The Dispatch Podcast - Trump’s Retribution | Interview: Matt Lewis

Episode Date: January 6, 2025

Unapologetic NeverTrumper Matt Lewis joins Jamie Weinstein to discuss the various “America on Fire” scenarios of the next four years and how history will judge President Donald Trump’s two terms. The Agenda: —Bret Stephens in NYT: Done with Never Trump —Anger toward elites —Best-case scenarios and worst-case scenarios —How Kamala Harris’ campaign went wrong —Trump’s criminal history —“He’s got rizz,” as the kids say —Trump’s minions —Internal contradictions The Dispatch Podcast is a production of The Dispatch, a digital media company covering politics, policy, and culture from a non-partisan, conservative perspective. To access all of The Dispatch’s offerings—including members-only newsletters, bonus podcast episodes, and weekly livestreams—click here. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome to the Dispatch podcast. I'm Jamie Weinstein. My guest today is my old friend, Matt Lewis. You know him. He's been on before with us. One of my best friends in the world, a political commentator. You've seen him all over cable news on Morning Joe on CNN. He's written just about every place under the sun. A long time, Never Trumper, original Never Trumper. And I bring him on again to discuss what is the state of Never Trump after Donald Trump's real. We discuss Brett Stevens column on the end of never Trump. We discuss Donald Trump, what might look like in his second term. Is there a possibility that it's successful? We discuss the future of never Trumpers in the media, what 2028 election might look like, and much, much more. So without further ado, I give you my friend, Mr. Matt Lewis. Matt Lewis, welcome back to the Dispatch podcast. Hey, Jamie, good to be back. Well, it is wonderful to have you back, and it's a similar topic, I think, to last time,

which is I want to talk you about the state of never Trump post Donald Trump's re-election. I think we talked about it before the election. And I want to use as a jumping off point what was, I think, a very significant op-ed in the New York Times by Brett Stevens in mid-December. titled, Done with Never Trump. Of course, Brett Stevens was a original band member of the never Trump gang. I would say one of the wings of the Never Trump game, because I think there are several wings of Never Trump. And he opens up his piece, which I think sums it up like this. It's been more than nine years since I first announced Donald Trump as a loudmouth, loudmouth vulgarian, appealing to quieter Bulgarians. I've called myself a Never Trump conservative ever since,

even when I agreed with his policies from time to time. I also opposed him throughout his run this year. Could his second term be as bad as his most fervent critics fear? Yes. Is it time to drop the heavy moralizing and incessant June saying that typified so much of the never Trump movement and that rendered it politically impotent and frequently obtuse? Yes, please. Matt Lewis, what are your thoughts? I have mixed emotions about this. Right. On one hand, I, I, I, I, I sympathize and certainly understand where Brett's coming from. And look, regardless of what we think or what we have done in the past, Donald Trump is going to be president again.

And I like the, what is it, Mel Brooks, I hope for the best, expect the worst, right? I mean, that's kind of my philosophy here. So on one hand, Brett has a point. Nothing we can do will change the fact that Trump is going to become president. So on one hand, yes, of course, we should hope for the best and try to, to make the best of it. On the other hand, and this is where I think I share Jonah Goldberg's concerns with this column, if you read it in its entirety, one gets the sense that what Brett is saying is that the people have spoken and that because Donald Trump got elected again, it means that

those of us who had concerns about them that we were somehow wrong or, you know, hysterical, misguided. And, you know, we were so out of touch. And I don't think that's the criteria that we should be judging whether or not we acted correctly or appropriately in the past. And I don't think that should really guide us in the future. So maybe an unsatisfying answer, but mixed emotions. But I'll give him credit. As someone who's a columnist myself, if people are talking about your column a month later, you did something right. He says, it's Trump's sulfurous contempt for the elite. His refusal to be shaped by their norms or shamed by their scorn and his willingness to call out their hypocrisy that makes him a

hero to his followers. Case in point. How come so many who denounced Trump as a sexual predator were 20 years earlier Bill Clinton's steadfast defenders? Why were the same people who demanded investigations to do every corner of Trump's family business dealings so incurious about the Biden's family's dealings, like the curiously high price prices for Hunter's paintings. Is he talking about never Trumpers, or is he talking about liberals, or is he talking about wings of never Trumpers? And does he have a point? Well, yeah, and I think you're right. It's hard to be specific because it's just like talking about the media. Who is the media? Who are the media, right? Who are the never Trumpers? I mean, it's, you know, we are not monolithic, obviously, right? And it's hard if you're

writing a 750-word column. You always can't be specific. But look, I think he does have, he has some points. I do think that a lot of Americans are just frankly turned off by the elites and they see Donald Trump as the big middle finger to the elites. And I just give you a microcosm of what I think bothers people. Even yours truly. I'm sitting here over, you know, the holiday weeks, and I'm looking at Twitter, watching journalists congratulate themselves as they play this game of musical chairs, I just got hurt at the Washington Post. Oh, I'm going to the Wall Street Journal. I'm going to Politico. You know, there's only like five, you know, really profitable media outlets in America, and they're all, you know, congratulating one another. I just wonder how

that, it doesn't even play well with me, Jamie, you know, somebody sitting in West Virginia, who is, you know, something of, you know, on the edge of media elitism. I do think that social media, for example, has exposed to the general public how out of touch some people, whether it's in the media or our political elites, how out of touch they are. Again, though, I get back to the point that, like, Donald Trump is a bad person who's done a lot of bad things. And just by virtue of holding him accountable or not wanting to go along with his agenda does not cast you as some elitist. But some of the specifics I thought were interesting. The Bill Clinton aspect of it.

Yeah. I remember right after Me Too, there was like six people who said, you know, I shouldn't have voted for Bill Clinton in retrospect of the Me Too movement. But like that seems to be totally faded. He's as, you know, he gets to speak wherever he wants to speak in the Democratic Party. everyone wants to host him. He'll talk about the failures of what occurred. He was on the view, I think, right after the election. It's kind of hard, right?

