The MeidasTouch Podcast - Lev Remembers: Inside the Trump Cult with Lev Parnas

Episode Date: June 15, 2021

On today's episode of The MeidasTouch Podcast, the brothers sit down with Lev Parnas and his attorney Joseph Bondy. During the interview, Lev takes us through his entire relationship with Donald Trump, Rudy Giuliani and the Trump inner circle. Lev reflects on his time in the Trump cult, how he ultimately broke free and how he got caught up in the "Trump-Ukraine Scandal." The brothers go on to discuss vaccination updates, Biden restoring America's place on the world stage and another Texas power grid failure that's potentially on the horizon.  If you have a moment, please subscribe and rate the podcast and let's keep fighting for Democracy! Get your official MeidasTouch gear today only 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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Okay. So we've got Lev Parnas, and we're going to talk to Lev like you've never heard Lev talk to any other group before. Lev, of course, in his own words, and this is what his Twitter profile says, post-cult of Trump, currently under federal indictment. Lev Parnas has one of these stories that you could not even believe. Someone who has no political or diplomatic experience, who only in the Trump cult world somehow gets embroiled in international intrigue involved in all of these escapades in the Ukraine to try to undermine the candidacy of the now president of the United States, Joe Biden, and the story of how he got into the cult, the characters he met, and how high up it went is truly hard to believe. And I'm excited to talk to him about it. What we're about to hear, I feel like, is an important piece of history. And we're getting

an inside scoop. Lev is famous for his hashtag on Twitter, where he goes, hashtag LevRemembers. And I'm excited to see all the little details that LevRemembers and is able to disclose with us today. That's a spicy hashtag. I didn't know that was his calling, Bert. He does too. He does LevRemembers and he does LevKnows. That's scary. That would scare me. He'll do it at like, you know, Devin Nunes will say something and he'll quote tweet it and just go, Lev knows. Yeah, that would like right to the soul would terrify me.

The thing is, Lev comes with receipts. Like Lev posts his text message conversations he has with people online. Everything that he says is substantiated. And he's really actively now trying to show the corruption of Donald Trump and his enablers. And the conspiracy, And I don't mean conspiracy as in conspiracy theory. I mean, an actual conspiracy runs deep. And we're talking about people in Congress like Devin Nunes. We're talking about obviously everybody directly in the Trump White House's orbit. We're talking about Fox News and Sean Hannity. All these people are looped together in these tales, in these stories that

expose the true corruption, which now every single day when we turn on the news, it's like we learn another story about the corruption. I feel like right now what we've been witnessing also with every day, all the stuff coming out about the Department of Justice. Every single day, there's something else. I feel like this is just the tip of the iceberg of the criminality that we are going to learn happened during the previous administration. So who better to go to than straight at the source? And we also got some really exciting news today, guys. So for those of you who listened to the show, a couple months back, we had the family and friends of Reality Winner on our podcast. Reality Winner was a political prisoner put in jail whistleblower under the Trump administration.

She was imprisoned for leaking the Russia hacking report, an extremely important thing that has led to a lot of election security reforms and really opened the eyes of Americans up into foreign interference in our elections. She was imprisoned for being a whistleblower who exposed that. You might remember that she had sent her documents to the online publication, The Intercept, who mishandled them in a horrible way. And these documents got out there. They were able to identify who the whistleblower was, and she was punished and imprisoned for being a whistleblower. But now, today, she is released for good behavior. She will serve out the rest of her sentence on home confinement. This is a huge step forward. And I just want to

personally thank all of you out there who have advocated in the free reality movement, who have helped put the pressure on President Biden and those in power to release Reality Winner. Now, this is just the beginning of her fight. The family is still fighting for pardons. They still want to clear her name, clear her record. So we still got to keep up the pressure and push for a pardon for Reality Winner. But this is an extremely exciting day. I can only imagine the feeling of relief that Reality Winner's family has now that they actually get to see reality back home. And America is back. America is back in terms of even this decision with Reality Winner. We don't hold political prisoners within the United States of America who are legitimate whistleblowers who helped expose foreign interference in our government.

I mean, what Reality Winner did should be applauded. But in the Trump administration, she was persecuted. America's also back and we've talked about this. Last thing, sorry to interrupt. I do like the symbolism of this. Not that I don't think this came from Biden, right? She was released on good behavior. But the day she was released, we're recording this on Trump's birthday. So that's a nice one. Total coincidence, but fuck that guy. And speaking about fuck that guy, I want to talk about, I was going to frame it as America's back, which was a positive framing of it.

Jordy took it on a little curve ball and turned it into fuck that guy. I'm actually responsible for fuck that guy. I want all credit for fuck that guy. We don't need to talk about that guy because we need to talk about what Joe Biden's doing on the global stage right now. And he's making America finally look like the leader that we always have been in the world,

the beacon of hope in the world, the beacon of democracy that all other countries aspire to. And finally, we have a president who's going out there who's saying the simple thing. We need to fight for democracy around the globe. That should not be a shocking thing. But in this last few years of the Trump era and of Republicans in power, Joe Biden is out there making Trump and the Republicans appear incredibly, incredibly small, weak and irrelevant on the global stage, while President Biden is out there being a true

leader and is actually bringing countries together. And one of the most hilarious things of every day of Joe Biden meeting with these world leaders is you could just see the smiles on their faces. They are not hiding the fact at all that they are thrilled by this change in our government. And even when asked, like, I'm not sure if you guys saw the clip of Joe Biden was asked, so have you, do you think that Macron would say that America is back if you were to ask him? And Joe Biden being, you know, a humble guy, not a braggadocious guy goes, you know, why don't you ask, ask President Macron? I'm not going to answer that. And they asked Macron and without skipping a beat, he goes, why don't you ask President Macron? I'm not going to answer that. And they asked Macron,

and without skipping a beat, he goes, definitely, definitely, definitely, definitely makes back. I mean, the photos that came out of the G7 were really, really incredible. You know what's also back? Biden memes are back. If you guys remember during the Obama-Biden administration, Biden memes were the hottest thing on the internet. They're back after this G7. At least I've rolled off like four Biden memes from this thing. And it's a delight. I see Jordy's focused on the important stuff. We're talking about global affairs. Jordy's focused on the memes that are coming out of this. Equally important. I think one of the problems is, is that I taught Jordy how to use Photoshop recently. And so he's been making a lot of Midas touch memes

and he's the meme guy now. He just can't, that's what he does all day. He dirty makes memes. And so he's very- They don't call me meme my cellist for nothing. They don't call you meme my cellist for nothing. Mimi, Mimi my cellist. Going to what also happened this week on Monday,

President Biden said that he told NATO allies that the US commitment to it is rock solid and unshakable. Let's play that clip. And I made a point to make clear that the U.S. commitment to Article five, the NATO treaty is rock solid and unshakable. It's a sacred commitment. NATO stands together. That's how we met every other threat in the past. It's our greatest strength as we meet our challenges of the future. And there are many and everyone, everyone in that room today understood the shared appreciation, quite frankly, that America is back. And when you hear that, I get chills. I mean, one, Donald Trump

refused to do anything even that simple as to publicly praise our alliances. Let's just think about that. You know, and also when you hear Biden talk like that, I don't know about you, but it kind of I kind of feel like that's something that you grew up watching or listening to US presidents. Oh my gosh. I was going to say, you could picture listening to the radio and hearing FDR give a speech on the radio, and it would sound a lot like that. It's like, yes, this is a president. And Ben, not only did Trump not get out there and express his support for our allies, he did the opposite. He criticized our allies on the global stage always. He would yell at them. He would say they weren't paying their fair share. He would criticize them at every turn. And then he would turn around that he would praise Russia, praise all of our enemies. So it's not even just that he didn't acknowledge our allies. He was constantly praising our enemies. And even before this trip, he was doing the same thing. Trump released a statement and he went after President Biden. And he, by the way, refused to call him President Biden in the statement. He just called him Biden and basically

just started talking shit about Biden as he was going into this conference. Then in the same letter, he refers to Putin as President Putin, Russian President Putin. So right there on paper, you could see the respect that this evil man has. Sick man. That's some real sick shit. And he's doing it. It's intentionally just sick and disturbing shit. The man hates our country and fucking loves Vladimir Putin. I mean, there's nothing else around it. He would prefer to see Russia take over the United States of America. There is no doubt about that. I mean, he's a former president who legitimately hates America and wants to see it fail. You have never in your entire life, in the entire history of our country, have we had a

former president a few months removed from office or at any time removed from office, go and write a letter to undermine the sitting US president and our allies. Never happened before because we have never had a traitor as president. We've never had a Russian stooge as president until now. But man, seeing Joe Biden on the global stage right now, I mean, I'm extremely thankful that we got President Joe Biden in office. I will say that. And I'm thankful for Joe Biden in office as well, because at least in the states that follow science, the states that have voted for Biden, even though we should all be united in this idea of getting vaccines, but in the blue states, mostly all have already met or exceeded weeks ago, Biden's July 4th vaccine goal. It should not be shocking that the red

states, which have become fully engulfed in QAnonism and the Trump big lies and the anti-science, have not. The United States, though, is now unlikely, though, to reach Joe Biden's July 4th goal outside of the blue states because we need at least 70% of adults to have had at least one dose. We're on pace to have somewhere between 67% and 68%. When you look at the Democrats, where these numbers come from, the Democrats are either fully vaccinated, partially vaccinated, or waiting to get vaccinated. So that's pretty much the Democrats. The Republicans, though, overwhelmingly, you have one, 29% will not, just will not get vaccinated.

