The MeidasTouch Podcast - Indictment Watch 2021 with Frank Figliuzzi, Former FBI Assistant Director for Counterintelligence

Episode Date: June 29, 2021

On today’s episode, the brothers sit down with retired FBI Assistant Director for Counterintelligence, NBC News National Security Contributor & author of the book The FBI Way: Inside the Bureau's Code of Excellence, Frank Figliuzzi! During the conversation Frank discusses how Fox “News” is basically just Russian propaganda, Trump’s pathetic re-run rally in Ohio and the tangible threats Americans face with respect to another potential insurrection. Frank goes on to discuss the latest on Matt Gaetz, as well as why the right wing media continuously tries to undermine our law enforcement & military. The episode is rounded out by the brothers discussing the latest on the Bill Barr / Trump break-up saga and how Trump’s own family members are now distancing themselves from the former President. Yikes! Be sure to tune in every Tuesday & Friday for NEW episodes of The MeidasTouch Podcast’and if you have a moment today please rate this episode 5-stars and leave us a comment! Get your official Meidas Merch at store.meidastouch.com --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/meidastouch/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/meidastouch/support Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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If you have questions or concerns about your gambling or someone close to you, please contact Connex Ontario at 1-866-531-2600 to speak to an advisor free of charge. BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with iGaming Ontario. Welcome to the Midas Touch podcast. Ben Micellis here, joined by Brett and Jordy Micellis. We've got a great episode for you today. We have Frank Fagluzzi on the podcast, retired FBI assistant director for counterintelligence. He actually led the division in Cleveland, Ohio. Really excited to have him on, especially in light of that crazy, what would we even call that? Fascist GQP festival yesterday in Ohio with- I'd call it a loser palooza. Loser palooza.

Loser palooza over there. You know, it just, by the way, the crowds were actually not all that big. If you actually look at them and kind of count how many people deep it is, like you could get people to organize, you know, over anything, especially if it's like a former president.

I'm actually, you know, I would say my evaluation is, is that there was not actually that many people there at all. You know what the crowd was like? It's like when a band that was popular, like in the nineties gets back together and performs at like a local fair. I remember growing up there, we had a, there was an event by us at a local church. It was called, what did they call it? It was at St. Pius Church by us. And they had like a fair. That was the best. There's a good

story that goes along with that. Don't forget to. They had like a Gravitron. I don't know if you know the Gravitron where you lay on the thing and it spins around and then you get up and it runs to throw up. It was just called the St. Pius Fair. It was just called the St. Pius Fair. Yeah, it was the St. Pius Fair. Have it every summer. And you have the slides. And then there's always like a kind of music act that fills the fair. And that's what this event reminded me of yesterday. And yes, from like a close-up point of view with a wide-angle lens, it looks like a lot of people, but we actually sent somebody there. We sent Walter Masterson there to take videos and get perspective on the ground. And not even half the fairground was filled up. And this is a place that would be filled up if they had a local festival in Ohio. And the tickets

were free and the tickets were free. And not only that, people were leaving in mass early to get back to their cars rather than hear the end of Trump's speech. And so we have a video that we posted that's like during the last like half hour of Trump's speech, him ranting about election fraud and, you know, all the same shit. And you just see people just walking away, just walking away because that's what it was. It was just reruns. Like he's saying the same crap. And how much could you say? Oh, yeah, we're still looking into Georgia. We're still looking into Georgia. It's like, bro, it's been like six months since the election. Get over it. Like I read the snake again. That was his 2015 fascist racist hits.

And no one even liked it. No one even liked it then. So we got to basically after we heard that he was doing the the snake routine, you know, which is his racist, xenophobic story about the woman who brings in the snake and the snake is healed from the sickness. And then the snake kills the women. And he used that to analogize to immigration. We made the video, the snake, to show that Donald Trump was the snake all along. Trump, the snake's got like seven point six, seven point seven million views right now. And we got to play this. We played our greatest hits again. We played the snake all along. Trump, the snake's got like 7.6, 7.7 million views right now. And we got to play this. We played our greatest hits again. We played the snake. You think you'd stop it after a video became so popular, but no, he goes on.

You can't listen to that story and not think about just the depths of his depravity. When you hear that story, it's about him, the snake. When you listen to every single word. Jordy, what's your St. Pius story? Yeah, we're not going to move on from here. For all the people that hate the brother banter, fast forward two minutes and then listen back up because there's this very famous Mycellus family. People love the brother banter. I know, but just for the few that don't, very famous St. Pius fair moments. Honestly, I was like one or two. Ben, I think you

need to tell the story because I don't want to paint you in a bad light here, but I'm happy to tell it as it was told to me. I have no clue what story you're in. Oh my God. So as Brett was talking about, there's this thing called the Gravitron. And what this thing does is it spins like a hundred, 200 miles per hour, like very unsafe, but you throw kids on it and really they just like put their backs up against the wall. To be fair, it probably doesn't spin that fast. It feels that fast when you're a kid. But I've been like, brothers, it spins like a thousand miles. I was going to go to my house and I cut it down.

I cut it down. Okay, so it spins like 50 miles per hour, which is very fast as a kid. And so I'm going to look it up while you look it up. Let me keep telling the story. So Ben's on this ride as like an eight, nine year old. This St. Pius fair was like the thing in town. Everyone would go over the summer. It was the hot thing. So Ben's on this ride. I think it was brand new at the time. It's spinning and spinning and spinning. All of a sudden the ride stops like kind of prematurely and all the parents

are looking around like what's going on. Somebody, I guess the operator comes out of the Gravitron and says, excuse me, excuse me. We have a child who threw up everywhere. Whose child is this? And takes Ben out of the Gravitron with puke all over him. And I think it was our mom who had to claim her son who puked on the whole ride and probably got puked on all the kids. And Ben, what say you? I don't remember this story, number one.

I got some info about the Gravitron. What I do remember though, is I do remember, I hate those small festivals. I like big amusement parks. I like the six flag style roller coasters, but I do remember puking on the pirate ship, the ones that in a pirate ship that just goes up and down and up and down. That would totally screw with my stomach. But Brett, give us the Gravitron details. Okay. So it seems like it's a hard conversion to make between rotations per minute and miles per hour. But it appears that it goes at a tops here. The ride quickly starts to rotate its top speed of 24 rotations per minute. It's like a hundred miles per hour in 20 seconds. And then I'm seeing another website that says 11.6 rotations per minute is

about one mile an hour. So that would mean it's about two to three miles an hour. If this is the same, our hometown went way faster than one mile per hour. Yeah. Yeah. Like if one at that speed, it would fly up into the air, like a spaceship. Those are the UFOs that everybody's been seeing. It's actually gravitrons that went too fast over the limits. But speaking of spinning in circles, the Trump speech yesterday even had his QAnon cult asking, what the hell was that? And, you know, I don't want to amplify further, you know, what those conversations were. Suffice to say that even the GQP cultists were like, this is boring.

