Raging Moderates with Scott Galloway and Jessica Tarlov

MAGA Revolts Over Trump’s Iran Disaster

33 min
Apr 10, 202617 days ago
Listen to Episode
Summary

Jessica Tarlov and Erin Parness discuss deepening fractures within MAGA over Trump's Iran strategy, with key figures like Tucker Carlson, Candace Owens, and Marjorie Taylor Greene publicly questioning his war posture. The episode covers economic headwinds including poor inflation data, Melania Trump's surprise Epstein statement, and Hunter Biden's cage match challenge to Trump family members.

Insights
  • Trump's political position is deteriorating across multiple fronts simultaneously—economic data, Middle East strategy, and internal party fractures—creating vulnerability heading into midterms
  • The real MAGA defection is happening among everyday Trump supporters in social media comments, not among media personalities who have financial incentives to remain flexible
  • Iran's control of the Strait of Hormuz is functionally equivalent to nuclear deterrence, giving Tehran significant leverage regardless of military outcomes
  • Melania Trump's Epstein statement appears strategically timed to get ahead of incoming reporting and shift narrative control away from Todd Blanche and the DOJ
  • Cabinet instability and potential reshuffles are likely as the administration attempts to confirm nominees and potentially replace Supreme Court justices before Senate dynamics shift
Trends
Fragmentation of right-wing media ecosystem as influencers respond to audience sentiment rather than top-down messagingEconomic stagflation concerns (0.9% inflation spike, GDP downward revision) creating political vulnerability for incumbent administrationMiddle East policy divergence between Israel-aligned officials and America-First faction within Republican PartyStrategic use of press conferences and media statements by First Family to control narratives independent of presidential messagingAccelerated timeline for executive branch personnel changes and judicial appointments due to political pressureStrait of Hormuz emerging as primary geopolitical leverage point in Iran negotiations rather than nuclear capabilityFood price inflation as downstream consequence of Middle East instability and shipping disruptionsFormer administration officials (Pete Buttigieg) gaining credibility through critical analysis of current policies
Topics
Iran Nuclear Negotiations and Strait of Hormuz ControlTrump Administration Middle East Strategy and Israel RelationsMAGA Internal Fractures and Right-Wing Media PersonalitiesInflation Data and Economic Policy ImpactMelania Trump Epstein Statement and DOJ StrategyCabinet Reshuffles and Personnel ChangesSupreme Court Judicial Appointments TimelineJD Vance's Role in Foreign Policy and Ceasefire NegotiationsHunter Biden Political Positioning and Democratic Party VoiceWebby Awards Campaign and Podcast GrowthLaura Loomer and Roger Stone's White House AccessPete Buttigieg's Post-Administration Media PresenceFood Price Inflation and Global Supply ChainCongressional Oversight vs. DOJ Authority on Epstein InvestigationMidterm Election Dynamics and Political Momentum
Companies
Dell Technologies
Sponsor providing Dell PCs with Intel processors; featured in multiple ad reads throughout episode
Grow Therapy
Mental health platform sponsor offering therapy sessions at reduced cost through insurance partnerships
Soul
Wellness brand sponsor offering CBD and THC gummies with precise dosing for mood management
Odoo
Business software sponsor offering integrated CRM, accounting, inventory, and e-commerce platform
Fox News
Jessica Tarlov was at Fox waiting to go on air when Melania Trump's Epstein statement broke
CBS News
Reported on Netanyahu calling Trump to remove Lebanon from ceasefire agreement
NBC News
Reported that Melania Trump has been upset about Epstein coverage for months
The Daily Beast
News outlet mentioned as target of Melania Trump's litigation threats over Epstein coverage
Harper Collins
Publisher mentioned in context of Melania Trump's litigation regarding Epstein-related content
