The David Pakman Show - 8/25/25: Trump police state grows as health concerns explode

Episode Date: August 25, 2025

-- On the Show: -- Donald Trump escalates his police state strategy by deploying armed soldiers to Democratic-led cities against the will of local leaders -- Ghislaine Maxwell undermines Trump’s exoneration effort by clearing everyone in Epstein’s orbit, making her denial sound rehearsed -- Trump’s bruised and swollen hands fuel speculation about hidden health issues as staff scramble with makeup cover-ups -- Trump awkwardly conceals his bruised right hand from cameras, deepening suspicion that his health problems are being hidden -- Doctors and observers warn of Trump’s possible cognitive and physical decline after visible bruises, weight gain, and unsteady gait -- Rising numbers of Americans, especially LGBTQ people, apply for asylum abroad as Trump’s policies make them feel unsafe at home -- JD Vance embarrasses himself by falsely claiming World War II ended in negotiations, showing ignorance of basic history -- Trump unleashes a late-night Truth Social tirade, escalating his public meltdown with unhinged posts -- Trump lashes out at Maryland Governor Wes Moore with threats of military deployment after Moore challenges him directly -- Ron DeSantis absurdly blames Joe Biden for the 2020 census even though it was run under Trump’s first administration -- Trump and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. reportedly plan to ban COVID vaccines nationwide, reversing Trump’s own “Warp Speed” legacy to appease anti-vaxxers -- On the Bonus Show: Hispanic voters turning on Trump, Cracker Barrel's new logo sparks MAGA outrage, Florida cities ordered to remove rainbow crosswalks, and much more... ✉️ StartMail: Get 50% OFF for a year subscription at https://startmail.com/pakman ⚠️ Ground News: Get 40% OFF their unlimited access Vantage plan at https://ground.news/pakman 🛡️ Incogni lets you control your personal data! Get 60% off their annual plan: http://incogni.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 to the show, everybody. I have to admit, I'm stunned to be in the position today of having to tell you the following about what's going on in the United States. We are seeing the deployment of the military, not just to one city, but we are now starting to move towards President. Donald Trump establishing a de facto police state nationally with the goal of deploying troops to numerous cities. If you thought that Donald Trump's authoritarian threats during the campaign were merely bluster,

or if you believe, no, he's for real, but it's not going to go any further than L.A. Well, then we got Washington, D.C. And if you then thought, okay, it was the LA test case and then Washington, D.C. because Trump's in D.C. and he just wants to deal with what he sees around him and not go any further, then you are also wrong. Because what is happening right now in Washington, D.C. is being planned for cities across the country. And it is straight out of the authoritarian police state playbook. That's where we are. Thousands of national government. troops and federal law enforcement officers are patrolling Washington, D.C. And we are now getting an escalation where guard units are openly carrying firearms.

We're talking rifles, handguns, holstered sidearms on city streets. We have an armed national guard patrolling city streets. Now when the Pentagon is asked about what's going on, they say, oh, no need to worry. These troops are operating under strict rules for use of force. They're only going to fire in response to imminent threats of death or serious bodily harm. But we know the bigger picture of how these things develop. And while that may be true at this particular moment in time, there's the question of how long will that remain true. Here, for example, is Janine Piro, former Fox News host, now a U.S. attorney, saying that Chicago as the next step is

uh, necessary because of the tyranny of being unable to walk around and go to dinner. Take a listen to this. What my response to that is, you know what tyranny is when you can't walk outside and go to dinner. Tyranny is when they shoot you and the person walks out of jail before you get out of the hospital. Tyranny is when people are not made accountable. And they should hope that the president comes in with this unified force and his joking

only nine arrests. I'll tell you what the good news is that this mayor can't figure out. The good news is that they're afraid to commit crimes. When you have an increased law enforcement, people in the community, especially the crime-ridden community, they're saying thank you. They're afraid to commit what my- What Janine Piro is arguing is that even though, even though all of Trump's troops and this entire deployment of federal law enforcement hasn't really found any criminals, her argument

is their mere presence has solved the crime problem, and therefore, this is very much working. But what about the tyranny they used to warn us about? What about the tyranny of a police state? What about the tyranny of deploying federal troops to do domestic law enforcement, which, by the way, happens to be illegal violating the Posse Comitatis Act? So the reality here is that we have armed soldiers patrolling the capital against the will of local leaders. So this is something we typically think about in, you know, war zones, situations of occupation,

not the United States. And it's not stopping because the Pentagon has been planning a military deployment to Chicago and it appears that that is going to be next. It won't just be the National Guard. It's potentially going to include active duty military as well. We could be days or weeks away from that. thousands of guard members sent to patrol additional city streets. New York is on Donald Trump's own publicly stated list. He's floated Baltimore after getting into a spat with Maryland

governor, Wes Moore, which by the way, we're going to get to that a little bit later. Wes Moore said to Trump, come see the city yourself. Trump's response was, well, maybe I'll send in troops. Chicago mayor Brandon Johnson says the city has reduced homicides by 30% in the last year, robbery is down, shootings are down without a single soldier on the street. And yet Donald Trump wants to use Chicago and apparently New York as political props. That's what they are, Baltimore as well. And he says, these are the targets. We're going to go after the crime. We're going to go after the homelessness. We're going to go after immigration. And we've now heard from Illinois governor J.B. Pritzker, who says this is an attempt to manufacture a crisis and to

abuse power, which, of course it is. And to be clear, These are all democratically run cities. Many of them have black mayors. Many have majority, minority populations. So we also have to consider and just acknowledge that there's an element here that is not really about crime. It's more about profiling. It's more about the idea of the sorts of people that we believe need to be policed by federal