What the hell is he talking about? The reviews on that former guy's speech universally was that it was panned, you know, and even others were like, look, he doesn't have the trappings of Air Force One behind him. You have to remember, he would use the incredibly powerful symbolism of our nation, of our military might, of the executive branch, of all of those things, and he would put it behind him. He totally would break any of the separation between politics and the commander in chief roles. And for people who hadn't seen it, it was just cool to go out and see Air Force One. He doesn't have that behind him anymore. And he stuck with his old head. So that's my first observation. My second observation

is I recommend you guys watch this and anybody out there watch this on Hulu. I'm watching Donut King, it's called. And Donut King talks about the history of family owned donut shops in California and talks about there's about 7000 for every 7000 people in California. There's a donut shop and 90 percent of donut shops are owned by the Cambodian community. Did you know those facts? It's it's incredibly interesting. And so after there was a genocide going on in Cambodia in the 70s, and one of the things this documentary highlights is the compassion that Americans had for immigrant and refugee populations, and with open arms, embrace the

Cambodian community with church groups and other religious groups and community groups, sponsoring families and welcoming refugees, immigrants from Cambodia and other foreign countries. And, you know, I was sitting there with Sochi, my girlfriend, who's from Mexico. She's first generation. And to think about the hostility that exists towards Mexican and South American immigrants and refugees here and the attitude that exists now within the Republican Party and how xenophobic everything was. And to think back then, it was a sense of pride that the country had of America as a melting pot. And so to see President Ford's declaration about America is this melting pot and America is

this beacon and to see the Cambodian immigrants love America for embracing them and their culture and their community, it just warmed my heart to be like, that's truly what America is all about. I'll have to check that movie out. Now I want some donuts. You're really going to kill this diet we got going on with all this donut. I'm not going to eat any of the donuts. We won't do that brother story. We'll do the brother diet story for another podcast. But I want to talk about something that people truly care about. It's not the brother Ben, Brett and Jordy post pandemic diet watch. It is the Trump indictment watch 2021. We learned last week and

we're learning more details this week that the district attorney in New York, Cy Vance, basically gave a deadline for the Trump organization in connection with the criminal investigation and potential criminal prosecution of the Trump organization to respond, essentially a request of tell us why you should not be criminally charged or criminally prosecuted. You got to explain that. You got to explain that to me. So is that like a normal thing that happens in these prosecutions where the prosecutors go, OK, I'll give you one more opportunity. Tell me why I shouldn't give you criminal charges. You have until Monday or I might do it. Like, is that like a thing that prosecutors do? Well, I think in any the short answer is it's a tool that they have. Is it a normal tool that you see and like respond by Monday, per se? I think that that's a little unusual. case, though, with the government attorneys and the attorneys of the accused individuals,

because people want to streamline the proceedings. They want to see if there are, you know, before there's a full-fledged war, which would be the criminal prosecution. Are there ways that certain people would agree to plead guilty in certain charges? Could there be plea deals? Is there information that can be exchanged to mitigate circumstances? And so when you think about it, if you're prosecuting a case, you want to get as much information as you can. And if you're a defendant, if you're a criminal defendant, you don't want to be criminally prosecuted, especially if you actually are guilty of the crime. And so there is a joint

willingness oftentimes to try to collaborate and see if something can be avoided. I don't think that here between the Trump stubbornness and criminality and constant lies and the scope of this DA's investigation, I don't think we're going to see any deals. But I do think they're just saying, look, we're trying to be fair here. If you want to give us information, give us information. But I think it is also a message to the former chief financial officer of the Trump organization, Allen Weisselberg, who we're told is not cooperating. Many believe that he would, quote unquote, flip. I don't like that term because to me it's, well, he'd be telling the truth about his criminality. Flip just views this whole thing through the prism of mobsters, which

the Trump organization is a mobster mafia style thing. But flip, you think about rats and think about that like we want Weisselberg to go out there and actually tell the truth. But I think this was a message to Weisselberg more than anything to are you going to cooperate or not? Because we're going to prosecute. Notably, on Midas Touch Legal AF, Michael Popak predicted that the Trump organization would indeed be criminally indicted this week. I agreed with him on the criminal indictment, the whole organization as an entity. I agree that the entity will be criminally indicted. but there is an individual who stands for the entity, right? Someone has to get booked. So it'll be interesting to see who their designated person is. Um, who's basically going to have to be booked for the organization. There has to be something. The entity is that it's not a big organization.

Like you think of the Trump organization, people think, Oh, it must be the sprawling company with millions of executives, but no, it's the family at the end of the day. It's the family. It's Allen Weisselberg. It's Matthew Calamari. Like that is the company. So but what is what is indicting criminally a entity actually mean? Could that mean criminal jail time for the people at the top of the entity? How does it affect loans they get their money flow?? How does it just affect on a practical level? All of the above. An individual, an agent could be arrested and could be charged for the organization's criminality as an agent of the organization. And the organization, if it's a criminal enterprise, could indeed be shut down. Those are all implications of

the criminal investigation. And it should come as no surprise that as and this is just the first kind of baby step into the foray of of what's going to take place. The scales of justice, as I joke, mixing analogies are mixing metaphors here. I always say in legal AF, the scales of justice move slow. But the point that I'm making is that at the end of the day, justice is not oftentimes as quick and as efficient and as immediate as we want on certain cases, especially financial fraud cases against organizations. And so what we've been seeing with Rudy Giuliani losing his law license, what we're seeing here with likely criminal charges against the Trump organization, I believe we will see criminal charges against Donald Trump and other Trump see liability across the board. I see liability in Georgia for Trump's interference in the election. I see New York state prosecutions. I see potential criminal prosecutions for Trump

inciting the insurrection. I think as the body of evidence is built with the hundreds of thousands of insurrectionists who are being criminally charged. Ultimately, their excuse is all pointing to their defenses. It was Donald Trump who told us. So what we're seeing, brothers, and what we're seeing everyone out there listening is the rats are fleeing the sinking ship. And that should be another indicator, though, that the tide is moving in the right direction here. And justice is happening slowly and incrementally. I mean, we see this, for example, we talked about this on the last. I just want to say, though, slowly and incrementally and sorry to ruin your flow.

