The David Pakman Show - 3/26/25: Total collapse over texting scandal, heads should roll

Episode Date: March 26, 2025

-- On the Show: -- Donald Trump completely fails to explain the texting scandal during what was meant to be a softball interview with Newsmax, caught very obviously lying -- A panicked Donald Trump attempts to defend the disastrous national security breach involving The Atlantic's Jeffrey Goldberg -- Mike Waltz, Donald Trump's National Security Adviser, suggests a journalist hacked his way into the Signal group in question -- Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard is absolutely destroyed during hearings about the Signal leak -- Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth gives an absolutely outrageous answer about what happened in the Signal group -- Karoline Leavitt, Donald Trump's Press Secretary, suffers a complete meltdown over the text message fiasco -- Karoline Leavitt, Donald Trump's Press Secretary, fails to run interference about the Signal text message scandal -- Fox News' Jesse Watters runs a very poor disinformation campaign after the Signal fiasco -- Fox News host Brian Kilmeade suggests doing away with due process in a stunning, unconstitutional rant -- Attorney General Pam Bondi goes full authoritarian while Donald Trump stares at and drools over her -- On the Bonus Show: Kristi Noem to visit El Salvador prison, Trump appoints Alina Habba as US Attorney, Jasmine Crockett calls Greg Abbott "Gov. Hot Wheels," and much more... 👂 MDHearing: Use code PAKMAN to get a pair for just $297 at https://shopmdhearing.com/ 😬 Remi mouth guards: Get up to 50% OFF with code PAKMAN at https://shopremi.com/pakman ⚠️ Ground News: Get 40% OFF their unlimited access Vantage plan at https://ground.news/pakman 🥦 Lumen lets you master your metabolism. GET 20% OFF at https://lumen.me/pakman 🧠 Try Brain.fm totally free for a month at https://brain.fm/pakman -- Become a Member: https://davidpakman.com/membership -- Become a Patron: https://www.patreon.com/davidpakmanshow -- Get David's Books: https://davidpakman.com/echo -- TDPS Subreddit: http://www.reddit.com/r/thedavidpakmanshow -- David on Bluesky: https://davidpakman.com/bluesky -- David on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/davidpakmanshow

. welcome to the show complete and total national security scandal the likes of which might completely take down prior administrations and Trump and the team around him now struggling to tell any lie they can to give any excuse they can come up with for the disaster that took place.

We're in war plans that should have been classified. The should is a critical part of this story. War plans that should have been classified were sent to an Atlantic journalist named Jeffrey Goldberg after he was included in a signal chat. Let's go all the way back to the beginning. The critical question, how on earth did Jeffrey Goldberg end up in this signal chat? Trump's new idea, which runs completely counter to everything we know, they're all lying. They're all lying. They're all trying to cover it up. Trump's latest line is that somebody, somebody, some staffer added Jeffrey Goldberg. This is counter to all of the facts, but it's Trump's latest meltdown.

Take a listen. What it was, we believe, is somebody that was on the line with permission, somebody that was with Mike Walsh, worked for Mike Walsh at a lower level, had, I guess, Goldberg's number or called through the app. And somehow this guy ended up on the call. Now, it wasn't classified, as I understand it. There was no classified information. There was no problem. And the attack was a tremendous success. So I can only go by what I've been told. I wasn't involved in it, but I was told by and he had nothing to do with it. Nothing was classified.

Everything's fine. Just a little mix up. The problem is that this is a very different explanation from the one that we got from like Mike Waltz himself. And we'll get to that a little bit later. Waltz has said a staffer was not responsible. And Trump is now saying we believe that some lower level staffer is responsible for this. Waltz is saying a and Trump is saying definitely not a. What's probably true is that they're all lying there. They're all completely lying and they are running a failing cover up of a complete and

total national security scandal, which is a humiliating scandal. The truth seems to be that Mike Waltz did add Jeffrey Goldberg. We have the screenshots. Jeffrey Goldberg, because of all of the character assassination against him, has now taken to publishing a whole bunch of this stuff. And you can see very clearly it says Michael Waltz added you to the group. Now, are you going to claim that, oh, a low level staffer for Waltz got access to Walt's phone? Is that the new claim? Or is it that Jeffrey Goldberg doctored these screenshots with every revealed bit of information they need to go back and come up with a new lie? We are going to continue following the Trump meltdown on this. We're going to hear from Mike Waltz, but just a couple other quick things from this really weird Newsmax interview.

Donald Trump also mentioned in this interview he's looking at a compensation fund for the January 6th rioters, if you can imagine. No, but I took care of them. I said I was going to and I did. Is there any talk of because they lost opportunity, they lost income, any kind of compensation fund? Well, there's talk about that. There are a lot of people talk about a lot of the people that are in government now talk about it because they a lot of the people in government really like that group of people uh they were patriots as far as i was concerned i talked about i talk about them a lot they were treated very unfairly you know the thing they show uh is they show a group of a thousand whatever it may have been 1500 people down what they don't show you never see the crowd that day. It was the biggest crowd I've ever spoken before.

