Will Saletan: A Rogue Presidency

Happy Monday. Welcome to the Bulwark podcast. I’m Charlie Sykes. Joined again by my colleague, Will Saletan. Will, as I was mentioning to you a couple minutes ago, Usually, on Mondays, we have a lot of catching up to do, but, oh my god.

There is so much going on right now. I mean, we have the rather pathetic, said, trombone, exit of to Sanders. We have the New Hampshire primary. We have the weekend with the adult Don to catch up with. But, anyway, happy Monday.

Good to be with you again. Always fun.

Thank you, Charlie. You too. It’s fun for us because we’re covering this stuff. It’s bad for, obviously, America. It’s bad for any Republican candidate other than Donald Trump, and really bad week for NFL kickers.

This was a bad week to be a kicker. Sorry. Sorry for your packers, but

Too soon to talk about the pack your game.

The bills also, you know, there’s gonna be a lot of employment, a lot of churn in the NFL kicking market.

I think it’s gonna be a boom market for sports psychologists.

Over the next few months,

but that’s that is just me. Okay. Can we just start off with one, like, little bright moment? As we all know, Ron DeSantis has quit the race, and he he left. It was so on brand of the way he left.

He, you know, did I sort of a smiling video, which was really awkward. But then he left with a quote from Churchill about something or other, which turns out to be completely bogus. Okay? So his crack staff comes up with this quote, attributed it to Winston Churchill. All the Churchill people said, yeah.

He never said that. Here’s the really good part, though. Okay. This is chef’s kiss. It actually The quote that was not from Churchill actually came from a nineteen thirty eight Budweiser ad.

I’m sorry. It’s like, you know, from from the Shambolic launch with Elon Musk to this sort of pathetic taking a knee, bending the knee. To go to Donald Trump. So give me your thoughts on this. I I I have my piece up this morning.

Actually, it was up last night. The obit for the campaign, which I start off by saying it’s almost too easy. Yeah. With Rhonda’s head, it’s almost too easy. Bad candidate, lousy message, awful campaign.

And then, of course, there’s a Republican electorate that did not want Trump light when they had the real thing. Right? As as somebody said, you know, why would you go see the cover band when the Rolling Stones are still playing. You know, it’s like was on Joe Scarborough this morning, and he was saying, you know, it’s like, if you actually can go see fat Elvis, are you gonna go to Vegas to see a Nova impersonator. No.

They had the real thing. So your thoughts, Ron DeSantis out before the first vote is cast in the first primary. And, of course, immediately endorses Donald Trump, who’s been mocking him accusing him being a groomer, calling him to sanctimonious, meatball run. And look, we’re just used to all this now. Right?

Right. In DeSantis, it’s a fence. The fact is I didn’t realize this came from a Budweiser ad, but that does make it less filling. That’s any right? Pre woke, bud.

Yeah. If you haven’t seen the DeSantis video, not that you wanna watch Ron DeSantis, but that’s as much makeup as I’ve ever seen guy where. I mean, this was a very carefully errors. It’s like the exit was planned for some time. Right?

It was all about the exit. But you’re right. It’s all about Ron DeSantis being a beta being abused by Donald Trump for months and months and then saying I endorse Donald Trump, which is of course, what they’re all doing.

But he was supposed to be the Florida alpha. Right. Turns out to be what it really counts, total thorough beta. And this is his life now.

Right. The way that he went out actually makes perfect sense. He beats Nikki Haley in Iowa, which You know, ten months ago should have been obvious, but he managed to sink so low that he comes back at the end. He just eeks out a second place, which he’s gonna claim as a victory and just before he would get absolutely humiliated in New Hampshire in single digits. Right?

He gets out. So he’ll claim I was the strongest candidate other than Donald Trump in twenty and his ID is gonna run again in twenty twenty eight. Charlie, who is gonna break it to Ron DeSantis that he was the problem? That people don’t like Ron DeSantis for president. And so You can change all the staff.

You can change the strategy, but if your candidate is Ron DeSantis,

you’re gonna lose. And then, of course, there’s the complete, the unanswerable question now. Well, What if Ron DeSantis had actually run against the guy he was running against? What if instead of waiting six months after the midterm elections, and thinking that Republicans cared about legislation and policy and punching the lips and mickey mouse in the face, what if he instead He’d gotten in right away, capitalize on the momentum, and it actually gone after Donald Trump. Would that have made a difference or is the Republican it becomes so trumpified that none of it would have worked.

What do

you again, we’ll never know because he didn’t try. Well, he probably decided that the strategy that you’re proposing, and which is the strategy that Chris Christie tried was gonna undercut him in the long term. Like, he thinks he’s got a long term. So He was either gonna inherit the Trump vote or he was gonna be the second fiddle and get out. I’m guessing that that was his strategy.

Charlie, one of the strangest things for me because I’ve been watching a lot of Ron DeSantis from doing press conferences in Florida running the state of Florida. In Florida, he is an alpha. He is the alpha. And he handles that role quite well. So it’s almost as though he decided he wasn’t gonna play that role in this race.

It was too dangerous to go with Donald Trump. And I think a lot of what we need to talk about today is what we’ve learned about the Republican Party and the falsification of this idea that you could run against Donald Trump and win.

Well, okay. So I think I understand what the strategy was, which is to, move to the right, to make yourself absolutely acceptable to Maga world, you know, Trumpism without the baggage. Trumpism without Trump because and the central calculation was that the Republican base would move on from Donald Trump if certain things happen, including the indictments. Now as shocking as it is to people like you and I, and probably to many of our viewers that Republicans have rallied around Donald Trump despite ninety one criminal Charlie Sykes, despite the fraud case, despite the findings of sexual assault, he was also shocking to Ron DeSantis and to many of that world in conservatism, Inc. That we’re just thinking, you don’t need to go after Donald Trump.

