The NPR Politics Podcast - Weekly Roundup: Thursday, August 2

Episode Date: August 2, 2018

Paul Manafort, President Trump's former campaign chairman, is in court, and his trial is wrapping up faster than predicted. And while the courtroom is a phone free zone, that hasn't kept the president from weighing in on the events from the outside. Plus, we examine how president's past and president influence the votes in a midterm election. This episode: White House correspondent Tamara Keith, justice correspondent Ryan Lucas, political reporter Tim Mak, White House reporter Ayesha Rascoe, and editor correspondent Ron Elving. Email the show at [e-mail]. Find and support your local public radio station at npr.org/stations.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

Hey, this is Tamara Keith, and I'm here in the studio with Gibson, his first trip to the studio. This podcast was recorded at 1.20 on Thursday, August 2nd. Things may have changed. Uh-oh, here's the show. And Tam, you're here! Magic! Things have actually changed. I'm here. I'm back at work. I'm so glad to be here. And no baby, but you're here. Yeah. So, guys, what did I miss? Everything.

A few things. Really? All right. This is the NPR Politics Podcast here with our weekly roundup of political news. President Trump's former campaign chairman, Paul Manafort, is on trial and the president hasn't held back his thoughts on the matter. Plus, President Trump and President Obama are weighing in on the midterm elections. I'm Tamara Keith. I cover the White House. I'm Ayesha Roscoe. I also cover the White House. I'm Tim Mack, political reporter. I'm Ryan Lucas. I cover the Justice House. I'm Ayesha Roscoe. I also cover the White House. I'm Tim Mack, political reporter.

I'm Ryan Lucas. I cover the Justice Department. All right. So before we dive into a conversation about Paul Manafort and his trial, Ryan, I just want to pull back the curtain and have you describe where you are right now. I am sitting in a hotel room, in fact, across the street from the courthouse, the federal courthouse in Alexandria, Virginia, where Paul Manafort is on trial. Just to get very technical here, or not that technical, the courthouse, you're not allowed to have any electronics in there? It's like... We're on lockdown. Yes, there are no electronics. There's no phones, no computers. We have been released from the digital world for the time period that we are in the courthouse, which is in many respects a blessing.

And so then you literally run across the street, go up to your hotel room and file the news. That's exactly what happens. And actually, when court breaks or when there's big news, you will see reporters, as the judge described it, scurrying out of the room like rats to go report the news. I don't think you guys are rats. I don't think we are either. News rats. His words, not ours. Okay. So when you left that courthouse, what was the latest? So we're two and a half days into the trial. This is day three. We've heard from a number of political consultants who worked with Paul Manafort in Ukraine when he was doing political consulting there. They talked about the sorts of interactions that they had working on TV ads, how Manafort worked closely with

the leader of Ukraine, Viktor Yanukovych, who was backed by Russia and ultimately toppled in popular protests. We also heard from a whole lot of people who sold Manafort goods and services. Some of those goods included things like a $15,000 ostrich leather jacket. It wasn't nice. I saw that picture. I don't know why you pay that much for that jacket. Because you can't. Yeah, it's not really my taste either. It's the Mr. Burns kind of thing. We've got an ostrich jacket. We got a gorilla jacket and we have a baby seal they have a python jacket is real he has a python jacket okay but what does this jacket have to do with the reason that paul manafort is on trial well what the government has done through these witnesses is illicit testimony

in which uh they basically say all of these things that they provided for Manafort, whether it be the luxury menswear, landscaping services for his estates in various parts of the country. There was also a karaoke machine, which is one of my favorite from today. But all of these things were paid for via wire transfers from overseas accounts in Cyprus. And what the government is saying is that that was money that Paul Manafort did not declare to U.S. authorities and did not pay taxes on, and that he was using them to pay directly for services so that he didn't have to report it. And that gets into the question of bank fraud and tax fraud, which is what he's charged with. So Ryan, the Mueller investigation was meant to look at

potential collusion between the Russian government and the Trump campaign. How has the government kind of talked about what relevance these tax matters and these business and loan matters have to do with their original priority? Well, the words Mueller investigation have not come up. The words Donald Trump have not come up. Russia has barely been mentioned at all. This is about Manafort's political consulting and lobbying work and the money that he made from that work from about 2005 to about 2014. Now, under Mueller's mandate, he can investigate any matters that arise during the course of his investigation.

