Trump’s Obsession with Retribution with Jonathan Karl

00:00:00
Speaker 1: Time is the greatest gift we can give and receive. As we turn the clocks back this fall, Bristol Meyers Squib is recognizing oncologists who help give patients something extraordinary, more time. The Time Back Campaign celebrates those everyday heroes who are working tirelessly in the pursuit of potentially helping get patients more time to experience key moments like seeing a child learned to ride a bike or a long awaited vacation. As we turn back our clocks, let's pause to thank the doctors who make a difference every day. Discover more about the Time Back Campaign and join Bristol Myers Squib and celebrating the physicians who give the gift of more time at BMS dot com slash time back.

00:00:54
Speaker 2: Now. He's coming in and I think he's really sensing so he didn't see before, which is his own mortality. And he wants to change the world, not just be the center of attention. That's why he's building a ninety thousand square foot ballroom at the White House. That's why he's desperate to get the Nobel Peace Prize. That's why he's transforming much of the rest of the whales. He wants people to confront the fact that he's there and the world is not going to be the same because he was there. Hi.

00:01:23
Speaker 1: Everyone, I'm Katie Couric, and this is next question. My guest today. Jonathan Carl is ABC News Chief Washington correspondent and co anchor of This Week. He has covered every president since Bill Clinton, but none more closely than the current administration. His latest book, his fourth on Donald Trump, is called Retribution Donald Trump in the Campaign That Changed America. The book picks up hours after Trump's reelection in twenty twenty four, when operating on virtually no sleep, John calls Donald Trump on his cell phone, and surprisingly, the president elect picks up. What follows is a revealing and unsettling look at power, loyalty, and the forces that are reshaping our democracy. This was a very wide ranging conversation. I could talk to John for hours, but we did talk about Trump's fixation on retribution, his handpicked cabinet, the differences between his first and second terms, and whether or not his popularity is starting to wane even among hardcore Magas supporters. So here's my conversation with Jonathan Carl. All Right, Jonathan Carl aka John Carl, great to see you. Thank you so much for spending some time with me talking about your new book. By the way, how do you have time to write a book when you're covering the Trump administration?

00:02:51
Speaker 2: I mean, my god, I don't know. I really don't know. I've now written. I think one of my daughters added it up. I think it's fifteen hundred pages. Four different book books, the first one while he was in office. The first time, I don't know. This one almost killed me though. This was a heavy lift.

00:03:07
Speaker 1: You know, these are very different times than your previous books, and I think you know, we hear the word John unprecedented constantly, but it almost seems to be used on a daily basis. Let's start where your book opened. So November sixth, twenty twenty four. It's the day after President Trump's election to his second term. You've just returned to your hotel room after being up for more than twenty four hours of election night coverage, and you decide to give the president elect a call.

00:03:40
Speaker 3: What happened?

00:03:41
Speaker 2: It's a strange thing. I mean, the context is I had been talking to him over the phone throughout the fall campaign, which again is something that I talk about unprecedented. I mean, and I didn't do it on his previous campaigns. It just it just started happening.

00:03:54
Speaker 3: How did you get his number? By the way, you.

00:03:56
Speaker 2: Know, I had had his number, somebody gave it to me, you know, more than a year earlier. I'd never really used it because if I wanted to get a hold of him, and I went through you know, I went through somebody else. And the first time I called him directly was after Butler, after he was shot in Butler, and I just wanted to leave a voicemail message and say I'm really horrified and sorry about what happened, and I hope you're feeling okay. And in this case, the election happens again. You know what it's like, Katie, to be round the clock coverage and then you have to do the morning show and then I mean, I was dead tired, but I figured I would call and leave him a voicemail message to just say basically congratulations. I mean, I had written a book about his attempts to overturn the last election. It was called Betrayal. I had warned that he posed a threat to American democracy. I had done all this stuff. I'd infuriated him with much of what I had said in my reporting, but I figured at this point I should call and say, you know you want congratulations, And to my total shock, seven thirty in the morning, he has been up all night. He has an administration to put together right now, he's just won the presidency again, and he answers the phone. He answers the phone. He's like, oh oh. And sometimes when I call him, he would say, uh, hey, Jonathan, what's up, which was always weird because like, does he have my number?

00:05:20
Speaker 1: Is he?

00:05:21
Speaker 2: But other times he would act like he had no idea it was calling. This time he acted like he had no idea, and I just said, hello, mister president elect, I'm just calling to say congratulations. And he pauses and he says to me, on what on what? Jonathan? You tell me on what? And he sounded at first I like laughed. I thought he was joking, but he wasn't joking. What mean well to me? He wanted to hear me say it. He wanted to hear me say that he had won this great victory. It was like in Breaking Bad, that scene when Brian Cranston's character Walter White has vanquished the other drug dealers, and they meet out on the desert to like pay their respects, and Walter White Cranston says, say my name, and Trump wanted to hear me say it, so I said it. I said, congratulations on the greatest comeback victory in the history of American politics. I mean, it's what it was.

00:06:26
Speaker 3: And what did he say after that? Did he say thank you?

00:06:30
Speaker 2: Oh? Yeah? Then he was like, oh, well, thank you very much. It was it was really quite a victory. It was quite a victory. It was very nice of you to say that. So yes, but at first he was like, come on, come out with it. What did I do?