You don’t need to take a shot on because he’s going to go down under his own weight once they come up with these Charlie Sykes. And that really was, you know, the statement of the case here. So his miscalculation was fundamental. So He’s a shock that I think has a lot of other people of what’s happened to the Republican electorate.

What do you think? I agree with that. I don’t know what it is that he thought gonna take Trump down. But clearly, he thought some deus ex machina, something was gonna do it Yeah. For him because he wasn’t gonna do it himself.

Right. One of the tells about DeSantis is is Listen to what he says now about Nikki Haley and why she can’t win. And so even when he was still in the race, it was him, Trump, and Haley. And DeSantis’s line, the whole time was, Haley can’t do it. And the reason she can’t do it is because she can’t win the Magavote.

She’s alienating the Magavote. She’s running against that. So that was a way of him telling what his strategy was, which is I’m gonna be as Maga, more Maga. I mean, he gets out of the race and says Trump wasn’t as anti Fauci as he needed to be. So he was running to the right of Trump.

He was gonna inherit that vote And he believed DeSantis was betting that you can’t win the Republican presidential primaries running against Maga. And I think he’s probably right.

Let’s just play his parting shot as he is, you know, taking a knee for Donald Trump. He’s taking a shot against Nikki Haley.

It’s clear to me that a majority of Republican primary voters wanna give Donald Trump another chance. They watch his presidency get stymied by relentless resistance, and they see Democrats using law fair this day to attack him. Wife had disagreements with Donald Trump such as on the coronavirus pandemic, and his elevation of Anthony Fauci, Trump is superior to the current incumbent Joe Biden. That is clear. I signed a pledge to support the Republican nominee.

Of course. I will

honor that pledge. Yes. My endorsement because we can’t go back to the old Republican guard of yesteryear. A repackage formed of warmed over corporatism that Nikki Haley represents.

Okay. So, Will, what is the warmed over corporatism that he’s talking about here? Not up on my DeSantis speak yet, so Nikki Haley warned over corporatism. Well, one of the hallmarks, I think, of

the twenty twenty four Ron DeSantis campaign was a rejection of the distinction between public and private. That is DeSantis has a fully advocated state interference in private. Disney is the classic example. I don’t like what this company is doing. I don’t like its woke politics.

So I’m going to change the tax laws to punish it. Big tech, he proposed going after big tech. He rejected the traditional capitalist Republican Party that said the government should stay out. We may not like what companies are doing in terms of their politics, whatever, but we don’t do that. And so when he’s attacking the warmed over corporatism of Nikki Haley, I think that’s what he’s rejecting.

This is the end of the Reagan Republican Party. Right? It’s a culturally conservative, but not economically conservative party now.

That’s not just Ron DeSantis, not merely Ron DeSantis. I think that that attitude is gonna suffuse, you know, Moggle world including a second trump term that they are willing to use the powers of the government, the regulatory powers of the government to go after to reward friends to punish enemies to bring people into line. Let’s talk about what’s gonna happen in New Hampshire tomorrow. I wanna have a caveat here that New Hampshire has a long tradition of surprising people. The polls would suggest that Donald Trump is going to romp that even though Nikki Haley did get everything she wanted in terms of a two person race, it is her.

She is the last woman standing. Interestingly enough that it’s a woman in the Republican Party. The last woman standing against Donald Trump, but let’s do a little quick flashback here, Will. This is from Chris Christie. By the way, I really miss Chris Christie today, but I’m probably alone here.

When he was caught on Hot Mike, the day that pulled out of the race talking about Nikki Haley. This is what Chris Christie had to say.

Well, don’t wanna hear it, Wayne. Mhmm. They don’t wanna hear it. We know we’re right. But they don’t wanna hear it.

Right. And and there’s, you know, we couldn’t have been any clearer. Right. If we couldn’t have been any more any more director, worked any harder. So

you know forget she’s been sixty eight millimeters. Yeah. I mean,

well, you spend money. Oh, and you could land a diner and place it like that. Yeah. That’s what you get. I mean, look, she spent sixty eight million so far.

Just on TV. She spent sixty eight million so far. Fifty nine million by Ron DeSantis, and we spent twelve. I mean, who’s punching above their weight and who’s getting a return on their investment. You know?

And she’s gonna get smoked.

She’s gonna get smoked. She’s not up to it. Thoughts on the eve of New Hampshire?

So the reason why I wanted to go back to this this hot mic moment from Christie is I think he got it exactly right. And I think what we’re seeing in New Hampshire is a test of two alternative theories of the Republican Party. One is the Chris Sununu, the governor of New Hampshire theory of the party, which If you can consolidate the anti trump vote, particularly in New Hampshire where a lot of independents, aka undeclared can vote, right, and do vote. It’s an open primary. You can take out trump because the the public party’s ready to move on.

Right? What Chris Christie said on the hot mic was basically we tried this. I’m getting out now because we we tried this idea of trying to find enough Republicans, people who vote in Republican primaries to take out Donald Trump, and we couldn’t do it. He says too. I think it’s his state chairman.

They don’t wanna hear it, Wayne. They don’t wanna we try. We told people the truth about Trump. They don’t wanna hear it. I’m not doing well enough.