Manafort's defense team tried to challenge Mueller's mandate to investigate Paul Manafort on these matters. The judge ultimately decided that this case falls squarely within Mueller's purview. And so this case has gone forward. What a lot of people are paying attention to in this case is whether there was at any point in time, a kind of threshold, a pain threshold for Paul Manafort at which he would decide, I don't want to fight these charges anymore. I am willing to flip and cooperate with the government. So another thing that you probably had to catch up on because you were in court without electronics is that while you were there, President Trump was tweeting up a storm about Paul Manafort, about the trial, about the Mueller investigation. Yeah, that was kind of a shock to emerge from the courtroom yesterday around

lunchtime and see all of the stories about what Trump had been tweeting about. So, Aisha, can you do the honors this time? Trump is tweeting and basically he says this is a terrible situation and attorney general jeff sessions should stop this rigged witch hunt right now before it continues to stain our country any further and he went on some more but that was the key part of it so he says that sessions who i will remind you has recused himself from this uh muller probe but he says sessions should stop this rigged witch hunt right now now when asked about this rudy giuliani talked about this the president's lawyer and uh sarah sanders white house press secretary what they said is that the president said should he didn didn't say you must. He didn't

say you have to. He's just expressing an opinion. It's an opinion. And he used his, he used a medium that he uses for opinions, Twitter. One of the good things about using that is he's established a clear sort of practice now that he expresses his opinions on Twitter. He used the word should he didn't use the word must and there was no presidential directive that followed him they didn't direct him they didn't direct him to do it and he's not going to direct him to do it sarah sanders actually said yesterday he has a first amendment right he is just a guy watching tv tweeting about the news and he's And he's not demanding it.

He's just letting his thoughts be known. And she said, this is just President Trump. This is him fighting back. Now, the question, of course, is if your boss is sitting in a very public space saying, well, I think you should do this, I think you should do that, is that an order? I typically, if my boss was like, you should do something, I might want to do it, but it's different. Yeah. What differentiates his first amendment rights is he has the power to make his opinions into action, right? And so if there wasn't confusion over that difference, we wouldn't be in this position. So in addition

to tweeting about an ongoing federal investigation and an ongoing actually happening right now trial being highly unusual, does this also create potential legal peril? Is there a reason why the president's personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, was racing to the microphones go back to the parsing of language that we saw over Comey's telling of a meeting that he had with Trump, in which he says that Trump told him that he hoped that Comey could see the way to letting Michael Flynn go when Michael Flynn was under investigation by the FBI over his contacts with the Russians. And there was a time at the Senate Intelligence Committee hearing with Comey about that when Republican James Risch asked Comey whether was that an order or was it merely the president expressing a wish? And Comey said, well, he's the president of the United States. I mean, generally, when he says something, I would take that as an order that this is what he wanted to see happen.

But we've seen this sort of defense from the president's supporters before. There's been a lot of reporting that the president is under investigation for potential obstruction of justice in this probe. And I think that the tweets that we saw this week return us to that question again. President Trump, he also, when he was tweeting, he expressed some sympathy for Paul Manafort. Ooh, ooh. Can I read the tweet? Can I read the tweet? Yes, read this one. All right. President Trump says, quote, Looking back on history, who was treated worse?

