The David Pakman Show - The dark spiral of power, panic and collapse

Episode Date: February 23, 2026

-- On the Show -- Michael Wolff, journalist and best-selling author, joins us to discuss Trump's return to power, the Epstein scandal, and his latest book "All or Nothing: How Trump Recaptured America" -- Donald Trump attacks Supreme Court justices as disloyal and foreign-controlled after they strike down his tariffs as unconstitutional -- Republican leaders including Don Bacon, Mitch McConnell, and Rand Paul publicly reject Donald Trump’s attempt to reimpose tariffs, signaling a growing loss of influence within the party -- Donald Trump repeatedly asks advisers whether JD Vance or Marco Rubio should succeed him in 2028, revealing deep insecurity about his legacy and fear of backing a losing candidate -- Donald Trump posts an angry Truth Social rant claiming he gained power after losing at the Supreme Court, reframing defeat as victory while attacking the legitimacy of the judiciary -- New polling data highlighted by Harry Enten shows Donald Trump suffering his worst independent voter approval ratings and lowest pre-State of the Union numbers of either term -- C-SPAN confirms a caller using the name John Barron was not Donald Trump, exposing how online commentators amplified an unverified claim that fit existing narratives -- Donald Trump demands that Netflix fire Susan Rice after she criticizes corporate deference to him, raising concerns about presidential pressure on private companies 📜 Trust & Will: Save 20% on your estate planning at https://trustandwill.com/pakman 👖 Fair Harbor: Get 20% off with code PAKMAN at https://fairharborclothing.com 🩳 SHEATH Underwear: Code PAKMAN for 20% OFF at https://sheathunderwear.com/pakman -- On the Bonus Show: Winter weather disrupts production of The David Pakman Show, and much more... -- 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(01:39) Trump Attacks Supreme Court(07:39) GOP Rejects Tariff Push(15:04) Trump 2028 Succession Anxiety(21:22) Trump Reframes Court Loss(27:51) Trump’s Polling Collapse(35:01) Michael Wolff Interview(41:50) John Barron Hoax Debunked(48:38) Trump Targets Netflix   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Something is changing in the administration and I don't think it's very subtle. What we are looking at is a series of events that all together paint a really striking picture, escalating paranoia, shrinking power, and growing insecurity. First, Trump launches a very dark meltdown after the Supreme Court, including justices he appointed, ruled against him. He calls them disloyal, suggests foreign control and generally describes a view of presidential power that doesn't sound very democratic at all. And then something even more revealing. Republicans and Congress are now just openly ignoring Trump.

His own party is blocking his reflexive tariff agenda. Courts are limiting him and Trump doesn't know what to do. And so that will take us to reporting that Trump is now privately asking, should I be leaning in the direction of J.D. Vance to replace me when I leave? Or Marco Rubio as the head of the MAGA movement. The insecurity of Trump is rising. Plus what happens when approval numbers collapse to historic lows and you are desperate for something you can call an accomplishment?

Well, the State of the Union address is tomorrow and I believe it will play a role. All of that and more today. Whether you watch on YouTube, listen to the podcast on Apple Podcasts or Spotify or just check out clips on Snapchat. TikTok or wherever. Thank you. I really appreciate you being here. Well, we're watching something really interesting unfold here that goes well beyond just normal

political outrage and it goes beyond standard presidential complaining when a president doesn't get their way. And quite frankly, it even goes above and beyond the theatrics we've become used to with Donald Trump. We are now seeing what looks like a full blown paranoid episode from the president of the United States and it is getting quite dangerous. Now, let me explain what happened. The Supreme Court, not a radical left court, but a six three conservative Supreme Court with three justices on it, selected by Donald Trump, said Trump's global blanket tariffs are illegal. This is a court

that has ruled in Trump's favor many times. Two of the justices in the majority, Neil Gorsuch and Amy Coney Barrett were appointed by Trump himself. And Trump's reaction was extraordinarily disturbing. He called the justices who ruled against him a disgrace to our nation. He says that they are unpatriotic. He said they are disloyal to the Constitution, sort of an ironic one. He calls them fools and lapdogs and suggests with no evidence whatsoever that they are being controlled by foreign interests. Most of the things he accuses the court of, probably a to Trump, but that's a different story than the worm we're talking about today, which is that the sitting president is accusing the Supreme Court justices essentially of being foreign agents

because they ruled against them. Paranoia. That is not a policy disagreement. That is paranoia. And it gets even worse. Trump went further in a press conference explaining that he believes presidential power includes, I can destroy the trade. I can destroy the country.

