The David Pakman Show - 9/12/25: United States entering a very dark period

Episode Date: September 12, 2025

-- On the Show: -- Tyler Robinson, 22, has been identified as the alleged shooter who killed conservative activist Charlie Kirk --Donald Trump fuels political violence in America and immediately weaponizes Charlie Kirk’s assassination without pause or fact-finding -- Prioritizing being offended over strategic thinking risks weakening the left and losing elections -- Trump is being manipulated by Vladimir Putin and other authoritarian leaders while Republicans are just starting to acknowledge it -- The Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that nearly one million jobs were overstated under Donald Trump, signaling a stalled labor market -- A new study finds 99 percent of Americans will lose income under Trump’s economic policies while only the top 1 percent benefit -- Trump faces an unavoidable political loss as House members move to force a vote on the Epstein files despite his defenses -- Gallup reports U.S. support for capitalism is at a historic low while Americans are disillusioned with the current economic system -- Ali Velshi reports on MSNBC that Donald Trump’s health crisis can no longer be ignored by mainstream media -- On the Bonus Show: Trump happily approves funding for red states, Senate Republicans block release of Epstein files, and much more... 🛡️ Incogni lets you control your personal data! Get 60% off their annual plan: http://incogni.com/pakman ⚠️ Ground News: Get 40% OFF their unlimited access Vantage plan at https://ground.news/pakman 🛌 Helix Sleep mattresses: Get 27% OFF sitewide at https://helixsleep.com/pakman 🔊 Babbel language learning: Get up to 60% OFF at https://babbel.com/pakman 💪 AG1 is offering you a FREE $76 GIFT when you sign up at https://drinkag1.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  

The alleged murderer of Charlie Kirk has been captured. He has been taken into custody alive. This is 22-year-old Tyler Robinson of Utah from a Utah family. There was a press conference today after Donald Trump announced on Fox and Friends that they had him. It turns out that he was actually taken into custody last night at 11 p.m. And it happened as a result, we believe at this time, of his own father having notified the authorities that it was his son and about his whereabouts.

Now, one of the critical elements that ended up not being true about original reporting from the Wall Street Journal is that bullet casings had pro transgender messages on them. I'm going to tell you in a moment what the casings did say. I think it's important to say up front that there are lots of people wanting to prove that this was either a left winger or a right winger inspired by hate for Charlie Kirk from the left or inspired by Kurt's hate for Charlie Kirk from the right and both exist, although certainly as a right wing figure, more of the dislike for Kirk is from the left. It's just too early to say definitively, but we're getting some information.

I am going to do everything I can in this segment to keep it only to what we know. And one of the things that we now know is what the governor of Utah Spencer Cox said was on the bullet casings. The writing on those casings, those, those bullet casings. And I believe we have that as well. And I will share that with you now. So the area north of Campus Drive Road where the suspect crossed over, you saw some of that in the video that we released last night, consists of a grassy area with trees on the edge of the UVU campus.

Investigators discovered a bolt-action rifle wrapped in a dark, colored towel. The rifle was determined to be a Mouser Model 98-30-0.6 caliber bolt-action rifle. The rifle had a scope mounted on top of it. Investigators noted inscriptions that had been engraved on casings found with the rifle. Inscriptions on a fired casing read, notices, bulges, capital O-W-O, what's-this question mark? Inscriptions on the three unfired casings read, hey, fascist, exclamation point, catch exclamation point. Up arrow symbol, right arrow, and symbol, and three down arrow symbols. Second, unfired casing read, oh, Bella Chow, Bella Chow, Bella Chow, and a third unfired

casing red, if you read this, you are gay, L-M-A-O. All right, so a few different things there, of course. If you read this, you're gay, sounds homophobic. Hey, fascist catch sounds anti-fascist, notices bulge O-W-O. uh, is a reference to like an anime sort of like, oh, this is interesting to me kind of thing. And then Bella Chow a reference to the anti-fascist anthem that came from an Italian 19th century protest song that was adapted by Italian partisans during the World War II resistance against the Nazis against fascist forces. So the big picture here as we dig in further,

And I'm going to come back to this is that the alleged shooters family certainly don't look like blue-haired liberals. The family at this time appears to be sort of standard Utah Republicans, father as former law enforcement family members in the military. I don't want to use the term gun nut pejoratively, but this is a big gun fan family. I'm not going to publish the pictures. A lot of pictures have been floating around of family members with guns from very early ages.

I don't think it's a good idea to start publishing pictures of family members of the alleged shooter at this time, but you can find those, but certainly a family that are big, big fans of guns, not a minority, not trans, not Muslim, not an immigrant. It is a shooter from, you know, realistically, a pro-Trump, pro-gun household. doesn't mean that those are the beliefs of the shooter. And I'll give you kind of like my best assessment in a moment. We also have this picture of the alleged shooter wearing a pro, not a pro wearing a Trump costume for Halloween.

I'll be honest. I don't know if this is a pro or anti-Trump costume. It's one of these costumes where it looks almost like you're, you're riding someone. It's one of these things where it looks like two people. And the alleged shooter is a riding on Trump's shoulders. This could be pro-Trump. This could be anti-Trump. Like, I'm going to sit on top of Trump or whatever the case may be.