If you're claiming that Donald Trump is a sexual predator, and that's why you can't support him to then host Bill Clinton and kind of toast him and feast him and want to hear what he has to say, you know, there is a hypocrisy there. Look, I think Brett is right. There are liberals. who were very critical of Donald Trump, but who made apologies for Bill Clinton's behavior and actually provided Bill Clinton cover. But this hypocrisy goes both ways, right? Like, just as there

were liberals who were willing to go along with Bill Clinton but condemn Donald Trump, there are conservatives. There are evangelical Christians who condemned Bill Clinton. Yes. I think rightly so. And now have a double standard as it applies to Donald Trump. we could say the same thing about the paintings. Brett was referring to the, you know, Hunter Biden's paintings, right? Which is absurd. He's not an artist.

Nobody should give him money for these paintings. You know, I wrote a book called Filthy Rich Politicians that talks about this. And so I think Brett has a point that it's swampy and skeevy and problematic and certainly liberals shouldn't be okay with it. But guess what?

Donald Trump's Son-in-law got like a billion dollars or something from the Saudis to go into a fund. And so I've always made the argument that, like, Democrats and Joe Biden are bad. And for many years, I would argue that Democrats in the left were by far the worst party and movement. But I think when it comes to Donald Trump, although it's fair to say both sides are bad, I just think qualitatively and quantitatively, Trump is worse, okay? So, again, Brett is right that liberals are being hypocritical.

He's not pointing out, I think, that both sides are. He goes on to talk about the anger at elites. I think we touched on it a little bit, but he goes on to say, some of that anger is intensely bigoted, and some of it is misplaced. That side of the anger gets most of the media's attention. But some of it, too, is correctly directed at self-satisfied elite that thinks it knows better but often doesn't whether the subject is COVID restrictions, immigration policy, or how to get our allies to pay more for their defense. And I will add,

even though it's not American, sound should. I mean, I'm still learning about it. And I went to grad school in London. But this story about the rape gangs or what they call the grooming gangs, I don't know why they call them the grooming gangs. It sounds just rape gangs in the UK and the vastness that could be a potential of it, where it seems elites on both sides were just ignoring it because of, I don't know, being afraid of being called racist or whatnot. I mean, is that, what do you make of the point that he was making there? I think he has a valid point. Let me first say the caveat, which is COVID, for example, this is like a once and a century

pandemic. And when it happens, people are going to be. their mistakes will be made. People are going to make mistakes. I think you can have pure motives and you are not going to get it right every time. And I think that in the olden days, our government may have been well-meaning,

but their mistakes weren't under the same magnifying glass because there wasn't as much transparency and we didn't have social media. What are you going to do? Write a letter to the editor to complain about Anthony Fauci. Good luck. You know what I mean? There's three TV channels. What are you going to do? And so now I think that it's maybe harder to be a so-called expert, and there's good and bad to come from that.

So that's the caveat. Now, I do think that Brett has a point here, which is that sometimes our elites and our so-called experts are wrong. Like, sometimes they're arrogant. Sometimes they sweep things under the russ. and they used to get away with it, they weren't caught on it, and now people are calling them on it. And like I say, like, there's a good thing to come from this. People were mad at Donald Trump for a variety of reasons. People like me were mad at Donald Trump for a variety of reasons. And I think that even today and throughout my career, I've done a decent job of pointing out the valid reasons that we were mad at Donald Trump. But there are some other reasons that aren't quite as valid, right? And I think some of it's this. Donald Trump, there were things

that Donald Trump did that we didn't like because they were a moral or because they were stupid. But there were other things that Donald Trump did. We didn't like it because we didn't think he could do it. We didn't think it was doable. And he surprised us. He actually pulled off, you know, he in some cases changed the paradigm, stunned people by getting away with things. Sometimes the things were good. They were actually things that needed to happen. But we just didn't think he could do it. We didn't think it was possible in this political world.

And then I think sometimes there's resentment. When Donald Trump gets away with doing something, even if it's good, we feel, and I'm using we, sort of the royal we, is. those of us in media, academia, whatever, journalism, we resent him for that. And that is not a valid reason, right? So I think that we have sacred cowls in the world. And some of these things, some of these are institutions. I'm going to be Burkean here and say that these are important institutions that over time we developed, and it would be flippant and stupid to try to tear them down wantonly, but sometimes we've built things that are BS. And frankly,

we shouldn't always be holding on to sacred cows. And so once in a while, Trump will knock over something that actually should be knocked over. Jamie, just to give you one example would be, I think pertaining to Israel and the Capitol would be something that a lot of smart experts might have said, yeah, we should move it, but that could anger these people and there could be fallout and backlash. And so, and Trump just went ahead and did it. I'd like to think that Rubio or Cruz would have done it, too, but I'm not sure they would.

Yeah. And there was a lot of promises almost every election cycle that a president would and then they don't. Yeah, yeah. This episode is brought to you by Squarespace. Squarespace is the platform that helps you create a polished professional home online. Whether you're building a site for your business,

your writing, or a new project, Squarespace brings everything together in one place. With Squarespace's cutting-edge design tools, you can launch a website that looks sharp from day one. Use one of their award-winning templates or try the new Blueprint AI, which tailors a site for you based on your goals and style. It's quick, intuitive, and requires zero coding experience.

You can also tap into built-in analytics and see who's engaging with your site and email campaigns to stay connected with subscribers or clients. And Squarespace goes beyond design. You can offer services, book appointments, and receive payments directly through your site. It's a single hub for managing your work and reaching your audience

without having to piece together a bunch of different tools. All seamlessly integrated. Go to Squarespace.com slash dispatch for a free trial and when you're ready to launch, use offer code dispatch to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain.

It's a good jumping off to the next section of this piece which deals with the post-October 7th world. And as I read this section, I'm going to ask you if you're a reaction, but I want you also, because as I'm going through this with you, I'm starting to think even more, and it was reminding me when I first read the piece, I mean, is he talking about never-trumper's, or is he talking about liberals in many cases or a wing of never-trumper's? Because some of this doesn't resonate with me from where I was in the never-trump world or where I think the dispatch has been with some of these issues.