He claims he can do whatever he wants, impose embargoes, reshors. shape the economy as will. He is being unfairly prevented from charging tariffs, he said. Now, let's pause there. A president saying, I can destroy the country while complaining that the courts won't let him do what he wants goes way beyond normal political rhetoric. This is authoritarian insanity stated out loud with a very simple mindset. And it goes back to 2015. Trump, Trump had this mindset in 2015. I alone can fix. it. I alone can decide. I know more than anyone else about everything. And that is the core of strong man rule. Notice also the very emotional tone that has hit Donald Trump. The justices decisions

were an embarrassment to their families. What? Trump is ashamed of the justices, he said. He praised the dissenting justices, by the way. This is loyalty politics applied to the judicial. judiciary. You rule in my favor. You're good. You rule against me. You're a traitor. It's not how government is supposed to work in the United States of America. Now, here we get to the part that people are increasingly noticing. Trump's paranoia. Across Trump's rhetoric, there is a growing theme, hidden enemies, shadowy forces, foreign control, disloyal insiders, subterfusion, betrayal, elections are rigged, prosecutors are corrupt. The media is the enemy. And now even Trump's Supreme Court justices are supposedly under foreign influence.

Everyone is supposedly against Trump other than those who are still personally loyal. Now, this is a kind of thinking that raises some pretty uncomfortable questions. Persistent paranoia, you know where we're going with this. Persistent paranoia where you see conspiracy theories everywhere, institutions are secretly controlled by your enemies and you're reacting as if everything is a personal grievance. That is often discussed in psychology and neurology as a possible feature of cognitive decline, particularly in aging individuals. And it applies to frontotemporal dementia, which we talked about last week.

Now, of course, we're not diagnosing anybody from afar. I am not qualified to diagnose people. But public behavior is what it is. When you see escalating suspicion, exaggerated claims of personal power, emotional volatility, detached from reality explanations, people are going to ask questions about mental fitness. It's unavoidable when you're talking about the president of the United States. And Trump is even framing himself as a victimized child. He says he was trying to be a good boy with the tariffs.

So it's not to influence the court. A nearly 80 year old describing himself like someone who is being unfairly punished by authority as if he's a little kid. So this is grievance politics mixed with personal insecurity. as well as unchecked power. Now, the real danger, because at some point Trump goes, is institutional damage. When a president repeatedly tells supporters, courts are corrupt, they're controlled by foreign powers, they're illegitimate when they rule against me, you erode trust in the law itself.

And if courts can't check the president, who or what can check the president? And if every time he doesn't get his way, it's proof of a conspiracy, what remains of democracy if we can't have contradictory conclusions to what the president of the United States personally wants. Now, if you want a warning, just look at history. When leaders start to believe that they alone represent the country and any limitation on their desires is illegitimate, that's the beginning of a democracy that collapses. It's not stability. It is not democratic governance. And it is not the behavior of a country that is functioning.

So we should be very concerned about this and Trump seems obsessed with vengeance. We'll talk a little bit later about what he is now planning to do. They are ignoring Trump again. Trump is losing control, but also power after the shock of the Supreme Court saying the tariffs are illegal. Now last week I did a story called powerless. They are now ignoring Trump. And in that story, I laid out quite astutely, I might add.

No, I'm kidding. I mean, hopefully it was, but I laid out that Donald Trump's demand that mail-in voting be ended was roundly ignored by Republicans in their voting bill. They did a lot of other horrible stuff, to be clear, but they did not even consider putting in a ban on mail-in voting. And that generated a ton of interest because it was Republicans just ignoring what Donald Trump wanted. And now all of a sudden, we have another instance of this.

And this one might actually be bigger because we are now talking about Trump's tariffs, one of the core pieces of his economic agenda. And Republicans are basically saying no. Here is what just happened. After the Supreme Court struck down Trump's blanket tariffs, Trump tried to get around them. He tried to get around the ruling rather by putting in a new 10% global tariff using a different law as the justification. Now, this is a classic Trump move.

door closes, you try to kind of smash your way through a different door. But this time, even Republicans in Congress are saying this is going nowhere. It's just, we're just not going to do it. They're saying Republican Congressman Don Bacon made it super clear. We're going to defeat Trump's new 10% tariff. It will be defeated, not maybe. He said there will be a majority in Congress against that new tariff. And he says that Trump made a mistake.

And then he said something even more revealing. Bacon said that tariffs have to go through Congress because that's what the found wanted. And just because Trump disagrees doesn't mean that that changes anything. So translation, Republicans are saying out loud, the president doesn't get to rule by decree. It's not Democrats. It's not the liberal media. It's Trump's own party and it gets even worse. Mitch McConnell, the Senate majority leader who has spent years enabling every one of Trump's bad ideas said the Supreme Court decision leaves no room for doubt that Congress controls trade policy. Rand Paul called the ruling a defense of our republic.

Again, a Republican. So think about what we're watching here. Trump demands something. He rages online. He attacks the courts. He says, I'm going to push forward anyway. And the system that includes his own party goes, yeah, we're not going to do that. That is the definition of a loss of power because if Trump really had the power, he wouldn't

have to be begging and finding new ways to try to do this. Power doesn't get overruled by your own allies and real power doesn't get publicly corrected by members of its own party on live TV. That is what weakness looks like and Trump is increasingly weak. I'm going to have the data later in the show to prove that to you. Now there's one other layer that matters here. The Supreme Court ruling, including votes from two justices that Trump appointed, essentially reaffirmed the authority over taxes and tariffs is that of Congress.

