The David Pakman Show - 6/6/25: Trump vs Elon goes nuclear, MAGA civil war unleashed

Episode Date: June 6, 2025

-- On the Show: -- Donald Trump and Elon Musk turn on each other with ugly allegations in a complete and total collapse of this fragile and volatile alliance -- A full blown MAGA civil war is launched by the collapse of Elon Musk and Donald Trump's relationship — Democrats shock everyone with a massive win in rural South Carolina, flipping a Trump district in a local landslide — A top Trump budget witness collapses under questioning, admitting the national debt will explode under Trump’s own proposals — Trump is reportedly skipping his intelligence briefings nearly every day, raising questions about who’s actually running the government — Trump's Secretary of Education flubs basic math in public hearings and can't answer simple questions about U.S. education rankings — A Republican strategist warns Trump might not make it through his second term—cognitively or physically—and the MAGA movement could fracture if he fades — A brutal analysis of MAGA as a movement built on loneliness, resentment, and a craving for identity through hate — Trump’s new hiring plan requires federal employees to write loyalty essays pledging allegiance to his agenda -- This week's Friday Feedback -- On the Bonus Show: Trump appoints 22-year-old to lead terror prevention, former Republican Congressman Joe Walsh joins Democratic Party, more of Congress is 70+ than ever before, much more... 🖼️ Aura Frames: Use code PAKMAN for $30 OFF & free shipping at https://auraframes.com/pakman 🔬 Freedom From Religion Foundation: Text DAVID to 511511 or visit https://ffrf.us/freedom ⚠️ Ground News: Get 40% OFF their unlimited access Vantage plan at https://ground.news/pakman 🤖 Sponsored by Venice: Use code PAKMAN for 20% off a Pro Account at https://venice.ai/pakman 🔊 Babbel language learning: Get up to 60% OFF at https://babbel.com/pakman 🥐 Wildgrain: Use code DAVID for $30 off & free baked goods at https://wildgrain.com/david -- Become a Member: https://davidpakman.com/membership  -- Subscribe to our (FREE) Substack newsletter: https://davidpakman.substack.com/ -- 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  

Ladies and gentlemen, Elon Musk has nuked Donald Trump. Trump has turned on Elon pedophilia allegations flying. And you all know that this was inevitable. This is not the pat on my back moment. I and so many of you predicted that exactly this would happen when you have two of the most egomaniacal men in America or the world. Donald Trump, the sitting president and Elon Musk, this kind of billionaire chaos merchant. There was no way that this alliance was going to last.

I said it from the start. They weren't partners. They were using each other. No real shared values to the extent they even have deeply held values other than whatever is good for me today. No real loyalty, self interest and attention seeking and two runaway trains on a collision path have now collided. It is detonated.

Musk is accusing Trump of being in the Epstein files. Trump's threatening to cancel Musk's contracts and rip up his subsidies. And none of this is about policy. It's about principle, but not the sorts of principles you might think. It's the principle of I am the only thing that matters to unstable men locked in a power struggle, each one desperate not to look like the loser, not to look like the beta. So let's go through it. Elon Musk turning on Donald Trump, posting an excretion on X time to drop the really

big bomb. Donald Trump is in the Epstein files. That is the real reason they have not been made public. Have a nice day, Donald J. Trump. And of course, this mirrors what many of us have suspected. What is the reason why Trump is eager to get all sorts of FBI files out on JFK on MLK on others, but not so interested when it comes to Epstein. The assumption is that it's because Trump himself was potentially implicated there,

not necessarily criminally, but implicated, uh, continuing on X Elon Musk with more of these excretions. Mark this post for the future. The truth will come out, of course, referring to Trump in the Epstein files. Musk continuing the Trump tariffs will cause a recession in the second half of the year. Elon sort of standing aside and pretending as though what Donald Trump is doing generally makes sense. More recently, expressing a little bit of concern with the tariffs saying he's for free trade

and now nuking it, telling us, I guess how he really feels. Um, Tr, uh, Elon continuing in light of the president's statement about cancellation of my government contracts, SpaceX will begin decommissioning its dragon spacecraft immediately. And then Elon appearing to turn on the Republican Party altogether, posting a poll on Twitter where he asks, is it time to create a new political party in America that actually represents the 80 percent in the middle? And then finally, Elon Musk endorsing by re excreting. Some call it retweeting. But now that these are ex excretions, it's re excreting. Some call it retweeting.

But now that these are ex excretions, it's re excreting. He re excreted a message calling to impeach Donald Trump and replace him with JD Vance, just adding yes to a suggestion from Ian Miles Chiang that Trump should be impeached and replaced with JD Vance. So it got very real very quickly. And then, of course, this boiling over with Donald Trump as well. Donald Trump starting to attack Elon Musk yesterday in what is the most public feud that a president has ever been involved in really with anybody.

I mean, we're in uncharted territory overall here. Trump posting, Elon was wearing thin. I asked him to leave. I took away his Evie mandate that forced everyone to buy electric cars that nobody else wanted that he knew for months I was going to do. And he just went crazy. This is a reminder as if you needed one, which of course you shouldn't have needed one. It's all posturing.

It's all nonsense. We had the idea that when Trump was on the campaign trail, that he was genuinely against electric vehicles. He said they don't go anywhere and they take forever to charge and they break down. But did Trump really care care one way or the other about electric vehicles? No. At the time it was politically useful to him to talk about gas guzzling and be against electric vehicles.

All of a sudden, Elon puts these massive dumps of money into Trump's campaign. Two hundred and fifty million. Now Trump puts a Tesla on the White House lawn and he says, Elon's great and buy his cars and anybody who threatens or does anything to Tesla is going to be gone after by Pam Bondi. And of course, that wasn't really what he believed anyway. It was just politically convenient for him. And then now he goes back to actually nobody wants these electric vehicles.

I don't think Trump knows a damn thing about electric vehicles. He doesn't care. It's just about what's politically useful. Trump continuing with the threats against Elon. The easiest way to save money in our budget, billions and billions of dollars is to terminate Elon's government subsidies and contracts. I was always surprised that Biden didn't do it. And then finally, Trump on troth central.

I don't mind Elon turning against me, but he should have done so months ago. This is one of the greatest bills ever presented to Congress. It's a record cut in expenses, $1.6 trillion and the biggest tax cut ever given. These are all lies, by the way. If this bill doesn't pass, there will be a 68% tax increase. That's a lie and things far worse than that. I didn't create this mess. I'm just here to fix it.

