The Daily Beast Podcast - Why Trump Will Hate Melania's Cynical New Scheme

Episode Date: October 24, 2026

Joanna Coles and Hugh Dougherty expose the latest chaos swirling around Donald Trump’s White House, from Melania Trump’s stunning claim that she brokered a Ukraine ceasefire—and the potential Nobel ambitions and reality-TV motives behind it—to growing questions about the president’s health as his rallies shrink and protests grow. They also examine Elon Musk’s extraordinary power over Ukraine’s military communications, the millions he’s pouring into Republican midterm races, and a potentially explosive Justice Department investigation into Trump ally Corey Lewandowski. But the biggest bombshell may involve Jared Kushner: a new book alleges Russian hackers accessed his phone and uncovered a secret billion-dollar bank account tied to powerful Middle Eastern figures. Kushner vehemently denies the claims, but with fresh questions about money, foreign influence, and Trump’s inner circle, this scandal may only be getting started. 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. In Toronto, every arrival is a statement, and nothing says it better than this. Cadillac Optic was the number one selling luxury EV in Canada for 2025. Find your rhythm across a seamless 33-inch display and an immersive 19 speaker AKG surround audio system. This city demands agility and optic delivers with precision to make every drive extraordinary.

Let's take the Cadillac. Find out more at Cadillac canada.ca. Luxury sales claim based on S&P Global Mobility Canadian New Vehicle Total Registrations for calendar year 2025 for the Cadillac definition of luxury. We've got breaking news about the First Lady. The First Lady, Melania Trump, is telling us, in a press release from the White House, that she has secured peace. Peace in our time. Peace in the White House? Peace where?

Hughie. She apparently, according to this press release from the White House, initiated discussions with both nations and aligned the parties on the agreement's objectives, technical procedures, timing, processes and terms. And she has a new title. She is the exclusive intermediary. So, congratulations. What if Melania is trying to get a peace prize? What if Melania got the Nobel Peace Prize? What would that do for the marriage, Hugh? Well, I guess she'd have to give it to him. like Christina Machado. I'm Joanna Culles. This is the Daily Beast podcast.

It's Friday, so it must be Hugh Docky, the executive editor of The Daily Beast, whose brain is constantly brimming with stories. You can't even pass Hugh without Hugh saying, have you heard the latest? Have you heard this? And of course, we've got breaking news about the first lady. And we've also got a theory

about why she's doing it and what she's really after, it will explode her husband. If this is really her aim, her husband's head will explode. What can I say? Don't forget to subscribe to the Daily Beast podcast wherever you get your podcast. It could be Spotify, it could be Apple, it could be YouTube. We appreciate your comments. We try and read as many of them as we can.

And you can get lots of extra content by joining as a friend of the beast or joining our Bee Beast tier. Be Beast, what better way into a discussion about the latest antics of the First Lady, who as we know is always besting, be best, be Hugh Dockery, Hugh. Joanna, we have the best beast news or we have the Beast best news. We are just getting this into the Daily Beast Newsroom from where I'm joining you. And I know you have been in Los Angeles doing live, a brilliant inside Trump's head performance with Michael Wolf. It was fantastic. I wish I could have been there.

Honestly, it was so much fun to meet regular viewers and listeners. They're just full of stories. It was so much fun. So for everybody who came, thank you so, so much. We got a very nice commentary, actually, from people, A, who'd come, and B, who saw it live. And hopefully there will be more to come. Well, I tell you, there is a possible venue for you this morning, Joanna. the first lady Melania Trump is telling us, in a press release from the White House, that she has secured peace. Peace in our time. Peace in the White House? Peace where, Huey?

Well, we have a theory that this might not cause peace in the White House. It's peace in the city of Eliske. That is one of the Ukrainian cities that is under siege from Vladimir Putin's Russian forces. And the conditions in this city have been, the Ukrainians who have been stuck there are in absolutely appalling conditions. It is a siege. You know, this is not a big place, but it has similarities to the siege. the famous sieges of the Second World War of St. Petersburg, or I should

say Leningrad, I guess, but now is in Petersburg, and Stalingrad, there are people who have been trapped in this in this reasonably large town, small city on the east of the Deneper River. They've been trapped there by

these Russian forces. There are concerns that they are beginning to starve. There are, of course, horrific shellings, drone attacks on it. And Melania Trump this morning has suddenly announced that she has secured a ceasefire starting six days' time, October the 29th, in the town city of Aleshki. So, Hugh, does this mean that the First Lady has been travelling to Ukraine? Where has she organised this ceasefire from?

I have organised ceasefire. Seasfire. Well, it's always a mystery where the First Lady is, as we know, as Michael Wolfe has often spoken about. but it does not appear that she has been anywhere near this war zone. This appears to be organized from wherever she is in the United States. She, apparently, according to this, press release from the White House, initiated discussions with both nations and aligned the parties on the agreement's objectives, technical procedures, timing, processes, and terms.

And she has a new title. She is the exclusive intermediary. So congratulations. She's the exclusive intermediary. Yes. So does this mean that she's an exclusive intermediary intermediating between Steve Wickoff and Jared Kushner? And we'll be talking about Jared Kushner's business dealings a little bit later in the show. I mean, what are they doing?