And he says about Nikki Haley, she’s gonna get smoked. Now there are many reasons why Nikki Haley could get smoked. Some of is the way she’s running. Right? But some of it is that there aren’t enough Republicans for Nikki Haley that Nikki Haley is winning independence.

She’s winning the undeclared in New Hampshire, but there are enough of them and Republicans in New Hampshire are voting overwhelmingly, and they’re consolidating behind Donald Trump. So I think Charlie Sykes big picture about New Hampshire, the sununu theory about the Republican party is wrong, and the Christie on his way out theory is right.

Alright. We’re gonna come back to, Sununu in a moment. So over the weekend, it is interesting that, you know, this thing is pretty much over. It’s gonna be over in the next forty eight hours. And, you know, one Republican after another is, you know, is coming and embracing Donald Trump.

And I do think that it’s worth spending just a moment, you know, attention ought to be paid to what Donald Trump is doing and saying. And can I read something from my newsletter here? I know it’s obnoxious to do this, but before we spend the weekend with the Adled Don, let’s leave aside for a moment. The defeats, the impeachments, the corruption, the live, the rape, the multiple felony indictments for the moment. Let’s also passover his calls for terminating parts of the constitution.

His claim of total immunity, his malevolence and his bigotry. And the hundreds of thousands of people who probably died as a result of his demagoguery on COVID, let’s leave that aside. Instead, let’s just think about what he did this weekend. You know, and whether it is, you know, praising Victor Orban calling Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong Un, you know, really fine people. They were murderers thugs.

What else signaled it again that that he would surrender Ukraine to Russia. He throws one, under the bus, etcetera, etcetera. And then, of course, there was this entertaining moment where the stable genius confused Nikki Haley with Nancy Pelosi. Let’s just listen to that.

You know, when she comes here, she gets like nine people, and the press never reports the crowds, you know. The way, they never report the crowd on January six. You know, Nikki Haley. Nikki Haley. Nikki Haley, you know, they do you know they destroyed all of the information, all of the evidence, everything, deleted and destroyed all of it, all of it because of lots of things, like Nikki Haley, is in charge of security.

We offered her ten thousand people, soldiers, national guard. So whatever they want, they turned it down. They don’t wanna talk about that. These are very dishonest people.

Okay. So Haley, obviously, you know, jumped on that. Other people jumped Jonathan Last Nancy Pelosi and Nikki Haley are different people. Nikahilly was not in Charlie Sykes Haley was not in government at the time. Okay.

Now considering how

much investment Republicans

are putting into the Joe Biden is senile and he’s losing stuff. It’s really kind of extraordinary. All of the you know, the flubs and the adult rants that Donald Trump is going on, but that was that was kind of a classic moment, wasn’t it?

Totally. Totally. So first of all, I agree with you about the hypocrisy of it. They’re gonna say Biden is addled, but, obviously, Trump is clearly addled here. But the second thing about this thing is Remember, Charlie, every time Trump lies about the twenty twenty election, there’s this debate.

Is he lying, or does he actually believe he won? Right? Oh, I

know where you’re going here.

So I’m still in the camp. That he believes he won. Right? Donald Trump is actually delusional and that this is more dangerous. This episode that we just saw in New Hampshire, is to me more evidence of that.

He’s talking about Nikki Haley. He’s talking about her not having crowds big enough in New Hampshire. And then he sort of in his mind segues to January sixth and what a great day that was. There were all these people who showed up. He’s thinking about Nancy Pelosi and the Capitol And he clearly in his mind has just segued from one world into another, and he’s just transposed the character of Nikki Haley into that world.

And you’re just seeing this guy who’s I don’t know how to describe this. He’s detached from reality. He’s confused to completely different scenes. And you can see how in his mind, he still believes that there were, you know, ballots in the suitcases in Georgia and that kind of thing. This is extremely dangerous.

Fact that this guy is sincere, but delusional, is not comforting.

Oh, right?

Not at all. He could survive the Jack Smith charges of fraud because he actually believed it. Right? And it would make it more dangerous to putting him back in the White House because god knows what he believes, what he will believe about himself once he’s president again, and in the next election. Anyway, I just think this is a window into the delusionality of Donald Trump.

And Nikki Haley to her credit we raise that issue, you know, in the twilight of her campaign. And by the way, you know my formulation, Joe Biden is old. And what Joe Biden needs to say is, yes, I am old, but so is he, and he’s old and dangerous and crazy or crazy and dangerous. Yes. I am old.

I am so old, the blah blah blah. But he’s old too. And he’s crazy, and he’s dangerous. Let’s play Nikki Haley because Nikki Haley actually waits until the the eleventh hour to unleash some stronger attacks on Donald Trump. And by the way, she is not gonna be his vice president.

I don’t think there’s any question about that. Here’s Nikki Haley going after Donald Trump this weekend right before the New Hampshire primary.

I wanna ask you about an ad that you have released. That includes video and testimony from the mother of Otto Warmbier, who

I’m Nikki.

Was an American student from the University of Virginia, who was taken prisoner in North Korea and died, as you know. After the Trump administration did bring him home. Why do you think this story is one you need to tell?

This was a happy smart kid. He went to North Korea. And, I mean, the thugs in North Korea tortured him and returned him back in a state that that is unconscionable. But what did Trump do? He talked about love letters going back and forth to Kim Jong and Cindy would contact me.

She was so upset. And he went and said, oh, but Kim said that he wasn’t aware of any torture that happened to Otto. All you had to do was look at Otto when he was returned back to his parents. But this goes back to a pattern. I mean, we saw this over and over again.

