The David Pakman Show - Republicans drop Trump as Noem impeachment is happening

Episode Date: January 13, 2026

-- On the Show -- Janet Mills, Governor of Maine, joins us to discuss her campaign for the Democratic nomination for the U.S. Senate -- Republican Senators Thom Tillis and Lisa Murkowski block Donald Trump Federal Reserve nominees after the Justice Department opens a criminal probe into Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell -- Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth delivers a culture war speech, mocks military readiness, and announces Elon Musk artificial intelligence tools entering the Pentagon -- White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt falsely claims evidence against Renee Nicole Good, defends the officer who killed her, and states Donald Trump fully supports the shooting -- Karoline Leavitt defends ICE actions in Minneapolis, attacks protesters, threatens Greenland, and suggests airstrikes on Iran remain an option -- Donald Trump displays new slurping sounds during speeches, prompting discussion of possible breathing or neurological issues -- Donald Trump posts a series of erratic Truth Social messages threatening tariffs, attacking courts and warning of retribution against political opponents -- Democratic lawmakers move forward with impeachment efforts against Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem following the killing of Renee Nicole Good by a federal ICE agent -- On the Bonus Show: A Minnesota Hilton cancels ICE agents' reservations, Trump calls for a 10% cap on credit card interest rates, Elon Musk's X faces bans over nonconsensual bikini images, and much more... ⚠️ Ground News: Get 40% OFF their unlimited access Vantage plan at https://ground.news/pakman 🛡️ Incogni lets you control your personal data! Get 60% off their annual plan: http://incogni.com/pakman -- Become a Member: https://davidpakman.com/membership -- Subscribe to our (FREE) Substack newsletter: https://davidpakman.substack.com -- Get David's Books: https://davidpakman.com/echo -- TDPS Subreddit: http://www.reddit.com/r/thedavidpakmanshow -- David on Bluesky: https://davidpakman.com/bluesky -- David on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/davidpakmanshow (00:00) Start (01:17) Republican senators block nominees (07:15) Hegseth culture war speech (17:51) Leavitt falsely defends shooting (24:36) Leavitt defends ICE & threatens (31:02) Trump slurping sounds discussed (37:02) Janet Mills interview (52:05) Trump erratic Truth Social posts (59:40) Dems push Noem impeachment    

Republicans are starting to tell Donald Trump no, at least some of them. Two Republican senators are going to block every single Trump nominee to the Federal Reserve because of his politicized probe into Jerome Powell. Then we're going to talk about maybe one of the most disturbing things you'll see today, which is Trump's top defense official melting down on stage and then announcing that Elon Musk's Grock AI will be inside the Pentagon network. this possibly be a good idea? Caroline Levitt resurfaces with maybe her worst and most humiliating public appearance yet admits

far more than she probably intended to, including threats, smears, and chilling rhetoric. We're also going to look at the slurping. If you don't know what this is about, it's disturbing. Make sure you're not eating during that segment. And finally, Democratic lawmakers are finally going to move forward. forward to try to impeach Christy Noam after disaster after disaster involving the Department of Homeland Security, all of that and so much more. All right, what a show today.

Before I forget, if you live in Lisbon, Portugal, either because that's where you're from or you've moved there, including from the United States or from some other place, I've got some stuff coming up in Lisbon. I would love to connect with some of the folks in the audience. who are there. So shoot me an email info at David Pakman.com. That's Lisbon, Portugal. All right.

There are some Republicans starting to tell Donald Trump no. We have two Republican senators who are now going to block Donald Trump's nominees to the Federal Reserve because the Justice Department, as I told you yesterday, launched this criminal investigation targeting the Fed chairman Jerome Powell. They are calling it exactly what it is. First up is Tom Tillis, who by the way, is not running for re-election. So he's in a position where he can do this. Tillis announced he is now going to oppose every single Trump nominee to the Federal Reserve

until that DOJ investigation into Jerome Powell is resolved. We then are also hearing. Oh, but I should mention by the way, Tillis is on the Senate Banking Committee. They control whether Fed nominees even get out of the gate. So this is not a symbolic thing. This is a guy with actual power to screw up Trump's plans for remaking the Federal Reserve in his own image or whatever. All right. Next, Lisa Murkowski. She said she personally spoke with Jerome Powell and described this DOJ investigation as nothing more than an attempt at coercion. Those are her words. That's a Republican senator. She said

Tom Tillis's blockade is something she's going to get behind. She said that they are right to attempt to freeze every Fed nomination until this is resolved. So what is it that is going on here? As I told you yesterday, Donald Trump's Justice Department is investigating the sitting Fed Reserve chair, the guy who's responsible for interest rates in addition to working in concert with the other Fed governors. And Republican senators are acknowledging what I said yesterday, which is this is Trump trying to intimidate the Fed. This is Trump saying, I didn't get the interest rates I wanted. So now I'm going to try to make your life a living hell. Of course, the Fed is supposed to be independent. The Fed is not supposed to be swayed by the personal wishes and desires and wet dreams

of the president of the United States. Now, where it gets interesting is that the banking committee chaired by Tom Tillis has 13 Republicans and 11 Democrats. If Tillis holds his ground and Democrats vote no, Trump's picks will hit a 12 to 12 deadlock if it's party lines plus Tillis's vote going with the Democrats. That doesn't automatically kill the nominations, but it would make the process extremely difficult and also politically explosive where you could end up with Republicans saying, listen, we need Tillis's vote. And we're not going to have Tillis's vote if and until the DOJ probe is resolved.