law enforcement and by the National Guard. In case and point, you look at D.C. you aren't actually seeing the deployments to the areas with statistically higher crime. You're seeing the deployments to the areas that are more sort of cosmopolitan and conspicuous because it is all a show at the end of the day. So we've seen different versions of this. We've seen Republican elected officials sort of try to reframe urban America as an enemy territory that needs to be subdued. That's been something that Republicans for a long time

has sort of worked with. And that's a version of what we're seeing here. It's the American carnage rhetoric that is extraordinarily racially tinged. We saw it in Trump's first inauguration, and now he's enforcing it with troops on the street. So the imagery is deliberate. It's not an accident. The armed troops stationed in, you know, the public squares and detaining protesters and all of it. And the point here really is not to fight crime. The point is to show the feds will dominate you. It's a reminder to the political opponents. Trump's reach will extend right into your city, whether you want them there or not. If you can override local governments in D.C., Baltimore, Chicago, and New York, then where would it stop? And so the question we now find

ourselves asking isn't, are these deployments constitutional? The legal. Challenges are being prepared. That's something that is going to be sorted out by courts. The question is do Americans understand what this means for the balance of power in this country for checks and balances because this is a test run for something far bigger. They want to normalize a military presence armed troops in U.S. cities under presidential control. Remember when Steve Bannon talked about Trump's going to send shock troops. doing it. They're doing it. And so I want to hear from the people who said, oh, you know, I know it sounds like Trump's this horrible authoritarian, but it's a lot of bluster. And he really wouldn't be that different from Kamala Harris. And speaking of which, as a reminder, remember when Kamala Harris said this at her final campaign rally? And so many people said, oh, she's being hyperbolic. Donald Trump intends to use the United States. state's military against American citizens who simply disagree with him.

She was ridiculed for it by many. Even some on the left said, oh, she's being so hyperbolic. It's like the Hillary thing. Turned out Hillary not getting those three Supreme Court picks was a pretty damn big deal, wasn't it? So this is where we find ourselves. And the question now is how are the American people going to respond? Jelaine Maxwell gave an interview that is a disaster for Donald Trump.

I'm going to explain it. This was supposed to be a big win for Donald Trump. The interview of Jelaine Maxwell was going to be the moment where she clears his name and says Trump didn't do anything wrong. There's no concerns with Trump and Deppstein, but it is turned into a train wreck that makes you wonder why they even tried this. So we really have to understand the goal of this interview with Maxwell and what came out of it. The point of interviewing Jelaine Maxwell was to get her to say, I never saw Trump do anything wrong.

And she said that. But then she said something else. She said, I never saw anyone do anything wrong with regard to the entire Jeffrey Epstein sex trafficking criminality. That is not the slam dunk that they believe it is. It's the legal equivalent of nothing to see here as you see a five alarm fire in the background. Now, Asha Rangappa explains this. She put out a post on blue sky. Some know it is bluesky, but that's a little bit aggressive, if you ask me.

On blue sky, Asha Rangappa said, quote, it's clear that the main goal of the Maxwell interview was to get her to say that she didn't see Trump do anything wrong, which can only mean that there was something in the files that suggests that he did. Why else would she need to say that? The interview is more incriminating, not less. But then she really undermines her exoneration of Donald Trump by exonerating everybody. She ended up saying she never saw Trump do anything inappropriate, but she didn't see anybody do anything inappropriate. So with regard to Trump, she said, quote, I actually not. never saw the president in any type of massage setting. I never witnessed the president in any

inappropriate setting in any way. The president was never inappropriate with anybody in the times that I was with him. He was a gentleman in all respects. She went in and she did her piece. She is trying to earn her pardon or clemency or the commutation of her sentence. She's doing what Trump would want her to do, except, except, there's another element of our conversation with Todd Blanche, the deputy AG, who is formerly Trump's personal lawyer, where she said, I never, ever saw any man doing something inappropriate with a woman of any age. I never saw inappropriate habits. So by saying she has never seen anyone do anything wrong, the message really is she has no clue

one way or the other because we know that this was a sex trafficking operation that involved underage girls. We know that that was taking place. And so the fact that Jelaine Maxwell says she never saw anybody doing inappropriate, doing anything inappropriate, just tells us that she doesn't know one way or the other, or at least she's claiming not to. Therefore, her exoneration of Trump is worth no more than her exoneration of everybody, and we obviously know that there was wrongdoing. So think about the message.

If there's nothing in the Epstein files that touches Trump, why go fishing for Jelaine Maxwell's exoneration in the first place and certainly why now? The only logical reason is try to get Jelaine Maxwell to say that Trump didn't do anything because there is stuff in the files that. that makes them nervous. But then she goes too far. She overcorrects. She clears Trump. She clears Prince Andrew. She clear.

She clears everybody in one breath. She says, I never saw abuse. There's no client list. There's no blackmail. There's no nothing. That's not credible. That's completely and totally rehearsed. And of course, the victims family see right through it.

Virginia Jufre's family says they're trying to rewrite history. This is insulting to all of the victims. This is insulting, given the fact that Maxwell herself was the orchestrator of this entire thing, she set up victims for Epstein and his cronies to go and then exploit. And so she sat in court, she was convicted, she was sentenced, and now she wants you to believe nobody did anything wrong. The entire thing is just a sham. And so the problem for Trump is that when the star witness in your exoneration says nobody

did anything wrong, it no longer sounds like she's defending you specifically. It starts feeling like she's defending herself. And it does nothing to dissuade me from thinking that there's incriminating stuff about Trump in the Epstein file. So an exoneration gone wrong, but she's doing her part. And I would not be surprised to hear that she's getting a pardon or that she's getting her sentence commuted. By the way, the Epstein stuff, getting a lot less attention than it deserves lately because of everything else going on with Trump, the health crisis, which we're going to talk about, the deployment of federal troops, the federalization of the D.C. police. The attention has really come off of the Epstein story, even though it shouldn't. And so this is part of what

they're clearly trying to do to set her up to say Trump did nothing wrong. She gets out of prison. Shake hands. Everybody have fun. We're going to have more about this, these machinations on our substack, which you can find at substack. David Pakman.com. You know, I'll often talk to my friends about what do we really think is private on our computers and on our phones. And many people believe that their emails are genuinely private. And it turns out that a lot of the email services are looking at your emails and can

look at your emails even after you have deleted them, which is why. I recommend our sponsor, StartMail, a trusted name in secure email for more than a decade. StartMail is based in the Netherlands. Netherlands is known for very strong data protection laws. Your emails won't be scanned. Your emails won't be tracked. StartMail will block those invasive tracking pixels so you won't be monitored by companies and by hackers.

