The David Pakman Show - 4/30/25: GDP down 1st time in 3 years, Trump crashes at rally

Episode Date: April 30, 2025

-- On the Show: -- Governor Gretchen Whitmer (D-MI) joins David to discuss her recent controversies with Donald Trump, including the Oval Office "hiding behind a binder' photo, appearing with Donald Trump in Michigan, and more -- GDP declined in the first quarter of 2025 for the first time in three years as the impact of Donald Trump's economic instability had immediate consequences -- Trump voters react and comment on Trump's first 100 days of his second presidential term -- Donald Trump's interview with ABC's Terry Moran goes completely off the rails in every way imaginable -- During a half-empty rally, Donald Trump crashes out, increasingly frustrated and unhinged -- The White House's latest "new media" press briefing is indistinguishable from a Saturday Night Live skit -- Donald Trump brags about bullying Jeff Bezos into having Amazon remove price advisories about the impact of tariffs on Amazon products -- On the Bonus Show: Consumer confidence sinks to lowest level in 5 years, SCOTUS weighs in on law enforcement being accountable when they raid the wrong house, Congress passes bill to fight deepfake nudes, much more... 👩‍❤️‍👨 Try the Paired App FREE for 7 days and get 25% OFF at https://paired.com/pakman 😬 Remi mouth guards: Get up to 50% OFF with code PAKMAN at https://shopremi.com/pakman 🤖 Sponsored by Venice: Use code PAKMAN for 20% off a Pro Account at https://venice.ai/pakman  🖼️ Aura Frames: Use code PAKMAN for $35 OFF & free shipping at https://auraframes.com/pakman ✉️ StartMail: Get 50% OFF for a year subscription at https://startmail.com/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

. well that didn't take very long at all three months into Donald Trump's second term the economy is already shrinking shelves are expected to start going empty my local grocery store hasn't had a single carton of eggs the last four times I've been there and hiring is freezing up with worsening jobs numbers. And as we speak, as I am coming to you today, do not adjust your television. This is a new show. The stock market is again down two percentage points once again. So here's what's going on. The American economy shrank in the

first quarter of this year. We measure that by looking at the GDP gross domestic product. It was expected to be somewhere between declining and up slightly most recently. And we now have the final numbers from Q1 negative growth, zero point three percent. That is a significant reversal from the 2.4% growth that we saw at the end of 2024 under president Joe Biden. It is well below the 0.4% growth consensus from economists. And of course the Atlanta feds GDP now indicator did expect a decline. It turns out we got one negative zero point three percent. This is the first economic contraction in three years for the United States. That's 12 consecutive quarters, roughly might have actually been 13, three consecutive years of every quarter.

The economy grows a little bit, grows a little bit, grows a little bit. And now Donald Trump's first quarter back in office and we see a GDP decline. This puts us halfway to a recession. And as I said yesterday, we may already be in a recession. Let me explain that. One of the most accepted ways to determine whether we're in a recession is two consecutive quarters of GDP decline. We are in the second quarter right now. If you believe as many economists do that, the economy is shrinking this quarter as well. Q1, we know saw GDP decline. If in this quarter, we are in another GDP decline, that means we are in a

recession right now. We won't know it until later. We won't know it until I guess it would be the very end of July. But we may be in a recession right now. Question that is obvious is what triggered it. Well, we saw this massive surge in imports as companies scrambled to stock up ahead of Donald Trump's new tariffs. That short term panic distorted the economy and now leaves us extraordinarily exposed to the empty shelves that many believe are coming. Trump's chaotic tariff policy didn't just slow the economy. It created the slowdown. Trump promised economic strength and growth. And instead, what he has done is spark a contraction is no longer speculation. That's what happened in the first quarter of 2025. And now we are seeing the fallout. The 145%, I guess, tariffs on Chinese

goods have brought imports to a halt. Bookings from China are down by as much as 60%. The port of Los Angeles, which handles 40% of imports from Asia, is expecting a 35% drop in arrivals. These are not normal fluctuations. These are crisis level supply disruptions. Trump ran on. You won't see empty shelves when I'm president. Not like you saw under Biden, even though really the empty shelves were during covid while Trump was president. But put that aside for a moment. Trump ran on no empty shelves. The cupboards will be full. The shelves will be stocked. But Wal- Walmart and Target have already warned Trump directly. If this continues, we will have empty shelves by summer and we are less than two months from summer right now.

The most affected import areas, furniture, clothing, auto parts, plastics and footwear, really everyday goods that people have come to rely on. Prices would expect to go up if we see the supply issues. Small businesses are saying we can't survive if this keeps going. And to add insult to injury or injury to insult, depending on your perspective, the job market is not looking so hot either. Stalling just 62,000 new private sector jobs added in April. That's the weakest number in about a year. It is half of what was expected.

What's happening? Well, employers are hesitating to hire because they don't know what comes next. Why hire employees to, for example, install products that you're not going to be able to get over the summer or that are going to cost so much that no customers are going to want to buy them. Wage growth is flattening. Education and tech are cutting jobs. So one economist summed this up perfectly.

Unease, unease is the word of the day. So step back. Look at what we are seeing here. We had an economy under Biden. It was not perfect. We still had poverty. We still had inequality. We still had unemployment.

It's a country of 340 million people to say we figured it out under Biden would of course not be accurate, but by most standard metrics that we consider things were going pretty okay. All of a sudden the economy is shrinking. Global trade is collapsing. Supply chains are breaking down and we're hearing panic about empty shelves just seven, eight weeks from now. Hiring has slowed down. Consumer confidence is at its lowest in five years. We'll talk about that on the bonus show today.