So you could end up with the other 12 Republicans on the Senate banking committee going to the president and saying you got to order this investigation to be stopped or ended. Now, according to policy analysts getting around the deadlock if they don't simply go to Trump and say end the probe would require some procedural gymnastics, including maybe blowing past the filibuster. So it doesn't appear that without Tom Tillis's vote in the Senate. banking committee, Trump can steamroll this. And Murkowski has a track record here. She voted with Democrats against one of Trump's nominees last year. And so this is not just talk. There are even

right wing policy groups and media outlets saying what the DOJ is doing is counterproductive because in the end it may prevent Donald Trump from getting any of his Fed nominees sworn in, which is a polite way of saying this is completely backfired. Trump doesn't know what he's doing. Trump wants leverage over the Fed, but he's doing something that is going to take that leverage away. He has united Democrats against his nominees and he is causing some Republicans to peel off. And so this is not a left wing led rebellion. This is Republicans now creating a real problem for Donald Trump. The resistance is coming from his own party. And these are the sorts of cracks that can lead to things breaking. Now, as I told you yesterday, Jerome Powell does not seem to be backing down.

Since I reported on this on yesterday's show, we learned that Jerome Powell has hired an extremely aggressive law firm whose name escapes me right now. And I should have looked it up. In fact, let me see if I can find it. Jerome Powell hires law firm. What is the law firm? He has hired Williams and call it Connolly. And that is an extremely aggressive firm that knows how to deal with exactly these sorts

of investigations. You don't hire them if your plan is to roll over is the point that I am inarticulately trying to make here. So we are going to see how this develops. And then again, I, this is so important to remind people of every single time. You don't typically see the dumping of interest rates, the decline in interest rates that Trump is demanding if the economy is good. Trump is simultaneously telling us this is a phenomenal economy.

is humming along beautifully, but I want the Fed to cut interest rates in the way that they typically only do during massive economic calamities. So they can't both be true unless I guess you were Donald Trump. Powell does not appear to be backing down. Top Trump tool Pete Hagseth, the Secretary of Defense, reunited in a beautiful love affair with Elon Musk and denounced if you can believe. believe this, that GROC AI, the X artificial intelligence LLM is going to be allowed inside the Pentagon. Does this sound like a good idea to anybody?

Forget about accuracy. Forget about the politics of it. Do we want Elon's AI run by, you know, random 20 year olds that he's put in charge of it inside the sensitive network of the Pentagon. We will get to that in a moment. Here is Pete Hegseth still going with this hole. No fat people, no dudes and dresses. We are really revising how the Pentagon is going to work.

First is we're reviving the warrior ethos. We want to get rid of the distractions and the debris. No more DEI, no more dudes and dresses, no more climate. change worship and social justice and political correctness, we're done with that. We're unleashing the warfighter to be ready, trained, disciplined, accountable, and lethal. When you allow them to do that, they're incredibly good at their job, as the world has seen and as a indicted criminal in Venezuela found out about a week ago. Yeah. You know, I would never use phrases like this, because it's just, it's just not me.

But I got about a dozen emails from people in the audience characterizing this video the exact same way, which is that Heg Seth is a little bitch. Now, I would never say that. I think that those terms are unproductive. It's unbecoming of a program like this. But I'm just mentioning to you, many in the audience wrote to me and said that. Now, I want to do a little, this is not a thought experiment. This is a practical question.

Think very carefully here. Does this approach, we are going to get rid of our dudes and dresses and no more DEI and all of this stuff? If you are living in Milwaukee or Des Moines or Oklahoma City or Fort Lauderdale and you are struggling to feed your family, struggling to make rent, struggling to afford replacing a flat tire on your car. And you hear that Trump has proposed increasing the military budget from 960 billion to 1.5 trillion. And the guy in charge of a lot of this is Pete Hegseth, who goes, we're going to get dudes and dresses out of the military. Do you hear that they are working for you? Does it sound like your stress about not being able to replace that spare tire or having to choose between paying your now double. health care premiums and food is a choice that now is not going to be one because Trump is going

to fix it for you. Does it sound like they are bringing solutions to those problems when you hear this? I think the answer is very obviously no. Pete Hegseth indicating that there haven't been a lot of boats sunk lately because they can't find any boats to sink. They got them all, I guess is the implication. Waters, we will target your drug boats and we will sink them. There haven't been many boats sunk recently because we can't find boats to sink because no one

wants to get in a narco boat, which is the whole point. Stop sending your drugs to our country and poisoning the American people. And it's not just you. His delivery and his whole demeanor on stage is very, very strange. Now then we get to the really big, toxic, disgusting. horrifying announcement that has been made, which is that Elon Musk is now once again being greeted as a hero after a little period of time during which things were a little rough between the Trump administration and Elon Musk.

And Pete Hegseth announces the AI chat bot Grock controlled by the former Twitter now X will be joining the AI engine operating inside the. U.S. Pentagon. This seems like a very, very bad idea. Thank you. Today, we're excited to announce the next frontier AI model company to join GenaI. dot mill, and that is Grock from XAI, which will go live later this month. Very soon we will have the world's leading AI models on every unclassified and classified network.

Uh, what? Throughout our department, long overdue. And we will not employ AI models that won't allow you to fight wars. We will judge AI models on this standard alone. Factually accurate, mission relevant, without ideological constraints that limit lawful military applications. Department of War AI will not be woke. It will work for us. It will not generate images of dudes and dresses.

We're building war-ready, weapons and systems not chatbots for an Ivy League faculty lounge. Yeah, one of the things Grock does and does regularly is it will make non-consensual artificial intelligence created nude and sexually explicit images of people in the public eye. That is exactly what we need inside the Pentagon. This seems like a disastrous idea. They did give Elon Musk a chance to speak. And he said, we want to make Starfleet Academy real. We want to make Star Trek real. And the always articulate and dynamic Elon Musk bringing his gravitas to this. And I'll tell you a little bit just about the purpose of SpaceX.

