The David Pakman Show - 7/9/25: Trump cuts off Epstein question, ready to take over US cities

Episode Date: July 9, 2025

-- On the Show: -- Marc Elias, voting rights attorney and founder of Democracy Docket, joins David to discuss how Trump is using the courts to abuse his power -- Trump launches criminal investigations into James Comey and John Brennan in a clear act of political retribution over the Russia probe -- Trump press secretary Karoline Leavitt gleefully endorses the weaponization of the DOJ against Trump’s longtime enemies -- Trump casually suggests taking over Washington DC and New York City, signaling a chilling authoritarian shift toward federal control of cities -- Trump shows severe cognitive lapses on live TV during a cabinet meeting, raising concerns about his mental fitness -- Trump lashes out and shuts down Jeffrey Epstein questions, reigniting suspicions about his ties and transparency -- MAGA influencers like Megyn Kelly and Alex Jones turn on Trump over his failure to release Epstein-related files -- On the Bonus Show: Investors buying more US homes, Grok AI posts antisemitic comments, American birth rate falling, and much more... 🌞 Sponsored by BetterHelp: Get 10% off your 1st month at https://betterhelp.com/pakmanshow 🍓 Strawberry.me: Get a $50 credit when you sign up for coaching at https://strawberry.me/pakman  🩳 SHEATH Underwear: Code PAKMAN for 20% OFF at https://sheathunderwear.com/pakman ⚠️ Ground News: Get 40% OFF their unlimited access Vantage plan at https://ground.news/pakman 😬 Remi mouth guards: Get up to 50% OFF with code PAKMAN at https://shopremi.com/pakman -- 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

Welcome, everybody. Have you seen the latest authoritarian freefall of this administration? It doesn't make me happy to come here and have to report to you that our worst fears are coming true, that we have yet another step towards total authoritarianism. We've seen the deployment of military to cities and states, even when the governor and the mayor don't want it. We've seen attacks on media. We've seen the flouting of due process.

We've seen this growing list of stuff that we would normally expect when reading a history book about 20th century authoritarian dictators. But it's Trump. It's the United States in 2025. And it's terrifying. And if you thought Trump couldn't get any more authoritarian. Well, we now have confirmation that the Trump FBI under the directorship of Cash Patel and the Trump DOJ under Attorney General Pam Bondi have launched criminal investigations into former CIA Director John Brennan and former FBI Director James Comey. These are the same Brennan and Comey that Trump has spent years accusing of being part of the deep state conspiracy against him.

And this is not satire. They of course have not been charged with anything at this point. It's just an investigation. But this is exclusively and absolutely political. That's what this is about. And it is not lost on me that Trump is now doing what he accused Biden of doing to him without evidence. We're going to get back to that in a moment.

These new investigations reportedly relate to the 2016 Russia probe. There's scant information about exactly what's going on. But all of this supposedly is about that Russia probe where multiple American intelligence agencies confirmed Russia interfered in the election of 2016 to help Donald Trump. It doesn't mean Trump and Vlad met personally to game out how Russia would help Trump. It's simply Russia had a preference for Trump over Hillary the way. There's nothing special about that. The way Russia had a preference for candidates all over the world and in the way that Russia knows how to do, they tried to put their hands on the scale.

That's it. It's not coordination between Trump and Putin. But that's that investigation where special counsel Robert Mueller did not find a conspiracy. In other words, the allegation was not that it involved Trump proactively, but documented 10 separate instances of Trump attempting to obstruct justice. That investigation, which found so much and recovered so much money and led to so many prosecutions. Trump has now decided it's payback time.

The kicker is that this is what Trump said Biden was doing and would continue to do had he been reelected or ultimately if Kamala Harris had been elected. Trump spent years screaming Biden's weaponizing the DOJ against me. Biden's weaponizing the DOJ against people who support me. And there was not a shred of evidence at the time for that. And as I warned and as so many of us warned when they loudly shout about things that aren't happening, what they really mean is this is what we would do if we were in that situation. When Trump was saying Biden's going to come after me really hard, what Trump meant was if I were in Biden's shoes, that's what I would be doing. And Trump is now doing it, not accountability.

It's revenge politics. It's criminalizing the people who investigated him or who Trump perceives to be his enemies. And it's a move right out of the authoritarian playbook. Use the state to investigate your enemies, discredit the institutions that check your power claim that you are actually the victim. And even better, you are the martyr. You were doing this for the people and they're just coming after you. Fox News says their sources are from the DOJ on this Trump's DOJ. We know that Trump's inner circle has been wanting to go after Brennan and wanting to

go after Comey since not even since day one, since before they even were elected. And these investigations reportedly were sparked by a referral from John Ratcliffe, a total Trump loyalist who served as DNI. The CIA and the DOJ are not commenting right now. Neither is the FBI. So understand what's happening here. Did Brennan maybe make mistakes as CIA director? Sure.

Who doesn't? Did James Comey make mistakes as CIA director? Sure. Who doesn't? Did James Comey make mistakes? I mean, listen, one of the mistakes James Comey made was days before the 2016 election after he had already previously held a press conference about the investigation into Hillary Clinton's emails, decided to hold an additional press conference, which was a factor. I'm not going to say it was the deciding factor, but the 2016 election was very close. Any one thing could be responsible for shifting one hundred thousand votes, which is all the election depended on at the end of the day.