13% say they're still deciding. 6% say they're planning to do it. And you look at those numbers and you see almost 50% of Republicans not being vaccinated. But it also goes to this other point that Biden said recently as well, you know, when he was giving media interviews and he said, the Republican Party leadership is fractured. The Republican Party is vastly diminished in numbers. The leadership of the Republican Party is fractured. And the Trump wing of the party is the bulk of the party,

but it makes up a significant minority of the American people. And I think that's reflected actually in these vaccination numbers. The goal can't be reached because you have, though, this small but very adamant Trump minority out there who are just refusing wholesale to get vaccinated. They're all in. Like, you know, those group of Trump supporters who are not getting vaccinated believe that Trump is going to be reinstated in august absolutely absolutely i want to get ahead of something if fucking chuck todd goes on msnbc july 4 weekend and he says biden's a failure for not hitting his goal of 70 i might i might retire msnNBC all because of Chuck Todd. I want to get ahead of that. That's a preemptive hatred of Chuck Todd.

Yeah. I'm angry at him now for something he may or may not do. You know he's thinking it. Yeah. 100%. Absolutely. He's thinking it. But I might sound callous here, but I don't know how you guys feel. But at this point, I'm just like, okay, like I'm vaccinated. My friends and family are vaccinated. Everyone I care about is vaccinated. If you don't want to get the vaccine, die. That's what you want me to say. I can't care about your life all the time if you're going to be an idiot. I see all these stories now of people who, you know, try to hold all these anti-vax rallies

and try to preach that the vaccine was, you know, the mark of the beast and all this crazy stuff. And then you see articles that are like, oh yeah, that guy died. And I just have a lot of trouble at this point, this stage in the game after the loss of life we've experienced because of these people feeling bad. I just do. Like I'm like, I know that's a horrible thing to say. No, no, no doubt about it. Look, I agree with you 100%. But the thing is, I don't feel bad for that person. I feel bad for the immune compromised person

who they eventually get sick because they're a walking fucking Petri dish. Absolutely. They still got it. We still got to find a way to fucking get these people vaccinated. I could give a shit if they get it. I care about the immune compromised person

who could easily get it. Absolutely. Brother of the podcast right there with that remark. When we come back from these brief messages, we will be talking to Lev Parnas about his experience in and now out of the Donald Trump cult. We will be right back after this. What's up, Midas Mighty? Have you been to store.midastouch.com yet? We got a great sale going on for you right now, and it's going through Sunday, June 20th, 2021,

Father's Day weekend. We're offering 15% off select merch. Jordy, what's the code? Pineapple. Pineapple. Pineapple, pineapple pineapple pineapple pineapple pineapple pineapple use the code pineapple and on select merch and you'll get 15 off the merch we got some great stuff in there really excited for you to check it out you can get your vax wristbands your pride wristbands your vax and relax masks and koozies and the Be Mighty button pack for 15% off. Just

use code PINEAPPLE at checkout at store.MidasTouch.com and get your official Midas Touch gear today. Welcome back to the Midas Touch podcast. We are joined by a very special guest, also connected to someone who's part of the Midas Mighty family. So welcome Lev Parnas to the Midas Touch podcast. Lev, here is where I would normally give the biography, but I think you say it best and most succinctly on your Twitter, which is the real Lev Parnas postness post cult of Trump under federal indictment. It pretty much says it all. Welcome to the podcast, Lev. Welcome, Greg. Thank you guys for having me here. And I also want to welcome to the show your criminal defense attorney who's joining.

Not very frequently do we have podcast guests who are joined by their criminal defense attorney. But Lev, it's a very special case for you. And so Joseph Bondi out of New York, Lev's criminal defense attorney, who's been filing a bunch of motions that I'd love to talk, of course, only what you can tell us, Joseph, about the case. But welcome to the Midas Touch podcast as well. Thanks for having me. So, Lev, how does, and I say this as someone's like, how does a good Jewish boy end up in such and such? How does a good Ukrainian Jewish boy end up on the Midas Touch podcast with his criminal defense attorney under indictment? Let's start with the beginning, the post-cult of Trump piece of it. So how'd you go

from businessman, successful businessman, to being caught up in the cult of Trump? We could thank Aaron Parnas for that. And by the way, before you say that, Aaron Parnas is Lev's son, who we're blaming. And by the way, when I first reached out to Aaron Parnas, your son, who's done incredible videos for Midas Touch, this will show you how much either I think so highly of Aaron, which I do, or how obtuse I am. I had no clue he was related to you.

And so after zero, none whatsoever. And no one believed me because after a while they're like, Hey Ben, is that Lev's son? And I go, I have no, I have no clue if that's Lev's son. And then it was of course this stuff, but I reached out. I think we posted like three or four Aaron videos because Ben had reached out to him and started slowly realizing and making the connection with the last name. And I think I texted Ben like, Ben, do you know that that's Lev's kid? And Ben like just oddly just didn't respond for a long time. And you could tell that he was really trying to figure out what just

happened. Like his whole world just exploded in front of him. And then he was like, yeah, I knew that. Of course I knew that. Yeah, of course. And he had no clue. So Lev, how did Aaron get you embroiled in the cult of Trump?

Because I'm going to have to speak to him about it. Oh, my God. It was one day, all of a sudden, I get a call from Aaron. Extremely excited, you know. And you guys know Aaron. He's a very go-getter. And he was, I think, 16 at the time. And he was in high school.

And my son was, I'm sorry, guys. Is that Aaron right now? He's upset that you're talking about him. I keep him locked up. Aaron's checking. Let me out, dad. Let me out. I just want to check with Joseph Bondi.

Joseph, has he locked up his son in a cage in his house? I can't talk about that all right so go into how aaron got you embroiled so he calls me up one day he says hey dad you know uh i think one of your friends is in the running for president not that we were friends but he knew that you know go to parties where trump was we ran in the same circles so as a young guy here you know as a kid he had a thought associated. He goes, I really want to go there. So I decided to figure out how I could make it special for us because I figured we're going to bond over this. I was never involved in politics. And Lev, you were in real estate, right? So you had a relationship

with Donald over co-op sales and other transactions? Actually, not Donald, but his father. Going way back when I was back in Brooklyn, when the co-op market started going around, my first job was for this company called King's Highway Realty. And they got an exclusive on selling Trump co-ops in Brooklyn. And basically, that's where I met Fred back then. And that was my first interaction. Then going forward, I really never did any business and never was really associated with the Trump family, except for going to some events and parties that we would interact and be in the same circles. You know, obviously, I also know his first wife, Ivana Trump.

So just running in the same circles, I would say. It wasn't like we had no formal business or any, you know, we didn't know each other that well. So Aaron gives you a call. He says there's a party. Was this before while he was running for election or after he had won? Oh, no, he just announced. He just announced that his first rally was at the rally.

And Aaron got some, he went online and got some kind of free tickets to go to the rally. And he goes, dad, I got us tickets. We're going to go to the rally. We're going to go eat afterwards, make a day, a night out of it. And so I decided to do something special. I called some friends in New York and one of my friends knew Eric Trump very well, and was able to get us some tickets to the VIP section where Trump was doing the rally. So we went to the rally and that was our first interaction with them. There was a small group, probably of 20 people there at the private VIP area.

And there was, you know, thousands obviously waiting at the crowd. But the small group, he spent about 30 minutes with us, walked in, took pictures with everybody, was very pleasant. I mean, very very very sociable and likable i mean very somebody that you really could like you know feel that you know you felt the power when he walked into the room and it was interesting because that was our real first interaction where i told him the story that i worked for fred and for the trump organization and while we were taking a picture, he turned around to Aaron and goes, well, when you become a lawyer, you'll come work for me. Your dad worked for my dad.

You'll come work for me. So that was our first interaction. And he actually took a picture, which later he signed for Aaron, which I think on Aaron's book is the cover. That's the picture that was the very first picture we took. How old was Aaron at the time? Was he 16 or 17? He was 16, took. How old was Aaron at the time? Was he 16 or 17? He was 16, I think.

