The David Pakman Show - People are noticing what’s happening in America

Episode Date: March 18, 2026

-- On the Show -- Americans react to rising grocery and gas prices, describing $150 for basics and saying they ignore political messaging and focus on what they pay every week -- Pam Bondi and Todd Blanche face a House Oversight subpoena over their handling of the Jeffrey Epstein investigation, signaling aggressive Democratic investigations if they win power -- Donald Trump delivers a series of erratic and controversial remarks on war, luxury spending, and foreign leaders -- Donald Trump appears to confuse basic facts about who is president, prompting mockery and a viral response from Gavin Newsom -- Donald Trump makes statements in the Oval Office about Cuba, markets, war, and social issues -- Speculation grows about Donald Trump quitting if Republicans lose midterms, but his personality makes him more likely to stay in office -- Marjorie Taylor Greene criticizes Donald Trump’s Iran war and links it to rising gas prices -- Donald Trump makes incorrect claims about NATO powers, struggles in exchanges with reporters, and faces pushback -- Viral footage of Donald Trump’s discolored hand fuels speculation about his health and spreads rapidly across social media -- On the Bonus Show: David discusses his trip to Chicago, and much more... 🌍 Haven Social: Check out their Kickstarter at https://davidpakman.com/havensocial 🛡️ Incogni lets you control your personal data! Get 60% off their annual plan: http://incogni.com/pakman 🛌 Helix Sleep mattresses: Get 27% OFF sitewide at https://helixsleep.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 (00:00) Start(01:23) Voters feel rising costs(06:11) Bondi subpoena Epstein probe(14:27) Trump erratic public remarks(24:05) Trump confuses president identity(28:21) Trump controversial Oval Office remarks(36:18) Trump quitting speculation grows(41:17) Greene criticizes Trump Iran war(47:03) Trump NATO claims pushback(58:04) Trump hand health speculation   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Well, Americans are now openly saying we can't afford groceries, $150 for basics, choices between gas and food, and they don't care what any politician tells them. They care about what they are paying and we're going to talk about it. And at the exact same time, Donald Trump's own attorney general, Pambandi, has just been subpoenaed in an Epstein-related probe. Basically, this is a preview of what happens if Democrats take the House in November. And then there's Trump himself, the most bizarre, unhinged moments, maybe of the last decade from Trump, confused about who is the president right now?

It's Trump, but he got confused, rambling about going to war out of habit, which I thought was what he told us we weren't going to do anymore and bragging about luxury marble and onyx stone when people are getting crushed by gas prices that are up almost 40%. Marjorie Taylor Green again has had enough. And on top of all of it, another video with Trump's rotting hands, which now seem to have gone from black to make up yellow, to a very strange kind of shade of green. And of course, even more people are asking questions. Well, sorry, Donald. They just don't believe you. Donald Trump is having the same problem that Joe Biden had. And he should have learned from what happened to Joe Biden.

and avoided this problem. The problem is that no matter how many times Trump says prices are down, no matter how many times he says inflation is solved, Americans know that that's not true. We have interviews with Americans about rising grocery prices. Here is one example that we're going to take a look at. We bought stuff for a stew and some snacks and a plant. $150. It keeps going up and up and up. People on lower end pay, they're hurting. This is the new normal. I think everything is more expensive now and it sucks. I don't really know what else there is to say on it.

Remember that in the Biden era, with the economy objectively stronger than it is right now, a lot of people were still struggling. And Donald Trump said, it doesn't matter how many times Biden claims everything's fine if people. don't believe it, if people don't feel it in their bones to use Trump's term, it's not really going to help you politically. And you know what? Trump happened to be right. But now he's trying to pull the exact same thing, arguing that all economic problems have been solved exactly as he promised. And people don't believe it. Here's one more example. Again, just a voter's telling reporters what they have experienced. A store like this is really survival, right? For others,

it's going to make those dollars go further. They can have maybe some more luxury items than what they normally would. When they see those prices go up either at the fuel stations or in the grocery store, they don't have options to just opt out. And so trying to save people money on their groceries is a way we can help out and, you know, have a great thriving business in the process. Anna, some context here. Cost of living has gone up significantly over the last year.

Two to two and a half percent for groceries, three for housing, for electricity, 10 to 11% for natural gas. And that is not counting the last couple of weeks. Things have gotten really tough for Americans and their wallets, Anna. Voters really don't give a damn about political messaging when their grocery bill is up. They react to what they're paying every week. And their grocery bill is up. It doesn't have to be by a lot to still betray Trump's promise that grocery prices would go down and they haven't gone down. Now, we go back to the Biden presidency, and you remember that rising prices were hurting Biden politically. It didn't matter that inflation had come way down from the pandemic highs.

It didn't matter that Biden and Harris and others were saying, Biden rescued us from the pandemic. In a sense, that was true. But it didn't change that things still cost more than before the pandemic. and they cost more than the year before. Because if inflation is more than 0.0, prices are going up, even if they're going up more slowly than they were before. When you hear people say, $150 for basics, that's really simple and that's really kind of memorable, in a sense.

And so it lands a lot harder than whatever the inflation report says or the egg price report or whatever, choosing between gas and groceries or choosing between gas and groceries or choosing between groceries and medications, which we've also heard people say, that is a form of real financial pressure. And so no matter what Trump says, no matter what the administration insists about, we know from Biden, if you try to downplay or kind of spin away price increases, people get angry and they go, here's my receipts. And that's what's happening right now. We see gas prices spiking. It's like close to 40 percent since January now. Insane. I've been putting the gas price chart up the screen every show, so I won't do it today, but you can go and easily find it.