Comey decided I'm going to do another press conference about the investigation into Hillary Clinton's emails. And some analyses suggest that that alone might have been enough to push Trump into the Oval Office. So it's not that Brennan and Comey didn't make mistakes. Every CIA director makes some mistakes. Every FBI director does. But that doesn't mean that Trump now directing these investigations from the DOJ and FBI

are a legitimate pursuit of justice. And in fact, when you look at Trump, we see this escalating pattern of using federal power to go after perceived enemies. Let me screw the states I'm going to send in troops to California. Yesterday, Donald Trump said, hey, you know what? We might have to take over. We the federal government, we might have to take over Washington, D.C. and New York City and take power away from municipalities to govern themselves and just make these federally

run cities. And then now it's used the FBI and DOJ to go after Brennan and Comey. And the irony is rich because Trump's White House is under fire from his own supporters for failing to provide evidence for their Jeffrey Epstein conspiracy theories. Now you have some of Trump's own eating him. It's the monster he created now going after him. But meanwhile, even though they are saying what these agencies are now bad and they are part of the cover up, they on the other hand go, no, of course, the DOJ and FBI are great agencies to go after Brennan and to go after Comey. So what does Trump do?

He always tries to change the subject. And now all of a sudden, instead of accountability for the perceived lies about the Epstein probe, which we'll get to later in the show, it's well, let's do something that my people will like with the FBI and the DOJ. Let's sick them on Comey and let's sit them sick them on Brennan. So justice very much not. Trump trying to rewrite history. Yes. And at this point, I mean, listen, I I don't think I have to convince you that if they

get away with this, it's not going to stop with Brennan and Comey. It never does. Right. On what planet in what country would it be? Let me take the incredible authoritarian step of weaponizing investigatory agencies against two political enemies. And then just stop there. I'm going to be satisfied with that and never try this again. Of course not.

So later in the show, we're going to be speaking with Attorney Mark Elias. This is one of the things that I do want to talk to him about. Donald Trump's White House press secretary, Caroline Levitt, gleeful, visibly overjoyed at Donald Trump's latest authoritarian insanity, directing the FBI and the DOJ to go after James Comey, former FBI director, to go after John Brennan, former CIA director. The regime is in total freefall. Here is Caroline Levitt speaking to Jesse Waters on Fox News. And she is celebrating these authoritarian criminal investigations.

It's like it's Christmas morning and she's got her biggest cross on and she's ready for the gifts from Santa. Here she is talking about how great this is. We're finally going to get transparency and justice and accountability. There's obviously something to that. We just heard Carillon on though. If you saw the top of the show, it looks like there has been an investigation opened up into James Comey and John Brennan possibly lying to Congress in a conspiracy over the Russia hoax.

What can you tell us about that? Well, I just heard that news at the top of your show and I'm glad to hear it because both of these disgraceful individuals turned against our constitution and our country and I'm sure they did in fact lie to Congress and it's up to the Department of Justice to investigate that and to prosecute them if they did. And what we have seen is corruption at the highest levels against President Trump. The deep state threw everything at him to prevent him from coming back to this big beautiful White House behind me.

And he prevailed and the truth must come out. And this administration is totally committed to transparency and to justice and to accountability. And we must have a rule of law in this country. We can't be a nation without law and order. That's what the president believes in. And I'm glad to see the Department of Justice is opening up this investigation. That's right. The people who don't want to answer a single question about why are Trump's hands so bruised and swollen?

Is he getting IV medication for anything? They don't want to answer even that, but they are committed to transparency by weaponizing the DOJ and the FBI against their perceived political enemies. The people who haven't released a real economic report in weeks and who ran on draining the swamp who end up filling government with their cronies and family friends now are telling us the investigation into James Comey and John Brennan is going to give us truth and it's going to give us accountability. Give me a break.

And so we one of the things I think is important to do and we'll talk to Mark Elias about this a little bit later is we need to clarify that this is Trump using the federal government to fight vendettas against his political enemies or to air vendettas to prosecute vendettas. These are criminal crow probes into the same two people who helped investigate Russian interference in 2016. The interference that every American intelligence agency confirmed did happen, even if Mueller couldn't charge a criminal conspiracy, which he couldn't. Comey led the FBI Trump Russia investigation.

Brennan ran the CIA when the U.S. concluded Russia interfered to help Trump. Trump has raged about these men for years and now he's back in power. And so the DOJ is his tool. It's a toolbox of political payback. Caroline Levitt's back in power. And so the DOJ is his tool. It's a toolbox of political payback. Caroline Levitt's not denying it. She's celebrating it, celebrating it. Trump has claimed for years Biden's weaponizing the DOJ. What Trump meant was if I were in Biden's position, I sure as hell would be weaponizing

the DOJ. And now Trump is doing what he falsely accused Biden of doing, launching DOJ investigations into people he didn't like, people who hurt his feelings, people who he blames for exposing what happened in 2016. And so this is much closer to dictatorship than it is to law and order. And the really scary part is this is not some rogue faction in the government doing behind doing this behind closed doors. They've decided they're just this.

This is the government coming from the top. Caroline Levitt, the official voice from the Trump White House celebrating it, she's giddy. She even said, I'm sure they did commit crimes. What? That's not due process. A statement from the official White House press secretary that individuals who have not even been charged with a crime definitely committed crimes. It's not oversight.

It's not justice. The only word we can really assign to this is that this is an attempt at revenge. We don't know how far this is going to go. And so we're going to do everything to continue supporting the movement for democracy, due process and law and order. They don't really support that. They pay lip service to it, but they don't. And so I invite you to join us on our YouTube channel, YouTube dot com slash the David Pakman

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Sessions are virtual, flexible and also designed to work with your schedule. So stop guessing and start growing. is David Pakman show is an audience supported independent media program. That is not just a talking point. That is not some vague reference to who knows what. That's the structure of this show. We're primarily funded by individuals like you who become members at Join Pakman Dot com, who become sub stack paid subscribers at sub stack dot David Pakman Dotcom. become substack paid subscribers at substack David Pakman Dotcom. That's how we do the show.

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Enter your email address to be put in line for a free membership. Come on. Come on. Come on. Come on. Come on. Come on. Come on. Come on. Come on. Come on. Come on. Come on.

