, the eerie surge of hyper-religious messaging from Trump-world, and the rituals that feel rehearsed rather than heartfelt. As the conversation widens, they trace how sagging TV ratings, Hollywood power plays, and proximity to Trump himself still dictate the action around him. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Where are we on the Epstein files? Among the things that we certainly know is that Donald Trump's friendship with Jeffrey Epstein was much closer than anything he has ever represented. And that, I'm trying to be careful here, Donald Trump was involved in Jeffrey Epstein's lifestyle. Michael Wolfe. Joanna Coles. Merry Christmas. Thank you.

I was going to say happy Boxing Day because we're recording this on the morning of the 26th. And Boxing Day is your holiday. It's not our holiday. What is Boxing Day? Boxing Day is a British tradition because in grand families, like if, you know, think Downton Abbey, obviously the staff were working flat out all Christmas Day

to provide a suitably opulent Christmas feast. And so Boxing Day, after they cleared up and swept up from the family, Boxing Day was the day they got off and they could unbox or they could open their gift, which was extra money from the family they worked for. I once went to actually a Boxing Day dinner at a grand house in your country. And I've remembered it ever since. It was like this is what Christmas. This was what Christmas should be. This is what families gathered around welcoming other people into their midst should be. So go figure.

Okay, well, usually Boxing Day people go, there's a lot of hunting on those big families. You know, there's often a Boxing Day hunt. No, this was actually after the hunt, which I did not go on. Okay. Was it a hunt with horses or was it a walking hunt? I believe it was a walking hunt. Okay, okay. Well, I will say I didn't grow up doing that, but I have done it occasionally, and it's enormous fun.

And then you get a flask of something called bullshod, which is basically bouillon with or broth with vodka or alcohol of your choice. I had made signals that I would have liked an invitation to this hunt, but no one invited me. I was ignoring about this, yes. Because people will be terrified at the idea of you having a shotgun in your hand. I mean, this is a man who can't drive. You can barely walk 200 yards when you're like, where am I? Where am I? So I think it's better not to give you a shotgun.

That would be my... Anyway, it's boxing day. And how do you think it is waking up on Christmas morning at Mar-a-Lago? We know the president was there because we saw him looking, quite bored at Christmas Eve dinner. Thank you to all the people that posted their videos of Mar-a-Lago, which we watch with enormous interest. Well, then he apparently spent Christmas Eve night posting on Truth Social,

I think over 100 posts. So I assume that he sat up in bed and just went crazy. So we saw him having dinner on the Mar-a-Lago patio with Melania, first lady, lest anybody needs reminding, because she's not there very often, and his father-in-law, Victor Canavs or Navs,

who I find a fascinating character. He's only two years older than Donald Trump. He's like a smaller squatter version of Donald Trump in terms of Melania marrying her father. But what a journey he's had. I mean, he grew up in communist Czechoslovakia

and was a car dealer, so presumably dealing larders. And as did Melania grow up in communist Eastern Europe. Right. But Melania spent less of her time as an adult under communism. And here Victor Navs is sitting opposite the president of the United States who's miraculously married his daughter.

And there he is at Mar-a-Lago. What an incredible journey. No, well, you know, I mean, it's a whole subtext. of contemporary history, the women, the Eastern European women, who became models, who went to the West. And all, you know, I think that was part of the goal was to try to marry someone and improve your station. Well, and indeed she did. She definitely improved her station. But what was notable about the videos that people were posting from, the event and I think this was a combination of members and people who were serving at the event

was how animated our first lady looked with her father when we are not used to seeing her looking remotely animated. And just to set the scene, so they are on the Mar-a-Lago Terrace, I imagine it's about 75 degrees. It is filled with other members. We're in the high season now, actually. It's peak palm beach. Yes, and why these people are not having their Christmas Eve with their families, we can only guess. But Donald Trump is where he always is at the table in the center with a red rope around his table.

Now, why there is this red rope around his table? It's kind of confusing because the table is right in the center of. of everything. And everyone is, I think it is clear to everyone that this is Donald Trump. The red rope is certainly not protecting him. I guess it's actually... Well, maybe it's like the brim of Melania's hat. It gives him a sort of perimeter around which you shouldn't lean in.