He was 16 at the time. I was graduating high school, and he was about to start his mission, graduating high school and college at the same time, actually, and embark his mission to Washington, D.C., and to go to George Washington University Law School. Yeah, your son's Doogie Howser. He went to law school when he was 18 years old. He graduated law school when he was

21. That's why I approached him because of the Doogie Howser. No offense to you, Lev. Nothing to do with you. I called him Doogie all the time. Our nickname for Brett, by the way, growing up, was Doogie Howser. That was the nickname that my parents called me. So you're there, Lev, at the very beginningogie Howser based on his, that was the nickname that my parents called

me. So you're there, Lev, at the very beginning. How does that though lead to in the fast forward version of it, you, Rudy Giuliani, talking about the ambassador from Ukraine in 2018 and how we have purportedly, and that there's a, I got you there, Joseph, purportedly talking to the ambassador of Ukraine and that there are problems and that we need to take care of that problem. How do we get there? It was a fascinating journey that, I mean, we probably don't have enough time to go through it all of it right now. Oh, we got time left.

It was, you know what, it was really fascinating because a lot of things kind of it was a lot of different events a lot of different interactions a lot of different things that then transpired into uh basically it all really came to uh where really started to where we really bonded and started to become like one family in that Trump world was, it was way before even Rudy, it was a dinner that we held for Trump in 2016. It was in October. Me and a couple of other Republican, again, I say at the time, it was my very first time even donating to anything, my very first time being involved in politics.

But one of the uh gentlemen uh robert perrero who was a billionaire and he was a very big republican donor uh had a 160 million dollar house here in bulk i mean this stuff you can't make out of movies it was all in gold and you know it was a crazy house and he goes let's hold a dinner for trump there he's gonna love the house let's let's do it And we started doing it. We started raising and trying to put this thing together. And like in Trump fashion, all the way in the beginning, the first thing he does is they pose out there and get some trouble with that, grab him by the, you know what, video that leaked. It was right before the dinner. And then nobody

wanted to come and pay money to come. You know ratings went down but we still were able to pull off the dinner uh he showed up there at that dinner was rudy giuliani uh also there was uh some uh one of his closest uh lobbyists and people then brian ballard i don't know if you guys know who he is he's a very powerful lobbyist in washington dc supposed to be like a 30 40 minute type of an event but it lasted almost two hours. He stayed there. Uh, we had, there was 20 people, uh, uh, around the round table and people were able to speak to him. And it just kind of, because when he first saw me, he right away noticed me and he, and we started talking about,

we got into a conversation again about, uh, Aaron and about, he's like, what's he doing? And he, that's when he signed Aaron's picture because I had it with me and I said, do me a favor, sign it for Aaron. So he signs the picture and we started talking. So when we got back at the table, we kind of started, me and him, we're just talking for like an hour about politics, about what was going on, about how he was going to win. And he was just so genuine at the time. I mean, that's when I really like fell for him because, you know, growing up in Brooklyn and, you know, for my past, the loyalty is very important. And, you know, you grow up, you have to, when you believe in something, you really believe

in something. And, you know, I started believing in him. And right after that, he invited me and another couple of people to go to some of the rallies that he was going to have and also his third debate with Hillary Clinton in Vegas and for the next month till the day he got elected I was with him almost every day we were traveling with him to all the events I was sitting front row at the in Vegas when he was with Hillary you know at that awkward debate that they had and then I was there at the Hilton when he won and when nobody expected him to win I I mean, but he won.

And after that, it was just kind of, how do you put it? It was like we were family. Like everybody knew each other. It was a very small group because nobody believed he was going to win. So the people that stood and were loyal, there was a very small group of us. And especially Florida was so big for him. And Floridians, and by nature, we were just like, you know, close with them. And Lev, for those knowing, the event was in Boca, Boca Raton in Florida.

And you're from Florida, although you had worked in New York, but that event was in Florida. So Lev, here you're someone with no political experience, no political background. You happen to know through the co-op industry, Fred Trump, you had this fortuitous encounter in the initial event, thanks to Aaron, who's no longer screaming in the back. We're going to have to check on whatever the hell it is you did with Aaron, which I'll do a welfare check after this. You then throw this fundraiser that's a highly successful fundraiser. Frankly, when everybody's kind of walking away from Trump after the grab him by the locker, you know,

what Trump said was the locker room chat, which is one of the most repulsive and kind of disgusting, you know, moments ever. But you have this bonding moment with him and you believe his bullshit and you travel around with him as he keeps selling you and Americans this bullshit. You're at all of these locations with him. He eventually wins president. And as a result, you feel very loyal to him. He feels very loyal to you. Is that a good summary of where we're at? I think that you just summed it up in a nutshell.

So we know, though, that one of the things that he does, though, consistently with people who were loyal like that, the way you were, is to have people like you and others that we know of who are also in difficult legal situations, you know, be involved in a dirty work, some may say beyond that, but you eventually through the Rudy Giuliani, you know, connection started getting involved, started getting involved in these while the special prosecutor was conducting the investigation and Mueller was doing his investigation. You started getting involved in kind of geopolitical affairs and you were involved in kind of foreign government issues. So how did that happen? Could I make a point here, though, before we continue? Because I mean, whatever...

Joseph, the criminal attorney, by the way, jumped in. Donald Trump did in the past. Other people, when he wasn't the president of the United States, is really, really different. Because all of us have the right to rely upon our public officials and our people in government as being honest and as telling the truth and as trying to do the right thing. And I mean, it's just a valid legal defense if any of our charges really related to this, which they don't. But, you know, everything that Lev Parnas did, quote unquote, in any respect, was either at the behest of the President of the United States or guided by the President's personal attorney, Rudy Giuliani. And so, you know, I would say dirty work is not what one

would call it. You have to be able to trust those in office, those who are in government. And unfortunately, the biggest problem we have here is that no one could. And let me ask you this, Joseph. But according to the president, he barely knew who Lev was and had no clue what be in power. And you go and you toe the line or you're loyal to this guy who dangles heaven on earth.osterous it was, given the fact that Lev had all of these interactions with him for Trump's kind of current position to be like, I don't even know where this guy is. And his father, like it goes back that far. Just think like there's Lev and there's the president and oh my God, what an extraordinary opportunity. And it's just, it's just, you know, it's part of a pattern. Yes, but not surprised. So Lev, you're working for the president in various capacities. How are you getting involved now in kind of geopolitical issues in

Ukraine? Well, the funny part, I was really not working for him. I was donating money. I was, I was a sucker. I was like, you know, they liked me there because we donated, we went to events and parties. We were trying to build our own business. It wasn't that we had nothing to do with the president until I really became very close with Rudy. And that's when our worlds collided because Rudy was on a mission going back to 2016 or 17. One Manafort, the one that whole thing with Manafort happened. Rudy was on a mission with Ukraine, but going back then, our just worlds collided, and I had no idea. When Rudy started getting all this information and all this people talking about

Ukraine ambassador does that, because of my relationship that grew very quick, very rapidly, and very close. I mean, we became, just today, I was telling Joe, I was looking at some of my text messages. I mean, literally, I spoke and texted with this guy every day 20 times a day and that's the days that i wasn't with him and then and the other days i was with him five days out of the week like you know i saw him i was with him more than i was with my wife kids and i you can imagine for the past you know whatever those two years or two and a half years were so that's when everything collided i mean we were we were basically and uh were enlisted i mean you i don't i wouldn't even consider it working it went from us being donors i was trying to do business to all

of a sudden hey you guys ukrainian and it all started because of my ex-partner igor he had a lot of relationships in ukraine and he had a lot because of his businesses and because of his associations he knew it's a very small little world over there. So he knew everybody knew who knew the right people. So when all of a sudden Rudy started asking questions and Igor started responding and I was translating basically in the middle. They started hitting on the same notes. It was like they were like playing ping pong. It was like they were talking the same language. And this is going back to somewhere around October, November of 2018, when this is all starting to generate.

Then it all came to a halt, basically, on December 4th, or I don't remember the exact day of 2008, when we had the Hanukkah dinner at the White House. So we get invited to the Hanukkah party at the White House. And we were in Washington, D.C. with Rudy at the time. Rudy was working on some things. He had also going on some stuff, I think, in Bahrain or some other stuff that he was working that he needed to see Trump about. And he wanted to go speak to him about some of the stuff that he some investigator gave him about Ukraine. So he goes, why don't I go to the Hanukkah party with you? This way we could all talk and get it done, kill like two birds with one stone.

So it was even funny because when he called Madeleine, Trump's secretary at the time, Madeleine was like, Mr. Giuliani, but you've been invited to the Christmas party, not to the Hanukkah party. He's like, what's the difference? Why can't I go to both parties? She's like, well, let me double check. So we were like even laughing, like she was giving Rudy a little bit of a, you know. But obviously, finally, he got permission, approval to go to the Hanukkah party. And that's when we went there.

And we went there totally different, not like everybody else through regular doors where everybody went through screening. We went through somewhere on a different side of the White House. We were met by the Secret Service. We were then taken past this other place and this other place. Finally, they took us inside the White House. And Rudy, we were supposed to go to the not to the White House first, but we were supposed to go to where he was staying, the residence.

But the last minute, Rudy needed to supposed to go to where he was staying, the residence. But the last minute, Rudy needed to speak to him about some private stuff. And he said, I'm going to go speak to myself at the residence and I'll meet you guys up at the party. So then we get taken to the party. Actually, Aaron was with me at the party also. It's so funny.