If this were happening under Biden or under Obama, Republicans would be screaming recession, impeach 25th amendment on Fox news 24 seven, but it's Trump. So they are pretending, telling themselves, telling us that this is all part of some brilliant master plan. That's going to work out. I hate to have to be the bearer of the bad news, but this is not an economic revival. There is no longterm gain coming at the end of the short term pain. This is economic sabotage. And the people who voted for it, the ones who voted for it are likely to be the absolute hardest hit. And that's what I want to talk about next.

MSNBC interviewed a bunch of Trump supporters about the growing economic disaster. GDP declined in the first quarter of 2025. Supply chain collapse is expected by summer. Wage growth is flattening. Trade has collapsed. And so MSNBC went and talked to a lot of these folks. And I'm going to play for you what they had to say. Some of them used religion to justify their faith in Donald

Trump. Others said, we've already seen inflation. It's just going to be more. Let's take a listen. And then we're going to talk about it. He's just a very funny man. You got to understand how he operates. No president, nobody can come in and change things overnight. I really believe that. What's funny is Trump kind of did come in and change things overnight, for the worse. I really believe that he's the one God's chosen. I'm really very optimistic. I know tariffs got everybody scared.

Tariffs, they don't scare me at all. I'm willing, I think, too, to go through a little bit of initial pain. We have to have some pain to have the gain. I think that sometimes you have to go through a little bit of initial pain. You have to have some pain to have the gain. I think that sometimes you have to go through a little bit of the fire to get to the end of the rainbow. Nobody likes to pay more for anything I don't, but in the long run, I think it's going to be good. People are saying, oh, well, prices are going to go way up,

we won't be able to do anything. Well, how was the last four years? My grocery bills were ridiculous. That was for no reason. This is for a good reason. Even the great empires he's built in business, I trust that same savvy is going to be helping our country also. My biggest issue is the border, and he's killing it. No open borders. The many millions running across the border.

Now, if you look at it, the amount of documented people coming across the border, it's done in a very structured way. It's just one of those things where you put yourself and you feel the empathy aspect of it, and you feel sort of when you see a kid being pulled, and you're like, man, is there another way we could have did that? I'm just thrilled that they are getting rid of the criminals and illegal aliens.

I'm not sure that all of them are real bad criminals, but if you come here illegally, it still makes you a criminal. I do believe that people are criminals and they're doing the wrong things. They should be taken out of our country. But some of the families, I was wondering if wondering some ways we could have handled that a little bit differently. Listen to that. Where do you even start?

You know, in in my book, The Echo Machine, I talk a lot about. It used to be that the argument was. Over what the facts are, in other words, what are the facts as they pertain to a particular scenario? We have had to back off of that in the United States where now we first need to establish what types of statements are even statements about fact versus statements of opinion? And we saw in the covid era, for example, some people decide that facts about whether a drug does a certain thing are merely matters of opinion. And so we have a real crisis of thinking in this country.

And as I sit and listen to these Trump supporters justify everything that he's doing without even really knowing how to justify it. Right. It did at the end of the rainbow. This is going to be great. This is it's short term pain and I'm willing to tolerate it. The follow up questions are how exactly is this all going to get us to a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow? I think it's a pot of coal at the end of the rainbow that is really awaiting us. But these are folks that are in so deep in a cult. There's really no other way to say it that I don't know that there is any way to really talk sense into them. And this is why when we see, you know, I've said before at an individual level, if you want to try to change the mind of, you know, your crazy uncle at Thanksgiving, do it. But at a mass scale, we're not going to

deprogram all of these people. And so the way to win is going to be by turning out our side and recognizing that 45% of the country doesn't vote. And without convincing a single one of these people, we can win just by getting more people out to the polls rather than by arguing with these folks. These folks strike me as probably too far gone. And I know no one is literally beyond reach, but it seems like these folks really are almost there. Here's another woman who said, I've been paying higher prices, sweetie, to an MSNBC report. Are you prepared to pay higher prices for goods? I've been paying higher prices.

We've been molested with mine. Gotten off this. My groceries have doubled. My gas has doubled. No, I'm not used to it. You know, I'm not used to it. Are you prepared for more? We're looking at. Yeah, because the tariffs, these are massive I, I'm not used to it. You know, I'm not used to it. Are you prepared for more?

We're looking at with the tariffs. These are massive. No, but it has to happen before it goes back down. The they have been sold this bill of goods. They've fallen for it. We need this. Now the inflation is worthwhile. Now the economic pain is worthwhile because there's a greater good and a greater goal

which we're approaching here. Explain, ask them to explain it to you. They can't, but they've fallen for it. I don't know how we deprogram them. I think we probably don't. And winning is going to depend on turning out new voters. That's my takeaway. Let me know what you think.

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telling me, David, talk about this, but don't talk about that. No, that you are really the bosses collectively of the show. And I so appreciate the, where are we at? What's the number? Eighty nine new members this week. Consider a membership at join Pacman dot com. Donald Trump suffered a complete and total meltdown when fact check to his face about Photoshopped gang tattoos and had what I believe is his worst interview ever since the infamous Axios Jonathan Swan interview of term number one. The interview was with ABC News is Terry Moran. Trump insisted that the M S one three on the Abrego Garcia knuckles was real even though

it was obviously photoshopped. Trump insists it was real and he does not like being fact checked to his face. Listen to this. He wasn't a member of a gang and then they looked and on his knuckles he had MS-13. There's a dispute. Wait a minute. Wait a minute. He had MS-13 on his knuckles. He had some tattoos that are interpreted that way. But let's move on. Wait a minute. I will. Terry, Terry, Terry.