00:06:41
Speaker 1: You know, it's interesting because you all have developed a fascinating relationship. I know that he has labeled you, and you write about this a third rate reporter. He's called you a real scumbag. He's declared you will never make it. He did answer a lot of your calls in the lead up to the election. But do you think part of this is performative, That the way he talks to someone publicly is really for consumption by the maga crowd, and that he has less animosity when he's talking to you on the phone.

00:07:14
Speaker 2: There's absolutely no question about it. You know, my very first book was front wrote The Trump Show, and I described how he saw the presidency as the world's greatest reality show, and a great reality show needs to have, you know, heroes. In that case him, when you're with him in person, he is by the way, he has gotten very angry at me behind the scenes, and that's when you know he's truly upset. When he's berating you and the cameras aren't there to document it, that's when you know he's truly upset. But even then it never really lasts because at root, Donald Trump, I believe, and I try not to be like a psychoanalyst here, but he wants to be loved. He wants to be liked, and he wants you to reaffirm your you know that you like the guy, so he treats you really well and doesn't stay angry. I mean he I'll never forget that. During COVID, we had those press conferences every day and there were only fourteen seats in the White House briefing room that were filled because of social distancing, and he just went after me in the most deeply personal way on national television, tens of millions of people watching.

00:08:26
Speaker 1: Was that so embarrassing for you or like it must have made you so uncomfortable?

00:08:30
Speaker 2: I mean it, I mean the idea that a president of the United States is doing that to you, and you're a reporter who you know, is just there to try to like tell the story. You don't want to get in a fight with the president. You want to like do your job. But I had known him for so long somehow it like didn't really bother me. I just like ignored it and went on. But like a minute or two later, he comes back to me and calls on me again for another question, like nothing had just happened, And did you see like recently I went back to the White House. I'm not there every day anymore. I went back to the White House and Pam Bondi had just said that the Justice Department was going to start looking into prosecuting hate speech. After Charlie Kirk and a lot of Republicans, a lot of conservatives, a lot of Trump supporters think that's a terrible idea. You know, hate speech is free speech, you don't prosecute it. So I asked him, you know, she says she's going to prosecute hate speech. Out of your supporters don't like it, Well, what do you think of it? And he turns to me and he says, maybe she'll go after you because you have a lot of hate in your heart. And I didn't even like I swear I must like didn't even like hear it because I'm like into the next thing. But before he's done answering my question, he's asking me if I'm going to take my beautiful wife out to dinner in Washington, d C. Now that he's like solved all the crime. I mean, it's like he doesn't process what he's done, and so I don't know. It's bizarre.

00:09:57
Speaker 1: You know. You say that he really wants to be liked, he wants to be loved, he wants to be admired, But good lord, I mean, have you ever seen someone go about wanting to be liked by behaving the way he does, By insulting people, by diminishing people, by behaving the way he does. The pathology is so bizarro to me.

00:10:21
Speaker 2: It's really something. I think that part of the attacks is he knows that it will please other people, Like he knows that it's a crowd pleaser. When he cuts down a reporter or when he goes out and he says the things that he has said about his political opponents, I mean, the stuff he has said about Biden. I mean, we've never seen a president say that kind of stuff about a former president.

00:10:45
Speaker 1: It's kind of understood that you don't even talk about the person who is the sitting president. I mean, that's kind of standard operating procedure for former presidents to not criticize the current administration, but also for the current administration to not really criticize a past administration.

00:11:05
Speaker 2: Right, Yeah, we never see anything like this, I mean, we never even see minor mild criticisms. And he's putting the autopen on display in the in the colonade.

00:11:16
Speaker 1: Yeah, that is so creepy. And I'm sorry, I've kind of gone beyond trying to be impartial here, Jonathan, because his behavior is so beyond the pale. This autopen. So he places presidential portraits along the hallway leading to the Oval office, and the one he puts up of Joe Biden is an autopen. It's so sophomoric, but it's also so creepy, Right, I mean, what is that.

00:11:44
Speaker 2: One of the things I did in the book is I tried to really get to learn as much as I could about the private interactions that Joe Biden had with Donald Trump, and there were a number of them. The first one was a phone call that made to Trump the night of the shooting in Butler, and we knew that that had happened, and they had both put out statements. But I talked to two people who actually overheard the phone conversation, and it was about five or six minutes long. Trump was in his you know, in his motor cade, headed out of Butler after he had been to the hospital, and they spoke like they were old friends, and you know a lot of Joe and Donald and Joe and Donald and how are you? And it's great, and I mean as friendly as you could possibly be. And then they meet again right after the election where Joe Biden is affording a courtesy to Donald Trump that he never afforded to Joe Biden of welcoming in the next president to the White House before the inauguration, and they met, as you remember, for two and a half hours, no cameras present in the Oval office. But I describe what happens when he arrives and the Bidens are waiting for him. There's no, Millennia. It's just Joe Biden. But Jill and Joe are there in you know, in that entrance near the diplomatic room and the residents of the White House, and Trump comes out, and again I talk to people who witnessed this, and he's like, oh, such a beautiful couple. You're so beautiful, and they and they pause, and they go and they take they pose for pictures, and in one of the pictures in the book, Joe and Jill and Donald all smiles, you know, next to the White House, posing like they've been old friends. They go in, they have that meeting. It's extraordinarily positive and friendly, playing golf, toget we should play golf and all this stuff. And if we weren't political opponents, you know, we'd probably be really good friends. I described that limousine ride that they took to the inauguration from the White House on January twentieth, and kind of got inside the car. Again. I can't. And then he says these things about him in public, but so friendly, cordial, stay in touch. Let me know if I can do anything for you. You've done such great things. And you know, there you have what he says in public.