Yeah, I don't know. And everybody on the terrace comes up to him. It's not as if stay away. Actually, actually, it's come a little closer, is what the rope means. Well, what was so fascinating about it was that he looks very bored to be sitting with his wife and father-in-law. And then every now and then, and it's unclear if this is true, because politicians do this all the time. And I know he's not a traditional politician, but where they pretend that they see someone in the crowd and they kind of wave. And he does a lot of looking bored and then suddenly Anna.

and doing his fist, sort of holding his fist up, and pointing at people, which I'm assuming are other Mar-a-Lago guests. No, it's a Trump thing to recognize people constantly looking. You know, even I remember in the old days before he was done or before before there was any possibility that he would be the president of the United States, I used to see him out in New York on occasion at night. And because we were acquainted at some minor level, when in rooms of strangers, he would see me, as I say, a minor acquaintance, and his face would light up. So that always is that strange thing about who you know, about seeing someone you know, about having the importance of. of knowing someone. The idea that you're anonymous is anathema.

That's a very interesting observation. It's a very American thing, I think. I remember there was a character who descended on London in the 90s called Michael Vermeulen, who was the American editor of GQ magazine. Who I knew very well. Right. So very entertaining character, very lively, came to an untimely and unfortunate end,

which I'll come to in a second. but one of the things that fascinated British people about him was at the time there was a club, I guess the media equivalent of Mar-a-Lago, perhaps, in the centre of Soho called the Groucho Club. And Michael would often have a booth or a table there for lunch. And he would walk round the entire restaurant saying hello to people at the tables. And people were fascinated by this because it turned out he didn't know any of these people. But he would go around, say hi to people, introduce himself.

I'm Michael Vermeulen. And it was just fascinating to British people who are like, I say, who is that fellow that just introduced himself? Because that's so culturally weird to a British person to do that. In fact, you want to be anonymous if you're British. So anyway, he came to an untimely and, unfortunately. He also, he became, he became, yes, and weight, he got to be very, very fat.

In my fact, I saw that, the arc of his of his weight gain, which was kind of extraordinary. Well, his weight game was because he fell and hurt his ankle and wouldn't get it treated and couldn't walk. You know. But he became the editor of British GQ and actually, basically under his editorship, that became an extraordinarily successful magazine, quite separate from the American GQ. True. And I noticed he would notice that we're both wearing Boxing Day casual today. You don't have one of your cardigans on. But I do have a cardigan. I don't have a blazer in honor of the fact that it's the holidays and we're doing this remotely. And talking about people losing weight, there was a fascinating article in the Wall Street Journal about the president of Beller Russe, who is trying to do a deal to come out from under sanctions. He refers to himself as the only dictator.

left in Europe. And John Cole, who is known to both of us, has been doing the negotiations between America and Belarus. But what's fascinating about it is that the President recognized that John Cole had lost some weight, which in fact you can tell in the photos of him recently. And he admitted he was on Zetbound, one of the GLP ones. And it now looks like one of the deals is going to be around the fact that they can get him some GLP1, so he too can lose weight. Now, John Cole, this is interesting. A minor note here is the husband of Grettafen Sustern. Correct. Who is the old Fox News. She was a legal analyst on Fox News, and then she got a prime time or maybe the 7 o'clock

anchor slot, very popular for quite some time. And Cole's lawyer has become a kind of a significant, unknown but significant Trump advisor. So he was brought in, and during the campaign, I kind of tracked his whereabouts because he was always brought into all of the the debate prep sessions. Oh, interesting. And, of course, he made his money. I used to know them at one point. And we've slightly lost touch, though I must get back in touch.

But he was known as, I think he was the first lawyer that got one of the really enormous settlements in the tobacco cases. So every year he gets an absolutely ginormous check. And they have an absolutely beautiful boat, which was the sister boat to the Honey Fitz that the Kennedy's had. Honey Fitz was John of Kennedy's grandfather, of course. Okay, thank you for putting that. But they have a beautiful old wooden vote.