This puts our country on a path of greatness. Make America great again. And of course, random capitalization all over this thing. It has collapsed and there are some trying to mediate saying we need a truce. We need a meeting. We've got to get everybody happy with each other. But it looks as though the MAGA civil war has escaped the stables. And I don't know that there's any rounding this one up.

Let's talk about that next. The Trump Musk implosion is no longer just a personal dispute. It has quickly turned into a full blown MAGA civil war. Republicans are picking sides Steve Bannon's calling for the seizure of SpaceX by the government Cattard, which I know it's crazy that someone named cat turd figures into this entire thing But cat turd has unfollowed Elon and cat turd is a big Sort of clout holder in the online space for the MAGA world members of Congress are either pledging loyalty to scrumps or a sort of clout holder in the online space for the MAGA world.

Members of Congress are either pledging loyalty to scrumps or to Elon Musk. And the grifters are hedging bets, sort of unsure who's ultimately going to come out on top. So this is not a split over ideology. This is a scramble for power, influence and relevance in a government that was teetering. And the MAGA machine is turning on itself and it's getting very ugly. Let's look at some examples. Here is Steve Bannon trashing Doge saying they didn't really find any fraud, which is

true and calling on Donald Trump to execute a seizure of space sex. Know anything. He's a know it all. He knows some engineering. Don't get me wrong. I give a head tip for that, but he doesn't know anything about the real world Doge was again for any fanboys that still exist While you're wrapping up in your cape tonight understand on Doge there was he didn't find any fraud

There's plenty of fraud out there didn't fight. This is President Trump's first complaint Was this all BS right with the with the with the Doge? The acts should that President Trump should be taking immediately I think when he threatens to take one of the big programs out of a space X president Trump tonight should sign an executive order, uh, uh, calling for the defense to production act to be called in space X and seize space X tonight before midnight. There you go. And small government conservatives, of course, seizing companies is exactly what they advocate

for. So there's Steve Bannon, a cat turd. Don't even worry about who cat turd is. If you don't know who cat turd is, I envy you. I wish I were near in position where I didn't need to know who cat turd was. Cat turd is some online guy who's just like a big MAGA influencer. He unfollowed Elon and he posted, quote, pay attention, pay close attention to all the people who don't have president Trump's back right now.

Congressman Thomas Massey said he trusts the math from Elon more than he trusts the math from Trump. I trust the math from the guy that lands rocket gets backwards over the politicians. I think that patient is on life support. And if the Senate thinks they're going to rehabilitate it and rewrite it, I think they're in danger in this patient. All right. So Thomas Massey, who of course has been opposed to the big, beautiful bill or the we're all

going to die bill anyway because of what it does to the deficit standing, I guess, on an actual principle. He is also taking Elon Musk side. But on the other hand, we have Congressman Troy Nails, who said in a really weird moment to Elon, come down and run against me in Texas. Go down there. I'll tell you what, Elon, this is what I'll do. Come down to Texas 22nd District.

I'll pay your filing fee and run against me. There you go. So a threat to Elon Troy nails clearly standing behind Trump and maybe the most interesting tweet of all coming from our friend Pekka Callion, Amy, whose podcast I was recently on. He posted, quote, This recent quarrel really reveals people's motives. Those seeking political power.

Jack Pazabiak, Bannon side with Trump, while the grifters chasing money. Alex Jones, Ian Miles Chiang side with Elon. So where does this go? A couple of possibilities. One is that Donald Trump crushes the rebellion, reasserts his dominance, and the Elon Musk kind of fades back into the billionaire tech lane, goes back to, you know, just talking about his businesses. Loud, probably, but politically irrelevant.

Other possibility is this crack becomes a full on fracture and it splinters MAGA into these various camps. The Trump loyalists, the anti-establishment tech bros, and that becomes a prominent narrative through and beyond the midterm elections of next year. And then possibility number three is the whole thing kind of burns itself out in a haze of ego and conspiracy and a broken NDA is non-disclosure agreements. Potentially. I don't know which way it's going to go, but where we are right now was completely predictable and arguably regrettable, although not if it does help to destroy MAGA from the inside

out. Make no mistake. This isn't just noise. This is not, you know, a disagreement between, I don't know, you know, Laura Loomer and some person nominated, Stephen Miller, right? This is not that this is a real sign that the MAGA coalition is weaker than we might have thought, more chaotic than we might have thought, less stable than we believed it to

be. And the opportunity for the left is use this to actually win back some power and get some things done. That's my interest in the entire thing. Where will it all land? Let me know info at David Pakman dot com. And of course, make sure you subscribe to the YouTube channel where we will have continued updates on this. Well, listen, this is not a headline that MAGA expected to wake up to. A Democrat crushed a Republican in rural South Carolina with over 70 percent of the vote.

Now, this was not a swing district. This was a place that Donald Trump won by 18 points statewide. And now a 24 year old city councilman named Keishan Scott has flipped it blue in a landslide. Democrats do not tend to win these races. They don't even usually show up for some of these races, but they won big earlier this week. And what this hopefully means is that it's an early sign that the old theory might still be true, which is that when Trump's not on the ballot, Republicans are

not showing up. And this could be a real problem for Republicans in this forthcoming midterm election, which is now only 17 months away, if you can believe it. Now, in reality, maybe that goes a little too far, maybe more sort of soberly and conservatively. It means Democrats ran a great local candidate and ran the race correctly in a district that was neglected, where Republicans were sure they were going to be able to coast. So it could just be a local moment, right? The truth could be this is merely a local moment to this is a sign of things to come. The pattern, though, that keeps popping up is Democrats flipped a Pennsylvania Senate seat. Trump had won. They stomped Republicans in that Wisconsin Supreme Court race despite 25 million bucks from Elon Musk. They won a special election in Iowa and now just absolute obliteration here

of the Republican in South Carolina. And interestingly, it's happening while Democrats are polling terribly. Twenty seven percent approval for Democrats in the latest NBC poll. So what you see are part of the reason, by the way, that Democratic approval is so low. Black voters have slipped in their support for Democrats. Young voters have drifted in their support for Democrats. And a lot of middle class voters are just kind of tuning out. So what's going on here? I think to a degree, we are still living in the psychological aftermath of covid.

This is not about masks or vaccines. It's just that covid had an impact on our economy and on our day to day and our relationship to government and elected officials. A lot of that stuff hasn't really been dealt with. It's just kind of been this vacuum that opened and was filled with bullshit conspiracy theories, rage and grievance politics, strong men, nostalgia for a past that never really existed. And covid did decimate trust in a lot of systems in government, medicine institutions, not necessarily for good reason.