It’s not just that he congratulated China’s president Xi A dozen times after China gave us COVID. He congratulated the Chinese, Communist Party on their seventieth anniversary. We don’t congratulate the Communist Chinese party. I remember at the United Nations. I had to sit him down and tell him to stop this bromance with Putin.

I mean, you can’t have someone who’s trying to buddy up with dictators that wanna kill us.

Boy, you know, you gotta give her credit. Although she clearly thinks that she is living in, you know, in a in a time machine that took her back to twenty fifteen where that’s the way Republicans talked.

The larger point here is this is what it would have sounded like, as you’re saying, if if Nikki Haley had gone after Donald Trump. What we’ve seen this campaign is the rightly or wrongly, Nikki Haley oh, rightly or wrongly chaos follows him. Right? Which I don’t wanna really criticize Nikki Haley for because Charlie, you know, I don’t know if it’s Nikki’s fault, but rightly or wrongly, cowardice has followed Nikki Haley throughout this campaign. Right?

She is not a tacked Donald Trump, but this indictment that she’s delivering now about Trump and the dictators. This is not a rightly or wrongly indictment. This is a wrongly. This is Donald Trump is wrong. This is a Donald Trump love the dictators.

She names the cases we know about, the love letters to Kim Jong un, the stuff about president Xi. But this thing she mentions at the end, I had to sit him down at the United Nations and tell him to stop this bromance with Putin. Have you ever heard this story before? Nope. I’ve never heard this story.

Nikki Haley has told this to all the people who wrote books about Donald Trump seems relevant. She needs to be asked about this. Here is another former Trump official who has a story of directly talking to Donald Trump and his love of dictators and having to talk him out of his bromance with Putin. I wanna hear more about this because clearly it’s more evidence of why the guy that He

doesn’t wait for her book.

Alright. And we know Charlie Sykes she’s gonna endorse it.

Meanwhile, we should spend some time talking about this that this new sort of denialism that’s going on, all of the, you know, smart anti anti trumpers, you know, the ross do that’s of the world. And you know, the Hugh Hewitts are saying, Hugh people need to calm down. He is not really dangerous. He does not pose a threat to democracy. You should stop saying this because you are over caffeinated You are hysterical.

Do not take what he is saying seriously. And yet, here’s Donald Trump, almost on a daily basis saying, no way really do wanna be a dictator. Yeah. I really do wanna be an authoritarian. I really do want absolute immunity.

Let’s just play a sound bite over the Can we just mention the the irony of of him being the law and order guy? Having just said that I want to be exempt from all the laws. Let’s just listen to that.

You have to give a president full and total immunity. And, you know, I liken it to a little bit police. You have to give them back their authority and their power because our country is crime with.

Can hold him accountable for killing people. Right? So it’s like it’s it is interesting that he links that together with police. Which we’ve we’ve talked about before. I’m guessing that if you asked him about, well, what about Qualified Immunity?

He would have no idea what you’re talking about. But then he says this. Having said that he wants full and total immunity from the rule of law, he says this.

We have to go back to being a country of law and order has to do it.

Not for me. And

you will have very seldom, but you will have the rogue. We call it the rogue cop, the bad apple, and perhaps you’ll have that also with president, but there’s nothing you can do about that. You’re going to have to give the president. You’re gonna have to allow a president. Any president to have immunity so that that president can act and do what he feels and what his group of advisors feel is the absolute right thing.

Otherwise, you’re gonna have presidents that are totally impotent.

If they can’t break the law.

We had

enough of them already.

Okay. So, I mean, I get this image you know, the Ross do thoughts of the world that he he would say. Nothing to see here. Nothing to see here. And there’s Trump going away.

Wait. Wait. You know? I need to have total immunity for, like, rogue presidents. Because if I am not allowed to break the law, if I am not above the law, then I’m just not gonna be able to do anything.

Okay. I don’t have a funny way of talking about this because I’m this is really serious.

No.

So, dear American people.

Dear American people.

I don’t know how to talk to, like, I we we’re gonna have an election in November as to whether this guy becomes president again. He’s telling you he is an authoritarian. This is explicit authoritarianism. This is the definition of authoritarianism. So we have a guy who has literally tried to block the peaceful of transfer of power and stay in power after the people voted him out.

He has called explicitly for suspending the constitution to reinstate him. Okay. If that wasn’t enough, so he’s vowed to send, troops into American cities. Again, that’s another trademark of authoritarianism. But this thing that just happened Listen to his words, people.

I want full and total immunity. Charlie, you would talk about the comparison to cops. He’s drawing the comparison. Cops only have qualified immunity. Trump is demanding for himself, unqualified immunity, full and total immunity.

Those are his words. Right? He uses the phrase. He says you have to give presidents their authority and their power. Again, the authoritarian Even rogue president.

Right. Even rogue authority, power, full, and total immunity, rogue cops, rogue presidents. There’s nothing you can do about that. He says. And his definition of what will happen once you give the immunity is the president will have full authority to do, quote, whatever he feels is the absolute right thing.

What he feels. This is the most explicit, concise definition of authoritarianism you can get So, Charlie, we can’t stop Americans for voting for authoritarianism, but it is real clear. We can make it clear what the election is a referendum is. It is a referendum on this.

So if I if I want to, you know, put my knee on the neck of America for a really, really long time, I should be immune from today. You know what the really bad news is? I just had this flash as you were talking that we get at people saying, look, he’s he’s already announcing that he, you know, wants to be the, you know, the rogue president who is immune from the law. I can see Milwaukee, Republican National Convention, Donald Trump strides out on the stage, and behind him in bright lights, rogue president, that he’s actually going to embrace and his people will go out of their minds. Women will weep.