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Come on. Come on. Come on. Come on. Come on. Come on. Come on. Come on the waiting list. Donald Trump has done the unthinkable. He is now suggesting the federal government taking over American cities, Washington, D.C., New York City. Trump is talking about federalizing the cities of the United States like these are companies he's about to acquire.

No shareholder vote, though. No press release, just a smirk and a mumbled comment at a cabinet meeting. We're looking into running D.C. It's like a casino. He's thinking about flipping, you know, we have tremendous power at the White House to run places when we have to. We could run D.C. I mean, we're we're looking at D.C.

We don't want crime in D.C. We want the city to run well. Suzy Wells is working very closely with the mayor and they're they're doing all right. I mean, in the sense that we would we would run it so good, it would be run so proper. We get the best person to run it. And we run the crime would be down to a minimal would be run so proper. We get the best person to run it. The crime would be down to a minimal, would be much less. And, you know, we're thinking about doing it, to be honest with you. We want to we want a capital that's run flawlessly and it wouldn't

be hard for us to do it. And we've had a good relationship with the mayor and we're testing it to see if it works. But New York City will run properly. We're going to bring New York back. Just like it's, by the way, also New York City. We can run New York City as well. And why? Well, he's worried that Zoran Mamdani might become the mayor of New York City. And then all of a sudden, it's the tremendous power of the White House that would descend

upon D.C. and New York City. You can kind of feel the ground shifting a little bit here. You know, one moment, Trump's criticizing crime statistics. OK, he's lying about him, but at least he's sticking to crime numbers. And then the next moment, he's suggesting, well, maybe the elected governments of these cities don't really matter. Like the fact that voters in those cities have chosen their leaders. Maybe I just take over.

Or if I don't like who wins an election in New York City, I just take it over. These are not like backroom whisperings that he's ashamed to say publicly. He's not he's on camera. He's saying it out loud. And it's sort of like, come stop me if you think you can. So not hypothetical. Donald Trump has already sent these heavily armed federal agents into Los Angeles. No warning, no coordination, certainly no request from the mayor of Los Angeles, Karen

Bass or the governor of California, Gavin Newsom. Just we're just doing it. That's it. Boots on the ground. Immigration enforcement, they said. But it really looked like a trial run for martial law. And so we are operating here with a new playbook. Mayor Karen Bass pushed back. She was told by a border patrol official, you better get used to us.

This is how strong men really operate. The rule of law isn't so important. The rule of law is something that's kind of like cool if it's convenient. But otherwise it's we do what we want. We retroactively find some kind of a justification later. Maybe it's, oh, there's crime in D.C. We had to take it over or there's homelessness in New York City. Why not? We've got to take it over. And that'll do for them. That that the part of, you know, when we sometimes report on these accidental deaths in Russia, which are clearly not accidental. And some of you write to me and you go, David, how does Putin think anyone will

believe these were really accidents? And the important thing to understand is that's the whole point. Putin pays lip service to these were accidents, but in a way where everybody knows they aren't really accidents. And that's the exact same idea here. It's we don't even respect you or care what you think enough to convincingly lie to you about what we're doing. We will deliberately unconvincingly lie to you about what we're doing. We will deliberately unconvincingly lie. It's such a shame that this political adversary of Putin fell out of a window and landed on a knife 14 times accidentally.

Right. And we go, that's not believable. That's the whole point. Part of the part of the whole thing is we don't even care that, you know, we're lying about it. So you don't really need to squint to see the direction that this is going. It's D.C., maybe it's New York City, then it's any mayor who resists any governor who disagrees, any journalist who doesn't get in line.

And Trump's not teasing out policy ideas. He's just mapping out the next phase, consolidate power, centralize authority. Elections won't really matter if that's what Trump can do. And you read about this stuff in the history books. This is if you want examples of how democracies sort of hollow out, you can read about this stuff at 19th and 20th century history. Now, as far as sort of takeovers of cities or states, you know, after the Civil War, federal troops were stationed in some southern states and there were people who said that's an overreach. But the critical difference was after a civil war that was fought over slavery, federal

troops were stationed in southern states temporarily to enforce civil rights to protect black Americans from white supremacist violence. So it was still controversial. It got pretty messy and brutal at times, but at least it had a moral core, which is, hey, we just fought a civil war. The North won. We're not doing slavery anymore. We are going to be there to protect the rights of people.

Trump is proposing the opposite. Trump is like, let's use federal power not to protect civil liberties, but to trample on them. Let's use federal power not to respect democracy, but to tell the people of D.C. and New York, I don't care who you voted for, we're coming in and we're going to be the ones who have the power. So when we see countries slide into authoritarianism, it often happens from the outside in military coups, shadowy conspiracies, exiled leaders pulling strings.

This is flipped. This is Trump sitting at the head of the table on national TV spitballing. How can I seize more control that certainly no one voted to give me? And that isn't actually part of the way the country is organized. So rather than like a behind closed doors coup, it's a running monologue about how can I dismantle democracy more effectively? Fox is playing in the background. Trump sitting there with his water in front of him and going, yeah, we might we might

do it. So rather than a bang, it's these small, surreal steps. It all starts to feel a little normal. Listen, we had troops in L.A. already. So it's just it's oversight of cities. Maybe we'll do a little more of it in New York. Maybe we'll do a little more in D.A. already. So it's just it's oversight of cities. Maybe we'll do a little more of it in New York. Maybe we'll do a little more in D.C. So Trump is not bluffing.

We should not believe that he's joking. He's just telling us what comes next. The question is, is anybody going to listen? Donald Trump suffering a painful cognitive failure at a cabinet meeting on live television. Clear evidence, clear evidence of presidential cognitive issues that the corporate press is going to ignore because it's either silly Trump or he didn't mean it or he was confused. Trump is asked by a reporter, did you rather Ukraine asked the International Court to go after Russia for using toxic chemicals in the war?