It's like we want to make Star Trek real. Okay. We want to make Starfleet Academy real so that it's not always science. fiction, but one day the science fiction turns to science fact. And we have spaceships going through space, big spaceships, with people going to other planets, going to the moon, and ultimately going beyond our star system to other star systems where we made me aliens or discover long-dead alien civilizations. I don't know.

We want to go and we want to see what's happening. And we want to have epic futuristic spaceships with lots of people in them traveling to places we've never been to before. It's really, it's really, really cool. Now listen, I'm the first to say I think space exploration is a valuable use of money and resources and we learn so much about ourselves and develop technologies. And I'm all for it. It's the combination of Elon.

being so involved in both the administration and also in the technology that is being allowed in. And meanwhile, as people are struggling, he was meant to find the waste, fraud, and abuse and get rid of it. Turns out they couldn't really find it. Still not a single person charged with any of the fraud that supposedly took place. And then he is being given the heroes welcome to talk about making Starfleet Academy real. So my skepticism is not about the worthiness of space.

exploration, my skepticism is about putting Elon Musk in charge of any of this stuff. We're going to take a break after the break. Caroline Levitt has resurfaced. It's not so good. I'll tell you that. One challenge in covering politics today is that even when outlets are reporting the same facts, they often are framing the stories really differently. And our sponsor, Ground News, is a website and app that makes those differences easy to see.

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Or you can sign yourself up at substack. David Pakman.com. Caroline Levitt resurfaced Donald Trump's White House Press Secretary. She appeared on Fox News and then she spoke directly to reporters in what is called a scrum. When she appeared on Fox News, she said maybe one of the most disgusting and dishonest things she has ever said. And that takes a lot because she lies every single time she speaks to the media. She referred to the deceased 37-year-old Renee Good killed by the ICE officer as a deranged lunatic and says there's lots of evidence that she struck the ICE officer with her vehicle.

That is not what any of the video suggests, but let's listen to what she had to say. About this case from the very beginning and they have had to change their story and their narrative because at first you heard Democrats, including the mayor of Minneapolis, saying that the car never struck the officer and the lethal force was unjustified. Now, of course, there is plentiful video evidence to show that the officer was struck by the car, that this deranged lunatic woman was trying to ram him over with her vehicle and was using that vehicle as a weapon, which justifies domestic terrorism. And unfortunately, we are seeing these instances play out in American communities across the country

where you have these organized paid antagonists who are part of these groups that are actively, unlawfully, impeding lawful law enforcement operations. They are harassing and targeting ICE agents, trying to make it impossible, again, for them to carry out their duties. That's what was happening in this case. That officer used his training. I understand that he's been on the force and he's been protecting American communities for many, many years. He's an experienced and brave individual who unfortunately had to make a very tough decision and was put in that position by these paid agitators who have been doing this all over the country.

Of course, no evidence that any of that took place. And when she says there is plentiful video evidence that Renee Good struck the officer with her car, Does she mean there is no evidence whatsoever? And this is the problem when you get into this web of lies. When you jump the gun and you get out ahead of your skis and you call the officer a hero and Renee Good, a domestic terrorist and all the stuff, you can't back off of it. They end up in a situation where they cannot constitutionally. And I don't mean like capital C like the constitution in terms of their makeup.

What makes them them? They are unable to just come out and say, we got out ahead of the facts a little bit. And it turns out that it's different. They can't do it. They won't do it. We now have, okay, I have a lot of these clips here to go through. She was then asked about whether Donald Trump believes the actions of the ICE officer were justified. And she says, of course his actions were justified.

Of course they were. In terms of what happened last Wednesday and the officer who was involved in the shooting, does the president stand fully behind that officer, that agent? does the president believe his actions were justified? Absolutely. And I think the more evidence that comes out shows the officer was justified, and President Trump was right about this all along. And who was wrong?

The Democrat Party and the mainstream media, who despicably have been lying about this officer and about this case from the very beginning. And they have had to change their story and their narrative. Because at first, you heard Democrats, including the mayor of Minneapolis, saying that the car never struck, the officer and the lethal force was unjustified. Now, of course, there is plentiful video evidence

to show that the officer was struck by the car. All right. So now we get into the part that that we looked at before. Um, listen, I, uh, I don't expect. Let me put it this way. I don't expect a fulsome and complete robust investigation of the incident because federal authorities are already blocking state authorities from carrying that out. And I don't expect that we will ever hear this administration simply say, hey, we were wrong about this. If and this is a huge if and at this point, not a particularly, not a particularly likely one. If indeed we see some authority decide we are going to charge the ICE officer. And if the evidence is not so good in terms of the ICE officer's actions, in other words,

if this starts to go south for the perspective of the administration, I assume that they will do what they never actually do, which is to back away and go, listen, we're not putting our thumb on the scale one way or the other. They're going to just kind of back off and they will never say, we were wrong about it. Now remember, if there were to be charges and they are federal, Trump can just pardon the guy. And so that's another sort of framework that's important to keep in mind with regard to if the with the importance of this being a state investigation. I'm with Tim Walls, the governor of Minnesota, who said he doesn't believe there is going to be

a complete investigation because that is being blocked right now by federal authorities. I think he is completely right. Finally, Caroline Levitt asked, does that this is now switching gears during this Fox interview. This is about the investigation of Jerome Powell. Does the president believe in the independence of the Federal Reserve and listen very carefully to Caroline Levitt's answer. A final question on the independence of the Fed. There are some concerned at this moment based on the new actions by the feds to open a probe