Sometimes yes, sometimes no. And instead of rebuilding the trust, there's kind of been an attempt made to bury the entire thing. And in that void, a lot of stuff has broken. Elections have gotten really weird. Voters have gotten very angry. The country started sort of glitching and we're in a pendulum swing right now. I talked about this Wednesday night in a Substack Live with Steve Schmidt, which I encourage

you to check out on Substack if you missed it. We're in an environment where Republicans obstruct everything when Democrats are in power. Democrats probably play too nice when Republicans are in power. Nothing really gets done. People get disillusioned and the next election becomes just a rejection of whoever's in charge. And I it pains me to say it, but I am dreading that Democrats big picture, despite this win in South Carolina, which is great. I worry that Democrats are once again kind

of counting on negative partisanship to save them in 2026. We really don't like Republicans and what they've done while we're in power and that that's all Democrats have to do. Vote for us or, you know, Trump's FEMA chief who doesn't know hurricane season exists, gets to do whatever he wants or that that sort of thing. Vote against more of a disaster. And that. Is a situation where the only fuel is fear and that burns people out when your only reward is we stopped something that would have been even worse.

Things probably still get worse, but a little more slowly. So I think we deserve the win here. We celebrate the win in South Carolina. Keishin Scott does deserve it. Ran a great campaign, great candidate. But we also say, why did it work there and why doesn't it happen more often? Because until Democrats actually use their power to make material change, this back and forth cycle with the small pendulum swings is likely to keep happening and it's

not particularly good for the average voter. So this should be inspirational in orienting us to what does need to happen in 26 and 28, but not a sign that we can just assume because Trump wrecked stuff, Republicans will lose everything. That would be very dangerous. We have another instance of a Trump witness crashing and burning this week when confronted on the substance of what they're doing. Russ Vought, who directs the Office of Management and Budget for Trump, was questioned by a number of members of the Office of Management and Budget for Trump was questioned by a number of members of the House of Representatives. And one guy who did an incredible job is Democratic Congressman Mark Pocan.

The subject matter was the big, beautiful bill, also known as the well, we're all going to die eventually. Bill here is Pocan really just dominating, dominating here. CBO disagrees with your analysis. Yale and Penn said 13.7 million people will lose health insurance. You also said this won't increase the debt. Is that correct? The bill will not increase the debt. It will. It will lead to death. That is a lie. You know, Institute disagrees with you. Moody's disagrees. The CBO disagrees.

Senator Hawley and Senator Rand and Senator Collins disagree. Elon Musk disagrees. Virtually everyone on this side of the aisle. So you're saying everyone is wrong, but you are the right one that this does not increase the debt? I'm saying that all the watchdogs, including the Congressional Budget Office, use a skewed vision of a view of what the baseline is. They were less than a few percent wrong last time on your tax bill and they predicted it

almost dead on. So you're saying this time there's significant changes and they don't know what's going on and only you do? Is that correct? I'm suggesting I'm stating that they use a base. Just create the Cato Institute. Yes. And Moody's.

Yes. And Moody's. Yes. And Senator Hawley, Senator Hawley has a view as to the Medicaid programs that we are working with to articulate why we believe that these reforms do not hurt the beneficiaries that are involved. I'm over. That is all completely untrue. Mark Pocan is correct. Russ Fodd is wrong.

You don't have to believe me. Go and look at the Congressional Budget Office evaluation of the bill. Take the bill, run it through one of these A.I. chat bots and say, using economic scholarship, analyze this bill and tell me what the effects are likely to be on the macro economy. There is no way to spin it. Pocan is right. And they're just lying about what this bill is going to do.

Pocan didn't let up. He started asking in more detail about how many federal dollars are even going to get undocumented immigrants Medicaid anyway, because this is a claim that the Trump administration is making. This doesn't go well for Vaught either. Gonna make somewhere between 11 and 16 million people lose their health care I know you said on a Sunday morning show no one will lose coverage as a result of this bill is that still your standing? Which one of those of would you like me to take? The one I just asked I'll ask it again I'm sorry if I was. The bill does not

lead to less coverage for Medicaid beneficiaries. It has improper payments, and it leads to the fact that people who are ineligible because they're illegal aliens or because they're unwilling to work. Illegal aliens do not get federal dollars for Medicaid, correct? That's not true. They get them in many different states, including California. Federal dollars? Federal dollars. Using provider. They get state dollars. State can provide it. Are there any federal dollars?

Congressman, because of- How many federal dollars, since you are the expert? How many federal dollars using provider proof. State can provide it. Are there any federal dollars? How many federal dollars that you are the expert? How many federal dollars funding illegal aliens getting Medicaid? Now understand before you hear his answer, there is some nuance here because what a lot of these people want to argue is even though it seems like these are state dollars, they are state subsidized. They are federal government subsidized state programs. Therefore it's sort of like the money really is coming from the federal government. Congressman, because of the money laundering number, it's a question.

It's a number. How much, how many dollars go to illegal aliens, federal dollars for Medicaid? It's a question. It is not actually a simple question because Congress secretaries have a hard time with simple questions lately. I got to tell you, it is a simple, but you are saying that that's true. So we will, if you can get back to us with that amount, how does that sound? How much federal dollars?

I'm happy to get back to you about how the bill works and getting rid of the money laundering. So a lot of people, he's not going to get back to him with the number of federal dollars. Pokens really good at this. And then finally, remember how Trump was going to decrease the deficit and cut spending and all this stuff? Polk and gets bought to admit year over year, the Trump administration is spending more money than the Biden administration did during the same period last year. Critical admission, by the way, support the efforts of Doge.

I understand. Is the federal government currently spending less this year than it did last year? No, it's not. That's a huge admission. Huge admission. Federal spending is up. Right. And part of that is because you've sent us a rescission package worth $9 billion that goes after Big Bird and Cookie Monster. But you've added $200 billion to defense and homeland security. You've also the bill that you just said the White House supports is going to add, depending who you talk to, 2.4 trillion to 5 trillion dollars to the national debt.

It's going to make somewhere between 11 and 16 million people lose their health care. in its totality is a debt bomb that disproportionately helps the very wealthy. Now, that is not a moral statement. That's just an analysis of what it is. You could hear that and say, oh, David, I love that. I don't care about the debt. And I want to cut taxes for the very rich as much as possible, either because I think it's good for the economy or because I like it or because I'm someone who would benefit.