Alphonse Capone, legendary mob boss and killer and public enemy number one, or Paul Manafort, political operative and Reagan dole darling, now serving solitary confinement. No, he is not. But he said Alphonse, which I was interested. Like, was he just trying to be formal? We normally say Al Capone. But to make the comparison like that he's being

treated worse. And I did ask, I asked yesterday at the White House, like, you know, you're talking about solitary confinement, even though he's not, Manafort's not actually in solitary confinement. But are you concerned about the way people are treated before a conviction outside of Paul Manafort? Like, is this a larger issue? And Sarah said they don't have any policy on that. But he is very concerned about the treatment of Paul Manafort. The question that I have to you, Aisha, and you, Tam, is who is Trump speaking to with these tweets? Is this about undermining this investigation of Paul Manafort and Mueller? Is it about him thinking that most people aren't going to take this tweet seriously, but I'm signaling to my supporters that this is how they should view this?

Who is this directed at? What's his audience for this? Well, I think that it's very important to the president to at least publicly downplay the connection to Manafort, downplay the severity of what Manafort is being charged with to make it clear like this is this is about Ukraine and Coates. This is not about me or my campaign. And so I think that's where he's going with that, that he wants to make this whole trial,

this whole investigation seem like a whole bunch of blown up nothing. And that even though it is weird, I think, to connect your former campaign chairman to Al Capone. But I think what he's saying is, look, there are real killers out there, Al Capone. And then you have Paul Manafort. Paul Manafort isn't isn't that guy. And Ryan, what about these tweets and how they might affect the jury? The jury has been instructed from the beginning that they are not, one, to talk to each other, two, to talk to their families, their friends, their spouses at all about what they are hearing in the courtroom. And three, they are not to do any research, listen to the radio, watch TV. What about like podcasts and the Twitter app?

The judge did not specifically mention podcasts, but I believe that that fell under the general umbrella of what they're supposed to avoid. So Ryan, I know you need to dash back to the courthouse very soon, but what are you looking for for next week? Is this rocket docket? Is the rocket accelerating? What's going on? Well, we do expect to finish this trial ahead of schedule. Prosecutors have said that they'll probably wrap up their case before the end of next week. Whoa. Which is news and also good news to the ears of Judge T.S. Ellis III,

who has definitely pushed both sides to move this case right along. So we've heard today the first bit of testimony from Manafort's bookkeeper. We're going to hear more from bookkeepers in the days to come. And then at some point, we do expect Manafort's former right-hand man and deputy, Rick Gates, to testify. And that is going to really be kind of the high point, the big dramatic pinnacle of this trial. The two men worked very closely together for a long time. And in the opening statements, the defense essentially pinned all of Manafort's problems on Gates.

They're putting it all on his shoulders. They said that he abused Manafort's trust, that he embezzled Manafort's money, and everything, everything, they say, circles right back to Rick Gates. And that, of course, you know, that's their strategy to try to undermine what is going to be the government's star witness. Well, get back over there. Enjoy the silence. Well, I guess it won't be silent, but, you know, the digital silence. The digital silence is lovely. I wish that I brought my sports coat again today because it's cold in that courtroom.

I forgot about that. Well, the cold keeps you awake. It does. It's true. And while we were talking to Ryan, news was happening. And Tim Mack, it is news in your wheelhouse. At the briefing room in the White House, like basically every high level American official responsible for election security showed up at that podium. Yeah. The senior national security officials, including the heads of the FBI, the DHS, the NSA and the director of national intelligence, they all appeared in the White House briefing room basically to try to push back against concerns that the Trump administration is not taking this Russian interference issue seriously enough. I mean, the top Republican on the Senate Intelligence Committee said on Wednesday that it feels like to some that Americans and American voters in the Democratic system is in a room that's on fire.