CNBC
Pete Buttigieg appeared on Squawk Box to discuss inflation and Biden administration economic record
Channel 5
Andrew Callahan's media platform organizing carnival tour with Hunter Biden cage match proposal
People
Jessica Tarlov
Co-host discussing Trump administration policy failures and MAGA fractures
Erin Parness
Co-host recently returned from paternity leave; provides geopolitical analysis on Iran and Middle East
Scott Galloway
Co-host mentioned in opening; appears to be primary host of show
Donald Trump
Central figure; subject of discussion regarding Iran strategy, Epstein statement response, and MAGA fractures
Melania Trump
Made surprise press conference statement addressing Epstein allegations and denying knowledge of abuse
JD Vance
Traveling to Islamabad to negotiate Middle East ceasefire; emerging as potential rival to Trump allies
Tucker Carlson
Criticized by Trump for questioning Iran strategy; released statement defending Trump while signaling concerns
Marjorie Taylor Greene
Questioned Trump's Iran strategy; attacked by Trump in Truth Social rant
Candace Owens
Criticized Trump's Iran war posture; attacked in Trump's Truth Social rant
Alex Jones
Questioned Trump's Iran strategy calling him a 'super villain'; criticized for Sandy Hook defamation
Megyn Kelly
Attacked by Trump in Truth Social rant; previously stated she'd vote Republican even if they dropped nuclear weapon
Laura Loomer
Described as having Trump's ear; sent Trump Tucker Carlson clips; described as 'clinically nuts' by hosts
Roger Stone
Reportedly saved Tulsi Gabbard's job; described as having significant White House access
Benjamin Netanyahu
Called Trump to remove Lebanon from ceasefire; driving Middle East escalation according to hosts
Pete Hegseth
Rumored to be on the outs; New York Times reported he pushed Netanyahu's pitch for Iran strikes
Marco Rubio
Predicted to potentially leave office to run for president; signaling concerns about Iran strategy
Tulsi Gabbard
Job reportedly saved by Roger Stone; predicted to be part of cabinet reshuffle
Todd Blanche
Administration attempting to give him clean slate on Epstein issue; Melania's statement undercuts his narrative
Hunter Biden
Challenged Trump family members to cage match; discussed as potential Democratic Party voice
Joe Biden
Discussed as having platform to defend his economic record against current inflation comparisons
Pete Buttigieg
Appeared on CNBC defending Biden administration economic record; praised for critical analysis
Barack Obama
Discussed as needing to speak up more against Trump; expected to campaign for midterms
Andrew Callahan
Organizing Channel 5 Carnival Tour with Hunter Biden cage match proposal against Trump family
Ghislaine Maxwell
Melania Trump acknowledged casual email correspondence with Maxwell; denied knowledge of abuse
Susie Wiles
Discussed as strategist planning cabinet reshuffles and Supreme Court appointments before Senate shifts
Samuel Alito
Predicted to retire this year to allow Trump to appoint younger replacement justice
Quotes
"I'm usually not the walls are closing in on Donald Trump person, but it actually feels like the walls are closing in on Donald Trump a bit."
Jessica TarlovEarly in episode
"Iran has a nuclear weapon, that nuclear weapon is the straight, right? I mean, the straight of our moves and being able to close it like Iran has is just as powerful as them being close to a nuke."
Erin ParnessMiddle section
"You actually, there's nothing you can do to keep that to militarily reopen that straight because if Iran could just shoot one missile targeting a cargo ship, that's enough to shut down the straight and spook other oil tankers."
Erin ParnessMiddle section
"Melania Trump just blew up the administration's narrative on Epstein. That's the fun perspective."
Jessica TarlovEpstein segment
"No press conference happens at the White House without the president knowing. The Donald Trump's little thing of like, I had no idea Melania was going to give this thing bullshit. Okay, he knew."