What are they chopped liver at this point? I thought they were organizing it. And the first ladies come in over the top of them? Yeah, they've been, I think the management term is they've been layered. They've been layered. The first lady is now involved. And apparently, she learned about this when she was at the United Nations General Assembly. And she immediately, in her terms, leveraged the communication channel we established with Russia and Ukraine.

You'll remember that she was claiming to reunite families of kidnapped children. One of the horrific subplots of this absolutely appalling war has been UK. Ukrainian children being kidnapped by Russians, taken to Russia, and tried to be brainwashed, basically. Right. Reeducated into being Russians in quote marks. And Melania very publicly said she had been in touch with Vladimir Putin. They had discussed this issue, and she had reunited the grand total of 34 children. The Ukrainians claim that the number of these kidnapped children may number into the thousands.

But Melania says this communications channel, she was able to turn it into a planned ceasefire for Aleshki. There's a very remarkable sentence in this. Aleshki is a Ukrainian, a city in Ukraine. It's in the Kershon region. People probably heard of that city of Kershon that is on one side of the Deneper. This is on the east side of the Deneper, much more exposed to Russian forces. The people that are there are Ukrainian. Let's just be clear about that.

The country is called Ukraine. And in this area, the Russian forces have been advancing, have been trying to make advances. So we know that the people that are there are not pro-Russian. They're obviously not. They're stuck there with Russians attacking them. And Melania says that the residents who wish to evacuate will get support and transport to the preferred destination. I anticipate some will want to go to Russia and some to Ukraine. this is kind of amazing.

We're both siding a siege. That's like at the end of the siege of Stalingrad, as if somebody turned up and said, oh, do you know what? Some people will want to go with the Nazis. They'll be really into it. Or at the end of the siege of Leningrad going, oh, yeah, yeah, they're going back to Germany now,

even though they were starving and eating the cats and eating the dogs in real life, not in Ohio. So, kind of remarkable. but we do have a theory and we'll just discussed this before we went on Er Joanna. Your theory is, your theory is very interesting. Our brilliant global editorial director Nicole Hines who every week is doing a podcast with our Alison Quinn

on the Daily Beast YouTube Live is doing a live about Putin and Russia and his theory is what if Melania is trying to get a peace prize. In fact, the Peace Prize. What if Melania got the Nobel Peace Prize? What would that do for the marriage, Hugh? Well, I guess she'd have to give it to him. She'd have to give it to him like Christina Machado. He'd have two, one on each side of the resolute desk.

And neither of them would be his. Yes, it's neither of them be his. And it doesn't sound, I mean, I don't know. Is that what you want in the White House? like competing people going for the Peace Prize. It's kind of remarkable. It's very unexpected. And of course, Joanna, you also have a theory about what this is good for.

It's all copy, I think, is what it happens. Oh, yes, yes, yes. I know exactly what I was thinking, and I'll talk about this on Inside Trump's head with Michael Wolfe tomorrow, because I know he'll have theories, but I bet if I were to anticipate his theory, he would say this is all content that we know the first lady is making a reality series following on from her Amazon documentary and this sounds like it's all content. What do first ladies do? They become independent intermedia is and they're you know organizing peace treaties that their husbands can't appear to get done. It does sound strange though. This line about well and some of them can go to Russia that sounds like it must be some sort of compromise line that someone has put in for her. or a compromise line. And there is an intriguing hint. She says in this statement, I have also secured an impartial American media organization to accompany and document Russian and Ukrainian teams on the ground throughout the process. An impartial media, American media organization, I don't think, we don't know who it is yet, but I'm going to guess it's not, let's see, CNN or ABC or NBC. I'm guessing it's something. I'm guessing it's something.

somebody kind of pro-Trump. Or it might be someone that Amazon has put up, right? Assuming that this TV show is with Amazon, they may have said you have to have just a documentary team or you have to have a news team. Maybe they create them from scratch. But unless she's taking Bright Bird, I'm taking Bright Bart for my content.

A Melania, when you see this, the Daily Beast, we'd be very happy to go and be absolutely resolutely impartial. We would promise to do our best to be completely neutral. So we'll see. We'll see. Will the White House go along with that? I don't know. 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 nofrills.ca. Well, it's a fascinating story and I suspect the Nobel Peace Prize and content for her TV show are never far from her thoughts. I wonder what she is thinking, however, about her husband's latest, well, what are the, I want to say symptoms, but perhaps symptoms isn't quite the right expression. I mean, I think the only way to do this is to show the clip of what we are talking about. And, you know, all I can say to viewers and listeners is listen hard because you're going to hear three clips in a row. And there is something that links each of them.

See if you can connect the dots or figure out the connecting link. It's our cryptic clue. You know, here's a lieutenant governor. And I'd say 90% of the reason I took the governor. If you don't want communists controlling the U.S. Senate, which is between Jai, how about the gentleman from a place called Michigan? He's in there jihadist. He's a jihadist.

I don't want you to have to think too much. I'd like that you, or being. Okay. Oh. Joanna, you are brilliant at voice as an accent. Go on. Go on. Even, that stumps even me.