And people just don't care about it, that they they they believe that that is just fine. And the Trump administration really wants to push back on that. And they're trying to they're emphasizing a that the foreign influence threat is real and they're trying to take steps to secure the election. And Kirsten Nielsen, she is the head of the Department of Homeland Security. She got up there and put this in like incredibly stark language. But it's not just risk to our prosperity, privacy and infrastructure we have to worry about. And that's why we're here today. Our democracy itself is in the crosshairs. Free and fair elections are the cornerstone of our

democracy. And it has become clear that they are the target of our adversaries. What's interesting is that a lot of this was about rhetoric, about their tone, about their position. They didn't announce any new steps, as far as I can tell, about how they're going to fight the Russian threat. They hinted at some. They said we might do this or that. But ultimately, this was about trying to convince folks, especially the Republican detractors who think that they're not doing enough on election security or on foreign influence, that they are taking this issue seriously. This is about rhetoric and it's about tone, especially since the president has been equivocating on the issue of Russian interference. Okay, we are going to take a quick break. And when we come back, Ayesha and Tim and Ron Elving will be here in the studio. And we are going to talk about the midterms and presidents and how they factor into that. We'll be right back. Support for this podcast and the following message come from the Southern Poverty

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And we're back. And we are joined by none other than Ron Elving. Hey, Tamara. Editor, correspondent. Is that what we call you these days? Yes. On the Washington desk. All right. So we are here to discuss the midterms and the president of the United States and past presidents of the United States and how they factor into the midterms and the president of the United States and past presidents of the United States and how they factor into the midterms. President Trump this week was all over the place campaigning for congressional candidates. Yes. And he says he'll spend the last 60 days before election day

spending five, six days a week on the road for candidates. That is a lot. It's a huge commitment from anybody, but it's a lot from a president of the United States who does have a day job. We assume that this is something that most of the candidates he goes out for want because there are many places in the country where the president is quite popular and his support for a Republican candidate will be a big positive. There are other parts of the country he might not go to. It's been clear for a while, but I think this week it became crystal clear that for President Trump, this midterm campaign is about President Trump. But also for many of the candidates, this is about President Trump. He's he's going out there and he's saying he's going to make the case for Republicans. And he's also saying, look, even though this we we have a history of this happening and presidents losing in our president's parties losing in the midterms.

We're not going to let that happen this time. You know, he's asking his voters, you guys have to come out. Don't get complacent. He says this all the time. Come out and vote. And because we need more Republicans, we need to get immigration done and all these things. And so he feels like he has a message and that he can really boost the Republicans that are in trouble. And he has had some success in the primaries

of getting the candidate, getting behind a candidate and those candidates winning. And so he feels like if he gets out there, then his people will get out and vote for Republicans. Well, what's so exceptional about him is just his ability to move the ideas and the political beliefs of his base. OK, that by his sheer will, we've got people on the right who now believe things that that they five, 10 years ago are the total opposite of what they previously believed. They were marching in the streets about some of the, there were people marching in the streets about deficit concerns and now the deficit is ballooning and it's okay. Yes. If you believe that the Tea Party was really about deficit concerns.

Well, it was about deficit concerns. It was, they had some free trade concerns. And, you know, as someone who, I mean, my first years in journalism and reporting was covering the rise of the Tea Party movement. And I think, did we get the Tea Party wrong? Did we get the movement wrong? And what their ideas really were about? Were they actually about free trade or about deficits? Or were they really more about just opposition to President Obama at the time, or more complex issues of race? And cultural change, and a number of other things that we've all said about Donald Trump's appeal to some of these same voters. I mean, you could say that Donald Trump's numbers are underwater. You could say they were lower than other presidents going

into their first midterm, but they are extraordinarily high among the kind of people, you're calling them Trump's base voters, but let's just think of the kind of people, you're calling them Trump's base voters, but let's just think of them demographically. They're the kind of people who turn out to vote in midterms. They're older, whiter, a little better educated, more affluent. They are the kind of people who turn out in midterms when the overall turnout is only about two-thirds as large as it is in presidential elections. So the Democrats are bucking a big historical trend too, which is they can't get their people out in midterms. So I guess the question is, does President Trump, as making himself and also being the center of all of this, does that help Republicans? Does it

like supercharged turnout among his base? Or does it supercharged turnout among Democrats who typically, you know, yawn at midterms? It seems like we'll we'll find out. But Republican candidates are definitely linking themselves and hugging President Trump as tightly as they can. There's DeSantis. Yeah. So he's yeah. So he's he's not running for Congress. He's running for governor of Florida. But but it is worth just listening to this ad because I think it it. Ron loves playing with the kids. Build the wall. He reads stories. Then Mr. Trump said, you're fired. I love that part. He's teaching Madison to talk.