Trump doesn't know what the hell's going on, asks Pete Hegseth very quietly. Do you know about this? Hegseth goes, John might know. And Trump just goes, I don't know. Can someone tell me what my policy is on this? I mean, the Ukrainian national court to go after Russia for using toxic chemicals in the fight. Germany and Russia, Germany and the Netherlands have intelligence saying that.

What does U.S. intelligence believe and what do you believe about the use of chemical weapons? While the questions asked, Trump knows he doesn't know a damn thing. He leans over and says, what do we know about this? And Hegseth is like, oh, John might know. John might know what is John maybe to discuss it if you'd like, John. Well, Mr President, obviously chemical weapons, if it's documented and it's use, it's illegal. It's against all

international laws of armed conflict and treaties. And obviously I can't share in this room with this audience the intelligence that I can share with you privately. But obviously you're not going to stand or allow for any violations of international law by anyone.

Did you understand what just happened there? This this if this were Biden, it would be a week on Fox News. Trump immediately identified. I don't have a clue in hell what they're talking to me about. So he goes to Pete Hegseth, who knows about this? Hegseth goes talk to John and John tells Trump what his policy is. That's the sick thing of it. Trump is told, Mr. President, of course, you would never stand for the use of chemical

weapons, right? Of course I wouldn't. Thanks, John, for telling me what my position is. This is also, by the way, what happens when you skip intelligence briefings. Trump then asked, did you approve of the pause of weapons shipments to Ukraine? And Trump goes, I don't know who ordered that pause. Why don't you tell me we're getting along with China very well. Mr. President, you have more weapons to Ukraine, as you said last night.

Last week the Pentagon paused some shipments of weapons to Ukraine. Did you approve of that pause? We want to put defensive weapons because Putin is not treating human beings right. He's killing too many people. So we're sending some defensive weapons to Ukraine, and I've approved that. So who ordered the pause last week? I don't know. What did you tell me? Trump asking the reporter, you tell me who in my administration ordered the pause. If Biden had said this, it would be news for weeks with 100 stories about his mental acuity, a shadow

government. Biden's a clone. He doesn't know what's going on. And it is now a daily occurrence, a daily occurrence, which under Biden would be we got to remove this guy. Trump is checked out. He doesn't have the mental acuity to understand anything. He then rambled about the Great Depression and wrongly stated that after the Great Depression, the United States implemented tariffs. Little problem with this. Tariffs were before the Great Depression. Country had a Great Depression. And then after the depression, as after long after it started, they brought back tariffs to see if they could save it.

But it took them really 25 years. When you say about 25 years to get out of the Great Depression, a lot of people don't understand that. Yeah. By all estimates, it took 10 to 12 years to get out of the Great Depression. A lot of people don't understand that. Yeah. By all estimates, it took 10 to 12 years to get out of the Great Depression. But the Great Depression was after the enacting of tariffs, not before. Just facts, right? But it's Trump legacy and corporate media won't touch it.

The cabinet meeting then went completely off the rails. Trump starting to talk about gold leafing the corners, painted the Romanus color, beige color. And it's been it's been really something. The only question is, will I gold live the corners? You could maybe tell me my cabinet could take a vote. You see the you see the top line moldings. And the only question is, do you go because you can't paint it if you paint it, it won't look good because they've never found a paint that looks like all you see that one of Trump's favorite topics paint just never really looks like gold. I want people to understand something. This is the meeting. People wonder, oh, they talk to the press for 15 minutes, but clearly they must spend hours in a meeting talking about the serious issues.

Right. Wrong. Unlike in other administrations, there is no behind the scenes. The full meeting is this. It's made for TV. There is no other part of this. Trump again says China has no wind farms. China actually leads the world in wind capacity. To what they'll be in

about a year from now. We're sending records and wind is a very expensive form of energy. It's very bad for your beautiful surroundings and planes and the valleys and the birds dying all over the place. You know, the whole thing is a disaster. They're almost exclusively made in China. Not that I have anything against China because I don't have a great relationship with President Xi, but I asked him, how many wind farms do you have? He makes them, but they don't have a lot of wind farms out there. You have very, very few. And wind is tremendously expensive and is very ugly.

And if you own a house that's inside of a windmill, your house is worth less than half and people and you hear noises. And interestingly, in New England, you probably read where for 50 years they had two wells washed up 50 years. And last summer they had 14 washed up. Now I'm not saying that's the wind farm that was built, but maybe it is right. Probably is. I'm not saying the wind farms in Massachusetts caused whales to wash up, but it probably

is. And then this just going so off the rails, so off the rails that Fox News felt they had no choice but to cut away to protect Donald Trump. It's nothing. We also painted the room in this color beige color. And it's been it's been really something. The only question is, will I go live the corners? You can maybe tell me my cabinet could take a boat.

You see the you see the top line moldings. And the only question is, do you go with it because you can't paint it if you painted it won't look good because they've never found a paint that looks like all you see that in the overall. All right. We're about half past the hour here. This is America reports. We have been watching this cabinet.

So Fox gets the hell out of there as Trump basically rants like a guy in Home Depot about which paint is good versus not so good. That was the cabinet meeting. There was no high level discussion behind the scenes before after that was the cabinet meeting. Corporate media will not talk about what's going on with this guy's brain. Tragic, tragic stuff. Let's be honest.