Jessica TarlovEpstein segment
Full Transcript
Dell PCs with Intel inside are built for the moments you plan and for the ones you don't. For those early morning news sessions or when you're on the go and leave your charger at home or even the times you need the best processing speed to just get the job done. Dell built tech that adapts to you. Built with a long-lasting battery so you're not scrambling for an outlet and with built-in intelligence that makes updates around your schedule not in the middle of it. Find technology built for the way you work at dell.co.uk forward slash Dell PCs. Built for you. Dell PCs with Intel inside are built for every moment with long-lasting battery life and built in intelligence you can stay focused on what matters most. Dell technologies built for you. Dell.com slash Dell PCs. Support for this show comes from Grow Therapy. If you're not feeling the spring energy yet, don't worry, you're not behind. With Grow Therapy you can start small like talking to someone who gets it. Whatever challenges you're facing, Grow Therapy is here to help. Grow accepts over a hundred insurance plans. Sessions average about $21 with insurance and some pay as little as $20 depending on their plan. You can visit Grow Therapy.com slash Vox today to get started. That's Grow Therapy.com slash Vox. Availability and coverage vary by state and insurance plan. Welcome to Raging Moderates. I'm Jessica Tarlove. And I'm Erin Parness. Erin Parness, the dad. Welcome back. Back from paternity leave. Two weeks. Long time. We're back. You didn't even take it off. You were making videos in the corner of the hospital room. How is it? Congratulations again. I mean, amazing. Thank you. It's beautiful, amazing, love it. Everyone's happy, healthy, but I am exhausted and I am, I don't know, I'm delirious at this point. It's a good thing that you're five years old. I started doing this 37, 38, and then having the second at 40, I was like, whoa, if it would have been nice if I had met the right guy a little bit younger, I would be less tired. Spring chicken over here, as they say. Yeah. Yeah. Well, you can do a lot of night duty that way. If you aren't ready, make sure to subscribe to our YouTube page to stay in the loop on all of the political news. And also, big news. Again, we've been nominated for a Webby Award. We feel really good about it, but we'd feel even better if we actually won. So we need you to vote. Go to vote.webbyawards.com, cast your vote for best news and politics podcast. We also have the link in the show notes. Voting closes on Thursday, April 16th. Show us some love. I'm usually not the walls are closing in on Donald Trump person, but it actually feels like the walls are closing in on Donald Trump a bit. We had a very poor inflation report today. You had the GDP downward revision for Q4 yesterday down to 0.5%. JD Vance is on his way to Islamabad to try to negotiate some legitimate ceasefire since what we're seeing right now fails to pass the test. And I think a pretty serious fissure going on in MAGA World. I mean, last night, Trump's meltdown had this 500 word true social rant going off on key right-wing figures who were questioning his Iran strategy, Marjorie Taylor Greene, Alex Jones, Candace Owens, Megan Kelly, and Tucker Carlson. Basically, I said, if you're not fully on board with Trump's war posture, you're out and apparently also low IQ. I mean, he's been saying low IQ about a lot of people. I think he just calls me an idiot and has never said low IQ. But let's listen to Alex Jones responding to Trump's attacks. But at the end of the day, I just feel sorry for him and pray that God touches heart and soul and free him from the demonic influences that he's under. I mean, it's just that simple. This is a nightmare. We know the Democrats on the left are absolutely terrible. But when Trump's calling for wiping out whole civilizations and acting like a super villain, I have to come out and say I don't support it. It's that simple. So again, Trump's own wife came out and announced press conference today and said the Epstein crimes are real and that she wants the victims to be in front of Congress to cover up the end. That's the opposite of what Trump's saying. It looks to me like she's breaking with Trump because she knows the ship sinking has found out the truth. Elon left eight months ago saying he's in the fall as it's covered up. I never saw any evidence of it, but he's acting like it's guilty. Okay, I've been, I just got to say, like, Alex Jones, you are a super villain for what you did to those Sandy Hook families. So I have a lot of trouble, you know, going with Alex Jones on some sort of higher ground. But how much credence do you give to what he's saying? Not much. So it's a little, it depends, right? I think like the Alex Jones, Candace Owens, Tucker Carlson, that type of wing of the Republican Party are really not, I don't consider them Republicans, the MAGA wing, really far, right? I don't know how much that they supported him three months ago or five months ago. His election to them was a means to an end in a lot of ways. And a lot of them are