This is a sort of strange series of nonsensical noises that are falling out of the president's mouth, which he doesn't refer to. And of course, unfortunately, I did actually look this up. This is a symptom of encroaching dementia. It's something increasingly people do as they get older. They make strange noises, which are approximating a word, but not actually a word. And they're in the middle of a sentence. And then they carry on as if they haven't heard it.

So there's something different going on in their head to what the listener or the viewer see. So tell me what your interpretation is. Well, first of all, we have asked the White House, and we have been asking the White House for more than months. ever since Donald Trump came back to the White House for transparency on his health. What is he actually being told by his doctors? What tests is he actually doing? What medications has he actually been given?

And we don't have that transparency. It's very well known. These latest, I don't know, glitches. I mean, it sounds like Mike Myers doing glitch, glitch, glitch. These latest glitches are at a time when an 80-year-old man in already questionable physical shape is out every night in a different part of the country doing these rallies

and Trump has fed energetically off these rallies we know that for more than a decade but it has been very noticeable that he has been out in red states or in deep red territory night after night after night and let's just be honest he doesn't look great and then we have these weird

sounds glitches whatever they are, that are absolutely, as you say, they are of a pattern with cognitive problems. He looks increasingly exhausted. We have a picture up on screen now of how he was when he got back to Andrew's Air Force base. And Trump is really seen without a tie. He's got his tie off. If you're listening, he's got his tie off. And he looks kind of drawn and kind of gray.

this pretty panicked tour that is going on of red states to try to shore up the vote when indications are that there is a blue wave on its way is clearly taking a toll on him. He clearly does not look good. He is increasingly publicly angry as well. We have seen him lashing out in really troubling terms at the independence. reporter Andrew Feinberg in the Oval Office and at Caitlin Collins of CNN on the tarmac or on this new tacky landing strip that they've put in at the White House. He is angry. He is uninhibited. And then we have these noises. The one in the middle, that particularly weird noise about a jihadist, he could clearly could not remember the name of Abdul El-Said, the Democratic candidate in for the Senate seat in Michigan, who he has gone on and on about, he has really, he sees El Saeed as a useful stick to, with which to beat Democrats, you know, calling him a jihadist, accusing him of being linked to the Muslim Brotherhood. El Saeed denies that robustly. Rather obviously, if he was a jihadist, he wouldn't be running for the Senate in Michigan, just to state the blindingly obvious. But he in this, in this portion of this rally, he'd completely forgotten the guy's name.

And it was very apparent. And the noise, as you say, Joanna, it made sense to him. It didn't make sense to anyone else. Well, you do have to hand it to him for a man in his ninth decade. He is crisscrossing the country. He was in Alaska last week and back. That's an eight-hour flight there and back. I mean, most people are felled by something like that.

Obviously, he has his own plane. Is he flying in the tricked out Katari Grift Force One, as you call it? He has used both planes. He's used the new Grift Force One. In fact, he's used all three of the types of planes that are available to him. He obviously loves the blinked-up Grift Force One. He's been in the traditional 747, I think once this week, maybe twice. And also, when he goes to these red state places, sometimes these are places with smaller

airports, shorter runways, they can't land to 747. So they take the presidential Boeing 757, which is, which is, you know, one story, smaller, slightly smaller plane, it's able to land. So he's been on all of them. Okay, but once you have your own transport, traveling is completely different. He doesn't have to do what the rest of us does do, which is, you know, to stand in, in line, you know, hauling your laptop in and out, depending on which. airport you're on, and what feels like the capriciousness of the TSA is. Oh, I'm sorry, Mr. Trump, you've got a diet coke in your backpack. Yeah. Right. I'm putting your entire backpack through the metal detector again.

No, Mr. Trump, you don't have pre-check at last. That's not, where's your real ID? To make an appointment. You get up to make an appointment and see them. So he does at least have ease of travel, but nevertheless, that crisscrossing back and forth across the country is exhausting. He has to get off the other end. He's probably eating, you know, not great on the way because you're grabbing convenience foods, and perhaps he's having a McDonald's salad when he gets back on the plane. But we know that's not what he likes. So it is impressive and certainly he's doing more than Joe Biden was doing in terms of being out there. And it's also obviously clear that he

feeds off those rallies, that entertainment for him. He's, as we've said before, like, old vaudeville, you know, performer. He's out there jazz handsing it through there. That's right. He's got his makeup on. He's got his bruise covered. His showtime. Let's go. Can I insult? What funny noises can I do? How long am I going to go? Is there now increasingly as well, the protesters and the violence, which has become something of a side show at these rallies, which he says he likes? I think one of the interesting things about these rallies is, first of all, they are smaller. Let's just be clear about that. You know, those pictures, it's hard. When you see those pictures, this is, the stagecraft is designed to make it look like they are huge packed venues. The venues are

getting smaller. There is something of Sunset Boulevard here. I was just going to say it's, it's not me. It's the, right? It's the venues are getting smaller. Trump's favorite movie, by the way. He's the nomadestment of politicians. But smaller venues and more and more protesters. And one of the things that we all remember those, you know, that there have been scenes of a protester, single protester at these things in the past. And they've been very high profile because Trump has, you know, demanded violence against them, said that he will pay the bail for people who assault people. Now, that is, you know, in the past. Now, we are talking about three, four, five, six protesters at these venues. Per rally. Per rally. We have never.

seen anything like that. They are getting in, they're getting past. He claims they're paid protesters. Obviously, we have no idea if they are paid, but what they are is better at getting in, more strategic about how they do it, and they are cognizant of what it is that's relatable

to the outside world. We saw somebody who had a T-shirt saying release the Epstein files. We have seen other people who have been the victims of violence and have then come out and spoken about it. And the uphill struggle, I think, for Trump at these rallies is he's exhausted and, you know, it's all part of the vaudeville. But these protests interrupt him. They take the attention away from him. Which he can't bear.