He got to go to some of these stuff. So we went to the party. There was like, you know, a thousand people or something there. There was a whole bunch of people. All of a sudden, Rudy shows up. We're standing there talking. Rudy's like all happy and giddy, giving me the thumbs up. He's like, everything's great.

Just spoke to him, everything, blah, blah, blah. And all of a sudden, Secret Service comes up and taps Rudy on the shoulder and goes that the president wants you guys to wait in the red room for him. And Rudy takes us and we go to the red room and they lock wait in the red room for him. And Rudy takes us and we go to the red room and they lock us in the red room and he goes with Melania and Pence and I think Jarrett was there and a whole bunch of people to give a speech

to this whole crowd. They did this whole thing and then it was time to go back to the red room to see us. Well, I don't know if you guys, did you guys ever see the video of, the famous video of us walking? There's this blonde girl there. People made a mistake. They kept thinking that was my wife, but that's not my wife. That was actually Rudy's date. You call it for the thing.

So we go up to the White House. We're standing there. She's standing next to him in the red room. And all of a sudden you hear Trump walking in screaming, where's my Rudy? And we're all standing there. And he walks in there. And the first thing he walks in, he sees this blonde and all of a sudden you hear trump walking in screaming where's my rudy and we're all standing there and he walks in there and the first thing he walks in he sees this blonde and he does a dash right at her right next to her he's like who are you and then you see melania walking back and pissed off like crazy like so he goes rudy goes with me he goes that's my boy rudy he goes like that and it was like this whole thing about this blonde girl that was, you know, lady, female, whatever that was there. And Melania got pissed off.

And that's where you see the infamous picture where it's only me, Trump, Pence, Rudy, Igor, all of us standing at the Red Room. Well, because Melania wouldn't take a picture of all of us together. She said, you guys take your picture and we're going to take a girl's picture separately. We got pissed off at them. And obviously Mama Pence was holding Mr. Pence by his hand so he

wouldn't go too far out of reach. So it was kind of very, very, very surreal and very unique. And having my son stay there with me watching that whole thing, it was kind of very, very funny. What was Giuliani, What did he want to accomplish there? What was the purpose of all this? He got like, I guess that was the day when Trump gave him the go ahead. And he was like, because after that, Trump came up to me and Igor and he's like, I appreciate all the work. Everything's good. Rudy tells me everything's going good and gave me like a thumb like that, like, keep it up. You know, I was mesmerized, obviously. And at that moment, Rudy told me he'll explain everything later.

And which he did and told me that we're, you know, to go to Ukraine and do a little research. Because that was our first trip to go to Ukraine and do a little research and find out who's who. And this was still when the Poroshenko administration was in power. And that was December of 2018. And then when we came back at the end of December, we updated Rudy.

One of the people that, through Igor's contacts, that we were able to reach for Rudy was Viktor Shokin. Viktor Shokin was the general prosecutor that started this whole thing, saying that he was fired by Vice President Biden at the time because of corruption. But, you know, obviously he was more corrupt than anybody else, but that's neither here nor there right now. And that's when we introduced Rudy to him. And that's when it all started with him taking, you know, that first interview over Skype with Victor Shulkin. Got it. And then what happened next? Next, that's when it started getting interesting. Rudy wanted Shulkin to fly into the United States

to meet with Lindsey Graham and do an interview for Lindsey. And we already got everything arranged. They were supposed to, they told him first to fly out to Los Angeles to pretend like he's going to visit his daughter. And then we were supposed to pick him up from Los Angeles. And then because he has a daughter that lives in California, and then we're supposed to pick him up from Los Angeles because he has a daughter that lives in California. And then we're supposed to bring him to Washington, D.C. to meet with Lindsay and do the whole interview. But what happened was this is when the ambassador comes in. The ambassador basically denied him his visa. So Shoken calls up and says that his visa got denied. I pass it on to Rudy.

And that's when you saw those text messages and the impeachment. Rudy basically gets pissed off and says, I'm going to get revived. I'm going to get it done. He even went as far as to speak to Trump about it and told Trump, but none of them could get it done because the ambassador stood strong and wouldn't give him his visa to come to the United States. So that's when the ambassador became enemy number one. And that's when Rudy went on a crusade, basically, to get rid of the ambassador. Got it. First off, while all this is going on from where you were two years ago, kind of being lured into, as you put it on your Twitter, like the Trump cult, now the inner

circle of the inner circle, such that you're literally taking a trip to Ukraine. And now you're working with some of the kind of top Republican leadership. At any point, did you pause and be like, what the fuck is going on? I mean, every day, every day, every day, I would call my wife, my sister, Aaron, I would say, and they thought I was crazy, because nobody believed me half the shit I would tell them anyway. Like, you know, so I mean, I really had nobody to talk to. I mean, it was really crazy. I mean, it was really surreal, real crazy. But when you say someone, I mean, it was the top leadership. It wasn't just you. I mean,

I was dealing with the president of the United States, his attorney, Rudy Giuliani, his other, I mean, at one point I was part of his legal team during the Mueller report, if you recall then uh you're talking about kevin mccarthy you're talking about devin nunez you're talking about lindsey graham you're talking about mark meadows i mean are you kidding me pete sessions pete sessions was the head i mean he was the chair of the what committee i mean he was the head of the republican chair of some committee also rules i, I think, committee or something like that. I mean, Kevin Brady. I mean, you're talking about the heads.

I mean, what's higher than that? You know what I'm saying to you? So these are all people that are looking to me every day and telling me that I'm going to get a Medal of Honor, that Trump's going to give me a Medal of Honor for what we're doing. And did they literally use that words to you, that for what you're doing in Ukraine, members that you just listed, who specifically said that to you, you're going to get a Medal of Honor. Rudy said that just another dangle of heaven on earth, the Medal of Honor. Pete Sessions told me Harry Sargent, billionaire Republican, I mean, all these people that were like a part of like that inner circle, you know, and there's a lot of

people that you don't know about that are part of the Republican Party and different ways of super PACs and stuff like that, that were, I mean, they were all in the loop, as you call it, you know, what I'm saying to you. And look, you and you believed, I mean, following the direction of the President of the United States and being told by the top Republican leadership that you could be in contention for a medal of honor for what you're doing. I mean, you took that seriously, didn't you? Oh, I took it very seriously. I mean, that's why my wife thought I was crazy. My kids thought I thought I thought I'm saving the country. I really believe that there was a deep state. I truly, truly believe this. I believe

that, you know, I'm helping out. And I was blinded, you know, and it almost I almost lost my whole family over that. I almost it was it was it's a scary thought. You know, you know, it's like, people don't understand that, you know, I'm the first one to admit it. Because before that happened to me, I used to if I would watch a cult movie, I would really couldn't understand how people could get so intrigued or so to believe somebody to such an extent where they would do things that they could look back and say, you know, be ashamed of. And that's kind of what this is, because it takes your mind away. I mean, this was the leader of the United States of America. This was the I mean, and I'm a kid that grew up in Brooklyn, New York. Emigrated to the United States, right, from Ukraine. I mean, as a young kid, you came here for a reason. It's not just you grew up in Brooklyn. There's so much attached to that. And there you are with like the billionaire son of the dude who gave you the possibly your first opportunity to sell a piece of real estate.

And not only that, I mean, I'm traveling with Rudy Giuliani. I mean, growing up, this was Mayor Giuliani. Then, you know, I looked up. I mean, this was America's mayor. I mean, I looked up to this guy. I mean, at the end of the day, he was godfather to my youngest son. I mean, it was like I really couldn't believe that they would ever do something wrong or bad. And that's another thing, because living in the Trump Hotel, that's where the cultism becomes. Because you're like intertwined where there's like, that's where the cultism becomes because you're like intertwined where there's no, you don't see any other side.

There is no other side. So you can't, you don't have anything to reflect on. You only hear one side. So it's like, if you think Fox, I mean, it was worse than Fox News being at the Trump Hotel. It was just, and it was everybody. It was after every event that you would see every congressman there, every senator there. I mean, and who are you to believe that? Like, I mean, like, literally, who are you to believe? Those text messages that were mentioned where the ambassador of Ukraine becomes public enemy number one. Take us through kind of what happens after that up until the date of your arrest.

Basically, Rudy, the ambassador, became enemy number one because she wouldn't allow the way Rudy perceived it is to have evidence brought in against Biden. And so he could prove the case that whatever he was trying to prove. And what was interesting and was very peculiar. And to this day, I still don't understand. I mean, I don't know how he fired the ambassador

at least three, four times. Trump that I'm aware of that Rudy came and told me that he literally came from the White House would relay the message and said that he's fired or whatever the case.