making a lot of money off of their current opinions, right? Is there a Fisher and MAGA for sure is Alex Jones, Tucker Carlson, Candace Owens, the one that are going to be leading this Fisher? I don't know. The real ones to me are when Rogan comes out against Trump, which he has, the Ovan coming out against Trump, which he has more of kind of the normie podcast-y people that actually helped propel Trump among the more independent voters or those voters who may not have voted for him in the first place. Those are the real Fishers here. Alex Jones, I mean, I feel like he'll sell out to whichever way the wind blows. Like these people are not, I don't know. I don't consider them true believers, if that makes sense. Well, I mean, Megyn Kelly did say earlier this week that a Republican could drop a nuke and she would still vote for them. So there is some true believing in voting conservative. Yes, she said that. But I mean, Megyn Kelly, to me, as an example, exhibit A of this is that after she was ousted from Fox and that whole debate situation, she hated Trump, right? Like, she did not like Trump. Then you saw her just a few years later on the stage saying, I'm going to vote for Trump endorsing Trump. And now she's going out again and saying, I don't like Trump. Yes, she's always going to vote Republican. She's always going to try to support the Republican candidate because it benefits her. But she'll go whichever way the wind blows when it comes to Trump, whichever way her audience wants her to. That's kind of what I see that. Well, that's where I think that this actually has some legs because these MAGA, I don't want to call them thought leaders, feels very generous. But you know what I mean? These personalities are getting feedback from their audiences and they're giving them more of what the audience is telling them that they're feeling or and picking up, you know, concerns in the comments or Collins or however they're getting it. So it's clearly not coming from nowhere. And you have Marjorie Taylor, right? But it's, it's interesting to me that you separate them from Joe Rogan and Theo Vaughn and Andrew Schultz, I guess. And yes, they're not part of the manosphere, I guess, in the traditional sense of it. But I do consider, I guess, that to be like a new media wing, I guess, of MAGA support. And it feels like there are cracks in every element of it. And Tucker Carlson is taking the proverbial high road in saying today he released a statement that Donald Trump is under this tremendous amount of pressure. He made sure to get in some jabs about Israel on it. And he says, like, we've got to give him some grace. And then you had Laura Loomer, and I want to play what she said, like going absolutely buck wild about her role in all of this. And she, she's always stirring the pot. Anyway, let's look at her. But the president has had enough of Tucker shit. And yeah, I'm just going to admit it. I sent the president Tucker Carlson's clip so he can see the shit that he says about him. I do. And I want that motherfucker Tucker Carlson to know that I'm the one who knifed him from the front. I want him to know I'm not talking about physical violence, physical knifing. But yeah, I'm the one that sent the president all your shit Tucker, because he deserves to see the fact that you are lying about him, and you are smearing him, and you are saying the most vile things about our country, and our president, and you are creating so much chaos, you're going to cause the Democrats to take the house in the Senate, and you are endangering our national security by whitewashing this barbaric death cult etiology known as Islam. I mean, she's nuts, like clinically, clinically nuts. But she has the president's ear. I mean, that's what's going on here. And his phone number, I think actually I'm like the only person who doesn't really have his phone number, but that she's a feeder to him. And then Roger Stohn is also back in the news, apparently he saved Tulsi Gabbard's job. You're like, what does this man's phone look like? Right? I don't want to see what's in his phone. But I will say this, my thing on why I separate all of this, at the end of the day, if the election were held today, all of these people would be voting for Trump. They all would vote for Trump. Tucker Carlson would vote, Candace Owens would vote. I mean, they would come around and they'd vote. They say things because they think it's the popular position, they're making money, and they're doing what they're doing. The real fishers go in the truth social comments that on Trump's post. He's getting ripped apart by like everyday MAGA people. Those are the real fishers right there. Laura Loomer, I mean, she's the definition of a true believer. But then again, like she owes her career to Trump. I don't know what she's gonna do. So we got one? We got one. I don't know what she's gonna do in three years, because Vance's team doesn't like her. Yeah, I feel like there's going to be like a radioactive fence around the White House on verbatim. She'll chain herself to the fence like she did in front of Twitter. Do you remember that? I do remember