It went all the way to the Washington Monument. It was so wide, you virtually couldn't see anything else but people. They never show that, whether it was a million people or less than a million. I don't know what it was, but I see Bernie Sanders has a few people out out there and they say, oh, the crowd is so big. They don't talk about the grass. But a group of people went down there. Anyway, so they're looking at compensation for the rioters. Insurrection now comes with a pension plan. I guess you could say these are, of course, people who should be in prison, not pardoned and certainly not getting reparations of sorts. Trump continued the nonsense by saying he really liked

Ashley Babbitt. Ashley Babbitt was a good person. Of course, remember, Ashley Babbitt was shot while climbing through a window that rioters had smashed multiple clips showing exactly what happened. It doesn't matter to Trump. He just lies with a straight face and says, Ashley Babbitt, that was a good family of Ashley Babbitt is suing the government wrongful death. The DOJ right now officially is still opposing that lawsuit trying to justify it. Shouldn't that be something that can just be settled at this point? Well, I'll look into that. I mean, you're just telling me that for the first time.

I haven't heard that. I'm a big fan of Ashley Babbitt, okay? And Ashley Babbitt was a really good person who was a big MAGA fan, Trump fan. Ah. And she was innocently standing there. They even say trying to sort of hold back the crowd. Right.

She was really there, there actually doing crowd control. And then just out of nowhere she got shot. And of course, not a single investigation turned up that that's what happened. And then finally, really not a delusion of grandeur. Donald Trump says it's conceivable that someone saved him, someone being God, so that he could then save the country. I think, you know, somebody said that God saved me in order to save this country. Somebody said that. This country was going down, Greg.

If this election wasn't won, this country had no chance. This country is going to be, remember I used to say for years we're going to be Venezuela on steroids. Right. And that's what was happening to the country. And now we're turning it around. And I think we're going to be Venezuela on steroids. Right. And that's what was happening to the country. And now we're turning it around. And I think we're turning it around fast. Yes. God saved Trump, but killed an innocent man standing behind Trump when he redirected that bullet. Wow. Wow. What a what what must it be like to live in a world if where you believe this is how things work,

but Trump's doing it. And I want to get back to the national security scandal. A panicked Donald Trump continues to try to defend the disaster leaks involving signal and Jeffrey Goldberg war plans, attack plans, Yemen and the Houthis, Tulsi Gabbard, Pete Hegseth, Mike Waltz. Just wait till we look at the testimony a little bit later in every single interview in every single public appearance. Trump's explanation for what happened is different.

Even yesterday, now, well after the scandal had broken before coming up with his first wrong explanation for what took place. Trump again said, I don't know a thing about it. I'd rather all of us be in person, I don't know a thing about it. I'd rather all of us be in person. I don't know anything about signal. I wasn't involved in this, but I just heard about it and I hear it's used by a lot of groups. It's used by the media a lot. It's used by a lot of the military. Yes. The media also use it. This is like a Hitler also breathed oxygen sort of thing. Listen, if signal so bad, the media uses signal,

you should go after them. Right. But the media doesn't plan wars. That's sort of like a key difference. It's up to me. Everybody would be sitting in a room together. The room would have solid lead walls and a lead ceiling and a lead floor. But, you know, life doesn't always let you do that. I want to look at the FBI. Anything like that. I would I would ask them. It's not really an FBI thing. It's really something having to do with security, security. Like, will somebody be able to break in? Are people able to break into conversations? And if that's true, we're going to have to find some other form of of device. There you go.

We're going to need a different device or software or whatever. Now, one of the battle lines in figuring out what level of culpability there is here is whether or not classified information was shared in that signal chat. This is actually its own mess. And I'm going to explain that to you in a moment. But first, let's hear what Trump's line is as to the presence or lack thereof of classified information. Are you going to change any of the practices that your national security officials use after a reporter was inadvertently added to a group chat about attacks on Yemen?

Well, I think it's a question I've been asked now and I've given a few answers, and they've all been the same. We have an amazing group. Our national security now is stronger than it's ever been. We have had a very, very successful, numerous attacks on that area. These are people that shoot down ships, not only our ships, ships all over the world. They're shooting down right out of the water and damaging them badly, or they're going down. They're also shooting anything that happens to be flying in the area. We hit them very, very hard. There was no classified information, as I understand it. There was no classified information, as I understand it. Now, you might say this is super simple. There either was classified information shared or there wasn't. But here's the problem.

Part of the Trump may be right, but that would only reveal a further layer of incompetence. Let me explain what I mean. The exact timing targets and assets of military operations is supposed to be classified. What might have happened is that in a second layer of incompetence, the Trump administration didn't classify it. It's it's mind boggling how their incompetence on one front might make their incompetence on another front less legally problematic. In the DNI's own guidance, which we're putting up on the screen here, information providing indication or advance warning that the U S or its allies are preparing an attack is supposed to be classified.

And then here is an example of the war plans that were sent, uh, at 1215 F 18s will launch at one 45, a trigger based F 18 first strike window will begin. Target terrorist is at his loan known location. So it should be on time. Strike drones will launch more F 18s launching at 1410 at 1415 strike drones will be on the target. The first bombs will definitely drop. So the point here is we know what was shared and we know that by the DNA's guidance, it's supposed to be classified. It's conceivable that they didn't classify it out of an additional layer of incompetence with everything that they do.

Now Trump was asked specifically by Caitlin Collins, who told you the information wasn't classified? Trump doesn't like the question. He asked for a different decades. Information was not classified. Another question, please. He doesn't want to answer that one. And then of course, a failsafe is attack the media, attack the journalist, attack the

Atlantic, attack Jeffrey Gold. From what I heard, the the man that we're talking about, who's not somebody that I don't think most people have ever heard of. He left. He found it very boring and he left early. He got off the line very early. OK. Of course, off the line translates to Trump doesn't really understand what signal is,

but maybe most importantly, one of the reasons this didn't become an even bigger national security fiasco is not because Goldberg was bored, but it's because he realized I'm not supposed to be receiving this information. I don't have the clearance to receive this information. I am going to end my participation in this signal thread. They should be thanking Jeffrey Goldberg, not saying that he's a low life, whatever. Now, just as an aside to show you how wacky these events are, Trump did mention that he's a low life, whatever. Now, just as an aside to show you how wacky these events are, Trump did mention that he's going to investigate the Pizzagate conspiracy.