I'm sure tomorrow we'll look at it again. That is so much stronger than people's connection to Trump's talking points. And when you are in the middle of an optional war that has overnight spiked gas prices, and it's going to increase the cost of shipping, which means everything is going to cost more unless Trump turns this around very quickly, we have to remember voters judge the economy. based on how it is affecting them, and then they vote on that basis. We said it when it was Biden as president, and it's the same thing right now. And so as we look towards November, the midterms now just seven and a half months away,

they have a real serious problem on their hands. Pam Bondi just had a legal bomb dropped on her. She has been subpoenaed, as has the deputy attorney general Todd Blanche, one of Donald Trump's former personal attorneys. And this is really a preview of what every day will be like for these people if Democrats take back the Senate in just seven and a half months. It's extra nice, I would say, to see Fox News be the ones to report on it. Here is a short clip from Fox announcing Pam Bondi has been subpoenaed. We're breaking moments ago.

House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer issuing a subpoena to Attorney General Pam Bondi and Deputy Attorney General, Todd Blanche, the committee demanding answers about the Justice Department's handling of the Jeffrey Epstein investigation and compliance with the Epstein Files Transparency Act. Bondi and Blanche are set for a private briefing with the committee tomorrow. Their formal depositions are scheduled for April the 14th. If we are looking for motivation to really vote the hell out of these people or vote these, so that's not exactly right, to vote these people the hell out in November, Part of it for me is that the rest of their political lives in practice, at least as far as Trump is concerned, are going to be a living hell shrouded in investigation after investigation after investigation.

The sitting attorney general has been subpoenaed. The sitting deputy attorney general has been subpoenaed. And what makes this even more explosive is the Epstein angle. When you look at that as the impetus for the subpoena and you see that the public over 50% believe that the Trump administration is involved in a cover up, when you hear that they're going to Iran and then you remember, we're not going to forget about the Epstein files, as I have been insisting for a while now. It's extra salient to hear that the subpoena is related to Epstein. Now, this whole transparency act thing really puts the DOJ on defense because they said they were going to do it. They bound themselves legally to it.

Now, it was some Democrats, most all Democrats and some Republicans who voted for it. But then Trump said, yeah, we're going to do it. They bound themselves to it and they're not sticking to it. And when you see Fox News covering it, I mean, listen, I don't exactly know what the Foxx audience believes right now. We know that Republicans in general by a little more than a 50-50 margin do believe that Trump is involved in covering up the full scope of the Epstein files. But when you put that in front of Fox viewers, that is just phenomenal. Now, I again want to restate if we can take the House from Republicans in just seven and a half months.

Maybe we can take the Senate too. We talked about that. But the House is where investigative authority sits. This is going to be the rest of their political lives. The last two years of Trump's presidency, if Democrats take the House, will be mired from Trump's perspective in all of the oversight that hasn't been done for a very long time. Now, Trump world is used to controlling the narrative and they like controlling the narrative. But that is going to change very quickly. And so you don't have to believe that Democrats are God's gift to politics. You don't have to believe that Democrats taking the House will fix all of your problems.

It won't. Maybe it'll fix some, but it's not going to fix all of your problems. This is going to ruin their political lives if we are able to do it. And the other important thing is that when Democrats take some control back over the news narrative by being able to say, hey, you know what today's headline is? It's that another person has been subpoenaed. that we are dragging in 10 Trump acolytes and cronies to testify under oath, they can shift the narrative back and strip Trump of the ability to control that narrative.

And that's a very frustrating thing for Donald Trump. And the theme that we have to reinforce here is accountability will come only if power shifts. And we need to be part of making that power shift. is going to lose his mind. If you think he's throwing the proverbial catch up at the wall now, just wait and see what happens. If he loses control of the house and then every day, it's another Trump crony under investigation, under subpoena, and maybe even criminal charges. Now, notice I'm not saying start locking people up. I'm not saying just charge people. If an investigation determines crimes have been committed, then we need to pursue that. That's actual law and order, very different

then just lock them up. Now, I know people are struggling with what's going on with gas prices. So next week, we're going to do something very special. I am going to unleash Trump's gas prices as a membership special. See what I did there? We are going to do a one week membership drive Monday to Friday where we will discount memberships from $7 a month down to whatever a gallon of regular gasoline is on that day. You will be able to determine what's the best day to get the membership. The whole point here is we want to give a big discount. I know people are struggling. We're trying to build independent media at the same time.

So that'll start Monday. If you want to be notified of it, just get on my newsletter on substack, substack. Substack. David Packman.com. If you felt the internet getting colder and creepier, more propaganda, more surveillance, you are not imagining it. The big social platforms are optimizing for control. That's why I'm excited to tell you about our sponsor, Haven Social, protecting users and creators

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Even a single exposed profile can lead to fraud, harassment, identity theft. Incogni's removal process is independently verified by Deloitte, and you can get 60% off when you go to incogny.com slash Pacman and use the code Pacman. The videos I'm about to show you have made people ask, is Donald Trump on something? Extraordinarily bizarre, manic behavior from the president of the United States. And of course, the substance as off the rails as anything that we have seen. In one of the most distasteful moments I have ever seen in American politics, Donald Trump very awkwardly revealed that Congressman Neil Dunn, would have been, quote, dead by June from a terminal diagnosis to which Maga Mike Johnson

explained, that wasn't exactly public. Now, some people are going, oh, HIPAA violation. HIPAA applies only to medical professionals. It's still just a horrible person being horrible. We don't need to invoke HIPAA to analyze it. Take a look at this. Congressman Neil Donne of Florida had had some real health challenges and it was very serious and had had a pretty grim diagnosis.

and I mentioned it to the president, and I said, Congressman Donne is a real champion and a patriot because he's still coming to work, and if others got this diagnosis, they would be apt to go home and retire. What was the diagnosis? It was, I mean, I think it was a terminal diagnosis. He would be dead by June. Okay, that wasn't public, but yeah, okay. It was grim, that's what I was going to say.