He did not have the letter M as one. It says MS one. That was Photoshop. So let me know. It was Photoshop. Terry, you had that. Hey, they're giving you the big break of a lifetime. You know, you're doing the interview.

I picked you because, frankly, I never heard of you, but that's OK. He's got to insult anyone with the audacity to say you were lying. He attacks. He doesn't know. This is his currency. Terry, but you're not being very nice. He had MS-13 tattoo. We'll agree to disagree. I want to move on to something else. Do you want me to show you the picture? I saw the picture. Well, here we go. Here, and you think it was Photoshop? Well, here we go. Here we go.

Photoshop it. Go look at his hand. He did have tattoos that can be interpreted that way. I'm not an expert on them. I want to turn to Ukraine. I want to get to you. No, no. No, no.

Trump cannot let it go. But of course, Terry Moran is completely correct. No, no. He had M.S. as clear as you can be not interpreted. This is why people no longer believe. Well, the news. Trump says we can't believe the news. But Terry Moran is telling the truth.

Trump is lying right now. It's a fake photo. Because when he was photographed in El Salvador, they aren't there. But let's just go. They aren't there when he's in El Salvador. Oh, they weren't there, but they're there now, right? No, they're in your picture. Terry, Ukraine, sir. He's got MS-13 on his knuckles. OK, we'll take a complete and total crash to all the people who all along said, no, no, no.

Trump means that the tattoos stand for MS-13. He's not saying that it says MS 13. No, Trump is saying that the MS one three that was photoshopped onto the knuckles is literally there. This is insane. And of course, Trump is either a terrible liar or he's cognitively impaired or he's being manipulated by his staff into believing that the photoshopped image of MS one three was actually real or some combination of the three. Uh, you know, it make remind when Trump glitched out during rally after rally and spent minutes swaying to music, we should have been a little more concerned about making this guy president. Now, Terry Moran asks Trump, are you saying that

Vladimir Putin wants peace despite all of the bombing? And Trump goes, yeah, he wants peace. Speaker 5 that he's willing to stop the fighting. Don't forget- You think he wants peace? You think Vladimir Putin wants peace? I think he does, yes. I think he does. I think because- Even with the raining missiles on. I think he really, his dream was to take over the whole country. I think because of me, he's not gonna do that. Do you trust him? I think-

Do you trust him? I don't trust you. I don't trust. I don't trust a lot of people. I don't trust you. Look at you. You come in. Do you trust Putin? Trump's instinct is to tell the person asking the question, you're the one I don't trust.

All shooting for bear. You're so happy to do the interview. I am. And you start hitting me with fake questions. He said, tell me that a guy whose hand is covered with a tattoo doesn't have the tattoo. You know, I mean, you're being dishonest. No, I'm not. Let me notice Trump going back to the tattoo.

He can't let it go. This is a child. I'm not. So I trust I don't trust a lot of people. But I do think this. I think that he let's say he respects me. And I believe because of me, he's not going to take over the whole, but his decision, his choice would be to take over all of Ukraine. All right. So, yeah,

he trusts Putin, I guess more than he trusts Terry Moran. Trump. And then in a big moment asked, are you 100% confident in Pete Hegseth? And Trump goes, I'm not 100 percent confident in anybody, which many are interpreting as not great news for Pete Hegseth. Signal chat with his wife on where he's discussing that attack in Yemen. There's another signal chat discussing the attack on Yemen. There's a reporter accidentally involved. You said the other day that you had a talk with the secretary. Did you take

him to the woodshed? I had a talk with him and whatever I said, I probably wouldn't be inclined to tell you. But we had a good talk. He's a talented guy. He's young, smart, highly educated. And I think he's going to be a very good defense, hopefully a great defense secretary. But he'll be very hopefully so far he's going to be a very good defense, hopefully a great defense secretary, but he'll be very, hopefully so far he's not, but Trump's still waiting defense secretary. You have a hundred percent confidence in a hundred percent confidence in anything. Okay. Anything.

Do I have a hundred percent? It's a stupid question. It's pretty important. I have no, no, no. Do you trust Putin? I don't trust you. Are you 100 percent confident? What a stupid question. You don't have 100 percent. Only a liar would say I have 100 percent confidence. I don't have 100 percent confidence that we're

going to finish this interview. We will. We will. All right. So this is this is what happens when an authoritarian used to having suck ups and sycophants around him is actually pressed. Not even listen. I, I, I think it's important to mention Terry Moran is doing a reasonably good job here of giving Trump follow up and not letting him get away with the lies. But this is what we call standard journalism in most of the world here. When you're expecting to be surrounded by sycophants, you go always being nasty.

What a nasty guy. This is called journalism. Okay. Now, of course, he'll never get another opportunity to interview Trump that we know Trump did also during the interview admit to willfully violating the Supreme Court order when it came to the deportation of a Brego Garcia. There's a phone on this desk. I could.

You could pick it up. I all the power, the presidency. you could call up the president of El Salvador and say, send him back right now. And if he were the gentleman that you say he is, I would do that. But the court has ordered you to facilitate that. I'm not the one making this decision. We have lawyers want to do this. But the buck stops.

