The Daily Show: Ears Edition - TDS Time Machine | Jordan Klepper Fingers the Pulse: Moscow Tools

Episode Date: March 9, 2026

As Vladimir Putin continues his gritty reboot of the Soviet Union, he's getting a surprising amount of help from the party once led by Reagan. In this 2024 special, "Jordan Klepper Fingers the Pulse: Moscow Tools," Klepper speaks to foreign affairs experts, possible Russian assets, and the Prime Minister of Russia's neighbor, Estonia, to find out whether Republicans have become the Kremlin's most useful idiots. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

You're listening to Comedy Central. Minestonia. They're trying to fight the Russians. Do you have any more camo? No? Okay. That's cool. They're using all these leaves? Yeah, yeah. Yeah, okay, sorry.

The crawling helps the leaves. It looks like you're a moving bush. Yeah, yeah. No, I got it. I got it. Yeah, yeah. America is heading into an election nobody wants. And the world has serious problems that demand serious conversations. However, after years of Trump rallies, the only people I know how to talk to about the state of the world are old pals like Maga Edward. We may already be in the middle of World War III. It just hasn't gotten real hot yet. You could blame Biden, but we all know who's running this country.

Who is running this country? Barack Obama. This is his third term. Do you think the world would be safer with Donald Trump returning to the presidency? 100 percent. I know without a fact it would. Without a fact, it would be a safer world. But as the Maga faithful wait for Trump to return us to safety, they found a support surprising model for their perfect society.

I would like to see America be more in that, like Russia. Yes, Russia. It's clean. Everybody looks healthy. I mean, it looks like they, you know, take care of their people. You see those streets in Russia, people are walking around and they all seem to be happy. Their country really looks like they've got things together a little bit. Putin is a bad leader who runs his country. He's a respectful person towards country.

What do you like about Vladimir Putin? The way he's lean in his country is all for freedom. I used to watch his videos. Fishing. Horseback riding back in the day. You would do just for fun you'd watch Putin horseback riding videos? Yeah. Who's a better leader?

Vladimir Putin or Joe Biden? Putin. This guy? The one with a terrifying track record? Littering the landscape with violent deaths, mystery illnesses, and dubious suicide. The one who meddled in our election in 2016? The one who is meddling in Ukraine?

What do they see in a guy who creates so much chaos? He's strong? He's well-mannered. He speaks well. Putin is well-mannered, right? He knows where the fork goes, where the knife goes, which window the journalist goes out of. I think he's a calm person. I think he's methodical. I think he thinks about things beyond today.

I think he sees into the future for his country. It looks like he's thinking two steps ahead, right? It's almost like he knows what the next territory that he wants to infiltrate with his own perspective. Right. Who do you think started the war in Ukraine? Joe Biden in his state. his son. This war was started so that Biden could remain president.

That is what's happened. War time president. So how did Biden manufacture Putin sending tanks into Ukraine? That's a big question. But you do think it was manufactured by Biden? Yes. Yes. Well.

Yeah. But how he did it. How does he do a lot of things that he does? That's a way to evade it for sure. Wait. People are giving Putin a pass here. Here, at a Trump rally in a field in rural Pennsylvania next to the most American vehicle in history, a monster truck with a tits license plate.

The Republican Party used to talk about Russia like this. Mr. Khrushchev understands only strength and firmness. They are the focus of evil in the modern world. Russia, I indicated, is a geopolitical foe. But this ain't your daddy's GOP. It's Vladdy's GOP. Nowadays, more than half of Republicans think Vladimir Putin is a big, better president than Joe Biden. And it's not just out here, it's everywhere. Tucker Carlson recently

went to Moscow to marvel at Chibada Loaves and Mass Transit. How does Russia have a subway station that's nicer than anything in our country? And the Russian fandom goes all the way to the very brain trust of the GOP. The Ukrainian government is attacking Christians. Russia is not doing that. Putin is smart. Our leaders are dumb. How did the Republican Party become Moscow tool? The explanation for that stems largely from Donald Trump. This is John Bolton, the most Republican of Republicans. He served under three Republican presidents, including Trump, sold the invasion of Iraq, and did some light geopolitical meddling.

Somebody who has helped plan coup d'etat, it takes a lot of work. Imagine Ronald Reagan is caught in amber in 1988 and using Jurassic Park technology. He wakes up now, unthought. What does he think of the modern GOP? Well, certainly the Trump wing of it, he would be appalled by. It's just antithetical, not just to the philosophical beliefs of Ronald Reagan, but to the positive attitude about America and its prospects. So Reagan wakes up and he's shocked.