And a former mayor of Boston. Right, right. Okay, we're slightly digressed. We've slightly digressed, except that John Cole turns out to be this significant negotiator. Before we leave John Coles just to give him some props here, he had a terrible fight during one of these debate prep sessions with Stephen Miller. And John Coles was on the side, relatively speaking, to the extent that anyone can be in Trump world, on the side of the angels.

And Stephen Miller was, of course, the absolute antichrist. Well, a segueing on from Antichrist, we could note that the cabinet Christmas cards this year have been unusually religious. You know, I wonder, there is a point here. So this is not just like, I mean, let's be a little more Christmassy. I mean, these are these greetings from Hegsseth. and Christenome, these great Christians of our time, are kind of extraordinary, certainly over the top, and make that assumption that this is a Christian nation,

and we are all celebrating the birth of our Savior and the government of the United States is involved with that celebration. of the birth of Jesus Christ, which is, of course, not, or as a whole bunch of people have pointed out, this is pretty unusual,

if not downright, un-American. So what's the point of this? Yes, and not, you know, I mean, the point is, again, this very concerted bow to this, to a, a, a bullwork of the conservative Trump movement, which is evangelical America.

Right. And Christian nationalism, as seen through the eyes of Erica Kirk now, and obviously a former husband, Charlie Kirk. And, you know, I say this as someone who joyfully went to Christmas Eve Mass and belted out the Christmas carols at the top of my voice. But there is something ominous, almost threatening about the message coming out from Pete Hegseth. Today we celebrate the birth of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, Pete Heseth wrote, I'm quoting from the New York Times here, may his light bring peace, hope and joy to you and your families, but somehow it seemed ominous. And then Marco Rubio, the joyous message of Christmas is the hope of eternal life through Christ, Mr. Rubio said, which feels very religious for a secretary of state.

Yeah, and of course, neither of these two men wrote these posts themselves. They ordered this up. I said, give us, go over, go over the top on Christ. Just, you know, lay it out there. Make it a, make it go full Jesus, they would have said. Yeah, and joy to the world, the U.S. Department of Labor put out a joy to the world sort of Christmas post with Let Earth receive her king. And again, it just sort of a card full of white people and harking back to a fantasy of America there never was, but of children's books. So at any rate, we know, and certainly Donald Trump was not in a candlelight service on Christmas Eve.

So what was he doing? This is what I'm trying to imagine. Donald Trump's Christmas morning. You wake up many, many people, the traditional Christmas morning is you wake up with your, with your family and exchange gifts. Can we see Donald Trump in that setting? Well, no, we cannot. No, we cannot.

So what do we think that he did? Did he have a Christmas breakfast? Did he have a Christmas burger? Well, I think he was watching television, right? He wakes up and his banks of televisions are still going because he didn't switch them off the night before. Unless someone slips into his room and switches them off for him, But we know he doesn't like people coming.

He locks his bedroom door. So he's also been up half the night truth socialing, as you say, put out a hundred posts. So he's in a sort of post-truth social sweat and probably wakes up. Yeah. And I would say. I'm certain where he is, do you think? Does you, do you think it takes him a couple of seconds to reorientate himself? Well, I don't know.

I mean, he's only ever two places. It's not as if this is, it's a confusing schedule for him. He's in the White House or he's in Mar-a-Lago. He's in Mar-a-Lago. And I think they're probably both very, very similar. I think he arranges these things to basically look the same. And he does the same thing. So he gets up and he starts, what's the most important thing to Donald Trump?

what is his lifeline calls he makes calls he makes calls he makes calls and he makes calls and um and you know he gets on the phone and he says what's happening how's it playing and which is all which is all a invitation to talk about him of course correct do you think people will have told him the truth about the ratings for the Kennedy Center honors, which he emceed this year. Indeed, he opened with a 12-minute speech, which CBS, and this is significant, obviously, because of their owned by David Ellison as part of Paramount and they're part of the deal for Warner Brothers, which I want you to come onto and give us an update with. But CBS put out its televised Kennedy Center honors without mentioning the fact that Trump has changed the name to the Trump