So let me read this part of it. What else did we not sufficiently appreciate? that as much as Trump might lie, Americans also felt lied to by the left, particularly when it came to the White House cover-up of Biden's physical and mental decline, that as bigoted as elements of the MAGA world can be, there's plenty of bigotry to go around, not least in the torrent of Israel bashing and anti-Semitism that emerged from the cultural left after October 7th, that as much as we fear Trump could wreck some of our institutions, whether it's higher education or the FBI, many of those institutions are already broken and they need to be reconceived or replaced. So let me leave you with that and these two questions. One is, is he speaking about never Trump or is he speaking about the left and maybe part of never Trump that's moved more towards the left over time? And two, I brought this up before the election with some guests. I know, you know, I'm not going to say dozens, but let's say a handful of Democrats who voted for Trump this time based on the reaction after October 7th. And their thought process to some degree was, you know, you had Charlottesville under Trump, but then you had,

you know, almost weekly Charlottesville under President Biden, where you had these mobs in the street. And maybe Biden wasn't praising them, but they certainly were getting, you know, some sympathy or at least cover and not being criticized to the extent Charlottesville was after October 7th, where you had essentially pro-Hamas demonstrators time after time and time again, which kind of undermines, I guess, the central reason Biden claimed he ran against Trump, which was because of Charlott's. So first, to your first point, I think that, yeah, Brett here seems to be, you know, never Trump to him seems to be anyone who's not Trump.

So if you're not in MAGA, you're never Trump. So it's not just never Trump conservatives like you or me or even like Tim Miller and Charlie Sykes or, but I think that throughout this column, he's lumping a lot of people in there, Basically, anyone who's not, if you're not Trump, at some point, I think you fit into his column, which is why I think that he's talking about, you know, people who were probably liberals or Democrats who, based on some of the reaction to October 7th, went with Trump. So, look, to me, I think this was a, one of the fundamental problems that Joe Biden faced was that for some reason, he, Biden and Kamala Harris got blamed for everything the left did.

So if somebody on a college campus did something, that was the same as Joe Biden and Kamala Harris doing it, right? Never mind the fact that Joe Biden actually went to Israel, never mind the fact that Joe Biden, I think, stood with Israel, never mind the fact that these same protesters called him genocide Joe and really protested his policies. There was no comparison between some of these protests and what the left was saying about Charlottesville, rightly so, what was going on in Charlottesville. Now, you may say the distinction is that, you know,

but even that distinction I don't even think holds. You know, Trump maybe wasn't willing to endounce them fully enough. I know the clip says, you know, there were good people on both sides and there were bad people there as well. But there was never like, these are neo-Nazi type denunciation of the protests that you were seeing,

you know, to me were very pro-Hamas, a lot of them. Well, no, first, so number one, I agree with you. I would have liked to have seen more of a sister's soldier moment from Biden and or Harris, where they were forceful, and they did condemn the anti-Semitism, but I would have liked have seen even more forceful, combination. I think we both know why that probably didn't happen. There were political reasons.

And I do think that speaks to the problems of the left and the Democratic Party. I don't necessarily think it's fair that that hurt Biden and Harris to the degree that it did. I do make a distinction, though, Jamie. I believe that Donald Trump's 2016 candidacy and his election had the effect of galvanizing the radical right and actually providing energy to anti-Semitism and like the proud boys and these groups on the right. I think that Trump actually inspired them and motivated them. I'm not saying he created them, but I do think he galvanized them. I don't think you could say the same thing about Joe Biden's election. I think Biden just happened to be the president and he paid the price for it. Fair enough. I think that's

a good point. This is how Brett Stevens concludes. So here's a thought for Trump's perennial critics, including those of us on the right. Let's enter the new year by wishing the new administration well, by giving some of Trump's cabinet picks the benefit of the doubt, by dropping the lurid historical comparisons to past dictators, by not sounding paranoid about every looming end of democracy, by hoping for the best and knowing that we need to fight the wrongs that are real and not merely what we fear that whatever happens, this two shall pass. What do you make of that conclusion? Well, look, okay. So again, I'm a little torn here. Hope for the best. Expect the worst, I think is maybe, again, my mantra. On one hand, it doesn't do us any. So I feel like he maybe

is preaching to himself. I don't know if you've ever been in a church or synagogue or wherever. They're talking and it's like, wow, they're talking to me. I think maybe he's writing this. for himself to help himself stay in line. I don't think it does any of us any good to be hysterical. I do think it's also true that some of the warnings that were issued by never Trumpers and liberals, for that matter, about Trump clearly didn't work. They didn't resonate, you know, comparing him, calling him a fascist or whatever. We could make that argument probably. I'm not saying It's always an invalid argument. I don't think it worked.

Clearly, it didn't work. Donald Trump managed to be reelected despite it all. So we could talk about the efficacy of it. But at the end of the day, I also think that it feels to me, and maybe you could read that last part again, that Brett is being dismissive of some of the worst concerns. This two shall pass. Probably, probably it will pass, but maybe it won't. And that, I think, is the sticking point. Brett, I think, is assuming that, yeah, Donald Trump says crazy radical things, but he's going to be gone in four years and we'll be back to normal. Well, maybe. I think he's probably, I think he's probably right. I certainly hope he's right. But I'm not 100% sure he's right.