into the Federal Reserve Chair, Jerome Powell. President Trump has made it very clear how he feels about the Federal Reserve Chair and his actions while chairing the Fed. Can you assure independence of the Federal Reserve? And where will this be going next, this probe? Well, look, as for the criminal probe, you'll have to ask. the Department of Justice about that. They are in charge. I do know one thing is for sure. Jerome Powell has proven he's not very good at his job. And of course, not being good at your job

is not a crime and it would not justify a completely partisan investigation of Jerome Powell. But this is Trump world that we are living in. Caroline Levitt may be the most dishonest press secretary, but also arguably effective because she has no scruples or limits to the lies that she is willing to tell. It was a little different when she was in a scrum with reporters. Let's talk about that. Caroline Levitt went out there and participated in a scrum with reporters outside of the White House. And she says that this is an administration that is steadfastly, wholeheartedly, and in a committed

way standing behind the, the American people, no, the officers of ICE. That is, that's who needs the support of this administration the most right now, according to Caroline Love. Homeland Security, but our national security. And this administration will continue to stand wholeheartedly by the brave men and women of ICE, including that officer in Minneapolis, who was absolutely justified in using self-defense against it, a lunatic who was part of a group. an organized group to interject and to impede on law enforcement operations.

Yeah. How about standing behind the American people? How about declaring that opinions and speech are not valid reasons to be roughed up, pepper balled, sprayed, and even killed by federal officers? Wouldn't that maybe be the more appropriate and courageous position to take? Caroline Leavitt was asked about Christy Noem, who is about to get impeached, the Secretary of Homeland Security. And not surprisingly, Caroline Leavitt goes, she is doing such a great job.

Secretary Christine Noam has been front and the center in response to this ice video. Is the president satisfied with her efforts there? By the way, the context is that there are a lot of reports that Trump is about to fire. And all of her media interviews? Yes, 100%. President Trump and I actually spoke about this last night. how Secretary Noem is doing a phenomenal job, not just securing the border, which she and the president did together in record time, but also in defense of the brave men and women of ICE,

who put on a law enforcement uniform every single day to protect our communities and to protect all of you. And every American, regardless of they are Democrat or Republican, ICE is doing a very important job to remove illegal alien criminals from our communities. And I think it's very striking that all weekend long, you had agitators and violent American citizens out in the streets of Minneapolis protesting. Protesting what exactly? Apparently, they are protesting the removal of heinous murderers and rapists and criminals from a city that I can guarantee you when you look at the list of the illegal criminals that ICE is removing from our communities every day. Not as you know, I have still not heard from a single leftist who says,

individuals who have been credibly accused or have committed crimes, not just being here illegally, which is, of course, a civil infraction. I have not heard anybody on the left in my circles, which I admit include a lot of the common sense leftists. I've not heard anybody die on the hill of those folks should simply be allowed to stay in the United States. What people are protesting and what we are activating against are the number one, potentially unconstitutional methods that are being applied here, the door to door stuff and all

of these other things. And also the fact that we were told one thing by this administration at the start of this entire process and they are just going, they're going to home depots and just wrapping up workers, people just looking for to work and earn a day's a day's wage. They are not doing what even they said they were going to do. And yes, it does seem that there are constitutional and legal violations here of all sorts as well. Now, in terms of Trump having full confidence in Christy Nome. Well, we will see. It seems that she is about to get impeached. And also, there are rumors that Donald Trump is about to fire her. Caroline Levitt asked about the Democratic response. And she said the following about who really

wants to protect pedophiles. Now, I just want to remind you, they still have not released the full Epstein file. The left. And I think that it just shows you where the modern day Democrat party stands today in protecting illegal alien predophiles and rapists and murderers over law-abiding American citizens and our brave men and women who serve in law enforcement. All right. And then she dumps a thinly veiled threat here, a very thinly veiled threat with regard to Greenland and says, you know, it's in Greenland's interests to be part of the United States. Nice little country you've got here would really be a shame. something were to happen to it.

I don't know he has not set a timeline, but it's definitely a priority for she's asking about Greenland and I think the president was very clear last night. He said that he wants to see the United States acquire Greenland because he feels that if we do not, then it will eventually be acquired or even perhaps hostily taken over by either China or Russia. Someone else is going to steal it. So we're going to steal it ourselves first. Which is not a good thing for the United States or for Europe or for Greenland as well. Let's not forget. It would not just be in the best interest of the United States, but perhaps it would be in the

best interest of Greenland as well to be parted. Greenland doesn't even know it, but they would be much better off as part of the United States. Finally, Levitt says that airstrikes on Iran are on the table. More bombs from the anti-war president, the rightful winner of the FIFA Peace Prize. Strikes off the table in Iran and does he believe there's a potential path to end the protest there without military action? Well, I think one thing President Trump is very good at is always keeping all of his options on the table. And air strikes would be one of the many, many options that are on the table for the commander-in-chief.

Diplomacy is always the first option for the president. He's told all of you last night that what you're hearing publicly from the Iranian regime is quite differently from the messages the administration is receiving privately. I think the president has an interest in exploring those messages. However, with that said, the president has shown he's unafraid to use military options if and when he deems necessary. And nobody knows that better than Iraq. And of course, the peace president seems to be deeming it necessary a lot of the time. Caroline Levitt, she really just can't help herself anymore.

Donald Trump has been known for sniffing when he speaks for a long time. But now he's slurping. Donald Trump has a new symptom and it's raising a lot of red flags. Now, let me explain for a long time, people have noticed that Donald Trump sniffs strangely when speaking. We even made a compilation of this from one of Donald Trump's recent speeches. Remember this? Good evening, America.