Just I just don't know. We just don't know at this point in time. What I do think is important is that everyone is hoping to see in the alleged shooter's motivations something that will vindicate their personal politics. And while I understand that, I want to remind you that no matter what the motivations are, it's deplorable and condemnable, not because we like or respected Charlie Kirk's views. which I found vile or disgusting, but because if our goal is to reduce political violence and reduce gun violence, we can't ever say some instances of it are cool. And I've made that

extraordinarily clear. One kind of strange video from Cash Patel, and this is what happened with what happens when he put, you know, a 40-something year old conspiracy theorist, uh, influencer as head of the FBI. He said something that makes no sense. Listen to this. Thank you, Governor. This is what happens when you let good cops be cops. Yeah. Of course, we always say great work by law enforcement. But here, Cash Patel trying to put himself at the center of this after the FBI seemed

to bungle early moments of this investigation, remember that we got this guy as quickly as we did, allegedly, because of his own father turning him in. And so Cash Patel jumping in and going, we're so awesome at the FBI. As always, it's the leadership at the FBI that seems politically problematic. Cash Patel Dan Bongino, but the agents at the FBI are a separate entity. On balance, what's the most likely outcome here? I think this appears to be based on everything that's been confirmed so far. There's a lot of unconfirmed stuff, based on what's been confirmed, probably some kind

of self-described anti-fascist from a Republican gun-loving. family. What that means about American politics, society and culture, we're going to have to kind of leave that question for a different day. In the aftermath of the assassination of Charlie Kirk that took place two days ago, an assassination that is disgusting and depraved and appalling and representative of so much of what is wrong with the United States, it's important to contextualize this. And this doesn't mean that the shooter is not to blame. for what he did, but we have to contextualize the environment of political violence that exists in this country. Political violence in the United States didn't just happen. It didn't just,

oh, we have no political violence. Now we have political violence. It's been fed and it's been normalized. And in some cases, this has even been celebrated. And one of the biggest agitators of that has been Donald Trump. The reason that political violence is now a part of American life to a degree is is because of Trump and Maga's agitation. And Charlie Kirk's killing, which you don't have to like what he stood for. You don't have to feel, you don't even have to feel empathy for Kirk if you don't. Because some people wrote to me, they said, David, I'm having trouble feeling empathy for Kirk.

You don't have to feel that to recognize that we're never going to get closer to a better country with political assassinations and political violence is just not going to happen. And so Charlie Kirk's assassination is kind of the latest in a grim series of these killings. And he was on stage answering a question about gun violence when the shot rang out. And within minutes, crystal clear video is circulating less than two hours later. Trump's on social media saying Kirk's a martyr for truth and freedom and radical leftists must be blamed for terrorism. There was no pause.

There were no facts. It was just partisan blame from Donald Trump. And this came from a guy who's been shot at 12. twice in the last year. I guess the one on the golf course didn't get anywhere near him or maybe a shot didn't even ring out at the second one, but he was shot at at least once and we know that that, that, that, that he barely survived that one. You would think that surviving would make him a really loud voice against this sort of incitement, no matter who the target is, but Trump's kind of doubling down. He still laces his speeches with violent language. We still see

the loathing of political opponents in public that's extraordinarily performative. He incited January 6th, obviously. And so the truth is political violence has not been totally partisan in its targets, but it's been overwhelmingly from the right. We went over the data yesterday. And one of the things that unfortunately is happening is that under MAGA, when violence hits Republicans. It's time for a national mourning period. Trump ordering all federal flags flown at half mast and the New York Yankees had a moment of silence for Charlie Kirk. And when it hits

Democrats, you see indifference or mockery. I mean, just remember when Paul Pelosi, Nancy Pelosi's husband was this was attacked. Even Charlie Kirk joked about it. Trump has joked about it many times. And so you have to evaluate in the broader context of this political violence, the selective outrage from Trump's base. They know who do we value and who don't we value. Whose deaths are politically useful and whose deaths do we want to downplay or avoid? And this is bigger than Trump. It's not just Trump. Mainstream outlets, even supposedly left-wing ones are framing Charlie Kirk as a respected debater and family man. And, you know, they ignore the extremism and the bigotry and his role in pushing lies about January 6th and other things.

of that means he deserved to get shot. Disgusting what took place. But you see them dehumanize democratic victims, Paul Pelosi, people like George Floyd. And they call this. Some people had political disagreements with Charlie Kirk as if it's just a disagreement over tax rates, for example. And the hypocrisy is really, really sharp. Now, there is also the impossible to ignore reality that the America in which Charlie Kirk was killed is an America that is a lot like the one he idolized, right? An America where he said it's worth, unfortunately, we're going to have the cost of some gun deaths so we can have the second amendment. That's all we have. And he was the cost. Now, as I said yesterday, if you had told him when he said that, Charlie, you will be the cost

on September 10th, 2025. Is that worth it? I don't know what he would have said, but we can't ignore that reality. The policies that he lived by to a degree and the rhetoric that he espoused were part of the environment in which this terrible tragedy took place. And a lot of his supporters are now demanding sympathy from everybody, even though they didn't show it for murdered school children or Nancy Pelosi's husband or, you know, to victims of police violence or whatever the case may be. Elon Musk immediately branded the left, the party of murderers before we knew anything about what took place. Trump followed the same playbook.

It's a playbook of weaponization at the end of the day. And this is an authoritarian propaganda tactic that we see used a lot. You seize a tragedy, you create an enemy, and you keep the temperature boiling rather than reducing it and saying, I don't care who's getting killed or who's doing the killing. It's all bad and it will never get us closer to a better country. So this scaffolding, this climate that makes political violence feel like an option has been built in plain sight. And Trump thrives in an America where you dehumanize your enemies, you kind of wink, wink,

we're against violence, kind of, right? But rough them up and don't treat the protesters too kindly and all of this stuff. And bloodshed is just used to prove that the other side is evil. So if you spend years pouring gasoline on the fire and then pretend you have nothing to do that you have nothing to do with the fire, you are going to be in a position, much like what Donald Trump is in right now. You build a politics around cruelty and blood sacrifice. And then all of a sudden, there's blood.

And it's tragic and it's disgusting. And we need to reinvent the political climate in this country. But to do that, we have to figure out who built the climate and got it to where it is. And Trump is absolutely one of those guys. All right. Let's go from criticizing the right to criticizing some of the right. criticizing some of what I'm seeing from Democrats here. The other day, I did a segment about the 2028 election. And in that segment, I said, here's some interesting candidates who might run.

Here's some interesting candidates who might not run. I don't think Kamala Harris should run in 2028. That was my opinion. This is a show about my opinion and I gave it. I explained that from a strategic standpoint, I don't think she can win and that what happened in 2024 suggests to me that she's just not the best person to be the nominee in 2028. It has nothing to do with any of her personal characteristics. It's just my opinion. At the end of the day, that's what this show is. And I got half a dozen emails, you know, not, not a hundred emails, but I got half a dozen emails.