And when you delete an email and start mail, it is gone for good. data stays private. They are all in on this with a ton of features including aliases to keep you anonymous, strong encryption with your emails. It is super easy to move to StartMail. It's a few clicks, migrate your emails, migrate your contacts. You really can't go wrong. Try StartMail for yourself completely free for seven days at StartMail.com slash Pacman, which will also give you 50% off your first year, the link is in the description. If you were not already convinced that Donald Trump and the White House are covering up something about his health, the last 48 to 72 hours will convince you.

Let's talk about what is going on. There is health panic exploding over Donald Trump. What was once bruises on one hand is now bruises on both hands, making that. handshaking explanation completely implausible zoomed in video of Donald Trump's eyes shows them extraordinarily swollen almost completely shut red and tearing up speculation is running rampant what is the truth I don't pretend to know because this is a white house that lied during Trump's first term about what was going on with his health and waited until it was impossible to say nothing this term and then put out a statement about his health that you

Yes, he does have some conditions, but even what they acknowledged has already been debunked, it's got to be more because of the evidence available in public. So let's start at the beginning. Donald Trump's hands are bruised, swollen, and discolored. And instead of addressing it, they are slapping on more and more makeup that is nowhere near his actual skin tone. It's like they tried to cover it up but made it worse. They have this new insanely clashing makeup color covering up Trump's right hand.

I don't know who in their right mind said, let's put this color makeup on his hand, completely contrasting, thinking that this is good enough. It doesn't make any sense. It's also weird because as president and as a billionaire, as either president or billionaire, you'd think you would have access to the absolute best products, technology, and people to really cover this up in a way that it would be noticeable, which is obviously what they're trying to do, and it doesn't look right. Now, I want to remind you, Caroline Levitt months ago told us the reason Trump's right hand is bruised, remember, in the West, in the United States, people shake with their

right hand. If you have a problem with your right hand, you might use your left, but people shake hands with their right hand. Caroline Levitt gave us the following explanation just a few weeks ago. Another note, I know that many in the media have been speculating about bruising on the president's hand and also swelling in the president's legs. So in the effort of transparency, the president wanted me to share a note from his physician with all. Here is Caroline being transparent with us. In recent weeks, President Trump noted mild swelling in his lower legs. In keeping with routine medical care and out of an abundance of caution, this concern was thoroughly evaluated by the White House medical unit. The president underwent a comprehensive examination, including diagnostic vascular studies.

Bilateral lower extremity venous dupler ultrasounds were performed and revealed chronic venous insufficiency, a benign and common condition. A v9 condition. Particularly in individuals over the age of 70. Importantly, there was no evidence of deep vein thrombosis or arterial disease. Laboratory testing included a complete blood count, comprehensive metabolic panel, coagulation profile, D-Dimer, B-type, natriotic, peptide, and cardiac biomarkers. All results were within normal limits. An echocardiogram was also performed and confirmed normal cardiac structure and function. No signs of heart failure, renal impairment, or systemic illness were identified.

Additionally, recent photos of the president have shown minor bruising on the back of his hand. This is consistent with minor soft tissue irritation from frequent handshaking and the use of aspirin, which is taken as part of a standard cardiovascular prevention regimen. There you go. Trump's bruising on the hand, by the way, Trump's doctor who told us that he's six foot three and weighs 239 gave us this information. And so 30,000 foot, it was like, come on, come on. But we were told it's the hands shaking.

People shake hands with their right hand. Trump on, I've never seen Trump in a video shake hands with his left hand. That's why his right hand is bruised. Except, and I think you know where this is going. Over the weekend, Donald Trump was golfing with former baseball pitcher Roger Clemens. And in a video that Roger Clemens' son posted to Instagram, you see that, uh-oh, Trump's left hand is visible and it has the same purple bruising and the same swelling. Remember, the bruising was purple before they started putting makeup on it.

This is not a mirrored video. You see the Trump logo on his hat is facing the right way. This is Donald Trump's left hand. You see that the steering wheel on the golf cart is on the left side. This is not a mirrored image. So now, even though it's handshaking that explains Trump's right hand bruising, the left hand is bruised. And so what is the explanation this time?

If it's handshake bruising and nothing to see here, why is the left hand bruised? And the questions are only going to become increasingly frequent. Now, there is all sorts of speculation. Now that you're seeing bruising on both hands, you look online, people are saying, oh, it's dialysis. Trump needs dialysis. It's undisclosed. That's completely speculative. We have no evidence to suggest that that's the case.