OK, well, you can have that debate. But that is a separate question from what does the bill do? So I encourage people take the text of the bill, run it through chat GPT and say, give me your highest confidence, high, medium, low confidence assessment of how this bill, if passed in this form by the Senate, will impact the macro economy of the United States. Don't take my word for it. My suspicion that Donald Trump is mentally checked out of the job of being president is now bolstered by the news that he is receiving his daily briefings, not daily, not even weekly, but

less than once a week. According to new reporting from NBC News and Politico, Donald Trump is receiving his intelligence briefings less than once a week. Not a joke. That's the PDB, the president's daily brief, the classified rundown of threats facing the country. He is skipping it almost every day. Now, to put it in perspective, in his first term, Trump got 55 briefings his first year.

Right now, he's gotten 12 since January. That's less than one briefing per week. Joe Biden, who Trump accused of doing nothing, got 90 briefings in his first year. Obama had 63. But Trump, who says Biden was lazy and half asleep, he's ghosting his own national security team while the world burns. And this isn't about one lazy week. We told you days ago, Trump has been MIA for a while, barely seen in public. He then reappeared with this summer soiree to speak about things even he didn't

seem to understand, understand. But now we know why he's been heavily limited in terms of his public appearances. He's not even going to his own briefings. He's not really doing the job. I think it's important in this scenario not to let the White House spin. Fool you. They claim he's constantly apprised and up to date of what's going on. That's the same thing he said when he's golfing during a disaster, when he's tweeting during crises, being informed doesn't mean that you're leading. It doesn't mean that you're thinking. It definitely doesn't mean that you're making any decisions based on facts.

Now, Trump is a guy who even during his first term demanded pictures in his briefings. They had to shorten the thing from many pages to one and then shorten that to just two or three bullet points with a couple of pictures, charts or graphs. And now he's not even bothering to show up for that. The timing is a disaster. We've got escalations in Russia, Ukraine, tensions with China, threats from Iran, his own budget crisis, of course, here. But, you know, Trump golfed on Saturday, had lunch with J.D. Vance on Monday, nothing Tuesday. Then he reappeared for the summer soiree on Wednesday. And he's skipping the one real thing that keeps a president plugged into the biggest threats that we are facing.

So we get back to the question if he's not governing, who is? Because when Trump is playing hooky, Stephen Miller is busy. I guess J.D. Vance is doing stuff. They're drafting bills or cutting Medicaid, floating suspensions of habeas corpus. It's all terrible stuff, but they're doing it. Tom Homan's planning arrests. Trump doesn't really need to show up for the worst parts of his presidency to keep advancing. And maybe that's the whole point. So if you find yourself seeing Trump is extremely limited in his public appearance, you're wondering is he still in charge?

He's in charge by virtue of being a sort of absentee president. And the dangerous part isn't that he's vanished. He doesn't really seem to think he needs to be there at all. I believe he is mentally checked out and doesn't care other than the minimum he needs to do to be perceived as strong and in control. And he's failing even that right now. So I want to hear from you.

Write to me info at David Pakman dot com or leave a comment depending on where you're watching or listening. Who do you believe is currently really in charge? And do you think Trump even cares anymore? Make sure you're subscribed to the YouTube channel, youtube.com slash the David Pakman show. All right. So we all know Alexa listens to us, recommends products based on our conversations.

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We don't have to make the same mistake with AI and that's why I've started using Venice AI, a generative AI platform that is private and permissionless. They don't spy on you. then in slash Pacman and use code Pacman to get 20% off their pro plan. That's Venice dot AI slash Pacman. Get 20% off with code Pacman. The info is in the podcast notes. Every year I find myself asking the same question. What do I get for the fathers in my life who say they don't need anything? Couple years ago I nailed it. I gave my dad an aura digital photo frame. for in It's a dot com. Use code Pacman for thirty dollars off their best selling Carver Mat Frame. Terms

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I invite you to go to join Pacman Dotcom, get a membership and get the full experience instantly. All right. This is really, really embarrassing. Donald Trump has a track record now. It's now a trend that his secretaries of education are completely unqualified for the job. In term number one, it was billionaire Betsy DeVos who knows nothing about education. In term two, it is Linda McMahon. Yes, the

Linda McMahon from World Wrestling Entertainment, WWF ultimately became WWE, et cetera. She got a softball during a congressional hearing this week, a Senate hearing. She was set up by Senator Mark Wayne Mullen with the question, where were we ranked in math and reading in 1979? We were number one. And the point that Mullen wants to make is that under the leftist takeover of education, we've started to diminish in our global standing on math and and reading. She doesn't know that, though, because she knows so little about education. And she goes, we were very low in 1979.

It's a complete softball and she blows it. This is so fun. I match Senator Mullen. Thank you, Chairman. Madam Chair, what's the definition of sanity? Of sanity or insanity? Insanity. Insanity. Yeah. Doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different outcome. Right. And what was we ranked in reading and math in 1979? I'm sorry. What? What was we ranked nationally in math and, and, and reading in 1979?

We were very, very low on the totem pole. We're number one in 1979 today. Okay. Oh, I love that. She tries to clean it up by pretending she misheard the year that this was supposed to be, you know, lining up this narrative where then we were so good and then now we've fallen. Now, of course, built into all of this is the reality that education is one of the systems like many U.S. Postal Service, Obamacare.

We've talked about all of them. We talked about a bunch of them on the Wednesday show. The education is one of those areas where Republicans have underfunded it, cut funding, reduced funding, et cetera, in order to make it dysfunctional to then point and say it's dysfunctional. Let's pull even more funding. Let's get rid of the Department of Education federally. Let's just let states do whatever the hell they want.

Of course, you look at what's happening with education in Alabama, Mississippi, Texas, Oklahoma, etc. you go. It's actually we it's a disaster when states do what they want to do. It's a complete and total fiasco if they are these hardcore right wing states. But aside from the fact that the story implicit with this question is wrong and they're lying about it, she just totally blows the softball question. It's just humiliating math confusion. Oh, and speaking, by the way, about math, like arithmetic confusion, you really can't

write this stuff. They start. She's the secretary of education, Linda McMahon, and starts to struggle with really simple arithmetic. Check this outcome. I'm secretary and I'm not a great mathematician, but I think you were talking about a trillion dollars. I believe one point five billion times 10 is $15 billion. That's a little bit off from a trillion dollars. I think the budget cuts 1.2 billion. Well, 1.2. That would be $12 billion, not a trillion dollars.

OK. Oh, these people are the worst. You know, it's like, is it pedantic to focus on the fact that they're getting the math wrong? No, because this is the wrong math they use to sell what they claim to be doing. Think back to the Doge cuts. OK, they were going to cut a trillion. But then they said we actually cut 100 billion.

You look at the list of what they cut. There were programs where they said we've cut billions, but it's actually millions. They just they got the number wrong. There were programs where they said we've reduced by X percent, but the calculation was wrong. So it's like, oh, you know, some people might react by saying critiquing their math, their arithmetic is like critiquing their grammar, either they're right or they're wrong or whatever. But hold on a second.