So even the institutions helped Trump shape that they are now going to limit Trump. And that's why you're seeing the escalation in rhetoric and the claims that this betrayed me and that betrayed me and the insistence that everybody is against him. When leaders start to lose control, they tend to lash out rather than go, oh, I think my party's turning against me. That's not their instinct, especially not the authoritarian. They escalate. They say there's conspiracies.

They say there's sabotage. They double down. And now what we are seeing increasingly is rather than everyone bend to Trump, as was once what was going on, we see Republicans ignoring him, courts ruling against him, Congress blocking him, his own agenda being defeated. Once the perception, this can be like a ball that, it's like a snowball that picks up momentum as it picks up more snow going down a hill. Once the perception of power breaks, the model cracks and others say, hey, I guess we don't have

to go along with every stupid thing that Donald Trump says. Trump doesn't know how to handle it. And one of the things that he is doing is very insecurely asking people around him. Tell me what I should do. What I should, what, what, what exactly should I be doing publicly? Trump is making demands and he's threatening and he's flipping out at people and raging. But as people ignore him, Trump is quietly going to those around him and saying, what should I be doing right now? Should I be supporting JD or Marco to replace me as the. head of MAGA. Tell me, tell me what to do. We are going to deal with that extraordinary change after the break. Let's be honest, estate planning is one of those things people know they should do,

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looking for swimwear, shirts, hoodies, or other casual clothing that works for every day wear and travel, head to fair harborclothing.com and use the code Pacman for 20% off your full price order now through February 28. The link is in the description. Insecurity. Donald Trump is very insecure right now and he is asking others for the answers to the test. Let me explain what's going on. Last week I played a clip of Trump being asked about J.D. Vance for 2028.

And Trump has continued to say, J.D. is great. Marco Rubio is great. And I pointed out that Trump has no idea which way to go. And he actually has a growing insecurity about picking the wrong person, meaning the one that doesn't win and appearing to have really lost his political power. So what's going on with Trump with that specific issue, J.D. Vance or Marco Rubio for 2028 is that Trump wants to be sure he knows very clearly which way the wind is blowing before he picks. He wants to pick the one that will eventually win because it would be really embarrassing

if Trump goes, JD's the guy. And then the Republican voters don't want JD and they vote for Marco Rubio instead. We now have full reporting as to the extent of this insecurity. Now, what's fascinating about this is I brought this up last week absent any reporting that Donald Trump is actually clueless and sort of scared about making. the wrong choice. I simply said the fact that he keeps saying this makes it clear that he wants to wait until he can make the choice that will render him the winner, so to speak. But we now have new reporting from Axios and Axios has learned that Donald Trump has turned the question of who should succeed him into a kind of constant conversation he's playing with aides and advisors and allies.

He is constantly going around asking people, should we be going in the direction of J.D. Vance or Marco Rubio. Which one? Not once. This is not like a structured meeting about it. Trump is reportedly constantly, casually obsessed with this. He's asking AIDS. He's asking confidants. He's asking insiders. Who's more likely to win? Who's more likely to get the support of Republicans in 2028? And what Trump is doing is crowdsourcing his political legacy. Trump knows, especially if Republicans lose the house in just a few months, that he is going to have a really tough time. I'm cementing his legacy. Part of it has become, hey, can I get more land, which is the obsession with Greenland?

Part of it has been can I make difficult to reverse changes to the structure of DC, like knocking down part of the White House and building a ballroom. Part of it is can I make news as the guy that got Maduro, for example. But another part of it is can I pick my successor and really make it clear that I am the one deputizing MAGA to keep going and I'm picking who is going to lead MAGA. But Trump's projecting no certainty or confidence here. He is asking other people, what am I supposed to do? And the reporting makes it really clear what is driving it, the obsession with legacy.

He doesn't want to choose the person who loses because for Trump, losing is a personal humiliation and it reflects badly on him and losing damages the image of strength that his entire identity is built around. So instead of making a decision right now as to who he likes better, and I'm sure he knows, he is looking for reassurance and validation. He wants to signal about who is stronger, who's safer, who's going to make me look more powerful by association. And that's what this is fundamentally about.

What's interesting is how conflicted he seems because on paper, I would guess that Trump favors JD because he chose him as his vice president. He's called them the most likely heir before. But at the same time, Trump keeps hearing about how Marco Rubio is doing really well. He's hearing it publicly and privately. And I'll be honest. don't like either J.D. Vance or Marco Rubio. But if you look at J.D. Vance's total lack of charisma and gravitas and how he just is so unlikable in every interview and conversation.

And you look at Marco Rubio, handle adversarial media. You see his recent speech at the Munich Security Conference. He's clearly better than J.D. I'm not praising the guy. I'm just saying these are the two choices. I'm evaluating them. Trump knows this. Trump is obsessively watching the news all the time. And he sees that J.D. doesn't get very good headlines. And Marco Rubio is getting pretty good headlines. He at least seems stronger on TV. So this is perception driven insecurity. And advisors say Trump likes to play people off of each other.