I saw. No, no, no, no. I follow the law. You want me to follow? There's a phone. So of course, Trump goes, no, no, no. I follow the law. You want me to follow? There's a phone on. So of course, Trump goes, no, I could have, I could have picked up the phone and I could have stopped the deportation, but he decided not to do it. Something he had not previously acknowledged. And then finally completely disconnected from the reality of how his economic policy impacts the day to day lives

of Americans. He claims that tourism is up. We all know tourism to the United States is down about 15 percent. Trump, I guess, has people around him saying, oh, sir, tourism is up. It's going so well. Terry Moran fact checks it. Trump doesn't like it. And Canadians, many of them are really angry, furious about your talk about we're going to take over. Canada is going to become the 51st state. And it kind of is of a piece. A lot of travel is down into the United States from around the world. It feels like there's been reputational damage. Great. Well, prices are down. Not the two. Gasoline's down. Energy's down. Tourism is going to be way up. When you see the numbers, the tourism is way up now. Now, Canada,

tourism is doing very well. We're doing very well. We're doing very well. Wait till you see the real numbers come out in about in six months from now. When you see the numbers, forget about Q1 GDP being down. Forget about Q2 GDP potentially also being down, putting us in a technical recession in six months. You're going to hear something about tourism and see how great it is. This is what happens when you're surrounded by yes, people and sycophants 24 seven, anyone attempting to interject some reality is considered a liar, is considered fake news, is considered nasty, is considered untrustworthy,

complete meltdown interview for Donald Trump. And just wait till you see what happened at his rally. You know, yesterday, Donald Trump went to Michigan on a sort of the hundred days roughly of his administration. And, uh, one of the people he met with is governor Gretchen Whitmer, and she is taking a lot of heat for meeting with Trump. She's going to join me next and we'll talk to her about that. But before we get to that, one of the things Donald Trump did in Michigan is he held a rally in Warren. Now this was a venue whose maximum capacity was about 4000. The setup only allowed about 60% of the space to be used. And there will, we're still many empty seats. As you

can see here, even up behind Trump, you see that one of the sort of bleachers, I guess we would call it on the left under the jobs, jobs, jobs banner is like half empty. And Donald Trump, of course, is there saying our crowds are so big AOC and Bernie, they don't have crowds. This was if you account for the fact that not the entire space was open and then a bunch of it was empty anyway. This is like a half full rally. This is 2000 people. This is nothing compared to the AOC Bernie crowds. And listen to Trump party. They have no candidates. And, you know, when they say that Bernie Bernie's probably the best they have. By the way, he's about seven years older than me, more eight years old.

One thing I got to give him credit. He's a lunatic, but he's still pretty sharp. And he's going around with AOC plus three, you know, the plus three follow. They hang on for little bits. They hang on for nuggets. And they get crowds. They say, oh, the crowd was our crowds are so much bigger than their crowds. Their crowds are small. If I ever had a crowd like their biggest crowd, they'd say it's over for Trump.

Yeah. Trump's got 2000 people at what is his only rally so far of, you know, the year build as the big celebration of a successful hundred days, skies deranged. But then it got even weirder. Donald Trump, once again, ranting about toilets. This guy is obsessed with plumbing. This guy is obsessed with water pressure. And once again, toilets. Has there ever been a president as obsessed with toilets as Trump? You know, it was William Howard Taft ranting and raving about being able to flush once. Listen to this all night long. And by the way, did you just see what I did? Straws.

I wiped out the paper straw a little bit. I flushed millions of straws down my toilet. You sink. You ever try buying a new sink and no water comes out? Your shower heads, your toilets, the whole thing. It's a disaster. We now have it so you can have as much water as you want because it's not an environmental problem. You have areas they can't get rid of their water,

and yet they have they put restrictors on them. You used to take them off, but now you can't because they're welded in and yet they have they put restrictors on them. You used to take them off, but now you can't because they're welded in. But now you don't have to worry about that because it would be interesting to do an analysis of how many times presidents said the word toilet publicly during their presidencies. It has to be that there's no one who even can hold a candle to Donald Trump. Trump unclear what actual successes he can tout is relegated to saying soon we will be on Mars. And one day soon, American astronauts will plant the flag on the planet Mars.

It's going to happen very soon. Every single day. It is not going to happen very soon. Every single day. It is not going to happen very soon. Mars is a frozen rock. And while absolutely fascinating and I'm sure extraordinarily interesting to look at going to Mars and it's a project I support, it is not going to be a presidential accomplishment. It is not going to happen anytime soon. And Trump is just trying to find a way to funnel more money into Elon Musk's pockets. A disoriented Trump talks about firing Biden attorneys, but he just seems mixed up and confused. Happened not even a little chance. We've ended the weaponization of law enforcement and

fired Joe Biden's handpicked crook. These are there's a glitch. You guys notice it and pick crook. These are pro crime US attorneys, except if it's a political person like me. I dare linguists. The most cunning linguist could not unwind the syntax of that statement. Trump as usual knows more than everybody. And he took the opportunity of yesterday's rally to remind us even when it comes to interest rates, he knows much more about interest rates than the chairman of the Federal

Reserve. Inflation is basically down and interest rates came down despite the fact that I have a Fed person who's not really doing a good job. But I won't say that. I want to be very nice. I want to be very nice and respectful to the Fed. You're not supposed to criticize the Fed. You're supposed to let him do his own thing. But I know much more than he does about interest rates. That's right.

Trump knows more about vaccination than virologists. Trump knows more about weapons than the generals. Trump knows more about interest rates than the chairman of the federal reserve. He just knows more than everybody. Um, Trump bragging about ending D E I I ended all of the lawless so-called diversity, equity, and inclusion bullshit all across the entire federal government and the private sector. You know, Trump is serious because he swore. And finally, Trump giving a shout out to our friend Mike Pillow Lindell in the crowd.