Well, I did skip one part here, and I meant to intentionally to leave it for a jumping off point for the rest of the conversation. Because I think this might be the most significant paragraph. of the piece. He says, we, speaking of never Trumpers, also talked a lot about democracy. That's important. The memory of January 6 and Trump's 2020 election lies were the main reasons I voted for Kamala Harris. But if democracy means anything, it's that ordinary a people, not elites, get to decide how important an event like January 6 is to them. Turns out not so much. How do we handle January 6th in this president. How do we understand it now that a guy who acted the way he did before and on January 6 who for three hours or so when people were asking for help refused to lift up the phone, people, his own people is vice president

and others asking for help. He doesn't pick up the phone. And he's reelected. Yeah. And obviously, most of the people don't feel the way that I thought about January 6, that Brett Stevens and you probably thought about January 6. Obviously, our view of it wasn't the view, at least as a significant issue, wasn't agreed upon by the country. How do we handle Donald Trump on January 6th going forward? I think it's a two-pronged approach. And so on one hand, Brett Stevens is right. So I think if I'm a political strategist and I'm talking to my candidate, I'm going to tell him, somebody, you know, a Democrat or a, you know, a never Trump conservative. I'm going to say, like, obviously what happened on January 6th was a travesty and should have been disqualifying.

But guess what? To a lot of the American public right now, it's not. It's in the rearview mirror. They actually are more concerned about the price of eggs. That's more important to them. So just be smart about it. We should not run this campaign based on democracy. And that was the weird thing to me, Jamie.

Kamala Harris, when she first launched her campaign this summer, she actually changed the subject very subtly. Joe Biden had run a campaign about democracy and fascism and all of that. Harris initially really got away from that, and I thought, this is smart, this is good. And then, interestingly, for some reason, she closed her campaign by returning to the Biden messaging about democracy and Hitler and fascism. There were reasons for that, I'm sure. Some of it had to do with the fact that Donald Trump, I think, opened the door, maybe on purpose, I'm not sure, to that conversation.

But I think in hindsight, it was a mistake. Harris or somebody obviously concluded that their closing argument about democracy would resonate, would move voters, and very clearly it didn't. So in this regard, Brett Stevens is right. It didn't resonate to the degree that maybe it should have. Here's where I think he and I or I disagree with his column or the tone. It's really about tone, the tone of the column, which is to say, just because something didn't resonate this time with the voters doesn't mean that the voters are right. Does it mean the voters won't someday regret their decision or change their minds? The fact that voters voted for something does not bestow it with moral

superiority, it does not mean that it's philosophically correct or that is virtuous. And I get the sense that he is making the argument that the voters have spoken, you know, and I say, yeah, the bastards, but that's a difference of opinion. But I wonder, does the election, obviously, it doesn't change what happened on January 6th. But does it give Donald Trump a second chance? Should it, you know, say, all right, bygones be bygones? All right, you might have tried to overthrow or softly tried to overvow the government, you know, four years ago, but the voters elected you. They didn't think it was a very important issue. We're going to give you a clean slate going forward. We'll judge you now by your forward actions. And because the voters elected you, we're not forgetting

it, but we're putting it aside for now. Look, for people like you and me, we shouldn't. We should not. What he did, you and I know, was unforgivable. And it was a disqualifying event, it speaks to your character. It speaks to a lack of belief, really, in just the American way, the American system. So I don't think people like you and I who fully appreciate what he did. I don't think we can look past it. We could still hope for the best. But when it comes to, you know, if I'm Donald Trump, I would, here's what I'm hoping. I would sincerely hope that Donald Trump would say, I really messed that one up, you know, but I'm going to be better going forward. No, I think that's naive, but I would certainly hope that he would try to redeem himself.

I think it's Pollyanna, but, you know, let him prove me wrong. I'd love to look back and say, you know what, man, what a second. They said there's no second acts in American history, in American life. Well, he proved me wrong. I mean, if he doesn't run for president again or doesn't try to change things to run again, I mean, it is unlikely you're going to get another January 6th because he didn't lose, right? I mean, January 6 almost was a face-saving, he didn't like the thought that he lost the election and had to come up with a, you know, cockamamie, you know, viewpoint or evidence in order to support the idea he didn't lose. So there is a good chance he doesn't try something like that again, right, if he doesn't. Not him, yeah.

Well, look, he may just never lose again. I mean, Vladimir Putin keeps winning elections. But look, there's another problem, and that is the message he has sent. What he has taught us, what he has taught other would-be demagogues. Jamie, there's an old story. It's probably apocryphal, I don't know, but it has to do with raising children. And the story goes like this, that, you know, in the circus or whatever, if you have the way you train an elephant, If you have a, I know this sounds like a bizarre analogy, but stick with me.

If you have a baby elephant, what you do is you put a stake in the ground and you chain the elephant to the steak. And this baby elephant will pull and will try to pull the steak out. And eventually he learns, no matter how hard he pulls, he can't pull the steak out. And then eventually you don't even need the steak. The elephant has been trained to abide by these certain rules. And he thinks the stake is there, doesn't even need the stake to be there. I think for a lot of American history, our presidents operated like that elephant. They felt like they were guided by these rules and these institutions and these traditions

that kept them in check, that kept them from doing things that would get them impeached or labeled out of touch with America or certainly fascistic. these, we'll call them guardrails. I don't know. They weren't really there, Jamie. They're not really in place, but the perception that you couldn't go there. Well, Donald Trump has eroded, has destroyed these guardrails. Can I push back a little bit?

Are you sure that they're not really real? I mean, there are some guardrails, right? There is the Supreme Court. There is, I mean, he wasn't able to maintain power. He tried, maybe tried, you know, a little bit. maybe he tried a lot, but he wasn't able to maintain power. There were some guardrails. I'm not saying they can't be weakened over time, but it does seem that there were some guardrails. Oh, yeah, yeah, no, there are some, but there were a lot of things that we thought you had to do,

either because the public would force you or because you would be impeached and removed from office, or because the Supreme Court would stop you, that he's kind of demonstrated not. really. And I do think it's entirely, this goes back, I'll bring it back to the Brett Stevens, you know, all's well that ends well. Well, it could be that part of the damage that Donald Trump does isn't, he may leave office in four years, but some of the damage that he's done, I think could come back to haunt us. And just because, I don't mean to sound hysterical here, But if you care deeply about this country, if you believe that what we have, to use Jonah Goldberg's words, you know, is this a miracle that we are blessed in this civilization, then you want to take care of it and you want to preserve it. And so I don't think it's hysterical to say like, eh, some of what he's done, somebody else could pick up the mantle and run with that.