With a heart problem, by the way. This was a heart problem. So, long story short, the president called him to encourage him and thank him, and they had a conversation, and the president mentioned in the course of the conversation, you know how to get my doctors involved. And they did, and within a number of hours, they took him to Walter Reed, emergency surgery. The man has a new lease on life. He acts like he's 30 years younger, and he walked into the conference meeting,

and we thought we'd seen a ghost. And I spoke with him over the weekend, and he's encouraged and thankful, and he thanks the president for his leadership and intervention. And thank you. Thank you. He actually called Mike. Mike called me, and he said, sir, we're up by three. We're going to lose one by June.

Said, who, Neil Dunn? He said, Congress, a great congressman. Incredible. He called to say that he was terminal, really bad heart. There's nothing they can do. I said, that's bad. Number one, it was bad because I liked him. Number two, it was bad because I needed this vote.

Truly one of the most off-putting, disgusting, distasteful moments I have ever seen. And that says a lot, given who we're talking. about here. Now, Donald Trump strangely obsessed with pounding people. There are like four or five examples of this from this event. I'm not going to play all of them because it's pretty vomitous, to be quite frank, but here is Trump just talking about pounding and pounding. The artistes a lot of, they took a pounding from Rick. It's almost like this guy he read over here, Anthony, you know, he knows what it is to pound people, right? Anthony, Anthony is. Anthony is, Anthony knows. Anthony's another great. You're not on the book. Really weird. I don't know what was on

his mind that made him talk like that, but very, very strange stuff. Now, Donald Trump raising eyebrows when he mentioned that he spoke to a former president who loves what Trump is doing in Iran and said, I wish I had done it. Trump isn't telling us. Is it Obama? Is it Obama? Is it Bush? Is it Clinton? He won't tell us. He says it would be very bad. But he says a president. The president loves what I'm doing in Iran. Take a look. And yet every president knew, I've spoken to a certain president, who I like actually, a past president, former president. He said, I wish I did it.

I wish I did, but they didn't do it. I'm doing it. Yeah. Which president? I can't tell you that. I don't want to embarrass it. It would be very bad for his career, even though he's got no career. Go ahead.

My instinct here is to file this under things that didn't happen, sir. But your mileage may vary with that. Now, as Americans are struggling with gas prices that are up almost 40 percent, electricity is up, groceries are up, people are genuinely struggling to make ends meat. Trump is talking about how they might use onyx and other precious stones in his ballroom. Not kidding. Is there anything less relatable than the following statements? It's going to be it's on time, on budget. It'll be under budget. Be literally we're having it under budget other than we've upgraded it in terms of the marbles we're using. We're using onyx and stones that are incredible.

But it'll be it'll be something really spectacular. I'm looking at Mr. St. You know, as I've said before, you can't buy class no matter how much money you have. And Trump has a lot of money, at least I think, as far as he claims, and I think he does have a bunch of money. Maybe not as much as he says, but he has a lot of money. But it doesn't matter. You can't make yourself a good person. You can't make yourself classy by just having a lot of money.

And when Americans are struggling to the degree that they are struggling right now, this is just sick. And maybe outdone in terms of sickness by Trump saying, maybe the war against Iran was done out of habit. I got to tell you, this undercuts everything Trump has ever promised about his own foreign policy. Take a look. Zero. We don't need, you know, we don't need oil. We have all the oil we need for ourselves. It's one of the great assets that we have. We have double, more than double what anybody else in terms of oil production, we're at more than double any other country. So we don't need it, But we did it. It's almost, you could say we did it at a habit, which is not a good thing to do.

But we did it because we have some good allies there. We have some great Middle Eastern countries there, Israel there. So we did it for a lot of reasons. You know, the whole promise with Trump was we're not going to do the same old thing. The same old thing that people used to do, presidents used to do, is get into these endless wars because it's simply what the United States does. and Trump ran on, I'm not going to do the same old thing. When Trump says we might have gone to Iran out of habit, the habit of getting entangled in

Middle East wars, Trump is effectively saying all of that stuff I campaigned on that I've been repeating for the last 10 years my entire political career. It was nonsense. It was BS. I'm doing the same old thing of all the people who I criticized. Trump then talking about out of touch talks about how the UFC and the UFC and Dana White are going to build a stadium at the White House for a fight. And it's going to be awesome.

Take a look. I think it's going to be something that's going to be very, very special. We're doing a lot of special things. We have a lot of things happening. We have in the front of the White House on June 14th. You've probably read UFC is going to be here. Dana White, the great Dana White. He's building a literally a stadium, a 5,000 seat arena right outside the front door of the White House.

and they're going to have about 100,000 people in the park right across the street where he's building, I believe, eight massive screens for people to watch. Free, all free, for people to watch. It's June 14th. Happens to be my birthday. That was only by happenstance. It was not planned that way. But it's a Sunday night, which they never did.

Sunday night's super prime time. It's going to be broadcast on CBS. which is the Ellison family, two great people, and great people. It's a great family. And it's going to be a tremendous event. Then we have Roger Penske. He's going to have IndyCar here. We're going to have a race around the Capitol.

That's going to be in August. So we have that. Americans are dying in a war right now. American service members are being injured. Iranian civilians are being killed in a war of choice that Trump started. and which is crashing the economy. And Trump is bragging about how he gave his friend Dana White, this very lucrative cash grab of a USFC fight at the White House.