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The link is in the description. It's great to welcome to the program once again, Mark Elias, a voting rights attorney is in Mark, we could start in any number of places, but because I told my audience that I would start here, I want to start with this news of the DOJ and FBI investigating former FBI director James Comey, former CIA director John Brennan. For years, we heard from Donald Trump. Joe Biden is weaponizing investigative agencies. And what he really meant was if I were in Biden's shoes, that's what I would be doing. And in fact, it's what he is doing. How big of a deal is this really if you're James Comey or Brennan right now? So I think we need to unpack

this a little bit. The first is if you're James Comey or Brennan, it's certainly not welcome news. It's not like what you are hoping for. But this is likely not going to amount to very much. I mean, let's start with the fact that the facts at issue, whatever comes of them one way or the other took place, you know, uh, eight years ago or more, the statute of limitations is five years.

So nothing, nothing that has that happened prior to say, 2020, uh, you know, five years ago, uh, would be, would be prosecutable anyway. Um, that's before you get to the fact that they almost certainly did nothing wrong. And that is also remember, Donald Trump actually did this playbook in his first term. People forget this, but Donald Trump accused Barack Obama of wiretapping him, accused Hillary Clinton of election interference in 2016 and importantly, accused the FBI of election interference. And Bill Barr appointed John Durham,

a special counsel to look into the allegations specifically with respect to the FBI, which then looked at the Clinton campaign, also the other intelligence agencies. There were cases that John Durham brought, those led to acquittals. which then looked at the Clinton campaign, also the other intelligence agencies. There were cases that John Durham brought. Those led to acquittals. And so it is hard to see not only is it old, not only is it political, but it is also like

this ground. Donald Trump has played this card once before and I don't see this going anywhere. We then move into and then we're going to weave. I'm doing the weave right now. We're then going to weave all of these things together. So. So we've got that maybe on a personal level based on the statute of limitations may not end up becoming a big thing for Brennan or Comey.

Fine. We then have CBS and Paramount, which have been sued by Donald Trump. They do appear to be moderating their journalism, their sort of eagerness to reach lawsuit settlements that some describe as frivolous, although I know that lawyers take issue sometimes with the term frivolous. So I'm not as frivolous as frivolous. OK, fine. So I'm using it colloquially.

You're not. But it's frivolous. It's frivolous. OK, fine. So I'm using it colloquially. You're not. But it's frivolous. What I'm seeing is it's working in the sense that these media institutions do seem like they would rather stay on Trump's better side. I don't know if it's the good side, but the better side. Self censorship, merger interests are sometimes sort of lurking below the surface. It seems like it's working exactly as Trump would want it to work.

Yeah. Look, I've been very outspoken about this. I mean, the lawsuit against CBS was frivolous. I mean, the argument was that it that it constituted election year interference because CBS News edited a portion of video with Kamala Harris. Well, guess what? Like news outlets regularly edit video for time,

they edit it for clarity. If they didn't edit video, Donald Trump would look even more incoherent than he often looks, because news outlets edit his videos to try to get to the point. So that case is frivolous. The ABC News one, which seems to have largely been modeled after, videos to try to get to the point. So that case is frivolous.

The ABC News one, which seems to have largely been modeled after was not, I would not say frivolous, I'd say it was meritless. So maybe a degree, there was a little more there, there was a traditional defamation claim, but just to clarify that for your audience. But absolutely, look, the legacy media is capitulating to Donald Trump.

Like, I don't understand why people would trust lawyers Look, the legacy media is capitulating to Donald Trump. I don't understand why people would trust lawyers who would sell out their principles in order to cut a deal with Donald Trump. And I don't understand why people would get their news from a news outlet that is willing to sell out its principles to cut a deal with Donald Trump. And people can give me all of the ancillary business reasons why this makes sense. They needed a merger to go through. The cost of litigation was high. They didn't want to go through discovery. They can give me all of those reasons just as the law firm lawyers can. The law firm lawyers can say, well,

they don't want to lose clients and this would be a distraction. But the end of the day, and this would be a distraction. But like the end of the day, the outcome is the outcome, which is you have large institutions, large media corporations that are bowing down to Donald Trump and they are willing to make changes to the way in which they do business. In the case of CBS News, the releasing of transcripts, there's also been some reporting that they may have agreed

to public service announcements, which is kind of like the law firm giving free legal services. And I'd ask everyone watching this, why would you trust a news outlet that cuts this kinds of deal and makes these kinds of compromises to give you the accurate and unvarnished truth and information analysis about what Donald Trump is doing to democracy.

Why would you trust them if they are if they're making these deals? I mean, this is why David, I'm on your show. This is why I, you know, we were talking before we went on. You know, I watch your videos regularly because I'm not going to. I'm going to get your perspective. But I know this. Your perspective is not colored by whether or not you want to be invited to all the right parties at Donald Trump's club, nor is it going to be colored because you are trying to do some ancillary business deal that you're trying to suck up to the Trump administration

for. Right. When it comes to some of the cases that your law firm is involved in. Well, let me let me enter this subject a different way. I recently did a sub stack live with Aaron Parnas, who is a lawyer, and he we were talking about our is anything working right now in terms of a robust opposition? And he said, you know, for all of the headlines about Trump ignoring court orders, Aaron's perspective is actually we are really doing quite well in the courts. And like even if you look at Kilmar, Abrego Garcia,

where initially they didn't turn the plane around, they did bring them back to the United States ultimately. And so Aaron's argument was, even though it doesn't get the headlines that maybe it should or shouldn't, but it doesn't get headlines, the work that your law firm and others are doing, we actually are doing pretty well when we take a lot of what the Trump administration does to court. What do you make of that analysis? Yeah, I look, I think that is that is largely correct with a caveat. So I don't think there's any question that right now the courts are the strongest bulwark

against authoritarianism and that if you look at the record of challenges to the attacks that Donald Trump has lodged against democracy now for the better part of 10 years, the courts have done pretty well for themselves. I mean, you know, the 20, post-election 2020, you know, the, he wound up pardoning a bunch of people, but that wasn't because the courts failed to hold them accountable. And as Aaron is mentioning in the Trump 2.0, the, you know, the win-loss ratio for the Department of Justice is at an all-time low, right? The Department of Justice is losing

an awful lot of these cases around the country. So I think that that is all true. I think the place where I give the measure of caution is that our system is not really set up to have the courts be the bulwark of democracy. And so, there's a lot of criticism of the Supreme Court. I lodge a lot of criticism at the Supreme Court, and that is all true.