And she would still not go. So it was like it was very weird. and it made you believe even more that there was a deep state because when he would come back and he wouldn't fire her you here you are thinking the president of the united states has just fired her but somewhere in the department they're not firing her because obviously they're trying to protect them so So that kept growing and growing and growing. And eventually there was a group called the BLT team, I called it. It was a bunch, it was basically Trump's loyalists, myself and Igor. There was John Solomon, who was a columnist, a writer for The Hill at the time. Another, Victoria Tunzing and Jody Genova, another Trump attorney, conservative

attorneys that worked for Trump and Rudy Giuliani. So we would always get together and like as a group, they would like try to figure out how to get this information and how to make sure that, you know, this got out and it got published. So eventually, I think I don't remember if it was John Solomon or Jody Genner said, listen, you know what? Oh, because what happened was Rudy came back from the White House and said that he fired her. This time, definitely she's gone. He fired her. And we were laughing saying, yeah, sure. Absolutely. You know, tell it to the next guy. And everybody's cracking up. And then I don't, this is where I remember either Jody Jenner or Solomon says, you know what? The only way we could put him in a pickle is if one of you go on TV and confirm that he fired her, then he can't go back, you know. And Joe DiGenova that night went on

Laura Ingraham and basically said that he fired her and she finally got fired. And that's how. And they were within Trump's inner circle and Trump, they were terrified, correct me if I'm wrong, at the prospect of a Biden candidacy. And they truly believe that of anybody, Biden could actually defeat Trump. That's, I mean, look, they almost give him credit for recognizing that reality, not their means. But even in 2018, they were obsessed with that concept. They were obsessed. Biden was, they were obsessed. He concept. They were obsessed. Biden was that it was they were obsessed. He was he was always scared of Biden. And that's why right now, I mean, probably his worst nightmare came true.

I mean, by losing to Biden, because that was the one person that I mean, like he really the I mean, I mean, I was a witness to it. I was part of the effort. I mean, every day lived it for years. I mean, to is just he was terrified of Biden. is this fear, this terror that Trump's main political rival on the Democratic side, Joe Biden, could beat him in an upcoming election. And so all of these efforts with all of these Republican top leaders that you mentioned were designed to work with, from the top Republicans and Trump, to work with, in Ukraine, their leadership to kind of undermine Joe Biden's candidacy in America? Oh, absolutely. To give it to you as a good example, you know, I grew up in Brooklyn and in school, you know, you go to school and you had

those bullies, bullies in school. And I always hated bullies. I was the anti-bullied. So you'd always have this one guy, a big guy that would always walk around and people would be scared of him. But nobody would be, nobody would, you know, stick up to him or stand up to him. And that's why people are scared. So, you know,

what his fear would always be is that one little guy is going to stand up to him because if that one little guy stands up to him and knocks him out, his whole game is over. And that's what Biden was to him. It wasn't that he was scared.

That's why he's now perpetuating this whole thing where it was fake and it was, you know, the election was rigged and everything because he can't admit that he actually lost to Joe Biden. And that's why it was just like it's like his worst fear of all fears because all Trump is is a blown up bully. That's all he is. He's a bully that threatened people. And that's why, thank God,'s out of office. Because can you imagine if he pushed some another country far enough and they

called his button? He wouldn't even know how to react. Lev, when did you realize you were in a cult? When I got out of it, when I got out of it, I'll tell you honestly, till I mean, even when I was my first couple of days in jail, I was, you know, hardcore, you know, still believing in, you rudy giuliani basically you know telling me to take it easy and everything's going to be okay and paul maniford's lawyers are good you know basically right after that i fired paul maniford's lawyers and i was you know starting to realize you know and then one because i didn't get information inside and once i started realizing people told me that trump started denying who i was. The biggest tell for me that something was wrong was where I wouldn't see Rudy. Because, you know, Trump, I, you know,

he is who he is, you know, he's going to play his games. He's uncontrollable. And if anybody tells you they could control him, they're lying. He only cares about one person, that's himself. But Rudy, I really believe that he was loyal to me and that he had our back and there was no issue. So when I didn't see Rudy, you know, show up to my jail, so that first couple of weeks and all of a sudden telling my wife she needs an attorney to speak to him and stuff like that. So I figured out, you know, something I've seen, you know, I grew up in America, I've seen the movie too many times, like, you know, you just don't believe that the movie is real. And then I was starting to live the movie.

I was starting to feel that something's wrong here. Something's getting set up. And the scariest part for me was, because you have to understand this, nobody understood that all my information and all the proof that I had that I was not crazy and this was going on, was in a little cell phone that was taken away from me. So I had no way to prove what I was not crazy and this was going on was in a little cell phone that was taken away from me. So I had no way to prove what I was saying. I had no way to tell anybody the truth.

Everybody thought I was crazy in the beginning. My own lawyers, you know, God bless Joe's soul. But I mean, in the beginning, I mean, he would have to ask me 10 times the same thing. Are you sure this happened? Are you sure? You know, and I would get upset. I beg to differ with that and I'll tell you why.

Truth be told, and it's a story for another day. Yeah. You got thrown a lifesaver, right? Yeah. I know I watched what you were going through and watched what was happening to you for several months before you were ultimately arrested and indicted. I watched it. And at the end of the day, the last thing that was going to happen to you is you're going to get pumped by the president and his lawyer and a bunch of other people. It just ain't happening. And so I have no doubt in your veracity and your truth about what happened to you. I note that since the beginning of the case, since we started complaining about the ambassador, the government took her out of count one of the indictment they took her out and they took her out because we complained about we complained about i

mean we we turned around and said we're going to talk to the intel committee and look what the southern district did after dragging their feet and we have to get a protective order modified to get documents in the national interest over to congress they decide to like cover the bases with these things you've seen come out recently, these warrants and stuff. Our story's never wavered. And we're at a really important juncture. You can read our motions. I mean, we moved to dismiss this case because of what we call selective prosecution. People, for a long, long time before Lev was ever on the scene, were talking about Bill Barr. And for a long time while this before Lev was ever on the scene, we're talking about Bill Barr.

And for a long time while this case was pending, they were talking about Bill Barr and his intervention in the Southern District. And maybe he's like trying to get rid of Jeff Berman, the former U.S. attorney, et cetera, et cetera. And we moved to recuse Attorney General Barr from having anything to do with this case in January of 2020. I didn't invite him to engage in the pattern of conduct that demonstrated beyond cavil that he would do anything to protect the president from any kind of political damage or any kind of criminal damage. He did that himself. But all along the way, what we've said is very, very true is that Lev was arrested and it seems like a means to an end. He had received a congressional inquiry letter on the 30th of September of 2018. He engages the president's lawyer, who then has,

you know, conflicts of interest waived, and this is all public information, by Jay Sekulow, in an email to John Dow saying, we waived this conflict of interest. The president who doesn't know Lev has his principal impeachment counsel waive a conflict of interest so some other lawyer of his can go circle the wagons and help Lev put a lid on it, right? Or should we say, put a lid on Lev? And that just wasn't going to happen. And so when Lev relieved his lawyers, literally one of the first things we tried to do is take advantage of the ability to tell the truth about something of great importance. And that's been what we've been trying to do ever since that day. It was like October of 2018 when he first appeared in the Southern District of New York. And that's where we really are. And Joseph, when you're talking about selective prosecution, that at that time, the Bill Barr Justice Department, which we now know to be basically Donald Trump's personal law firm, selectively prosecuting Lev to shut him up, to basically cover up Donald Trump's wrongdoing. Yeah, but there's two aspects to that,

because the investigation starts early, right? And you look in the media and you see this notion of the sovereign district of New York and this question of going after Trump detractors earlier in the game. And Lev, of course, presents as a donor to a super PAC at a high level, who is a Ukrainian emigre. And there are questions, I think, in the beginning of this investigation as to what he's doing there. This push at the end to try to put a lid on somebody who may be in a position, as we've argued in our public papers, to talk

about the president, to provide adverse testimony against the president, may be section two of our motion. But, you know, to the extent that you arrest someone prematurely, that you do so in an effort to try to thwart them from exercising their right to speak or to comply with a subpoena, then the law is firmly with us. That's selective prosecution. So we've seen a ton of stories come out, and Lev, this is directed to you, about Bill Barr, about Justice Department subpoenas targeting enemies of Donald Trump. Does any of that come as a surprise to you, Lev? Absolutely not. I mean, one of the scariest days of my life was when I went on Rachel Maddow and I basically said that Bill Barr was a noob because he was one of the scariest guys.

I was scared of him because I knew how deep inside he was because I was there and I heard the conversations he had with Jody Jenner. I heard the conversations he had with Rudy. I knew the stuff they were doing. And then I would see him go on TV and lie. And they would stand there and all lie. And that's when I got scared more. And because if they could do that, and they're doing it now and getting away with it so far. in the House Intelligence Committee, sat there, sat there, right? Having known you, having had phone contact with you, having had Derek Harvey, one of his senior staffers, have contact with you, right? Absolutely. I mean, months. Don't wait.

And then when you raise it, he goes on the Sean Hannity show and dares to have the long arm of the law arrest you and me. Yep. On TV, knowing that you're a potential witness in a congressional proceeding, the ranking Republican congressman tries to chill your statements and shut you up. Right? That's not the end of the story, though, for those of you that know the end of the story.