00:14:04
Speaker 1: Why do you think? And again, is it because it plays well with his base? And have you talked to Joe Biden since he left the White House at all?

00:14:13
Speaker 2: John, I talked to him recently. I have to say he was looking pretty good. He had just been through his Did you see him, Yeah, I saw him. I saw him in person.

00:14:22
Speaker 3: Did you interview him?

00:14:23
Speaker 2: No, I wasn't an interviewed. He was out to dinner in Washington, d C. He went out to dinner with a former Senator, Mark Pryor at Cafe Milano. Sat right there in the dining room, right there in the dining room, in front of everybody. I happened to be there. And you know what else was there was Barack Obama. Oh my god, dinner at Cafe Milano. But they didn't cross paths And it was wild seeing the Secret Service. The armored SUVs had to kind of like Biden's had to move to make room for Obama's. They didn't interact. But I went over and just had, you know, had a few words with him, and.

00:14:56
Speaker 1: They didn't interact at all. They were in the same restaurant. What's what's their relationship? Like, that's weird that they do really.

00:15:01
Speaker 2: Bad really really Yeah, Yeah, it's Biden and the people around him very much blame Barack Obama for the effort to push Biden out of the campaign. I had extensive interviews with Hunter Biden for this book over the course of the campaign and then after it was over, and Hunter Biden is just, you know, he's got real anger towards Barack Obama, and I think he's channeling not just Hunter, but the Biden family. He believes that for instance, the George Clooney op ed that was such a big moment where Clooney.

00:15:37
Speaker 3: Calls on right, you know, to step down.

00:15:40
Speaker 2: Yeah, he says to me on the record, Hunter says, do you really think that he would have done that if Barack Obama didn't say it was okay? I mean, do you really believe? And remember that moment at that fundraiser in California where Obama basically leads Biden off the stage. Yes, I do have another moment and went viral. Hunter describes being there at that fundraiser and saying he wanted to jump up on the stage and say you don't grab the President of the United States like that. Nobody does, I mean, really like angry, knowing that it would become this moment, So it's not a good relationship. If they had wanted to see each other, they absolutely would have. They were not that far apart in the restaurant.

00:16:24
Speaker 1: That's something, you know, former president and his vice president who ultimately becomes president, not even speaking when they're at the same restaurant. I wanted to ask you, and then we'll get back to the BOOKI there's so many things I wanted to talk to you about. But you know, do you think that Joe Biden, or Hunter for that matter, and Joe Biden's inner circle, take any responsibility for the timing of his decision? And do you think they regret, you know, his not being a one term president and saying as much so the field could be open and the best candidate could run against Donald Trump? Do they have any regrets about that?

00:17:04
Speaker 2: The honest answer is not really. I talked extensively with Hunter about this, and I asked him, at you know, what point was the decision made that he would run for reelection? And he said to me, you know, we never really made the decision. The machinery just went And I talked to other people in Biden's inner circle about how about at the White House. They never had a single meeting where they said here are the pros and cons about running again. It was never It was just like on autopilot. I think that the regret that they feel is that the party pushed him out and Kamala Harris comes in and she lost. Biden himself has said publicly that he believes that he could have won by the way when he finally made that decision, and you know, he calls Kamala Harris and says he's dropping out. And I describe how Kamala Harris really pushes him to make the endorsement immediately, which he ultimately does, you know, half an hour after he announces he's dropping out. And there's been a lot of talk about and reporting on how Kamala Harris sat down and made over one hundred phone calls, you know, to get people to support her campaign and to get started. But Biden made a whole bunch of phone calls that night too. You can imagine somebody his whole career in politics. Now it is over, he's run his last campaign. He calls the people that made it possible for him to be president, thanks them, encourages most of them to support Kamala Harris. I was astounded to hear that one person he did not call was Barack Obama, the person that really made it possible for him to be president by making a vice president. He didn't call him. Then Obama did call. I learned to talk to Biden. He didn't take the call, and the two of them did not speak for weeks. They eventually spoke right before the convention, but can you imagine, I mean literally not taking the call.

00:19:12
Speaker 1: Oncologists are often the central guide for patients and families facing a cancer diagnosis. Let's hear a bit more about what they specifically do, how they support patients and families, and why their work matters so deeply. Joining me to talk about the role of oncologists is doctor Monica Shaw. She is Senior vice president of Global Oncology Commercialization at Bristol Meyers Squab.

00:19:39
Speaker 4: Thank you, Katie so much for having me here today to discuss this important topic. It's really incredible to think that a single oncologist will probably have to give that bad news twenty thousand times in their career. It's important to remember that it's not just the bad news that they give that they're often also responsible for letting people know about those additional precious moments of time that people will be able to spend with their friends and family.

00:20:11
Speaker 1: I read that in the mid nineteen seventies, the five year relative survival rate for all cancers combined was about forty nine percent, and it's increased to around sixty nine percent in recent years, and that's why.

00:20:24
Speaker 4: We're really excited to bring this new campaign time Back. It's important to recognize that they're also part of the positive moments of the journey.