We also have no transparency about Donald Trump's health. But what is abundantly clear is that they aren't being forthcoming. They aren't being forthcoming about what's going on and they never have been. goes all the way back to Donald Trump's letter from Harold Bornstein, his old doctor, when Trump was first running, would be the healthiest president ever to be president of the United States. How could a doctor make such an assessment, especially having not examined other presidents? Really strange claim to make. Looks like it goes a little too far. When Donald Trump had COVID during his first term, they did everything possible to cover up the true nature of the

seriousness. We were told he's going to Walter Reed by hospital by a helicopter because it's the president it's an abundance of caution. That's all it is. Except we later found out Trump was being told you're deteriorating so quickly. If you don't go now, you may not be able to get there under your own power. And if we have to take you there on a stretcher, the media will know and it will be much worse. So that was part of the medical cover up. A few days after Trump was in the hospital, his doctor was asked, did Trump receive oxygen? And the doctor said, Trump is not on oxygen. The question was, did he at any point receive oxygen? They said, we're not going to go backwards. He's recovering. He's not on oxygen. Another attempt to cover up and not give

us the whole truth. So we are left to speculate. And unfortunately, it's getting much, much worse. And Trump knows it. That's what I want to talk about next. Donald Trump's latest health mystery has gone from bad bruise to full blown makeup cover up. And now Trump is hiding his own hand from cameras. We now know that Trump's left hand is also bruised. But at the point at which the focus was Trump's right hand, yesterday in the Oval Office, Trump did everything he could to cover. Actually, this was two days ago, to cover up his right hand. I'm going to play a video for you here. And I know some people are going to be listening, not watching. I encourage you to find the video on my YouTube channel or on my website, but I'm going to

describe what's going on. As Donald Trump talks, you will see that he very notably uses his left hand to cover the right hand. And then when he gesticulates with his hands, he holds his right hand up in a way that the back of the hand is not visible to the camera. He sort of goes palm forward the way I'm doing right now. Check this out. This. is deliberate he knows exactly what he is doing here your project to make it uh it'll be great it'll be fantastic you see the way this is looking look nice i can't tell you how much that gold cost a lot of money is nothing like gold and there's nothing like solid gold this is very unnatural for trump he's deliberately not using his right hand to gesticulate and holding it at an

angle where the camera cannot see it with this and then immediately as he brings his back at his hands back to center, he immediately puts his left hand over it. Go find other video of Trump. This is not the way he ever moves his hands. Beautiful office needed it. It had to be representative. When we took it over, it was dirty, not clean. I immediately changed the chair and had the, this beautiful desk renovated, brought out by

the White House people that do this, they did a great job. You get the point. He keeps the hand there and keeps it covered with his left hand. This is a president who we just have to acknowledge has gone to war with the media over crowd sizes who obsesses over lighting for TV appearances. Optics really matter to this guy. And now it's the optics of a single hand. And you have to ask, if the bruise is really nothing, why do you have to hide it?

Why not let the press photograph it? Why put bizarre, thick makeup of a different skin tone on it? Why go out of your way to a cult of view of the top of your hand from cameras? That makes it all more suspicious. If it's a bad makeup job or a sign of something bigger or whatever, it's clear that Trump does not want video of his right hand. And thanks to this extraordinarily awkward cover up, this is only bringing more attention onto this. And now I want to zoom out and give you the big picture on this. And then I promise

we're going to move on. A lack of being forthcoming about a president's health is a major story. I also don't want to pretend that it's the only story. So I wanted to say a few more things about it. And then we're going to move on. The big picture right now of Donald Trump's health is sort of three parts. Number one, a growing number of signs and symptoms that are as yet unexplained and certainly concerning. Number two, it's the continued lack of transparency from the White House about Donald Trump's health, even as he and they insist that he is in completely and totally perfect health. And then number three, number three, there's a JD Vance element to this that we're going

to get to a little bit later, which is that there is growing speculation that Vance and his team know something is up. And they see this as it's so morbid, potentially as an opportunity to accelerate J.D.'s ascension to the throne. This is tough stuff. This is very morbid stuff. We're going to get to it a little bit later. A video has gone viral to start with of Donald Trump's eyes extraordinarily swollen, pink and teary. You will see text on screen that speculates that Trump has been medicated. We do not have any proof of that. But the speculation is happening because of the lack of transparency.

This is just a short clip. We've seen this before. Trump's eyes as swollen as ever. They're red. It's hard to say that he looks anything but sick. Last week, the Pentagon paused some shipments of weapons to Ukraine. Did you approve of that pause? We wanted to put defensive weapons because Putin is not treating human beings, right?

It's killing too many people. So we're sending some defensive weapons. So Trump's eyes are all glassy. They're red. They're almost completely swollen shut. We then have Trump unable to walk in a straight line just last week. This is video that has gone mega viral and you see Trump walking to greet Putin. And he is carving an extraordinarily strange path meandering left to right on this self-serving

red carpet that he laid out, raising more concerns. We now have the additional concerns of Donald Trump's hands. It was just the right hand, but now we see also that it is the left hand as well. So here's what a doctor wrote to me, a number of doctors in the show's audience. Interestingly, a number of cardiologists and neurologists, and I heard from a bunch of them over the weekend who wrote to me. This is, again, speculation from doctors who have not personally examine Trump. All we have are the videos of Trump and the statements from the White House to evaluate that. Physical health concerns. Visible hand bruising can be linked to blood thinners, corticosteroids, diabetes, liver or kidney disease. We don't know what's going on because they

won't tell us. This is just a doctor saying this is what it could be. Trump is obese. He has a terrible diet. He has a sedentary lifestyle. He is carrying a significant amount of extra weight. This puts you at extra risk of diabetes. This puts you at extra risk of fatty liver disease. His gait has been observed as unsteady for a long time. Trump often drags one leg when walking. He was unable to walk in a straight line during the meeting with Putin. And he seems to have an increasingly sort of limited affect during recent public appearances. Trump is at high risk for stroke or heart attack, and that is what is all sort of under the potential of the physical health side of it.