Yeah, which he can't bear. And they're clearly a relatively new phenomenon to him. And I think he thinks he's got how to deal with them of going like, go on, get them out, get them out and insult them, you know, call them fat or whatever. But this is a new part of the Trump show and it's not one that suggests that Trump is doing that well. It's a tiny moment of reality intruding on these incredibly choreographed shows in deep, deep red territory. He's not going anywhere that is not a safe space.

And yet, reality is intruding. 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. Yes, and our reporter Tom Latcham, actually, had a good piece, I want to say last week, about the size of the rallies and how certainly, obviously in 2016, but still in 2024, Donald Trump could fill local stadia with, you know, up to 15, 20, 25,000 people. And now he's pushed to get 8,000 people. And it's become

more of a sort of entertainment. If you live in a place where there isn't very much going on, a political rally becomes something where people meet their friends. And it doesn't actually necessarily mean you support the candidate. It means that you want a night out with your friends. And you're going to see what, you know, something that's happening in the hood. And one of the other phenomena that becomes increasingly apparent here is there has always been this role, this group of people that go to every rally or to most of the rallies. And Trump actually talks to them, he calls them the front row Joe's. And that front row Joe's group is there, there's Mr. Brick Suit, there are others who are there at almost every rally. And what's

clear is they're coming from out of these states, they're traveling to go to these. You have this hardcore that are an irreducible core, but that means that this is not locals that are all coming. This is not a big local event. This is like the Rolling Stones coming to town and people traveling. We all know people who've gone to see, I don't know, Taylor Swift in Edinburgh or, oh, I'm going to London to see the Rolling Stones. I keep using British places just because people tell me them. But, you know, there are people gone to Brazil to see them. And this is kind of the same thing. That these are hardcore fans. And yeah, Trump can fill 8,000 hardcore fans when he goes to Clemson, for example. But that doesn't mean that he is incredibly popular in the wider state or, or, you know, district in which he is trying to summon support. So he's also not popular at all in Europe at the moment with the remarkable decision that we've been talking about throughout the week on the podcast with David Rothcombe and with Michael Wolf and Anthony Scaramucci.

That interview will go out on Sunday night about the decision to align himself with Putin. And there were secret calls between him and Elon Musk this week over what appears to been the debacle with Star Shield, which is part of Starlink. The Ukrainians use it to, it's part of their defense. They're trying to use it to alert them to incoming Russian missiles. It didn't work last week for whatever reason. Keev was surprised by a series of incoming missiles from the Russians. So what was the secret call about? Because Elon Musk said, oh, it was nothing to do with me. It's the Pentagon making these decisions. They decide, I just give them, you know, Star Shield and Starlink. They decide when to use it. Donald Trump said, well, I didn't know

being switched off. This is nothing to do with me. It's first time hearing of it. So what actually was the communication that we found out about? Yeah, this story is very remarkable because we have so many leaks. This is a white house that is leaking like a sieve and it is leaking titbits of gossip and agendas and facts in different directions. What we know is that Starlink has been crucial to the Ukrainians and, as you say, it suddenly switched off. We then began to get leaks that had been switched off, and I'm saying switched off, but it had been made less accessible. The critical thing with this Star Shield is that it was able to be used to track incoming missiles going above 100 miles per hour, which is obviously fairly fast.

and the Ukrainians could then use defensive drone and missile, their own defensive missiles against those. By not allowing it to work above 100 miles per hour, they could not track their own drones. They couldn't work out what was coming in. Clearly, that's much more dangerous. We got leaks that this was being done both by order of the Trump Whitehouse or by unilaterally by Elon Musk.

Now, this is complicated because Elon Musk, through Elon Musk administers Star Shield, he has the technical ability to deal, to change things in it. But he says, oh, no, it wasn't me, it wasn't me. I did it on orders from the White House. I just do what I'm told. We then found out that, in fact, Trump got in touch with Elon Musk in a secret call and said, stop it. You need to reinstate it. It's very clear. It's very clear of what's ideal on here. Even if it was not, even if he was just being orders,

he was doing that enthusiastically, tweeting about it. You know, he's going on. He's very much, very clear that he doesn't like Zelensky. He doesn't, not in favor of the Ukrainian cause. And Trump has tackled. Trump has folded to the pressure from Europe and also from Republicans. Right. I was going to say this has caused it. absolute stink within Republicans. Amazing. I mean, amazing they're showing any kind of backbone at all, except perhaps they sense them in terms, you know, 10 days away and they think we're going to

get shellacked anyway. So why not? I mean, is it possible they're thinking, why not do the right thing? Or are they feeling pressure from their constituents? I think the dramatic persona of people who are speaking out include Susan Collins up in Maine. Susan Collins, incredibly difficult race. We don't know because the polls are so tight what is going to happen. But this again emphasizes to people who are persuadable to go against Susan Collins that bad things happen with Donald Trump and she's got no control over it. So she was straight out saying we need to stop this, we need to get it back online. We need to reimpose the sanctions which were also removed or suspended against Russia.