Kennedy Center honors and the Trump Kennedy Center. And sadly, it had a 35% dip in ratings from the previous year. You know, the thing about television ratings is they're broken down into such increments that you can always find good news. So someone would have gone through this and said we are up in the um sort of 18 to 24s or well they're probably not up in the 18 18 to 24th maybe they're up in the sort of 75 to 85 uh you know Cd counties yes some increment they would have they would have found they only good they certainly would not have gone to trump and um to announce that um um um um terrible ratings and that in that the show the show that he had emceived the this his his his his his dream i am the emcee of a network show um actually he sort of was the emcee of a network show for 14 seasons many many

years um but he may miss it he may miss it i'm sure he does but they would not have told them that this was a you were, that it was a flop, which it was. So I wonder how, how does David Ellison react to the fact that they didn't call it the Trump Kennedy Center and that they cut the president's 12 minutes speech down to two minutes given that he's hustling as hard as he possibly can for Paramount to take over Warner Brothers Discovery, which is up for sale. Okay. And let's, I mean, the, the context here, bidders for Warner Brothers Discovery. There is Netflix who is now the top bidder and has the accepted bid. Warner Brothers Discovery has announced that they will be sold to Netflix. Paramount and the Ellison family has made a hostile offer, which is to say they have gone directly

to the Warner Brothers Discovery shareholders and said, our offer is best. better. And our offer is better, not least of all, because we will have our offer approved by the Trump administration and the FCC, whereas Netflix will be tied down in regulatory issues for the foreseeable future. So that's the, that's the, that's the lay of the land at the moment. In order, though, to pull this off, of course, the Ellicons have to continue to carry favor with Donald Trump. But they have to carry favor with Donald Trump at the same time not making themselves into a universal laughing stock. Now, the other day they canceled a segment on 60 minutes about immigration, which would have likely offended the Trump administration.

And that has now put them in the crosshairs and made them not only a laughingstock, but seemed to be utter dupes of the Trump administration. Therefore, they now have to lean over in other ways not to be perceived as just lackeys, Donald Trump's lackeys. well and David Ellison's son of Oracle founder Larry Ellison says that his father is second richest man in the world second richest man in the world his father will backstop this personally with 40 I think I think he said 44 billion dollars what does that actually mean well he said I mean I think well yes that that's the language that they use a personal that he will personally guaranteeing well yes that he will personally guaranteeing well yes that he will personally guarantee we don't know what that means.

I mean, a personal guarantee in a technical terms is that you put up the following collateral against this. And if for some reason you renege on this debt, well, you know, tough luck and we come and take your property and that's it. We don't know if that's actually what's going on. and it just could be a personal guarantee. I personally guarantee it.

And if you don't put up the clatter of... He could be guaranteeing it with his islands in Hawaii. Yeah, well, or nothing. Or nothing. Just to trust me. Yes, I guarantee it. Trust me. So we don't know. Is Trump in a difficult situation here?

Because we know that Ted Sarandos, the co-CEO of Netflix, went to see Trump and Trump gave him a favorable report. but we also know that he's that Larry Ellison is part of the TikTok deal that Donald Trump has brokered. So, and we know that at one point Jared Kushner, Trump's son-in-law's private equity company affinity partners, was going to be part of the Ellison deal. Then he dropped out. So if you had to put money on this at this point, who would you say ends up with Warner Brothers? And just part of the background here.