Very angry emails from people on the left saying, David, you're being misogynistic. I'm offended that you had the gall to tell Kamala Harris what to do. And I am very worried about that. Because if that is the reaction, we are in some serious trouble. We are in some serious trouble. If we are going to treat a strategic analysis like a personal insult and say, I'm so offended, David, we are setting ourselves up to lose again. Look at the reality.

Okay. Harris ran in 2020 and her polling was a complete disaster, dropped out before voting even started. In 2024, she had some disadvantages, right? having only 107 days to campaign, being, being sort of put in the role she was put in after Biden realistically shouldn't even have run for reelection. Like she had some disadvantages that were circumstantial, but also her national numbers against Republicans were consistently shaky.

She wasn't more popular than Joe Biden. Like it wasn't misogyny. It was electoral math that led many to say she can't win. Now, of course, there can be misogyny if white people in. why people, some people didn't vote for her. There were some voters who were just like, I'm not voting for a woman. That's not what I'm talking about. What I'm talking about is the political analysis here. 2028 is not going to be a low-stakes election. It's almost certainly going to be close no matter who the Republicans put up. The Republicans could put up Marjorie Taylor

Green and hopefully she would lose, but it probably wouldn't be as much of a blowout as you would think. We cannot allow this stuff about being offended to be injected into how we pick a nominee or who we select. We need the strongest candidate that can win key states with stand relentless attacks and build a coalition that's broad enough to win and subsequently to govern. The problem is that there is a slice of the left that thrives on division and it is a really easy tool to use on offense and to divide. If you say Harris isn't the best option, you get an email that says that's misogynistic.

If you critique a policy, you're told, oh, you're betraying the cause. So none of this is about persuasion or strategy. It's about shutting a conversation down and turning a disagreement into a moral failing. I respect everyone in my audience who says, you know, David, I think you're wrong. I think Kamala should run. I think Kamala could win. Awesome. Great.

Let's talk about that. But David, I'm offended at your misogynistic comment that Kamala Harris shouldn't run. We're in trouble. We're in some serious trouble. Now, there are things that Republicans do that I do not think we should emulate, emulate, and there are things Republicans do that should at least be considered. And one of them is that Republicans rally behind who they believe can win. You know, if they don't care if their candidate hurt their feelings last week.

And a lot of Republicans who ran didn't even care that Trump personally attack them. They were like, we, I want to win. We want to win. We're going to get behind Trump. Democrats do not have a shortage of talent right now. got Gretchen, and by the way, many women as well, speaking of gender, Gretchen Whitmer is a strong option. There's governors, there's senators, there's mayors around the country could mount really competitive runs. Plenty of women who would be formidable nominees.

It's not about gender. I just don't think Kamala Harris's particular record approval ratings and viability in a general election make her a good pick for 2028. And if you disagree with me, that's fine. I still want to talk to you. I still want to hear from you. If you disagree with me on the facts. Now, the bigger picture is this. If the left continues to prioritize being offended over being strategic, I think we're just going to keep losing. Some on the left might want that. I remain skeptical that everybody on the left actually wants the more progressive candidate to win. Sometimes it seems to me that some on the left would rather lose so they can go, I told you so and just so more division. I don't think it's a big slice of the left, but I think

it's there. If you don't win, you can't govern. You just can't. Okay. If every critique is spun as bigotry, we're going to have a real problem here. And so I think we should make this about winning elections so we can implement policy, not so much about feelings. And if Democrats, the left, however you want to slice it, can't do that without crying foul. We might as well start writing the concession speeches now. I don't want that. Let me know what you think. Republicans are slowly realizing that Putin played Trump. Donald Trump is being played by Putin. And by the way, it's not only Vladimir Putin. Every authoritarian, every strong man, every corrupt operator, whoever crossed Trump's path has figured out if you stroke his ego and feed him some compliments, you're going to get him to do

what you want. Putin, of course, knows it. Netanyahu knows it. Kim Jong-un knows it. They've all done it before and they're going to do it again. So this is not like a sudden realization. The rest of the world saw it a long time ago. Think back to the Helsinki press conference where Trump stood next to Putin and said, I believe him over U.S. intelligence. He said it very strongly. Remember that? World leaders quickly learned you can manipulate Trump. You can manipulate him with the easiest, cheapest currency. It costs you nothing. Praise. You praise the guy. He's desperate to be validated. He's desperate to be liked and the validation doesn't even have to be real. You can fake it. He's going to fall for it. And what we get in return is a president that's really easy to manipulate. You've got a

weakened NATO tariffs that were supposed to hurt foreign economies, but they end up hurting the American economy. This hostile stance to President Zelensky of Ukraine who's fighting a defensive war. And even when Republicans realize Trump's being played, they still soften it like Iowa Senator Joni Ernst said, Putin is playing Trump, but Trump understands that. I don't know that Trump understands that. North Carolina Senator Tom Tillis said Russia's playing us like a piano, but he says, but Trump's not naive. Trump, they're not going to get away with it. Trump understands what's going on. I don't think Trump does understand what's going on. You then get the two weeks routine. Whenever there's a crisis, we're always two weeks away from the solution. Immigration reform in

two weeks, a plan for Ukraine in two weeks, sanctions on Russia in two weeks, economic relief it's in two weeks. And the two weeks never come. I mean, like two weeks go by, but the solution never shows up. And this is stalling dressed up as leadership. And it is another opportunity to take advantage of Donald Trump. If he ends up in a tough spot, he still won't act. He'll go, give me two weeks on that one. Now, a lot of Democrats knew this. For all my criticisms today of Democrats, Kamala Harris said it to his face in a debate. Hillary Clinton warned that Putin would eat him for lunch or would eat his lunch. I don't remember exactly what the phrase was.

And even Trump's own words have been the tell. Like when he blurted out, you're the puppet at Hillary Clinton in that 2016 debate. And really, we knew that it was Trump that was the puppet. So this is the danger of a political movement built around one guy's ego and personality and desire to be loved. It means that when he's being manipulated, the whole country gets manipulated. And the most embarrassing part to me is that he's not good at hiding it. Every time he gets played, he brags.