00:20:34
Speaker 3: Doctor Monica Shap thank you so much.

00:20:37
Speaker 4: So, Katie. If you or your videos would like to learn more, please come and visit us at BMS dot com slash time back and you can learn more there about our commitments oncologists and the time back that they potentially can give to patients.

00:20:52
Speaker 1: As we've heard, oncologist's work extends far beyond medicine. It's about the valuable time and key life moments they can help give back, and they deserve our deepest gratitude. Time is the greatest gift we can give and receive. As we turn the clocks back this fall, Bristol Meyers SQUIB is recognizing oncologists who help give patients something extraordinary more time. The Time Back campaign celebrates those everyday heroes who are working tirelessly in the pursuit of potentially helping get patients more time to experience key moments like seeing a child learned to ride a bike or a long awaited vacation. As we turn back our clocks, let's pause to thank the doctors who make a difference every day. Discover more about the Time Back Campaign and join Bristol Myers squib and celebrating the physicians who give the gift of more time at BMS dot com slash time back. Let's get back to Donald Trump, though, because that's how your book is about retribution, And the first chapter is called Felon and front Runner, And you spent a lot of time John at the courthouse in New York covering Donald Trump's hush money trial. Tell us why you believe this really solidified his retribution mindset, that whole court case, and if you think that was a legitimate case against Donald Trump, because it's now been massaged into a specious trial by his supporters and something that shows what a crook he was by those who oppose him.

00:22:46
Speaker 2: Yeah, So on the first thing, on how it solidified his retribution. You have to realize that for six weeks he was compelled to be and sit in that courtroom silently, four days a week, courts not in session on Wednesday, four days a week. He has to go to one hundred Center Street in Lower Manhattan. It is a dingy, dark, dirty courthouse that hasn't been renovated, you know, in decades, hasn't It looks like it hasn't been had a deep cleaning in decades. I described when I walked in, the first thing I noticed is there's this big frickin' rat trap, you know those plastic rat traps. By the front entrance. There are signs that say warning, you know, asbestos, the flickering fluorescent lights, the dirty marble, you know floors, the elevators that are kind of dysfunctional, and sometimes you have to take two elevators because one bank isn't working, And he has to go there. He has to stand at attention when the judge enters the room. He has to sit there through deeply embarrassing testimony. Stormy Daniels talking about their interaction, Michael Cohen saying, you know, his former fixer saying, the most horrible things about him. He has to sit there and cannot leave. He's technically under arrest. I mean, he was hell bent on retribution before. He wanted not just to come back to be president again. He wanted to get even at those who he felt had betrayed him, those that had gone after him. But now, I mean, it just it's burning in him every day. And look, in terms of that case, it was a bizarre case. Let's be honest, it wasn't totally bizarre case. What were they prosecuting him for. It wasn't for the hush money itself. It was for it was I mean, he called it for an accounting issue, and in a way it really was. It was he paid her one hundred and thirty thousand dollars. There's nothing illegal about paying hush money, but they said no, no, I mean, I mean, there's absolutely nothing as long as you're you know, you account for it properly. The issue was that he accounted for his illegal expense because it was Michael Cohen that physically made the payment, and he's reimbursing Michael Cohen for it. And the argument that they're making is it was basically a campaign expense, So he's violating campaign finance laws as well as having a fraudulent accounting by not saying what it really was because it was done so it wouldn't hurt his campaign, so the revelation wouldn't come out and hurt his campaign. Look, I mean, this is a guy that has been indicted for pilfering the nation's most sensitive military secrets from the White House, and for leaving him around the bathroom and ballroom at mar A Lago, and for talking about classified information with you know, an Australian buddy at the club, and for a journalist and for one of his I mean, he's a guy that is charged, indicted for overturning American democracy, and he's on trial for improperly accounting for hush money to a porn star. I mean, whatever, even if you think it's an okay case, it pales insignificance.

00:26:01
Speaker 3: But he was found guilty, right, I mean, I.

00:26:03
Speaker 2: Mean, he was convicted. He was found guilty. I'm just saying because it was such a bizarre case and hard for the public really to understand why this was being done, it was easier to make himself out to be a victim. And he's not being held accountable for the far more serious alleged crimes that he committed as president of the United States.

00:26:27
Speaker 1: You know, I know that the seeds of his retribution fixation were planted even earlier, you write, after his lonely departure from the White House in twenty twenty one, Trump was detested by elites of all kinds. In the world of politics, yes, but also in business, law, academia, and media. Hatred of those elites quickly became the driving force of Trump's twenty twenty four campaign. I think it's really interesting because I think all his life, or his adult life, he has felt like an outsider. I think, you know, as somebody who's lived in New York for decades now, he was always seen as kind of rich and full of himself and kind of a harmless buffoon I would say, by sort of the upper crust of New York society. But he was never really welcomed into that group. You know, he was always a bit.

00:27:20
Speaker 2: He was the guy from Queens. He was the yeah, the guy was trying to make it in Manhattan from Queens.

00:27:25
Speaker 1: But how did that bitterness and resentment fuel him, particularly during this second campaign and now the second term of his presidency.