As we talked about earlier this week, Pillow's having a tough go. But Trump, I guess, still likes him. This purchaser of ads in history, if he would have bought my ads, I could add 10 times more ads on. There's never been. Is there any station that doesn't have a Pillow ad in? But he's great and he's doing great and he's got a beautiful new wife and all that stuff.

And I'm proud of you. Look at him holding hands. They're still holding hands. I'm very proud of you. Look at him holding hands. They're still holding hands. I'm very proud of this. Nice. Usually by this time, usually in a lot of people I know, Mike, by this time, it's over. It's over. Look at you holding hands. I love that. I saw that. I pardon. Oh, boy. So this is what the president is doing on the hundred day mark of his second term as we learn the economy contracted GDP down in Q1. And this is what Trump is doing. Sad state of affairs. After the break, we will ask Gretchen Whitmer, what's up with these Trump meetings? What is she up to?

Quick break. Back after this, remember to get on my newsletter at David Pakman dot substack.com. All right. So we all know Alexa listens to us, recommends products based on our conversations. Meta retargets us based on our browsing and engagement history. Have you wondered what chat GPT and Claude are up to with your conversations. We feed so much of our information to these AI chat bots, thoughts, dreams, sensitive questions, business ideas. They take the information, tie it to your identity, and they can sell that to third parties and governments. Chat GPT has the former director of the NSA on their board right now. That doesn't feel awesome. It took us a long time to truly understand what social media companies were doing with our data.

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com and getting thirty five dollars off plus free shipping on their best selling Carver matte frame. It's great to welcome to the program today, the democratic governor of Michigan, Gretchen Whitmer. And what a day of all days to be on. You know, I, I woke up and started to see what's in the news today, governor, and I see many stories about the visit that Donald Trump made yesterday and your appearance with him and I'll be upfront. We are big fans of yours on the show. And we think what you've done in Michigan is phenomenal. And we're seeing some of the backlash to the visits with the, with the president. So I just want to start

kind of at the beginning with you. I see governors really as administrators of states. And in a sense, you need to work with the federal government. And so for me, when I see governors work with presidents across party lines, that doesn't seem like a huge, surprising thing to me because there are areas where governors depend on the federal government. Talk to me generally about your approach to working with the federal government, whether or not it's a Democrat or a Republican in office. Maybe we'll start there. Yeah.

Well, thank you for setting the table like that. I appreciate it. I'm really glad to be with you and I appreciate, um, all the, all the different work that you do. You know, I'll just say this. When I took my oath of office to be governor of the state of Michigan. It was an oath to put the people of Michigan's interests first, above my own interest, above any other interest. I am the governor of Michigan and I've got to deliver balanced budgets. I've got to get shit done. I've got to work with

whomever I can in order to do that. And, you know, I think some of the, I think consternation in this moment is in my first term, I had a very contentious relationship with the Trump administration and, you know, infamously got threatened with kidnapping and murder plot. Yes. Because I was telling people, trying to keep Michiganders safe and asking them to wear masks and stay at home to be safe. Now, you know, I show up at the White House because I know how important this base, Selfridge Air National Guard base, is to the Michigan economy. And I get, you know, criticized by some in the pundit class. But at the end of the day,

the same values drive both of those decisions. And it is what's in the best interest of the people of Michigan. So I can weather the ups and downs of it if I feel like I'm making a difference for Michiganders. And that's what it's all about. It doesn't mean that I don't fight important fights. And certainly there are a lot of things that I don't agree with the current administration on and we are fighting. But my ability to seek common ground is driven by my North star, which is the people of Michigan. Right. And so for people who may not know the backstory, you met with the president a couple of times to secure funding for the Selfridge Air National Guard base. Why? Why that issue in terms of what you chose to lobby Trump on rather than anything else?

Well, I'll start with this. You know, we have, I've got a list. I've always got a list of to-do lists, right? In my personal life as governor and when I show up at the White House, I'm trying to cover as much ground as I can. So a self-ridge is an important thing. Our A-10s, the fighter mission that we currently have, that plane is being retired. And so getting recapitalized is really important, not just for the base, not just for Homeland Security, although those are two important things. It's important because this base is really the linchpin to about $850 million of economic activity

in aerospace and defense sector in Michigan. It is the linchpin to three other bases as well. I didn't just talk about self-region every opportunity. I've talked about tariffs and what all the chaos and tariffs has wreaked on the Michigan economy. I talked about Asian carp, which is an invasive species, which is at risk of infiltrating the Great Lakes. And we are home to the Great Lakes. 20% of the world's fresh surface water is in those beautiful lakes. And we have ice storm victims in Northern Michigan that I'm advocating for as well. So I've always got a list, but

Selfridge has been an important part of every conversation I've had with the White House. And I'm just so happy that I can check that off my list and I'll stay focused on all the other things and I'll keep adding to my list. So let's maybe go chronologically and speak first about the visit to the White House. There was this viral image of of you with I think it was a three ring binder, although maybe it was a notebook in front of in front of your face. And it led people to react all sorts of different ways. Why was she there at all if she planned to hide her face or why did she stand there as Trump made bogus election fraud claims? Let's I want to give you an opportunity to kind of explain the picture first, maybe. And the binder. What was your thinking with that?