is that all three companies, Paramount, Netflix, Warner Brothers Discovery, have hired virtually anyone they possibly can in the Trump orbit to advise them. So it's a-competing advisors? A long list of Trumpers trying to, well, each of them trying to make money off of this deal. but with their function being to represent what each company's interests to the President of the United States. And who said he wants to be involved in the decision too? Yeah, no, I think what you're seeing is an auction. Now, in theory, this should be the company that should win this deal is the company that should

offer the shareholders of Warner Brothers Discovery the most money. That's how that's how mergers and acquisitions work. That's how ultimately a hostile takeover, the only way a hostile takeover works. I'm offering more money. Therefore, the shareholders should vote for us. But there's a third, in this deal, a third element. And it is who is going to offer the best deal to Donald Trump. Right. That's so interesting. I think that's what's going on right now. Trump is conducting an auction. And it will be, you know, does Paramount,

does Paramount deliver something advantageous to Trump or does Netflix deliver something even more advantageous to him? And of course, what's fascinating, the media is the character of Barry Weiss, who squeezed in the middle here between her owner, David Ellison, who bought her own startup, the free press, installed her as editor in chief of news. And of course she made the decision to drop the segment about America

sending people to the jail in El Salvador under the pretext that they didn't have anybody from the government speaking to defend the policy. which internally people have been saying, including the producer of the segment, this is a political decision. Yeah, well, understand. I mean, so she took this job.

I mean, the terms of the job to be the head of a news division of a major network, the assumption there has always been, yes, you have to have a relationship and you're going to have to negotiate with, with the suits the suits who are who you ultimately report to.

But also with a great degree of independence. I mean, it's somewhat like the independence that one assumed if one became the Attorney General of the United States and ran the Justice Department, you had. Yes, you had a relationship with the President of the United States. Yes, there were political concerns in issues, but nevertheless, you have, you had, your independence was largely guaranteed by

tradition, if not statute and sometimes statute. And that was, that's the same as a director of a network news division. Your responsibility is, your primary responsibility is to the news, rather than to corporate interests. Now this is a fine line, and it has been crossed many times in many instances, and it always is kind of difficult to sustain. But in some measure, it has been sustained.

Barry Weiss, however, comes into this job knowing that her, independence is substantially more circumscribed than probably any other, the head of any other news division. And in fact, that's one of the reasons she gets the job. She has never run a news division. She has never worked in television. She doesn't know any of the, she doesn't come into this job equipped with any kind of, of, of experience. that would allow her to to capably defend herself.

That's the deal. And the deal is understanding that the Ellison's own this lockstock and barrel. It's their money. It's their place. It's not an issue of shareholders. It's not an issue of a network that has a long tradition.

That tradition ended with the Ellison's, the Ellisons took over, it's their money. And she would have known that the Ellisons are in this battle and their allegiance is to, in order for them to win this battle, they have to cultivate Donald Trump. Therefore, it's just almost inconceivable why Barry Weiss or anyone would have taken this job, except that people are, you can say,

you might say they are ever optimistic or they are wholly craven. What was fascinating about the decision to pull the segment from 60 minutes is that no one was paying attention to the fact that it aired in Canada. I mean, again, sort of inexperience in understanding how these things work.

So the show that was essentially banned in North America becomes available in Canada, ergo it's available anywhere you want to see it online. And so Paramount's been rushing around trying to close it down, but once the cat's out of the back.

No, and I would imagine that Barry Weiss and I would imagine she's pretty alarmed about what happened, what has happened now. And I imagine the way it happened is that she got a call

and not impossibly the call was directly from David Ellison and he said, you know, get rid of this, what are you doing? Well, they've been busy advertising it all over social media too, so he may well have seen the ads for it. Yes, and he probably raised his voice and he probably was pretty unpleasant about the whole thing. I have had those calls from magazine executives when they've seen pieces that they weren't comfortable going out.

So I'm sympathetic to Barry's what I imagine is panic. And they are never pleasant those calls. And now it's on Barry Weiss. She is the her credibility, which she didn't have to begin with. And I guess was conscious that she had to build up has now taken to say the least a substantial hit. And I think it's also the nature of

the job, right? CBS News has gone through six heads of news in the last six years. So it's not a job with longstanding potential necessarily. Yeah. I mean, I can't, again, I can't imagine why anyone would take this, take this job, which is a whole kind of a subtext of many jobs. Why would anyone take a job? Why would anyone take a job in the Trump White House, for instance, knowing that if you look, I mean, we're not talking ideology here, we're talking careers, looking at all of the, pretty much 100% of the pass of the personnel in Trump's political life. That has all, for everyone, come to some form of ignominy. And now a word from our sponsors. And Michael Wolfe and I are back inside where else, Donald Trump's head on Boxing Day.