that, but also the before and afters on her plastic surgery make me so sad. I don't know, that's just like an aside. Whoever's editing this maybe throw in the before and after. She really messed up her look. So the underlying issue for this particular round of MAGA freak out is what's going on in Iran and across the Middle East and this feeling that we are not in a war for American interests, that there has been too much Israeli pushing and I'm being generous, I guess, in saying that they have new reporting from CBS that originally Lebanon was included in the ceasefire and then BB Netanyahu called President Trump and got him to take Lebanon out so that Israel could continue their campaign there. I have been talking about this a lot and I just want to add into the mix that the fault lies with Donald Trump for being the one American president that fell for it or that is just happy to do what Netanyahu is pitching. He tried to do this with Obama, he tried to do this with Biden and Trump is the one that has been going along with it. But what are your, I guess, the odds that you're putting on our chance of a lasting ceasefire or whatever this team of JD Van Steve Wittkopf and Jared Kushner are going to get out of the meetings in Islamabad? Zero. I put the odds at zero and not because I don't think that like, I think they'll come out of it and they might have some framework where they may say, okay, the United States isn't going to be bombing Iran directly, but that doesn't mean that there's peace in the Middle East. In the past 48 hours, Israel has bombed Lebanon to such a degree that we had not seen since the start of the war. Since October 7th, we have not seen such bombing. Israel and Netanyahu has openly said that they want to take parts of southern Lebanon in terms of a land grab to build some type of barrier of sorts. You still have Syria, which is parts of Syria, which is a hotbed. You still have Turkey, Israel, which they're not getting along. So, yeah, you may have this sort of deal in terms of like, some type, something coming out of Islamabad so that Trump can save face. But at the end of the day, peace in the Middle East, we're not, I don't think we're, I think we're further from peace in the Middle East today than we were six weeks ago. I really do. And what about the straight? Because for me, that feels like the only thing that matters now, like that we could, we went in with these grandiose goals of no more nuclear program, right? We're going to have regime change. They'll never support a proxy force again. They'll be like Hamas, who? Hezbollah, who? And now it's like, we just need to be able to get tankers through the straight. And the, you know, the high count that they might let 15 ships through per day, we're getting 100 through per day and with no toll. So the IRGC, to my mind, is in an incredibly strong position, especially with this quote, unquote, two week break, which they can use to rearm and also strategize with, you know, Russia and China and try to figure out what's next. Well, I think what you've learned, and I think Donald Trump and the American government has learned that Iran does have a nuclear weapon, that nuclear weapon is the straight, right? I mean, I think the straight of our moves and being able to close it like, like Iran has is just as powerful as them being close to a nuke, right? They theoretically are able to almost shut down the global economy and Americans aren't feeling it yet when it comes to food prices, but food prices are about to go up a lot more in the coming weeks because of the straight. We saw inflation go up 0.9% highest level in two years. Gas prices in some places are above $6 close to $7. That's only going to continue to rise and this straight is not opening up overnight. No matter how much Trump said it should or it will, it's not. And we have conflicting messages of what that means. Will there be the so-called joint venture between the United States and Iran? What does that look like? Does that mean that Chinese are now going to be paying a million bucks to us and a billion, a million bucks to the Iranians to get through? I don't think they're going to want that. So I really think that the big takeaway here is that the United States, as Trump likes to say, doesn't have the cards anymore, right? Iran has a lot of the cards right now and you can bomb Iran into oblivion. You can quote unquote end the civilization as you know it, but as long as you have one missile, one mine, one bomb, that straight will not be reopened. So you actually, there's nothing you can do to keep that to militarily reopen that straight because if Iran could just shoot one missile targeting a cargo ship, that's enough to shut down the straight and spook other oil tankers. So I don't know. It's a very difficult situation the administration has put itself in. Do you give any credence to the rumors that Pete Hegseth is on the outs and that JD Vance and Marco Rubio are maybe not like telling Trump this guy's got to go, but are definitely signaling that things have not been going well and can point fingers at him? I mean that New York Times piece