I want to stick on January 6th. I think it's, you know, it's a very interesting questions that you can put around it now. And my question, you know, if, and I'm going to ask you about what is the best case scenario for Trump. But, you know, my mind, it's not impossible that Trump has, I always thought there's more upside with Trump than Harris and much more downside. But let's say there's the upside wins out in the second Trump term. And you get more Abraham Accords and the end of Iran's nuclear program and deal with Saudi Arabia and, you know, other positive things for the economy. and you know, you end four years and you don't have major crisis, certainly nothing on the line of January 6th. Can Trump be remembered as a great president with January 6th still there? Is it possible

that if he is this, you know, creates this great economy and foreign policy does work out and everything goes to the way he paints it, which is, you know, very amazing, right? Is it possible to even rate him? How do you rate him in the rank of presidencies? How do you rate him in the rank of presidencies. You know, the historians always have these lists. How, how, is there, is there an asterisk? What, what do you do with January 6th in terms of rating Donald Trump's presidency? Well, speaking for me, it is a disqualifier. And no, uh, I, I hope for the best, but, um, you know, there's no coming back from this one. This was the unforgivable sin, you know, um, there are a lot of sins, most of which you can repent for and make amends, but there is an

unforgivable said, and that's what this is in a representative democracy. That's me, though, Jamie. Look, I think in the eyes of history, it may be like Barry Bonds. There may be the asterisk, but you're still, the ball is going to be in the Hall of Fame. I think that historians, you know, will judge him by the totality of his presidency. And even though for me, he would rank dead last, you know, down there with Buchanan, possibly. But I do think that for history, if he is a excellent president for the next four years, they will certainly factor that in. And, you know, I root for it, actually. And that's okay. You know what? Because I'm not a politician. I could be seen as eccentric. I could be seen as like a conservative guy, yet he's a crank,

because he still doesn't love President Trump the way we all do. I mean, I could become that old guy at some point. I'm okay with that. You kind of like historian as well. I mean, you're not an academic historian, but your columns try to bring in history to them. So, I mean, you sometimes have to see that you try to put yourself in a historian shoes, but you're saying Matt Lewis, amateur historian, does dead last, no matter what he does. Did last.

But, Jamie, to your point, I can see it is well within the round. a possibility that Donald Trump, I think that there's a lot of range in how things could go. I think it could go south. I think there could be good things that come from this presidency. And in fact, what is the best case scenario for a Trump presidency? Well, and look, I think this is something that you've spoken about. You and I have talked about this before. But I think when it comes to reigning in Iran's nuclear ambitions, it is, you know,

it is ripe for that to happen. There's a scenario where, you know, Israel and the United States take out their nuclear capacity, which would not have been really feasible or possible in the past, but right now for a variety of reasons, including the fact that their air defenses are weakened, the fact that their, you know, Hezbollah is not, you know, capable of the backlash that they might have had a few years ago. So that's an opportunity. Some people would say that's scary, dangerous. I bet you there's a lot of MAGA people who would hate that. They would think this would be a betrayal. But for those of us to worry about, Jamie, I think, as you've put it in North Korea in the Middle East,

this is perhaps an opportunity that someone like Trump may take advantage of. I also think that there is a chance. Donald Trump is changing the electorate, bringing African Americans and Hispanics into the Republican Party. There are good things, certainly, to come from that. I don't think it's great when any one political party can assume that in a entire demographic is completely beholden to them. It's not good for that demographic for nobody to really be competing over their votes. And then I do think when it comes, you don't

hear me talk a lot about political correctness or woke or anything like that, but guess what I'm against it? I'm against the woke thing, especially when it's, you know, the run amok, the really negative cancel culture side of woke. And I think that Trump, if you look at what's happening with some of these companies with getting rid of their DEI programs and all of that, I think that could be a very positive externality that comes from this. And so, again, hope for the best. Well, you painted an upside scenario. But I don't think, I think any upside scenario still has to come with, what is something

that's unavoidable? I mean, I'm going to ask you about the downside in a second, but even in the upside scenario, are there certain negatives that are unavoidable that will get this upside, but Fauci is going to get imprisoned or maybe some people say that as upset. But Millie is going to get audited or something like that. Are there certain negatives, even in the upside scenario, that are unavoidable? Well, I don't know if they're unavoidable, but definitely Donald Trump campaigned on vengeance and retribution. I mean, those are big campaign promises.

In fact, maybe his first campaign promise launching this second president. third presidential campaign, second administration. So retribution and vengeance were definitely a key part of his platform. I still don't know if it's inevitable, but it wouldn't surprise me if you got the good and the bad, if you got something good and if you got something bad. And I have to tell you, seeking, it would have to see how it plays out. But in general, my consent, you know, my take is that seeking retribution on people for political purposes would be in the same league as January 6th, which is to say, unforgivable, un-American and unpardonable. Well, you know, I guess not technically unpartnerable, but in my book,

unpardonable. What is the downside? What is the worst kid? What is the American on-fire scenario? What's the downside, the worst case scenario you can imagine? Well, okay, so I think that there's even here, there are different levels. I think there's one scenario where he tries to do something like mass deportation and it's an S show. It goes really bad and there's a backlash and Trump becomes wildly, I think there's a scenario where Trump becomes wildly unpopular while in office and that there's a revolt against him and that people regret voting him back in. because maybe he, so Donald Trump does tariffs and tax cuts and all of a sudden inflation soars even higher than it is, right? After running against inflation, it goes higher. And then he rounds up grandmas and mass supports people. And there's a, so I think there's one version of a bad

presidency where the public turns on it. And I actually think that's not the worst scenario. The worst scenario is that Trump does all sorts of bad things and he becomes a hero for doing them and he never leaves. He stays in office. He makes the argument, you know, over time what Trump is doing, he's placing his people in different positions. And these are loyalists, right? These are not establishment Republicans. These are not people dedicated to the Constitution or the republic. These are Donald Trump loyalists. And if you get enough of them in important places, he could just conceivably stay on. And maybe the Supreme Court decides, oh, well, yeah, you can't have three consecutive terms, but you could have a non-consecutive term.