00:27:35
Speaker 2: I mean, it was the driving force, and it really propelled him to run for office again. And you remember he announced he was running for president in twenty twenty two, a week after Republicans suffered a series of losses in midterm elections that were blamed on Trump and his own advisors were telling him wait, just let the dust settle, and he charged the head because he was so focused on proving those people wrong. Think about how he left the White House, not just the fact that he tried so hard to overturn the election. You know, looked like a sore loser, condemned by the leaders in his own party, the impeachment, the Senate trial, all of that. But it's more than that. He was banished from Twitter. He was banned from Instagram and Facebook. The leaders of the nation's most of the biggest corporations, had most of them, almost all of them, who give political donations, announced that they would not be donating to any candidate who had supported Donald Trump's effort to overturn the election. Law firms he was facing the legal trials the nation's top law firms refused to represent him. Todd blanche who you know, did you know take up, you know, become basically his lead counsel in that hush money case and also in the federal cases. Todd Blanche was with a top you know, Manhattan firm, and he he had to leave the firm go out on his own to represent Donald Trump. So yeah, he sees all of these people, not just the Democrats, not just the prosecutors that you know brought the cases against him, but all those other people who you know, try to banish him, cancel him, if you want to use that term. He's hell bents on getting back at them and proving them wrong. And if they're going to come back and right the wrong, he'll bring them back.

00:29:39
Speaker 1: To Jenny like right, all the tech titans. Jenuflecting right, there.

00:29:44
Speaker 2: Was a moment during the campaign where he actually speculated that Mark Zuckerbrook should go to prison. You know, now Mark Zuckerberg's a somewhat regular guest at mar A Lago in the White House.

00:29:54
Speaker 1: How would you compare the two terms so far? I mean, obviously you talk about the first term is remarkably ephemeral, which you can explain what that means, and the second term, as we all know, is shaping up to be far more radical and consequential. So can you talk a little bit, John about your observations on the first term versus the second. I mean, I'm sure it's about the people he surrounded himself with. He was, as you write, seeking legitimacy in his first term and now only cares about his loyalty.

00:30:26
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, that's part of it, and there's a lot more to it. I mean, I was there at the White House. I was actually ended up being president of the White House Corresponds Association while he's president. I was obviously there for ABC covering day in and day out. It was constant activity, just like it is today. The eyes of the world seem to be on that White House, I think, to a greater extent than even they are today. I think today a lot of people avert their gaze and they're sick of it, you know, they and they try to pretend it's not happening and art. But at that moment, everybody was like, what's going to happen? As won? And it was constant activity, chaos. I wrote you that first book I wrote was called Front wrote the Trump Show because I believe that he saw the presidency as the world's greatest reality show and he was programming it. I said, he was the star. He was the executive producer, he was the publicist, he was the spokesperson for the Trump Show, and he did put together amazing spectacles. It kept the attention on the White House. I think the greatest was probably when he met with Kim Jong un in Singapore. I mean, this guy that had been the great pariah and no American president had ever met, and he's like welcoming him as his buddy in Singapore. But none of it had any lasting impact, I don't think. I mean, there were a few things in his first term and a few accomplishments. The Abraham Accords probably the one over writing big accomplishment. But for the most part, Biden comes in and all the stuff that happened, all that attention, all that it's just like gone. Now he's coming in, and I think he's really sensing something he didn't see before, which is his own mortality, and he wants to change the world, not just be the center of attention. That's why he's building a you know, ninety thousand square foot ballroom at the White House. That's why he's desperate to get the Nobel Peace Prize. That's why he's transforming much of the rest of the whitouse. He wants people to confront the fact that he's there and the world is not going to be the same because he was there. He's changing the world, and a big part of it is what you mentioned. He had people with real credentials that were around him, even the non traditional people. Rex Tillerson was the Secretary of State, very unusual choice for secretary of State, but he've been the CEO of x on Mobile. This is a serious guy, right, Jeff Sessions, you know, he was a judge. He was an influential senator, very influential senator, General Madis, General Madis at the Pentagon, General Kelly at the Department of Helmand Security, four star Marines would star you know, I mean really, but every one of those people, in Trump's mind, betrayed him. So he didn't give a damn about credentials. In the same way when he's putting together his administration this time, he cares about loyalty and that makes him. I make the case, and I think it's absolutely True's why I make it that he's the most powerful president that we have had in the modern era because he's empowered by a Supreme Court decision that says that essentially he can't be prosecuted.

00:33:31
Speaker 1: I mean you say powerful. Other people might say unchecked, unchecked.

00:33:35
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's fair because he's not checked in the same way by the courts, although I mean he is checked to a degree by the courts. And by the way, watch what happens at the Supreme Court on tariffs, because he is taking and seizing power that he actually doesn't have under the Constitution. And one of the biggest examples of that is he's just imposing terrorifts left and right. Congress has the power to impose taxes and do it the.

00:34:02
Speaker 1: Power of the purse, right, but Congress has become the weakest branch of the government.

00:34:07
Speaker 2: It's I mean, Steve Bannon the other day said that the US Congress is like the Russian Duma. Trumps just operated through executive power, executive orders, and when he's had to go through Congress. Although now we're in the midst of a shutdown, we'll see where this goes. But the Republicans have, with the exception of like two or three people out of you know, uh, and the House and the Senate have just done whatever he wants.

00:34:35
Speaker 1: There are a few that have spoken out against tariffs, right, a handful of Republicans in Congress.