He enjoys competition. He likes gossip. But there's a defensive aspect to this. He doesn't want to screw up and end up looking like he is weak by picking the wrong person. So he'll delay and hedge and ask other people what he should do. Now, I think it's important to mention it's good to consult experts. Of course, one of the criticisms of Trump is that he knows more than everybody, the generals, the scientists, the doctors, whoever.

So on the one hand, you could say, well, David, now he's consulting people. That's a good thing. Sure. In some abstract way, it's a good thing. But you have to understand Trump's personality. Trump's claim to fame is that there's no one better at choosing people than him, hiring people, etc. He is always projected that ultimately he is the one who really knows and that other people

are there just to, you know, maybe advise on the fringes. But now he's doing something very different, which is I have no idea. Tell me, what should I do? That is not someone seeking counsel because he values the knowledge of others. That's someone afraid of being wrong. Here is what makes the insecurity even more obvious. The primary polling shows J.D. Vance way ahead, more than 50% support in one poll. And Marco Rubio is in single digits. So if it were purely strategic, I think the answer would be pretty obvious, but this isn't about strategy. Trump wants to be validated and he wants to be the big boy, not the posture of a confident leader, but rather the behavior of someone worried about losing control, losing his power, losing his image, and having no legacy. And when leaders

operate from insecurity rather than confidence, which is what Trump is doing, they become reactive, they become defensive, they become unpredictable. And that is exactly what we are watching happen to Donald Trump. Some might say, wow, it's really sad what's happening to Trump. And maybe on some level it is. But it's a reminder that this guy had no business being president ever to begin with. Trump is not handling rejection well. And we are seeing it again in a truly bizarre meltdown on truth social after the Supreme

Court said that Trump's blanket tariffs are illegal. Now, I'm going to show you what Trump actually wrote. We're going to break down what it tells us just as much psychologically as politically. Trump posted this long rant attacking the Supreme Court. Let's take a look at it. And remember, authoritarian always claims success no matter what happens and Trump is doing that here. Quote, the Supreme Court will be using lowercase letters for a while based on a complete

lack of respect of the United States accidentally and unwittingly gave me as president far more powers and strength than I had prior to their ridiculous. dumb and very internationally divisive ruling. For one thing, I can use licenses to do absolutely terrible things to foreign countries, especially those countries that have been ripping us off for many decades. But incomprehensibly, according to the ruling, can't charge them a license fee. But all licenses charge fees. Why can't the United States do so?

You do a license to get a fee. The opinion doesn't explain that, but I know the answer. The court has also approved all other tariffs of which there are many, and they can all be used in a much more powerful and obnoxious way with legal certainty than the tariffs as initially used. Our incompetent Supreme Court did a great job for the wrong people, and for that they should be ashamed of themselves, but not the great three. The next thing you know, they will rule in favor of China and others who are making an absolute

fortune on birthright citizenship by saying the 14th Amendment was not written. to take care of the babies of slaves, which it was as proven by the exact timing of its construction, filing, and ratification, which perfectly coincided with the end of the Civil War. How much better can you do than that? But this Supreme Court will find a way to come to the wrong conclusion, one that again will make China and various other nations happy and rich. Blah, blah, blah, the Supreme Court sucks. Okay, this is a stream of grievance, confusion, and yes,

contradictions. Let's unpack it. Now, first of all, notice the logic problem. Trump lost the case. The Supreme Court issued a ruling against Trump. His power was limited. And his response is to say, they just gave me more power. This is classic psychological strong man reframing. If you can't accept defeat, you redefine the defeat as a victory. And we saw this after the 2020 election. Trump lost and he said, I won. If the story doesn't match what you want, then you just rewrite the story. This is not a policy analysis. This is just Trump trying to protect his ego.

Secondly, the language. Trump says he can now do terrible things to other countries. Think about the wording. A president celebrating, forget about the fact that it's not true, that he can do terrible things. That is not diplomatic language. That reflects a worldview where power means domination. rather than governance.

Power as punishment. Power as revenge. Authoritarian psychology at its core. And third, the post really shows that Trump is confused about how government works. He says licenses normally involve fees. So the US should charge them too. He says the opinion of the court doesn't explain something, but then says he knows the answer anyway.

We see this pattern over and over again. He dismisses expertise, rejects legal reasoning, and says that he knows the right answer to everything, even without understanding a damn thing. He doesn't engage the ruling. He just overrides it. And then finally, he spirals. As the rant goes on, and it is quite lengthy, it's wide and long. It starts with tariffs, moves to licenses, jumps to China.

Suddenly he's talking about birthright citizenship. He's talking about the civil war. This is the inability to maintain coherent thought about one issue. One grievance triggers another. There's no coherent structure. It's this cascade of enemies and injustices and whatever. This matters because leadership requires disciplined thinking. You've got to be able to think clearly.

You've got to be able to focus. And Trump can't do any of those things. And then finally, maybe the most revealing thing about this rant is that he's attacking the court itself. He says the justices are incompetent. They should be ashamed. They're helping foreign countries. He's attacking the legitimacy of an independent branch of government for one reason and one reason alone.