All right. And I apologize if people are eating. That is very, very disgusting stuff. So Trump has been known for that sniffing noise for a very long time. He is now doing something new. Trump is slurping instead of sniffing. Now, you hear it at the start of this video. Take a listen. That. And there are a lot of examples of this. We go, for example, to Trump's recent interview with Sean Hannity. Take a listen to this. This is, this is, and again, I, this is disgusting stuff.

To our country, nobody did anything about it. You hear that and we have another one. But the cartels are running and they're killing 250,000, 300,000 people. There you go. We've got another one. To live in their home. Every day, people are knocking on their door every hour. And it's just a great honor to be involved with it. The ICE and Border Patrol and all of the people have been so good, Tom Holman, Christy Knoem.

You hear it. Trillions of Dallas, but we're going to be there until we. Another slurp there and one more for you. All right. So what is this about? A lot of you have written to me about this. There are two hypotheses here. Okay. The first is this is a breathing issue before Trump struggled to breathe, but he still could through his nose, but it was loud. Now, as maybe he has diminishing strength for these breaths through the nose, he's taking these extra breaths through his mouth. And if there's any saliva in there, it makes noise. And it could be that. But there's another aspect to this that a lot of medical professionals, have started to weigh in on. The thought is that what is taking place is that Donald Trump is losing his passive swallow reflex. This is a natural reflex. Most of us aren't controlling when we blink. Now that I mentioned it, I'm thinking very much about my blinking. But normally we aren't thinking about that. We normally don't even control like when we are breathing. And now that I'm saying

it, I realize that between phrases, I will sometimes take a breath as I did right there. But it's normally something that just happens naturally. Similarly, the swallow reflex, that passive swallow reflex while you're sleeping while you are just hanging out, you don't even notice. Now I noticed I just swallowed because I mentioned it and I'm paying attention to it. But the point here is if you start to lose that reflex, saliva starts to build up in your mouth. You've got to either swallow it or suck it back in. If you are in the middle of a speech or being interviewed, maybe as you start to think about it, it becomes hard to swallow. So you suck in when you would normally just be breathing. Now, you could say, all right, so he's sucking saliva. I don't get good. What's the, what's the reason

that this is notable? The reason it's notable is, again, as we have a total lack of transparency about what's going on with Donald Trump's possible cognitive decline, neurological and conditions, etc. That loss or diminishing of the passive swallow reflex is associated with a whole. bunch of neurological conditions, including many that are progressive diseases that get worse over time. The sniffing has become slurping and you can find now there's on social media copious medical professionals who are explaining exactly what Trump is doing with the slurping there. Man, that is a, I apologize.

That is a disgusting sound. They're what, what he is doing with that and the relevance given the concerns about Trump with regard to cognitive decline, Alzheimer's, dementia, and other conditions whether he has had a stroke. So this is, again, we are left to speculate because there is a complete and total lack of transparency. If they were just honest about what was going, they spent two months describing an MRI to us that Trump never got because he had a CAT scan. Think of that for a moment. Slurping Trump, what do you make of it?

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That level of coverage really matters. 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 incogni.com slash Pacman and use the code Pacman. Today, we welcome to the program for the first time, Governor Janet Mills, governor of Maine, also now running in the Democratic primary to represent the state in the U.S. Senate. Governor, really appreciate your time today. Thanks for being here.

Thank you, David. I want to first talk a little bit about this viral moment you had when you went to this governor's meeting at the White House. And you got into an exchange with President Trump, which sort of ended as far as we saw on camera with Trump saying that he's going to see you in court. Can you talk to us a little bit about the aftermath of that? And if when, you know, I'm curious about when these things happen, is there any follow-up? Are there, did you ever hear again from the president of the United States?

Oh, well, gosh. Yeah. He tweeted blasted me all over social media and insisting that I've been to his will. There was some nastier language than that. But, oh, yeah. He came up one morning when he was in a foul mood and blasted me again. And I thought, I just ignored it because I don't get engaged with the President of the United States on tweet and social media. My mother always said, don't get into a pissing match with a scum, right?

But, you know, that exchange was really strange. It was jaw-dropping for me because when the President of the United States, no matter what the issue is, when he says to you, I, we are the federal law, and you go, no, no. I mean, I'm an American citizen, and I'm a lawyer, and I read the Constitution. You are not the law. The Constitution says that you have to take care that the laws be faithfully executed,

not invented, created, or amended by tweet or executive order or press release. You're not the law. So it was jaw dropping to me, and when I said, oh, he said, are you going to follow my executive war? I said, I'm going to comply with state and federal law. when he said, I am the law.

I said what any American citizen would say. I'll see you in court me. And so a little while after that, he told his Department of Agriculture to stop funding Maine schools, which meant 17,000 school kids would go without the school lunch program. I thought, well, that doesn't make any sense. So we went to court, and a Republican appointed judge, a federal judge appointed by a Republican president,

gave us a ruling that said, no, you can't do that. You can't stop funding school lunch programs because you disagree with state policy on transgender athletes. It did make a sense. So we took them to court and we won. What a, what a situation. I mean, it does seem as though this is an administration that sees federal funding as like a personal compliance tool where it's just a tool to be wielded based on personal grievances and preferences at the end of the day. Do you think that there needs to be some kind of, uh, formal check on the ability of the president to do that put put in place because it seems extraordinarily

dangerous. It is dangerous. We're seeing that every day. Unchecked weaponization of the Department of Justice and the FBI and the court's not standing up to him and the U.S. Senate not standing up to him. And that was that's what bothers me most right now with the Senate and the Congress have given up their authority. They're seeding to him, the authority to, the will to issue taxes and tariffs and whipsaw the economy, which is dangerous to everybody. It's hurting our people, hurting our economy, the authority to just undermine health care, undercut, undercut women's rights to reproductive health care, those kinds of things. And then to just sort of take a military action in another country, Venezuela, and take out the leader and not express.