It's very hard at this point not to bring up the spectra of Rex Tillerson, who was, you know, famously the CEO of Exxon and who in fact, when he took over a secretary of state, I think with full sincerity expecting to be able to do the job, ended up being fired as he was seen. sitting on the loo. Yeah, no, again and again, you know, McMasters, who was that Goldman Sachs guy, whose name now I can't remember. Which Goldman said? Gary Cohen.

Gary Cohen survived, though. He was one of the few, and Steve Mnuchin survived. The finance guy survived. Well, Steve, I don't think Gary Cohn survived. How can you say that? He was treated miserably insulted, consulate. and ultimately pushed out. And, and, you know, he survived to tell another tale, Gary Cohn, and also he emerged as a

slight hero because he was the guy that kept taking pieces of paper off Trump's desk so that Trump wouldn't know these things, these issues even. Well, Gary Cohn has gone on to try to justify this and to make himself into a hero. If we think of Gary Cohen as a hero, it's only because Gary Cohn has said he's a hero. But other people, more objectively, would say Gary Cohn was a classic Trump overreacher and dupe. Fair. And he took the job because he knew he wasn't going to get CEO of Goldman Sachs. And where is he now? A man without portfolio.

out. Aren't we all? So we've managed to get this far without mentioning your favorite person, Jeffrey Epstein. And where are we on the Epstein files? We've still got incredibly a million files still to drop, whatever the files are. Whatever the files are. And what are they at this point? We have no idea. We have no idea here. I mean, this, I mean, this announcement, And it was oddly phrased, and we've discovered a new million files. And what does a million files means? I mean a million documents, who counted them? Who? You know, there's a thing. I mean, I think there are two themes which we ought to keep our eye on here. the one of them being that that I think the the the clear-cut strategy of the

Trump might have the White House might have been just to we're going to you know we're stuck here we got you know our Republican allies screwed us they voted for this you know this release the files business and and we don't really know what is in them And we can't really know. So the way we're going to deal with this is just a dump. To release this stuff in such a chaotic, disorganized manner, that by the time people figure out what's in them, the headlines will have, the moment will have passed,

the headlines will have passed, and we will deal with this all later on. There's just too much here for anyone to come up with a cogent picture of what happened or even any one specific instance of what happened versus so many other instances or half instances. And we don't even know if each individual document is a true document or not. We've already seen many things that are at best implausible. Well, the weird thing is some of the fake documents are getting as much attention as the real documents, which is bizarre.

But we do know that the FBI have been working overtime at a desperate call beseeching agents to work extra over the holidays went out because there's so much to redact. And we also know that this being Trump, dumps DOJ, that there is a level of incompetence in the redacting, which online hackers quickly discovered that if you just take the document that's been redacted and put in Microsoft Word, it's unredacted. Right, which is another story. That does actually doesn't, that, that, that, something else that yet distracts from this, from the, the, the, the import of, of, of, of this overall picture, or this specific aspects of this overall picture. We don't know what's going on here. Everything,

just part of the chaos. Now, there's another part of this, too, another thematic part that I think we ought to think about, which is that this idea of the very idea of release the files. I mean, that has become the thing. Release the files, and then we will know what we don't know. Release the files and all mysteries will be cleared up. the files and every conspiracy that we have imagined will be revealed. Release. And this turns out to be, as we might have imagined with any kind of forethought, ridiculous. I mean, it means nothing. Release the files means nothing means that you're going to have a sea of unvetted information. a sea of disorganized information, a sea of contradictory information that will answer nothing.

So, and you made the point that if there was an official investigation into the files, they would have had to be pre-sorted and put under themes or subject matter or whatever. What is the answer to this now? Because nobody is going to, no single person is going to be able to go through every single file. I'm sure that the big news organizations have got teams who are working on it. But how should people approach this at this point? You know, I don't know. And even, you know, it should be said that even official investigations

don't necessarily solve this problem. And we can go back. There was the Warren Commission. You can't get more of an official investigatory body than that. and all that ultimately accomplished is to define all of the parameters of the limitations of an investigation and of the holes in what we did not know. And so therefore, all of these years later, we have, in fact, we set up the paradigm for the, for, for, for, for, for, for, for the central conspiracy of our time and the model for all conspiratorial thinking.