Dear God. And then finally, as the cognitive decline continues, Trump saying that the new president of Venezuela, he has done a very good job. He, little problem with that, the president of Venezuela is a woman. Literally millions of barrels of oil are being taken out, and it's been a great help, and it's been to their great benefit. The president has done a really good job. We get along with them really well, but we've taken out millions of barrels of oil and brought to Houston and other places to the refineries. We have refinery setups.

Dear God. Oh, man. his brain is fine, folks. We're supposed to believe that his brain is completely fine. And misgendering, which I thought was the biggest crime you could commit to misgender someone. And now all of a sudden Trump's the one misgendering people. This guy's got a real problem. And just wait until you see Trump's confusion about who is currently the president of the United States. Listen, to the Trump supporters watching this, I have a request for you. Just admit that something is very wrong with Donald Trump. I will respect you so much more. You can still say, David,

I disagree with your politics. I agree with Trump's view on foreign policy. I agree with Trump's tariffs. I agree with Trump's tax ideas. Tell me that, but acknowledge that something is very wrong with Trump. Donald Trump referred to Gavin Newsom as the president of the United States. Trump seemed visibly confused and disoriented about who is currently the president. And it goes without saying that it's slightly more ironic to see Donald Trump president sitting in the Oval Office going President Gavin Newscum. Now, many reactions said, oh, the nine second clip has been taken out of context. Well, we have the full clip. And I've got to tell you, the full context is not helpful to Donald Trump at all. Take a look.

Gavin Newscombe has admitted that he is learning disabilities. Honestly, I'm all for people with learning disabilities, but not for my president. I don't want, I think a president should not have learning disabilities, okay? And I know it's highly controversial to say such a horrible thing. The president of the United States, Gavin Newscombe admitted that he has learning disabilities, dyslexia, everything about him is dumb, but then he looked at the... Come on, Maga. Come on, guys.

Just admit something's wrong with your guy. You can still say Biden sucks if that's what you believe. You can still say Obama's bad and Hillary's bad and Kamala's bad and Democrats are bad and and they're all bad and progressives are bad. But are you ready to admit that there is a major malfunction going on with this guy? Gavin Newsom's Twitter account responding, quote, Now that I, Gavin C. Newsom, am officially president of the United States. Thank you, Donald.

I have many big announcements to make. First, every Trump executive order is null and void. Stephen Miller and every Trump goon is fired. And the Trump corruption probe is officially launched. Healthcare is now free for all Americans. No measles. And all moms get free child care. So we can have more babies.

Also, cannabis is now legal. Okay, you get the point. It's just ridiculing Trump and making. fun of Trump. When you see moments like this, it just feeds the concern about Trump's mental sharpness. And supporters end up in what should be a tough spot. If you ignore it, you seem like a hypocrite because of what they said about Joe Biden. If you defend it, you just seem kind of dumb because it's very hard to argue that nothing is wrong with Trump. Or you acknowledge that something is off, in which case, we have to go to the next question, which is, listen, you said, Biden,

should have been removed when he spoke slowly. Donald Trump doesn't even seem to know who's president. So they are put in a really tough position here. Now, the reaction to this initially was it's been taken out of context. You've got to look at more of the video. And so we got more of the video and it's just as bad. And so the picture that is being built is yes, the video captures the cognitive gaff, but how frequently is this happening? now? How often is Trump confused about, I mean, listen, we talk about when you go into a doctor's office, in the note, you will often see that the individual was oriented to time and place. And time, place and what else is? It's like three things. In any case, Donald Trump often

doesn't seem oriented to time and place. He either confuses when it is or where he is in a lot of different ways and sometimes together. At some point, the MAGAs, I believe, are going to have to come and say, okay, here's what we believe this is, or he's almost 80. He'll be 80 in three, three months, not even. He's slowing down, but he's still better than whatever. But it's going to be increasingly difficult for them to make that case, the worse that this gets. And it is getting very, very bad. Have you ever seen what a dictator want to be looks like? Have you ever heard what a dictator wannabe says. Well, one of the things that they say is that they can and will do whatever they want with another sovereign nation. And that is exactly what a swollen, orange and sweaty Donald

Trump said about Cuba. When the topic of Cuba came up, Trump gleefully going Cuba, take a look. Peter. When you say Cuba is next. Cuba. But then we really got to the ugly stuff. It got very, very dark. This is as dark as things have gotten. Trump says he'll do whatever he wants with Cuba. He might free Cuba. He might take Cuba. And he says, you know what? I can do whatever I want.

Take a look. I was just with a fantastic person who's Cuban and made a fortune in sugar. You know, fun whole family, right? And this family wants to go back to Cuba. to visit it. They haven't been back in like 50 years or something. They come from, largely come from Cuba. And we'll see what happens. They were asking me about that. They want to go back. Not only Fon Hul, a lot of Cubans have said, oh boy, would they love to go back? I think Cuba, I don't know, in its own way, if you know, tourism and everything else, it's a beautiful island. Great weather.