And then maybe Trump gets, I don't know, Melania can't get elected unless he changes that, too. He has Don Jr. get elected, but it's really Don Senior, you know, running. the show. I mean, we're talking about... He's 90 at this point, though, right? I mean, he's pretty old. That's our only saving grace, Jamie, is that he's a million years old. I agree that you always, after January 6, have to take that as a risk, but when you say the odds are extremely low that he's going to try to run again or try to stay on, or do you think there's a potential, there's a serious potential for that?

You know, I put it, we've talked about this before, and I forget what Dick Cheney said if there's a 1% chance of a dirty bomb at a major city, you have to act as if it's a certainty. Something like that. I'm paraphrasing. Yeah, I think it's in the single digits for sure, but the stakes are pretty high. And so it's alarming. It's like, I'm going to get on a plane tomorrow. And if you told me there's a 7% chance, it's going to crash, I wouldn't be very comfortable with that. Is it a 7% chance that he would be able to do it or that he would attempt to? But I think you're painting institutions as a little bit weaker than I think they are. I think the risk is there and that's why I didn't vote for him and I voted for Kamala Harris.

But I do think the institutions, even so the military, the judiciary, even the his Supreme Court picks, are a little bit stronger than just, you know, fiddling around the edges. Yeah. Well, look, I don't want to sound hysterical and I'm not. I mean, you know, but you're you're, you're based. me into this so I will take the bait. He's got four years to do this. And that's the key. It's about slowly maneuvering, right? So if you get Pete Hegseth in charge of the Department of Defense, right, and then you start threatening the media. The media is very important. But we saw how Jeff Bezos was sort of brought to heel. He pulled back the endorsement of Kamala Harris. He's

giving a lot of money to the inauguration. You saw how ABC News and George Stephanopoulos agreed to settle this. I think it was a defamation suit or something because Stephanopoulos referred to it, said that Donald Trump was found liable of rape when, in fact, he was technically found liable of sexual assault. And ABC decided to pay, I think it was $15 million. So we're seeing how the media, and oftentimes these media companies are protecting other interests, other holdings, you know, they're owned by parent companies who don't want Donald Trump to seek retribution on them. I don't know via tariffs or whatever. That's how this works, Jamie. You go through our institutions and slowly one by one, he starts softening. Let me push you a little

A little bit further on that, though. There was a great saying that when I interviewed Jamie Kirchick, who we both know, the writer and journalist, during the first Trump administration, his saying, I think he was quoting someone else saying, Jamie, he's a golfer, not a fascist, Trump. What you're saying is it takes focused, you know, intent with someone who is, like, really has a long-term plan

is Trump that guy? Is Trump a guy that like really is focused at doing something like that, hauling out these institutions to remain? Good question. I think it's interesting, Jamie. I feel like it's almost schizophrenic. There is a Donald Trump that is funny and seems a little bemused by this whole thing and likes to plague off. And yet somehow he also seems like a brilliant political you, a Machiavellian maneuverer on occasions. And some of the stuff he pulled off, we're talking about a guy, going back to your point, who incited a capital, a riot on the Capitol,

trying for the first time in history, stopping the peaceful transfer of power, has been convicted of, I forget, how many felony counts. He was found liable of sexual assault. He was impeached twice and managed to get reelected, okay? The guy's got something going on. He's obviously got Riz, as the kids say, but he's got a cunning. But it's not just that, Jamie.

He's also got minions. He's got people like Stephen Miller who are working for him and who may have Cash Patel, people who are devious and maybe they're not going to be playing golf. Maybe they're going to be focused on, you know, auditing you or something or me. And so, look, I don't think it's as absurd as it might seem when you, think of Trump as the clownish figure. I think it's plausible. And then the last thing I'll say on this is my point earlier about someone else could be

watching. I mean, if it ain't Trump, somebody down the road could look at this playbook and maybe they are able to execute the plan in a way he wasn't. Does the Gates failure, does that give you hope in any way in institutions that that Gates, you know, clearly the Senate wasn't going to just give Donald Trump the green light on one of his most important picks at Attorney General. Does that give you any hope of some barrier to Donald Trump doing just what he wants to do? Not really. Maybe if you'd ask me when it first happened, it might have. My sense is that, first of all, I don't understand why Gates didn't wait,

right like if if gates had had stayed in and forced them to take him down then you could argue that the senators will have gotten their bloodletting and then they'll say like well pete heggseth isn't as bad we'll vote for pete because we took down gates we show so on one hand i feel like the smart strategic move would have been for gates to to last but it just it it seems like the gates thing uh and maybe i'll be proven wrong but it seems like that kind of existed like in a vacuum it's old news. And now just reading the tea leaves, when you look at some of these nominees, it seems like, and we'll say Pete Hegseth is a prime example, Joni Ernst is kind of seen as the most important senator when it comes to whether or not Hegseth will be confirmed. And reading between the

lines, it seems like she's going to support him. And so I kind of feel like right now, maybe I'll feel differently in a couple weeks or whenever when Trump is inaugurated. But right now, It feels more like a rubber stamp to me. What do you make of his cabinet picks generally so far? Heartened or discouraged? Well, so it's schizophrenic, again, right? You've got people like Marco Rubio, you know, Secretary of State Marco Rubio. I was kind of heartened by that one, even though Rubio's lost some of the respect I had for him.

He's a serious person and he knows foreign policy. And then this isn't, this is not a cabinet pick. but making Susie Wiles, Chief of Staff, I think, sent a signal of seriousness and an adult maybe in the room. And then he follows it up with Matt Gates and Pete Heggseth and Tulsi Gabbard. And, you know, you can go down the list, Cash Patel. And so on one hand, I think it's a sign of really this coalition that lacks, and I had a word about this in a column at the Hill recently, that the MAGA is full of internal contradictions. And I do know Donald Trump obviously has a couple of core principles or beliefs that he's held over the course of many years, including protectionism and tariffs.