We're basing our analysis as to are we spending too much or too little? Are we getting value for what we're spending? How much are we cutting? How much are we saving? How much are we adding? It's all based on arithmetic, which they continue to get wrong. One point two billion multiplied by 10 is one point two trillion. No, it's not. One point two billion multiplied by 10 is 12 billion.

This is a it's an order of magnitude difference. And the sort of like final disturbing irony of it is this is the secretary of education of the United States, who, of course, has no business, no business whatsoever. Being in that role, a prominent Republican strategist has just said that Donald Trump may not be physically or cognitively capable of finishing this second term in which he finds himself right now. It's not coming from Democrats. It's coming from Rick Wilson, a Republican operative, co-founder of the Lincoln Project. Let's hear what he has to say. I think some of these things maybe go a little beyond his expertise, but that's OK. I want to hear what he has to say.

Then we'll talk about he is incoherent, his inability to articulate any thought or position without constant asides, constant lapses, the verbal aphasias he is experiencing at various points. And his as a very close observer of Trump since 2015, I can tell you the man you're watching today is not the Trump of 2015, nor is he the Trump of 2020. He's not even the Trump of 2024. There is a decline in Trump's ability to communicate. There's a decline in Trump's ability to articulate his thoughts. This is not uncommon when people get older,

but it is, and I'm not the, I'm certainly not, you know, the opportunity to be a gerontologist or a neurologist, but there are an awful lot of professionals in the world who are looking at the same set of behavior and saying, this is what we see in early dementia cases or in mid-tier dementia cases. This is what we see when early dementia cases or a mid-tier dementia cases. This is what we see when there is a cognitive decline. Just circling a man, camera, woman, TV, circling the elephant on the cognitive test does not make Donald Trump not suffering from the ravages of age and ill health.

So similarly. All right. So let's pause there. Some of what Rick Wilson says is apparent to anybody who's been following Trump. OK, his speech is slower. His thoughts are scattered. His coherence is deteriorating. He seems disoriented. His he's far less articulate. His vocabulary has narrowed. He loses his train of thought. That's anybody can see that. And I agree that even if you compare simply to a year ago, it's getting worse.

And obviously to four years ago, to eight years ago, Wilson is not a doctor. He says other experts say they see signs of early stage dementia. Maybe. OK. Trump does lose his train of thought mid-sentence. He rambles into unrelated stories. He repeats short phrases with increasing frequency, another sign that he's sort of like not so totally connected to the substance of what he's saying.

Now, the White House physician who works for Trump, right, says Trump's in excellent health of every kind. We should just be really honest about this. If Biden's age was an issue, Trump's age has to be an issue. Trump is going to be 79 in a few days, you know, 10 days or something like that. He doesn't exercise. He's obese. He lives off of fast food, brags about, you know, KFC buckets and McDonald's and whatever.

This is statistically dangerous. You talk about numbers. We sort of start with actuarial tables from the Social Security Administration a 79 year old American male just big picture you would expect to live eight more years fine He would survive this term if you start there you then have to adjust that obese sedentary Cardiovascular issues that number of eight years starts to decline and it can decline pretty dramatically.

So based on lifestyle, Trump is in an extraordinarily high risk group. You then add to that the family history of dementia, Fred Trump and how Trump is articulating or not articulating his thoughts. You start to say, OK, I think we have reason to be a little bit concerned here. Now, let's put aside for a second the cognitive decline, even cognitive decline aside, even physical decline aside. I think Trump's already checked out. If you look at how he, you know, just earlier this week went days without a signal, a single public event.

If you look at how the frequency of golf has increased even more, this is something where health aside, it doesn't seem like he's even remotely engaged. Now, the reason this is politically actionable is not that Trump is continuing to brag about passing every test. I mean, yes, but that's the cognitive and physical. We're talking about something else. We are left with a deeply fragile presidency and it's held together by denial, ego and fear of what comes next.

Who takes over? Who's really in charge? Is it Stephen Miller? Is it? And this is not like a puppeteer sort of who's in charge. It's just Trump doesn't seem interested with Biden. What Mago was claiming is Biden was so physically addled and mentally addled that secretly someone was pulling the strings.

Trump just doesn't seem to care. He's just more interested in golfing and handing out, you know, medals and knickknacks in the Oval Office than actually governing. So it's just a question. It's not that they're sneakily behind Trump pulling the strings. It's just Trump doesn't seem to care. And so we look at people like, OK, what about J.D. Vance? What about, you know, Stephen Miller and Suzy Wiles, whoever sort of like insert.

At one point it was Elon Musk. Now, obviously, it's not. Rick Wilson goes a little bit beyond his expertise, but says he's citing doctors. My argument would be it almost barely matters given that Trump doesn't seem to give a damn and is completely checked out. Let me know what you think. I want to hear from you. You say you'll learn a new language every year, but few of us actually follow through. That's why I always recommend Babel.

It's the app that finally made language learning stick for me. This year I've got a trip to France planned. I've already started brushing up using Babel's 10 minute lessons. The app is built around real life conversations, not games or gimmicks. So I'm learning exactly what I actually need to know when I land. I've even been using babble speech recognition technology to improve my pronunciation. Super helpful. Babble is designed by over 200 language experts and proven studies from places like Yale and Michigan State. There's a study that found that using babble just 15 hours is like a full college in Here's a special limited time deal for my audience right now. Get up to 60 percent off your Babel subscription, but only for my audience at Babel dot com

slash Pacman. Get up to 60 percent off at Babel dot com slash Pacman spelled B.A. B.B. E.L. dot com slash Pacman. Rules and restrictions may apply. The link is in the podcast notes. There is a coordinated campaign right now to force religious beliefs into law and it's moving fast. apply. The link is in the podcast notes. to strip Medicaid coverage for gender affirming care using religion as the justification. And across the country right now, we see these Christian nationalists really emboldened by the MAGA movement and they're reshaping America.

And it's terrifying. This is why I support the freedom from religion foundation. They've been fighting back since 1978 defending the separation of church and state in courts, in schools and wherever religion tries to take control. If you believe, as I do, that government should represent everyone, not just the religious right. Take action now. I'm description. Text fees may apply. If you want to understand MAGA or at least an important part of it, if you want to understand what happened to the Republican Party and how it became this atrocity as it exists today,

if you want to understand how and why tens of millions of people are worshipping a failed casino owner who can barely string together a sentence. We have to acknowledge that to a degree, MAGA is what happens when people have no friends or maybe put more subtly are interested in anti-social behavior and maybe more importantly, anti-cial approaches to governance and to society. Now, before people jump all over me, this doesn't mean that every Trump supporter literally

has no friends and is isolated. That's not what I mean. Plenty of people in MAGA go to church. They live in communities. They're surrounded by people who think like them. But this is exactly the point. They're surrounded by people who reinforce their worldview, the same fears and the resentments and the beliefs that someone else is to blame for everything that Trump has successfully weaponized to build this MAGA movement starting back in 2015.