But think about it. It's five months since Donald Trump left the presidency. And now every story is how he is owing to be criminally indicted, or at least the Trump organization is going to be criminally indicted. And that could happen as early as this week. I know people want this to happen at the snap of a finger, but justice doesn't move at the pace of Twitter. But the fact that we are five months removed from a presidency and we are talking about criminal indictments, but the fact that we are five months removed from a presidency and we are talking about criminal indictments. I mean, that's insane. I like that line, Brett. Justice doesn't move at the pace of Twitter. That's a good line. It's very accurate. I think Ben would agree with that. And Ben, before we go on, I just want to say, man, Legal AF this week was amazing.

We established the term Popakian. Popakian. Popakian. It's fantastic. Popakist. And so the symbol for that is a P with the Voltron Star Trek symbol next to it. That's the official symbol. If you identify as Popakian, as I certainly do on Twitter now. Excellent episode, Ben, as always. Oh, I appreciate it. It was just funny. And this is a random tangent and I'll go right back into the rats sinking the ship though. As Bretttt says justice doesn't move at the speed of twitter i was just thinking yesterday or two days ago when i was going for a walk with sochi i was like i just want to give a shout out to just twitter in general like just the idea of a tweet we heard like a bird tweet and i was like oh man the the just the term tweet is just so brilliant. It's like tweet, tweet, tweet, tweet, tweet, tweet, tweet.

I just, I don't know if I had a moment where I was losing my birds. I just think that the way birds tweet to each other, like tweet, tweet, tweet, tweet, tweet. And then like, we like talk about people tweeting things like, yo, I just tweeted, like, like we just say that word, like, yo, I just tweeted this or this or the president tweeted that like ultimately a tweet is a bird going going tweet, tweet, tweet, tweet. And so I just thought that, like, we have these like the president of the United States tweeted, you know, it's like kind of stupid when you think about it. Yeah, it's become vernacular, though.

Just because it's colloquial these days. It's like Google. I'm Googling. I think I think I needed to be on that walk. Tweet, tweet. I hear I hear what you're saying. I's like Google. I'm Googling this. I hear you. I think I needed to be on that walk. I hear what you're saying. Who are the rats fleeing the ship? Who are the rats fleeing the ship? Going from birds tweeting to

rats fleeing sinking ships. What are the rats saying? The rats are going, leave, leave, leave, leave. That's like that. Instead of Twitter, it's rats. That's so stupid. Talking about Leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave,'s obvious based on who's writing about it, that they're out there just saying that we no longer support the president. They're just trying to rehab their image. But this week we saw Bill Barr in an Atlantic piece, basically trying to

fully distance himself from Donald Trump's bogus claims of election fraud. Bill Barr in the article basically says we all knew what Trump was saying, you know, was was total bullshit. That is that he had no evidence. The whole thing was a crack of shit. And it was just craziness with the my pillow guy. I mean, what do you think about Bill Barr changing gears, fellas? I think Bill Barr could go tweet himself. We've had enough of this guy. This guy has just unleashed lawlessness on the country. He acted as Trump's personal attorney this entire time. And now he has the audacity to try to come out and speak with the Atlantic and claim that he is some savior of democracy

because he refused to go over with these ridiculous plans, concocted ideas to overturn the results of a free and fair election. I don't want to hear from Bill Barr on this crap. I think I would I want to see Bill Barr indicted for any criminality that he did during the administration, or at minimum, I want to see him go away forever. I don't need to hear Bill Barr as any sort of savior of anything. Bill Barr is a disaster. He is a criminal. He is one of the most evil attorney generals to ever hold the office. I agree with you on those points, but I do like hearing from him though on this. I do like it to be out there and known what was going on behind the scenes. I'm not saying glorify the man. I'm interested to see down the line what his legacy will be.

Now, I think it's obvious in our circles, how we'll always remember this, but for lack of a better comparison here, I think we're almost looking at this like a Mueller situation where I think tides have sort of shifted on how people look at Mueller. How so? I think there was that great Showtime or HBO show that come out on the Mueller report, and it humanized the guy to an extent. And I think it actually brought a lot of non-believers, for lack of a better term, to his side of things and really showed, hey, maybe deep down this guy was just trying to abide by the letter of the law during a lawless time. And I'm curious if Barr is going to get a similar treatment. That's what I mean by that. I don't know. Still have no clue what you're talking about. But the. But I think it's a good it's a good comparison. I just like I don't. Here's why I think, though, your analysis is wrong.

I think Mueller and Barr are completely separate entities. I think Mueller was supposed to come along and was supposed to actually deliver, you know, swift justice that he had the evidence in front of him. And then based on a series of norms that Mueller felt were applicable here in an era where Trump broke all of the norms, Mueller applied a norm that a sitting president, despite his criminality, should not be subject to criminal investigation, but then used like cutesy footnotes to kind of highlight and send a scavenger hunt of people to figure out the shit of like, OK, now we got to go after Trump after he's president. I mean, people were like, fuck that. We don't need a scavenger hunt. We thought you were the man. We heard all of this stuff about you being like a tough prosecutor and our country was

literally imperiled by a fucking Russian asset as a president. And you're hinting to me in footnote number 19, you know, that I should be looking at footnote 33 and cross-referencing in a page 79. And then, oh, if I combine those three things, you're telling me that Trump may have been, you know, colluding with the Russians like we wanted direct action. That to me was the Mueller criticism. The Barr criticism is that he's a fucking criminal and that he's a horrible human being. And now he's out there trying to rehab his image. Mueller has a good image no matter what. Mueller's just viewed as weak. And I think that will be his legacy. Unfortunately, Mueller did not step up during the right time. And yes, Jordy, it did humanize him as someone who was a deep thinker. But we needed a deep thinker who

can save our country. And he failed at that test. At the same time, Bill Barr is not a special prosecutor. Bill Barr, who was Trump's lackey, is now trying to rehab his image. And he's on this rehab image tour. And he's telling stories about him and McConnell and how they both thought that Trump was crazy at the time. But I'm with you here, Jordy. I'm OK with Barr talking shit about Trump. The more disunity there, the more they're talking shit about each other, the better. I just think we have to take it with a grain of salt. And clearly it is driving Trump utterly crazy. He gave another statement from whatever place he gives statements from basically calling them spineless rhinos, how he's talking about how Barr was a big disappointment in every sense of the word, you know, using that kind of crazy,

you know, language to talk about them. So, Jordy, I agree. I like when they war over each other. So I don't want to kind of shut that down. And he also noticed one of Trump's other statements. It may have been in connection with this attacking his Supreme Court nominees as well. I mean, the Supreme Court appointees that he brought on basically calling them rhinos and that how disappointed he is with them and how horrible the Supreme Court is like, dude, you appointed three of them. So I hope they all just look at that and go, you know what? Like, he's a crazy man. Like, this is a crazy cycle. We got to we got to come together on certain issues. And on legal left, we've talked about some eight one nine oh decisions

where we've actually seen the Supreme Court coming together. But I didn't mean to totally discount your argument about the Mueller-Barr comparison. You know, people are saying that you're too mean to me. So don't act like you're making up for it right now by being nice in the back end of this. It was a really great comparison. I think the audience will understand the analogy that I was trying to draw. And I just want to say this before we move on. Trump acts like a 13-year-old boy when he gets broken up with for like the first time. And that's when he starts rage tweeting all these things at McConnell, at Barr. When he sees these, he loses his mind. Not tweeting anymore.