really made Hegseth out to be the villain when it came to the pitch that Netanyahu was making for why this was the right time to go in. Well, I think what we'll end up seeing is just a major cabinet reshuffle between now and the end of the year. I don't know that it's that this may push Hegseth out, but I wouldn't be surprised if you have Hegseth out, Chavez Doreem around, Tulsi Gabbard out and a whole number of other folks. I wouldn't be surprised if Marco Rubio leaves soon too to go run for president because he can't run for president as secretary of state. It becomes a little more complicated for him. I wouldn't be surprised if he leaves at some point. He does so many jobs already though. I know, but I think Susie Wiles and the administration know that as this war continues and the president's political position gets worse, the more likely it is they lose the Senate. And so if they want to get Trump's nominees confirmed, then they got to leave now. And that's why I also think Justice Alito will retire this year. They want to get another justice in this year, right? So I think they're going to try to do a lot of maneuvering with the cabinet, with the Supreme Court and others before the end of the year. That is the stuff of nightmares that he'll put like another 40-year-old on the court. That's the plan. Yeah. I mean, hopefully we would be ruthless enough to do the same thing. But that's a show for another time. As a reminder, Raging Moderates is now five days a week with new episodes dropping every week to evening on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and everywhere else. And in addition to five days a week, you can find us on Substack. Subscribers get ad-free episodes, live streams, a place to engage with me and the whole ProfG community. Scott, of course, we did our first Substack Live this week, which was a thrill. Find us at Raging Moderates.Profgmedia.com. Let's take a quick break. Stay with us. Support for the show comes from soul. They say the key to life is balance in all things. You work hard, which means you deserve to cut loose now and then. And whether that means pick me up or a wind me down. Soul has you covered. 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Try Odoo for free at odoo.com. That's Odoo.com. Welcome back. I want to try to elegantly switch gears and talk about Melania Trump. So now I'm kind of going back to the MAGA meltdown portion of this. I was at Fox yesterday waiting to go on. I was going to be on in the 3pm hour and we had gotten the flag that Melania was making a statement that it was going to be really newsy. So I see she comes on the screen and I'm getting my hair and makeup done. I'm like, let's put up the volume. And then she's talking about Jeffrey Epstein, which totally shocked me. And everybody else that was around, she said that she had no knowledge of his abuse, pushing back on what she calls years of fake images and smears, acknowledged past contact with Colleen Maxwell, but that it was just friendly and didn't mean that she had any knowledge of anything that was going on. Let's watch a little bit of what she said. To be clear, I never had a relationship with Epstein or his accomplice Maxwell. My email reply to Maxwell cannot be catarized as anything more than casual correspondence. My polite reply to her email doesn't amount to anything more than a tribal note. I am not Epstein's victim. Epstein did not introduce me to Donald Trump. I met my husband by chance at the New York City party in 1998. What is going on? Your guess is as good as mine. I think, okay, I'm going to take it from a journalistic perspective and then from a legal perspective, from a journalistic perspective. Can you just do a fun perspective first? Okay, fine. A fun perspective is that Melania Trump just blew up the administration's narrative on Epstein. That's the fun perspective. That's the stuff I'm looking for, Erin. She decided to come out with the one thing that they had been dodging on every level. I don't usually do everything's about Epstein, but you look at this and you're like, he's in the middle of a deeply unpopular war. He's trying to pretend he's the big dog and he's in charge of this. She's like, you know what? The one thing that you never want to talk about, you just fired Pam Bondi about, I'm going to call a press conference. I'm going to make all the networks take it and I'm going to come out and put the story front and center again. No, it's absolutely bonkers, but I will say, I mean- All right, go ahead. Be responsible now. Okay, I'll be a little responsible. Number one, is she responding to a story that's coming out soon? Is that why we're doing this now? Number two, no press conference happens at the White House without the president knowing. The Donald Trump's little thing of like, I had no idea Melania was going to give this thing bullshit. Okay, he knew. Maybe he didn't know exactly what the statement said, but he knew about Epstein and he knew she was going to give a press conference. Let's dispel with the notion. Number three, I actually think this is a bit of a poison pill for survivors, what Melania