00:34:41
Speaker 2: But he's done it without He's bypassed Congress to do that. So is the Supreme Court going to say to him? Are they going to rule that no, those tariffs are unconstitutional? I think, Katie, there's a real possibility that they do, and that'll be a game changing moment for Trump. I mean, think about all the time he has. I mean, first, all these talked about tariffs. Now he calls them so central and it's not just an instrument of like managing trade, but it's an instrument of foreign policy. It's an instrument of retribution for him, punishing Brazil, rewarding his friends. So imagine if that gets taken away and undone. And I think there's a real possibility it will be even this Supreme Court.

00:35:25
Speaker 1: You know, I'm curious when you look at those cabinet meetings that are sprayed by the White House pool. You see them going around the table just gushing about Trump, every single one of them. I mean, it's so grotesque, but it's also just so weird to me that none of these people is embarrassed or ashamed or uncomfortable with having to fawn all over him. It's just so weird. I mean, having covered you've covered many administrations. I'm older than you are, so I've been around even longer, and it's just so bizarre to me that they think this is palatable. I mean, don't you ever think or does nothing ever surprise you at this point.

00:36:16
Speaker 2: Remember the very first cabinet meeting he had in twenty seventeen, and they went around the table and gushed and praised about him. General Mattis, who you mentioned, was one of the few Kelly too, by the way, that didn't do that. He praised the troops, you know, he's Defense Secretary, and he talked about the greatness of American service members. But he later told me much much longer after that, he had a feeling at that very first cabinet meeting in twenty seventeen that was like it was North Korea vibes. It was like the way, you know, Kim Jong un is likely to be greeted when he convenes the North Korean Polet Bureau. But it's gotten much more so since that first I mean, there's a picture that I put in the Book of the very first Trump cabinet meeting. This time he walks in that the cabinet is already seated and the picture has taken place as he walks into the cabinet room and they all stand and they're all applauding him. They're applauding him. I mean, you actually, John Kennedy, like being President Kennedy being applauded or I mean, but by his own cabinet. I mean, is your meeting to talk about, like your agenda? But you know, it's not just his cabinet. It's it's when he's meeting with congressional leaders, it's when he's meeting with foreign leaders. They watch what happened as Zelenski. It's all preceded by how wonderful he is.

00:37:41
Speaker 1: Tell me what you think are some of the biggest scoops in the book, John, I know you have a number of them. Tell us more about Christino. Is she a couple with Corey Lewandowski? I mean, what's going on with those two?

00:37:52
Speaker 2: I'll have to leave others to answer to that question. They certainly have a very close relationship.

00:37:57
Speaker 3: Isn't Christino married or am I?

00:37:58
Speaker 2: They both are married and not to each other, so, but but yeah, this was that there was a member of Trump's transition team who was totally surprised when Trump announced. He often surprises the people that work for him when he announced he put out the statement that Christy nom was going to be his choice for homeland security. And this person just asked him, so, why did you decide to do that? And his answer was, I did it for Corey. It's the only thing he asked for. You know, Corey was his first campaign manager. He just asked for one thing, just one thing. I mean, you know, it's got to give it to him. And Steve Bannon speaks to me on the record, and I sat down for an extensive interview with Steve Bannon two days after Christy Nome was announced as Trump's choice for homeland security, and he was exasperated. This is all on the record. I actually put the sound of the interview because Bannon is so riled up telling me this in the audiobook, and he says, what you're gonna there's no experience whatsoever. She's going to be in charge of, the of the War on Terror, the Secret Service, on the border she's gonna be in charge of, but all are you kidding me? And the interesting thing and very revealing thing is that Bannon, although he is furious at this announcement, he doesn't blame Trump who made the announcement. He blames Corey Lwandowski. He says, you know, that was irresponsible of him to ask Trump to do this. But in terms of the scoops in the books, first of all, I believe the book is much more than the kind of collection of the of the scoops there's but there was a lot of new reporting that, you know, a lot of things that I learned as I went back to try to get answers that I couldn't get in real time as the events were happening. And I spent a great deal of time deconstructing the transition that period where Trump is operating almost exclusively out of mar A Lago, which is a you've been there. I believe you. You've been to mar A Lago, haven't you.

00:39:57
Speaker 3: I went to his wedding John right, so you.

00:40:01
Speaker 2: Know, so you know how small it is. I mean, it's not a very big place. It's a private club. It doesn't have office space. There's one office it's his, But it's not the kind of place that you can run a big, complex presidential transition. They had a place to do that in West Palm Beach, a couple miles away. But everybody knew that the only thing that was ultimately going to matter is what Trump himself was doing. So mar A Lago became this like crossroads at the center of the political universe. So I describe some just to me like mind blowing scenes of these would be want to be cabinet secretaries and other people that wanted jobs in the administration coming and trying to get time with the King, trying to get time with Trump, and the way it was all operating, you know mar A Lago when you're going basically the lobby is a place they call the living room, and there's a couch there and a couple of chairs, and you have all these people waiting for their time to come in to talk to Trump. There was an attorney general candidate, There was a candidate for Secretary of Energy. Pete Hegseth was sitting there. You know, Cash Bettel's kind of running around back and forth hoping to get a little bit of time FaceTime with Trump. All these things are happening, and one of the potential cabinet Secretaries that was there, sees Pete Hegseth and says, oh god, I guess Trump's getting interviewed by you know, the Fox Weekend news anchor. And little did anybody know, Like later, you know, the next day, we learned that he's the choice for Secretary of Defense. So a lot of the description of that incredible transition on like any we had ever seen, I think is an important part of the book.