That didn't answer the question, and I don't know what the answer to the question. How do you solve a mystery? I don't know. Well, we do know that... And it also is, you know, particularly suited to, I mean, a particular problem when, often when there is no mystery to solve,

or when you think a mystery is much greater than what is in front of your face. I mean, the Jeffrey, the mystery here is that we assume Jeffrey Epstein was at the center of a worldwide conspiracy, that he was, that he trafficked girls for the purpose of controlling, powerful men. I mean, I think that is the underlying assumption here. Well, and that he was Donald Trump's closest friend for at least 10 or 15 years, that the two of them hunted women together. And Donald Trump has denied that friendship and said that it was completely overplayed. No, and then we should look. I mean, I think so far, what do we know here? And among the things that we

certainly know is that Donald Trump's friendship with Jeffrey Epstein was much closer than anything he has ever represented and that it probably that it certainly crossed over that that that Donald Trump was involved with I'm trying to be careful here in in Donald Trump was involved in Jeffrey Ebbstein Epstein's lifestyle. Well, they hung out with models together. I mean, you're always talking about it. The models was the currency of the time.

Successful men displayed their success by being surrounded by models. So to look at, I mean, the questions are still, and we might as well, what did Donald Trump know about what Jeffrey Epstein was up to? when did he know it? In the meantime, we have an email from Andrew, formerly known as Prince Andrew, to Gillesne Maxwell, which I thought would be worth reading out, because it gives you an insight into the British royal family, which, as you know, I'm not obsessed with it, but I'm curious about anything that gives us insight into actually how they live and think as opposed to what we were fed by the palace officials.

but I thought it's not a very long one, but I thought I'd read it out. It's sent on the 16th of August 2001. I'm up here at Balmoral Summer Camp for the royal family. Balmoral is this huge grey castle in Scotland that the Queen was said to like, best of all her royal residences. And my experience of having spent a lot of time up in that area in Scotland as it's constantly raining. There's a fret that hangs over almost all of Scotland

for most of the summer. Anyway, activities take place all day and I am totally exhausted at the end of each day. The girls, that's Eugenie and Beatrice's daughters, are completely shattered, and I will have to give them an early night today, as it is getting tiring, splitting them up all the time. How's L.A., which is obviously where Gillen was living. Have you found me some new inappropriate friends? Let me know when you were coming over as I am free from the 25th of August until the 2nd of September, I want to go somewhere hot and sunny with some fun people before having to put my nose firmly to the grindstone for the fall. Any ideas gratefully received? See ya. A. It's just like... Well, let's, first, let's, let's, let's, what did, what do you think Andrew's

Christmas was like? Well, I think it was probably his last Christmas in Royal Lodge, so not good. and his brother, the king, was roundly criticized for putting eugenie, princesses, Eugenie and Beatrice very prominently in the Christmas Sandringham. The royal family go to church on Christmas morning, it's always televised, and very prominently there there was no sign of Andrew. The two princesses were front and centre, which caused an uproar in Britain. They were furious about it

because they feel that they're part of Prince Andrew's grift. So the popular view is that they should also be wiped out of this. Yeah, the popular view is that. Scrubbed from the royal list, scrubbed from getting free apartments for peppercorn rents, as they're called, in Kensington Palace, I believe. And so it backfired. The decision to, I think, say that the children are not of the man, as it were,

and that they have independent lives. And as far as we know, are perfectly decent girls. I've met Beatrice a few times. She was utterly pleasant and hardworking. Shouldn't be penalized for the sins of the father. At some point, let's have a discussion. I'm not sure how interesting it would be. nevertheless, is Andrew, what has happened to Andrew, a greater threat to the monarchy