But what I'd say is that even if you had the best Supreme Court, even if you had all the courts operating exactly as you and I might like them, they are still not, I sometimes tell folks who say, Mark, you're saving democracy. I say, No, I am buying time for democracy. I am buying time for it to be saved if it is going to be saved through the political processes that are set up to protect democracy. And that starts with, by the way, Democrats taking control of Congress in 2026, because it is ultimately Congress has more of power

than the courts do, frankly, to reign in the executive branch. When people talk about three co-equal branches of government, the founders really anticipated the legislative branch would be the most powerful, not the judiciary or the executive branch. So that is my only qualification, is that eventually if we do not get, if we do

not get other institutions, whether it's the institutional media, whether it's the Congress, whether it's the legal establishment, you know, the courts are not going to be able to hold this back. The analogy or metaphor that comes to mind would sort of be if you're on a boat with a huge hole in it, the courts may be able to sort of like take buckets of water and throw them overboard. But at a certain point, unless you plug the leak, the ship's going to sink. Is that a fair sort of a hundred percent right? So let's talk now about 2026. I've started to get emails from people

basically saying, do you think there will be free and fair elections in the 2026 midterms? And every time this comes up, it's sort of like, I guess, maybe tell me specifically what you're concerned about. You know, it's such a broad question. Are we talking about me? Listen, because of gerrymandering to get 50 percent of the House seats, Democrats need around 54 percent of the vote based on the reports I've seen. So like, is that free and fair? Or are you talking about voting machine manipulation or the closing of polling? There's so many fronts on this.

So I'll just leave it broad. What where what are we staring down, so to speak, for 2026 right now? Yeah. So first of all, to address one step back, which you didn't ask, I want to assure people we will have elections in 20. Yes. Right. They're not going to cancel the election.

People who are spreading conspiracy theories that there'll be no elections. I tell people to disregard those. Yeah. So we're going to have elections. I think the right question is the one that you asked, which is, will they be free and fair? Which is of course a continuum, right? Like there is no hard cutoff

where something goes from being free and fair to not free and fair. There are gradations of elections. And so, what people I think need to think about is the election process in several phases. The first is what are the rules of the election? You know, for example, like how are districts drawn? Because as you point out,

you can have all of the voting access you want. You could have, you know, voting equipment that you love, you know, 50 days of early voting, vote by mail. Like you could have everything else, but if you have extreme enough days of early voting, vote by mail, like you can have everything else, but if you have extreme enough gerrymandering, then none of that will matter, right? So the rules, the first thing I always tell folks is that the rules of voting matter enormously.

Gerrymandering is the most obvious one that people see, but I've increasingly been writing about this at Democracy Docket and warning people that, that, you know that we cannot excuse the other rules changes or the other manipulation rules that we see Republicans doing that are less obvious. So this is something like, this is an example that I used recently in a piece I wrote.

In 2013, the Republican legislature in North Carolina was found to have targeted black voters in a voter suppression law with near surgical precision. What the legislature did is they went through all of the potential voting changes they could make, and they asked the staff to score them by how much it would negatively impact black voter turnout versus white voter turnout. And then they chose the provisions that would most negatively impact black voters without impacting white voters. That was 2013. The person who was the state Senate president in North Carolina at the time was Tom Tillis. The person who had just been the most recent presidential nominee for the Republican Party was Mitt Romney. Okay, so that was the party of Tillis and Romney.

If they were doing that with the technology as it existed in 2013, you can imagine what they are doing today as they are scoring what voting changes they make. Were they open polls, were they closed polls, were they, you know, make changes to voter registration and the like. And so the pernicious impact of a lot of the laws

that you see Republicans enact are not on their face as obvious as redistricting maps are, but that's because we can now use software to know what the effects will be of those redistricting maps. But just looking at the visual of the maps, you wouldn't be able to tell either. And so I feel like sometimes with the voting discussion I have with people, it's like they're looking of those redistricting maps, but just looking at the visual of the maps, you wouldn't be able to tell either.

And so I feel like sometimes with the voting discussion I have with people, it's like they're looking at the visuals, they're not understanding what's underneath them. So I think that is of concern. And then the final piece of it is the whole certification of elections. We were very, very focused on this in the run up to 2024

in states like Georgia. Well, the only thing that changed is that Donald Trump won in 2024. It's not like the threat went away. And it's not like the, so where I would tell people to be worried are in the following things. Number one, that the Republican voter suppression

war machine is cranking away. The RNC and the Department of Justice in tandem with them are suing to make it harder for you to vote. If you are watching this video, almost certainly you are among the audiences being targeted with new voting restrictions and changes that you may not even notice, but will have an impact on who votes,

who can vote and whose vote counts. And then finally, I continue to be very worried about what a post-election certification process looks like. We saw what they did in 2020, obviously, and in 2024, frankly, what they did in North Carolina with the state Supreme Court election, where they litigated for six months to try to overturn the results of that election. At the obviously having lawyers fighting is important for my audience. What can the individual do on this front?