They ruled against him. And so when we have, if we are to have a constitutional system that functions, losing parties have to accept the outcomes. I was reviewing a kind of not funny video, but an interesting video of when the Supreme Court ruled against Al Gore during the 2000. thousand election in the controversial recount. And Al Gore immediately came out, came out and said, the Supreme Court has ruled. I must concede. This is the end. The Supreme Court has made its decision. That is very different than what Donald Trump is doing on truth social. Trump's worldview is,

if they block me, they are illegitimate and I'm going to attack them. Every constraint is a betrayal. Every loss is corruption. And the philosophy of this, if there is one, is that Trump can't distinguish between the self and the state. In Trump's view, if it's bad for him, it's bad for the country. But in fact, the opposite is true. A lot of things that are good for Trump are terrible for the country. And so the takeaway for me is that Trump is a leader who can't process rejection becomes unpredictable.

And if he can't accept limits, he escalates. And if he can't tolerate constraints, he tries to remove them. And it matters because we either have a democracy. with checks and balances and a respect for the judiciary or we don't. And we either have stability through institutions or we don't. And what we're watching is a mindset from Trump that produces extraordinary instability. Look today, by the way, look today at the stock market. Dow is currently down 700 points and a big part of this is the outrageous tariff back and forth

that we are dealing with right now. Let's get to those numbers. The weakest that Trump has ever been. Trump is now the weakest in terms of his political position of his entire two terms. The numbers aren't subtle. There is a collapse in support that is bad even by Trump's standards. Let me tell you some of the numbers. Here is Harry Enton on CNN explaining them.

This is a brutal, brutal poll. Numbers, but talk about what is driving this drop for the- What is driving this drop? I said record was the name of the game when it came to this segment, right? Talking about the lowest Trump has ever been going into the state of the union, the lowest that any president has been this century going into a state of the union at this point in their presidency. It is also the weakest that Donald Trump has ever been with independence. Look at this drop.

We've been talking about it the past few months. At this point, a year ago, Donald Trump was at minus 13 points. Look at this. minus 47 points among independence. The lowest Donald Trump has ever been in either of his two terms as president with independence. That is driving these numbers. When you're 47 points underwater with independence, that's the name of the game. You can't be above water overall.

And that's why Donald Trump is near record lows overall and the lowest he's ever been going into a state of the union address. Yeah. We're going to get back to that in a moment. But consider those numbers. A year ago, Trump was minus 13 with independence. That was bad. But now this is the lowest he has ever been in either term, minus 47. And as he mentioned, state of the union, it doesn't stop there.

Take a look at these further numbers. And new scene in polling is now out on the eve of this big event, showing some record lows for President Trump's approval. Overall, job approval now standing at 36%. but there's much more to it, especially when you look in the past. See as Harry Anton is running the numbers on this one for us. Harry, what's your take with what you're looking at on how people are feeling about how Trump is doing in this moment? Yeah, okay. I would borrow the phrasing of Tony Blair,

of course, the former Prime Minister of Great Britain saying, weak, week, week. It was weak over there in the United Kingdom? It is weak here in the United States when it comes to President Trump. Okay, Trump's not approval rating. Look at all the pre-sodest polls, the state. So to the State of the Union, look at this. Okay, we're at this point. Look at that.

Negative 27 points, my goodness gracious, the snow is up to the knees here in New York City. And Trump seems to be well underneath it at this point. Compare that to where he was in 2020, 2020, 2019 and 2018. And term one going into those state of unions. Minus 10, way lower now. Minus 15, way lower now. Minus 15, way lower now. Okay, I think you get the point.

Harry Enten is extremely passionate here about the number. You get the idea. Trump entering the state of the union of 2026, worse numbers ever. Now, why does this matter? Independent voters can decide national elections and they can decide midterms even more easily. Partisans are locked in. Democrats vote for Democrats, Republicans vote for Republicans mostly. The middle can decide the outcome, especially when partisan turnout is lower. When a president collapses with independence, it means that the persuadable middle is rejecting Trump and saying, we're going to go with something different. Historically, it's a huge warning sign. When George W. Bush's approval collapsed during the Iraq war and the financial crisis,

Republicans suffered massive, massive losses. When you lose the middle, political power tends to go with it. And that's the key point. Trump built a political identity on strength and dominance and winning and the idea that he represents power. And the numbers show he's eroding. He's weakening. He's shrinking. The coalition is shrinking. He's experiencing. He's experiencing. He's experiencing. experiencing shrinkage. Come on. And once the perception of strength breaks, the influence can collapse. And that's why we saw as we started the show, Republicans are going, yeah, you're not going to get these 10% tariffs. It's just not going to happen. When the belief that he is unstoppable goes away, we see major, major shifts. And the combination of institutions that start to resist and support

that's collapsing signals a major political decline. Now, the broader historical question, which I'm interested in is how will Trump be remembered? I believe that Trump will go down as one of the worst presidents in history, not because of a single policy or controversy, but because of the pattern. Damaging institutions, endless chaos, attacks on democratic norms. Now, let's think back to George W. Bush. George W. Bush left office very unpopular. His approval ratings collapsed after Iraq and because of the financial crisis. But Bush, I didn't like Bush. and I was against so much of what he did, but I'm trying to do a political analysis here. Bush operated within the traditional structure of American government.