is trying to do. They're trying to throw the narrative and the insinuation of that something has to be done onto Congress. They don't want it on Todd Blanche. He's the new attorney general. They want to give him a clean slate. They don't want it on Trump in the White House. They want to say, Congress, it's your job. Hold these public hearings. We're demanding it now. We're the good guys. You guys do it. But here's the thing. It's not Congress's job to interview Epstein survivors. It's the FBI's and the DOJ's. The Epstein survivors should not have to go under oath and be grilled by Republican lawmakers who don't believe their stories. That should not have to happen. In addition, several Epstein survivors may be subject to NDAs and various settlements and other legal proceedings that won't let them testify. What Melania Trump did is, and the Epstein survivors put out a statement saying, we did our part. Now it's time for those in power to do theirs. It's not up to the survivors to do anything more. They've done everything. Melania coming out and giving this weird statement, to me, is like, she's getting out in front of something. That's what I think it is. I just don't know what it is yet. There are a bunch of theories floating around, but they're all unverified pretty much. I don't know. Yeah. There's definitely, I mean, she named Tect, James Carville, Harper Collins, which is Michael Wolfe, the Daily Beast, who's been doing a lot of coverage on this. NBC reported, which I give a lot of credence to, that Melania has just been upset about this and angry for months, which doesn't take away from the idea that there could be something coming in the next day or over the weekend or whatever it is that adds to it. But it feels strange to me the idea that she would just wake up on this particular Thursday and be like, today is the day that I need to talk about this if she's been fuming about it for months. And she has been and throwing around litigation. Right. So yeah. I mean, I think it's like kind of what you said at the beginning. It's like this constant cycle. It's like, the Epstein files are so bad that we're going to launch a war, but then the war becomes so bad that we're going to start talking about Epstein. And then eventually this is going to get so bad. Trump is going to say something else about the war. And it's just going to be this constant cycle. At the end of the day, these powerful people need to be held accountable. Oh, and that's the other thing she said. It wasn't just Epstein involved. She said that in her statement that there was other wealthy, powerful people involved in this. That completely undercuts everything Todd Blanche has said, that there are no other wealthy and powerful people that completely undercuts Donald Trump who said that it was a hoax. So I mean, I think she just blew up all of Trump's narratives. And I think that's why he went on that tirade about Megyn Kelly and all of them. I think he's not happy with the media coverage around all this. And it's probably why we're not going to see him publicly for a little bit. Oh, you think so? You'll have another disappearance and then everyone will say that he's at Walter Reed when And then I'll drive to Walter Reed again and see that he's not there. But yeah. Is that what you did? I did. The baby sleeps in the car. So I was like, you know what? Let me just drive by Walter Reed. No motorcade, no blockade. I was like, okay. On the ground. You'll tell her when she's older. Like you were Nancy Drewing with me when you were just two weeks old. Correct. Okay. I want to talk about Hunter Biden as well. This was, we were even texting about this, was absolutely hysterical. He says that he's ready to settle the family feud in an old fashion in an old fashioned way, a cage match in front of a crowd. He's claiming there's an effort led by Andrew Callahan to line up a fight between him and either Donald Trump Jr. or Eric Trump. I don't actually know which one I would prefer to fight in a cage match. Like I fight Eric over Don Jr. Don Jr. is a little built. I don't, yeah. I think he's just like a little wilder. I don't want to say anything about what might be enhancing his wildness, but he does seem like more of a loose cannon. But this feels like totally perfect, I guess, for our political moment that this would be going on and also speaks to to some degree, like that Hunter Biden's vibe is very much what Democrats want to see. Like he has that fight in him, but let's take a look at a bit of his statement on the cage match. Hey guys, Hunter Biden here. I just got a call from Andrew Callahan. He asked me to come out on the Channel 5 Carnival Tour at the end of the month. I think we start in Phoenix and then we go to San Diego and we end in Albuquerque. And I think he's trying to organize a cage match, me versus Eric and Don Jr. I told him I'd do it 100% in if he can pull it off. And if he can't, I'm still coming. And I think he's got a lot of other surprises up his sleeve, a lot of fun. And I hope I can see you guys out there. You can get tickets online right now and I'll see you out on tour. Is it crazy how