Yeah. So, look, I gave a talk which is somewhere on the Internet a couple of years ago, and I was asked the question essentially, why do you win so often in court? And what I said is that one of the reasons why we win so many voting cases is because the judges live in the communities that are being targeted. And they have neighbors, they go to soccer games, and they don't want to live in a community in which the community is concerned

that their votes are not gonna count, right? It's an abstraction to say someone else vote maybe doesn't count, but the communities judges lives in matter a lot. You know, culture, you know, we, I think it was Steve Bannon said, or Breitbart, he said that, you know, politics is downstream of culture. Well, that is true in the macro sense of politics.

It's also true in things like voting. So the most important thing people can do is honestly, is to share their views about the importance of voting and the importance in their communities to having free and fair elections. That will help win court cases. That will also help election deniers not do their work. Because fundamentally for voter suppression to work,

you need the collaboration and the coordination of a lot of people at the local level. So the more visible people are at the hyper local level in their towns, their counties, their election offices, the better because like that is ultimately more so than anything the Supreme Court's going to do. The thing that is going to make the biggest difference.

We've been speaking with Mark Elias, founder of democracy docket. Mark will of course have you back as we get closer to the 2026 election to dig in, uh, in more detail to exactly how, how this is all going. Always appreciate your time and your insights. Same here. And by the way, I, like I said, I'm a big fan of your time and your insights. Same here. And by the way, I like I said, I'm a big fan of your show. I hope everyone watches it. And your book was great, great read.

So I hope people go out and buy that. Appreciate it. Thank you so much. Thanks. So I learned a while ago that I was clenching and grinding my teeth at night, not on purpose, not because I was necessarily stressed out by something obvious, but grinding and clenching without even knowing it. teeth and Well, an absolutely furious Donald Trump exploded and cut off questions about Jeffrey Epstein when this came up during the completely fake staged cabinet meeting at the White House, a reporter attempted to ask questions about Jeffrey Epstein.

Why is it that the list everyone said existed? All of a sudden, supposedly doesn't exist anymore. Trump doesn't like it and he tries to end it. Sure. Your memo and release yesterday, Jeffrey Epstein, it left some lingering mysteries. One of the biggest ones is whether he ever worked for an American or foreign intelligence agency. The former labor secretary who was Miami U.S. Attorney Alex Costa, he allegedly said that he did work for an intelligence agency. So could

you resolve whether or not he did? And also, could you say why there was a minute missing from the jailhouse tape on, sure. I just said to him, are you still talking about Jeffrey Epstein? This guy's been talked about for years. You're asking. We have Texas. We have this. We have all of the things. And are people still talking about Trump's like, I've caused so many other problems for

you to talk about. And you're still talking about Epstein. This guy, this creep. That is unbelievable. Do you want to waste the time? And do you feel like answer? I don't mind answering. I mean, I can't believe you're asking a question on Epstein at a time like this where we're

having some of the greatest success and also tragedy with what happened in Texas. It just seems like a desecration. But you go ahead. I am wrecking the economy or trying to. I am decimating the federal workforce. I'm doing so much damage. And you want to talk about Jeffrey Epstein. Now, of course, that's not what Trump meant.

But Madge is going to love this exchange. Just wait till you see how Magas reacting to this. So listen, is there a cover up here? I genuinely don't know. Forget about what I believe or my asserting it by their standards. Any president who didn't release the Epstein files was covering it up. Trump is not releasing the Epstein files. They're claiming there's no list. They're saying, and eventually Trump does allow Pam Bondi sort of to give like a non-answer. And she defends the missing minute from the hallway video outside Epstein's jail cell when he took his own life. It's not super convincing. Sure. Sure. First to back up on that in February, I did an interview on Fox and it's been getting a lot of attention

because I said I was asked a question about the client list and my response was, was it's sitting on my desk to be reviewed, meaning the file along with the JFK MLK files as well. That's what I meant by that. Also to the tens of thousands of video, they turned out to be child porn downloaded by that disgusting Jeffrey Epstein. Child porn is what they were never going to be released, never going to see the light of day to him being an agent. I have no knowledge about that. We can get back to you on that. And the minute missing. That is that, by the way, folks, that is a shaky ass answer. If I've ever heard it from the video, we released the video showing definitively the video was

not conclusive, but the evidence prior to it was showing he committed suicide. And what was on that, there was a minute that was off the counter. And what we learned from Bureau of Prisons was every year, every night they redo that video is old from like 1999. So every night the video is reset and every night should have the same minute missing. So we're looking for that video to release that as well, showing that a minute is missing every night. I am not an Epstein conspiracy theorist. This answer just strikes me as someone who is using the most careful language possible to avoid saying something,

something I don't know what it is. But the important thing is, I'm not the one who was asserting the conspiracy. It's the MAGA people who were. And if that's what they were asserting by definition, Trump and Bondi are now in on the conspiracy. Now, the reason that people are talking about this at all related to Trump is Trump previously described Jeffrey Epstein as a friend who likes beautiful women, including very young women, was pictured hanging out with Jeffrey Epstein and sort of like observing and evaluating women who were dancing, rode on Epstein's plane.

And Trump has gone back and forth endlessly about the declassification of the Epstein files in what is an increasingly suspicious manner. So what I do have to acknowledge is I have always said you will never see those files under Trump. Period. Period. And that's what we're learning. And Magus turning on Trump.

The Magus fear is increasingly enraged with Donald Trump because he and Pam Bondi and Cash Patel and Dan Bongino are saying we're not going to release the Epstein. This or that the list doesn't exist. There's no relevant video, even though that's the opposite of what they were saying for years. Let's take a look. Here is Megyn Kelly. We're going to go through everybody

from MAGA who's turning on Trump. Here's Megyn Kelly. Very angry with Pam Bondi, kind of an attorney general would pretend she's giving new information to some of the president's most loyal to some of the president's most loyal advocates in the press, buying ink by the barrel. What, so either Pam Bonny knew she was about to embarrass some of his most loyal surrogates out there and did that willingly, or she didn't take the time to make sure what was in those binders.