Right. And he's also like, what is this Internet thing? Maybe we should send Stephen Seagall over there to kick Putin's ass. Wait a minute, Stephen Seagall already lives there. This is all too confusing. Let's just go back to ignoring AIDS. I think he'd be stunned that the Republican Party had anything to do with Donald Trump. What is Trump's infatuation with Putin?

Well, I think he has a fascination with authoritarian leaders generally. I think Trump would like to be a big guy, but I don't think he's smart enough to be a dictator. So is Trump, what's the term, an idiot? Well, I think Rex Tillerson had the iconic two-word description of Trump. The first word I won't repeat even on your show, the second of which, was moron. Okay, I'll throw it in there. That's pretty much on point. Yes, a f*** moron.

Right. Can a f***ing moron still be a useful idiot? I think the answer to that's yes, and I think Vladimir Putin understands it. Yes, for Putin, Trump is like one of those dogs that the Russians shot into space. Obedient, useful, and utterly disposable. But if Putin's puppy actually wins, what does that mean for things like NATO, an alliance of Western nations, which has been a thorn in Putin's size? Well, I think there are two main points that Putin will be concerned about if Trump wins in November.

One, the most immediate point will be the war in Ukraine, and second, related to it, but broader the future of NATO. Does Trump know what NATO does? He doesn't understand alliances. How important is having an alliance with perhaps somebody who don't agree with, but connect with so that you can push together a common goal for geopolitical safety? Well, I think NATO is the most successful political military alliance in human history. So before we give that up, people ought to think about it a little bit more seriously than Trump does. So the stakes of this election couldn't be higher.

The only way to stop an existential threat is through alliances, a unified front for the common good. So picking between Trump and Biden must be a no-brainer. I'm not going to vote for either one. I wrote in a name in 2020. I'll do that again this year. A wise man once told me that sometimes it's important to make alliances with people that you may not agree fully with in order to have some sort of global stability.

But maybe tell me more about writing an unnamed candidate for president with 0% chance of winning? I don't think either prospect is very appealing, frankly. Great. So in the race between a current president and a former president, It looks like the winner will be the Russian president. The GOP's softer stance on Russia was giving me flashbacks to 2016, when Putin tried to influence our election.

I mean, it could be Russia, it could be somebody sitting on that bed that weighs 400 pounds, okay? But Russia would have to think we're fools to fall for that again. This is the traditional image of Americans that Russians have in their minds, that were stupid, that were gullible, that we smile at everyone like total idiots. You can seed information in their head, and they will parrot it the information that is useful to you. This is Russian-born American journalist Julia Yaffe. As a correspondent in Moscow,

Yafi covered Putin and the Kremlin, so I wanted her to help me parse through what I'd been hearing at rallies. There was an amazing Washington Post report by Catherine Belton, an investigative reporter, who got her hands on some secret Kremlin documents. So this is a pitch for a partisan media campaign in the US.

The targets of this campaign, are Republican Party voters. We want to echo what they're saying, which is that, I'm just reading from the document here, colored perverts and invalids get all the privileges. Sounds like a Toby Keith Ler. This will sound familiar to you. The danger of criminality of colored people and immigrants.

Yeah, I've heard a thing or two there. I used to live in Milwaukee, and there's places in Milwaukee that you can't go to because me as a little white guy, I wouldn't feel safe being there. You see the streets in Russia? It looks like their infrastructure and their country. It looks a whole lot nicer than ours does here. The murder rate is twice as high in Russia as it is in the United States.

I didn't know that, guys. I mean, well, thank you for informing me. The best political influence campaigns are the ones where you don't invent anything. You just take the facts on the ground and you amplify them, right? And so what you see these fake accounts amplifying are arguments that I'm sure you've heard on the trail and at these rallies, which is that Democrats are globalists who care more about Ukraine than about the southern border. It's Russia's good and Ukraine is corrupt. It is corruption.

They're taking advantage of the situation where they created, it's by design. They're pumping money over there, and we know it's coming back to politicians' pockets here. Now it goes into the means of spreading this information. How are they going to do it? Well, you're going to use social media, but it says the only place where they can spread this information without any censorship is, I'm going to let you guess. Where can they get the vitamins?

Where are you selling T-shirts? I'm red pill can. On true social's red pill can. Truth social, yes. The most useful of the idiots can be found on truth social. Or owning it. Connect these dots how Zelensky is benefiting from this. Where's the correct?

Because he has yachts. He has plenty of money. And guess what Zelensky does? He sniffs cocaine right in front of y'all. So the yacht story is that Volodemir Zelensky, the president of Ukraine, took money that the U.S. sent him for weapons, siphoned it off and bought two luxury yachts. The story is completely false. But then, researchers were like, where did this come from?