Children will throw their hands up in the air. The rogue presidency. And so even though, you know, we’re warning you understand what he’s saying, he is talking about a rogue, potentially violent, illegal presidency. And if he elected, You can’t say that the American people were not told exactly what they’re getting. And maybe that’s what they want.

His comments about Victor Orban, it’s not just that he has a bromance. Victor Orban, who governs explicitly as an ill liberal leader, ill liberal strong man. And I think quote is something like, yes. Victor Orban is a strong man, and countries need strong men. You know, he’s very explicitly saying that Victor Orban’s illegal authoritarianism is a good model for him, for us.

There’s nothing subtle about it. Meanwhile, This gets worse, doesn’t it? We not only have the denialists out there saying he doesn’t really mean it. We’re also having the sort of the the rationalized and the normalizers. Where do you wanna start with this?

Because we certainly saw that parade over the weekend. Should we start with Tim Scott,

Yeah. Let’s go to Tim Scott, and then we’ll go to Doug Bergam.

Okay. We’ll work up to that. Okay. Here’s Tim Scott, who who, by the way, was appointed to the United States sent it originally by Nikki Haley. And then as a thank you note to her, turned around and endorsed Donald Trump and put on over the weekend.

I mean, if it wasn’t for the DeSantis stuff, well, this is what we’d be talking about. The incredible self abasement of Tim Scott. But here’s here’s Tim Scott rationalizing Donald Trump’s recent behavior.

Senator Donald Trump is watching some pretty personal attacks against Nikki Haley who I know you’ve known for a very long time. He suggested she is eligible to be president, even though she is. She was born in your home state of South Carolina. She, he repeatedly mocked her, given first name, Nimorada, even though she has gone by her middle name, Nikki, her whole life. Are you comfortable with that kind of rhetoric from the president, the former president?

Well, I’m I’m watching rhetoric on on all sides of of the issues facing becoming president. What I mean by that is, so The the the rhetoric from Joe Biden is is terrible, but it is in its salacious. Nicki Haley questions whether seventy year olds should be allowed to run for president. I think there is so much negativity and toxicity in this aim to becoming president again or for the first time that we should be very clear and look at both sides of the comments made.

So what was that fuckwad word salad, Will? Okay.

What is going on in the Republican party right now, is we have the authoritarian telling everyone, hey, I’m an authoritarian. I want a mandate for my authoritarianism. And what’s going on around him is the collapse of all of these Republican politicians into the authoritarian. They’re finding ways to defend or excuse it or look the other way. So Tim Scott’s version of this is the both side stuff.

Right? So part of authoritarianism is I want power and authority, and I don’t want anyone my But part of it, Charlie, what makes it really dangerous in history is targeting minorities. So Trump called for a Muslim ban going after quote Hussein Obama. Now he’s going after Nimorada Nikki Haley, right, now using her Indian first name.

Birther conspiracy theory, which, of course, called

the launch Donald Trump. I mean It is what Trump has always been. The the birther guy. Right? Right?

So ethnic persecution is part of the danger of authoritarianism. So Trump is making it explicit, and Tim Scott is emerging as a minority speaking out endorsing Donald Trump defending Donald Trump as he does this. Right? And what Scott is saying is that the ethnic attacks Trump’s ethnic attacks on Nikki Haley and others are no worse than standard political fair. He’s just saying that’s what, you know, Joe Biden says mean things.

Other people say mean things, both sides, all sides. So that’s a way of normalizing the ethnic bigotry. And that’s how we start to descend further into a mindset where we not only have authoritarian precedent.

I think we are way past normalizing it. It’s almost like the fact that he’s bringing up the birther conspiracy thing didn’t even register. I mean, it’s not it’s barely a speed bump we’ve normalized the normalization of these things. And so he’s asked about these really vicious personal attacks. And I agree with everything you said here.

Just don’t wanna over intellectualize it because it’s also just the the embracing of the total assholery of it. I mean, just the viciousness of it. And Tim Scott cannot bring himself to utter the slightest criticism without shifting into the well, all of the the toxicity It is so pathetic, but also the absolute loyalty, and we’re seeing this again and again that it’s not just enough to say I’m supporting Donald Trump you need to mimic or provide cover for everything he says. You know, like, Elise Thaphonic asked about immigrants poisoning the blood. And she’s raising her hand.

Absolutely. I’m saying that. Whatever he says, they are going to embrace. So This is a shift from twenty sixteen where at least they would go, alright. Well, yes, I disagree with that.

I’m, you know, offended by that. You know, but it’s a binary choice, whatever way they rationalize. Now it’s like no. I’m I’m all in on this. Okay.

You mentioned Doug Bergam. For people who think that Tim Scott was the most cringe worthy person, Doug Bergam was a presidential candidate for about ten minutes. Right? Just kinda was around. He’s the governor of of North Dakota.

Right. I’m asking this because I I just the North Dakota, South Dakota thing always, you know, kinda trips me up. I mean, Christie Nom, maybe the VP is South Dakota. So, he dropped out and endorsed, Donald Trump even though at one time he had said he would never do business with Donald Trump. So here’s Doug Bergam yesterday.

This was one of

the high points of your Sunday morning. I understand. Well, listening to this. I almost threw a brick at the TV if I didn’t have a break. Charlie.

I did have a TV.

So no TVs were damaged in the course of watching this though. Right?

You just thought about it? I thought hard.

Doug Bergam. Okay.