Right. I just want to follow up on that. If, and by the way, the person asking this question is Marjorie Taylor Greene's boyfriend and parenthood is defunded. Uh, would you look into the harvesting of baby organs that they've done throughout the years and maybe go after some criminal prosecution on that? Well, I think you're talking about a subject that is a heated subject. Right. And we'll look into it. We're going to look into everything.

But that's certainly a subject that's been debated for a long time. That's right. We call it Pizzagate. And it is a wild and wacky conspiracy theory because of Brian Glenn's presence now in this press corps. That wild and wacky conspiracy theory is right inside the cabinet meeting room. And then finally, as Trump likes to say, groceries, not a word you hear a lot, but it's a very descriptive word. We brought eggs down at a level that nobody thought we could get at. I inherited that situation and I inherited a grocery situation.

The groceries went way up an old fashioned word, but it's a very descriptive word. Groceries have gone through the roof and I used to campaign on it. I used to say, we're going to get groceries down and we have got it. Right. Very old fashioned word. I mean, who's ever heard of the word groceries? But groceries are real. And Trump has done it. And he's also done it with, as he calls them, eggs. Very, very compelling stuff. After the break, what does Mike Waltz say about how Jeffrey Goldberg ended up in the signal chat? It's completely different than what Trump is saying. The Echo Machine, my first nonfiction book, is out.

Please review the book on Amazon especially, but also Barnes & Noble and Goodreads. The reviews are starting to come in, some very funny ones, by the way, which I featured on my social media. If you've not gotten the book, please do. But if you did, please review. It is the critical thing at this point in time. Let's take a quick break back right after this. Things are still expensive that we know, but one thing that doesn't have to be is your hearing aids. Hearing aids are famously overpriced at brick-and-mortar hearing clinics, but our sponsor MD Hearing makes high-quality, easy-to-use, rechargeable hearing aids with exceptional sound quality, personalized to your hearing profile, and shipped right to your door. MD Hearing just made their Neo Rechargeable Digital Hearing Aids aids only $297 a pair, less than 10% the price

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Go to shopremy.com slash pacman. Use the code pacman to save up to 50%. That's shopremy.com slash Pacman. Use code Pacman for up to 50% off. The link is in the podcast notes. As an independent progressive media program, the David Pakman show does depend on your support to do what we do. Most of the ways you can support us are completely free.

Subscribe on YouTube. Make sure you've subscribed to the podcast on Spotify and on Apple podcasts. Leave a rating for the podcast. Leave a comment here or there. We also do have something called the membership program. We do an extra show every day and we provide commercial free audio and video feeds of the show hours before the show is made public to every single member. I invite you to sign up at join Pacman dot com. As you saw yesterday, the Trump administration now monitoring this program and sometimes pointing out things that

happen on this program, they are edging closer, sort of like a fire that just is creeping, creeping, creeping in. And the more robust we are and the more robust the progressive independent media ecosystem is, the better we will be able to beat off those attacks. Join Pacman dot com, the place to sign up. Welcome to all of our new members. All right. What did Mike Waltz say is the explanation for how Atlantic journalist Jeffrey Goldberg ended up ended up in that signal chat? Well, his explanation is completely the opposite of Donald Trump's. Remember that Donald Trump suggested some low level waltz staffer invited in Jeffrey Goldberg.

Mike Waltz has a completely different explanation. It might involve subterfuge. It might involve hacking. Listen to this. President expressed complete confidence in you today and his entire cabinet. But how did a Trump hating editor of The Atlantic end up on your signal chat? You know, Laura, I'm not a conspiracy theorist, but of all the people out there, somehow this guy who has lied about the president, who has lied to Gold Star families, lied to their attorneys and gone to Russia hoax, gone to just all kinds of lengths to lie and smear the president of the United States. And he's the one that somehow gets on somebody's

contact and then gets sucked into this group. Is someone in your president very, very suspicious, isn't it? Listen, Mike, you got to come up with something better than this. First of all, there is zero evidence for what he is suggesting. He's suggesting some kind of subterfuge. It's too suspicious. This guy that isn't nice to us. Suddenly he's the one on the signal

chat. No, no, no. Something must have happened here. And of course he's suggesting hacking or some kind of malfeasance. Number one, no evidence of that. Secondly, if it were true, if it were true, that would suggest they shouldn't have been doing this on signal to begin with, because if what he is alluding to is even possible, it would only confirm you shouldn't be using signal for this. And of course, part of the issue here is nobody in that chat said, hey, this shouldn't be discussed on signal. That's a reinforcement that they use signal for this sort of thing all the time.

And then third, Goldberg reported that Mike Waltz sent him a personal signal invitation two days before he was added to the group. And indeed, it is Mike Waltz who invited him to the group. So it is a very, very weak explanation. Now, as of course, you have to do if you work for Donald Trump. He has to lay down like a doormat and say, sir, please walk all over me. I would like another and quite a Freudian slip here.