Oh, yeah, exactly. We're releasing these statements. And it's just like, you know, how like a very immature kid would act when they get broken up with. I didn't get broken up with. They're the idiots. They're the losers. You know, blah, blah, blah. You know what I have to say to that, Jardy? What are you going to say?

Tweet, tweet, tweet, tweet, tweet. No. Tweet, tweet, tweet, tweet, tweet. We will be right back after these messages. We'll be right back. What's up, Midas Mighty? We've got new merch in the merch store. Brett, tell them about it. New merch

line. This is in addition to the hit lines club democracy vax and relax we now have two amazing new designs in case you haven't seen them yet we got the it wasn't rigged you're just a loser shirt fan favorite totally a fan favorite i am loving it and it's just my favorite like graphic to see all the time it just makes me smile to see that phrase because it is so true. And today we are announcing the Midas Touch For The People line. We got a For The People tee. We got For The People mugs.

We got For The People totes. So get yours today at store.midastouch.com. And keep sending pictures of you rocking your Midas Touch Pro Democracy gear. We love to see it. Thank you so much for all your support. That's store.midastouch.com. Let's go! Welcome back to the Midas Touch podcast,

here with the guest who I really need to talk to after what I saw yesterday in Ohio, a man who knows something or two about Ohio. We have Frank Pagluzzi on the podcast, retired FBI assistant director for counter intelligence. He's also an NBC News national security contributor and author of the book, The FBI Way. Go out and get that book, The FBI Way, and host of a new podcast, The Bureau, with Frank Fugluzzi. Frank Fugluzzi, welcome to the Midas Touch podcast. Hey, thanks for having me. I'm keenly observing that the older I get, the longer my introductions become. At some point,

you know, we'll have to cut it off at the two page mark. It's a good thing. You know, you prefer that intro versus I have some guy on named Frank Fugluzzi from Cleveland. Frank Fugluzzi. Tell me about it. So it's Frankie from Cleveland. Frankie from Cleveland. I got Frankie from Cleveland. I'm retired FBI assistant director for counterintelligence who knows a thing or two about Ohio. Fugluzzi was previously the special agent in charge of the FBI's Cleveland division, which includes northern Ohio and a number of the surrounding cities there. When I looked at that

crowd, Frank, I just saw one gigantic threat. What did you see there? Yeah, I got to tell you, I experienced I know this is going to sound corny, but I experienced sadness that this is still happening. And I'll characterize it as kind of a professional sadness, meaning that the threat is still with us, that people still buy into this, that there are cult-like attributes to this movement, this group of people focused on one individual, regardless of his status or power, believing he's been dethroned, believing he may come back soon. I mean, it has the hallmarks of a cult. And sadly, as you know, that cult has become violent. We saw it on January 6th. And until I see more actions implemented,

I think more violence is possible. And one of the things we see as, you know, some of the institutions we've long revered, you know, the military and law enforcement enforcing law and order. And these Trump cultists and Trump are breaking the law. This new attack that they have, it's probably the attack they've always had, but they've just come right out with it, going after the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, attacking military leaders, calling them clowns, you know, calling them horrendous names. Did you ever think that that would be taking place in the party that claims they're about law and order? A couple of thoughts here. First, I don't think any of us should be

surprised. It continues to shock us. But listen, for the last four years and now more, we have observed slowly but surely the denigration of our institutions, of the men and women in those institutions, the career professionals who get out of bed every day just trying to make democracy happen, FBI agents just trying to prevent the next crime in their community, our community. And we've seen them bashed and denigrated. It's part of why I wrote the book, The FBI Way, because once you destroy the credibility of an institution in the public's eye, the effectiveness of that mission, their ability

to succeed is eroded. And far more importantly, our values as a democracy are, like it or not, are wrapped up in those institutions, right? We, you know, we have a piece of paper called the Constitution, but it's lived out through those institutions. You destroy them, and you are essentially attacking our form of democracy. The other observation I have on these attacks on institutions and people in them is that, sadly, this echoes Vladimir Putin's objectives and his intelligence service objectives. So when you can't tell the difference between stuff coming out of the mouth of Tucker Carlson or the former president or his cronies and the propaganda put out by the Russian intelligence services, then we have a problem because they're all aimed at the same thing. Chaos, discord. And now, as you point out, even attacking the military and the people in it, police officers being denigrated, those who served on Capitol Hill, you name it,

everything is fair game. And that sounds an awful lot to me like an adversary attacking us. Yeah. And you mentioned Vladimir Putin and the Russian propaganda and that being spewed by Fox News, by Trump and many of these members of the GOP. Do you based on your counterintelligence experience, do you believe they're doing it intentionally? Are they just doing it unwittingly because they care about power or does it not even matter one way or another just because they're doing it? And regardless of if they're doing it, we need to call them out for what they're doing. Well, let me go with that first. Obviously, when you're under attack, sometimes the details don't matter of where it's coming from. You just know it's coming from multiple fronts and it appears coordinated. That's all you need to know. But let's go ahead and spend some time looking and analyzing at that because really root cause is part of mitigating a threat. So the language is the same. It's gotten to the

point where you really can't tell anymore. Did this particular angle come out of the Kremlin or did it come out of something we saw on Facebook that we can't figure out who posted it? Or was it first said by Alex Jones or by Fox News? Where did we first hear it? It's becoming harder and harder because it's becoming circular. And when I hear the same phraseology used and the same approach to everything. So, you know, I don't know, COVID vaccines make you sterile. Pick your poison in terms of outright lies. Okay. Yeah, that's being spewed by, as we speak, by Russia propaganda on social media. But we're hearing it echoed by people in the Trump orbit, you know, that kind of thing. And then very, very real and recent, let's look at Vladimir Putin's stance on the horrible political persecution of those who

were present in their peaceful protest on January 6th in the United States, right? He's raising it as a human rights issue. And sure enough, that's being echoed by Fox News hosts. So one's feeding the other. They're working in concert. I'm a reader of the special counsel report by Bob Mueller. And if you read volume one, you will see the collusion of that campaign, 2016 presidential campaign, with Russia. Unmistakably, even though Bill Barr told us no collusion, there was really no criminal conspiracy, a very different thing. But you can't erase the collusion. So we have a party and a person that will collude with an adversary. So when you ask me, you know, where's this coming from? Is it, is it core? I, I, I assume based on track record, there is some coordination. So what do we do? You know, I, I, we build these kind of, one may say doom and gloom. Others may say diagnosing the problem. I think Biden is doing a great job promoting democracy and in a worksman like very normal way, methodically just kind of getting things done. That's not sexy, though, getting things done.