Make America great again. People say Ron's all Trump, but he is so much more. Big League. So good. I just thought you should know. Ron DeSantis for Governor. I watched this ad a couple of times. Is this real? He's in a Republican primary. And we have to understand that President Trump has an 85% approval rating amongst Republicans.

And so this is not the message, if he wins the primary, that he's going to bring to Floridians. But it is the message he needs to run on now with Trump being so popular amongst Republicans. This is the way to win a primary. That is so over the top, though. But I think it gets at something. It does. Absolutely. And when you talk about bumping up the turnout and you ask, is that turnout going to be mostly among his greatest supporters or his greatest detractors? It could well be both. We could see extraordinary turnout in November on both sides, both the people who are totally devoted to Trump, as the DeSantis family clearly is, multi-generationally, but also among all kinds of Democrats, particularly, especially the kinds of Democrats who historically don't turn out in midterms, younger people of color, people who have perhaps more to lose if government programs are cut back, etc. Because we have seen in like the special elections where there has been a lot of turnout. And if I correct me if I'm wrong, but that Democrats have turned out in high in or more than they have historically in these special elections and you've seen a democrats win in some places obviously uh the special election in alabama was

kind of a special situation but you saw people turn out that hadn't before and i think that what you have in this election if you're really upset at president trump and you really want you want to send a message and you want something to happen, then you might go out and vote in a midterm where you didn't before because this is your first opportunity to really send some message to President Trump and express your displeasure. Yes, and by the way, the other demographic element that I didn't mention is perhaps the most important in a lot of congressional districts, and that's gender. The women who are responding to Donald Trump in a negative way could make a big difference in swing districts, and there aren't very many, or lightly identified as

Republican districts, and there are quite a few of those. If they turn out and don't vote for Donald Trump, if they vote for Democrats, that could be crucial in a number of swing and lightly identified districts. And just to give a preview of what might be to come, that could be crucial in a number of swing and lightly identified districts. And just to give a preview of what might be to come next Tuesday, there is a there is a special election in a congressional district in the suburbs of Columbus, Ohio. It was a Republican seat. The Republican left. It's up for a special election. And there's a very open question of whether quite possibly in those suburbs, even though it's been a Republican seat, the Democrat could possibly end up winning. And watch the women's vote if he does. We have been talking a lot about the current president of the United States and how he might

be a factor in the midterm elections. But what about his recent predecessor, President Obama, former President Obama this week came out with a list of endorsements. Was there a collective yawn or was that just me? I think that people were, I think that there were people that were excited about it. I think that President Obama is still very popular with his base of Democrats. And I think for those candidates that did get the nod from former President Obama, I think that means something among Democrats. You know, and what it is, is it's an unusual departure of what we saw with George W. Bush after he left office. He was kind of taking a step back and he didn't want to interfere with President Obama's governing or the politics of the moment.

He was painting. He was doing paintings. But President Obama has taken a slightly different tactic. He's given speeches all around the world in which he kind of mentions what's going on in American politics and the way that the Trump administration is operating. It's not quite direct involvement or any condemnation of President Trump. But we have diverged from what we've seen over the last decade. There's been some criticism of former President Obama that he has not been more activist, that he has allowed Donald Trump to systematically dismantle much of his

legacy and certainly try to dismantle all the rest. So people have thought he should be fighting back. He should be leading the resistance. He should really be out there. Traditionally, that has not been the role of American ex-presidents. They may get involved again in future elections. They may show up at conventions and give speeches. Ronald Reagan gave one in 1992. You know, it can be done. He can have a role.