I'm so close that we get along so well. We know. That's how they're playing you. That's exactly how you're falling for it. He never realizes the respect is fake. The praise is fake. The adulation is fake. They use the flattery as bait and Trump takes it and they just reel them in.

And now Republicans are realizing it. And they're going to have to decide, are we going to be willing accomplices in this thing? or are we finally going to say something? I think it's the former. Let me know. Leave me a comment on YouTube or leave me a comment on my substack at substack.davidpack.com. Every time you Google your name, you will probably find dozens of sites that expose your personal information. This can include phone number, home address, family details. It's just sitting there waiting to be scraped or abused. Incogny is a privacy service. They go out. after these sites on your behalf. They contact the data brokers. They demand your data be removed,

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Try Incogni risk-free and get 60% off when you go to incogny.com slash Pacman and use the code Pacman. The link is in the description. 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.news slash Pacman or enter the code Pacman in the app to get started. The link is in the description. The David Packman show is an audience supported program and I appreciate every single new member

that has signed on recently. You can sign up at join packman.com. We do an extra show every day. for our members. It's called the bonus show. It's more stories, more analysis, more discussion. We also have commercial free audio and video streams of the show every day. You can put it in your podcast app. You can watch if that's better for you. And lots of other great membership perks, all of which you can read about at join packman.com. I want to talk about a million job crater that has just opened up in the economy. It's now Trump's economy.

But this predates Trump to a degree and also includes periods of time that Joe Biden was president. This is sort of a reality check. It is not a rounding error. These are not small adjustments. The Bureau of Labor Statistics has just revised job growth for the 12 month period through March. And it turns out that we overshot by 911,000 jobs, almost a million jobs that never exist. This is about 76,000 fewer jobs every single month spread across the year.

The most recent trend is even worse, just 29,000 jobs a month over the last three months. As you know, August saw only 22,000 jobs created. June was revised down to a loss of 13,000 jobs. An economists are now saying overall, this is a jobs market in a standstill. This did not start under Donald Trump. The April of 2024 to March of 2025 period includes the end of the Biden presidency. But we have seen a deepening stall under Trump manufacturing, which Trump said he would bring back, has seen a loss of 78,000 jobs over the last year.

Trump says the jobs are coming back in manufacturing. Actually, the jobs are going out. We also have the reality that the reason it's accelerating under. Trump is Trump is making it worse. And as I've said before, a lot of the economy depends on global business cycles, one-off events, black swan type events, et cetera. But there are some things presidents can do to make it worse and Trump's making it worse. The immigration crackdown, according to Morgan Stanley, right?

This is not some liberal rag. Morgan Stanley economists say that the deportation fiasco is creating a problem in labor force growth. You've got fewer workers. That means slower hiring, it means lower output. It means businesses are less willing to expand. And Trump's response has really been to attack the messenger. We had that weak jobs report from August. And we now ended up with Trump firing the head of the Bureau of Labor Statistics within

hours replacing her with a heritage foundation loyalist who says Trump's doing so good. The tariffs are awesome. Everything's awesome. Now we have it. Job creation is not this black box shrouded in mystery and, you know, Trump wanted to create jobs. There are proven strategies that do work. A steady labor market benefits from stable policy, not whiplash, not tariffs that are on and then off, not immigration panic that leads to unreliable sources of employees. We need to grow the workforce, infrastructure,

is a big part of it. Supporting small and medium businesses and education programs, training programs. They talk about what about the people that don't go to college? Well, yeah, we want to scale up trades as well, but they're not, they're not doing it. And so there's a lot of aspects to this that matter. But trade stability is close to the top because the tariffs have two effects. The tariffs themselves are an import tax. I'm not going to go through and again give you every the blow by blow of how that all trickles down and it does. But you put in tariffs, it's more expensive for the manufacturers, the companies making the stuff to buy the the raw materials they need. They trickle down those price increases to the consumer. Consumers buy less,

which reduces economic activity, which then means the companies that are now paying the import tax also have to lay off workers. The workers now have less money with which to buy stuff. It's a circle. Okay. So we know that. But then there's the same. second aspect of it, which is, it's not just tariffs. It's tariffs that are on and then off, on and then off. They're 100%, they're 50%, they're 25%. They're 150%. They're 70%. But is that on top of the previous 15% or does that replace it? Who the hell knows? The problem with that is that the instability also leads businesses to say, maybe we will wait on hiring. Maybe we'll wait on deploying a new product. And it also leads other countries to say the U.S. is a mess. This is, you know, it's

like, I don't like the person I'm dating who constantly cancels at the last minute. It's too hectic. I'm going to switch to a more reliable partner. And that is what a lot of countries are doing. And so the slowdown absolutely started before Trump took office. But he is locking it in. And the risk now is it turns into a deeper recession. So the idea of Trump as the peace president, well, that went out the window. The idea of Trump as the fixing trade president, that's gone out the window. But the idea of jump as the job, Trump is the jobs president is not matching the reality. And the longer this continues, the more difficult it's going to be to reverse. And I haven't even yet talked about the tax bill today. I've talked about it before,

which is also playing a major role. There's a new study that finds that 99% of the tax bill. of Americans, not a typo, not a joke. 99% of Americans will lose income under Donald Trump. Only the top 1% will benefit once you account for tariffs, the tax bill, benefit reductions, and other aspects of Trump's economic policy so far. He's figured out a way to do it again. Donald Trump has wrapped this massive transfer of wealth up to the rich in a package that he has said is about helping working families. The one big, beautiful bill. And they wanted it to

sound patriotic. They wanted it to sound like the sort of stuff that's covered in red, white, and blue sprinkles with fireworks that blow your hand off and all of that nostalgic stuff. But unfortunately, it is a rigged deal. And that leaves 99% of Americans with less money in their pockets, but the 1% will walk away richer than never. Now, this is not my interpretation. This is what a nonpartisan analysis is finding. You've got to look at it by 2027. It is true that in the short term, there are other income groups that will see some benefit. It's small, but it is there. But by 2027, income after taxes and transfers will fall for every single income income group other than the top 1%. If you are in the top 1%, you will get richer, but everybody else is going to get poorer, and

here's how it's going to work. The tax bill has combined two Trump priorities, a set of tax changes buried in the bill, and then the tariffs. For the middle 20% of Americans with an average income of $109,000, you'll get about a $950 tax cut, But the tariffs will cost you $2,200. So you get a tax cut of $9.50 tariffs cost you $2.50. The net loss to you as an American making $109,000 a year is $1,300 a year by 2027. If you're lower down than that, you might say, keep going, David.