much he looks like his dad though? Yeah, it is. Honestly, one day I'm gonna be sitting with my daughter and I'm gonna be looking at her history books and I'm gonna be reading Hunter Biden cage match with Don Jr. as Melania Trump spills the beans on Epstein. And it's just gonna be like, what are we living through? What is this timeline? Could it be at the UFC arena that they're creating on the White House lawn? Imagine that. Imagine Trump boxing Hunter Biden fight. Hunter would be like, the Coke was mine. Right? Like now that he's back. You know, there are a few things that would get me to the Trump White House. I may actually go and watch that and just for shits and giggles if that were to happen. Yeah, I mean, I imagine it's obviously not going to happen. But I do in a serious way feel that when I watch these Hunter Biden clips or I mean, he did long form interview that he is really embodying this fight and also like a pridefulness about being a Democrat and kind of like standing by your policies and what you did. And obviously he's a Biden. So he's going to be very defensive of his father. And now I'm going further obviously into the cage match situation. But do you think that he's a good voice for us and an important avatar, I guess, for the party? No. I mean, yes, I don't know. I mean, I think Hunter has his place in the party. I don't necessarily, I wouldn't consider him an authoritative voice that everyone should be listening to in the party. It's not like he's running for office. He's an elected official. I don't know. I mean, a lot of this kind of just sounds, I just don't want it to get to the point where it's like Hunter is just another like Benny Johnson or just like one of these like grifty type like influencers rather than like he is the president's son. I think Biden is his dad is more of an influential voice and should be speaking up more right now in this moment than Hunter should be using. There's an appetite for Joe Biden to be around. Not necessarily for him to be around, but yes, for him to speak up. I mean, I think that like him, he has massive platform whether or not like regardless of whether or not people fully like him or not. But like even him speaking up in this moment and saying inflation is higher today than it was under my presidency, right? Like just reminding people of what his four years were like because his four years were great for a lot of Americans and the administration just didn't message it at all properly. And he has an opportunity now to kind of juxtapose what we're seeing today versus what we saw during his four years. So I think he should speak up some more even if people don't necessarily like him or want him around. He should still use his voice. That's so interesting because I have the opposite reaction. Oh, really? Yeah. I just like I watched Pete Buttigieg this morning on CNBC on Squawkbob. He was great. And like it was unbelievable. And you took it to Joe Kernan like so hard. Andrew Ross-Sorkin backed him up a bit, like at least on the numbers, obviously they were using the inflation report. And it was like an unadulterated massacre of facts right on there. And seeing him be able to do that as someone who was part of the Biden administration but also had the freedom to criticize the parts that didn't go as well, which he's been doing since the 2024 election, I think is much better than Biden because Biden has proved himself over and over again to not be able to admit the things that didn't go so well. So yes, of course, like there was a global health pandemic and everyone's inflation spiked and we had a better recovery than everyone else. But like to be a broken record about it, like that's not a bumper sticker anyone's interested in. And it was a huge swath of people who traditionally vote Democratic or people who don't vote came out and supported Donald Trump because they felt those four years went so poorly for them. So yeah, no, I mean, I agree with you on that front. For me, it's more of like he has to recognize his faults, but he could also use his voice. He's a former president. I think Obama should be speaking up more than he is, even though he is speaking up a lot as well. Like I think former presidents now it's their time to kind of come up and say like, this is a right George Bush should be speaking up if he doesn't like Trump, right? Like these presidents have power even if people don't necessarily like them as people or what they did when they were in office, speak up and use your voice. All right. I like that. And Obama, I think is going to be out on the campaign trail a ton for the midterms and learned a bit of a lesson from 2024 that we need, we shouldn't need him as much as we do, but we do. I also hope that he really gets to meet the Pope and that that David Azzarra meeting over there. That'd be amazing. I think I'm trying to like sue. I mean, that would be something. We could have another president from Chicago. Erin, welcome back. It was great to have you and I'll see you next week. This is my Friday plea for you to vote for us for the webbies. 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