You know, when these Republicans go out and they start screaming these crises, that scares people. It's hard to motivate people by saying, hey, you know, we're putting, you know, we're building infrastructure, support this, you know, we're bringing COVID relief. It's hard to inspire people the same way the fear does. So what do we do? How do we address that and build a coalition for democracy? That's what we're trying to do at Midas Touch. Yep, I agree that Biden is allowing his cabinet members and their agencies to do what they need as Biden does it as well. I know there are tons of people on my social media platform screaming

for people to be dragged out now in handcuffs. Where are the handcuffs? Where are the indictments? Justice moves very slowly. And it may not at the end. It may not look at like what you think it should or or who should be in handcuffs or, you know, all of that. But there's a beauty to this because what someone like Merrick Garland, the attorney general, he's got it. He's walking a tightrope right now. He can't appear to do and cannot do anything that looks like what his predecessors did to destroy the institution and abuse it.

The second he comes out and says, we're raiding the cabin in Montana where the Arizona audits are being locked up because we you know, we don't like it. He's got to do this, as you said, methodically. Look what he's just done recently. He's filed a lawsuit against the state of Georgia. And he hasn't said in the lawsuit, hey, I don't like what you're doing. You can't change the rules down there. He has said very, and this is a strong case.

I mean, think about the statement. You did, you did that. You made those election reforms because you are deliberately trying to minimize the votes of black people. That's a very specific charge. So even, you know, even the non-believers, the Trumpsters out there got to go, oh, wow. Okay. So he's just not trying to mess with Georgia. He's going to try to prove conversations, texts, emails, where lawmakers said we got to minimize the black vote. That's how you do this. The truth has to just keep coming out, not just political bashing. This is so much bigger than politics. How do you think Merrick Garland is doing in terms of restoring normalcy at DOJ after the lawlessness that we've experienced under Bill Barr these past few years?

Yeah, there's another thing that can't happen overnight. And multiply that across all the agencies as cabinet leaders try to figure out who in my agency is guilty of misconduct, rule violations, or violations of law that is still down the hall. Who's in this building that's still doing it? And we got to ferret that out. So one of the things Merrick Garland has done is he's called for an IG investigation around certain abuses. I've advocated for a writ large IG investigation at DOJ, meaning who amongst us at DOJ has, under the previous administration, violated procedures, protocols, or law that we need to get to the bottom of? That kind of thing needs to happen. But Garland has, again, he's got to preserve the institution

while he's trying to restore it. He's got to manage public perceptions. So far, I think the methodical approach is working. He is an institutionalist. He's done some things that I don't agree with. For example, I don't agree with the stance on the lawsuit by E. Jean Carroll for defamation against Trump. I don't think in any way, shape or form, that's a function of the presidential office to defame a woman who's an assault victim. I don't get it, but he's doing the right thing. And speaking of Bill Barr, one of the things that has always puzzled me was I felt like Bill Barr was in most ways, Donald Trump's henchman throughout the entire administration. But then he took exception at the very end with the overturning of the election. And I always

wondered, why was that the red line for him? Why was that the stopping point that made him not go along with Trump? And we're seeing him come out now and try to kind of rewrite history and rehabilitate his image. He spoke to The Atlantic and said that it was bullshit. But why that issue? And why would he do everything else for Trump along the way, but then stop at that one and say, that's too much for me? Well, you're asking a great question. And I wish someday he would talk enough to get to that line that he somehow couldn't cross. And thank God he at least had a line. I think one of the, you know, he's a bright man. I think one of the things he was concerned about was from a logical standpoint was, OK, we've got no evidence that this is happening. If I do it, I'm doing it only for the president. And I'm actually destroying arguments about all other elected Republicans.

Meaning, I think he saw a flaw in the logic. If I say there was a massive fraud that overturned the presidential election, I got to say, I got congressmen and senators from my party who are screwed. Because I can't say all the fraud was just about the presidential top of the ticket. Right. And I think he goes, I will be called out as clearly a buffoon who's just working for Trump. And I'll have all my Republican friends telling me I just screwed them by saying their win was fraudulent. Here's the thing, Brett, too. And I want to say this. I think if it came down to just one state, which is why these voter laws are very important, if it was like Pennsylvania, one county, I think Barr would have been all out, overturn that shit, overthrow democracy. Who

cares? He just saw, OK, there's legitimately no path here. And as you said, Frank, he's a smart guy and said, look, Trump's going to lose this. And as you said, Frank, he's a smart guy and said, look, Trump's going to lose this and I don't want to be stuck with the loser. If Trump was going to be a winner and there was truly a path to win, he would have been like, I'm all in. Let me throw away this democracy. Well, he famously said in an interview once, history is written by the winners. Remember that? Because the question that somebody asked him was, you know, how are you going to go down in history? Well, I don't know. History is written by the winners. Well that? Because the question that somebody asked him was, you know, how are you going to go down in history? Well, I don't know.

History is written by the winners. Well, now it's dawning on him with these interviews he's starting to do. Yeah, I better talk to those winners and have them write about me. So he's trying to make it right. But in that Atlantic piece, he made it worse because he conceded

that at the very same time that he told the Justice Department, hey, I'm changing the rules. We can open fraud, election fraud investigations before anything is certified. So U.S. attorneys, knock yourself out out there. While he did that, he knew he says this in the article. This is why he should be disbarred, by the way, for many reasons. But in the same article, he goes, yeah, but I told them they could investigate, but I knew it was all bullshit. Okay, so you broke your, you changed the rules of DOJ because you wanted to appease a president you were afraid of, but you knew it was all bullshit. Good lawyering there, good ethics and integrity there. Do you think that's what's going on across the board? We were speaking about

this earlier about how the rats are fleeing the sinking ship, so to speak, and you're starting to see, do you think it's that history is written by the winners, that mindset that you see Barr putting out these statements, that you see Jared and Ivanka, which seems like they leaked a statement saying that they were becoming estranged from the former president. You see Mike Pence getting up there and saying that he was proud of certifying the results. Is that, in your opinion, what's happening behind the scenes? I do. And I think when you combine it with some of the shocking attempts at bipartisanship on Capitol Hill, on infrastructure and other things, I think you now have a core group going, yeah, probably going to be on the wrong side of this.