Okay. The lowest 20% are going to lose $160 from the bill's policies, but they are going to lose $1,500. dollars from tariffs. So that is more than 3% of their income. If you are barely scraping by, that is the difference between paying your rent in full or starting to fall behind a little bit each month, a little bit each month, or buying the groceries that you need versus not quite buying the groceries that you need. Now, meanwhile, the top 1% gets a nearly $18,000 benefit from the tax bill, which is way more than enough to offset the higher tariffs of about $12,000. So that is going to leave the top 1% ahead by $5,000.

And they were doing fine already. But over time, it's going to get worse because some of the benefits expire after 2028. The cuts to Medicaid and snap keep going. In 2029, the poorest Americans are going to see incomes fall by 5% compared to the 3.4%. compared to the 3.4% I mentioned for now. Middle class will be down 2%. Even the top 1% will lose a little bit of ground, but by then they will have pocketed years of gains. So Trump's team has sold all of this as a working family's tax cut. That's a lie. It doesn't do that. This is an upward wealth transfer, plain and simple. Trump benefits, his friends benefit is

cronies benefit. It's like Robin Hood in reverse. Take from most people and give it to the richest Americans. Now, the political part is the following. This is what Donald Trump's economic nationalism looks like. You know, he, what does he say? We're going to protect workers. We're going to be there for the average person. But the reality is if everything you buy is more expensive and you've got less money in your bank account, the average worker is not winning, not even close. If you're not in the top 1%. Ultimately, the bill plus the tariffs are coming for your wallet. And unless you're paying close attention, you might not realize it until you feel it. And then the question, the age old question, will the people who did it be held accountable? Because there's a unfortunate trend

in this country to hold the wrong people accountable when things go wrong. The Epstein files fight is slipping out of Donald Trump's control. The discharge petition to force a House vote at 200 is at 216 signatures right now. Every Democrat and four Republicans, Massey Lauren Bobert, Nancy Mason, Marjorie Taylor Green have signed on. The only thing that stands in the way is two special elections in safe blue seats. Both are expected to go to Democrats who have already said, I will sign the petition. that happens, they will have 218 votes and then they've got it.

So in that scenario, Trump and Mike Johnson can threaten and they can beg and they can try procedural tricks, but the math will be the math, which is they will get steamrolled on the Epstein vote. Now, Trump is drowning in damage control right now. After the alleged 2003 birthday letter came out, Trump said, it wasn't me. Then he said, I'm not talking about it anymore. it's dead. Caroline Levitt said we're going to have handwriting experts. We're going to sue. We're going to do all these things. It used to be it doesn't exist. Then it's it's a hoax. Then it's it's

Obama did it. Then it's business related. Then it's a technicality. The goal here is not to land a consistent story for them. It's to spray out so many contradictory defenses that his supporters can just pick the one that they like and go, here's the defense I like. James Comey made the Epstein list. or here's the defense I like. The letter is a forgery or whatever. But this votes could just smother all of that because it will push the Epstein files into the open. And then there will be the next flood of excuses. It was AI. It was deep state framing. It was Hillary or it was Hillary. The real tell here is how the Republicans are behaving. Some of the loudest Epstein conspiracy pushers, you know, Anna Paulina Luna, for example, or Tim Burchett, they are refusing to sign this petition, and

they are saying, this has gotten personal. This is just a personal thing between Trump and Thomas Massey. I'm not getting involved. Now, others are starting to run interference by trying to change the moral frame. You're hearing, you know, we're not talking about 11 year old girls here. Or back in the day, 15 year olds could get married. I mean, really sick stuff. But this is the normalization process. It's the playbook that churches have used to protect abusive. pastors, you circle the wagons, you kind of redefine the offense, you forgive and you move on. This is projection in its purest form. The groomer smears, they used to throw at the Democrats.

It was never about protecting kids. They wanted to demonize opponents. And when they get caught doing the same thing, they have excuses up the wazoo. Every day that passes, they seem to be realizing the vote is probably going to happen. And it could spin into an unstoppable floor fight because they've told their base for years that there's a cover up to protect Epstein's friends. The vote comes. The cameras are rolling.

They will either have to vote for what Trump wants to hide the files or they will have to vote for transparency. If they vote for what Trump wants, they look like they are hiding the guilt of terrible people, which they would be doing. And if they vote for transparency, they risk. Trump's wrath. My expectation from what we're seeing so far is that most loyalists are going to hold the line. And again, Democrats should not make this about whether the letter is sexist. Of course it's sexist. Of course Trump is a misogynist. That is not the revelation. The kill shot here is Trump's

evasiveness, the lies, the degree to which the Trump administration has been trying to cover this entire thing up. And that's really where the pressure should be. So we are heading towards an inevitable disclosure here. They will come up with a new set of lies and distortions, but I really hope that Americans don't fall for it. When it was time for a new mattress, I didn't want to gamble on something generic. I had heard about Helix. I like that they customized the mattress based on how you sleep. I'm mostly a stomach sleeper. So I took the quiz and ended up with a model that felt tailored to me. I've had it for years. What I notice is I don't wake up with back stiffness. I don't wake up with shoulder pain. I don't toss and turn looking for a comfortable position. It's just

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Support for capitalism in the United States is collaboration. American capitalism in a sense, I think we can say is in crisis. Gallup just dropped new numbers showing the opinion of capitalism in the United States. And it is at its lowest point since they started asking about it. Only 54% of Americans now view capitalism positively. That is down six points from 2021. It is a full collapse compared to where it has been for a lot of the last decade. And the biggest drop is not among Republicans.