Take a listen of global commerce is getting rerouted. The world owes the president a favor or excuse me, a thank you for taking this on and fixing this problem. Everybody owes Trump a favor. Oh no. I mean, a thank you. Both of course are indicative of the sort of worshiping of Trump that you are required to do. But Trump would certainly agree. Everybody owes him a favor. And then finally, what lesson did national security advisor Mike Waltz learn from this entire signal fiasco?

Not that you shouldn't use signal for planning war crimes or or war. Now I'm now I'm the one with the Freudian slip. I don't know that there were crimes, war attacks, elements of war. Not only should you not be using signal for that. That's not what that's not what he learned. He learned that journalists are really bad. Learned lessons learned after the. Well, we're not using signal app. And yeah, right. Lesson learned. Number one is you've got journalists out there who have made fame and fortune trying to trash this president. And so, look, we've got to tighten up.

We are tightening up and we have some of the best technology minds looking at how this happened. Yeah. If you don't buy it, listen, you don't need a technological genius to figure out how this happened. In fact, lack of technological genius is probably to blame. The real problem, of course, is the journalists. It's it's Goldberg's fault that he was added to the signal chat. That's the final point on it. Tulsi Gabbard

suffered a complete failure to explain anything. You will see her in this clip using words. OK, I mean, she is speaking. She is synthesizing synapses in her brain into speech. But beyond that, it's hard to say she's really saying anything. She was questioned yesterday by a number of senators. And it's really bad. It's really, really bad. Here is Senator Mark Warner asking questions about what happened and director of national intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard, who has no business even having a security clearance. She couldn't pass an FBI background check if she were subjected to one, which she wasn't. And she is the director of national intelligence. And she simply refuses to substantively address the story. This is tough to listen to. You are not TG on this group chat. I'm not going to get into the specifics. So you refuse to acknowledge whether you

are on this group chat. Senator, I'm not going to get into this. Why are you why are you going to get into specifics? Is this is it because it's all classified? Because this is currently under review by the national security. Because it's all classified. If it is currently under review by the National Security Council. Because it's all classified? If it's not classified, share the text now. As the White House previously stated. Is it classified or non-classified information on this text? I can confirm.

Director Ratcliffe, were you on the group chat? Senator, I was on a signal messaging group. So you were the John Ratcliffe on that chat? I was. Thank you. Thank you. Can I provide some context, Senator, to that? Yes, but I've got a series of questions.

But I think it's important because at the outset, you made a couple of comments about signal messaging using encrypted apps so that we're clear. One of the first things that happened when I was confirmed as CIA director was signal was loaded onto my computer at the CIA, as it is for most CIA officers. One of the things that I was briefed on very early, Senator, was by the CIA records management folks about the use of Signal as a permissible work use. It is. That is a practice that preceded the current administration to the Biden administration. I've got a series of questions. I, I, you know, do you, if you're

making the point, if you're making the statement, the signal is a secure channel. No, can I, can I answer that? It is decryption. So it is permissible to use to communicate and coordinate for work purposes, provided, provided, Senator, that any decisions that are made are also recorded through formal channels. So those were procedures that were implemented. My staff implemented those processes. Desperate to filibuster. Followed those processes, complied with those processes. Desperate to filibuster. Followed those processes, complied with those processes. And finally, just please. So my communications, to be clear, in a signal message group were entirely permissible and lawful and did not include classified information.

We will make that determination because if it's not classified, share the text with the committee. And of course, the problem is the lack of classification. If indeed it is, the reality is part of the problem, because as I told you earlier in the show, everything that was being shared in that text thread is supposed to be classified. Tulsi knows it or she should because she's the director of national intelligence. We'll get to that. OK, we then get to another series of questions. Here is Senator Reid. Take a listen to this. Director Gabbit, were you overseas during any parts of these discussions? Yes, Senator, I was. Were you using your private phone or public phone for the signal discussions.

I won't speak to this because it's under review by the National Security Council. And I'm so sorry to interrupt. She's now used this phrase a couple of times, something being under review by the National Security Council. They're acting like it's a trump card. It's sort of Trump's Donald Trump's. My tax returns are under audit. So until the audits finish, I'm not going to be able to show them or I can't speak to any, you know, Supreme Court justice nominees who say,

oh, I can't really answer that because it's an issue that might come before the court. And it's important for me not to speculate. She's acting like a review by the National Security Council as a valid reason for non-response. It's not. Once that review is complete, I'm sure we'll share the results with the committee. What is under review? It's a very simple question. You know, which phone were you using? I've? Private phone or officially issued phone. What could be under review? National Security Council is reviewing all aspects of how this came to be, how the journalist was inadvertently added to the group chat and what occurred within that chat across the board. But so you are not going to disclose anything about whether you use the phone.

Speaker 1 Nope. She's just not going to answer. Then Senator Mark Kelly had a turn and interestingly asked, do you all know that you're not allowed to discuss even controlled, unclassified information on unsecured devices? So question one is, was this stuff classified? It should have been. It seems it may not have been. Mark Kelly goes further.

He goes, even the lack of classification would not be permissible material. So I understand that DOD policy prohibits discussion of even what is called controlled, unclassified information or see you CUI on unsecured devices. Are both of you aware of that DOD policy? I haven't read that policy. I'm not familiar with the DOD policy, but I would say that the Secretary of Defense is the original classification authority for DOD in deciding what would be classified information. There you go. Your DNI and your

director of the CIA don't actually know what the policy is on a lot of this stuff. And then finally, Tulsi just won't answer questions in the signal chain that we have been talking about. Was there any mention of a target in Yemen? Speaker 1 Remember, we now know the answer is yes, we have the screenshots. OK, so just like she's about to answer. We know now that the answer is yes. Speaker 4 I don't remember mention of specific targets. Any generic target?