But in many ways, I think MAGA is full of contradictions. We've seen it, of course, recently with Vivek and Elon Musk supporting these H-1B visas, angering people like Steve Bannon. and Laura Lumer, and it's almost like Trump just through all these people who supported him in this pot, and he's like, we'll sort it out later. We'll see who sticks, who wins and who doesn't. And so I don't think we really know exactly, in many cases, what is agenda going to be like other than retribution, of course. There's actually a quoting to find from a profile of Michael Bloomberg from maybe a decade ago of how he hires these people and then throws him in a bag and let some fight like cats, and then, you know, somehow comes to a decision.

That actually, that's, I need to dig that up because I feel like that may be apropel. Who is the most influence over his thinking here? I mean, as you mentioned, you have Rubio. I mean, I would say most of the national security team, you know, other than Tulsi Gabbard, probably is probably more interventionist than not, or at least, you know, not of the Tucker Carlson Wing of the GOP, which surprised me because I thought Tucker might have more influence than he did. So who has the most influence, do you think, over Trump?

Whoever talks to him last is the person who, whoever he sees on Fox News, whoever talks to him last. And that's part of the problem is his capriciousness. I do think there's one person that has outsized power, and that is Stephen Miller. And that's because he is actually going to be writing, probably, legislation and rules and speeches and regulations in a way that other people who may win the rhetorical argument or the argument on social media, but then when things actually get written, Stephen Miller can have the last word. That's interesting, because I was thinking the other day that he does seem to be a little bit out of the current zeitgeist as the H-1B visa conversation

is going on with Trump siding with Elon Musk. What if Musk targets Stephen Miller and says, you know what? This guy is where the problem is. Is Stephen Miller the last guy there that is of the Steve Bannon wing within the Eternal White House that you can think of? I mean, he does seem to be the, you know, he's dangerous to maybe to some people because he's the guy writing things, as you said.

But also, he seems to be maybe the most important, an only player there of significance, that if he were to leave or forced out, that that influence is gone. My impression is that, you know, without being an insider here, the problem of being a never-Trumper who's been opposed to Donald Trump for a decade is it's not great if you're in the access business. But it's really good if you want to be able to criticize people and be intellectually honest. So it's a trade-off. But here's my take on that, Jamie.

I do think you're right. When it comes to, you know, the cable news celebrities, Steve Bannon is no longer, you know, a top strategist, so he is gone. He lacks that influence within, you know, within the West Wing. So in that regard, I think you're right about Stephen Miller maybe being the last man standing. But the big difference here is Stephen Miller is playing this inside game. And my instinct is that what he's been doing, and this is part of like Project 25, the staffing, is filling the bureaucracy and the White House with people that share Stephen Miller's political

worldview. And so I think that when it comes to who's saying what on Fox News or on X, who's getting the attention, that's one thing. when it comes to, you know, who is actually writing the regulations and the rules and the laws and all that stuff and that Stephen Miller certainly has outsized influence and partly because he has infiltrated, you know, the power, the halls of power with people who share his his worldview. Well, that brings me to Elon Musk. One, what do you make of the Elon Musk, Donald Trump? How much influence do you think he has over Donald Trump? And let me throw this caveat

in here. Will this blow up like some people think it might because of other relationships? Or does the fact that Elon Musk is far and away the wealthiest person in the world, almost at $500 billion, dollars, half a trillion dollars, who has a plausible reason to be the takeout of truth social to make Donald Trump billions of dollars. I mean, there's a plausible tie to Twitter. He could buy it at an inflated price. Does that make him almost unassailable, that Trump has more reason to listen to him than other people?

I don't know, Jamie, and I am so fascinated by this, because on one hand, you're right. I mean, Elon Musk is a billionaire. He is obviously brilliant in many ways. He is very popular in Maga World and certainly certain parts of Maga World. He owns X, which gives him this amazing megaphone to influence public opinion. On the other hand, Donald Trump doesn't like to play second fiddle. He wants to be the man. and it seems pretty inevitable that there's going to be a clash with these two huge egos.

And furthermore, you know, Donald, the whole MAGA thing, Donald Trump's oldest and most loyal and most devoted supporters clearly have a different point of view when it comes to immigration, at least, than Elon Musk. And, you know, Musk is going around throwing sharp elbows talking about people being his word retarded, you know, if they don't agree with them. So, and then if you look at Vivek Ramoswame, who is obviously an ally with Elon Musk in the Doge world, I mean, he had this incredibly just condescending take about how Americans are, you know, we're not, you know, my kids aren't. capable of being programmers and coders because they're too focused on watching saved by the bell or some 80s or 90s sitcom, you know, because American culture is so soft and so weak. I mean, it was very condescending. It just has to rub a lot of Trump voters the wrong way if they ever hear of it, which they probably won't if they watch Fox News, but some of them will. So on one hand, you're right. I can't imagine that Trump would want to fight Elon. On the other hand,

it just feels inevitable, right? That eventually they're going to clash. And I'm just here for the popcorn at this point. Well, here's the intersection of all this. And this is a great question for you. Our former boss, Tucker Carlson, is one of those people who, if he had a Fox show right now, and it wasn't Elon Musk, and it wasn't Donald Trump, trying to push H-1B visa position on the masses, he would call that guy evil and an idiot and trying to capitalize, I mean, all the worst names that you can imagine. As far as I can tell, he's been interestingly silent. Obviously, a lot of stuff that he puts out is on X. He seems to be somewhat friendly with Elon Musk, Donald Trump, he's endorsed. What do you make?

How will he, will, you know, Tucker has now, you know, develop this persona or he does not, you know, he's not afraid of attacking anybody. He's beholden to nobody. Is he beholden to Elon Musk and Donald Trump? Will he pull his punches when it comes to them? And the H-1B visa question. Yeah, you're right. I mean, maybe I've missed it, but it seems like he has so far. Obviously, we've had people like Laura Lumer go after Elon Musk.