Donald Trump has taken to referring to his opponent Nikki Haley by her given name, a mangled version of that NIMorada. The kind of thing he did with Barack Obama using his middle name Hussein. He’s also reported reposted false conspiracy theories saying she is not eligible to run for president because her Indian immigrant parents were not yet American citizens. She was born in South Carolina. Why do you think he is doing this?

Well, I did all I know is that I believe this election, the primary election is gonna be over after Tuesday. President Trump is leading in all fifty states. No. Please answer the

question, sir.

I think it’s the time.

Yeah. Answer the question about why you think Donald Trump is doing that.

I think it’s politics. You know, Joe Biden launched his campaign a couple weeks ago with a a set of personal attacks on president Trump. He talked about, president Trump. He talked about the law fair that they’re mobilizing to try to slowed him down as a Tennessee. He didn’t talk about inflation.

He didn’t talk about violent crime in our cities. He didn’t talk about the open border where we’ve got a massive invasion and now we’ve had more fentanyl deaths than four Vietnams in our country under Joe Biden in the last three years. No, he talked about attacking his opponent. That’s politics around the world, and it’s politics in America.

So do you think that’s the kind of politics that Donald Trump is using, going after Nikki Haley’s heritage, that will bring a country together?

I think that the the, I mean, you could ask me the question about, you know, what did, Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders and the the, you know, the vicious things they said about Joe Biden even during debates nationally televised within that party. This is all in the norm inside of for for for politics in our country. But once we agree as parties, we get behind candidates. The Democrats got behind Biden in twenty twenty. I’m confident Republicans are gonna get behind president Trump because

Okay. This is normal. This is normal. Calling out somebody’s felony indictments is just exactly the same thing as making fun of somebody’s ethnic heritage and implying that they are perhaps because of their ethnicity or not eligible to be present, completely the same thing, completely normal will. Right?

Right. So the line at the end where he says it’s all in the norm, that’s that’s where I wanted to throw the brick. He’s literally saying we’re, you know, it’s totally normal. The ethnic bigotry is normal. They say claiming that someone because of their heritage is ineligible to run for president, totally normal.

Right? So You might ask yourself, why should we care what Doug Bergam says? Right? As you say, running for president for, like, ten minutes, the governor of the who who cares about this guy? Let me.

And that’s what gets me, though. This guy is a nobody. I mean, not a nobody. He’s he’s a, you know, billionaire or whatever. He’s he’s a he’s a governor, but he was completely unimportant Right?

And Charlie, we we know that all he’s doing is running for energy secretary. That’s what he’s been doing the whole time. Right? And then he endorses Trump right before Iowa. He is the kind of person who makes an authoritarian state possible.

Right? Because he’s a businessman. He’s normal. You know, he’s a family guy. He’s a Christian, whatever.

But when he’s confronted with, then over authoritarianism and over ethnic persecution, he just says, oh, it’s normal. It’s completely normal. I’m ready to stand here beside Donald Trump, be part of Donald Trump’s administration, and defend whatever he does or says.

And this will be, like, top of his resume now. Well, let’s get into the deep stakes in a moment. You’re auditioning to be VP, but also the auditioning to be in the cabinet. The number one thing on their resume is that I defended the most indefensible thing that you did, which proves that I am absolutely loyal. This has now become the thing.

And so, yes, this is authoritarianism, but it’s also kind of the cult, the cult of personality. It’s also the bending the need to the total bottomless narcissism of Donald Trump, that it’s not enough for you to support me. You must no matter what it is. So first interview is going to be, yeah, they tried to get me to say that your racist attack was racist, but I didn’t, mister president. I said it was completely normal.

You know?

Right. If this happens, Charlie, if we have a second Trump administration, it is gonna be full of people like Doug Bergam, like Elise Stefanic. It’s all of these people who simply watch whatever Donald Trump does or says, defend it, excuse it, salute it. That’s their path to slightly elevating themselves from governor of North Dakota to energy secretary or to becoming the House Republican chair. To have an authoritarian state, you need these people.

This is one of them.

Alright. So let’s talk about this beep thing. Is it too early? Is is it too early to talk about this? Because you can tell what the campaign is really ramping up lots of stories, lots of speculation.

What is Will’s take on this?

So my take is that it’s happening right now. So there has been no normal people are not like us. They don’t have to watch a lot of this stuff. But what’s been going on on the campaign trail for the last week or so has been a bunch of Republicans auditioning to be Donald Trump’s vice president. I mean and when I say audition, I mean, literally, they endorse Donald Trump, and the way they endorse it is they go up on stage with him.

And trump stands back with five or ten feet and beams, folds his arms. He’s an authoritarian. Right? And the person does their song and dance. So we’ve seen Elise Stephan do this.

We’ve seen Vivek Ramaswamy do this. We’ve seen Tim Scott trying to think of who else has done it so far. DeSantis wasn’t there in person.

Tim Scott even got engaged. He wants so bad. He got engaged over the weekend. Okay.

Because yeah. I mean and he’s got a fiancee. He’s committed to that person sort of, but he’s really committed to Donald Trump.

Mhmm.

So All of these folks are putting on a show, and I guess Trump is evaluating what? How by the way, Charlie, I need to get some gift advice from you. So I play basketball and I wear some knee pads because you go if you fall on a hard court, you can hurt your knees. Right? Oh.

I have an extra pair that I haven’t used. And I’m wondering whether I can just send this Oh, do you have a prompt? Yeah. Should I should I send a separate pair of knee pads to each of these people too. Stefanic and Ramaswamy and Tim Scott and the others.