I believe there was discussion around targets in general. Mr. Ratcliffe. I think that's consistent with my recollection. Again, I don't have access to that. Was there any mention, Ms. Gabbard, of a weapon or weapons system? I don't recall specific weapons systems being named. We know the answer is yes. I'm not talking about specific any weapon or weapons system.

I don't recall specific names of systems or weapons being used. Her memory suddenly very, very shaky. So we're building up a list. We already saw Mike Waltz's handling of this. He should be fired. We have seen Ratcliffe's and Gabbard's involvement. They should be fired. Let's now talk about Pete Hegseth. Pete Hegseth, the secretary of defense, was asked a question yesterday, which is, did you declassify the information you put into the signal chat that involved discussions of of then forthcoming attacks in Yemen. I am going to play Hegseth's answer. And what you will notice is that he does not address the question.

There's a reason why. I will tell you in a moment. Mr. Secretary, the messages the White House called authentic did at the very least include sensitive details about targets and timing. Did you declassify that information before you put it in the chat? And are you using Signal to discuss operations as sensitive as the strikes against the Houthis on a government or a personal phone? First, all I would say is the strikes against the Houthis that night were devastatingly effective. And I'm incredibly proud of the courage and skill of the troops.

And they are ongoing and continue to be devastatingly effective. The last place I would want to be right now is a Houthi in Yemen who wants to disrupt freedom of navigation. So the skill and courage of our troops is on full display. It's a complete opposite approach from the fecklessness of the Biden administration. President Trump said peace through strength will be brought back. You might be wondering, does he know the question? Oh, he knows it. He's just not answering.

Freedom of navigation will return. And that's exactly what we're doing. As I also stated yesterday, nobody's texting war plans. And that's all I have to say. So the one substantive answer was a lie. Nobody's texting war plans. Jeffrey Goldberg has released them. We showed them to you earlier in the show. You would have to be first of all, this this response inspires no confidence, no confidence. They are counting on you believing this bullshit. They are lying about everything. There were no war plans. We've got the text messages now. There must have been some kind of subterfuge or hacking that led Jeffrey Goldberg to end up in

this chat. Zero evidence of that whatsoever. Finally, and this is completely beyond parody, Hegseth says the way they are evaluating people is how good they are at doing their jobs. That's really funny. Speaker 5 My assessment is the DOD will be merit based and colorblind. You will be judged based on how good you are at your job. Full stop. Really? That's it. And so getting rid of diversity, equity, inclusion, DEI, getting rid of different standards was fundamental to getting back to basics. And that's what I when I get a chance to talk to commanders here, that's what I emphasize.

We're getting zero self-awareness because, of course, Pete Hegseth is only the secretary of defense due to a loyalty version of DEI. What knowledge did Pete Hegseth possessed that made him a good candidate for secretary of defense? What temperamental characteristics did Pete Hegseth have that made him a good candidate for secretary of defense? What experience did he have? None.

He was there because of a form of affirmative action and D.I. that is loyalty to Trump above qualifications, above experience, above knowledge and above merit. And the lack of self-awareness by him saying that is stunning. He should also be fired. Caroline Leavitt is Donald Trump's press secretary, at least as of today, and she delivered a borderline criminal meltdown over the text message scandal. I'm going to play an interview she did with Fox News's Jesse Waters. This is North Korean Soviet style propaganda where it would even make the North Korean news anchors blush. Listen to the confidence and the condescension

which with with which she delivers blatant lies and disinformation to the American people. It is beyond belief. But this is what Trump wants. Take a look. White House Press Secretary Caroline Leavitt joins me now. So does the president have full confidence in his national security team? President Trump absolutely has the full confidence in his national security team, Jesse. That includes our great national security advisor, Mike Waltz. Who has already been caught lying about what happened. Secretary Pete Hegseth. Who has already been caught lying about what happened. And the American people should be grateful to these individuals and especially to President Trump for putting together such a competent and

highly qualified team straight out of the cult playbook scandal. They did something terrible. They get confronted. They go, every single one of you should be grateful that Donald Trump is the president and that he selected these great people to be in the cabinet. This is how cults operate, who are killing terrorists that the Biden administration allowed to run wild in the Middle East. And that is the real story here. We had Houthi terrorists firing at American naval ships and commercial vessels in the Red Sea. The Biden administration removed the foreign terrorist designation from this radical terrorist group, allowed them to take these actions, put American lives at risk, shut down the freedom of navigation in the seas. And you can tell she's lying because her lips are moving and also because she's not substantively

dealing with the question, which they never do. And because of the effort of my colleagues and President Trump, we are now killing these terrorists. We have redesignated them as a foreign terrorist organization. And Americans and the world are safer because of it. So it's kind of strange that of all people, Jeffrey Goldberg entered this chat. And now speaking of entering the chat, Jesse Waters jumps in to help the disinformation. It's very suspicious that this particular reporter was ending up here. Could have been an accident on your team side, but it also could

have been something a little more mischievous. Oh, on Goldberg side, as you heard Walt say. Yes. Goldberg hacked his way in. What do you think about this character? It certainly could have been more mischievous, as Mike Waltz alluded to in the previous hour. We are working very hard to find out how this number was inadvertently added to the group chat. It remains a mystery. We're going to have to hire Elon to investigate it. We hope that soon it will be solved. And as you heard from the national security advisor, Elon Musk's team of experts are looking at this. The White House counsel's office and the National Security Council are all digging into this matter. And what's the what's the theme here? Another authoritarian theme. So first,

it was the cult theme. You should be grateful for the leader there. They're out there saying the leader did something bad. You should be grateful for the leader. That's number one. Number two, attack the media. Any opportunity to attack the media they welcome, of course, to ensure this can never happen again.