00:41:52
Speaker 1: If you want to get smarter every morning with a breakdown of the news and fascinating takes on health and wellness and pop culture, sign up up for our daily newsletter, wake Up Call by going to Katiecuric dot com. Do you worry that people are just odd on this? As you mentioned, some people are just tuning out? I mean, there have been many books written about Donald Trump. He never ceases to frustrate a maze and infuriate people. And at some point, do you worry that A I think as a news person, as a journalist, that people will stop paying attention and b that they're not going to really want to read this book.

00:42:40
Speaker 2: Look, I felt it was absolutely essential. I didn't plan to write another book until really when Biden dropped out. I was like, I need to write about this campaign. It's the most extraordinary, unpredictable, twists and turns campaign that we had ever seen in our lifetimes. I think you have to go back to me nineteen twelve to find something close. When you know Teddy Roosevelt stormed out of the Republican Convention and started the Bull Moose Party. I mean, but this is like a incredible series of events and I wanted to document it for history because I knew that I had access to some of the key players in a way that really nobody else did or very few people did, and I wanted to for myself. I wanted to kind of get an understanding of what happened. But yes, the short answer is absolutely, I worry that people have largely tuned out. They're exhausted with it all. We're a decade into this now, a decade into the Trump era, and you know, I hope people read the book because I think it's an important record of how we got to where we are and what is at stake going forward. But I know that a lot of people are going to say I've heard too much. I'm just going to ignore it all. But you know, what we can't ignore it all.

00:43:55
Speaker 1: Let's talk about for the last few minutes we have John about the future. We're doing this interview on election Day. There's some key races going on which might provide some insight on how the electorate is feeling about Donald Trump at the moment, especially with races in New York City the mayor race. We've got Mikey, Cheryl and Abigail Spanberger who are favored to win in New Jersey and Virginia, respectively. And I'm curious, do you have any sense at this point, John, about the mood of the electorate and the enthusiasm for Donald Trump, even among his magabase.

00:44:37
Speaker 2: There's clearly anxiety in the country about the state of the economy, which was a big part of what got him elected, the rejection of Biden. It was for several reasons. I mean, it wasn't part of it was his age. Part of it was the failure in Afghanistan. Part of it was the mess at the border. But a big driving force it was a drag on Kamala harris Is inflation and the state of the economy.

00:45:03
Speaker 1: And insisting the economy was doing well by the numbers, but as people had pointed out. It's more of a feeling, kind of the same thing as crime and safety. If no matter what you're being told, if you don't feel it to be the case, it just doesn't resonate. So the economy and people feel like the economy hasn't really improved. In fact, for so many of his voters and people who supported him, it's gotten much worse, right, I mean, look at farmers and soybean farmers and the impact tariffs are having and inflation, et cetera, et cetera. So do you think he's starting to wear thin amongst some of his folks.

00:45:42
Speaker 2: I think that you're clearly seeing that in the polls. He still is popular among the overwhelming majority of Republican voters, but there is growing economic anxiety. And I think that his obsession with retribution and his obsession with what seem to be trivial things like changing the White House all the gold at the White House, tearing down the East Wing at a time when Americans are wondering if they have enough money to feed their families, are wondering about the strength of their jobs. We the unemployment rate is still low, but there's so much anxiety about you know, major companies, you know, announcing large number of layoffs and AI. What AI does to the job market? How many jobs does it? Does it eat away? You know, the federal employees, you know what's happened to them, So I you know, not to mention this, this government shutdown that Republicans are blaming on Democrats. And they've got an argument that it was Democrats that caused the shutdown. I mean, I don't think many people really care about that argument, but they care about what it means to their lives. And you've got millions of people that are on SNAP, that depend on food stamps to feed their families. A lot of those are Republicans, by the way.

00:47:04
Speaker 1: That's why I don't understand John Lake. He does this three hundred and fifty million dollar renovation, He renovates the Lincoln bathroom right with all marble and gold, and these constant displays of ostentatiousness, if that's the right word, and you know, having a great gatsfee party at mar A Lago the weekend SNAP benefits run out. And I'm just curious why even MAGA voters don't see that as a bit of a disconnect. How can he convey that he still really cares about the working class or people who are struggling in the country, and yet display all these constant signs of ostentatious wealth and spending on things that really don't help people but are really just self angrandizing.

00:48:00
Speaker 2: It's a great question, and I have to say one of the unique things about Trump is that where most politicians, even very wealthy ones, and we've had very wealthy people become President of the United States, become senator, become you know, governors, try to hide their wealth or deemphasize it and try to act like a regular person, regular man, regular woman, even when they're multimillionaires, billionaires. Trump never did any of that. I remember when he was first running and he goes to the Iowa State Fair. This is where you eat the corn dogs and you show you're just like everybody else. And what does he do. He brings his helicopter with the big Trump sign on, you know, in blazon, and gives helicopter rides to the kids. I mean, he he never tried to pretend that he wasn't. I mean, if anything, he was pretending to be richer than he was. And his people, who are largely you know, working class Americans struggling drawn to him because they feel like they've not been served well by the political elites in both parties. You know, we're drawn to him. And part of his argument was I became super rich. I did it all for myself. Now I'm going to do it for you. I'm going to do it for the country. So I think there's still a little bit of that in the psychology of his supporters. He's doing greatness. He's doing it on behalf of America. He's going to have this big ballroom, it's going to be all of ours. He's going to big the big, the big arc Da trailmph that he's going to put, you know, by the Lincoln Memorial. You know this greatness. He's doing it now for America. And even as you're struggling to figure out, you know, how you're going to make ends meet, a lot of them will be there and will be there until his dying days and their dying days.