Well, I'll share this. I was there to advocate for self-rege and for ice storm victims. That was the whole reason I was there to advocate for self-ridge and for ice storm victims. That was the whole reason I was in Washington, D.C. I had had a one-on-one with the president previously. Well, his chief of staff sat in it, so I guess it was three people in the meeting. But, you know, I was led into what I thought was going to be another meeting of that sort. And to my surprise, it was a room full of press and cabinet members. And I took one of his aides aside and I said, what is going on here? And they said, he's just going to sign executive order and then you'll have your meeting. So I was stuck. And to my surprise, it was a whole lot of

rhetoric and actions that I vehemently opposed. And so I think part of what was lost on people was that I started in the front of the room and gravitated to the end. And by the thousandth picture, it felt like was taken of me. I held my folder up. I didn't want to be there for any of that. That was not why I was there. And I was opposed to it. And eventually I walked out of the room. No one reported that. I made it look like I was there for any of that was wrong. But I had to stay for my meeting, which was after all of that. And so I did. And, you know, all the grief that I took for covering my face or just even being in the room, you know, that's all a part of, I think, the moment we're living in.

And I get it. But I was there for Selfridge, which we got done yesterday in a spectacular announcement and for ice victims of the ice storm. And I don't apologize for that. My job is to show up for Michigan. I was angry about being put in that situation though. Do you think you were set up deliberately in this sense? The last time I was at the white house, president Biden was president. Everywhere we went, we were constantly told here there are cameras.

When you walk by here, you could be photographed this over. This is private over here. This is off the record. Do could could this do you believe that this was a deliberate setup to put you in this situation or was it lack of organization or wherewithal or the schedule got mixed up? I don't know. I really don't know. And I don't want to cast aspersions, but I'll just say I was not happy about it. It was not what I was under the impression was going to happen and certainly nothing that I would ever endorse or want to be associated with. So, you know, last time I was at the White House, I was brought in at the tail end of a meeting he was having with a different group. And you know, it just seems

like maybe they're, they, things move fast there. And I, I don't know, I can't explain it, but I wasn't thrilled about it. Okay. Before we talk about tariffs, let's talk briefly about yesterday. So the president goes to Michigan. There's this, another picture now of you. Uh, I think it's shaking his hand. It sort of looks like you're facing the camera. He's kind of blocking you. I think you're shaking hands. And then he brings you up to speak at this first event that he did. You seemed surprised to be honest, that you were being invited to speak. Uh, I think you said even in fact, I, I didn't know that, that I was going to speak sort of same question.

I mean, I'm starting to sort of get the sense that this is being done deliberately to put you in this situation. But what was your what was your reaction when then again you're asked to speak and it's sort of unclear the circumstances, what you're supposed to say, what you're supposed to talk about? Yeah, well, I think I think they do a lot of things off the cuff. I'll just say that whether it's policymaking or or actions like that, you know, I don't think that Secretary Hegsut anticipated speaking. He spoke as well there. So, you know, I took the opportunity, though, because on behalf

of Michigan, on behalf of the men and women of that particular base and their families and all the businesses that rely on that base, I wanted to say thank you and I did. You know, this means we were able to find common ground on this. It doesn't mean that we're not, we don't still have very different views on the world and on values and the rule of law for that matter. But this was a good thing for Michigan as the governor. I'm really proud that we got it done and I'm grateful. So let's now talk about a little bit of policy and how the state of Michigan and your day to day is being affected by what's happening in Washington. There's sort of like a few main categories that I think I would want to get your thoughts as to what's the day to day that's most relevant to you. There's the kind of slide

towards authoritarianism and and lawlessness and lack of due process and deportation of people with temporary legal status or more without due process out of the country. This affects workforces. This affects local law enforcement, et cetera. That's like one category, one pillar. We have the economic, which is primarily tariffs. We just learned that the GDP contracted in the first quarter of 2025 for the first time in three years. There's concerns about empty shelves by summer, et cetera. So there's sort of like the, the economic and then there's everything we might call

foreign policy as governor of Michigan, which of these areas are you contending with and dealing with problems as a result of Trump policy in your state on a day-to-day basis? Well, I would say all of the above, but I'm going to focus on tariffs. You know, the, the chaotic tariff policies have already, it's already being felt by Michiganders, by Michigan businesses. People have been laid off. People are seeing their costs go up, their savings go down. I don't think that most people in Michigan voted for losing their life savings or losing the job. they were hopeful that they were going to get lower costs, actually. And so I think that there's a real sense that all of this chaos is costing us

our livelihoods, and it's dangerous for Michigan's economy. That's part of, I think, something that we're all going to feel eventually if we're not feeling it yet. I would add, you know, the economic policy absolutely is a part of the international, right, policy. Canada, you know, Canadians are like our neighbors, our friends, our cousins, you know, we are practically related Michiganders and Canadians. If you've ever been to a hospital in Detroit, you've been taken care of by a Canadian nurse. I mean, this is a relationship that is so important to Michigan and Michiganders. And the level of hurt and now anger that we are feeling from our Canadian friends and neighbors because of what's happening, because they're being treated not like allies, but adversaries, comes with a big cost as well, as you think about just even Canadian tourism, much less

all the other important economic ways that we are intertwined. So this is, I think, the most salient issue that Michiganders are feeling on a day-to-day basis. When we think about all the other constitutional issues that we are combating and that we are in court on, that obviously is of high concern as well. But if you stay grounded in the economics, it's undeniable that we are feeling the brunt of the uncertainty around tariff policy and the tax that is being foisted on to everyday, you know, hardworking Americans. Why do you think Michigan flipped back to Trump in 2024? Well, you know, Michigan's always a state that is swings, right? We are a state that is a bellwether for the country.