explain why you're there and what you plan is to run another country. That's insane. And I've called upon Susan Collins to hold hearings. You know, she's the chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee, the all-powerful Senate Appropriations Committee. So hold hearings. Find out what the game plan is. Find out how they plan to run another country. Even the oil company said, we're not going to invest there. It's too risky. So what's the plan? You know, taking these dramatic and risky actions without consulting Congress, as he should have, without consulting the American people about a dangerous action, and sending ICE agents into American cities, and harming people in these cities, giving them quotas to make arrests, handing them a dark outfit and a gun

and a mask, and setting them loose on the American people is unchecked power, and the Congress has to stand up to this. I want to now talk about the Senate as you brought it up. You are in the middle of this Democratic Senate primary. There's some interesting data in the polling, including that there's a pretty significant generational divide between you and your sort of chief primary opponent, Graham Platner. We've invited your opponent on the program. He has not yet accepted as of this moment.

But of course, we're glad to hear from him as well. I'm curious on some of the policies that he proposes, a $25 minimum wage as an example or canceling all student debt. What is your, what do you think about some of these ideas? Maybe those two specifically. Well, listen, I think actions speak louder than words. I've been in a position to write legislation to negotiate legislation and get stuff done. It's in this fancy words that matter.

It's deeds. It's results. Getting results. And so, you know, in the area of minimum wage, for instance, I've been there and drafted minimum wage legislation for farm workers, for instance, and been there on prevailing wage legislation for working people, giving them prevailing wages on construction, publicly funded construction jobs and things like that. I've had to make decisions.

And when you're in public office, you do have to make decisions and not just utter platitudes or talk policy in the general sense without backing it up with action. So I think, you know, regardless of age, you look at what somebody's done. What are they accomplished? How have their acts portrayed their deeds, portraying their philosophy and their positions? And I think my acts as governor, for instance, delivering progress for main people on healthcare. On day one, I expanded Medicaid, healthcare to 100,000 people. I expanded school lunch programs, free school lunch to all public school kids. We created free community college for all

recent high school grads, very popular with younger people. I've invested hundreds of millions of dollars in housing. Look, I have grandsons who are in the early 20s and getting married or planning to get married, start a family. Good jobs they have, but they can't afford a house in Maine. And so I want to help that generation too. Child care. We've created another 6,000 plus child care slots in me through my actions. We keep moving along that line, making progress. Governor, I apologize. On those two things I mentioned, is it that I'm trying to read between the lines, is it that you don't support a $25 minimum wage or that you think it's an unrealistic thing to promise?

Look, I think it's worthy of debate. And I plan to go to the Senate to talk about what the minimum wage should be. It darn well shouldn't be 725. That's insane. And many states still go by the federal minimum wage, including I think New Hampshire. That's insane. Our minimum wage today is like $15.10. It just went up.

We have a graduated minimum wage increase. And maybe that should be on the federal level, too. Maybe it should be geared to the CPI or something, you know, geared to an objective criteria. So you don't have to go back to Congress every few years or every 20 years for Brian out loud and say, what should it be today? What is the price of living? But we also have to bring prices down.

I truly think that affordability is not just a talking point in a campaign. It's a moral imperative. That includes the cost of health care. of car repairs, the cost of groceries, and this president has done nothing but damage the economy and bring up the price of goods. When he campaigned a little over a year ago, saying he was going to bring down prices and not have any foreign wars or foreign military actions. Well, that's BS, as we know now. So I'm going to fight in the U.S. Senate to bring down prices, bring down the cost of health care, and get rid of those crazy whipsawing tariffs.

They're, you know, uncontrollable tariffs that are affecting the cost of housing. When it comes to housing, I've looked at your housing grant, which would be basically $15,000 to first-time buyers. Your primary opponent, Platner, wants to ban corporate landlords entirely. I'm curious as to what you think about that and a market-based solution. And just as a little bit of context for this, a couple months ago, we had the governor of Colorado on the show. And I asked him about the fact that I forget the exact percentage, but there's a surprisingly high percentage of apartment rental units in Colorado that are owned by private equity. And he really didn't want to criticize that in any way.

He just kind of said, ah, you know, there's different landlords of all kinds. And my audience, which I think is a fair representation of where the Democratic primary vote is right now, was really repelled by that answer from from Governor Polis. And so I'm interested in in hearing from you, especially since you're in a Democratic primary Mary, for the time being, the $15,000 grant is really a market-based solution, which is okay, if that's what one supports. Banning corporate landlords is like a systemic solution about who can own property. How did you, where are you on this issue, I guess?

Well, I haven't heard his specific proposal on banning corporate landlords. Okay. That's new to me. And nor has he ever presented that to the legislature. And I worked with the main legislature, members of both parties for years now. to create solutions to the housing problem. One interesting thing we've done, for instance, was to put money towards mobile home parks,

which is one-eighth of our housing in Maine, mobile home parks. And the people who live in them, many of them have lived there for decades and decades. And when these corporate interests come in from out of state and want to buy up a mobile home park and turn it into condoized housing units or something different,

I've been there to protect the people in those mobile home parts and help them buy their own part with some ingenuity, with some creative financing, and with some state money. We've done that three times. So that's the kind of creative thinking I do, working with the legislature to solve or address the housing problem. It's not just landlord-tenant. It's keeping the big equity firms out of our mobile home parks, too,

and turning our properties into, you know, mini malls and fancy condos for rich people. So would you be up for keeping them out with legislation? No. And another thing we've done is to encourage first homebuyers. And this is a key need for young people in Maine. So we up the tax on the real estate transfers because so many people come in to Maine and buying houses for over a million dollars.