Stephen Biss, the congressman's lawyer, then undertakes to represent Derek Harvey, the congressman's lawyer, then undertakes to represent Derek Harvey, the congressman's aide, who then sues Lev and CNN and me, of all people, in federal court in Maryland in a scurrilous defamation case that's dismissed for lack of personal jurisdiction because it was ridiculous. The last time I was in Maryland was to have a crab as a teenager. I don't even know if Liz has been in Maryland. But, you know, the court couldn't even speak to the merits of our claims. We were out. We were dismissed. But they dismissed us to CNN on the merits. And then the court invited lawyers Stephen Biss and good old Eric Harvey to amend

their complaint and whack at it again. And they filed the same complaint, which resulted in a dismissal and sanctions and the payment of attorney's fees. So the lawyer and the plaintiff ended up paying attorney's fees to Williamson Connolly. That's what happens if you dare speak up and you dare speak out and you got a big enough mouth against the wrong people, then they come after you. And they come after you in a form, they try to cut the edges out from under you, but that won't happen. Just like I said before, no one's going to punk let it, and it's not going to happen. Stephen Bliss is Devin Nunes' attorney, and for those listening, was the attorney who infamously was suing the fake cow, Devin Cow, and other sort of lawsuits like that.

A wonderful fake cow, we must say. Great courage, yes. Yeah, responsible for a lot of these, you know, quote unquote, defamation suits. Basically what you're saying, and just to clarify, you think there's a, or you know, there was a coordinated effort between Barr, Trump, Devin Nunes, and others to silence you and other

enemies of Trump? Again, here's the thing. I think we might go too far by saying we knew this coordinated effort, right? What we can do is lay the marbles out there and kind of show where they lead, or you can talk about the bouncing ball. But I think that's the nature of all of this, is it's very tough to put together a coordinated effort. And so in our motion papers, we've sought discovery on this question of selective prosecution, trying to shut Lev up so that he gets thwarted from talking about the president. We've asked for an evidentiary hearing in our papers because we think that witnesses should be placed under oath and I should be able to

cross-examine them. And obviously, I think this is a question of great national significance, and I believe that the law is on our side. So yeah, we can't say definitively, but we certainly believe that we're entitled to discovery on the question of the integrity of letters of prosecution and adhering to place those witnesses who may have information under oath and to have them give that testimony. Yeah. And as Ben was saying, I mean, this fits a pattern of behavior now that we've seen time and time again from the Bill Barr Justice Department. And every day a new story seems to come out that reflects similar sentiments to what you guys are saying here. One thing that I saw Lev

say the other day, Lev, you asked, why did Barr visit SDNY and then have a private meeting with Rupert Murdoch on the day of my arrest? Let me turn that question back on you. Why do you think Bill Barr visited SDNY and had a private meeting with Rupert Murdoch the day of your arrest? I may have to interrupt and remind you that we've got, you know, motions pending. I'm so sorry. This is what happens when the lawyer doesn't ask the questions. I try to get straight to it. I was going to say creatively. So I hope you, okay. So basically the way, so to answer your question is I can't go into detail, but I don't believe in circumstances where, you know, everything just coincidentally things happen. And like I said, Bill Barr went to me with Rupert Murdoch.

What people are not putting one plus one together is I was supposed to be the day I got arrested. I was flying to Vienna to set up an interview for Sean Hannity to do with Victor Shokin. And it was supposed to be a primetime interview that they were setting up. With Sean Hannity and Shokin, and who else was behind it? Rudy Giuliani was supposed to be there. And also the ex-CFO of Burisma, who was supposed to be giving information on all of that. So if you believe what I'm saying, then you would understand that what would be the purpose of all of a sudden now Fox being told to, because if you take a look at the stories afterwards, there was never, after my

arrest, Fox was the only one that really stayed away from everything. They really didn't report on it. They really didn't get into it. And, you know, they knew all along that I was not fleeing a country. I was going on behalf of Sean Hannity, Rudy Giuliani, and all of them to do an interview. I mean, I didn't even want to leave there. I wanted to stay home for the holidays with my family. I got into an argument with my wife because I just came back to leave again.

And they knew, and everybody knew that, you know, but then if you ever take a look at the infamous tape where Southern District comes up and Jeff Berman gets up there and says, they had one-way tickets and they were leaving the country. Since when is it illegal to have a one-way ticket? What basis were we leaving the country? What basis do you have us arresting us on a tarmac when we were all day with Rudy Giuliani sitting at the Washington Hotel? I mean, listen, if you believe in coincidences, yeah, then none of this. But I don't believe in coincidences. I don't believe in this day in life all of this happened.

Bill Barr visits SDNY. Why would Bill Barr congratulate them on our arrest? I mean, it's public information. Bill Barr, who benefits us from being arrested? Just think about it. congratulate them on our arrest. I mean, it's public information. Who benefits us from being arrested? Just think about it. It only benefits one person. Then again, it could have just been a routine visit to the SDNY to say hello

and then a dinner with Rupert Murdoch to chat. On the day of our arrest. Right. On the trip that Rudy was supposed to go on with you until he back. I canceled all of a sudden the last day. I mean, it's all a coincidence.

Hell of a coincidence. And as the youngest brother, and I'm sure you can relate with sons of your own, they let me get in one question in episode. Like you said before, Rudy Giuliani, I mean, we're New Yorkers, you know, we knew him as America's mayor at one point. It's been so bizarre for me personally to see this decline, even like the last year and a half. What do you think's going on with Rudy mentally right now?

I mean, is this an act so he can maybe plead like insanity down the line? Because it's really gone off the deep end. What's your take? No, I think he sold his soul to Trump. When he was on the election trail with them, he really believed that Trump was going to make him Secretary of State. That's what his dream job was. That's what he wanted. And Trump basically offered him attorney general twice. He turned it down. And after that, because he left the law firm he was working at, he didn't, people turned away from him. so he didn't have the same contracts coming in. He kind of got stuck in that position where, you know, Trump was his only because he had nowhere else to go.

What's driving him, I can't tell you. I mean, it's just bizarre to me sometimes to see some of the things because, like you said, Jordan, we grew up. I mean, I looked up to this guy and to this day, you know, certain things that transpired don't make sense. I mean, this is a guy that would preach to me loyalty every day. This is a guy that would tell me if, you know, something would happen to you, I'll be there. And he didn't show up not one day in my jail cell. And let alone, this is an attorney and supposedly my attorney, because, you know, like he told everybody he was my attorney. So why wouldn't you come see? Why wouldn't you get up in front of the court and say he wasn't going anywhere? I'm the president's attorney. What's going on here? Instead, he locks my son up in his room for two days while my son's sitting there listening how they're trying to distance themselves from me. I mean, that's just crazy.

Like, why even have him there? Because they were scared that, you know, he might, you know, go tell me. I mean, that's just crazy. Like why even have him there? Because they were scared that, you know, he might, you know, go tell me, I don't, I don't know, but a lot of it doesn't make sense, you know? And the only thing I could tell you is, uh, and what Joe said, and that's what I live by today because past couple of years, you know, it's been just so crazy. It's just, the only blessing I could tell you is that I've got out of the Trump cult. I've been able to get my family back. I've been able to get, you know, the real friends and contacts

that are truly back. I feel like a good person. Again, I didn't feel like it's hard to because, you know, I'm not that person, you know, to be to be along with the guy that laughs at disabled people. Like when he laughed when Trump made fun of that journalist, disabled journalist, I wanted to throw up. But you kind of turn around and that's the real sick part that you hate yourself for. And that's why every day I try to

better myself and use my platform for, because that's not me. That wasn't me. And there's a lot of people in that orbit that feel that way. I see it. When I was there, I would look at it and they're like,

some of them are like scared mice because they don't know, like when you have that around you, where do you turn? Cause you don't have any friends. Otherwise your friends are, who believe in what you believe in. I look at some of the things that people put on. I mean, they believe like grown men and women that I know are, you know, are smart, intelligent people think he's going to come back into office. August, in August, it's just,

it's just how do you explain something like that? And I can't, except for telling because maybe if I was still part of that cult, I'd probably be saying the same thing. Who knows? I'd like to give you the opportunity to just answer this because I know it's a question that we'll get. And I mean this completely respectfully, but on the note that you could have still been in the cult and you being so open about your story, what would you say to the listener who says, hey, this guy, Lev, he is responsible for a lot of what we witnessed over these past few years for Trump. Why should I believe that he's telling the truth now? Why should I be listening to him and trust him at this moment? What would you say to those people? At the end of the day, I mean, everybody has to make their own decision in life.