You then have the cognitive stuff. We have seen significant declines in Donald Trump's diversity of vocabulary, the blunted affect, agitation, impaired memory, poor concentration, disinhibition, in appropriate comments, sometimes up all night posting to the internet, and frequently not recognizing people he knows who are sitting right across from him, looking around, where are they, where are they? That is the list of concerning symptoms when it comes to cognitive. You then have the sort of broader personal context here where we have a lack of transparency

in this particular White House. We have a lack of forthrightness from Caroline Levitt and others. How is this different from the people who are saying, oh, Hillary Clinton has Parkinson's? The differences are, number one, Donald Trump has already been caught numerous times, either exaggerating the degree of his great health or covering up health problems. COVID during his first term is a great example. The White House pushed to say something this time around because it became so clear. that an explanation is warranted, given the concerning signs and symptoms. They give explanations,

but those are often invalidated quickly. It's his right hand that's bruised from shaking hands. Well, now his left hand is bruised. Trump doesn't shake hands with his left hand. Nobody does in the United States. So the limited explanations they give are invalidated by subsequent information. That's what we know. We will leave the speculation to people who want to do. it, it would be nice at some point to get the transparency that they promised. What do you believe is going on? Write to me info at david packman.com or leave me a comment on my substack, substack dot david packman.

. Donald Trump has already packed his second term cabinet with loyalists. He's threatened deportation as political punishment. He's expanded executive authority in ways we have not seen in modern history. These are real changes that are happening right now. And what's even more alarming is that a lot of the media is either glossing over the worst of it or they're reframing it so it all sounds a little more palatable. And that is why I use ground news.

This is a news comparison tool. Doesn't just feed you headlines. It shows you here's how different outlets left, right center, are covering the same story. And this is one of the few tools I know of that can really help you detect the political spin, the bias catch stories that your usual sources might downplay or not cover at all on everything from immigration policy to economic shifts. If you want to get a bigger picture, a broader picture of what's being reported, ground news is an invaluable source to keep you informed.

And ground news is offering my audience 40% off their top tier vantage plan. You'll only pay five bucks a month. Go to ground dot news slash packman or enter the code packman. in the app to get started. The link is in the description. A growing number of desperate Americans are applying for refugee status in Canada and in other countries to escape Donald Trump, to get away from the growing police state, to escape the authoritarianism.

This is what a world. Did any of us imagine it would be this bad 10 years ago when he came down the golden escalator, literally and proverbially. You know how Donald Trump never shuts up about the flood of asylum seekers coming to the United States, how they're a threat to the country and they're taking advantage of us and it's an invasion? You know all of that nonsense. We've talked about it a lot.

Here's something that maybe you did expect. Maybe you didn't. Americans are now the ones filing refugee claims to get out of the United States. We have new Canadian immigration data from the first six months of 2025 More Americans applied for refugee status in Canada than in all of 24 these are the highest numbers since 2019 now it's still a small share of the total claims But the trend here is unmistakable lawyers are saying a big part of it is trans Americans who simply don't feel safe in the United States, and I understand why.

Donald Trump and the Supreme Court have rolled back trans rights. They've banned gender-affirming care. They've kicked people out of the military. They're policing bathrooms. They're trying to decide who gets to play in certain sports. So life is being made so difficult that it's such a hostile administration to trans people and to other Americans that many are saying, I'm going to go to another country And I'm going to say I need to be allowed in because the United States isn't safe for me and this is where the irony just smacks you in the face because Donald Trump paints the United States as the final stop.

This is where people want to come to. You might go from one country to another to another, but ultimately people want to get here and Donald Trump has talked about the paths, right? He says, oh, well, terrorists go to Latin America and then they come over the U.S.-Mexico border or people. People from Africa go to Europe and then from Europe, they try to seek asylum here. All these paths, everybody's desperate to come to the United States. But under Trump, we're seeing something at a greater degree than we've ever seen it before, which is that Americans are standing at the borders of other countries and saying, I need asylum.

I need refugee status. Now, Canada's one place where this is going on, but it's not the only place. We talked previously about Ireland, seeing a major spike in American asylum claim. our friend Rosie O'Donnell has left the United States and has moved to Ireland. We've seen a lot more of this since Donald Trump's political comeback. We have seen, by the way, most people get denied, but Irish citizenship applications from Americans doubling since 2022. There's Spain where Americans bought 57% more property there than the year before.

It's the fastest growing group of foreign buyers, Americans. The Daily Beast spoke to people saying they're leaving because of the Trump nightmare. And I've said before, I have a plan. I am prepared to leave the United States should it be necessary. This isn't about taxes. This isn't about becoming a passport bro or anything like that. It's simply, what are the backup plans? And as many of you know, I have Argentinian citizenship.

I was born there. I could go there if that became necessary or I felt that it was the right thing. I could go through the process of obtaining Israeli citizenship, something that I don't have. And then there are these opportunities in Europe where if you buy property, you can get permanent residency. There are other programs where you can get citizenship. I'm not even thinking about that. But at least I know that there are European countries. Spain is one of them where a property purchase would put me on.

the path to residency, legal residency. And so this is not a fringe thing. This is not something I ever thought that I would be considering. Polling finds, according to Harris, 40% of Americans have considered moving abroad. 14% are seriously thinking about it. 63% of Gen Z is thinking about it. 61% of LGBTQ Americans are thinking about it. This is millions and millions of people.

And as is often the case, you know, the ultra rich are thinking about it as well. The wealthiest Americans, New Zealand has become a popular one. But they're also looking at some of these abilities to purchase citizenship. There's a number of Caribbean options. Some have been looking at Turkey and a number of other countries. So sit with that for a second. came in saying, I'm going to stop people from coming here. The United States is full.

These immigrants are making the United States unsafe. But what we're seeing under Trump is a record number of citizens saying, I'm looking to leave. I'm not safe in the United States. I'm thinking of getting out. So there's a hypocrisy element to it. There's a credibility element to it. If you can't even keep your own people from trying to leave, maybe you're not really running the safe, prosperous country you claim to be running.

And this is a classic of authoritarian regimes. You look at 20th century authoritarian strongmen. They insisted we are the envy of the world. Everybody wants to come here. And meanwhile, their citizens were actually desperate to leave. You know, the former Soviet Union is an example. East Germany is an example. North Korea is an example.