They're not in a hurricane zone, which is nice for a change, you know. They won't be asking us. money for hurricanes every week. But I think Cuba's the end. You know, all my life I've been hearing about the United States and Cuba. When will the United States do it? I do believe I'll be the honor of having the honor of taking Cuba. That'd be good honor. That's a big honor. Taking Cuba. Taking Cuba. Taking Cuba. In some form, yeah. Taking Cuba. I mean, whether I free it, take it, I think I could do anything I want with it. You want to know the truth. They're a very, very weekend nation right now they were for a long time very violent very violent leaders Castro was a very violent leader his brothers are very violent leader extremely

violent that's how they governed they governed with violence but a lot of people would like to go back okay it is really difficult not to get desensitized to the insanity of how this has gotten worse and worse and worse and worse over the last 10 years. But this is one of the darkest and most dangerous things I have ever heard any president say. And it's not that different from what Trump has said before, except now with the kidnapping of Maduro,

apparently illegal in his back pocket, with the invasion of Iran, apparently illegal ongoing, Trump is uninhibited, he's unfettered, he is disinhibited. And he is now saying, quite frankly, I'm gonna do whatever I want with Cuba. this is not the American way. This is simply not that. We now have to consider what's going on with the stock market. And Trump has decided that it's a worthwhile sacrifice. If it's your 401k

that you're counting on for retirement and it is now crashing, Trump has decided it's worth it in order to invade Iran. And Trump actually said, you know, I did this thinking the stock market would crash even worse. Now, I don't know if he's telling the truth there or if he's saying it to make it seem as though what's happening isn't that bad. But Trump is actually saying, I decided that an even worse crash was an acceptable sacrifice. Take a look. But I know that. But that's a very small thing compared to allowing them to have, you want to see a stock market cut down? Start letting him hit you with nukes. Okay. I think I said it this morning. I think it's a very small price to pay.

And frankly, I thought it was going to go down much more if you want to know it to. I assume that it was going to go down much more only because people don't understand to a large, it's a great, it's a big chess game at a very high level. So listen, you're the one who has to decide when you vote. Is it a worthwhile sacrifice? Is 380 a gallon gas and climbing now and stocks way down? Is that a worthwhile sacrifice for whatever you're going to do you? you have come to believe is going on in Iran? I think the answer is no. Fox News reporter asking,

can we wrap up the war this week? Trump says yes, but we're not going to. If Iran, as you said, totally obliterated, got the missiles, got the first two rounds of leadership, Air Force gone, maybe gone. Can we wrap this war up this week? Yeah, sure. Okay. Will we? I don't think so, but it'll be said. Well, isn't that nice to know? And then finally, Don't Donald Trump fixated on transgender still take a look. But then I added on no men playing in women's sports and I added in no transgender surgery, the mutilation of our children. We have no mutilation of our children, no transgender.

I think they're, they say that's an 80% issue. I think they're 99% issues, but whether they're 80% of 99. know, as I've said before, this is just not an issue. Trump and Caroline Levitt and others insist, transgender, trans mutilizations, as he wrongly calls them. Men in women's sports, these are huge issues to Americans. They're not. When you poll Americans, they're not big issues. And as I said earlier this week, I'm not going to do it again. There are almost no trans athletes. They're just, they're just, they're just, are almost none. The trans community is tiny. It doesn't mean we don't care about the trans community. We want to treat them well. But the trans community as tiny as a portion

of the population. The percentage of those that are athletics aged is an even smaller slice. The sliver of those that are in competitive athletics is even smaller. Then you've got to only look at trans women because trans men, they don't care about. If you're a biological woman and you want to play with the men in basketball, all right, go. You might just struggle. So we're slicing and slicing and slicing. There are states where the NCAA has zero to two trans athletes. Think about that. And so every time you hear Trump go trans this, trans that, people don't really care about that. A small group that has weaponized it won't stop talking about it. It's not a real issue. The real issues, including affordability, Trump's not dealing with. If you were shopping for a new mattress, I would

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offer only for my audience. Get 27% off everything on their site when you go to helix sleep.com slash Pacman. The link is in the description. Is Donald Trump about to throw a tantrum and quit the presidency if Republicans get crushed in November? A bunch of you believe that that's exactly what is going to happen. I'm going to show you one example. Check this out. Kelly wrote to me one of many who has suggested this and said, quote, David, I suspect that

if Trump loses the House and the Senate and he can't convince anyone that the election was stolen, he will quit and flee the country. He is the ultimate sore loser and knows he will be in endless trials for both his Epstein connection and massive corruption. So is Kelly right? I'm going to tell you what I think. First of all, Kelly is completely right about Trump's tendencies and Trump's traits and Trump's characteristics. She says Trump is a sore loser. Of course, she's completely right. Yes, Trump is an extraordinarily sore loser. Trump is the sorrest loser I've ever seen. He, He won the presidency in 2016, but lost the popular vote to Hillary Clinton. And he still hasn't admitted Hillary Clinton simply got more votes.

He can't admit that. That's 10 years ago now. He lost to Joe Biden in 2020. And he still insists that he won. And he still insists it was rigged. He said it just this week at that very confusing rally that he did. Trump won in 2024, the popular vote and the electoral vote. And he can't just leave it at that.

he still says if the votes were counted fairly, he'd have won every state, including California. And I think Trump does suspect that it will be really bad if Democrats take the House. Why do I say that? Well, Trump has said it. Trump has said, if they win, they'll probably impeach me. It's probably true. Maga Mike Johnson, who conferences regularly with Trump, has said, we could be in real rough shape. The Trump presidency is effectively over if we lose the House in November.

And I think that that's probably true. So Kelly is completely correct in assessing a bunch of Donald Trump's traits and kind of personality characteristics. However, it is the very traits that make Trump so terrible that won't allow him to just walk away. Let me explain what I mean by that. One of the key traits of these ego maniacal, self-centered narcissists like Donald Trump is that they always believe they can talk their way out of it. They're untouchable. They're the smartest person in the room and they will prevail. And so Trump would be very unlikely to walk away because constitutionally and what I don't mean legally. That's I just mean like by Trump's personal makeup, Trump's constitution.

He would see walking away as a sign of weakness and he would always believe that he can get one over on whoever. We've seen this a lot insofar as think back to Donald Trump's criminal trial and depositions. He always thinks he can just go in there and talk to the lawyers that he's smarter and that they're not going to catch him in lies or contradictions. Now, in depositions that has gone really bad for Trump in the criminal trial in which Trump, was of course found guilty of 34 felonies, his lawyers were able to convince him, do not testify. But even though Kelly's premises are very strong, she's got Trump nailed as far as the personality, she's correctly assessed that it will be hell for Trump and probably his family and certainly the Republican Party if Republicans lose in November.