They are still overwhelmingly pro-capitalism. It is Democrats and independents who increasingly say, I don't have a positive view of capitalism. Only 42% of Democrats now say that. Only 51% of independents now say that, basically barely holding at 50%. And the important thing to consider here is that it is not because socialism is suddenly surging and way more people like socialism. In fact, support for socialism has been flat throughout this entire period at 39%.

So while capitalism is increasingly something that Americans are skeptical of, they're not exactly running to socialism and saying this is what we want instead. They're just soured on capitalism and for good reason. More and more people recognize they look around and they say, this system really isn't working for me. I'm not convinced socialism is the answer, but I do know that the status quo isn't really working. Now, I hate to even have to introduce this, but it is the United States. Do Americans know what these words mean? Like if you went to the average American and said, what's capitalism? What's socialism? Don't give me feelings. Don't give me the vibe. But tell

me, what is capitalism and what is socialism? I think you would get more grunts and fewer cogent explanations than you might want. For some people, capitalism means the economy when I have a job is capitalism. And socialism means I don't like who's president. Okay. So there are there are groups of people for whom those are kind of the definitions. And it's become almost like a brand recognition thing. So I do think it's important to keep that in mind. But the most important sentiment, which is the status quo isn't working and it is some version of capitalism that is out there in the world and that's not working for me, that's a growing sentiment and that's very, very important.

Now, there are some other numbers that really kind of fill in what is going on here. 95% have a positive association with small businesses. Eighty-one percent have a positive association for free enterprise. business on the other hand, only 37% of Americans have a positive view of big business. That's a significant drop. So if we zoom out a little bit and we say, all right, maybe not everybody knows exactly how these terms are defined. The feel of the thing is what I think of or identify as capitalism isn't working.

I don't think it's good. I don't have a positive view of it. Small businesses aren't the problem. Free enterprise and being able to say, I want to build some. something from the ground up. That's not the problem. Big business is the problem. And so this skepticism of capitalism that is growing is significantly sort of oriented to big business and conglomerates. Now, Democrats approval of big business is down 17 points in four years. Independence down 10. Even Republicans are a little bit less positive about a big, big business. So what does this tell us?

are not rejecting the idea of an economic system where if you have innovative ideas, you get rewarded. People seem okay with that. Small business, free enterprise, positive view. What people are rejecting is something I reject as well, which is that the version of capitalism they're living in right now, dominated by giant corporations, runaway inequality, political corruption, a system that keeps getting harder and harder for regular people to survive in. I don't even know where the numbers are today, I think it's like half the country can't afford an unexpected $400 expense without borrowing. That all seems to be part of the story.

Often this is where the conversation falls apart. We treat capitalism and socialism as two boxes and like, that's it. Most of the countries with the strongest economies and the highest standards of living and the most satisfied citizens are not pure. purely one or the other, but they are a regulated form of capitalism. We call them social democracies. I write about this extensively in my book. So there is a market economy.

There is private business. There is competition. There's innovation. There are billionaires. There are rich people. But you've got a strong social safety net. You've got in most cases some form of universal healthcare, education that's affordable. Sometimes that includes college paid for through taxes.

You've got worker protections. You've got guardrails that say once you get this big as far as a business goes, we are going to put in place some limits so that you can't swallow up the whole system. So countries that would fall under this umbrella are like Sweden, Denmark, Finland, the Netherlands to a degree. And so it's not Jeff Bezos or, you know, Lenin or Lenin, as Trump has referred to him. You have functioning markets. You have functioning public services.

And we say we're going to do more taxation at the top to make sure no one falls below a certain standard of living. You can go and start a business. You can make a profit. You can innovate. But if you are no longer able to work because you're sick, you're not going to go bankrupt. You're not going to be homeless. Your kid can afford to go to college without a lifetime of debt and try to pay off the debt

with a job that just doesn't pay well. Wages aren't going to be eaten alive by predatory rent, for example. So it's not anti-business. And in fact, one of the big, one of the often repeated talking points about the countries I listed is that it's actually really a bad business environment. But if you look at take your pick, right, don't take my word for it, go and Google it. Look at business environment rankings from around the world. You'll see that the United States is not number one and it's often not even that close

to the top. It's often in the middle. And some of these countries do have higher rankings in terms of a bit environment for entrepreneurialism and innovation. The problem with all of this is that when the conversation is either we keep what we have or we go full socialist, it doesn't generate any productive dialogue. The political class rarely talks about this in terms that more tangible. It makes sense that Americans are losing faith in capitalism, but they're not embracing socialism. And it seems that the perfect conversation would be we're talking about tweaks from where we are to get to where some of these highly prosperous countries are. But Democrats haven't been big on taking it up. Republicans just want to say it's all socialism and it's crazy. The truth

is capitalism doesn't have to mean what we have right now. It can still be capitalism, but look more like Denmark and if the people who want to reform it the way that I do don't step in with a clear workable vision, we know what happens. The vision gets filled with whoever shouts loudest. And for the last decade, it's been Republicans shouting socialist, communist, Marxist, anarchist, and this sort of stuff. But Americans are seeing what's going on and they are saying capitalism as I know it, not something I approve of. The Trump health crisis has finally hit mainstream legacy corporate media. We talked earlier in the week.

Why won't corporate media talk about Trump's health situation? He's clearly getting worse. Whatever he has, it's getting worse and more noticeable. I've got to hand it to him. Ali Valshi, who's been on this show, and I know pays attention to the stories on independent media. Ali Valshi went full in on MSNBC. This is the exception to the story.

Take a listen. States, his health. A lot of speculation about. the president of the United States, his health, his fitness to run the country, swollen ankles, bruised hands, a days-long disappearance from the public eye. There is an explanation for some of this, but this administration is not exactly known for transparency, so it's leading many people to draw their own conclusions and to assume that the badly blended wrong shade of makeup on it Donald Trump's hands is not the only cover-up

that's happening right now. Now, I'm not a doctor, and I don't play one on TV, so I'm not going to attempt to diagnose Donald Trump. But most of the speculative, could be cleared up very easily by the administration. Instead, it's doing what it does best, dipping, dodging, and dragging out the intrigue. Let's go through a little timeline. A large bruise was first spotted on the president's right hand back in February. The bruise has appeared on and off.