There's so many examples where the dear leader always insists, this is the beacon. This is the absolute best place. Everybody's trying to come here. And meanwhile, they have armed people at their borders so that individuals don't leave. We've seen it in the 20th century. We've seen it in the 21st in authoritarian regimes as well. And now it's happening right here in the United States. Is there any vice president in modern history less informed about American history than J.D. Vance?

It seems like every time he opens his mouth on a big topic, he's confused or disoriented. He's like the freshman who skipped the lectures and skimmed a wiki article or something like that. Yesterday, J.D. was interviewed on NBC News by Kristen Welker. And she asked him about Ukraine. And in the middle of his answer, Vance decides to give the audience a history lesson. The very humble and not at all condescending J.D. Vance says, I'm going to give the audience a history lesson. Unfortunately, it was the kind of history lesson that makes actual historians pound their heads

on their desk or maybe their microphone. said about the Ukraine-Russia war, if you go back to World War II and other conflicts, they end up being settled by negotiation. The only problem is that has nothing to do with what happened in World War II. I want to get to security guarantees, but very quickly, if Russia is allowed to keep any of the territory that it illegally seized, what message does that send to China? Does it give China a green light to invade Taiwan? Does it give Russia a green light to invade other European countries, which is what your European allies are concerned about? Well, first of all, the Ukrainians are going to ultimately make the determination about where

you draw the territorial lines in their own country. But, Kristen, this is how wars ultimately get settled. If you go back to World War II, if you go back to World War I, if you go back to every major conflict in human history, they all end with some kind of negotiation. We're actually not active parties in the negotiation. We're effectively mediating. We're trying to mediate the Ukrainians and the Russians to come to some agreement. That is not how World War II ended. World War II ended with the surrender of Germany, not through negotiation. It simply didn't, Germany did not negotiate.

They fought until the bitter end. They fought even when they knew that the war was lost. There were, you know, post-war peace talks about terms and how will specific issues be handled. But the war did not end because of a negotiated settlement. And J.D. Vance has no idea what is going on. The allies didn't sit down with Hitler's team or, you know, Tojo's government in Japan and say, let's compromise. Let's figure out a compromise. They defeated them on the battlefield and forced them to surrender. And then later, after the fighting was over, they said, okay, now we're going to figure out some of the logistics. Who accepts what and how are we going to?

going to arrange this, that, the other thing. This is not an obscure detail. This is a core fact that Americans are taught about World War II. You don't have to be a history for a professor to know this. You just, you have to have paid attention, I guess, when you were 11 or something like that. Vance was not done embarrassing himself, by the way. Kristen Welker asked, were you furious when you learned that Russia targeted an American company in Ukraine? And J.D. basically goes, oh, you know, this is war. Just another one of these downplayings of Russia's belligerents. But was President Trump, were you enraged when you learned that Russia targeted an American company based in Ukraine? I don't like it. Kristen, I don't, I don't like it, Kristen, but this is a war

and this is why we want to stop the killing. The Russians have done a lot of things that we don't like. A lot of civilians have died. We've condemned that stuff from the get go. And frankly, President Trump has done more to apply pressure and to apply economic leverage to the Russians, certainly than Joe Biden did for three and a half years when he did nothing but talk, but do nothing to bring the killing to a stop. It's Biden's fault. Understand J.D's answer here. These people are just pathetic.

They are, they are feckless. The vice president downplays an attack on an American company by a hostile foreign power because his real anger is at Joe Biden. Because Biden didn't push some imaginary settlement to a one-sided war where Russia is trying to wipe Ukraine off the map. This is this sort of shallow isolationist playbook over and over. Pretend every war ends with a handshake, ignore historical reality, and make the conflict sound like it's a scheduling problem that Biden could have just snapped his fingers and fixed. even though Trump said I'll have it solved in 24 hours, which hasn't happened. And meanwhile, this is not like a random podcast ramp, right?

I mean, we have to contend with the reality that this is that arguably the second most powerful person in the country talking about global conflict with less accuracy than you find in the Reddit comments. And defense is this careless with history and is this sort of quick to defend Putin? and attack Joe Biden, imagine if he were to end up in charge of foreign policy decisions if Trump died, which, by the way, more and more people are concerned is going to happen before the end of Donald Trump's term. So that's JD, not the guy, I guess, who paid attention in history class.

Between the economic failures, the health concerns that he's failing to cover up, and the general incompetence, Donald Trump suffered another outrageous. overnight meltdown. I'm not going to go through every post. It would be physically painful for me and probably for you, but understand that things are going so poorly for this guy, Trump, that this is what he spent the last 15 hours doing. This went overnight. Trump attacked Chris Christie for his statements on a news show.

You think you've got thin skin? You ain't seen nothing until you've seen Donald Trump. you've seen Donald Trump respond in real time totally triggered by what former elected officials say about him on TV. Trump then ranted that he has the right to appoint whoever he wants, but that they're trying to take that right away from him. This relates to the power of Democratic senators using a blue slip, something Trump is furious about.

That is the law. Sometimes things are inconvenient for Donald Trump. By the way, these ads you're seeing, these are the sorts of ads that you see on Donald Trump's troth central. Donald Trump claims that he has the highest poll numbers ever, including that in the 70% range of the population, they approve of the job he is doing. This is a lie. Donald Trump saying that even though he's really, really popular, TV networks continue to run negative

stories about Trump and that they should have their licenses revoked, spoken like a true authoritarian. Trump continuing. Why is it ABC and NBC fake news aren't paying millions of dollars a year in license fees? They should lose their licenses for unfair coverage of Republicans. This is what triggered snowflake authoritarians do. Trump saying the mayor of D.C. is incompetent and that D.C. is now safe thanks to his militarization of it. Then there's an ad for timeshares, of course. Donald Trump says, I paid zero for Intel. It is worth approximately $11 billion. All goes to the USA. Trump just ranting and raving about things.