She's gotten all of that right. But Trump's personality is sort of like the most important overarching and overriding factor that will never allow Trump to just go, you know what, I'm getting the hell out of here, J.D. can deal with this. Frankly, it would also be an unusual move to see a president just kind of do that. You typically only see it when they are in deep doo-do like Richard Nixon was in the midst of the Watergate scandal. That is the level that what Trump, Trump's had like 10 water gates.

If we had a different media environment and if we didn't have such a uninformed and kind of propagandized population if we didn't have Fox News since 1996, we might have seen someone like a Trump already have resigned because of any one of the prior scandals the way Richard Nixon did. Because Republicans would have come to him and they said, they would have said, it's not tenable to keep supporting you the way they did to Nixon in the 70s. The reason Republicans haven't done that is because there is essentially nothing Trump could do to really lose his base. I don't know if it's 20%, 22, 24, 26%.

There is some roughly 1 5th to 1 quarter, maybe a little more of the population that will never abandon Donald Trump. And because of that and because of Trump's personality and the media environment, I don't think Trump will ever quit. Marjorie Taylor Green has looked around and is sort of asking what on earth is Donald Trump doing? Now, Marjorie Taylor Green already broke with Trump. but her continued criticism of the specifics of what Trump is doing that goes way above and

beyond simply a personal dispute or the sort of insider baseball politics that can make strange bedfellows, but then all of a sudden you're kicked out of the bed. This is bigger than that. Marjorie Taylor Green continues to to use Trump's word pound and pound Trump. And now she is saying, why on earth from a strategic standpoint, why on earth would Trump go into this war in Iran, unprovoked, optional is what she's saying. It's spiking gas prices. Things will get more expensive.

It's terrible for Republicans. She doesn't get it. Quite frankly, neither do I, but let's listen to what she had to say. Oh, you were a longtime loyal supporter of President Trump, but you broke with him in part because you felt he was too focused on foreign affairs rather than the America first promises he's made on the campaign trail. As we enter day 17 of the Iran War, do you believe the president's voters can trust him? Well, just to be clear, the president broke with me over the Epstein files.

So that always has to be said. He called me a traitor because I stood with women who were raped when they were 14 and 16. But I do completely disagree where the president has led the country. You know what? It makes absolutely no sense, Pamela, going into midterm elections, Let's remove Donald Trump out of it. Let's just put any president in there. Why would an American president lead his political party into the midterms,

waging a full-scale major war, completely unprovoked on Iran, on behalf of Israel, and that's the way most Americans see it. They see this is for Israel, not for America. Why would an American president do that, which is forcing gas prices to hike right here going into spring break where families are going to be driving out of town? going into summer, declaring and waging a major full-scale war that seems to have no end in sight, that is not de-escalating. It's escalating every single day. And it just doesn't make sense. And the American people did not vote for this. This is not what we campaigned for, Pamela.

I went to, I can't even tell you, countless rallies all over the country for President Trump campaigning for him and Republicans because we wanted to win. And we said on every single rally stage, no more foreign wars, no more regime change. It's time to put America first. And this is a complete betrayal of those campaign promises. So listen, it's not news that Marjorie has broken with Trump. This is another example of the degree to which she is really not on Trump's side anymore. She's treating Trump's actions as reckless rather than defending the policy. And it really, reinforces this maga on maga split that has taken place. When Marjorie calls the war unprovoked, of course she's correct.

But a better word would be optional. Now, Trump is trying to insist he had to do it. J.D. Vance, Marco Rubio, they're trying to insist. There was no choice here. He absolutely had to do it. But the more information we get, the more we realize that's not true. And then she says, look, we're seven and a half months from an election. Republicans stand potentially to lose the House, but maybe even the Senate.

That's me saying it based on the data we have, not Marjorie. Why on earth would Trump do this, especially when the American people didn't vote for it, aka they didn't want it? The American people are looking around at what's going on domestically. They're looking at 92,000 jobs lost last month. They're looking at gas up almost 40% since January, just a couple of months. And so the broader pattern here is we are seeing more Republicans go, it's not just the disagreement with the personality of Trump. Those Republicans have been around for a while. It's people

who are saying, I don't agree with the policy at all. Now, of course, Marjorie is in a position that makes doing that much more plausible because she quit. She quit Congress. And what I would love to see, and I don't know if they have the audacity to do it, I don't know if they have the balls to do it, which is what about more Republicans in power who have table stakes and have something to lose who could come out and go, hey, you know what? This I don't agree with. This is bad policy. This is bad for the country.

And also they could make it self-centered. They could make it just about it's bad for our party. A lot of us are gonna lose if this continues. We've got an optional war combined with rising costs. And there's really no way to argue that Trump is helping the average person right now. And instead of defending Trump, Marjorie is building a case against Trump that's based in fact. for her for doing that, even if I disagree with her philosophy in most areas. But come on, Republicans, are you ready to finally call it like it is? Like I said earlier, we'll still disagree, but I'll

respect you so much more if you're ready to say it. Getting ready for a game means being ready for anything. Like packing a spare stick. I like to be prepared. That's why I remember 988, Canada's suicide crisis hubline. It's good to know just in case. Anyone can call or text for free confidential support from a train responder anytime. 988 suicide crisis helpline is funded by the government in Canada. When WestJet first took flight in 1996, the vibes were a bit different. People thought denim on denim was peak fashion, inline skates were everywhere, and two out of three women rocked, the Rachel.