Sometimes it's covered in what appears to be makeup that's not very well matched. Other times it's not. On July 13th, the president was photographed at a soccer game appearing to have swollen ankles. On July 17, President Trump, doctor, Sean Barbar. I got to hand it to Ali Valshi. He's hitting all the notes we've been hitting. Bella released a statement saying that Donald Trump has been diagnosed with something called chronic venous insufficiency, which means the veins in the legs can't properly carry

blood back to the heart and causing it to pool in the lower legs. This is a very common condition, particularly common amongst older adults. The doctor said that other tests were done and they all came back normal. He added that the president was taking aspirin. as part of a, quote, standard cardiovascular prevention regimen, which is also pretty common in older adults. And at the bottom of the letter, it said, quote, summer. What Ali Velci is missing here is that the aspirin regimen is not really recommended anymore in Trump's scenario. President Trump remains in excellent health.

Okay. So the chronic venous insufficiency explains the sole and ankles. But the condition only affects the lower body so it doesn't affect the bruised hands. His doctor and the White House press secretary Caroline Levitt said had an answer for that. 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. That's a little bit of BS. This was not the first nor the last time that Levitt has blamed the bruising on frequent handshaking.

I shake a lot of hands, let me tell you. Donald Trump is a self-described germophobe, germ freak, and clean hands freak. Those are his words. Over the years, he's called the practice of shaking hands barbaric, disgusting, very, very terrible, and one of the curses of American society. But let's go with that and say that a few really stiff handshakes combined with the use of aspirin caused the bruising on Donald Trump's right hand. Well, about a week ago, the Daily Beast spotted what appears to be a bruise on Trump's left hand.

You can see it here in the video of Donald Trump during a golf outing. So, is the germaphobe in chief shaking hands with both hands now? To add to the speculation, Trump, who rarely goes a few hours without getting in front of a camera, was MIA for six days, no official vacation or anything, not so much as a glimpse of the president. Not a peep from the president outside of social media posts where he declared on Sunday, several days after he had disappeared, quote, never felt better in his life.

Trump emerged on Tuesday for an announcement in the Oval Office, which doubled as proof of life. Now, here's the interesting thing. Recently, Vice President J.D. Vance, also not a doctor, weighed in, saying that President Trump is in, quote, incredibly good health. But, God forbid, is going to serve out the remainder of his term and do great things for the American people. And if, God forbid, there's a terrible tragedy. I can't think of better on the job training than what I've gotten over the last 200 days. There you go.

J.D. Vance got called into the Oval Office after that one. So listen, Ali Valshi basically gets it right missed a couple of small points that I think make the story even stronger like the claim about the aspirin regimen. It's actually not common for people of Trump's age unless they've had a cardiac event, which the White House has not disclosed that they have had that he has had. But the fact that this is happening is a big deal. Like Ali Valshi said, I don't know the full scope of Trump's condition. I don't believe that the hand bruising is from handshaking.

I don't believe that the only thing going on is chronic venous insufficiency. There's too much going on. I don't know what the full scope of it is because they aren't being transparent. It's hitting corporate media. It's hitting legacy media. We've got to keep pushing it and maybe someday we'll get an answer. Many of us know it can be tough to stay on top of nutrition every single day, especially when things get busy and hectic.

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Quick, tastes good, just helps me feel like I'm covering my nutritional bases. And now clinically backed with an advanced formula, it's the perfect time to try AG1 if you haven't. Head to drinkag1.com slash Pacman to subscribe. You'll get a free bottle of AG D3K2, a welcome kit and five travel packs with your first order. The link is in the description. All right, let's get into Friday feedback where I hear from you and address questions, concerns, insults, trolling, attacks. But mostly questions and concerns. You can always write into info at David Pakman.com.

comments might be featured, Reddit posts, etc. We start with a subreddit post from Incognito 5. Would impeachment even work at this point? Incognito asks. If the Republicans in Congress came to their senses and realize that they are not in on it and eventually they'll be targeted by the dear leader and move to impeach and convict him, would it even work? Trump attempted an insurrection after losing the 2020 election and came very close to succeeding. If impeachment proceedings began, what would stop him from having the FBI, for example, detain, arrest, threatened members of Congress to prevent the vote? Assuming a vote was even able to be held and he was convicted in the Senate, who would make him leave? Pete Hag Seth, Cash Patel, Pam Bondi,

the generals that have a loyalty interview with him before getting the job. I'm not confident that a successful impeachment and conviction would work at this point. There are a lot of very good points brought up here. And I find myself thinking a number of them are irrelevant for this one reason. They all depend on if he was convicted for impeachment. And he won't be. I hate to let the air out of the tires or whatever metaphor you want to use. But Donald Trump is not going to be convicted on impeachment.

impeachment for as long as Republicans control the Senate. Hopefully Democrats will take control of the House in November of 2026. In some vague sense, I mean, it'd be great if they took the Senate, but the Senate map is not looking likely for Democrats. And so a lot of this is really good thought about would anyone make him leave physically? Maybe they would. Maybe they wouldn't. I think we are in such an impossible situation to even get to this.

that point that it's almost irrelevant, almost irrelevant because there are simply not the votes to get a conviction on impeachment. FTGOP commented on Spotify, I wonder if Levitt will struggle with the things she said when she's older. I'm still mortified by things I said when I was in my 20s. She's probably just a sociopath with no feelings. But if not, she might struggle later with what she did to America. Well, listen, I'm mortified by things. I said last week. Forget about when I was in my 20s. So there's no doubt that your average person does have very different perspectives about what they're willing to say and how they say it when they're older and past their 20s. I don't think it matters for Caroline Leavitt truly

strikes me as a true believer in Trump, a sort of cult follower. She seems to have internalized that the greatest good is whatever is good for Trump and the facts really don't matter. And so even later, imagine if in 10 years they go back to her and go, you know, when you said that stuff about Trump's hands being bruised from handshaking and everybody knew it wasn't true, that was terrible, huh? She even if she acknowledges, yeah, it was completely made up, she would still believe it was the right thing to say because like a good cult member, it's all about servicing the greatest goal, which is the uplifting and support of the dear leader.