No one's, you know, it's like a real, sir, this is a Wendy's kind of moment. More ads for, I guess Vaseline. Donald Trump saying, what's going on in South Korea? Thank you for your attention to this matter. Endless, endless, endless, endless posts from Donald Trump. Do you feel better or worse that this is what Trump is up to? And I'm not asking that rhetorically. There's an argument that some have made that for every post Trump makes to troth central, he's not doing some policy thing that hurts the country. So there are people who write to me. and say, David, it's outrageous, appalling, humiliating, embarrassing, dilapidated, decrepit that Donald Trump is spending so much time posting this crap to social media.

But the more time he's on social media, much like the more time he's on the golf course, the less that he is actually governing. I struggle to go with that perspective for the following reason. Trump is getting reactions to the things he posts. And he's even in a sense doing policy by posting. So I don't see Trump's either doing policy or he's posting to truth social. The way I see it is the crap that Trump is posting often moves markets, impacts global relationships, or has real consequences.

So for me, it's not let him post more because that means he's not actually doing horrible policy things. He's do what's what's outrageous about Trump is he's doing horrible policy. policy things, ruining relationships, attacking and moving markets by the things that he posts. So I'll open it up to you. Would you rather Trump golf and post more because it means he's doing less in the Oval Office? Or is it all kind of one and the same at this point? Let me know.

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We'll get it taken down, even if the site's not in their database, whether it is whitepages.com, trellis.law, dnb, or anybody else quietly publishing your information, Incogni will wipe the footprint clean. You paste the link and they do the rest. If you're tired of being tracked, profiled, targeted, this is how you push back. For instance, these sites are where scammers and spammers can get your information to then target you. Using incogni can cut way down on the spam calls and the messages that you get, try it risk-free for 30 days and get 60% off an annual plan when you go to incogni.com slash Pacman. The link is in the description. I want to talk about Maryland Governor Westmore and a reminder that when Donald Trump is challenged by an actual alpha male, by his definition, Remember, these are not, I don't go around doing your alpha, your beta, your gamma, but

by their definitions, Trump can't handle it. Donald Trump was challenged by Trump, by Westmore. Listen, forget about deploying troops to Baltimore, come to Baltimore, and I will show you around. This set Trump for a loop, and he posted to truth social quote, Governor Westmore of Maryland, has asked in a rather nasty and provocative tone. By the way, I'm so sorry to interrupt myself already. They love to say the left is tone policing. We don't care about tone.

We care about facts. And now Trump is tone policing. He doesn't like Wes Moore's tone. Okay. Governor Westmore of Maryland has asked in a rather nasty and provocative tone that I walk the streets of Maryland with him. I assume he is talking about out of control crime ridden Baltimore. As president, I would much prefer that he clean up this crime disaster before I go there for

a walk. Westmore's record on crime is a very bad one, unless he fudges his figures on crime like many of the other blue states are doing. But if Westmore needs help, like Gavin New Scum did in L.A., I will send in the troops, which is being done in nearby D.C., and quickly clean up the crime. After only one week, there is no crime and no murder in D.C. When it is like that, it is like that in Baltimore, I will proudly walk the streets with the failing because crime, because of crime, governor of Maryland, P.S. Baltimore is ranked the fourth worst city in the nation in crime

and murder. Stop talking and get to work, Wes. I'll then see you on the streets. Also, I gave Wes Moore a lot of money to fix his demolished bridge. I will now have to rethink that decision. Thank you for your attention to this matter. Make America great again. President Donald J. Trump. We've got to talk about this bridge thing. Two parts to this. Number one, as usual, Trump conditioning aid based on political loyalty. I don't like Westmore's tone so I might cancel the money for the bridge. That's disgusting. But there's another aspect of this. And I know some of you know it because you emailed me about it. Biden and Congress fix that bridge. Trump had nothing to do with it. So it is yet another completely performative lie. And then Donald Trump,

who remember, Donald Trump supports the troops. Donald Trump defends the troops. No one is a greater respecter of the military and service members of all branches than Donald Trump. And he posts the truth social. Did Wes Moore, the governor of Maryland, lie about getting a bronze star? Disguise, It's truly the worst of the worst. And as far as Westmore is concerned, you know, when I interviewed California Governor Gavin Newsom last week, one of the names he brought up is this is, we have a great bullpen right now. And one of the people he brought up is Westmore.

A couple months ago, I had the opportunity to hear Westmore give a speech at an event, a relatively small event. And he is extraordinarily impressive, extraordinarily impressive. president. As I've said before, I am not thinking about 2028 primary in the sense of who do I like, who am I supporting. We have a ton of great candidates. I believe Gavin Newsome has shown a willingness to fight. That's phenomenal. Wes Moore is excellent. And for people in my audience who may not be super familiar with him, check him out and check out some of the interviews he did over the weekend. Ron DeSantis, the governor of Florida, is rewriting his history.

and not in a subtle way, there's a new clip in which he says, hey, Florida was short-changed in the last census, and he blames it on the Biden administration. The problem is the last census did happen when Donald Trump was president. These people seem to be unable to keep it straight. Trump's been bending over backwards now to get back in Donald Trump's good graces. The whole context of what DeSantis said is that he thinks Florida needs to get more seats. They are terrified about what might happen in 2026, but here's DeSantis seemingly confused about who was president when.