While those things stayed in the 90s, one thing that hasn't is that fuzzy feeling you get when WestJet welcomes you on board. Here's to WestJetting since 96. Travel back in time with us and actually travel with us at WestJet. com slash 30 years. In Packman show is an audience supported program and the best, most direct way to support the show is by becoming a member at join packman.com. You'll get the daily bonus show, the daily commercial free show, and plenty of other

great membership perks. Get the full experience by signing up at join packman.com. Donald Trump does not like getting corrected. And what he doesn't like even more than that is getting corrected in public. And what he doesn't like even more than that is getting corrected in public by someone he sees as a beta, aka anyone from Europe. And that is exactly what happened with the Irish leader who visited the White House. But it was even worse than that.

Donald Trump is also just saying I might do more things that are against the law. Now, what is another crime or two between friends when this is one of the most criminal presidents I've ever seen? I know. Just another crime. stack them up, but Trump was asked by a reporter, you thinking of getting out of NATO? And Trump goes, well, you know what? I can do whatever I want. If I want to get out of NATO, I'll just get us out of NATO, which isn't how the law works.

But we'll get to that in a second. Take a look. Are you rethinking of the United States' relationship with NATO possibly getting out? Well, I've disappointed in NATO that we spend trillions of dollars on NATO. Think of it. Trillions over the years, many trillions of dollars. It's one of the reasons we have deficits and we help other countries. And when they don't help us, I mean, it's certainly something that we should think about.

I don't need Congress for that decision. As you probably know, I can make that decision myself. I'd work with some very smart people. And I'd always deal with Congress anyway, but I don't need Congress for that decision. But, you know, when you say rethink, I have nothing currently in mind, but I will say that, that I'm not exactly thrilled when we help them with Ukraine. Look, Ukraine would have been over in one day if we didn't help. Frankly, Ukraine would have been over in the first day.

They had the best equipment in the world. It was our equipment given by Slippy Joe Biden. No charge, no charge. Hundreds of billions of dollars are the best equipment in the world. No charge. I will say that I'm not happy about it. Well, that is not true, Donald. You are very, very wrong about that.

The president of the United States cannot single-handedly withdraw the U.S. from NATO. Congress must approve it. Now, I'm not naive to the reality that Trump would have no problem signing something that says we're out of NATO, an executive order and saying, I got us out of NATO. But it's important to remember that executive orders are sort of like memos. Here is what I would like you to do. Most executive orders are not actually doing anything. they are directing someone to do it. Not always the case, but for many, it is. And so Trump's not going to be

able to presidential memo us out of NATO as much as he would like. Now, the stock market, you might remember it hit 50,000. They talked a lot about it. Christy Noam talked about it and Pam Bondi talked about it. Trump, it's nowhere near 50,000 right now. Maybe it'll get back there. I would love that. My retirement account would love that, but that's not where we are right now. Trump now has a new sort of approach to explaining the stock market and the Iran invasion, which is the Dow got to 50,000. So I said, hey, we're doing so well. Let's do a little incursion, which Trump is confused about and calls an excursion. Take a look. But I went to Susie. I always go to Susie. I said, Susie, do you mind if I take a little excursion here? Do you mind if I, you know, we're hitting all

these records, right? Most more people are working in the United States today than ever before. I could name this. I don't want to bore you because this is all about Ireland. This is all about – but you're a big part of it because you're a big part of this country. But I said, do you mind if I take a little excursion, my chief of staff, because I want to do this. I have Marco here. We have a lot of our great people. J.D. is here.

They're all here. I say, let's do this. We've got to do it right. It should have been done by many presidents. It should have been done long before 47 years. It's 40 years of living in terror. You know, they're called the bully of the Middle East, but they're really the bully of the world because he used oil to bribe, right?

They used oil to bribe and to, you know, gain power. I don't know what they gained. What did they gain? What the hell? How are they doing? Not so good. So Trump doesn't know what words mean. Remember when Trump would always, he still says it.

They're opening up insane. They're emptying insane asylums into the United States. And we've thought about what is. he mean? And it seems Trump doesn't understand the difference between seeking political asylum and an insane asylum. He's confused. Similarly, Trump keeps saying that what he's doing in Iran is an excursion. An excursion is like, hey, let's go out and get ice cream. We're going out on an excursion. An incursion, which is what Trump means, but he doesn't know the word, is usually the way it's defined is a brief attack or military operation, an incursion.

Trump keeps calling it an excursion. He doesn't know what the hell is going on. Trump asked, are you afraid that it could get really bad? It could turn into Vietnam if you put boots on the ground in Iran. Trump goes, no, I'm not afraid of anything. Because the Iranian regime is still starting to use. If you put boots on the ground in Iran, it will be another Vietnam. Are you afraid of that?

No, I'm not afraid of. I'm really not afraid of anything. This is a perfect illustration of why this entire. higher approach to politics is wrong. In Trump world, in the manosphere, if you admit you're afraid of something, it means you aren't alpha. You're not a big strong boy, which Trump wants to be. In the civilized world, we understand the adaptive evolutionary value of fear. We acknowledge fear is sometimes the appropriate emotion. When fear helps you behave correctly by assessing and evaluating risk, we remember, oh, yeah, fear is how we survived for so long.

Being tuned to when we should be afraid is part of what led to this human survival over 250,000 years for modern humans. Trump and MAGA don't get that. I'm not afraid of anything. Afraid, only sissies are afraid. And Trump, I guess, not being afraid of anything applies to. are you afraid that if you go into Iran, gas will spike 40%. No, I'm not afraid of anything.

Well, it happened. Are you afraid that if we go into Iran for regime change, the regime will stay in place? No, I'm not afraid of anything. Well, it's happening. They believe fear is a bug. But in reality, fear is a feature that Trump has learned to suppress. Trump asked about the question about the Irish president saying, that what Trump is doing in Iran violates international law.