But to really be active when you've had your two terms in office, we don't have a great deal of precedent for that, certainly not since FDR with his third and fourth terms, and then he was dead after that. So, you know, I mean, it's... A little thing. Very permanent. You don't get a lot of precedents. You don't see a lot of big footprints or thumb on the scale from the former president.

But Obama has been a special case in many respects, and the way that Trump has Obama has been a special case in many respects, and the way that Trump has handled himself is a special case in many respects. So some people have felt the president, the former president, should be doing more. And former President Obama says this is just the first of his endorsements. He plans to put out more. He's not getting involved in primaries. So once these primaries are over, we can expect to see more endorsements from him. Are we going to see him out there campaigning too? He is expected to get out there on the campaign trail and, you know, stump for candidates. It will be interesting to see what messages he's promoting. He's known to want to be above the fray. He's not known for really

wanting to get down in the dirt and really do all of that. So it'll be interesting to see how much he actually talks about President Trump or if he does at all. He's going to try to boost turnout. He's going to certainly try to get people of color to turn out. He's going to try to get younger people excited again. And I suspect he'll talk a lot about the Russian attack on the election infrastructure in 2016 and 2018. And he's going to say, if you believe in democracy and you don't want to have it interfered with, you need to be out there voting in November. What I feel is all but guaranteed is the presidential tweets about this that will be certainly coming once President Obama is on the campaign trail and speaking maybe

even just tangentially about the Trump administration, we will see a president who loves to fight back use his preferred medium to go after President Obama. If there is one thing that is certain in life, it is that President Trump will tweet. And fight back. Bank on it. Bank on it. All right. We will be right back. And after this quick break break can't let it go support for this podcast and the following message come from zip recruiter hiring is challenging but zip recruiter can make it simple smart and fast zip recruiter sends your job to over 100 job boards with one click then it scans thousands of resumes to find people with the right experience and invites them to apply to your job. Try it for free at ZipRecruiter.com slash weekly.

ZipRecruiter, the smartest way to hire. Support for NPR politics also comes from Rocket Mortgage by Quicken Loans. Rocket Mortgage gives you confidence when it comes to buying a new home or refinancing your existing home loan. With Rocket Mortgage, you confidence when it comes to buying a new home or refinancing your existing home loan. With Rocket Mortgage, you can apply simply and understand all the details so you can mortgage confidently. To get started, go to rocketmortgage.com slash NPR politics. Equal housing lender. Licensed in all 50 states. NMLSconsumeraccess.org number 3030. I'm Ann Powers from NPR Music. Last summer,

we launched Turning the Tables, a project that radically changed how we talk about the history of popular music, with a list of the 150 greatest albums by women. This week, we're launching season two, looking at the 200 greatest songs by 21st century women. Check out who made the list and who didn't at N.P.R. slash turning the tables. All right. We are back and it is time to talk about the one thing that we can't let go of this week. Politics or otherwise. Aisha.

Yeah. So this week, what I can't let go of is something that you might have heard of, you might not have, but it kind of came to the surface because there was this campaign rally for President Trump in Florida this week. And there were all these people wearing like shirts and had these signs and stuff that said things like we are Q and what basically what they were referencing was Q Anon people started asking like what is this it kind of came from these message boards like 4chan there is a person or maybe people who are saying that they are this person Q and that they work in the federal government and that they basically have been giving clues on the Internet about what they say is actually going on. So some of that includes this idea that Mueller is actually not investigating the Trump campaign and possible connections to Russia, but they're actually

investigating Hillary Clinton and former President Obama. And then it even goes back to like stuff like the Titanic and that it was that the Titanic crashed because there were all these rich people on board who opposed the Federal Reserve. And so they wanted to take them out. And I know that sounds really insane and complicated. But if you want to know a more in-depth version of that, our colleague here at NPR, Brandon Carter, wrote about this. So it's on NPR.org. Yeah. But what's so remarkable about this is how vulnerable certain segments of the Republican base have been to these kinds of conspiracy theories and how these ideas about the deep state or what Mueller really, really actually is doing have infiltrated especially younger people