And as you so rightfully pointed out, the president and the national security advisor himself have taken responsibility and recognize that we are moving forward to ensure that communications are secure. Of course, suggesting someone might have hacked in or that the media is lying or, or using other forms of disinformation is not taking responsibility. I don't think they know how to take responsibility. And there is nothing better. The Democrats, there's nothing that they're better at than spinning a sensationalist story out of a basic set of facts. And the president and our team have been incredibly transparent about what happened. No classified information was shared in

this group chat. Now, this is another hook on which they're hanging their hats and scarves and whatever that the information was not classified. If it's true, there are two problems with that. Number one, the DOD guidelines say even unclassified information of this kind still isn't supposed to be shared. They don't they claim Gabbard and Ratcliffe said we were not aware of that policy. So if the information was unclassified, it's still not supposed to be shared. But more importantly, according to Tulsi Gabbard, Tulsi is the director of national intelligence. She oversees the guidelines for what's supposed to be classified. If not classified, it was supposed to be.

So it's not really the Trump card to say, don't worry, it wasn't classified anyway. But the Democrats would have you believe we have a national security crisis on our hands when we absolutely do not. It's the same playbook they ran with the Russia, Russia, Russia hoax, which was a perfect phone call between. And then I'm going to stop it here because it's so nauseating. But then she transitions into talking about other things not directly related to this, a borderline criminal meltdown. You know, we wonder how long can she last? She's doing a good job of lying about everything from Trump's perspective. She might have the wheels to last four years. Another day, another Tesla story. What is going on with this company?

Well, if you go to ground dot news slash Pacman, you will see how some outlets are covering Tesla and Elon Musk compared to others. The story really is one story, but the way it's told really can change your perspective. And this is the exact problem that our partners at ground news help to solve. Ground news is the only site that shows you how political bias and financial incentives and even blind spots shape the narratives in the news that you read. Otherwise, you're letting billionaires and political agendas shape everything from public opinion to policy. See every side of the news story, read the news from multiple perspectives and see through the media bias with reliable news

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There's no better way to describe the coverup that the Trump administration is attempting after the signal chat fiasco than to say they are effing around and now they are finding out every single lie that they are telling is subsequently being debunked by the information now being released by the Atlantic and by Jeffrey Goldberg. I'm going to give you the next example. And we've covered this in sort of pieces throughout the show. But it is fascinating how quickly they are just being destroyed. Donald Trump's press secretary, Caroline Leavitt, posted a message to X. She posted a tweet. Some people call it an excretion wherein she says the Atlantic has conceded. These were not war plans. This entire story was another hoax written by a Trump hater who is well known for his sensationalist spin.

And what she cites as her proof in this excretion on X is that the phrase attack plans was used. Now, I want you to really understand what's going on here. Their initial insistence was this was not classified information. Now, that may be true because it appears as though they may have failed to classify it, but it should have been classified. And we now know based on the DOD policy around sharing of such information, even if it's not classified, even if it's correctly not classified, which we dispute, but even if it were correctly not classified, you're still not allowed to share it in such a venue. So the next sort of battle line was these are not war plans. This is

this is an attack plan, but it's simply a linguistic misdirection because we can put them back on the screen. We now see that these are war plans. Pete Hegseth sent the message team update. Weather is favorable. Confirmed with sent com. We are a go for mission launch. Twelve fifteen eastern F-18s will launch the first strike package. Thirteen forty five eastern trigger based F-18 first strike window starts target terrorist at his known location should be on time. Strike drones will launch MQ nines, even mentioning specific equipment. 1410 more F-18s will launch. This is the second strike package. 1415 strike drones on target.

This is when the first bombs will definitely drop pending earlier trigger based targets. 1536 F-18 second strike starts. Also first sea based Tomahawks launched. Tulsi was asked, were weapons or weapons systems mentioned? She said, oh, I just don't remember. Well, here they are mentioned many, many times. This is a meaningless distinction without a difference. Suddenly they're talking about not really a war plan.

It's an attack plan. My guess, if you press them on it, is they would go. No war plans would be more general war plan would be like, hey, we are going to be launching an initiative in Yemen against the Houthis for these reasons. But of course, that's so generic. And that was already announced publicly that that is completely meaningless. This is exactly what they said was not released. And I think we really have to look carefully here at the approach being taken by the Atlantic because they are only releasing what is necessary to disprove the lies being told about them. When Jeffrey Goldberg first wrote that this was what happened,