Congressional map, Florida has been growing, it's been growing a lot since I've been governor being before that it was adding population, not at the same rate, and we got short changed in the last census. We should have had two or three seats. We only got one seat, and that was really the Biden administration's doing. So we are working with the attorney general in Florida, James Uthmire, to, what? talk to the Commerce Department. He's written a letter. Even Biden's administration a couple years after acknowledged Florida got short change. Let's unpack this. First of all, what's the

motivation? The whole reason that DeSantis is bringing this up now is he wants to justify squeezing another congressional seat for Florida. That would mean redrawing the map. The real game here is not to fix some imaginary Biden-era census problem. The only goal is get Republicans more seats because the 2026 midterms could be a disaster. They might not be. I mean, Republicans might hold the House and Senate, but it could be a disaster for Republicans. The fear is palpable. They are terrified about the fact that if they lose the House in 26, that is it for Trump's agenda. Trump has no elections to run, but it will imperil every single Republican's opportunity to get reelected in 2028. They know their bleeding support. They know the Republican brand is

in a free fall. They know a bad midterm flips the house and then Trump gets nothing done for years. So they now want to go back. They're going back and distorting facts. They're pretending that the census that Trump ran is somehow Joe Biden's fault. But the 2020 census was conducted under Trump's Commerce Department. The director of the census was selected by Trump. Now, we had pandemic chaos. There was this compressed counting period. There were lawsuits over, oh, what about excluding undocumented immigrants or the, it was all under Donald Trump.

Biden was not in office. If you admit that, you can't point the finger at Democrats. And so what DeSantis is doing is he's just swapping the names and he's going, this is Biden's fault. The problem is we're noticed. It makes them look desperate. It makes them look dishonest. It makes them look willing to throw reality under the bus if it means, hey, I can get one more gerrymandered seat. Now, what's wild is that Donald Trump had as one of his most vocal supporters during the chaos of the census, Ron DeSantis. Ron DeSantis and Republicans were saying the census is fair. It's accurate because their guy was in charge. We were worried that Trump was using the pandemic. to hamper an accurate census in order to help Republicans. DeSantis and his cronies at the time said, it's great, it's all going fine. There's no need to worry.

Now they sense the possible political disadvantage. And now they're saying it was the corrupt Biden organization. So they're reversing their own talking points from 2020. Now, one final thing on this, it's worth noting that you don't just ask for another seat and get one. Apportionment is a process. You get population counts. The population counts get certified by the Census Bureau.

The law doesn't give governors the power to just go back and change numbers because they didn't like the outcome. And so DeSantis at his core is selling a fantasy that does not reflect how the system works. And my suspicion here is that this is about more than 2026. This is also DeSantis wanting to be the Republican party post Trump. And so when he blames Biden for Trump census. He's avoiding criticizing Trump directly. He stirs up anti-democrat outrage.

And he's kind of testing, will Republicans buy a different version of history that might help me in the future? That's what's going on. They want to ban the COVID vaccine. Donald Trump and his anti-vax health secretary, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., are planning to ban the COVID vaccine within months, according to new reporting. This is not just speculation from the corners of the internet. This comes from one of our FK's closest advisors, Dr. Assim Malotra, who's a British cardiologist,

who's really made a career out of pushing claims that go against the science. According to Malotra, the plan is let's pull MRNA shots off the market entirely. We will claim they need further research. He says it's going to cause chaos. It's going to cause legal battles. It's going to cause a health crisis. But they are going to do it anyway based on the reporting. Why are they going to do this?

They have cherry-picked a widely criticized study that ignores the evidence that COVID vaccines have saved a lot of people. They reduce the risk of death from COVID. They reduce the risk of severe illness. They do not prevent transmission. We hoped that they did. That first version of the vaccine up against the first variant of COVID did seem to prevent transmission.

Subsequent vaccines do not seem to prevent transmission. but they prevent people from getting sicker. They prevent people from dying. Now, the part they won't tell you is that no credible medical organization, excuse me, says the vaccines are more dangerous than COVID. We know that no vaccine has perfect efficacy, but they've been proven safe for the overwhelming majority of people. Side effects are rare. They're typically mild. And we know that COVID can cause a lot of problems. Now, the whiplash is that Trump used to want credit for the vaccines. Remember when Trump said, I did Operation Warp Speed. Thank me for the vaccines. Get down on your knees and pray at my altar. He bragged about it as one of his signature achievements.

But what happened then? The MAGA base turned on the vaccines. When Trump would say at rallies, I got you the shots, he would get booed. And suddenly the father of the vaccines stopped talking about it. And now he's standing by as RFK Jr. is reportedly trying to ban them. The vaccines Trump used to brag about. So he's pandering. It's just total capture by the MAGA base. He threw his own accomplishment into the toilet because his own base turned on him. And it's not even really consistent with conservative ideology to ban the vaccine. The free market approach here would be. If a product exists, the government shouldn't ban it. It should be up to individuals to decide, do I want to buy this thing or not? If you don't want the vaccine, don't get the

vaccine. But banning it so no one can get it, once again goes against their own stated principles. So this is government overreach on steroids. It's not freedom. Freedom would be, I'm free to get this vaccine or not. Banning it would mean the government is taking away my freedom. There is no I know a lot of people are sort of thinking, is there a blue state work around here? It's still early days in this, but from what I'm reading, if a medication can be imported or compounded, blue states could just keep getting it from elsewhere. But my understanding is that MRNA vaccines require specialized production and ultra-cold storage and distribution is tightly regulated.

From what I'm reading, a federal ban would be. absolute. And then you would have to travel abroad to get the vaccine, which is not something most Americans can afford to do on a whim. So it's complete and total hypocrisy. While they complain about government overreach, now reportedly they plan to ban the COVID vaccine. They claim to be about letting the free market decide, but it sounds like they are deciding. And I can't say I'm completely shocked. We've got a great bonus show for you today. Hispanic voters are increasingly turning against Republicans after going in their direction in 2024. We'll talk about the cracker barrel fiasco and we will talk about Florida cities ordered to remove

Rainbow Crosswalks in the latest battle in the war on woke. These people are pathetic. Get instant access to my bonus show by signing up at join Pacman.com and make sure you're getting my substack newsletter at substack. David Packman.com.