Got to worry about the legacy with my grandkids. Yeah. And carve out some, you know, it's smart to carve out like Liz Cheney. It's smart to carve out a space just in case. Right. It's that insurance policy, so to speak. If all of this is going to collapse on Trump, I want to be the one who said, I'm not him. And I think it's happening. Right. At minimum, they're hedging. At minimum, we still have, you know, we still have a minority leader and we, you know, let's see who they appoint. One of the big things we should all be looking for is who the Republicans will appoint, if anybody, to the select committee that Nancy Pelosi is starting to look into January 6th.

If we see a clown show with Marjorie Taylor Greene, Matt Goetz, you know, Kukla, Fran, and Ollie, which was a kid's show when I was growing up. You know, if we see those show up and then we got a circus, then they're sticking with nonsense. But if we see some serious people appointed to this committee, then that's a signal that, yeah, the Republicans are starting to rethink this Trump thing. Speaking of Gates, where, what do you think we're at with the Gates investigation? And what do you think of him launching these attacks against the FBI who is investigating him? Well, right. I actually wrote a column on this for MSNBC Daily, which I do occasionally. And I basically pointed out, look, this, you know, we talked about propaganda and themes, right? The theme that's now du jour here is FBI orchestrated January 6th. And all of those, and it came from an article in

an online publication called Revolver, I think. And, or Revolve, I don't know. I don't want to give it any more publicity, but Tucker Carlson grabbed it. Then Alex Jones grabbed it. Now all the GOP and Congress is spouting it. And it's this theory that all of the unindicted co-conspirators listed in the indictments for January 6th, though that's a code word for undercover FBI agent, unindicted co-conspirators. Now, that is not legally how that that term is used in an indictment. It usually means we suspect this person also committed a crime. We don't have enough evidence yet. Or, or, yeah, we talked to this person and they're cooperating with us. So we're not going to, and if, and if they really cooperate, we're not going to indict them. So they're on an undidated cook's purse, but it sounds good to the people on the street, right? People in Ohio were interviewed outside the Trump rally. Hey, do you think the FBI orchestrated January 6th? Yes,

they did. You know, and do you, I thought it was, I thought you said it was Antifa a few months ago. No, no, no. Well, I thought you said it was a peaceful tourist group. No, now it's the FBI who did it. Okay. And that's because the FBI, a couple of things. One, we found out initially through NBC News reporting that FBI agents are asked a defendant, a January 6th defendant, if he knew anybody in Congress or any congressional staffers. And that scared the hell out of people on Capitol Hill. Like, oh, so the FBI has actually inserted this as a question of people they're talking to. Oh, so of course, you're going to see this defensive attack the FBI because they're coming at us. It's funny that we, that was kind of a point that we made on our last episode,

that every time you see Fox in attack mode, that anytime you see these politicians in attack mode, so focused on one individual group, it's because they're being investigated by them and they're trying to get ahead of it in a way. And that's, I think, what we see with the FBI. Well, and the FBI, this happened throughout the Trump administration. The FBI provides a convenient, I don't know, scapegoat or something. Because why? They can't. They're constrained from talking about a pending investigation.

So people who go, oh, Chris Wray should come out and hold a press conference and say, you know, it's like, when did you stop beating your wife? Right. You call a press conference and say what? Just so you know, we we didn't orchestrate January 6th. What? Did you orchestrate January 5th? What? You know, if you can't win and you can't talk about a pending investigation. So he just needs to let this wash over him. And, you know, Fox News and others will go, yeah, he can't talk back. So we're going to bash him. And I think the divide of what Fox News is trying to create and what these Republican officials are trying to create is a divide between leadership and the rank and file is how I'm seeing it. When they attack, you know, the head of the Joint Chiefs, they're attacking him, but they're trying to act like they are defending

the people who he works for. It's almost like the theory that, you know, everyone hates their boss. Do you think that that's what's happening with their attacks on the FBI, the military, and does it work? Well, there's evidence that that is an approach and a strategy. I'll go back years ago, Don Jr. was asked about, hey, the FBI is looking at your father. He made a comment. He said, the door kickers are with us, meaning the rank and file agents in the field are with us, right? Like a mob family is with us. Okay. The same thing dangerously could be the goal for the military. And yes, there are rank and file versus management in any bureaucracy, right? It's the guys who work for a living and then there's the suits. And so, you know, you can exploit that divide and make it deeper. And it's very, very dangerous.

Look, we still hear reports of Fox News playing nonstop on TVs and military bases all around the world. And it's a problem until leadership figures out the dangers there. Right. Going back to our earlier conversation here, I hate to speculate, but is law enforcement on high alert these days with regards to another insurrection? I mean, with Trump coming back on this revenge tour, you know, Fox News and all these right wing media stations just spewing out Russian propaganda like we discussed. You know, is there a likelihood that we'll see another January 6th type insurrection before the next presidential election? To answer your question, they are on a hypervigilant mode right now. And I'm not just talking about the FBI or DHS. I am talking about a partnership through the FBI's Joint Terrorism Task Forces in every

single field office in the country. You know, and those task forces have the sheriff's Joint Terrorism Task Forces in every single field office in the country. You know, and those task forces have the sheriff's investigators, they have the city police, they've got the state troopers, they're all there. And the alerts and advisories are going out. You see the, what, are we at about 500 arrests for January 6th, literally from, I think, every state in the union except maybe Hawaii. And what that means is even at the patrol level, when that county sheriff's deputy pulls over somebody in the hinterlands, they have been attuned to the fact that we've got a domestic terrorism problem growing. And they are sensitized to that. And if they have a conversation and the guy goes, I'm headed to the state house, you know, or I,

you know, I don't, you know, you get that sovereign citizen response. I don't recognize your authority over me. Now they're referring that back to the Joint Terrorism Task Force. So yes, hyper alert, all hands on deck. I'm told by sources the 500 arrests will turn into, you know, even more arrests. They're still going. And with regard to this August nonsense about Trump being reinstated, which he himself is now, even the MyPillow guy, the bastion of journalistic integrity, the MyPillow guy is saying, well, it could be this summer or maybe after, I don't know. So, but all you need, people don't understand, all you need is a handful of people bent on violence who are true believers to think August is going to happen. And I'm showing up for that.