Or can I just send one pair and can they circulate? Maybe I could give it to Trump and whoever shows up can wear the one pair? I think it’s completely unnecessary for you to send your knee pads to them because based on their current behavior, they all have their own already.

I think that some of those folks have had those knee pads in the closet for a very long time. So I don’t I don’t I don’t think it’s necessary for you to do it, but I just keep thinking that you need to understand the overriding priority that Donald Trump will have when he thinks about this, that it’s got to be the most loyal, least unpredictable possible candidate, the vice president, and I’m gonna repeat this endlessly, is the one person he cannot fire. He has, I think, still traumatized by, Mike Pence’s extraordinary burst of independence after, you know, four years of being a complete totey. He also knows that in theory, If we actually don’t terminate the constitution, if he’s elected president, he will be a lame duck president, and that vice president will be the heir apparent. And therefore, it will tend actual, you know, different center of power.

So it’s got to be somebody small, unchallenging, and absolutely loyal and dependent. It’s an interesting formulation there. If you put a gun to my head today and said, who’s it going to be? I’d say at least Defonic. But I’m guessing that that in his lizard brain he’s already thinking, he knows who Elise Stephan is.

He knows what a shape shifter she is. She he knows what a completely you know, ambitious opportunist she is. And the fact that she’s from Harvard might give him pause that here’s somebody who is actually cunning completely without principle, may be smart, but are they really going to, you know, be the totey when I really need them to be the totey. So far, the answer is yes, but

I love that analysis. And as you were laying it out, I was looking at my list of candidates here. The four people that I remember over the last week or so going up and doing the auditions are Doug Bergam, Vivek Romaswamy, Tim Scott, and Elise Defonic. Lee Zelda was there, but he’s not in the money. And I ask myself the Charlie Sykes question.

Well, first of all, two of these guys are ethnic minorities, and that’s a big advantage if Trump is going to run a campaign of ethnic bigotry, he’s gonna need a front man. He’s gonna need somebody with dark skin who can rationalize this. Right? So Scott is already doing it. Ramos Swamy, I think, would do it for

him. But

let me come back to the Charlie Sykes test, which is the next January sixth, or, you know, who is the person he can count on to do his bidding when it staying in power. Mhmm. I have to cross out Tim Scott. I don’t think he’s trustworthy. He’s a little too much in danger of being an actual Christian who might actually you know, defend the constitution, do do the right thing.

Like Oh, who might have actual beliefs buried deep down there inside.

I mean, Tim Scott, don’t you think he gives off a little bit of the Mike Pence vibe he might do the right thing. So I would worry about that if I were Trump.

You you can’t have any pesky conscience lurking down there. Right?

Right. Bergam’s a a cipher. I don’t know what you would say about him. Ramaswamy is pretty avid lead pro trump, and he’s never been in politics before. He’s just a businessman.

He’s kind of an authoritarian, a little bit of a libertarian too. But anyway, he might do it.

Yeah. But too erratic, but Stefanic.

She is so hardcore. I mean, I think you make a good point that she’s a shape shifter, but she is so avidly pro trump, and she will defend absolutely anything. She’s the only one I think who’s who has said J six hostages. Right?

Yes. The hostages, the poisoning the blood. She will say whatever she has to say.

Right. So I kinda think if I were Trump, I bet on her to defend me if I needed to override the constitution at the end. What do you think?

No. No. I I think as I said, if if somebody’s had to pick somebody, it would be her. No. The Christie gnomes out there.

I I mean, I think he’s gonna look at it because there’s also that quirk, that King that he has, that Everybody has to look a certain way. They have to be from central casting. So okay. I’m gonna get ripped for this. But if somebody says to Donald Trump, yeah, at least Taphonic is great, but you know she has fat ankles?

That could be enough for Donald Trump because this is a shallow, shallow, small man. So he might look at Christy Norman said, boy, she just looks better. Now, of course, the fact that she’s she’s diddling around with Corey Lewandowski, big negative, But, you know, we’re in a post shame Maga world. Who knows? I just want you not to be too shocked if it’s one of his kids.

Do not be gobsmacked. If it’s one of his kids, I’m

just telling you. I will be gobsmacked if it happens, but not many things, but that would be one of them.

Who else is out there that’s, you know, I in the world?

Well, you mentioned Christy Nome. She’s she could do it.

But I don’t know of of many others. Carrie Lake? No. Too crazy. Yeah.

I think you need crazy at this point. You need someone who’s gonna but he has a woman problem. If you look polls. He definitely does much better with men than with women. So he needs to fix that.

The minority thing is a factor. Another white guy, I just don’t know. I think Trump’s got the white guy vote.

No. At least Defonic is the logical one. And I think, you know, the question is, you know, because she is incredibly loyal, she will be an attack dog she will say and defend absolutely anything. And if it is her job to go after Joe Biden, if it’s her job to go after Kamala Harris, she will do it. However, one of the lessons that we always forget and we need to relearn every cycle is that not everybody scales up.

Ron DeSantis was the ultimate alpha in Florida. But what happened when he tried to scale up? And, you know, not everybody can make that particular leap. And I and I don’t think that people ought to be, you know, tremendously sure I’ve watched her, you know, in some of the press gaggles and everything. And remember, she’s a, you know, a Congress person.

She’s not a governor. She’s not a senator. She’s just a Congress person. And so I’m not sure that she’s had the experience on the national stage.

He doesn’t wanna be overshadowed. No. No. She’s an average man. She owes her whole career to him.