Other Republican senators are hyper aware that they might. not be up for re-election, but people in their states are. And the perception that Trump is pro-putin is problematic. It's not a big driver of votes, but it's something that when you're talking about they are like they have to make sure to show up every available vote. You can't afford to lose a vote. That's what this is a problem. That's where this emerges. And yet, also, this is a betrayal of Lindsay Graham, who was an extremely, extremely hawkish, on this whole issue, on Russia, and extremely hawkish in support of Ukraine, it's rather obvious that he would have been disgusted and probably would have spoken out publicly about

it. Maybe it wouldn't have happened if he was still alive. So Trump phoned Musk and told him and he's to stop. The Ukrainians say it has come back a bit. It appears to be, you know, sort of getting back to where it should be. But what this exposes, first of all, is that there is a weakness in Trump that people had not appreciated. And secondly, that Elon is an actor in his own right with this military equipment that is, this is a problem. And if there's a democratic administration in the future, they still have to deal with Elon and his Starlink. And he clearly has technical control over it. Well, and there doesn't seem to be any real competition to him at the moment. I mean, you're seeing now increasingly businesses coming out and saying we're not using

Starlink. I think Delta has said that. You're seeing the Europeans saying we have to put something together that will be as effective as Starlink. Of course, he's got a massive head start. But, I mean, it also became clear this week that his funding of the midterms on behalf of the Republicans was also growing. So I think the total now is it's almost half a billion dollars that Elon Musk has himself put into supporting Republicans. in the midterms, 200 million of which at least has gone into Texas, where he has his headquarters of Tesla, of SpaceX, of whatever, however else he sort of organizes his companies. But again, this incredible power of one man.

One man. The money bomb that he has dropped in Texas, if that is the thing that gets Ken Paxton across the line, then, you know, I think many people rightly would be troubled by that, particularly troubled already, are the Democrats who are saying if we get in, we, you know, if they win in November and therefore sworn in in January, yeah, they're going to investigate Elon. He has access to the nation's most treasured secrets. He has a high-level security clearance. He has this head start courtesy of being permitted to send his rockets into space. And he is clearly very concerned. that they're going to come after him.

You know, the troubling thing about Ukraine is he has given, and let's just be clear about this, you could say he's given aid and comfort to an enemy. There's no doubt that Russia has an enemy here. And by throttling the Ukrainian's access to Starlink, to Star Shield, he's given aid and comfort. People in the democratic circles are extremely exercised about Elon's power and about the amount of money that he's dropping. And, you know, I don't think revenge is quite the right words here, but accountability would be a very tough road for Elon Musk. Well, I do hope that if he does get

Ken Paxton elected, they have to spend a lot of time together. I would like to urge Ken Paxton. In the unlikely event, he's listening to this podcast, Ken, you should just hang out with Elon the whole time. You should just become his new best friends. The two of you tooling around bars in Texas, Elon looking for more baby mamas. In Toronto, every arrival is a statement, and nothing says it better than this. Cadillac Optic was the number one selling luxury EV in Canada for 2025. Find your rhythm across a seamless 33-inch display

and an immersive 19-speaker AKG surround audio system. This city demands agility, and Optic delivers with precision, to make every drive extraordinary. Let's take the Cadillac. Find out more at Cadillac Canada.ca. Luxury sales claim based on S&P Global Mobility Canadian New Vehicle Total Registrations for Caled

calendar year 2025 for the Cadillac definition of luxury. So the other thing that's sort of fascinating is this DOJ investigation into Corey Lewandowski who was constantly flying around, talking about flying around with Christy Noem, the former Homeland Security Secretary, he became her special advisor, something that we focused on very heavily in the Daily Beast at one point, especially when we discovered that he was putting trash out from her apartment on the Sunday in D.C. That's advice too. Well, La Nome is, I think, now divorced from Byron Nome, her husband, who had his own issues and appeared to be spending the family retirement fund on Onlyfans.

What exactly is going on here? Because this appears to be the first MAGA advisor to be invested. by Todd Blanche's DOJ. Yeah, this is a real, I mean, that picaresque that you have just described, Joanna, is an extraordinary, like, sort of, I'm chronicle of our time. Corey Lewandowski is being investigated by the Justice Department after they were sent a criminal referral by the Inspector General of the Department of Whole Plan Security. Inspector generals are these independent advisors, I suppose, is one word you could use.

and they audit, they try to find out what's gone wrong. And if they find significant wrongdoing or they believe they found significant wrongdoing, then they can refer that to the Justice Department who then decide, are there the elements of a crime and should they investigate it? And that's what happened here. Can I just throw in here, I thought most of those independent investigators had been fired. I thought they've been fired in Doge. And sort of ideologically, the Trump administration is opposed to them, correct?