who support Trump. And this is going to have enormous ramifications during the Trump administration. You're going to hear about it more and more and it's going to last well beyond it. And it's a symptom of our information age, right? That people aren't quite sure where to get their information, what to trust, what to believe,

and that there isn't a ton of belief and trust in what have traditionally been our institutions. It feels like also, you know, at the beginning of the Trump administration, there were all these Twitter accounts that claim to be people inside the administration leaking information out. And liberals wanted to believe that those Twitter accounts were real. It feels like maybe this QAnon thing is conservatives wanting to believe. But you know, what is so remarkable also is

usually it's the it's the movement or the party out of power that becomes attracted to conspiracy theories. You know, the Bush denied 11 conspiracy theory or or Obama's a secret Kenyan Muslim conspiracy theory. Those have been the historical tendencies. But Trump is in power. Conservatives and the right control most of the major levers of power in politics. But there is still this attachment to alternate realities. Yeah. And this idea that somehow there are these people that are still working against President Trump and that and that somehow what looks like it's negative for Trump, this Mueller investigation, is actually a secret positive for him. And we should point out that even though it is kind of funny,

like these different conspiracy theories, there was somebody who was like blocked off a road and had like a gun. And look, I mean, there are a certain number of people who are willing to move lock, stock and barrel into Game of Thrones or something else and think in this instance, that they're actually playing with real cards, that this is in some sense or another reality and actually happening as opposed to Game of Thrones. So there are going to be those who, as Tim says, are going to carry this forward in such a way that it has to be dealt with. For example, the people who came to that rally the other night and really attracted a great deal of attention while the president was

speaking. Some people, as a part of this conspiracy, they think that Q might be President Trump or Dan Scavino, who works President Trump's Twitter page. There was this video where they showed Trump making a hand gesture. To me, it just looked like he rose. He just like his hand just moved. But they said he was making a Q. It did not look like a Q to me, but they said it looked like he rose. He just like his hand just moved. But they said he was making a Q. It did not look like a Q to me. But they said it looked like a Q. So that's what we're dealing with. Wow.

All right, Ron, what can't you let go of? You know, I'm always looking for visuals to illustrate politics. And last week we talked about a map of how divided America is, red and blue. Well, here's an even more interesting visualization. It's a painting. We've all seen a painting of Washington crossing the Delaware, famous Emanuel Leutze painting from the mid-19th century. Okay, a couple copies of it in New York and Washington and so on. This is a homage of that painting or a reproduction of that painting. It is an oil painting by an artist named John Naughton.

Some people may recognize that name because he has painted several other paintings of Donald Trump and of Washington, D.C. He is a great supporter of President Trump and accompanies these with encomiums to the president and his program. This particular one has the president in a Make America Great Again hat,

holding a lantern and crossing, not the Delaware, but the swamp, standing at the front end of a boat with Melania's arms around him and John Bolton is there. Sarah Sanders is there. She's there fending off. But instead of ice, okay, this is not ice in the Delaware River. What we're fending off here would be called swamp creatures because he is not crossing the Delaware River. He is crossing a swamp that is Washington, D.C., with the nation's capital standing in the background and a lot of creepy looking creatures in the water trying to interfere with the president's progress.

They're wearing camo. Yeah. Like they're like you like hunters camo. Well, they are in battle. It looks like they're looking for ducks. They've got firearms with them. I see John Bolton with a shotgun. Yeah, but Melania is there, like, in this.

She's fighting the fight. She's the first lady. Some have suggested that you can look at this picture and imagine that she is actually trying to push the president out of the book. So there is a school of thought that all of this is a bit over the top. And as a result, perhaps some people are actually buying some of these lithographs and prints and so forth in a certain sense of humor as opposed to the total honorific and, you know, respectful attitude in which they are apparently being painted. Well, if I'm the artist, I don't care how you, if you're buying it ironically or not,

as long as that money goes in my pocket. Yeah. Bring the green. My guess is Mr. Naughton feels very much the same way. Okay. I'm going to go next. I guess I have two words for you, or is it three? Bigfoot erotica.