She was too lazy to actually figure out none of this is new and, and yet she called a meeting with the influencers that included cash Patel, the head of the FBI and the sitting vice president. So she's either lazy and incompetent or she willingly humiliated some of the president's most loyal supporters. Now Megan Kelly's being careful not to go after Trump yet, but Pam Bondi is Trump's pick and she is going scorched earth on Pam Bondi. We then go to Patrick bet David. Remember, these are all serious Trump supporters. Megan Kelly showed up and I think she even spoke at a Trump rally.

Maybe she just went on stage and hugged Trump. But I think she did. I think she spoke. Patrick, bet David overt supporter of Trump. He says this is the worst thing that's gone on so far. You're talking about Epstein? Yeah, I think good to be back on with you, buddy. But this is what I will tell you. The number one trending hashtag right now on X is Epstein. Two million people have tweeted with the topic of Epstein. Number two is Nicki Minaj at 100,000. Comey's at 42,500.

There is a reason why people are asking about this. This is by far, and I'm a supporter, three times I voted for this man, this is by far the biggest fumble of the administration they've had thus far, and here's the reason why. If you remember pre the president winning He had a conversation with Fox News the great Rachel Campos Duffy and she asked mr. President 911 yes, John F Kennedy. Yes

Epstein ah, he didn't say yes. He was a little bit hesitant of bringing that information out Why right? So why does his leadership team go out there and like we have this information and we're going to release this and cash. And let me tell you what we have with Pam Bondi at a state of Florida. She knew everything about Bondi, about Epstein. Why are you fumbling this? Why are you not having an emergency meeting together to conversate and say, hey, we're going to be on the same page with messaging on this.

All right. So Patrick, that David thinks it's no good. We then go to Tim Pool, another overt Trump supporter voted for Trump. Tim Pool says Pam Bondi is obviously lying. The DOJ has released a two page memo stating that there is no Epstein client list and nothing uncovered would predicate criminal charges against any third parties. That is my friend. You are all wrong. The conspiracy theories were all wrong. and nothing uncovered would predicate criminal charges against any third parties. That is my friend, you are all wrong.

The conspiracy theories were all wrong. Jeffrey Epstein was simply a financier with a lot of rich friends who got arrested for trafficking and then killed himself. And there was no evidence about anything else. And he did everything by hand personally. Let me just cut through the BS. I am going to break this down. It's an obvious lie. I'm going to tell you why I think they're lying. And I think it's pretty obvious. But this is probably the most obvious lie of any lie

ever told. And one need only logic and facts to break this down. There you go. That's Tim Pool. Benny Johnson says, guys, hold on a second. This is they're obviously not telling us the truth here. This is absurd. And Bondi was talking about obscene cash was talking about obscene. But you know, talking about obscene, Elon Musk talking about obscene. Trump has been talking about obscene.

He started his presidential campaign in 2016 by blinking the Clintons to Epstein. What possible interest would the U.S. government have in keeping Epstein's clients a secret? Oh, if you're a journalist and you're not asking questions about this case, you should be ashamed of yourself. What purpose do you serve? I'm sure there's a middle-class teenager somewhere that you could be harassing right now, but try and do your job once in a while, says JD Vance about asking questions about Epstein. JD Vance, real tweet. Carolyn Levitt, same thing yesterday.

And just kind of like, you know, effectively saying, you know, there's really, there's nothing to see here. We have been transparent, but this is just not how the American people feel on this issue. And it's not how it's being communicated. Right? So like one of the, you know know the statement that Pam Bonney says I miss I misspoke right I meant to say there was a file on my desk not we have the Epstein actual client list on my desk but but even that is being called into question when you put

the when you put like the actual clubs back to back. Here we go. Tens of thousands of videos of Epstein with children or child porn. And there are hundreds of victims and no one victim will ever get released. It's just the volume and that's what they're going through. Also to the tens of thousands of video, they turned out to be child porn downloaded by that disgusting Jeffrey Epstein. That's not the same thing saying that there's all these victims

and then saying that these are just like, you know. All right. So Benny Johnson also doesn't believe it. And then finally, Alex Jones in tears now by coming in and being part of the cover up, the Trump administration has become part of it. I mean, you cannot see it any other way. So I'm going to I just got to the office. I'm going to go throw up, actually. And it's only happens every few years when something really, really bad happens or something. I mean, I'm physically going to going to puke probably right now.

My mouth is watering right now because I have integrity. Right. And you know I just really need the Trump administration to succeed and to save this country and they're doing so much good and then for them to do something like this And then for them to do something like this, terrors my guts out. And you know, the left, they're all complicit, they're openly promoting pedophilia, we know they're pure evil, and they'll think it's all funny. Oh, look, Alex is sad, the MAGA is tearing itself apart. Your globalist masters literally want you to eat bugs and live in a 5G, 200 square foot coffin apartment.

Look at the left. Look at them all. Supposing with their Pfizer shots looking like dead zombies. I mean, come on, you guys are sick. And so you shouldn't look at those of us that have a soul still and have integrity in paying over this and celebrate you. All right. Listen, the specifics matter less than the fact that this is not like one guy.

This is not, oh, all Republican senators are on board with Trump. But here's Rand Paul, who's like, I don't really like this. This is the totality of the audiences of these people. Maga people is significant. And so I don't know where this leads, but they are going to have to do better for their own. This is for the monster they created. They are going to have to do better for their own. This is for the monster they created. They're going to have to come up with something.

We've got a great bonus show for you today. By the way, Alex Jones hates the bonus show, the bonus show where you want to make money. Yeah, everybody else that makes money to fund themselves is bad. Not quite sobbing there, but close. We've got a phenomenal bonus show. Sign up at Join Pakman Dotcom. Gift a membership at Join Pakman dot com.