Michigan, like every swing state in the nation, marginally went for President Trump. I think it was because people thought that their costs would go lower. By far, that is what I hear from people that they were hopeful of, and now they're feeling betrayed because their costs have only gone up and their

savings down or their ability to get into a higher paying job has been compromised because business isn't making those investments because of all the uncertainty. So it's all related. And I think the personal economy always drives voter behavior. In other words, it was the perception of the economy under Biden combined with at least the plausibility that Trump would fix some of what they saw as wrong with the economy. Speaker 2 You just said it better than I did. Yes. Speaker 1 Governor, I know that your priority, of course, is being governor of Michigan and

you're not announcing anything today. But are you thinking at all about 2028? Speaker 1 I'm always thinking about, you know, the future. you're not announcing anything today. But are you thinking at all about 2028? I'm always thinking about, you know, the future. You know, I've got kids who are 23 and 21. I am thinking about them and their rights and their livelihoods and their ability to live the lives they want in this country. Thinking of, you know, I'm always thinking about that. So I'm staying focused, though, on on my job through 2026, making sure that Michigan has great, strong Democratic leadership going into 2028. That's going to be so important, regardless of who's at the top of the ticket. But I hope to always have an impact on writing whatever that

future looks like. I'm not sure that I need to be the main character. All right. Governor of Michigan, Gretchen Whitmer, we really appreciate your time today and we're going to keep an eye on your work in Michigan. Thank you so much. Thank you, David. Good to be with you. You know, I'll often talk to my friends about what do we really think is private on our computers and on our phones. And many people believe that their emails are genuinely private. And it turns out that a lot of the email services are looking at your emails and can look at your emails even after you have deleted them, which is why I recommend our sponsor start mail, a trusted name in secure email for more than a decade. Start Mail is based in the

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You really can't go wrong. Try start mail for yourself completely free for seven days at start mail dot com slash Pacman, which will also give you 50 percent off your first year. That's S.T.A.R.T. mail dot com slash Pacman for a seven day free trial and 50 percent off your first year. The link is in the podcast notes. Is this a press briefing or a Saturday Night Live skit for the second straight day? White House Press Secretary Caroline Leavitt did a second White House press briefing specifically for what they call new media. Now, in practice, this is the most sycophantic MAGA influencers that they could find. And it is bizarre in every way.

Now, I'm going to I want to mention something here in a moment. But before we do that, let me just play a little bit of a clip from this. But there's some really weird stuff going on at this thing. Take a listen to this. We'll continue to be so thanks for coming to the influencer briefing. I look forward to taking your questions in Deborah. Why don't you kick us off? So congratulations on 100 incredible days and over the first 100 days, the majority of policies that we've seen from the Trump administration have been either targeted at

foreign affairs such as bringing the American hostages home or attempting to end the war between Ukraine and Russia or a long term goal such as cover cutting government spending with Doge. What policies can we expect? By the way, I just should mention the guy in the second row here with the blue suit. That's Anthony Pompliano. He's sort of like an acquaintance of mine. I've been on his show. He has really jumped on the Trump train fully. And I would love to appear with him again. But it's interesting that he's sitting there. He rolled out over the next few months that Americans will directly feel the effects of in order to secure the 2026 midterms for the Republican Party and keep his approval rating historically high. Yeah. And of course, Trump's

approval rating is historically low, not historically high. Every aspect of the basis for this question, completely fabricated, sycophantic suck up ism. But that's why they're there. That's why these people are there. Now, I want to show you something really weird there. It's a little bit out of school for us to talk about people's physical appearance. It's not really it's not really salient and relevant to most of what we discuss. But I have to acknowledge that this is a very strange looking group of people that is part of this new media MAGA influencer briefing. And there's a guy here. I'm going to be honest. I don't know if this guy's 25 or 65. It sort of looks like someone with the Benjamin Button disease. I think it's called progeria and I'm not at this guy doesn't actually have that.

I'm not making fun of people with the disease. The point I'm trying to make is there are these are such odd people that are putting themselves together in ways that they would ridicule when they are on the other side politically with no self-awareness that they are making themselves look completely nuts. Anyway, so here is a question from that guy suggesting that Biden was responsible for rising suicide rates. If you can imagine this in the first hundred days is that the White House is crawling with kids. You have a young, beautiful baby boy. There are babies everywhere. There's so many young folks on staff who have kids. But the last four years under Joe Biden, parents are really stressed and ravaged. They had to take on two or three extra jobs. Depression rates. Yes, people had

three extra jobs under Biden, despite the fact that zero economic indicators suggested that we're up. Suicide rates were up. You're a very high profile young mother who seems to juggle and balance it all beautifully. What advice do you have to young parents out there who are starting their careers, having kids, building families and trying to find that balance so desperately? Yeah. What a vomitous question. What a vomitous question. This should make all of us have that disgusting taste when you when one of those weird burps happens. This is a disgusting question.

Wow. Well, it's a great question. And first, to the heart of your premise, it's true. The president has empowered not just me as a young mother in this role. Anyway, her answer doesn't even make a difference. Who could tell the difference between an SNL skit and this Caroline Leavitt said that Trump is finding it frustrating that it's more difficult than he thought to end the Russia Ukraine war.

Who could have known it was so are dying as a collateral result of the military conflict and the president wants to see it end as quickly and soon as possible. And I can tell you, watching firsthand, he has exuded a tremendous amount of effort into this war. He's getting frustrated with the amount of effort this has taken. And he's made that clear to both sides. But he remains optimistic that he's doing everything right. But he just can't seem to end that war.