He accepted institutional limits. He accepted the outcomes of elections. He didn't attempt to redefine reality. And when Bush left, my view was this wasn't a good president, but he's not going to be remembered as the worst president in history. Trump seems very different because the defining feature of Trump, of Trump's presidency includes policy failures, but it's also attempts to delegitimize constraints on his power. And there are consequences to that. And people start to not trust institutions and

to destabilize, it starts to destabilize governance and it weakens the presidency. And I believe that this is measurable in the polling collapse that Trump is experiencing today. We often don't recognize when things are changing when we're in it. It can feel slow. But think back to where we were, regard to the strength and respect for institutions and expertise in 2016 versus where we are today and then all of a sudden you realize, wow, things have changed significantly. And it is all a disaster for Donald Trump. A lot of guys go years without ever thinking about their underwear. You just keep buying the same kind, dealing with the same discomfort, the sticking, the chafing, the readjusting. Once you try,

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And with the holidays here, sheath also makes a great gift for yourself or for someone else. They've got tons of styles and colors for both men and women. Go to sheathunderware.com slash Pacman and get 20% off with code Pacman. The link is in the description. Today we'll be speaking with Michael Wolfe, journalist and bestselling author. His latest book is All or Nothing, how Trump recaptured America. Michael, great to have you here. I appreciate your time.

Any time. Thanks for having me. Listen, just for context first, can you talk just a little bit about how you first sort of came to cover Donald Trump, how you've developed sources so close to Trump? Give us just a little bit of the back story. so the audience sort of understands that. Sure. And just somewhat working backwards here,

the book that we're now talking about all or nothing is the fourth book I've written about Donald Trump within how many years, I think five years. So he has kind of occupied my mind as at various moments, I think I have occupied his. But we actually go back quite a ways because I worked at New York Magazine in the 90s, and 90s, early 2000s,

and he was, he used to call me up all the time and sort of complain about what had said about him, but actually more often when something was not said about him, why wasn't I in that story? Tell me why I was, anyway, we had a, we had a something of a relationship, amused, jocular. You know, he was always a kind of an anecdote to tell when Donald Trump called you up and yelled at you. It was kind of mock yelling at you.

But when he started running for president, and I was working then for the Hollywood reporter, and he offered us the opportunity to an interview. And the feeling was he offered us an interview because nobody else wanted to interview him. He just wasn't a very serious candidate. But I sat down with him actually at his house in Beverly Hills in 2016. And we spent several hours together. And I think the most notable line of that interview is I said to him,

Okay, come on. Why are you doing this? Why are you running for president? Still at a moment when no one thought he would be president. And he said, without hesitation and without shame, he said, to be the most famous man in the world. And I thought, hmm, is there anything else one needs to know about him? But I continued to cover him throughout the campaign with kind of remarkable access. I mean, partly because we kind of kind of got along. The article that I wrote about him for the Hollywood Reporter, which was a cover story, which was not necessarily flattering, but he liked the cover. Great cover, he wrote to me. So we got along. And then when he was, when he was elected, shockingly, I went to him and said, I'd like to come into the White House as an observer. And curiously, he thought that was a, he seemed to think that was a job, deputy assistant, observer. And I said, no, no, no, I want to write a book. And that seemed to could not have been less interesting to him. So he said, yeah, yeah, yeah, sure, sure, whatever, literally, whatever. I remember Steve Bannon said, well, whatever is not a no. And that was the kind of entree for me to spend really seven months in the West Wing, the first seven months of the Trump administration. And out of that, I wrote my book, Fire and Fury. And continued.

There were three more books, and I continued to preserve relationships or develop relationships or have relationships with the people around Trump, who had all of whom had a deep, deep need to talk about the experience they were having. So the people around Trump don't think this is any more normal than any more normal. anyone else. And they all wanted, they would all call me and still constantly call me and said, you won't believe it. And then they would tell you, tell you a tale of Donald Trump, which was always unexpected and peculiar.

And Michael, it seems as though what started as a much more collegial working relationship with him at the beginning of this, what I see now publicly at least is that he's mostly attacking and insulting you while you cite sources. including on your podcast. You know, yeah, I think that that happens with a lot of people. And after my book, Fire and Fury came out, he threatened to sue me, continues to threaten to sue me. And he threatened to sue me and, you know, tried to have the publication of the book stopped,

all of that. But by the next book, someone told him I was writing, someone close to him said, oh, they had heard that I was writing this next book. And he said, oh, that guy gets ratings. Let's see him. And suddenly I was invited to have dinner at Mar-a-Lago with Trump and with Melania. So you can't tell. He doesn't respond to people in normal ways.

And I could, yes, he's threatening. just the other day, threatened to sue me again. And, but just as well, he could invite me to dinner again. Well, what's going on is that as we are getting pounded, just pounded by snow, our internet went out. And possibly Michaels as well. We can't tell. So we are going to this is very embarrassing. But we're going to have to have Michael back at another point, I believe, to finish the interview. And that is not where I wanted this to end, but we will have him back and we will take it from the top. But let's go to a break. We're going to have more show right after this.