10 different lies came in. And so he is slowly releasing what is necessary to prove that he is not lying. And so far and we should look at this with objectivity and we should simply analyze the statement and analyze what information we have. So far, every single allegation that has been made about Jeffrey Goldberg has been debunked. And so this is now leading to a pathetic attempt to run cover. They're bringing in all of their allies and we should look at a couple. Here's a video of how Fox News propagandist Jesse Waters explained what is objectively a national security catastrophe to his viewers. We now know that someone leaked actual us war plans to a journalist at the Atlantic over signal. Now, when we say someone in it and leaked, we still don't exactly know why he ended up on the signal thread, but we know that he did. And we know that at least as far

as the screenshots are concerned, it was Mike Waltz who added him. OK, that's not gossip. It's not campaign strategy. War plans were given to a member of the press on on the signal app. Here is Jesse Waters employing smug sarcasm and basically saying the problem is really the Atlantic. Do you ever try to start a group text? You're adding people and you accidentally add the wrong person. Right. All of a sudden, your Aunt Mary knows all your raunchy plans for the bachelor party. Well, that kind of happened today with the Trump administration. Kind of. Mike Walsh was putting together a group chat on Signal, an encrypted app with the secretary of defense, the VP and a bunch of other

national security officials to collaborate on whether to strike Iranian proxies in Yemen who keep firing missiles and shutting down shipping. Well, National Security Advisor Mike Waltz accidentally added a reporter to the group text. And not a good reporter. Jeffrey Goldberg.

Always attack the media. One of the biggest hoax artists around. Well, he heard some things he probably shouldn't have, but could have been a wee bit of a security breach. But it's not like they homebrewed a server and then bleached it or kept classified documents in their garages next to their Corvette. Talk about someone else.

Always the subsequent strategy. This is not journalism. This is damage control. OK, this is what state TV looks looks like. You minimize threats. You mock accountability. You pretend the real scandal is that someone else did something some other time. And the real takeaway from the way that Jesse Waters chose to handle this is that when he likens a massive national security breach to a WhatsApp mishap or texting the wrong person, the plans, oops, I texted my ex something that was meant for my current girlfriend or something like that. It is part of the coverup campaign. Now helping in this coverup campaign is also MAGA Mike Johnson.

Here is what he had to say. What you did see, though, I think was top level officials doing their their job, doing it well and executing on a on a plan with precision that mission was a success. No one was jeopardized because of it. We're grateful for that. But they will certainly, I'm sure, make sure that that doesn't happen. Mike Johnson's approach is, you know, what I really learned from this is, wow, they are operating the the operation in Yemen with extraordinary precision. That's really the takeaway. Forget about national security breach. Forget about the humiliating

nature of it. Forget about the fact that this is information that may have wrongly not even been classified, which raises even more questions about Tulsi Gabbard's competence and whether the entire Department of Intelligence is even remotely operating competently. No, no, no, no, no. The takeaway was, wow, our military is really doing an awesome job. This is not going to stop. They will keep covering it up like this until the story is replaced or supplanted with the next scandal. How do we know that? Because it's what they do every single time. Do you ever feel like it's tough to stay focused? I've sometimes struggled with it. And brain FM's focus music has really helped me find my groove. I used to think background music from Spotify or YouTube would help me focus,

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You can get access to Brain.fm's entire library of science-supported focus music for an entire month totally free. I think you'll find it as useful as I do go to brain.fm slash Pacman. The link is in the podcast notes. One of the propagandists over at Fox news is now saying the quiet part out loud, which is he doesn't think that due process should apply to anybody. I'm talking here about Brian Kilmeade and Brian Kilmeade says, you know, with all these deportations and everything Trump's doing and Tom Homan and the ice raids, it's just not practical to give due process to everybody. A lawyer, a day in court.

No, no, no, no, no. They don't deserve it and we just can't do it, which is another principle, constitution due process, another principle that they claim to support out the window. Let's take a listen to what he had to say, and then we'll talk about it. I also think it's not practical to think that we can do due process on 8 million people. It's 22 million people here and minimum legal, illegal or already just in the last three administrations. Right.

And there's some people that got through with Trump's administration. If we're going to give every these guys a day in court and a lawyer, we can't do it. They don't deserve it. Our system doesn't need to be double burdened. They are so nonchalant about taking people's rights away when it's inconvenient. They claim that rights are the most important thing. They claim that the constitution is the most important pillar of our society, but all of a sudden following the law is not practical.

The constitution is not practical. What kill mead is calling for here is the suspension of constitutional rights, not for a few people, not in an emergency, but as a blanket policy for millions of human beings. And he's saying it on national TV, like he wants a different coffee mug for his water on the set of Fox news due process is not some kind of bonus feature of American life. This, it really is the bedrock of the rule of law. It's a principle that the government can't punish you or detain you or deport you without a fair legal procedure. And this comes directly from the fifth and from the 14th amendments of the constitution. No person shall be deprived of life, liberty or

property without due process of law. And the scary part is that this is not like a fringe voice. This is a major host on the most watched cable channel, cable news channel in the United States. And he just casually floats this idea that millions of people should be punished or deported without a trial, without a lawyer, without a defense. Now, once you carve out a group, maybe it's immigrants, maybe it's refugees, maybe illegals. Once you carve out a group and you decide they don't deserve rights, it doesn't stop there because then someone will say, well, look at this other group. That's also very dangerous.

This one's not practical either. Here's another group of people that doesn't deserve it. This is really textbook expansion of authoritarianism. This is how it works. You start by suspending the rights for a group of people that the public has already been primed to either dislike or to fear. You normalize that you make it policy. And then the next step is that you've built a legal system based on you determining who deserves rights. And then you say step is that you've built a legal system based on you determining who deserves rights. And then you say, here's another group that we are going to deprive certain rights to.

Now I, it would be, it's important for me to mention, not every constitutional right applies equally to non-citizens. So for example, the right to vote in federal elections is only for U.S. citizens. So the folks who push this stuff often point to we don't give every right to noncitizens necessarily. And in a sense, federal election voting is just for U.S. citizens. Jury service is limited to citizens in most jurisdictions. There are certain federal jobs or security clearances. They're only open to citizens in most jurisdictions. There are certain federal jobs or security clearances.