It's two words. It's got a nice ring to it. What does that mean? Okay, so this is actually not an otherwise story. This is a politics story because I'm not going to name names here, but there is a congressional race in virginia where one candidate tweeted you think my opponent is bad he's into bigfoot erotica and is this true was he actually well he denies that he's into bigfoot erotica but he did write a bigfoot erotica

book all in good fun i mean it is mind-bogg. But the best part is, to me, there was a Washington Post article where the author went out and found real live Bigfoot hunters who are not fans of Bigfoot erotica because they think it is bringing a bad name to Bigfoot and Sasquatch searches. Unserious people. So I have to admit now on this Bigfoot. Now, when I was a kid, it was definitely not erotica. But I as I think I said last week, I like, you know, scary movies and all that stuff and scary stuff.

So when I was a kid, I was really into like Bigfoot and the Loch Ness Monster. I did like a big report on it, like in the fourth grade on Bigfoot. How well was that graded? Did they say, girl, now focus on some nonfiction? It was do a report on whatever you're interested in. And that's, I found books in the library and I did a report on the Loch Ness Monster in Bigfoot. Like I was really into it.

So I've been tweeting about Sasquatches and Bigfoot. Bigfoot. Bigfoot. Bigfoots. Bigfoots for years. And the reason is that many years ago, I was having this Twitter conversation with a Republican strategist, and we mentioned the word Sasquatch. And it turned out that every time we tweeted the word Sasquatch, and I had like 500 followers at the time. This was many years ago. Many, many years ago.

It's a very virgin way from the beginning. Every time we tweeted the word Sasquatch, three or four new followers would just pop up. You never know. Okay, around the room, do you believe in Bigfoot? Aisha? I want to believe. Ron? Well, I don't think we should lump him in with Loch Ness Monster because I think Loch Ness Monster might be real.

Tim? I'm of two minds because it's bad for my Twitter following not to believe in Bigfoot. So I think for those of you out there in the Twitter world who want to follow me for all your politics, national security, and Sasquatch needs, follow me at Tim K. Mack. Tim K. Mack. That was a great commercial. That's what it's all about. Follow me at Tim K. Mack. Tim K. Mack. That was a great commercial. That's what it's all about. And you, Tam? I'm not a believer.

But I don't believe in aliens. I don't believe in anything. I'm just, I'm no fun. Tim Mack, what can't you let go of? Okay, so there's this movie coming out. It's called Crazy Rich Asians. It's the first Hollywood film in over 25 years to center on an Asian-American story. So I'm really interested in how that's going to go.

I mean, Asian-Americans have always kind of had a problem getting cast in Hollywood for roles that aren't quote-unquote typically Asian. So they finally got a film that was sponsored under a Hollywood studio, and it's the first in a very long time. It's going to be very interesting to see whether it catches on and can achieve some mainstream success. What's it about? It's about crazy rich Asians because... That is what it is called.

It's like a love story or something, right? Yes, it is. The other name, Sane Middle Class Asians, did not screen test as well. But it's about this Asian American who goes to Singapore and falls in love and realizes that the person she's fallen in love with is actually from one of the wealthiest families in Singapore. And it's also one of the actresses in the film is one of my favorite rappers, one of the very few good Asian-American rappers named Awkwafina. All right. And that is it for this edition of the NPR Politics Podcast. We will be back in your feeds just as soon as there is news that prompts us to run back into the studio. Send us your timestamps to NPR Politics at NPR.org.

I'm Tamara Keith. I cover the White House. I'm Aisha Roscoe. I also cover the White House. I'm Tim Mack, political reporter. And I'm Ron Helbing, editor correspondent. Thanks for listening to the NPR Politics Podcast.