We've had people, Steve Bannon, I think, caught him a child or something like that. But will they continue to or will they just get in line? That's what's so fascinating about this, right? Is that the anti-immigration thing has been like a fundamental bedrock aspect of Donald Trump and MAGA. And so the idea that these kind of newcomers, I mean, Elon Musk was a Barack Obama supporter, you know, that these newcomers would show up, and at least as it pertains to these highly skilled immigrants, change policy, or certainly the MAGA preferred policy, that seems presumptuous, you know, get in line.

Well, you know, you don't join a movement and take over the next day. So I feel like there has to be some animosity. And look, these are the kind of things that you would think, oh, okay, on one hand, I like, I think these are interesting ideas. I mean, you know, should, let's talk about the idea. Like, should we have H1B visas, right? It's like, on one hand, I think we could make kind of a nationalist populist argument that, like, no, Americans ought to be filling these jobs. And if they're not capable, then let's get them capable. Let's school them up. And on the other hand, I think you could argue, no, like immigration makes us all better.

That one of the reasons America has stayed vibrant and young and has thrived is that we bring in the best and brightest who are looking for a better future for themselves and their children. And so this is a feature, not a buck. I mean, I think you could, like, either position, I think, is actually defensible. I think, you know, you could be a good person and fervently believe either position. But usually these ideas are like hashed out in primaries or the principle. You know, the president has a coherent worldview. And everyone knows what the position is. In this case, we've elected a guy.

And there's so many of these issues that now are going to be hashed out. like on the fly in public and it's going to be messy and ugly and it's going to be I think fascinating to watch and Jamie let me just say this this is a little self-indulgent to say but let me just say I was watching a clip of George Carlin back when he was alive and he said and I'm not I'm not quite this cynical but Carlin was said talking about his comedy and he said at a certain point I gave up on the American experiment, and it made me a better comedian. I decided that I could tell the truth and just observe things kind of at a distance, and it gave me a better perspective not to have any skin in the game.

Well, again, I don't want to be cynical, and I certainly love this country, and I believe in it. But having said that, there's something fun. There's something to be said about getting to sit back and watch MAGA fight each other, and not really caring that much how some of these, not all, but some of these internal squabbles shake out. That's like, can't they all lose? So let's close on two non-Trump questions. This is one that we've discussed before.

What happens to never-Trumpers in the media? We talk about before the election, but now Donald Trump is elected again. You're a never-trumper in the media? I am a never-Trumper in the media. What is the state of us? Well, there's two places you can work, and I don't work at either of them, so I don't have a job. I mean, you can work at the book or you can work at the dispatch. It's not great because basically, look, I think if Kamala Harris had won, let's just say,

there would be a, maybe a seat at the table for us in the mainstream media, you know, like on a Sunday morning panel discussion, because, you know, I think it's, naive to think that the Republican Party is going to go back to Mitt Romney or John McCain. But if Trump had lost again, the Republican Party would have to maybe start rethinking some things. And you might be like, is Marco Rubio going to be the future? Is J.D. Vance going to be the future? And maybe some sort of hybrid. And that's a conversation where I think, I'll speak for myself, that I'd be a relevant, you know, newsworthy part of that conversation. as it is, I think that we are not relevant the way that the media look.

If you, here's my, here's, my stock and trade is telling the truth as I see it and trying to have insights and, uh, intellectual scoops, you know, I'm not like a straight reporter. I don't play the access game, but if I can have an intellectual insight, then I'm winning. So I feel like I'm contributing, obviously, but the media will invite you on a panel if they think you're sort of part of the fight, part of the relevant part of the debate. And let's just be honest, if you're a never-trumper, right now, you're not getting a seat at that table. Not during prime time, at least. 2028, how does the 2028 president, I know we just finished the 2024 presidential election.

In theory, Donald Trump doesn't, can't run again. So 2028 would be an open Republican field. how does that play out? So first of all, we should acknowledge that we see through a glass darkly and that I remember when George Allen, the governor of Virginia, former governor, former senator of Virginia, that the political insiders at National Journal's hotlines selected him to be the most likely Republican nominee after George W. Bush. I don't think most people would have thought Barack Hussein Obama would have been president in 2008, you know, coming off the heels of 2004.

So Donald Trump certainly most people didn't think he was going to win in 2016, most of the so-called experts. So our track record of predicting things this far out is not great. I will say that I think that J.D. Vance is obviously an interesting person to have in the discussion. I think someone like John Fetterman, like AOC, are interested. And I think you can't discount something like a Donald Trump Jr. I really don't think you can. Donald Trump is, you know, monarchical to a certain degree.

So I think that like if you were to like poll people today, I think Donald Trump Jr. would not be at the top of the list. I think he's probably, I'd probably put some money on him as a dark horse long shot. and then sort of buy low and sell high. So you're two on the right on the Republican candidate that popped to your mind as J.D. Vans and Donald Trump Jr. Yeah. And, you know, I think Tucker Carlson, too. And I also think we probably, we as in the media, are probably underrating people who aren't even in politics right now, like celebrities. How about a kickback? UFC fighter. Or something, someone like that that we, you've heard of, I haven't even heard of yet, might be, you know, Camacho or whatever from the, from the judge movie.

But what you're saying is it's Trump's party. The three names that you set up are ideologically, I mean, again, I don't know what Trump's ideology often is sometimes, but to the extent that you would call them a Trump wing or Trump centric, I mean, one of his name Trump. So, I mean, if there was something like a major depression, I don't think you would, like, Nikki Haley wouldn't have a chance anyway, right? Because the Republican's not going to win. If Trump does a bad enough job, you couldn't even get a Nikki Haley. So I think that if the next president's a Republican, my money would be on someone from the Maga Wang of the Republican Party. Matt Lewis, thank you for joining the dispatch podcast.

Thanks, Jamie. You know,