They're only open to citizens. Second Amendment protections, gun ownership we're talking about can be restricted for non-citizens, especially undocumented immigrants or those who are here temporarily. We know that the right to enter and remain in the U S is governed by immigration law and noncitizens can be removed under certain conditions that would never apply to citizens. But due process specifically is not optional. It, it does apply to noncitizens. The Supreme court has been really clear when you look at the fifth amendment and the 14th amendment, um, and how they protect persons,

it does mean all persons and not just citizens. So if we were a country ruled by law and if Republicans really believed in the importance of the Constitution and due process, it means noncitizens who are here have a right to fair legal procedures before a government can come in and say, we're taking your liberty or we're taking your property, uh, or, or we're taking even more than that. Potentially, even if someone is here illegally, they have a right to a hearing. They have a right to challenge deportation and they have a right to avoid indefinite detention and be treated with basic legal fairness. Now I know the reaction for many

on the right is, hold on a second. They come here illegally and now we need to waste money in order to prove that it is time to send them back. Yes, that's the way it works. Either you respect due process and the rule of law or you don't. And every single one of these people that says they hold the constitution as their highest sort of standard. And then they go along with what Brian kill me to saying, you're not actually following your own principles. Donald Trump sat grinning like either a proud dad or a creepy stalker while the attorney general, Pam Bondi, shredded the constitution in real time. Pam Bondi went full fascist. Okay. Take a listen to what she had to say and then check out the look on Trump's face. And if you've committed fraud, we're coming after you. Thank you, Elon, for that. On the violent

crime level, thanks to president Trump's directive, we are seeking the death penalty again. So all of these horrible, violent criminals that you're hearing about around the country, they will face the death penalty federally within our country. And the drug dealers need to get out of here because we are coming after you. We're going to have 94 great U.S. attorneys around this country, and everyone will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. Thank you. Thank you. President is at your directive. I couldn't have said that better. Look at Trump just drooling. That's very good.

She's done a fantastic job. Thanks Pam. Now you will notice not any mention of the importance of due process in any of this. No mention of the importance of a fair trial, evidence, courts, appeals, just they will be facing the death penalty because when they say law and order, what they mean is punishment without process. We've seen it with the deportations. Is it too much to imagine that it might mean even more than that justice as a political stunt? Uh, and Trump is sitting there nodding and loving absolutely every second of it. Now, one other aspect to this, the sucking up to Elon, uh, to Elon Trump, to Elon Musk is it is nauseating.

And there was a hell of a lot of that. As far as the we are hearing a lot about fraud, waste and abuse, a lot of waste and abuse. But there is a tremendous amount of fraud. And Elon, thank you for your partnership. Thank you for your team. You have uncovered so much fraud in our government and we will prosecute you. OK, that that that didn't come out quite right. Elon, you have found so much fraud and we will prosecute you. Obviously, she means the fraudsters, but it came out

weird. We have an internal task force now working with every agency sitting here at this table. And if you've committed fraud, we're coming after you. Thank you, Elon, for that. Yeah. Under Trump and Bondi, prosecution is a tool. It can be a favor. It can be used as a threat. It can be used as a weapon to be handed out at rallies, depending on who's clapping the loudest. And this is not how democracy is supposed to work. Prosecutors don't promise executions. Okay. Attorneys general don't base criminal or shouldn't base criminal investigations on what Elon Musk decides to tweet that a 23 year old given the keys to the castle thinks they found when looking through some database and the rule of law isn't supposed to bend to applause lines. And so really none of this is about crime. You know, as I've said before, if this were really about crime, all of the fraud

they claim to have found would lead to arrests and prosecutions. Fraud is a crime. And what we really see the meaning by fraud is stuff. Trump doesn't like stuff that is inconvenient or antithetical to their political agenda, but not antithetical to the law. This is all about promising your base that your political enemies are going to suffer and that then the state is going to look the other way when you do the punishing. And while Pam Bondi makes these threats and acts like she's sounding normal, Trump grins because that's the plan. This has always been the plan on today's bonus show. We are going to talk about the latest with the mega jail holding deported Venezuelans and Kristi Noem's trip down there. We will also talk about Alina

Habba Habba getting a cushy job as a U.S. attorney in New Jersey. She really deserves the job. Right. And then this is one many of you wrote in about Texas Congresswoman Jasmine Crockett mocked Greg Abbott, the governor of Texas who uses a wheelchair as governor hot wheels. This has become very divisive in the audience where there are some saying we are that this is her stooping to the level of making fun of disability. And then others saying, uh, why should we maintain a decorum that they don't care about? Uh, and that this is exactly the right way to be talking. So we're going to talk about it on the bonus show today. All of those stories and more you will get when you sign up at join pacman.com.

Really appreciate all of our new members. Remember that my book is out initial. There was such demand that Amazon was delayed on shipping. Here's what happened. They now have the book at all regional distribution centers and overnight shipping is now happening. OK, so the books available, available everywhere. Please review the book on Amazon, Barnes and Noble and Goodreads. You can just say, you know, people think overview, I've got to sit over a typewriter with a Scotch thinking what to say.

No, you can just say, uh, important book at this point in time tells me a lot about history that I didn't know. Interesting ideas for the future of the democratic party. It can be as simple as one line. Okay. So we'll feature some of the, uh, more interesting reviews later this week. I'll see you on the bonus show. I'll see you back here tomorrow.