Yes. And this is actually, this is significant as well. The Department of Homeland Security has an inspector general who has the approval of the Trump administration. So this is not a wild liberal Democrat from the DSA that we're talking about. This is somebody that they are on board with. So Corey Lewandowski intensely devise a figure inside Faga. He has more enemies than I've had hot dinners.

he is somebody and I always have a hot dinner by the way just you know if anybody's concerned about my welfare unless it's salad anyway he is he has an intensely devised of figure he has so many enemies he was the special advisor to

to ice Barbie he was her alleged lover you'll remember of course that they had that flying boudoir if you're listening we've got a picture on screen of that bedroom in the sky up it's pretty nice better than seat 22B and you United Airlines, the idea that anybody that the Trump Justice Department investigates anybody

without them being identified as a Trump enemy is absurd. We know what this Justice Department does. It goes after Trump enemies. It goes after Tish James. It goes after the FBI, you know, goes after James Comey. It goes after people that they have identified as Trump enemies. So why a John Brennan? Why is John Brennan? Why is Cory Lewandowski being investigated? We've got to conclude that he has fallen foul of forces inside the Trump orbit, and we had a hint from Donald Trump himself when he was asked about it. He said, I don't know anything about it, as he always does. Always. He's remarkable how little he knows about anything, especially his own people. A man without knowledge. And then he said, I regard it as people stealing from the country

and stealing from me. And I think here we have the critical point. Uh-huh. that he or those around him have been briefing that Corey Lewandowski has been, in quote, marks, stealing from Trump. Now, we have no idea. We have a very robust denial from Corey Lewandowski that he knows nothing about any criminal referral and that he was always an unpaid advisor to Christy Noem and that he did nothing wrong. So I just want to put that out there, that there is a very robust denial. However, we had an very intriguing indication of what life is like inside Trump circles. Because a couple of hours after it emerged that Corey Lewandowski was being investigated in a leak, I'll just say, Joanna, a leak that is really bad for Cory Lewandowski. Two other people then announced that they were giving all the money that they had earned for advising the Russian-aligned Republic Serbska that we discussed the other day. Oh, we discussed this last week here. Yes. Chris Lasavita and James Blair had four.

blown to Republic's Bresca. I'm sorry, people gave advice in the comments and I did practice and it's very difficult to drop the E basically. So I do apologise to those who gave me advice. Thank you and I'm still trying. But they had

been very much criticised for this decision to go and cash in basically during the run up to the midterms. They suddenly announced last night that they were going to give all their money all the money that they had taken or that their companies had taken in

to the Trump Presidential Library and that it was an honor to just give that money to Donald Trump Presidential Library. That means that Trump can't accuse them of stealing from them. It means that other people in the Trump orbit can't accuse those people of stealing from him as he sees it. So it's kind of like, I mean, I don't want to use the term protection money, but I just have.

It's kind of in that direction. So we know that one of the things Donald Trump really can't bear is though he is allowed to get rich from the presidency, he can't bear it if people in his circle are seen to be getting rich or cashing in essentially of their connections to Donald Trump. And obviously one of the ways to do that if you've helped Donald Trump as Chrysler Svita and James Blair did in the election in previous elections is to go and use that expertise abroad. I think Chrysalisovita, didn't he promise to make Albania great again? He didn't even have to change the letter. It was, you know, another version of MAGA. Luckily, he went round other countries that don't begin with A. That would have been like a very, it's a small niche.

The Armenians would have been like, oh, God, he's here. Yeah, make Angola great again, make Andorra great again. There's a limited number of places he could go with that. But Donald Trump doesn't like it when he thinks that people are exploited. their connections to him to put money in their own pocket, which is presumably why these latest two have said, oh, we did make this money, but we're going to give it to the Trump library because they don't want what's happening to Corey Landowski to fall to them. And we should be clear that obviously, as you say, Corey Landowski's denied it. It appears he

wasn't paid as Christy Noem's advice. Correct. But what it does appear is, and certainly Christine Nome has been accused of this herself when she was governor of South Dakota, South Dakota or North Dakota, South Dakota, right, Doug Bergam's North Dakota, when she was governor of South Dakota is getting kickbacks on contracts. So that's how people who aren't being paid, get paid, that they facilitate a deal and they get some kind of commission from that deal. And that's the allegation that has hung around Corey Lewand-Doust, he has always denied it. We have no documentary evidence that would prove it,

but this allegation just keeps coming back and coming back. And one of the specifics of this elite was that the allegation is that he was saying to foreign governments that he would be, that he would take money from them for their interactions with the United States government. That's clearly, if true, very problematic. and amounts to much more significant level of charges against somebody that's been doing it

than just domestic contracts because we're into questions about foreign relations as well. So this leak was very strategic, it was very damaging, it was laser focused on Corey Lewandowski, and yet, the idea that, you know, let's just be clear, it's also extremely, it's a very risky leak for the Trump administration because the Democrats may be about to get subpoena power. And here, if they get subpoena power, is a paper trail through the Department of Justice about alleged wrongdoing that they can find. And if there is a democratic administration and a Democratic attorney general, attorney general Jack Smith would come and say, here's all this paperwork. He could flip Cory Lewandowski. There's all sorts of machinations that this could lead to.