And I'll be in DC for that. And if it doesn't happen, I'm going to make sure all hell breaks loose. That's all you need for people to get hurt. So DHS is on it. FBI is on it. But understand, when you're talking about a solo operator, one violent offender or a few handful, shoot, they couldn't even stop thousands from showing up and getting inside that building and doing violence. Imagine just a handful that's off the radar screen that wants to do it. Very tough job. FBI has to get it right every single time. Bad guys only have to get it right once. And I want to talk to you a little bit more about January 6th. So during the insurrection, the crowd was literally chanting, hang Mike Pence. Mass chaos, windows were smashed,

a Capitol Police officer was murdered. If they got to Mike Pence. Mass chaos, windows were smashed. A Capitol police officer was murdered. If they got to Mike Pence, do you think in your opinion that we would have seen like a violent assault on one of the highest ranking government officials, if not a murder take place? I do think that the gallows outside were not just symbolic. I do think that the people who were the kind of tip of the spear, the breachers, the ones leading, the ones with the earpieces for comms, the guys who knew how to stack up like a tactical team and, you know, hand on shoulder. Yeah, those those people were going to take somebody out. I actually believe that. And I believe the Secret Service came perilously close to losing their protectee that day. It's shocking to me because we're, you know, back to the intelligence issues around January 6th. The Secret Service didn't get it that this was going to be a violent day and that they had to get Pence out of it.

This it's a shocking failure. And it tells our adversaries, by the way, huh, really not that hard to to get close to a secret service. So I thought, Frank, I was like, you know, even some of the breaches in the White House that you see, you know, you think that there's this incredible protect these various protective layers and layers on layers. And it was like, wait a minute. They just walked right in. What's what's going on? How could this be the most powerful nation in the world? They just walked right in. And I feel like I was always told, like, yeah, once you enter the grass, they have snipers.

You can't even see them. Right. Once you get on like you are, the security system gets ramped up. I didn't realize you could just walk right up to the buildings and just go and attack. Yeah, they do have, I mean, they do have very elaborate security. I'm familiar with some of it. And yeah, sure, there's snipers and counter, there's a counter assault team. You know, there's high tech surveillance. There's properties across the street, around the White House, where, you know, let's just say the government owns those properties, too. So lots of things that could repel a large force, but the single person who somehow makes it through the gate, you know, I think it's the system's not designed for that, because it's like, well, is this a nut or do we take him out? Or, you know, who shoots the nut as opposed to the assault team that's going to try to do this?

So I think the fact this for me, the January 6th issue with Pence gets down to this intelligence issue. They didn't get it. Nobody got it. This should have been this event. This this ratification of the Ele college vote, should have been declared what we call a national security special event. We do it for the Super Bowl, for God's sakes, but with all of the indications that there was going to be trouble on the peaceful transition of power in our democracy, you're kidding me? You didn't declare it a national security special event? That would have brought the counter-assault team from Secret Service. It would have brought all kinds of resources to play. Just didn't happen. Frank Fugluzzi, thank you so much for joining the

Midas Touch podcast. We so appreciate your time. Thanks for the discussion. Anytime, guys. Check out Frank's book, The FBI Way. And of course, listen to the new podcast, The Bureau, with Frank Fugluzzi. Get it anywhere you get the Midas Touch podcast. I promise if you enjoy the Midas Touch podcast, you will enjoy Frank's podcast. That's Frank Fugluzzi. We'll be right back after these messages. What's up, Midas Mighty? Ben Mycelis here, joined by my younger brothers, Brett and Jordy Mycelis. Have you got your Midas merch gear? If you haven't gotten your Midas merch gear, I don't know what's taking you so long. I got my gear. Most of the Midas Mighty got their gear. We have some incredible stuff.

Isn't that right, Brett? That's right. And with the new CDC guidelines that say you no longer have to wear masks indoors or outdoors if you've been vaccinated, a lot of people have been asking us, how do you let people know you've been vaccinated? How do you know if you're around other vaccinated people? A lot of people are concerned. But, you know, we already thought about this, guys. We got our vaxxed and relaxed merch line. You could get it now if you still want to wear masks, if you still feel comfortable wearing masks around indoors or outdoors, we got the masks, we got the tees, we got the shirts, we got it all, and we got more on the way. So let people know you've been vaccinated. Shop at store.midastouch.com

to get yours. And that's not all we have. We got the club democracy gear. We got the shout out to the Midas Mighty gear. We got it all. Go check it out. That's store.midastouch.com. Welcome back to the Midas Touch podcast. And as we were talking about with Frank on that interview, the new biggest enemy of the GQqp it's law enforcement the military the fbi secret service like the way they talk about uh the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff millie they call him a clown they basically call him like a woke idiot like they go i don't even think i sent this to you guys did you guys see don jr's post about general millie no i saw the one when it was the the the photo yeah it's a photo of general millie but he photoshopped or whoever made the meme that he posted photoshopped

general millie's hair pink They put a bunch of hearts instead of badges on his on his uniform. They put a Black Lives Matter sticker on his uniform and a pride flag on his uniform. And it says, I don't know why everyone keeps saying the army is woke. I'm offended. Mocking General Milley in this meme and mocking him because he said that it's important that as military leaders, we have access to a broad array of information. And I even read information that I disagree with, he said. And that is one of the reasons that they've attacked him. And really, the true reason they have attacked him is because they genuinely hate the military. Like we could break it down however you want to. These are people who are truly jealous of what a real patriot is. These are people who are not patriots. These are sexual molesters.

These are disgusting pedophiles. These are losers. These are reject human beings. These are people who never had to work for a living. They're jealous of somebody like the chairman of the Joint Chief of Staff who actually served combat, who's an army ranger, who actually served this country, who didn't claim bone spurs five different times. They actually, when you go down to it, hate the military. You know, when you talk about defunding the police or abolishing the police, the way it's talked about on the left is from a real strategic sense, which is how do we allocate resources away from having interactions with the community that are always violent,

that involve guns and tasers? And how do we allocate those resources more efficiently to help people? And how do we turn policing into shooting and killing into actually helping people solve problems? That's how people on the left talk about when there are those conversations. And by the way, for the benefit of both sides, for the benefit of law enforcement and for the benefit of the community, it benefits everybody when policing is conducted in that way. And that's how it's discussed. When the right talk about the police, they hate the police as as human beings at their core. They hate the military. They hate people who support our country and risk their lives for this country because the GQP hates this country. And then one caveat with one caveat, unless they're killing black and brown people,

then they're all in. Then they're all in. That's the one caveat. That's the one time where it's you better black the blue. And then you have those blue flags with the blue stripe where you have the white officer who killed the black man or woman caught on camera. That's when they're like, we got to support the blue. We got to support the blue at the end of the day, which is truly viewed through the prism you just discussed, which is the accurate prism, which is just a projection

of white supremacy, which is what the GQP is blatantly all about anyway. And then when confronted with it, I saw, you know, Chris Wallace to his benefit because it's still Fox News. He actually asks tough questions of Republicans. And so during the segment, he asked this weekend Representative Jim Banks a question. And why don't we play the clip? The president said that the central part of this anti-crime package is the three hundred and fifty billion dollars in the American rescue plan, the COVID relief plan that was passed. Congressman Banks, you voted against that package, against that $350 billion, just like every other Republican in the House and Senate. So can't you make the argument that it's you and the Republicans who are defunding the police?