than Charles's divorce from Diana, and Diana's then media campaign against him? Well, it's a very interesting question, because people are less tolerant of the monarchy now, and Andrews foibles, including what? one weekend where he went through apparently 40 prostitutes in Thailand while he was on official business for his mother, I think are much more egregious, obviously, than Charles apparently continuing a relationship with the woman that is now being Miller. Now we see that as much as less egregious. But then in the innocent 1990s,

that seemed to be pretty perilous for Charles and for the monarchy. Yes, I think that's true. And then Diana's death was also perilous. Do you remember the moment when the queen had to come out and stand in front of Buckingham Palace and curtsy as the funeral cortege passed by? I remember less the moment than the movie about the moment. Well, I might be remembering that too. I mean, there's the Crown, and then there's the movie.

What was the movie called? There was the Crown, the brilliant Netflix series by Peter Morgan, and then there was the movie. I can't remember what the movie was called. What was that movie called? Is it just called the Queen? Yes, it was. And Tony Blair was the primary figure in that movie.

And I think... And that was... Was he played by Michael Sheen? Well, I can see him clearly, and I know that actor, And I would recognize that actor anywhere, but I don't know his name. I think it was Michael Sheen. It was a very good movie, and there's a great moment where there's just a stag standing on its own at the top of the hill, which seemed to carry a lot of resonance.

Anyway, people were looking for something to watch this holiday season. Just that guy, the guy who played that role, he was the MC of the GQ Man of the Year Awards, when I got a man of the year award along with then the then Prince Charles. Oh, is that right? So you and Prince Charles shared a stage. Did he turn up? He did. He did.

And we had a conversation. Would you like me to repeat it? Okay. You've really buried the lead here. Yes, please. Michael Sheen. It's Michael Sheen. I was just checking.

Yes, go ahead. Michael Wolff shared a stage with Prince Charles. I need to know more. And this is what Prince Charles said to me, as follows. He looked at me up and down and then said, I know your tailor. What a great line. That's fantastic that he recognised. Do you want to give your tailor a shout out?

Why not? It's Anderson and Shepherd. Sounds pretty British. Very respected London. Taylor, who Charles, and also Charles's Taylor. By special appointment, by royal appointment. We've given great recommendations for holiday viewing, the Mar-a-Lago videos, or the Queen or the Crown. And you can look at it through the Epstein lens now.

I mean, they may have to do another spin-off of the Crown, which is just Andrew, the falling crown, the broken crown. and suits. We can recommend a really choice brand of suit. Oh, and I thought you meant the TV show suits. Now it's like what? Because it's got Megan Markle in, which is another part of the...

No, my suits and Charles's suits. Okay, all right. Okay, well, Michael, happy holidays. We've got lots in store for people next week. Very exciting. We've got a two-parter on Jeffrey Epstein, relationship with Donald Trump, where we go back to the beginning and really chronicle the chronology, I guess, of the relationship of these two men.

Forget the files. The millions have come. This is all you need to know. This is all you need to know. And once more and gratefully, a commercial break. And Michael and I are back inside Donald Trump's head. And also just reminding you, there are very few seats left for. the 21st of January,

92nd Street Y on the Upper East Side of Manhattan, where you can come and see Michael and I discussing live, whatever I guess the news of the week will be. And I will be wearing an Anderson and Shepard suit. And I will not be wearing an Anderson and Shepard suit. I've no idea what I will be wearing, but I'm glad you've given sufficient thought to it. And I guess we'll also be talking about,

it will be a year to the day since Donald Trump was inaugurated, we'll be talking about what his first year has been like. A year to the day plus one. A year to the day plus one. And the decision of all those business people to appear in the inauguration quite as prominently as they did, Jeff Bezos, Tim Cook, Sergey Brin, Mark Zuckerberg. And are they regretting that now? And are they regretting that now?

Well, happily, Jeff Bezos is enjoying himself with his big, 10-gallon cowboy hat in Aspen. And on that note. Happy holidays. Do we want to leave our viewers and readers with a religious message? We do not. We believe in the separation of church and state. So if you have been, thank you for joining us.

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