You know, I made mistakes, you know, and the only thing I could do is I could admit my mistakes. At the end of the day, I never believed I was doing anything wrong. It's not an excuse, but it really is. I thought I was actually saving the world, saving the country, being, you know, like I said to you. And as funny as it sounds, as crazy as it sounds, I really, truly believed it. And now looking back at it, you know, you know, I made a lot of bad choices. And not just if like you would say that, you know, by helping out Giuliani and Trump and, you know, with this whole Ukraine thing and whatever it is. But also in my family, in my life. I mean, like it was,

it was a difficult time in our lives when, you know, we're sitting around the table, like you, my poor son, you know, Aaron, I feel so bad for him because he couldn't give a word wise if he would, I mean, you couldn't put on CNN or MSNBC in my house. I mean, my wife, like, I mean, couldn't have friends that were not part of that. And I mean, it was just a crazy time. And all I could say is I thank God every day and, and for giving me the opportunity to be able to get my life back in order,

get my, my wife, my kids back in order. And now all I'm trying to do is, you know, I use my platform that I have to, you know, try to help people try, you know, I've been working with some nonprofit organizations trying, you know, I got a lot of time on my hands right now trying to do good things. And at the end of the day, I think by getting the truth out, getting my story out, maybe you'll get some of those people in that trunk world out of that, because there's a lot of people like me in there that got suckered in because it was fascinating or because of different things you know i've seen

them there's just there's different people in different parts his main core is not set up of the same group there's there's a lot of people they even like him for different reasons and don't agree with them it's so hilarious it's just so crazy the way that whole i mean i say hilarious because at the end of the day i try and you know make light of it because otherwise it gets very gloomy but it's it's it's it's crazy the way you know it is and again now i i think it's getting better because now i'm starting to see even on social media people are starting to you know uh, realize that, you know, that now we have a new administration, things are going to go more.

And I think within the next six months here, I think once, you know, certain things happen and hopefully the people that were responsible for all these things, you know, they start getting in trouble and paying the time and not guys that, you know, got caught up in this. Not to say I'm innocent because we're all guilty of something. And whatever mistakes I did, like I said, I'm a big man boy. And I'm willing to accept my mistakes and go on and move forward and do good.

But these guys will never accept their mistakes. I'll tell you this live too. And this is one of the things I've noticed when I look at just videos of you when you were kind of in Trump's inner circle. And of course, just the other people around him too, whether it's the Kevin McCarthy's or Nunes, they don't look happy. They look like they're suffering. And when I see you today, I see kind of a healthy, happy person who's got a lot off his shoulders. Yes, I feel. And that's the biggest thing. When I was able to finally get Joe on my,

you know, retain Joe, get him on my side, it was like, and we were able to say, we're going to tell the truth. It was like a whole relief came over me. I can't even explain to you. It's like to this day I can't stop talking because I have so much to say. I've witnessed so much things. The biggest regret is that I was not able to testify because I think even though, yes, the Senate probably would have made no difference, but I think it would have pushed a lot of other people.

I know definitely John Bolton would have had to have testified. I know Mulvaney would have had to have different things to say. I know Pompeo wouldn't just key because there's too much that I knew of what was going on that they couldn't. They would have had no answers to. And that's what the biggest thing. That's why the Devin Nunes, the House Intelligence Chair that was set over the, presided over the impeachment of Donald Trump, sat there and discredited me so I can't come up there and testify and give truth to exactly what happened. We did try to speak in that trial and we couldn't. And now we have an opportunity to put on witnesses with discovery who are government witnesses, and to hold them accountable for what's been done. And so it's a

little different than, you know, that Senate trial where you can decide not to call the witnesses, and you're the Republican senator. So let's see what happens. We're hopeful that we'll get our opportunity in court. We'll hopefully be able to put people under oath as witnesses. And I think that's where the truth is really going to come out. Thank you for having us today. Thank you. Lev Parnas joined by his attorney, Joseph Bondi. Thank you so much for joining the Midas Touch podcast. We'll be right back after these messages. Thank you guys. What's up Midas Mighty. Thank you for making the Midas Touch merch store one of the, if not the, most popular destination for pro-democracy merch from T-shirts to mugs and, of course, the best-selling Vaxxed wristbands. I can't wait to be out in town getting coffee, getting dinner, whatever it is, and seeing people

rocking their wristbands. These wristbands are amazing because it's an easy way to let people know that you've been vaxxed and are following CDC guidelines. They say Midas Touch right there on them. You know what we like to call them? The perfect GQP repellent. That's exactly what they are, Brett, because it lets people know, to your point, that one, you're vaxxed. You're making a safe community for the folks around you. And two, maybe even more importantly, right up there, you're not a Fox News watcher. That's what these wristbands let people know. And let's be real. It's just a matter of respect, right? We're all going out. A lot of people are going to be kind of uneasy being around other people after being locked in for a while. And it's an easy way to just let your

neighbors know, let your friends know, let your overworked barista know that, hey, I followed the guidelines. I'm vaxxed. You don't have to worry about me. We're all in this together. And so you could get your vaxxed wristbands at store.midastouch.com. If you're still masking up, you get your vaxxed and relaxed masks at midastouch.com. We Vaxxed and Relaxed gears. We got koozies, which are going to be great for summer. I'm excited for summer right now with the Midas Touch merch. And I've seen people showing us photos that they're receiving their tank tops and everything. So go check out store.midastouch.com. Get your pro democracy gear today. That's store.midastouch.com. Welcome back to the Midas Touch podcast.

Great interview with Lev Parnas. Really makes you think. I felt like I was watching or listening to like a movie that you really couldn't even believe if that was turned into a Hollywood. I could see it being a movie. I mean, it was ridiculous. And Ben, I got to compliment you, man. It was like a Dateline interview right there. That was some one-on-one stuff right there. You just laid on Brett and I, so nice job. I remember all those moments happening and how shocking they were at the time. I remember when he and Igor Fruman got arrested in the airport and all the stories

about how, you know, they were caught before they were fleeing the country. I remember all of that so vividly and to just see the transformation of Lev and to hear these stories firsthand and to hear how I think one of the most interesting things were that he thought he was doing a good thing throughout all that time. You know, he was so in the cult. And I think one of the comments that struck me the most was like when he said, you know, the bubble of Fox News, it pales in comparison to the bubble of Fox News when you're in the bubble of Trump, which I think is something that we have to kind of understand that these people aren't even living in the same reality as us. And once you realize that, you realize how all these crazy conspiracies could happen. You realize how they could say this crazy stuff and think these crazy things. Because at the end of the day, a lot of them believe it themselves. They're so entrenched in it. He believed in the

deep state. I mean, look, we just spent an hour talking to him. He's a smart fucking guy. He believed in the deep state and now he's part of the deep state with us. Talking about though, the real problems also confronting America, not the fake conspiracy theories that Trump and the GQP throw up. Talk about deep state. Talk about, I mean, but that's why it's always projection with them. At the end of the day, they were always the ones trying to undermine the, I didn't even know what a deep state is, but here are actually people who are working

within the inner recesses of our government power centers to like try to destroy lives. There's been a slew of stories of all the abuses recently at Bill Barr. We referenced this on the Lev Parnas interview. Lev described how intimately on a personal level, Bill Barr was involved in all of these issues. And as Lev Parnas would say, who presents as an incredibly honest historian of all of those events. There's one thing I can tell you when I see Lev, and I know a lot of individuals who are accused or embroiled in things, Lev was not lying one bit. Everything

Lev said was true. So when he tells you, look, I would have these conversations. That's why Lev also has the receipts. But I have these conversations with Bill Barr, and I would see Barr show up, and then Barr would just lie and literally just say the exact opposite of what I saw actually happen. You know, and now we see all while Bill Barr was presiding over the Justice Department, we were seeing how there are all these secret subpoenas by the Justice Department targeting reporters, targeting Democratic Congress members. And now we even know targeting Donald Trump's own lawyers for not being sufficiently loyal. The most recent story that we know about is the DOJ's targeting of Don McCann, who was Donald Trump's counsel, who was basically the main lawyer, the general counsel within the White House when Don McCann was being accused of not being sufficiently loyal when Donald Trump was trying to fire Robert Mueller. We now have information, according to a New York Times article, that the DOJ was secretly

subpoenaing McCann's records, the attorney for Trump, totally breaching the attorney client privilege to go after McCann and to go after his family. You wonder sometimes now how people like Lindsey Graham and others would bend to Trump's will, how the McConnells. Look at what was going on. Trump was using the DOJ to subpoena people's cloud. He was going into their Apple phone information and he was getting their text messages. He was getting intimate information. As Brett said, it's just the tip of the iceberg. Think about what Trump has discovered and had literally on his enemies. Just think about what he may have on all of these people who you go, whoa, that person just made a crazy about face.

I wonder what Trump had in him. Well, we're learning that he did have this information on him by using the Department of Justice to gather this information. And one person who seems to be totally co-opted or just totally just despicable and cowardly, it's probably a combination of both, is Mitch McConnell. There are certain people like Pence, McConnell, Trump could literally and did literally try to murder them. And they come back and they like, he's a great president. He was great, but he tried to kill you. You were the victim of the attempted murder. And you're like, well, he was a great, great guy. But here we see McConnell this week on the UU at some crazy right wing nutcase radio show.

This is what he's saying now in 2021. OK, just saying now it will be highly unlikely that I would allow Biden to fulfill to fill any Supreme Court vacancy in 2024, as long as I'm the majority leader, is what he's saying right now. His whole precedent is, I am going to destroy the democratic agenda, which is now the pro-democracy agenda. Not only did he say that, he also refused to even commit to having a vote on a nominee if a seat opened up in 2023. What? The guy is just an evil guy.