So I'm not making the case that every mega Potamian is physically alone. A lot of mega voters are sociologically and ideologically cut off from perspectives that are outside their bubbles. And many of them are truly isolated, by the way. We've talked about incel culture, but I think we can, you know, that can get pejorative if we just talk about have some of them been abandoned by society or at least feel as though they have or abandoned by the economy, abandoned by the culture, abandoned by the left.

And when this happens, Maca doesn't just look like politics. It looks like rescue. It looks like this is what's going to save me. One of the things that Trump did so effectively and he's done it dishonestly, he's done it with lies and incompetence, but it's still worth learning about is he has succeeded at telling people you are not the problem. Nothing you've done is wrong. They are the problem.

Democrats, Marxists, anarchists, as Trump sometimes says, anarchists, immigrants, people from China, whoever. Right. You're not losing in the free market. You're being targeted. You're a victim. You're not alone. You're part of something huge and patriotic and righteous.

And then what it does is it turns grievance into identity and resentment into belonging. They claim that the left is about grievance politics. They claim that the left is about identity politics. But the truth is they have weaponized grievance into a form of identity politics where you don't need connection with people. You need enemies based on who you are. You don't need to develop a sense of empathy for other people. You need someone to own and to dominate. You don't need to develop a sense of empathy for other people. You need someone to own and to dominate.

You don't even need the truth. You need loyalty to the leader. That's what you need. And this is how MAGA has become really more than a movement. It's become a personality cult for people who feel discarded by society. The rallies, the Facebook groups, the memes and the hashtags or whatever. They're not a policy. They're about belonging. You look at some of these mega people. There's this guy for Giotto Blow, who looks like a clown. I mean, he's he's dressed up with a strange

chin strap beard and a huge mega hat. And he's got chains that, you know, try his car is painted in Trump's face. It's about belonging. At the end of the day, they look like morons. There's no doubt. But belonging to a tribe that's getting its meaning from who they hate and the orange man that they worship. And if you've been isolated long enough and again, it doesn't. You might have people around you, but you're isolated economically.

For example, the hate starts to feel good. It feels like clarity, power. It fills a silence. But the kicker is it's all fake, right? It's not real community. It's a closed loop of outrage. It's not real community. It's a closed loop of outrage. It's not friendship. It's a media ecosystem that exploits you.

And Trump doesn't know these people. He doesn't care about them. He wouldn't recognize them outside of a rally. He spent his whole privileged life as a rich New York kid being kept away from the very people that now make up his constituency. But I think many of them would die for Trump because he gave him a story. It's a it's a simple story. It's a comforting story. You're the victim. They rigged it against you. And the only person who has the solution is Trump. And then in comes Fox News and

Newsmax. And they just kind of fill in the rest. Everything wrong is the fault of Democrats and immigrants and drag queen story hours in the deep state. And everything Trump does doesn't matter if it's harmful. It's either heroic or it's someone else's fault. Either Trump is heroic for a tax bill that will lead to 15 million people losing coverage or it's someone else's fault. Yes, 15 million may lose coverage, but it would be someone else's fault. Yes, 15 million may lose coverage, but it would be someone else's fault. And what's dangerous is that this part of MAGA, this isolated echo chambered anti-social

wing, they don't want democracy. They want control, revenge. They want to feel something, even if it's hate and they want to be the deciders. And that's why they cheer book bands, which seem to contradict their value of free speech. They threaten school boards. They idolize being cruel to people because group cruelty starts to become a sort of connection. So we should be restating some of the important facts here. Not all MAGA voters are literally loners, but MAGA thrives in loneliness. It feeds on people who are hurting, offers them identity through division.

And it's never about fixing what's actually broken. It's let's identify something that's broken, even if you don't understand why. And I lied to you about why it's broken. Let's identify something that's broken or seems broken and turn that into a weapon or a cudgel to go after other people. And if that social decay keeps spreading, disconnection, despair, algorithm driven isolation, the movement is likely to keep growing even beyond Trump. So we've got to deal with the loneliness to a degree if we want to fix the politics. But to a degree, MAGA is what happens when people feel alone and someone tells them the

answer is not connection or integration into systems in society. The answer is vengeance. And it has worked really well to build this movement. All right. Here is a real story from the Orange Cult. If you want to work for the federal government under Donald Trump, you now have to write essays praising Donald Trump, not essays about the Constitution and defending it and supporting it, not essays about your qualifications. You're being told to explain how will you advance Donald Trump's executive orders and

policy priorities? That's a quote from a May 29th memo from Trump's OPM, the Office of Personnel Management. If you apply, you now have to write four short essays, one about work ethic, one about the Constitution, one about government efficiency and one about how you will serve Trump's agenda. We are one final step away from having to end each one of these letters, writing exercises with thank you, Mr. Trump, for this opportunity to serve your greatness. You'll notice that none of this is about merit, which they say is what matters. None of this is about streamlining hiring.

It's about loyalty, raw, unbridled narcissism. And the kicker is that I don't think it's going to work. It's not going to suddenly flood government with Trump loyalists. What this is going to do is deter the sorts of people who take public service seriously, people with moral standards, critical thinking skills, a sense of democracy. It's going to deter those people from even applying. So the people that will apply are already going to be a self-selected group and they'll probably just game it.

Here's how I expect that this will go. A.I. is going to write these essays and A.I. is going to read these essays, give this about 12 hours and you are going to have a ready to use chat GPT prompt that will tell you how to write a 200 word essay for these application questions that will placate Donald Trump. And then the people doing the hiring will probably run all of them through chat GPT and say, who are the people here who indicate that they will likely be the most loyal to Donald Trump? If you've ever applied for a federal position, you probably know the process, which is you've

got 10 versions of your resume. You're attaching PDFs, cover letters, trying to tweak it to appear as though you're a perfect fit for each one of these jobs compared to that amount of work. The writing of these four short essays isn't really the problem. It's not, oh, it's just an unfair amount of work. What we are really dealing with here is an enforced authoritarianism. It's a it's a bar. You have to get through to even apply being willing to submit one of these glowing suck

up the notes about how you will serve Trump's agenda. Now, there's one other. I want to mention here the question about your commitment to the Constitution The context is how will your commitment to the Constitution help advance Trump's agenda? It's kind of a trick question because very often what we've learned is that the Constitution and Trump's agenda are in conflict. The Constitution is about checks and balances. Trump's agenda is about unchecked power on Trump's say so because he said it.