So we increase the tax on those sales of over a million dollars and put that into a home fund that helps renters get out of renting an apartment and get to buy their own home. And that's the kind of creative progress we've been making in Maine. So more market-based solutions that are positioning people to be able to make these choices on their own, it sounds like. Sure. And we put money towards encouraging lower interest rates from mortgages. And obviously, we put money into shelters and temperate.

temporary housing as well and encouraging businesses in Maine to provide interim housing and transitional housing with some state funding as well. It's a multifaceted problem. You can't just address it by saying we've got to get rid of operations or something. But it's a lot of avenues to address this. And we have some great people working on housing in Maine. Governor, you've pledged if elected to the Senate that you would serve only one term. Talk to me about that decision.

Sure. I want to think going back on corporations, obviously I'm not taking corporate packs. So there aren't any corporate landlords or something that are supporting my campaign. Not taking any corporate packs. The age, you know, I know how old I am, and the people that may know how old I am, and they know my background, they know what I can get done, they know I will get done things on day one in the U.S. Senate. important to remember and that's why I said I'm not going I'm not going into this thinking I got to have a

career land of the climb or build a resume been there done that okay I just want to get stuff done for the main people that's why I'm running for one term or one term only because I'm not going to be down there on day two picking up the phone and dialing for dollars okay I don't want to be down there run for re-election six years from now when I'm Bernie Sanders age frankly I just want to be there and start making progress immediately. And I've got the background and the commitment and courage to do that. And that's why I'm running for one term only. We have a younger bench coming up. We have some great people who are in the legislature, who are leaders in the legislature, who are running for governor and other things. And I'm looking forward to their progress as well and helping mentor

them too. We've been speaking with Maine Governor Janet Mills currently running in the Democratic primary to represent the state in the Senate. Governor, I really appreciate your time. This is a very important race, and we're going to be watching it closely. Thank you so much. It is indeed an important race because I think taking control of the Senate goes through Maine, and I'm the person who can unseat Susan Collins, help turn the Senate blue and stand up to Donald Trump.

I'm the only one in this race who's actually done that, and I'll do it again in the U.S. Senate. The David 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. This is what it looks like when the president is unwell.

You will notice real contrasts. prior presidents, both Democrats and Republicans. This near psychotic break took place on social media. It included messages posted overnight and very early this morning. Let's get right into it because there was a lot of consequence here. Donald Trump's starting quote, the actual numbers that we would have to pay back if for any reason the Supreme Court were to rule against the USA on tariffs would be many hundreds of billions of dollars.

And that doesn't include the amount of payback that. countries and companies would require for the investments they are making on building plants, factories and equipment for the purpose of being able to avoid the payment of tariffs. Blah, blah, blah. I won't even read the entire thing to you. But what the president here is arguing is that it would be really complicated to fix his total screw up of blanket tariffs on everything and everyone. And so the Supreme Court should just forget about what the law is, forget about interpreting

the Constitution and the presidential powers and just say everything Trump did is fine. Because at the end of the day, it would be really inconvenient to have to change anything and give the tariff money back. Not a very convincing argument for keeping tariffs if they are otherwise unconstitutional or exceed the power of the presidency. Not a great argument, but maybe it's the best one that Donald Trump has. Trump continuing in another post. Effective immediately, any country doing business with the Islamic Republic of Iran will pay a

tariff of 25% on any and all business being done with the United States of America. This order is final and conclusive. Thank you for your attention to this matter. What I love about this is even with executive orders, Trump seems to think that an executive order is a law. An executive order is sort of a note from the boss which tells someone to do something. what you're asking them to do might be legal, legal or it might not be. It might be doable or it might not be.

But this is not even an executive order. This is just supposed to truth social. And Trump seems to think that by saying this order is final and conclusive, it just makes it so. Now, of course, Donald Trump has a mechanism for putting a 25% tariff on anybody, I guess, doing business with Iran. We could discuss the politics of whether that's good idea, who that really hurt. of the Supreme Court is sort of looking at the constitutionality of it. But the idea that the line,

the order is final and conclusive. It's sort of like if I am here and I go, I declare. And then I think that that has any value. Listen, I said I declared it. I don't know what else I could really do. Childish, childish in every way. Then, and Trump is just racking up the else here on the topic of congestion pricing in Manhattan. Donald Trump says, quote, congestion pricing in Manhattan, is a disaster for New York. It's got to be ended immediately. It's never worked before and it will never work now. I love New York and hate to see it being destroyed so rapidly with such obviously foolish policy.

You know, I kind of like the congestion pricing. I have to tell you. But but David, it's more expensive to drive into lower Manhattan. Yeah, I know. And so fewer people are doing it. It's so funny. Most of the time that I'm in lower Manhattan. I've taken the subway because it is actually faster and more convenient.

However, if I need to be down there and having the car is more convenient, I think it's like seven bucks or something like that. And because the congestion pricing has dissuaded a lot of people from driving their cars into that area, just the other day, I parked near the stock exchange area, which is part it's it's part of the congestion pricing area. There was no traffic. It was the time where in the past there would be a ton of traffic. I just drove right to the garage that I needed.

I needed to bring some stuff and that I think that it's been a great success, both because I'm personally benefiting from the convenience of fewer cars when I need to be down there with a car. But also from a pollution standpoint, it is keeping a bunch of cars out of lower Manhattan. By what nature, by what metric Trump says it has failed, I don't really know. Okay. Trump then unleashing on Biden, it just every single one of these posts. Trump is just wrong about everything he's saying.