So this is certainly, I think, a high stakes and very high. profile leak that is going to cause a lot of turbulence around the Trump administration generally. 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. Well, some turbulence around Jared Kushner at the moment, a new book has come out by an author called Matthew Cole, which claims to have been, well, you take up the story, Hugh, because you've been following it more closely than I have, but it's such a sort of remarkable, it's the stuff of spy novels.

Yeah. Jared Kushner has issued a very robust denial saying this is absolutely outlandish. This is insane what they're saying about this. Yes. And yet we know so many things from this government are outlandish and are. are insane. And of course, he's not officially part of the government, but he is the official son-in-law. And he's been out there, as we know, he says, trying to, you know, end various conflicts. Take up the story, because I'm a little sort of nonplussed by this one.

This is a wild spy-adjacent narrative, and in fact, narrative involving spies. There's a new book out or about to come out called Princes and Thieves. It's by an investigative journalist called Matthew Cole. He was previously involved in the Snowden Papers. He's been involved in national security and secrecy and that sort of closed world. He's written about Sealed Team 6. he has a long back catalogue of this sort of national security journalism. In this new book, which was a chapter of it was published in Vanity Fair,

he says that he discovered that Jared Kushner's phone during the first Trump administration was hacked into by the Russians. And how did this come to light? This is an incredible, it's like a novel. he says that the Dutch secret service, the Dutch spy service, discovered that one of Vladimir Putin's GRU operatives was on their way to the United Kingdom. And they got in touch with the United Kingdom authorities. The Dutch came to the United Kingdom and presented this operative with a deal. And the deal was, you will become a Dutch double agent for us and tell us the secrets of Vladimir Putin's spirit.

buys. And if you don't, then the British will arrest you and put you in prison for a very long time. The guy was turned. He took the deal. He went back to Russia. And this secret agent was involved in their incredibly technically difficult hacking, which we know the Russians are amazing at. And he showed the Dutch where the best, most guarded secrets were kept. He showed them this. There was a server somewhere in Siberia. The Dutch hacked into it. They found on it, Jared that the Russians had hacked Jared Kushner's iPhone X. They had exploited a little known vulnerability in this phone, and the vulnerability made the people who hacked it

able to just see what was happening on his screen. And they would screenshot everything that happened on his screen. So everything you do on your iPhone, couldn't hear it, they couldn't see him, but they could see what he was doing on his screen. They could see who he was phoning, what apps he was using, what pictures he was taking. The Dutch saw that this was happening.

So they did the same. They replicated the hack, and they, according to this journalist, Matthew Cole, monitored Jared's iPhone, and they discovered that he had access to a secret bank account based in the United Arab Emirates with around a billion dollars in it, and that he was moving money from that bank account. They discovered, according to Matthew Cole, that this bank account was linked to another bank account held by the Israeli Central Bank, and this is a crucial element that is leading to questions about the accuracy of this account, that he had this secret account with the Israeli Central Bank,

and that that account was allowed to be used to enrich Jared Kushner. Now, I just want to give some of the denial that Jared Kushner has issued, and we're showing the whole thing on screen. He says that these are categorically false, they're completely insubes, insane allegations and never happened. He says they've denied every one of these claims on the records and that the author failed to provide to them a shred of evidence to substantiate any of them. There's also been reporting in Israel that the Central Bank of Israel does not issue personal accounts and that that would therefore raise questions over the accuracy of this story.

Now, I just want to offer a big however. However, how would Jared know that the Russians had hacked his phone. This was not, you know, anything that he had, any vulnerability that he could have known about. They used the most high-tech measures of imaginable. Would he have known that the Dutch had managed to replicate it? It depends. Did the Dutch tell the United States that this was the case? They are close, we are close allies of the Dutch, but they are not part of five eyes, which is this, the most sensitive intelligence sharing network. So we don't, we, we, simply don't know what duty the Dutch spy services would be under to share that sort of information. And in this account, all that is happening is world leaders talking, you know,

this is the allegation is that this account was set up by Mohammed bin Zayed, who's the de facto ruler of the United Arab Emirates, and that it was done in coordination with Benjamin Netanyahu. So could these people make exceptions to banking rules? You know, it's not impossible. So there are elements here of incredible questions about what is happening in the Middle East. Some of the details of this account are impossible to know if they are true. And other details have some factual backing. There are Mohammed bin Zayed and Benjamin Netanyahu, our close allies of Jared Kushner, that Middle Eastern potentates use slush funds to move their foreign policy objectives. That is incredibly well known. And I think the only thing that we know is going to happen is the Democrats

are going to go for this one as well. What is happening here? Jared Kushner, show us your bank accounts, show us these receipts. This has a potential as a scandal to run and run. Wow. And also it's not uncommon for middlemen to be used in the Middle East to move money around. It's a very much, it's a part of the sort of shadowy networking thing that happens in the Middle East. MBZ, as he is known, I know people say like, you're British, you should say MBZ. He apparently calls himself MBZ, so I'll just, you know, just trying to be, you know, sin of verity. MBZ is probably the most powerful person in the Middle East at the moment. it was all MBE

as a direct contemporary in some ways of Mohammed bin Salman who runs Saudi Arabia but he MBS is in a bit more of a difficult position at the moment because of these huthy attacks MBZ has a very robust economy broadly speaking in Dubai particularly United Arab Emirates have diversified away from oil

they have trouble obviously with Iran but one of the allegations that underlies this account is that MBZ was very keen to disrupt the Iran nuclear deal. And this was, you know, as we remember, the Obama nuclear deal with Iran was railed against by conservatives in this country. MBZ had his own interest in disrupting that deal. And the allegation is that this money flow was involved was to help disrupt that deal. And again, this doesn't fail the common sense test.