The Constitution is meant to protect individual rights. Trump's agenda is about ending birthright citizenship, censoring political dissent, eliminating due process, deporting people without due process, et cetera. So if you're an applicant, what are you going to say? I will advance unconstitutional policies in a constitutional way. I just it doesn't even make sense. So the goal here isn't logic. It's obedience.

It fits within Trump's loyalty agenda. It fits within what Project 2025 has planned. That's an important thing, which is they want to purge the nonpartisan federal workforce and bring in loyalists, rig the hiring process, fill it with these people who lay down like a doormat for Donald Trump. So this is not subtle. We are seeing longtime public service experts sounding the alarm saying that it took generations to build this nonpartisan public service infrastructure and they're just doing away with it and stacking

it with loyalists. And the worst part, I believe, is that it's barely going to register. A lot of people won't even hear about this. Many will and will roll their eyes and say it's Trump being Trump. But you have to understand that this is the machinery of the second Trump term authoritarianism. It's getting bolted into place now. It's not just sticky notes. They're bolting it into place.

It's idiotic. It's performative, but it is dangerous because when you turn the civil service space into the very personality cult that the MAGA voter has become. You're not just breaking government. You're kind of breaking the idea that it even is going to serve the people at all. So I'm doing everything I can to let people know that these things are going on. These are not the sexiest stories that are going to make for good headlines. So we have to do what we can to make sure people know that these things are going on.

On that note, please make sure you're on my sub stack newsletter. You can email info at David Pakman dot com and say, sign me up or just go to my website, David Pakman dot com. And you can sign yourself up. We will be relaunching and rebranding the sub stack very soon. A lot of extra stuff is coming. We will take a very quick break and be right back. Constitution and maybe even pursue another term. Now if you don't know the bias behind your news, you might believe, Oh, Trump's just teasing us. There's nothing here.

Go to ground.news slash Pacman and see how media bias influences more than your perception from Trump's policy and ability to understand and undermine constitutional norms. I've been with ground news for years now because this is what they do. They expose the hidden agendas behind reporting sources and make it easy to compare coverage and understand critical issues. Even better, if I'm reading a story on another site, the ground news browser extension will flag the sources, political bias, and give me other reports on the same story so I can Brown news boxes it in in the podcast notes. It's always a reliable place to send your feedback. OK, this one is really, really funny. When word broke that former President Biden has cancer, it was a weekend.

And as many of you know, I don't do shows every day. Call me crazy, but I think I deserve a weekend. And when we came in on Monday and of course, it was our lead story and we have a schedule for publishing content. Daniel Philip posted in the chat for our YouTube premiere, finally preparing how to cover it up. Huh? Why no immediate video when the news broke?

Yeah, yeah, you can take notes from your Democrats as to what you should say about Biden having cancer. Take your time. You know, the implication here is I didn't immediately do a show about Joe Biden's prostate cancer over the weekend because I needed to wait to get my Democratic Party talking points. And then I would be able to tell people, what am I supposed to say about Biden's cancer? First of all, I prep the show daily. All right.

If something breaks at some time of day, we have a schedule. We do five shows a week, Monday to Friday. If we're mid edit, if we've already recorded, well, then it goes on the next show. And that's normal for daily programs that have a certain schedule that they stick to. But one of the funnier things about this is the idea that the left is better at coordinated messaging. We all have to get our ducks in a row. If anything, the I've said the right is way better at the coordinated messaging.

In fact, one of the things that often happens on the left and we've seen it during elections and at different times is that there's an exclusionary rather than inclusionary instinct or that everybody is actually on a different page about every issue. Biden should stay in versus Biden should go. You did not have agreement about that during the twenty twenty four campaign. So even the concept that we're all coordinating messaging as evidenced by always being on the same page, we're often not on the same page. One of the things about the left seems to be that everybody just kind of says whatever

they believe, which I think is great. It may not always win us elections, but that that's the way we do it. So no, I didn't do a show over the weekend to talk about Biden's cancer news. I did it as the top story on the next damn show, which was Monday. All right. The Bootsch 109 submitted the following on the David Pakman show sub Reddit. I'm tired of hearing about Biden's age in 2025. It's time to focus on the current president.

I'm not denying Biden's old. I'm not denying Biden was too old to run for president a second time, because in my opinion, he was. But with that said, I'm sick of turning on CNN and hearing Jake Trapp Tapper try to sell his book Original Sin on the Biden age cover up. There are bigger things being covered up right now by the Trump administration. We have scandals, unfathomable policy, lack of policy, dismantling of our freedoms and

institutions right now. Write a book about that. Get on camera and cover that. Every time I see an ad for this book, it feels like seriously wasted resources and a distraction from issues that matter. You know, this does reveal how warped the media landscape is. CNN has been wall to wall coverage of Jake Tapper's book because they want to help him sell his book. Right wing media has been wall to wall coverage of Jake Tapper's book because they just want

to criticize Democrats and Joe Biden. And it is absolutely true that Trump is president. He's rolling back rights. He's threatening legal norms. But network anchors are obsessed with whether Biden should have run in 2024. You don't have to love Biden to understand that the fight right now has nothing to do with Joe Biden. Joe Biden's political career is over.

Should never have run for reelection. Said that at the beginning he did. It was a mistake. He eventually got out. It didn't work. The handover to Harris was not effective. She lost. OK, we have an ongoing constitutional erosion.

You can't lose democracy retroactively because you're still debating Joe Biden's age or whatever the case may be. Now, do I have a problem with Jake Tapper's book? My only real issue with Jake Tapper's book is that as a CNN journalist. Some of what's in the book, he claims to have learned while the campaign was going on. And even though he writes in the book, it had bearing on our democracy. It wasn't important enough for him to actually reveal this in 2024. And instead he saved it for his book.

Now I know, I know everybody does it. I totally understand. Everybody does it. I totally understand. Everybody does it. But if he wants to really be taken more seriously, the issue I have is he should have put this out. And I've said this about so many. I said it about Bob Woodward has had it about others saving it in this way. No longer feels like this is about warning the country because the time to warn the country would have been before the election when he, according to his own reporting, had some of this information. That's the issue I have.

All right. Another one from Reddit. The lament of Squidward says, I touched grass today and it made me feel better. I went to a local memorial weekend festival looking around, seeing everybody, having a good time, being able to tell on site. Most of these people were nothing approaching MAGA. It made me feel a little better. Is our democracy dead?