Quote, under sleepy Joe Biden and the radical left Democrats, the average American households monthly utility bills went up massively over 30%. I never want Americans to pay higher electricity bills because of data centers. Therefore, my administration is working with major American technology companies to secure their commitment to the American people. And we will have much to announce in the coming weeks. Okay. And then he goes and he mentions a bunch of different companies.

A couple of thoughts on this. Number one, electricity is up under Trump more than 10%. And so the idea that rising utility rates were only a problem under Biden, it's happening under Trump as well. But maybe more importantly, a lot of people have jumped on this whole data center electricity use, AI water use and all of this different stuff. These things are concerns, but you also need to think about them in context. Like just as an example, the AI water use one.

I just read a very good study, mostly debunking it. Like, yes, there is some water use associated with AI, but it's quite modest, really, particularly compared to all of the other sources of water use. And it's like, Trump just hears a little kernel of something and then it's like, I don't know, that sounds pretty good. And then finally, just hours ago, Donald Trump unleashing on Minnesota where he says, quote, do the people of Minnesota really want to live in a community in which there are thousands of already convicted murderers, drug dealers and addicts, rapists, violent, released

and escaped prisoners, dangerous people from foreign mental institutions and insane asylums, and other deadly criminals too dangerous to even mention. All the patriots of Iswana do is remove them from your neighborhood and send them back to the prisons and mental institutions from where they came. Most in foreign countries who illegally entered the USA through Sleepy Joe's horrible open border policy. Okay. And then he goes on and on and on. And he closes with fear not great people of Minnesota. The day of reckoning and retribution is coming. As usual, total confusion about what this is really about. First of all, ICE would only have jurisdiction with regard to undocumented immigrants

and arguably in cases where they are trying to denaturalize or whatever. The vast majority of convicted individuals anywhere are not undocumented. They are just natural born Americans, which are outside of the mandate and scope of ice. And it's funny how, of course, Minnesotans want to live in peace. But the vast majority of the chaos is being caused by ice and by the raids. Think about the level of uncertainty that is being brought to the streets by the very presence of Donald Trump's ice goon. So Trump could turn that off overnight.

And it would all of a sudden be a much better environment for Minnesotans. The guy doesn't know what's going on. He is desperate. He is cornered and he is grasping at straws. Christy Gnome is getting impeached or at least the impeachment effort is going to move forward. Democratic lawmakers are now saying we're going to impeach Christy Gnome, Donald Trump's secretary of Homeland Security. This is after federal ICE agents, one federal ICE agent shot and killed an American citizen

in Minneapolis, 37 year old Renee Good. She was a mother of three. She was born in the United States. No, no serious criminal history, no violent record. And yet within hours, the Department of Homeland Security said she's a domestic terrorist. And of course, that label came before any of the facts were known. It came before the footage was reviewed. It came before an independent investigation, which, by the way, they are blocking. Representative Angie Craig went on MS now and said, we are going to move forward to impeach Christy No. Another Democrat, Robin Kelly, has already introduced articles of impeachment. Those are very

serious articles. They accuse Noam, number one, of abusing her office for personal benefit, of obstructing congressional oversight, of withholding funds that Congress already appropriated, and this is a big one, of compromising public safety and violating the constitutional rights of American citizens. This is not about the rhetoric of Christy Noem. This is about oversight of ICE and the use of deadly force. Now, we've already talked about what happened in Minnesota, videos show Renee Good attempting to drive away when she was shot. DHS says she used her car as a weapon. Local officials say that's not what it looks like at all.

The mayor of Minneapolis, Jacob Fry, said that those are bullshit claims and told ICE to get the F out of his city. And then things really escalated. Protests not just in Minneapolis, but nationally. Federal law enforcement kills a civilian. Leadership rushes to justify it. And the victim ends up smeared. And accountability is option.

here. I don't think we're really going to do a full investigation. We're certainly not going to let state officials do it. Now, the claim from the administration is the ICE officers are really in danger here. They are facing assaults. But of course, it is ICE that is carrying out the assaults, including on American citizens, which were supposedly outside of the purview of ICE. Now, I think it's always good to be up front. Will impeachment succeed at removing Christy Noam? No. Republicans control the House, Republicans control the Senate, at least for now. And Donald Trump is not exactly known for supporting accountability. But that's not the only point of the impeachment, as I've said before. Impeachment is a duty of Congress, of the House of Representatives. And impeachment can also

force facts into the open because you get hearings, you get sworn testimony and you get a lot of information gathering ability. And so it puts decisions under the microscope. If indeed, the feds are going to impede an investigation at the state level, well, maybe the impeachment. of Christy Noem will bring that fact to light. If a cabinet secretary can get away with labeling an American citizen, a domestic terrorist after they are shot dead by a federal agent before the facts are known, it is a terrifying amount of power. Christy Noem has snatched a lot of power. And it is very far from law and order. It's all narrative control. So I don't believe that this effort is silly. I believe that this effort is dramatically overdue.

We are going to be furthering our discussion of this on the bonus show today as the Minnesota Hilton has canceled ice agents hotel reservations after what happened. And there are people furious on all sides of this. We'll talk about the latest with Elon. We'll talk about Trump's call for a 10% cap on credit card interest rates. All of it and more on the bonus show. You can sign up at join packman.com and remember that Tuesday, January 20th, we will be be doing a one-day membership drive. It'll be 365 days into this first year of Donald Trump's second term.

I would love for you to partake, get a membership at this record low rate. Just make sure you're on my mailing list, substack.davidpack.com. See you on the bonus show.