Not at all, Chris. I mean, let's go back again and look at the last year and the record of comments that Democrats have made from Rashida Tlaib, who said that policing is inherently evil.

Sir, respectfully, I heard you make that point, but I'm asking you, there's $350 billion in this package the president says can be used for policing. What they do is, let's look at the record of comments. They often misstate what the underlying comment is, take it out of context

completely, but they don't talk about whatever the action is. You know, one of the criticisms of Biden from the left is actually he's increased police budgets. He says he wants more police officers out there. So we should at least that we should be having the conversation about is what's truly happening. But they, the Republicans, voted against Biden's package of increasing funding to the police. In addition to the funding, it shouldn't just be funding to the police. It was also funding for mental health programs and other programs as well. But we should talk about what the action is. Dude, you voted against that. So you want to cherry pick a comment that's taken out of context from one specific congressperson and then basically say that's everybody's view of the matter without actually talking about what's truly happening. Dude, let's talk about

your actual voting record there. And I think Frank summed it up great. And someone like Frank, like Frank knows his shit at the end of the day. You leave with that and you go, Frank Fugluzzi knows his shit versus who's at the Trump support. Some crazy fuck who they claim is JFK Jr.

who looks nothing like JFK Jr. And they're like, he's the reincarnation. That's the whole philosophy. Let's stop there. Please just explain that. It's banana land. There's a QAnon theory that JFK Jr. is still alive and is attending these QAnon rallies and these MAGA rallies. And he was at the Ohio event, the Ohio Trump rally event.

I want you to look up a photo of this man. And then I want you to look up a photo of JFK Jr. Once you realize that they're not even looking at the world through any sort of form of reality whatsoever, that their reality is just a funhouse mirror, that they could project literally anything they want on a person, then you realize how their beliefs could just be so outlandish and crazy. Please look up this picture. Ben, what do you think about JFK Jr.?

Wait, wait, wait. I thought it was him reincarnated into this individual. They think that's JFK Jr.? Yeah, they actually think that JFK Jr. never passed away. I thought it was him reincarnated into this individual. They think that's JFK Jr.? Yeah, they actually think that JFK Jr. never passed away. I think they think that's actually him and that he's going to come back and then be a running mate of Trump or help Trump retake power in August. But he was supposed to be Trump's running mate in the prior. They always change the theory, no matter what, it doesn't happen. But he was supposed to be Trump's running a mate in 2020 and that didn't happen. And yeah, so he runs around pretending that he's actually JFK Jr. And people take photos with him.

People like get autographs from this guy. And the guy's like one of the most disgusting looking human beings on the planet. Like he just like looks like one of these basement dweller types. Like, no, no. I mean, that's ultimately what you're dealing with, Brett. And you gave like the other analogy the other day, like where at a certain cult levels, like you get up in the next ring and the next ring and you get closer to like the most pure ring, quote unquote, pure ring of the cult. Like in this one, once you kind of slip into it, it leads you to believe that that

man is JFK Jr. And the theory is that he did not actually die in a plane crash in 1999, but that this is the man and his name, this man's name is Vincent Fusca or just Vincent Fusca. And that he is actually JFK Jr. in disguise. And he is a celebrity. I'm looking right now on TMZ and they have photos of just a bunch of guys, people taking pictures with this weirdo. I mean, what do I mean? Just reflect what a weird

rally as I tweeted. You won't find Waldo at that rally, but you will find a bunch of wackos at the rally. Now, let me not a bunch. Every wacko. Where's wacko? All fucking there. So I want to close with just some other good news. We knew that Ivanka Trump was deposed in connection with another investigation. This one arising out of the Trump Inauguration Committee, TIC, and where hundreds of millions of dollars just fucking went,

like the money just disappeared. I have a few ideas of probably where it went, probably right into, in my opinion, probably right into a lot of the bank accounts of Trump's is probably where all that money went. But literally, like there's hundreds of millions of dollars missing out of this Trump inauguration committee. Ivanka was deposed pretty long. I think it was in December one, she was deposed. And she replied, I had no involvement whatsoever. I really was not involved at all with the inauguration. And now we see email chains involving her directly involved and coordinating, calling Rick Gates in 2016 to discuss ideas about it and looping in her staff about it, asking for high-level summaries for her review. And so what's the ultimate implication of this? It does appear that Ivanka lied in her deposition. The question is, is that a civil contempt lie? Does that then become part

of a criminal investigation that could be taking place as well? You know, and ultimately, as Frank discussed, as Brett discussed, justice doesn't move at the speed of Twitter. As I mix my metaphors, justice, the scales of justice move slowly, as Geordie says, tweet, tweet, tweet, tweet, tweet. And we will find out what what happens. I just want to lay out the landscape for you right now. The Department of Justice is suing Georgia over the voter suppression laws. Rudy Giuliani was suspended from practicing law. Criminal charges are imminent for the Trump administration. More information is coming out by the day about the rest of the family. I just don't want to hear from the defeatists out there. Oh, nothing's ever

going to happen. Oh, these people, they're all going to live free and da, da, da, da, da. No, let the wheels of justice turn or let the scales of justice turn, as Ben says. I don't know what that means when the scales don't turn and things are happening justice will come i do believe that we will see trump indictments soon and i uh i'd like i'd make a bet even with the listeners i don't know i don't know what that would be but betty brett betty brett i just want but i just want an acknowledgement when the indictments do come down then you could say you know what you know what brett Brett? You know, you're right. You're right.

I got a big bet. Brett's big Brett. Betty Brett. Thank you for listening to today's Midas Touch podcast. We appreciated Frank Fagluzzi as our guest. We'll see you next time. This has been my cellist with Brett and my brother, Jordy telling you shout out to the Midas.