Trump couldn't hear it. Trump regularly can't hear it. What do you think about our president's comments that your actions on Iran is breaking international law? Say it? What do you think about our president's comments? Can you speak it right into your phone? All right.

All right. So Trump not really able to hear particularly well, but then this is just an amazing moment. Trump corrected. and and sort of rebutted by the Irish leader on the issue of Europe. Take a look. Yes, excuse me. First of all, I would say, like, Europe is still a very good place to live in. Good.

A lot of just to let you know. I'm glad to hear that. And our view is you have to have robust and fair rules around migration. But on the other hand, a lot of people, you know, within the European Union, we free mobility of people. And in Ireland, our population is growing, but in a very positive way. Our economy is going well because we're attracting a lot of people from Europe and beyond into work legally and validly. In a country, in fact, I'd love if we could develop a legal pathway between the U.S. and Ireland into the future because of our history and so on like that, that we could have a legal pathway because no one is in favor of illegal migration and so forth.

So you have to have robust rules for that. But fundamentally, I think sometimes Europe gets characterized wrongly in terms of it. being overrun or whatever like that. It's much more robust now, it's much more stronger mechanism in place to facilitate legal migration. And I think it's important

that I have understanding to say we need more economic growth in Europe. It doesn't have the same focus on innovation as you do here in the US. We discussed that earlier with Vice President in terms of technology in terms of AI. We need to pivot more to innovation

as opposed to regulation. And I think investing in people, you know, and that's the key to, I think, our collective future. If there's anything Trump doesn't like, it's being corrected in public. Most of the people around Trump who Trump can fire know that you don't correct Trump in public. That's why nobody's gone to him and said, hey, when you say insane asylums, it doesn't make any sense. Hey, when you say you're going to cut prices 1,300 percent, it doesn't make any sense. The people that work for Trump know that. But other leaders, some of them, just say what's on their mind.

And Trump did not like that. Finally, as gas prices spike, as oil prices spike, as electricity spikes, wouldn't this be a logical time to really go full bore into alternatives and renewable energy? Trump goes, we're going to stop all windmills in the United States. Take a look. See, why are they buying oil from Norway? But they have windmills all over the country destroying those gorgeous Scottish fields and those beautiful fields all over the windmills, which don't work. They're tremendously expensive. And the best testament to that is the windmills are made in China, but China doesn't use them.

You know what China uses coal? They're building 58 coal fire plants right now, and that's up to them. But these foolish countries that are buying windmills are putting them out of business, I'm proudly telling you that we're going to try and have no windmills built in the United States during my they're very bad they're very bad environmentally they kill the birds they're unsightly they make a lot of noise and for some reason uh the environmentalist love windmills okay you say he's a very nice man i think he's the next as usual if the priority were what's best for the american people you would say let's get off of gas so that way when i do stuff like what I did in Iran, it won't make your transportation costs of fuel go up nearly 40%

in two months. But no, Trump has a personal vendetta against so-called windmills, and that's what he's doing. Ladies and gentlemen, they can't cover up Trump's hands anymore. And I mean that figuratively, and I mean that literally. Once again, just hours ago, footage of Trump's rotting hand going viral because it's another new color. This time, Trump's hand looks green and it looks abnormal and it looks sickly. And viewers, of course, have been speculating. Bruising, circulation issue, something else. I want to remind you that the questions around Donald Trump's hands have been floating around now for several months. First, it was he's bruised and it's turning black from shaking hands. But except the problem was he had the bruise on both hands. He had the bruise on both

hands. And Trump only shakes hands with his right hand. So that didn't really make sense. Then it was, well, Trump's on blood thinners. And so that happens. But that doesn't really make any sense. Trump then getting very self-conscious about the black hand. So he started putting his face makeup on it. It clashed terribly and looked even worse. And then now it's starting to look kind of green. And the video is, of course, spreading virally because when Trump's hands are looking worse and worse and they don't even acknowledge that there's a real problem here. People start to notice and go, what the hell is going on here? And the visual of it is so powerful because there's no explanation. People are just looking at the hand and it looks terrible. Now, I still genuinely don't really

know what is up with this. The continued speculation, especially because of both hands, is Trump getting regular IVs for something? And then when you open that door up, everybody's got their own idea. Is it medication for Alzheimer's? Is it who could be anything? We just don't know. Now, what this relates to are growing questions about Trump's condition more broadly. And I have no clue what that condition is. We've had all sorts of experts on the show who claim to know. I don't know. We've heard everything from frontotemporal dementia to heart failure to everything in between. I don't know. There's a lot of speculation. Something seems very wrong. Just in the last 24 hours, we have also had a viral moment where Trump referred to Gavin Newsom as the president of the United States.

So we've got the unexplained hand stuff, confusion about who is the president. All of this is fueling questions as to whether the oldest president in the history of the United States, Trump can do it. Is he medically fit to do it? I don't know the answer. but I know a lot of you increasingly believe the answer is no. And without some real explanation as to what is going on, I don't think we can say that Trump is fit. That's for sure.

We have a phenomenal bonus show today. I'll tell you what I've been up to here in Chicago, Illinois. Wow. Very interesting stuff. We also next week are running a week long membership drive. We will be releasing gas from Trump and taking control of gas. to speak, by discounting memberships on my website down to the price of a gallon of gas. It will change every day and follow the price of gas.

The price of gas is way up thanks to Trump. But relative to our normal membership pricing, it's way down. So we will be doing that next week. If you want to be notified, just get on my substack newsletter, substack. davaddap.dap.dap.dap.com. I'll see you on the bonus show.