I mean, somebody who owes everything to Donald. Of course, Donald Trump believes everybody including Ron DeSantis. It was everything to him. Right? But have someone who is completely dependent.

I mean, if you’re Trump and you’re afraid of the the Mike Pence scenario, Pence was the governor of Indiana, Pence had an independent. And and that’s the danger. You don’t want someone who actually believes something and who has a base of than you.

Okay. That that’s a very, very good point. And she would be totally his creature. I’m totally dependent on him. I just wonder whether or not she’s too smart for him.

You know, that he would be intimidated by that?

I don’t think smart is relevant. I mean, I think to me, one of the lessons of the Trump era has been that smart doesn’t matter. What matters is courage, what matters is integrity. And she has none of it. In fact That’s true.

Absolutely. Well, to me, what’s perfect about Elise Stephan is She is the inversion of Liz Cheney. She is the person who would do for Trump what Liz Cheney wouldn’t. Right? And she replaced that’s perfect.

The whole point of of a least defining. What she represents in history is a person who advertised her lack of integrity. Right? Liz Cheney had to be thrown out because she believed in something other than Donald Trump. Elise Stephan said, what she won’t do for you, I will.

Now I’m trying not to, you know, there’s obviously a misogynist version, but take out gender. It’s the same point. The person who will do whatever you ask of them. If you wanna call the people who have been imprisoned for crimes on January sixth, hostages of illegitimate government, I will say that for you. I owe my job to you.

I owe my next job to you. I just don’t see that person undercutting Trump.

You’re persuading me, but also your point that, at least Defonic is the, you know, inverse the opposite of Liz Cheney. It’s almost as if

the symbolism is is just too much in

our face here, is that The Republican Party replaces Liz Cheney with her. That they look at Liz Cheney and her integrity and her honor and her commitment to principal, and they say, No. We don’t want that. We want this completely cowardly opportunist instead. And they got her.

And they got her, you know, pretty good. Right.

So Can I bring this back to sort of the demise of the Republic of the Reagan Republican Party?

Yeah.

Yeah. Just for people who for what the Republican party used to stand for. It’s, you know, the limited government, fiscal responsibility, a strong role for America in the world, law and order.

Uh-huh.

So what Donald Trump is doing on the campaign trail in twenty he he he’s been doing this twenty sixteen, twenty twenty, twenty twenty four. It’s all a continuation of just obliterating all of that. Trump is on the campaign trail attacking Nikki Haley for proposing to cut government programs for proposing to cut entitlements. He’s attacking her for supporting aid to Ukraine. You know, we once republicans to be an isolationist party.

He’s attacking law and order. He’s attacking the prosecutors, courts, judges, juries now. We’re at the point of attacking juries and saying it’s it’s all illegitimate. So that is the gradual iteration of everything that it used to be the Republican party. And what you’re left with, of course, is whatever Donald Trump says.

So you’ve gotten rid of Liz Cheney who had, what, a ninety five, ninety seven, ninety eight percent conservative voting record by Reagan Republican standards. Right? You’re just getting rid of all that old stuff. Charlie, I don’t think this party can be reconstituted as the Republican Party.

I don’t see it.

Yeah. The the Reagan Republicans and have left or are leaving the party. A lot of them have retired at the elite level, that at the base level, these people are now voting for Nikki Haley. Donald Trump is complaining that half of Nikki Haley’s voters are gonna vote for Biden in the general. Those are the Republicans who are leaving.

Right? A lot of those people. And so there may be a conservative party in the future, but I think we’re done with the idea that it’s gonna be the Republican party. Because as Chris Christie said, The republican party has presently constituted people who vote in Republican primaries are not gonna vote for a Reagan Republican like Chris Christie.

I do not disagree with you at all. In fact, I I think that, particularly as you think about the generational shift that’s going on here right now. Again, If you would have asked me about this back in twenty fifteen, twenty sixteen, twenty seventeen, I would have said, you know, there’s gonna be no youth magma movement. I mean, young people are gonna be absolutely repelled But the reality is that most of the people who are, as you described them as Reagan Republicans, they’re aging out. They’re leaving.

They’re retiring. They are, you know, yesterday’s. You know, the when you see the letters from, you know, former government officials or ex members of Congress, the key thing is former and ex. That there are as a younger generation. Again, they may be a minority of young people, a substantial minority of young people, but as notina Win was scribing in her book on Secret Podcast last week.

There’s this huge infrastructure bringing in an entire new generation into politics, and those folks are gonna be around for twenty, thirty, forty years. In the Republican Party. And I don’t see that shifting anytime soon. I mean, there is an historic shift of the Republican Party from being an international party, which it has been released since nineteen forty. But, you know, after twenty twenty four, there will be almost no vestiges of that left.

And it may be I mean, how many years, you know, was that run? It may be, you know, thirty, forty, fifty years before this party changes its direction again. I don’t know. I mean, I’m sorry to leave on that particular dark note, Will. So, by the way, it is January twenty second.

Can you imagine how much smarter we’re gonna be one year from today? Assuming we’re still around.

You know, Charlie, I feel bad because not once today. I’ve got a pony on my shelf here and not once I felt like reaching for the pony? I guess

was not a pony day.

This was not pony day. This was knee pad day, unfortunately. Yeah.

I think we’re gonna have many, many more knee pad days than pony days coming up. Will is great talking with you. We’ll do this again next Monday. Alright? Alright, Charlie.

And thank you all for listening to today’s Bullworth podcast on Charlie Sykes, we’ll be back tomorrow, and we’ll do this all over again. Bohr contest is produced by Katie Cooper, and engineered and edited by Jason Brown.