I mean, McConnell really is an evil, craven man who does everything in his power to keep power. He really doesn't care about America. He doesn't care about norms. He doesn't care about any of the stuff that he pretends to. And this is why that Democrats need to play ball when it comes to this idea that we have to follow the norms and precedents of the past, because we're playing against a side right now in the GQP that isn't playing by norms. They're making new norms. That's what the DOJ did also. They're creating a new set of norms. So when somebody so screws up

our system, that doesn't mean that when you come into power and you're running the DOJ now in the case of Merrick Garland, or you're running the Senate now as you are, if you are Chuck Schumer or the House as if you're Nancy Pelosi, that doesn't mean you go, oh, well, you know, the norms now dictate that, you know, because they did this thing in the past that we need to defend those actions. No, you need to set your own precedent right now that these actions are not okay and that you're not going to stand for it. But I think you're starting to see the Democrats starting to take the lead here. You're starting to see them put pressure. Hopefully we start seeing some investigations into this. The problem with the Trump administration is there's so much criming going on that it's just investigation on top of investigation on top of investigation.

And here's one of the points too, and this arose, you know, just thinking about Democrats needing to fight. On this weekend's edition of Legal AF, Popak and I addressed the potential for Midas Touch to bring legal action against Fox News. OK, because Fox News wants to deprive us of our ability to add messages that support democracy and condemn insurrection. There's really no political messaging in there other than let's support democracy. I can't tell you, though, how many kind of whiny Democrats like, no, you can't do that. You can't sue them. They got a First Amendment right to block you. And it's like, look, do you want to try to solve the problem?

Do you want to try to solve the problem? Do you want to try to fight? Rather than whine, why don't we try to come together and come up with a solution? Because we're not talking about even the issue of free speech anymore, okay? We're talking about a news station that's become a full-blown anti-democratic, fascist propaganda wing that has caused hundreds and thousands of deaths in the United States of America. So I'm trying to be constructive here with a solution. I'm trying to fight for something. And the second you go up against them, you get, oh, but you can't do that. Actually, the First Amendment. It's like, no, let us go toe to toe with Fox News. We've got a proven track record at this point.

Let me tell you the First Amendment. The First Amendment is on our side. The First Amendment is for us to be able to condemn an insurrection. Fox News is not a news network. They're an entertainment station faking as the news that lie every day and that cause serious harm to the American people. Whatever that exists shouldn't exist. And there's a big difference between what Fox News does as a big disinfo, intentional disinfo center, than an area like a Twitter that is a free-flowing information of ideas where GQP members just get upset for being called out for lying, where they get banned from a platform because they inspire

insurrections. If you can't tell the difference between those two things, okay, you're part of the problem. Sorry, I just wanted to get that off my chest. No, I think that's smart. And I think also though, calling them an entertainment network is almost too nice, calling Fox an entertainment network. What they are is they are a propaganda wing of the Republican Party and they're not hiding it. It's literally in their roots. The way Fox News got started with Roger Ailes, who was an advisor to Nixon, who worked with Ronald Reagan, Fox News was built as a Republican mouthpiece. That's what it is. And they don't hide it. So let's not pretend like this is a news organization. I think it's more of a government entity being controlled by a

political party to push partisan political propaganda. That's what we're dealing with here. It's an interesting point, Brett. And maybe as we talk it out and not to just start brainstorming on the podcast, but it does occur to me that what they're doing is a perpetual in-kind contribution, a perpetual donation that they make coordinating election campaigns and coordinating election strategies with the GQP. I mean, remember all the times where Lindsey Graham would show up and they would say, all right, Lindsey, tell us how you feel. And they would just let him go on for like, you know, two minutes and give, you know, give these speeches. So at the same time they do that and they don't allow us to talk and say, hey, insurrection is bad. I mean, they are a

they are political action committee at some point. They are a political player by doing what they do. Fox News did not know who they fucked with. We're going to we're going to fuck with them back. Well, I agree with that. And the one final thing that I just want to talk about and get off my chest, which is, and this is as coming from a Californian, there's just an absurdity and all the false, just ridiculous bullshit that the GQP says. It's all performative. And the most recent example of this is recently Aircot, which is the main energy grid company in Texas, is asking people to conserve electricity

through Friday. This is in Texas, saying there are a significant number of power plants offline and they're expecting possible record use for June. This comes after Greg Abbott stated that everything that needed to be done is done to fix the power grid in Texas. Today, I signed bills into law to reform ERCOT and weatherize and improve the reliability. He made those comments immediately right after Texas because it failed to modernize. It failed to, at the most basic level, put the most basic conditions so that when it got slightly colder, that their equipment wouldn't freeze. That was Greg Abbott. They also blamed the Green New Deal and blamed everyone for their own irresponsibility. But I remember when Ted Cruz said,

California is now unable to perform even basic functions of civilization, like having reliable electricity. Biden, Harris, AOC want to make California's failed energy policy the standard nationwide. Hope you don't like air conditioning. And he made this comment August 19th of 2020, when there was simply a tweet by the office of the governor of California, just simply saying, hey, you may want to turn off unnecessary lights, avoid using major appliances, set your thermostat to 78 or higher. And here, ERCOT is saying literally the exact same thing, if not even going further. They are going further. ERCOT is definitely going further. They are going further. It's definitely going further. Listen, I feel for the people of Texas here. I think it sucks that this is the leadership that they're dealing with.

At the same time, I want to look at these Texas politicians and just say, what are you doing? What are you doing here? This is karma in a way for you coming after California for trying to take reasonable efforts to conserve energy during extreme weather. regulation at all on their power grid. They are literally the only state currently being affected at this level by the heat. And they have the audacity to criticize California all the time and act like California is some hellscape. And I'll tell you, I live in California. Ben, you live in California. California is great, guys. I will say. I will go to California. By the way, does anybody have eyes on Ted Cruz today? Did he flee? Did he go to Cancun today? I haven't seen him. I haven't seen him since the Eric Hodge statement came out.

I would check all airports on the border. Where is Ted Cruz today? Does anybody know? Last time I saw he was doing another performative antic and he was standing in his office, pledging allegiance to the flag saying this didn't used to be controversial. Okay, Ted. These aren't real people. We need real serious politics back. Concluding this podcast where we began, listening to that Biden speech brought chills. Listening and watching as Biden shows true

leadership abroad, that's what America is truly about. Focusing on health and safety measures, both here and abroad, leading domestically, leading internationally. That's why we fought as Midas touched. That's why you fight every day, but be aware of these, you know, Ted Cruz, these Mitch McConnell's, you know, that's why we all need to stick together. We all need to fight together. And that's why we are here every week discussing these issues directly with you. And we appreciate you so much, Brett. I did a great hot air balloon ride for his birthday. That sounded like a, was it fun? Did you have fun doing that, Brett? I did. I did have a lot of fun. My wife surprised me with the hot air balloon ride for his birthday? That sounded like a, was it fun? Did you have fun doing that, Brett? I did. I did have a lot of fun. My wife surprised me with the hot air balloon ride for the B-Day. We woke up at four in the morning and did a sunrise ride. I had to really control myself

to pretend like I wasn't scared out of my mind to get inside this little tiny wicker basket attached to a balloon that was being inflated by propane gas being ignited to fly it up into the sky. When you actually think about all that's happening, you're like, I don't even understand how this works. There's fire being blown up into this thing and that's what's making it fly. Shouldn't it be burning the thing? I don't understand that at all. But the whole thing was an incredibly cool and surreal experience. And it gives you a very interesting perspective on everything when you're up in the sky and you feel that vulnerable in this little tiny basket at the window. It was an incredibly thoughtful gift for sure. And not that we have contracts, but I think we're

going to need to start to have contracts that explicitly state that you can't do that shit, man. That's Midas touch right there in that hot air balloon. God forbid something happens. And Ben and I are just here like, all right, come on, B, you got to be more safe. We would call that an NMI, a non-Midas injury. And if there's a non-Midas injury, I'm sorry, Brett, we're going to have to determine. What's a Midas injury though? Like me editing and hurting my finger by typing the keyboard too hard? Like that's really-

You should be doing nothing other than staying in that room and editing. I will say this though, for anybody who's ever considering doing this, it's actually, according to Google and the internet is never wrong. The internet is undefeated at being factual all the time. Hot air balloon rides are actually safer than flying on an airplane, which is a crazy stat. And you do feel very safe on it and it's a very smooth ride. Very cool guys. Highly recommend. I'm glad you got out of your system. That's great. The next birthday coming up is Jordy's in July. We go right from May to Brett in June. Jordy at the beginning of July. I'm sure all the team Jordys out there are getting ready. They're getting ready to show their favorite brother. And thank you everybody for listening again to this Midas Touch podcast.

This has been Brett and Jordy fighting for you for the heart of our democracy. We'll see you next time. Shout out to the Midas Mighty!