It came from a little website called DC Weekly, which is from... Not actually here at Washington. in D.C. D.C. Weekly is allegedly run out of here, Moscow. Then the story spreads across the internet and makes its way to there. To f*** there! Yep, it was shared by Marjorie Taylor Green and J.D. Vance. There were people who would cut Social Security, throw our grandparents into poverty.

Why? So that one of Zelensky's ministers can buy a bigger yacht. Meanwhile, military aid for Ukraine hung in the balance. Not another penny will go to Ukraine. Eventually gave Ukraine a whole lot of pennies, but aid was stalled for seven months. In that time, Ukraine suffered tremendous battlefield losses. So people are actually dying because members of Congress are parroting fake Russian bullshit. So is that a win for Putin?

A thousand percent. Yes, Putin was winning, but it wasn't just because of disinformation. What's happening in Russia is basically a Republican wet dream. They have banned the international LGBT movement. restricting abortion. Vladimir Putin invokes a lot of what Republicans call wokeness. It just seems that MAGA heads, they're much more comfortable with that authoritarian persona, especially when the guy is white, male, Christian. Shirtless, hairless.

Clearly a big Putin phase. Well, I mean, it's like a souvenir. Meet Klein Preston. That's the founder of the KGB. Yes. He was a lawyer for future GOP Senator Marsha Blackburn. He attended the NRA convention in 2015 with a convicted Russian agent. And in 2020, he fought to overturn Biden's election results in Michigan to help Trump. And he knows all about election integrity because he's been an official observer of seven Russian elections.

So in Russia, they have legislation that allows for foreign observers. What do you say to the critics who might say maybe they're choosing outside observers who are, biased to be a little pro-Russia? Well, I wouldn't say that I'm pro-Russia. From a decorating perspective, perhaps. Well, I mean, I could say I would make such a comment based on, you know, knowing my background. Or your furnishings? My furnishings and, you know.

Yeah. Or your knick-knacks. Yeah. Your oil paintings. Long interest. Weaponry on the wall. Yeah. The bus.

Who do you point the finger at for that Russian invasion? The West. When Russia invaded in 2022 in February, you know, it was a defensive move. Putin's a victim here. Well, I mean, to some degree, Russia is. The fact is, and American politicians hate this, Vladimir Putin's done a very good job for his country, and he's really popular. Some people claim that he controls the media.

He controls and or executes his enemies. I mean, who? Well, Navalny... But there's no proof that he killed him. Right, okay. You have Ganyi Prygosen? Pregosin, okay. His plane blew up or whatever.

What about somebody like Nikolay Glushkov, Putin critic? Is that suspicious to you, his death? Yeah, suspicious, absolutely. But can I say that Vladimir Putin did it? No. Litvinenko, you remember him? I don't. Well, let's just say you had a pension for polonium.

Right. especially in his tea. He died a horrible death. It seems like the Oscars style in memoriam for all the opposition leaders and journalists who have died under Putin's watch. It's just like, I don't know if John Legend has the stamina to complete that. As we were talking, Klein got an unexpected call. Oh man, I've got to do it. Got a call? Yeah, RT thing. That's Russian television that's calling?

Yeah. I mean, I have to ask, are you a Russian? asset? Well, if I am, I'm a bad one. Wait, was Klein about to feed the propaganda from the Kremlin back to Russian state television? There's nothing democratic today about Ukraine. Oh, no. Was I the biscuit in a propaganda circle jerk? Putin has a clear set of goals beyond decorating his U.S. assets offices. He also wants to stop funding for Ukraine and weaken NATO so he can expand Russian territory. And Donald Trump is playing right into Putin's hands

by threatening to leave our allies to fend for themselves. You didn't pay, you're delinquent. I would encourage them to do whatever the hell they want. You got to bang. If Trump wins a second term, what happens to NATO? I think Trump will withdraw from NATO. I think that's his intention. How do you stop something like that from happening?

The best advice I can offer for people in a second term, since I won't be part of it, is keep distracting Trump. He's like a cat. Get a laser pointer into the White House. right? Jesus Christ, it's the only way to save nuclear apocalypse? Well, I hadn't thought of that, but that might do the trick. If we do pull out of NATO, who is the most screwed? Well, I think any country that borders on Russia or a former part of the Soviet Union.

So if I were booking travel into the Eastern Bloc to say Estonia, maybe slow down or at least get the trip protection? I was going to say, go now. If you say so, John, when is following John Bolton's advice on foreign affairs ever gone wrong? This is Estonia, a NATO member country of just over a million people that sits on the border of Russia. Since the invasion of Ukraine, Estonians have been wondering, are we next?