NBC absolutely did want it was against this deal. He did not want Iran getting nuclear power, never mind the possibility of a nuclear weapon. They thought this deal was going to lead in that direction. Of course, those who were in favour of it say, actually, it stopped it much more effectively than Donald Trump ever did. But disrupting that deal was an objective of MBZ. And he remains probably the most powerful figure in the Gulf right now. So there is a lot to untangle and a lot that is going to be untangled in this. And Jared Kushner, it's worth pointing out, it's supposed to be negotiating peace with Russia.

Fonded in sick when Steve Whitkoff went to the Pentagon, Jared did it on remote. We are expecting that there will be more fallout, particularly in the Middle East, from this. It's a very up and down place at the moment in the Middle East, as we know, because of the Iran war. And we don't know what the Saudis think about these allegations. Well, also you just think back to when Jared Kushner married Ivanka Trump, none of this. He couldn't imagine any of this. He couldn't have. But his father-in-law, you know, at that point, the star of The Apprentice, a sort of vaudevillian, as we've mentioned, you know, sort of reality TV star would, you know, eventually become president and appoint him as special peace envoy.

and along with Donald Trump's golf buddy Steve Wickoff, the two of them would be bouncing between, you know, Moscow and Kiev and the Middle East, trying to, you know, figure out what an earth is going on and be central, central to US policy in the Middle East and trying to end wars with zero experience, zero experience, zero sophistication. It's just, Jared,

own the story is also as strange as Donald Trump's in many ways. And one of the things that lines up in this version of events by this journalist Matthew Cole that lines up with known reality is that at the time of this alleged opening of a secret bank account, Jared did not have his own wealth independent of the Kushner family. His father is now an ambassador, also a felon who got a pardon, but was a New York property developer. And of mixed, frankly, success. And Jared at this point was somebody who did not have access to his own money. Jared is now a billionaire in his own right, something that Democrats are very keen to dig into.

And that journey you've just talked about, Joanna, this account lines up to some of the way signs on that journey, including a very high-profile and kind of controversial property deal that was done for a Kushner property in New York that was bought by Middle Eastern money at a time when it could otherwise have been very bad news for the Kushner Empire. So this, we just talked about pickeresks. This really is another pickeresque with some overlapping characters. Well, Hugh, I have every confidence that the Daily Beast will be covering in myopic detail. As you say, Jared Kushner's denied it, saying this is outlandish and frankly, these accusations are insane. He says, outrageous, fantasy, fiction and advocacy, written by

someone who's either deeply disturbed or acting with sinister intent. Matthew Cole has yet to fire back, but his book is coming out. He will be speaking about it. And we've only seen an extract from this book. And it's clear there's other chapters. We don't know what's in And so many more chapters of this government and we don't know what's in it. But the DOJ is investing Corey Lewandowski, which is an interesting move. Hugh, I would have to say pay to be a fly on the wall in that investigation room. Anyway, always good to talk to you. If it's Friday, it's Hugh Doherty.

I will be back in the office on Monday, but you will be in our detail. Bureau, but we will be back together, hopefully, next Friday. I will be here next Friday. I am going to our nation's capital. I expect a procession, an honour. I don't know. Hail to the chief. Hail to the chief of the Daily Beach.

Maybe I'll get a tour of the ballroom. Anything is possible. I spoke to a friend the other day who'd had dinner with Donald Trump, and they said that all Trump talked about was the ballroom, that they were expecting some kind of, you know, discussion about Russia, discussion about Ukraine. It was all about the ballroom. Joanna, you kept the best of the tea until the end. Hugh, I'll be back on Monday.

Have a great trip to D.C. Thank you for catching us up with the week. And we will, well, we'll be in constant texting contact. And the Russians are probably got our phones. If the Russians can use my phone better than I can, Good luck to them. Hugh, have a great weekend. And everybody watching and listening, thank you for joining us.

Also, have a good weekend. Leave us a comment. You may or may not understand Hugh's Scottish accent. Yes, he's from Scotland, but leave us a comment. We'd love to respond to them when we can. And big thanks to our production team, John Romero, Ryan Murray, Rachel Plesser, Heather Pizarro and Neil Rosenhouse. 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. 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 nofrills.ca. For most of the history of professional sports, there was a wall between the game and gambling. Then suddenly it was everywhere. Ontario is all in on sports betting. Make every moment more with fandom. But that wasn't supposed to include the players themselves.

For actors for, Jonte Porter is under NBA investigation. Athletes are the perfect gamblers. Understood. The Big Bet. Available now on Spotify.