She really seems like a true believer. And so I would be shocked if she was really mortified by the things that she has said, although she'll probably recognize that some of them weren't true. She will say that it was for a greater good. It was serving a higher master or something like that. All right. Also on Spotify, Sean says, what's funny is that David seriously thinks that the Dem primary will be a free for all. Look what happened to Bernie. It will be more like the WWE winner already

determined. Whoever can suck off the richest donors is going to win. Well, everybody who knows me knows that my opinion of the DNC isn't very high. The DNC has proven itself to be concerned primarily with its own self-preservation above all else. The DNC is really a corporation seeking to justify its own existence. And what the DNC wants is what they believe can get their candidate in power, not necessarily what's best for the average American person. If it happens to be, then great. But in that sense, the two parties are tragically similar.

Do I believe that the Dem primary will be a free for all? Listen, there is no doubt that the DNC puts its fingers on the scale. I think that there's no question about that. Are do I believe that the DNC is going to stage the primary by deciding who gets to run and who doesn't and then deciding in advance who they have anointed? I think that the more likely scenario is that after candidates decide, after after elected's decide, do I want to run or don't I? And there's initial polling and momentum gets going.

I think as almost always happens, the party is going to have a preference. And that is different from they are going to handpick the nominee, but I'm not naive. I understand that the Democratic Party will do everything it can to push the nomination towards a candidate that they believe can win and that they believe they can control. Now, my question is, who will that be in 2028? Is it that they believe they could control Gretchen Whitmer? Is it that they believe they could control Newsome and that they want Newsome? Is it going to be, you know, I don't think AOC is running, but is it AOC or is she too much

of a free thinker for that? I don't know who it is. So the way I want to leave this question with you all is, do you think the DNC already has a preference? Is it Kamala, who I don't think should run at all? I think that that would be the biggest mistake. Or who do you believe the DNC has sort of anointed in their minds already? Or is it simply too early? I love hearing from Fannie Bates via substack.

Fannie says, I am 76 years old. I depend on David Packman to keep me informed without stretching the truth. Fannie, thank you. I am humbled and flattered and I really appreciate you being on substack. I hope, by the way, that you're getting the daily substack newsletter at substack. David Pakman.com. Here's something very different, not at all like Fanny, a user named Diomino Oxfanoxie. Says, ah, deraged Pacman again. Go for an ice cream with Joe. He likes chocolate chip and vanilla. You know, we got a conversation on the Monday bonus show about ice cream. And I mentioned my favorite flavors are pistachio. And this is really more gelato, but pistachio, black raspberry.

and cherry chocolate chip. I did forget to mention there's one from an old hometown ice cream shop that I haven't been to in a while called mud pie, which is espresso ice cream with, I believe it's pieces of Oreo and something else. Anyway, I got absolutely roasted for my ice cream choices. Like, what is that bad about those, those flavors? It just doesn't really make any sense to me. Glenn says the U.S. has a trade surplus with us here in Australia, but applied a tariff all the same.

We are a longtime ally, yet the feeling here is now we need to diversify as the United States is not looking like such a reliable friend anymore. Trump is more eager to meet with Putin than our prime minister, not even close. Trump is way more interested in meeting with the Russian president than he is with the Australian prime minister. Listen, this is what I'm talking about. Last week, I did a segment where I explained passionately that Donald Trump is uniting the world against the United States when historical allies like Australia see the US is putting a tariff

on us and we have a we have a trade deficit, meaning the United States has a trade surplus with Australia. It goes against Trump's reasoning for doing tariffs. Why is this happening? we don't like it. Of course, many countries are going to say, screw these people. Let's go and make a deal with Indonesia, Malaysia, Japan, China, whoever. And this is why Donald Trump has sort of set off this cascading economic impact where, yes, the tariffs are stupid on their face because it's an import tax paid by American companies passed on to consumers. Yes, that's stupid. But it's also

wrongheaded because of what it does to our allies. And when we talk about dynamic estimates, I've given this example before. If you said to me, David, what's the effect of raising the top tax rate to 70%? One might say, well, all you need to do to figure out how much money would we get by raising the top tax rate to 70% is figure out how many people are currently in the top tax rate and what's the additional money if we raise the tax rate to 70%. But that would be a short-sighted way to do it. You have to do a dynamic estimate. And the dynamic estimate says, if we raise the top tax rate to 70%. Would anybody leave the country? Would anybody stop working? Would anybody change their business structure to one where we wouldn't capture that as tax? The answer might be yes or no,

but you have to dynamically account for that. Even Trump admits when he goes, oh, we're going to get eight, the number changes. We're going to get seven trillion dollars from the tariffs. Even though that number is calculated in a way that makes no sense, even though the money would come from American companies, not from foreign countries, put all that aside. It does not account for the dynamic effect, which could be a lot of the stuff we're currently exporting, we're no longer going to export. A lot of the stuff we're currently importing, we might not be able to import. Other countries will go their own way, for lack of a better term.

The point of that is to say, every one of these economic decisions. decisions and non-economic political decisions has second and third order effects, which I don't think Donald Trump even has the cognitive capacity to evaluate. Kim Elaine says never in my 43 years in this earth have I hoped to hear news of someone's passing before. Trump is that repulsive and causes so much damage to the lives of others and keeps taking it further. You know, I've made it really clear.

I don't wish for people's death. I just don't. Constitutionally, it's not me. What I will report to you is a fact. Never before in my time doing this show have I received so many emails from people wishing gleefully and anxiously awaiting the death of the current president. I don't think it's a good thing emotionally even. I think it's, you know, there's something dark about it.

But I understand that so much damage is being caused by this guy. And I see the messages from people. So while I don't wish for the deaths of others, it's just, it's just not me. I can factually tell you that there are more of you wishing for Trump's death than any other public figure ever since I have started doing the show. Make of that what you will. Make sure you're getting my substack newsletter. This week, we published some great pieces about the gym.

selfie political trend about why authoritarians don't like to lose and so many other really interesting things. You can get it at substack dot david packman.com and I encourage you to do so. We will see you on the bonus show and then I'll be back here on Monday.