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 members. Membership perks, get the full experience by signing up at join packman.com. All right. Who fell for this? I hope that you didn't. A lot of people online, including a lot of left-leaning people, clearly fell for a supposed

C-SPAN caller named John Barron, who sounded like Trump. And it was very obviously not Trump, and C-SPAN has confirmed it. I'm going to talk about why this matters more than just a stupid prank gone wrong. But what happened was that after the Supreme Court tariff decision, C-SPAN had their Washington Journal show. A guy calls in, says that he's John Barron. And it's clearly a guy doing a Trump impersonation. It's okay.

But it's very obviously not Trump. It should be obvious that it wasn't Trump. And a bunch of people started spreading that Trump called in to attack the Supreme Court under a fake name. A fake name he has previously used, by the way, but that's part of the joke. So let's listen to it first, and then we will talk about it. Well, this is John Barron. And you have, look, this is the worst decision you've ever have in your life practically.

Jack and Jack's going to agree with me, right? But this is a terrible decision. And you have Hakeem Jeffries, who he's a dope, and you have Chuck Schumer who can't cook a cheeseburger. Of course these people are happy. Of course these people are happy. But true Americans will not be happy. You have the woman earlier.

I assume she's a woman. I assume she's a woman. That's actually a giveaway. That is the type of thing someone would do when imitating Trump, but that Trump actually isn't clever enough to say. And I'm going to say more about that in a moment. She said she's disgraced. She's devastated by this.

All right. John. We'll go to Chester who's in Baton Rouge. All right. So C-SPAN realizes that this is a Trump impersonator. Okay. This is so obviously not Trump. It is someone doing a mediocre Trump impression.

Still better than mine, but a mediocre Trump impression. And one of the funny things is aside from the tone of the voice, what the person doing the impression gets wrong is that Trump isn't this articulate. Trump struggles to find words and his speech speed is much slower today because Trump is so diminished in terms of his ability to speak and his vocabulary and his ability to deliver. lines coherently. But a lot of people believed that this was Trump. So C-SPAN put out a statement.

They put out a tweet where they said, quote, because so many of you are talking about Friday's C-SPAN caller who identified himself as John Barron, we want to put this to rest. It was not the president. The call came from a central Virginia phone number and came while the president was in a widely covered in-person White House meeting with the governors. Tune in to C-SPAN for the actual president at the State of the Union address Tuesday. So what is sort of concerning to me, and I'm not doing this as like, oh, you stupid people, that's not what this is.

What is concerning to me is that a lot of people who should have known better pushed this as if it was really Trump. And this is where the left shouldn't get caught. If we care about credibility, we shouldn't start promoting this as Trump calling in to defend his own policy secretly because it feels satisfying or like it would be embarrassing to Trump. And part of why this spread is that Trump has used fake identities in the past in the 80s and 90s. He admitted to posing as his own spokesperson and he would sometimes use the name John Miller. And he would sometimes use the name John Barron, which is the name that the caller used.

But of course, that's what was used to make it seem plausible, but plausibility isn't proof. And I think that that matters. We want to make sure. I mean, listen, if I go back to the beginning of the video, I'll tell you when it was obvious, it wasn't Trump. Well, this is John Barron. And you have, look, this is the worst decision. Right there, I knew it wasn't Trump. And I understand that it would be satisfying and interesting if Trump was so shriveled and diminished by this embarrassing defeat from the Supreme Court that he goes and he calls C-SPAN pretending that he's someone else in order to defend his policy and attack the Supreme Court.

I get it. That would be interesting. But it simply wasn't the case. And I, you know, it's not really about one call. It's about credibility. And we just want to make sure there's enough really bad stuff about Trump, really embarrassing stuff about Trump, really humiliating and dangerous and outrageous, extreme things that Trump says and does.

We don't need to then go, look, Trump called in. And one of the things that is unfortunate. And again, I'm maintaining my commitment not to do the stuff where it's like intra-left attacks. There are content creators out there who when they put out something that is just wrong or made up, or they will sometimes publish AI modified images or I'm not naming any names. And they are told, hey, this isn't real. They go, oh, I don't care. Did it get clicks?

Did it get me new followers? And I think that that's a dangerous direction for the left to go. So in any case, there is an irony here, even though it wasn't Trump. Some people instantly believed it because they really wanted to. But it is plausible that Trump would do this, right? Trump's public image is such that we know and we remember. We as a reputation that he pretends to be his own spokesperson or will communicate with people under fake names.

But bigger picture, I think there's a media story here. This is how our informational environment works. A clip appears. Speculation spreads. The outrage and the reposts accelerate. And later, when the facts arrive, if they arrive at all, no one really cares or it goes kind of unnoticed. And we have a system that rewards speed and emotion here rather than accuracy. I have an entire.