To see how people here are feeling about being in Putin's crosshairs, I sat down with Estonian Prime Minister, Kayakalas, who has been described as the Iron Lady of the Baltic for standing up to Russia. Apparently, I'm the only leader that is on Russia's most important. Wanted list. Oh. Yeah. You're on the most wanted list?

I am. I'm not in danger, right? No. I'm a brave, fake journalist, but I'm only so brave and mostly fake. As Putin has gotten bolder, Kalaas has become one of NATO's most vocal supporters. We shouldn't dismantle NATO. NATO is the strongest military alliance. We don't have war here because we are in NATO.

And America, presidential candidate, is arguing that if everybody's not paying their fair share in NATO, then why should we be facing the brunt of it? First, we are paying more for defense. I mean, Estonia. You guys are? Yes, we are spending 3.2% of our GDP on defense. It's more than the United States spending in terms of percentage. Nice black. How I explain NATO to schoolchildren.

I always say that, you know, if you have a school bully and you are weaker physically, the bully doesn't bully you when you have big friends. And this is how NATO works. So what happens if one of your big friends also happens to be a bully who's talking about just becoming friends with the other bullying and then bullying all the little people? Well, that is definitely going to be more complicated. Yeah. If Russia will succeed in Ukraine, then their appetite will grow because, you know, they have expanded their empire and colonized the country.

Aggression pays off. Every next time, every next step, they're bolder. Okay, nothing happened to us. We can do this. They have built up their military to colonize another country. Just, and for clarification, how close is Russia to us right now? It's 320 kilometers or something. I'm from New York. How many city blocks is that?

It's three hour drive. Three hour drive. Okay, so that's a good seven city blocks in New York. It's, that's congestion. New York is intense that way. Turns out we're so close that Estonian civilians are training in the woods in case of a Russian invasion. These are our guys? Okay. If Russia were to attack, well, I'm with you guys, I gotta be honest, I'm not really the fighting kind.

This is the Estonian Defense League. They're an all-volunteer army of about 30,000 regular Estonians. What do you do? What's your day job? I'm a choir conductor studying for that. You were a choir conductor? I was studying for it, yeah. How do you go from studying to be a choir conductor to in the middle of the Estonian

woods holding an AR of some sort? The Russian Ukraine War changed everything for us. When Americans gather like this, they're usually training to keep a barbershop open during COVID. When you guys are training to repel Russians. Simple. We don't have any illusions even today. When we see what's happening in Ukraine, we understand the only Estonians has to stop Putin.

And there's a reason these soldiers are concerned. I got your six. Or whatever it is in metric. 12. Russia brutally occupied Estonia until 1991. So while Mago World turns a blind eye to Putin's plan to expand Russia, people who lived under that occupation have a different view of it. Everybody is for peace, but we understand what peace under Soviet or Russian occupation means.

You had mass atrocities, mass deportations. My own mother was deported to Siberia as a six-month-old baby. There were mass killings. They were suppressing our culture, trying to erase our language. This is what peace under occupation means. That doesn't mean that the human suffering will stop. If only we could get that information to go viral on true social.

For the past few months, I've been wrestling with my country's susceptibility to propaganda. Are we just useful idiots, or is the harder truth that some of us might actually want autocracy? And if it's Russian autocracy, do Americans really even know what that looks like? I love Moscow.

It's a place I was born. It was one of my favorite cities in the world, but it's now become the center of totalitarian repression. It's almost total police surveillance. People are being sent to jail for what they say in private phone conversations. And what I would tell these mega voters is that a great metro is not worth your personal liberty.

Yeah, it's quite the price to pay for a fancy subway ride. We have a Russian minority in Estonia. It is interesting. Those that are living closer to the border, they can see the life on the Russian side and they can see that it's not better than on the European side. Whereas, you know, people that are further away from the border, they may also believe what the Russians are telling.

That makes sense. I was in Green Bay, Wisconsin, and I heard about how great life in Moscow is. And I think that's five billion kilometers away. I have to learn this metric eventually. I got to get into this. Yeah, yeah, we all have to. It's complicated.

It is. So if we want folks in Pennsylvania to pay closer attention to the realities halfway across the world, maybe I could help make the rest of the world look a little more like Pennsylvania. It says, ride for tits. It's a traditional American license plate. Everybody has them in America. If you have a giant monster truck and want to flex in America, you got to throw a ride per tits. You gotta throw a ride for tits on it.

It's illegal here. Is that illegal here? For recruitment, you put this thing out a military truck. These numbers are going to go up 20%. Yeah, can't put it to car, though, yeah. My failure at novelty license plate diplomacy made me feel like an idiot. Well, at least I'm not a Moscow tool.

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