00:49:42
Speaker 1: I'd love you to just end by talking about the future. I mean, I know that this was about the campaign, but as we look ahead at the mid terms, John, and especially at this kind of quid pro quo redistricting fight that we see unfolding all the country. The last I heard is going to be a net gain for the Republicans in terms of additional House seats. How do you see the mid term shaking out. It's probably hard to predict, I'm sure, but yeah, tell us a little bit about what you're seeing in the country, what you're seeing in races, and what you believe may in fact happening, especially with this whole redistricting thing layer added to the mix.

00:50:27
Speaker 2: Yeah, the redistricting could make it possible for the Republicans.

00:50:32
Speaker 3: To hold on to the House well, to hold.

00:50:36
Speaker 2: Like about ten seats or so that, you know, to get squeeze an extra ten districts that would go from being Democratic to being you know, majority Republican. You know across Texas, Indiana, you know, North Carolina, Florida, I mean Florida. The're probably not going to pull off, but they're trying in every you know, in every state where they can. California is the only state where Democrats are able to to squeeze some seats themselves. And that's well.

00:51:02
Speaker 1: Now the other states are looking into it, right Virginia, New York. I just watched a piece done by the New York Times and I think that's not right. California is not the only one, is it.

00:51:12
Speaker 2: Well, it's likely to be the only one that can pull it off. In New York, there's a real question about whether or not they can do it. In Virginia's a real question about what yes. So they've got barriers in all those states that are going to be very hard to overcome. And the one place, depending on how the voting goes in California, where they can actually do it, where they will have a green light to do it, is California. And the others, I mean, we'll see how it plays out. They're running out of time to be able to do it in Virginia and in New York. But look, he has not done well for Republicans when he is not on the ballot. In twenty twenty two, Republicans held the House, but they lost a whole bunch of seats, and they lost a lot of, you know, Senate seats that they thought they were going to win. They lost governorships in twenty eighteen. You know, Republicans got hammered while Trump was in the White House.

00:52:02
Speaker 1: That's pretty predictable, right, Usually they do get hammered in the midterms. But what do you think is going to happen next year for the mid terms? Now you mentioned the redistricting, right, yeah, Is it going to be a huge shellacking? Is Arack Obama? I believe said right after.

00:52:20
Speaker 2: His forty year I said, after a twenty ten or was it twenty fourteen? He got shlacked twice Obama, It's very predictable that happens. What the redistioning does is it makes the playing field much smaller. There are fewer seats that Democrats can really compete for to win. But I'll just tell you what I asked Gavin Newsom about this, because Gavin Newsom is obviously the one that is pushing to make the change in California to counter what's happened in Texas and elsewhere. And I asked Gavin Newsom basically the question you're asking me, which is, do you need to win this ballot issue of this Prop fifty? Do you need to do this in California for the Democrats to have a chance of holding onto the House?

00:53:00
Speaker 3: And his answer, you mean getting back the House.

00:53:03
Speaker 2: Getting back the House or getting back the House. And he said, actually no, he thinks that there will be such a wave of election that the five extra seats that they squeeze out of California, assuming they do, will be a footnote. So who knows. But Trump's approval rating in this latest CNN poll is lower than it had ever been, even in the darkest moments of his first term. An incumbent with economic headwinds, with anxiety in the country, as unpopular as he is in that poll. If that remains, you know, all the redistricting in the world might not be enough to hold the tide. So we'll see. And I think that this election, you know, Virginia, New Jersey, New York, will be a bit of a leading indicator of where the party and where the where the Congress is going to go next year in the midterms.

00:53:56
Speaker 1: And the big question I guess is also, will Democrats be able to get their act together and provide a compelling vision for the country instead of being the anti Trump party?

00:54:09
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, right now, They're a long way from doing that.

00:54:13
Speaker 3: I love talking to you.

00:54:14
Speaker 1: I mean, I could talk to you about this stuff all daye Jean, preferably next time over a vodka martini at Cafe Milano. But the book is called Retribution Donald Trump and the campaign that changed America. Ah, so much to talk about, and God bless you for covering this day in and day out, because honestly, I'd want to blow my brains out at some point.

00:54:38
Speaker 2: Katie. It's awesome to talk to you and I look forward to seeing you in person soon.

00:54:42
Speaker 1: Yeah, me too, And good luck with the book and keep up the good work because God knows. I'm paying attention, John to everything you write and talk about, and I hope most Americans are because I don't think I've lived through a time where it's more important to really understand what's going on.

00:55:00
Speaker 3: I wasn't around in nineteen twelve. I covered Teddy Rose.

00:55:04
Speaker 1: Great race to cover though, yeah it would have been but enough excitement just covering this administration.

00:55:11
Speaker 3: John, Thanks again, and I hope to see you soon.

00:55:13
Speaker 2: Thank you, Katie.

00:55:18
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