In fact, in my forthcoming book, pay attention, which by the way, you can preorder at David Pakman.com slash attention. In my book, pay attention. I have a chapter about AI as one element here that's going to make it increasingly difficult to discern what is real and what is not. But on the other hand, there is also a discussion about how the corrections really get far less attention. And so the system incentivizes being quick and wrong rather than slow and correct.

So bottom line, the John Barron caller wasn't Trump. It's still a revealing episode about confirmation bias and misinformation, why credibility matters. And if we care about truth, let's make sure. that we don't end up believing what feels right or what we want to be true, even when it is not. Just when you think we've reached peak Trump, he finds a way to go further. We now have the president of the United States inserting himself into a corporate streaming company's board decisions. Yes, Trump is now threatening Netflix.

It's real. This one isn't fake. This really happened. And what triggered the meltdown is that former national security advisor, Susan Rice, a Democrat, is on the Netflix board. And she warned companies, if you are on your knees for Trump, remember that at some point Democrats will be back in power. It was a warning about possible future consequences.

Let's take a look at the tweet or the truth post, a social post from Trump. should fire racist, Trump deranged Susan Rice immediately or pay the consequences. She's got no talent or skills, purely a political hack. Her power is gone and will never be back. How much is she getting paid and for what? Thank you for your attention to this matter. So why is Trump raging about Susan Rice? So here's the context.

Rice warned corporations that bent the knee to Trump because of Trump's pressure. There could be consequences in a future administration. Democrats are going to return to power at some point. And Susan Rice said, if you've got these companies who are making decisions now because of this very short-term self-interest to stay on Trump's good side, may realize Trump's not popular, political wins change, and there may be consequences there. And she went even further. She said if corporations think Democrats are going to forgive that corporations fired people,

changed policies, bent rules to satisfy Trump, they have another thing coming. She warned corporate America about accountability. Now let's pause. There are some people on the right going, wait a second. All these Democrats have been saying Trump is weaponizing the DOJ. And now Susan Rice is saying when Democrats get the opportunity, they will weaponize the DOJ. It's the same thing.

Except that is not what Susan Rice is saying. What's happening right now is that corporations are firing people in dubious ways that may may be wrongful termination. They are changing policies in ways that could violate everything from equal opportunity, equal employment law to OSHA to all sorts of other things. They may be bending rules to satisfy Trump. And the point is, Trump is ignoring these violations because the corporations are doing what he wants. But in the future, someone may enforce the law. There's a big difference between saying when I'm in power, I'm going to go after my political opponents, which is what Trump said, versus when Democrats get back into power, they may not ignore

crimes and violations committed under Trump that Trump didn't care to prosecute. Those are not the same things. Now, Trump's response is to threaten her employer and demand that she be fired and that tells you a lot. The president of the U.S. talking about a private company's board member, not about let's deal with inflation, let's deal with health care. There's a foreign policy. Netflix. And the timing isn't random because Netflix is in a position where it wants to complete this massive $72 billion merger deal with some major entertainment assets. They need approval from the Justice Department. Trump controls the Justice Department. So this is a lot of This is really a message.

Do what I want or your merger and acquisition may not go through. Now they claim to be advocates of the free market. They claim to be advocates of not getting involved and interfering with private industry. But this isn't a free market. This is political pressure and it is using government power to influence private companies based on loyalty. And notice how it started. The pressure campaign came after far right.

activist, I guess, extremist. Laura Lumer urged Trump, hey, you got to do something about Susan Rice. Laura Lumer screenshot what Susan Rice said and then called Trump's attention to it. That makes Trump go, wait, I should say something. Let me threaten a private company. The policy is being made in this completely hairbrained deranged way. Now think about the pattern. Universities, Trump attacks.

Law firms, Trump attacks. media companies, Trump attacks, corporations, Trump is attacking. Any institution that doesn't show total loyalty becomes a target. This is loyalty politics applied to everything. You'd better bend the knee or there will be problems. And there's something else that makes this episode very revealing, which is Trump's losing policy fights everywhere right now. The Supreme Court blocked his tariffs.

Republicans in Congress said, we're not going to get rid of mail and voting like you want. We're not going to go for a new 10% tariff that you're putting in. Courts are limiting Trump's authority. And what he does is threaten more people, create more enemies, generate new bizarre targets. And authoritarian often as they have a shrinkage of power, their reaction is to lash out. The president spending time threatening a streaming service over a board member. That is not normal governance.

It's not economic policy. It's just grievance politics. And what's wild is for so many years, the right has insisted that the politics of the left is about scapegoating and is about grievances. But it's really the politics of the right. And the pattern we see is personal vendettas, claims of enemies everywhere, corporations, judges, media companies, political opponents, even some of his own Supreme Court justice appointees are now the enemy.

Everyone's against him except the people who remain personally loyal. His kids, Maria Bartoromo, that guy, Stephen Chung, you know, take your pick. And historically, leaders who start seeing loyalty tests everywhere are not becoming more stable. They're becoming insecure, as we talked about earlier, and they are becoming as a result of that much more dangerous. So where we are is Trump threatens Netflix, demands corporate purges, inserts himself into private boardrooms and says, I am a leader and it is supposed to be considered a completely normal day. Deranged, dangerous stuff.

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