Yes. Will we be living under fascist rule for the foreseeable future? Probably, probably our lifetimes. Sure. Will tens if not hundreds of millions suffer and starve and get shipped off to concentration camps? Yes. But at least we can make friends with some like minded individuals in the meantime. Right.

Maybe the real civil war was the friends we made along the way. So you know, this is simultaneously dark and hopeful and there is a contradiction here. Right. This is where a lot of people are right now. We are staring down an authoritarian consolidation, climate catastrophe, economic precarity, suspension of habeas corpus potentially. But we're still trying to have a nice weekend with friends. And so I don't think that it's dangerous escapism.

It's sanity preservation. I do the same thing here. I've said before, I do the show when I'm done with the Friday show. I do not pay attention to any politics or news until I start prepping the Monday show. It's not that I want to escape. Bigger picture. It's that I need to preserve sanity. And so I understand.

And by the way, I do still believe that in many blue states, there are, of course, risks to what Trump is doing and we're going to have to face them and deal with them. But a lot of the things Trump is wrecking are going to be particularly bad for the people in the red states. And that is a tragedy I can't necessarily do anything about. All right. On Instagram, we heard from Admiral with the with who said the following. And this is really wacky stuff.

This is packed with nonsense. This it's almost performance art. Here's what this person said. Funny demo rat. They don't give a shit on baby in the womb. They say it not a full live human, but take a lot of care of those border crossers having a baby and now become a first born USA. Yes, that fight for that demo rats evil as ever.

So David is now serving time in prison after the Doge raid his home over illegal money getting from USAID. I love the misspelling of raid as R.A.D.E. So listen, I have not been raided. I am not in prison as of this moment. I have received no illegal money nor legal money from USAID and Doge. I don't know if they mean Dogecoin or the Department of Government Efficiency has nothing to do with any of this. The sad part punctuation aside, which is its own war crime here, the sad part of this is

that this person thinks they figured it out. This it's it's nothing more than a fan fiction about border babies and first born American status. It's incoherent. It's xenophobic. It's detached from reality. This is an example of someone who thinks they're engaging in political discourse and in some right wing corners of the Internet.

It counts as political discourse, which is a tragedy in and of itself. Spotify user Alucard says, what happened to advising people to move to blue states instead of leaving the country? I don't think you suffer from delusions, David, but I do think you suffer from a little hypocrisy. So listen, there is no this is in response to me saying last week that I'm putting a contingency plan in place to leave the country should I need to. And the, the, the, the comment alleges a contradiction. There's no contradiction. I've said before, we need people to stay in fight.

If everybody leaves, then we are ceding control to the worst people there are. But also, who am I to tell any individual, don't do what's best for your family, don't do what keeps your family safe. So I have always said we need people in the fight. Maybe if you're in a red state, it's getting really bad. Consider moving to a blue state. You can you can stay, but it'll be better. Right.

But the truth here is I've always said when it comes to what's best for your family, at the end of the day, we need people to stay. But I'm not going to look you in the eye and say, don't leave, even if there's a threat to your family. So that's my perspective. I said it in that segment where I said everybody can't leave or that's it. But we also all need to act to keep our families safe. I've always had that perspective.

No, no, no change whatsoever. Another Spotify comment here from Tesla Deco Sla Deco, who says the following. Now I know why I've never heard of you before. Just another extremist on the left in an echo chamber, ridiculously unaware that if they were to be given everything they want, they'd regret it for whatever remained of their vastly shortened life. The left quite literally can't see beyond their goalposts, never ask themselves what happens then, all the while pretending that they don't have what they want because someone else has it and won't give them access.

Why do nothings? This is Projection 101. It's always the people who accuse the left of whining, who spend hours rage posting on public forums about how woke college kids and food stamps are ruining America. And as far as the echo chamber, we cover conservative speech. We cover liberal speech. I do tick tock streams and let any Trump supporter who wants to come confront me and convince me that they are right to come and do it.

I don't know that the right really wants debate. I think the right wants submission and that is not free speech. That's ideological enforcement. As someone on the left. Yes, I'm against that. That's true. Let's check out some of these from Substack. Veritates says it seems that almost everyone except David has learned that the markets and America aren't necessarily the same thing.

I suspect David is unaware of the 1962 law passed by Congress that gives the president full tariff authority for national security interests and the 1974 law passed by Congress that gives the president full tariff authority for unfair foreign trade practices. Tariff authority will go back to the president. And when American companies are on equal footing, the market will respond as never before. David class is dismissed and you're welcome. Ah, yes. Let me.

This is the classic. I'm going to school you on presidential trade law a little bit with a little condescending twist at the end. Now here's the reality. No one is denying that the 1962 and 1974 laws that are cited by veritates do grant presidential tariff authority in some contexts to the president. But the court struck down Trump's 2025 tariffs for overreach. That has now been stayed by an appeals court.

We need to see where it lands. But the whole point here is that Trump is accused of superseding the authority, the limits of the 1962 law and the 1974 law. So the ruling wasn't that the president can't use tariffs. The ruling was the president can only do tariffs based on these laws that the person cites when the circumstances match the letter of the law. The law doesn't justify what Trump actually did according to economists, legal experts and that lower court.

Now, of course, we're waiting to see what the appeals court ultimately rules. But it's not me who misunderstands the law. It's veritates who thinks that the law says Trump can do whatever he wants with tariffs for any reason, no matter the circumstances. And that's what violates the law. All right. Let's now go to tick tock. Nihilist Degin says every single judge challenging Trump was appointed by Biden.

He installed over 100 activist judges before leaving. But OK, fact check, this is not true. The ruling on the tariff case, for instance, came from a panel. There was a Reagan appointed judge and Obama appointed judge and a Trump appointed judge. It is not true that it is Biden appointed judges that are blocking what Trump wants to do. And unless the argument is Biden secretly appointed the judges or something like that, Trump appointed a hell of a lot of judges himself.

And I would argue, especially through his Supreme Court picks, Trump reshaped the judiciary way more than any recent president, certainly more than Biden. So if you're mad at the judges, the question that nihilist Degen should be asking is why are even Trump judges ruling against him? The answer. You might not like to see it. The answer just might be the Constitution and the rule of law. We've got a great bonus show for you today. Uh, sign up, become a member at join Pacman.com. Get the full David Pakman show experience. I will be back Monday with a new show and a new bonus show. But we've got today's bonus show. and a little less alone. Listen to Beautiful Anonymous. Each week I take a phone call from one random anonymous human being.

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