And then another one of these mega influencers plays a game with Caroline Leavitt called trolling or truthing, where the idea is to get Caroline Leavitt to say when Trump said X, it was for real versus when Trump said X, it was just trolling. I was wondering if you'd indulge me in a quick round of Trump trolling or Trump truthing. Sure, let's do it. Okay, good. Love it. Greenland joining America.

Definitely Trump truthing. Canada becoming a 51st state. Trump truthing all the way. And the Canadians would benefit greatly, let me tell you that. Eliminating the IRS? I think that is an optimistic goal and the president, so I would say we're on the side of truthing there for sure. And the president again wants to see tax cuts and he wants to see this massive revenue that we can gain from tariffs as- Yeah, anybody who thinks Trump

is really going to eliminate the IRS, I've got a bridge to sell you. Well, which will create the external revenue service. So that's a definitive goal for sure. And most importantly, Trump 2028. Trump trolling, although the hats are flying off the shelves. Yeah, you this is a very dumb timeline. This scene SNL won't be able to do a parody of this because it looks like a parody. But this is what they're now doing. I don't I just don't even know what to say,

but this is how far we have fallen. The party of small government and not interfering with business is now bragging that they strong armed Jeff Bezos into removing the impact of tariffs from their products. And Trump bragged about it yesterday. Let me explain to you what happened briefly on Amazon. This tariff premium showed up. So if you looked at a product that was 20 bucks, it would say, you know, this product is four dollars more because of the tariffs. The White House didn't like that. And so yesterday, Donald Trump, with the helicopter blades whirring in the background, said that he called Bezos and they took care of that problem very quickly. Great. Jeff Bezos was very nice. He was terrific.

He solved the problem very quickly and he did the right thing and it's a good guy. This is government interference in how for profit companies do business. This is a party that says, let businesses do whatever. And the market will dictate, you know, if Amazon displays tariff prices and customers don't like it because they think it's mean to Trump, they won't buy off of Amazon. That's what they claim to support and defend as a principle. But then Trump had to call Bezos and bully him into removing the impact of the tariffs from pricing. And by the way, the most interesting thing is that Trump is admitting that showing people the effect of tariffs is a problem. Trump is, despite claiming

that the tariffs are phenomenal and everybody understands how great they are and how much they're going to help the country. Despite all that, Trump is acknowledging people actually knowing that it's making stuff more expensive is bad. I'm going to call Bezos and tell him to get rid of that. That's the opposite of what he's been claiming. Trump also said that he would like to be Pope. He is number one in his mind to be Pope. I'd like to be Pope. That would be my number one choice. No, I don't know. I have no preference. I must say we have a Cardinal that happens to be out of a place called New York. Who's very good. Yeah. This is the guy who couldn't name a single Bible verse when he was talking about how

religious he is. He thinks that he should or could be the Pope Trump now referring to his big, beautiful bill, which we still know very little about as the big, beautiful new deal, new deal. Look, a very important element that we're working on now, maybe more important than anything with the border in good shape is the fact, excuse me, is the fact that we want to get and very importantly, the big, beautiful new deal. If we get that done, that's the biggest thing what's happening in Congress right now. And I think I think we're going to get it done. We have great Republican support. If the Democrats blocked it, you'd have a 60 percent tax increase.

I don't think that's going to happen. We have great support from Republicans. Of course, this is ridiculous. There is no 60% tax increase coming. If his bill is blocked, we don't even know what's in the bill. We're constantly two weeks away from whatever it is Trump is talking about. And then finally, and this is really wacky as part of the new media, whatever at the white house, the conspiracy theorist outlet gateway pundit is now allowed at the white

house and Trump loves the question and he goes, who are you with? conspiracy theorist outlet Gateway Pundit is now allowed at the White House. And Trump loves the question. And he goes, who are you with? Gateway Pundit. I want to see your response on the left. They're trying to hide the mugshots that are featured on the front lawn of the greatest murder. What do you think about it?

They're proving to be the enemy of the people. Well, I guess they are. I guess they are right now here. Trump's like, damn, that was a good question. Thank you. Who are you with? I like your hat by the way. The gateway is the gateway pundits. Trump likes that. Trump likes the question from Gateway Pundit and the conspiracy theorists are now inside the house quite literally here. They're standing right outside the house, but they are now inside the house, quite literally here. They're standing right outside the house, but they are allowed inside the house as well. This guy is on a bender

and we should expect that if and when the economic news gets worse, I hope it doesn't. But Q1 GDP being down, job creation slowing, empty shelves coming. This stuff is not good. I hope it doesn't happen, but it's starting to look like it's happening as the economic news gets worse and worse. Trump will become increasingly hostile towards any media outlet that doesn't just lay down and pray at his feet. And we should expect the behavior to become increasingly unhinged. Now, on the bonus show today, we are going to look at consumer confidence. And once again, it feels like every week this is happening. Consumer confidence has sunk to its lowest level since May of 2020.

We will also discuss the Supreme Court weighing whether law enforcement can be held accountable when they raid the wrong house. It's happened a bunch of times now. And finally, Congress has passed a bill to fight deep fake nudes and revenge porn. Does it have teeth? All of those stories and more on the bonus show. You can sign up and get instant access at join Pacman dot com. And remember that my book, The Echo Machine, now a three time New York Times bestseller

is available everywhere. Books are sold. Thousands of books still shipping out. You can get your copy. I'll see you on the bonus show. I'll be back here tomorrow.