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US POLITICS CHOOSING THE VP Breaking Trump News [10PM] 8/4/2024 \| 🅼🆂🅽🅱️🅲 Latest Trump August 4, 2024 PLAY YOUTUBE VIDEO Original article: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FDqAJLLX9-M Peter Burgess COMMENTARY Peter Burgess
Breaking Trump News [10PM] 8/4/2024 \| 🅼🆂🅽🅱️🅲 Latest Trump August 4, 2024 103K subscribers Aug 4, 2024 Transcript 0:00 [Music] good evening tonight on aiman the final test we're live outside the home of Vice President Harris with her announcement of a running mate due any moment as one of the contenders posts a cryptic message on X and then deletes it and do VP do VP picks even matter Donald Trump says they do not which JD Vance is wearing as a badge of honor plus how to buy a president one effort is flying under the radar while another unfolds in plain sight I'm Sam Stein in for Aman moyin let's do it all right decision day it's upon us at any moment between now and Tuesday the first big decision of kamla Harris's presidential campaign and of her presidency possibly it will be announced or it will be prematurely leaked NBC News has confirmed that vice president Harris has had in-person meetings scheduled with three vep contenders today that's Minnesota Governor Tim 1:05 Waltz Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro and Arizona Senator Mark Kelly who just sparked speculation onx about that meeting which we'll get to in a moment but all this is going down as a new head-to-head CBS poll of likely voters show Harris leading Donald Trump by onepoint nationally while they are deadlocked in Battleground States so with the race essentially tied which direction will vice president Harris choose to take what attributes is she prioritizing in a running mate and what will the choice reveal about Harris and her leadership style let's begin tonight live outside the vice president's residence at the Naval Observatory in Washington it's where you find NBC News White House correspondent Ali Rafa Ally what is going on in the last sen in the last hour Senator Kelly posts on x quote my background is a bit different than most politicians I spent my life serving in the Navy in at Nasa where the 2:02 mission always comes first now my mission is serving arizonans he's now deleted it does he not know we're all sort of reading every single sign what is happening here yeah Sam just to prove to you how much attention is on everything these top contenders say and do that post on X in which he said that his mission is to serve arizonans immediately fueled questions speculations over whether this was a veiled announcement that Kelly was not in the running to be a VP uh running mate the pick for vice president Harris anymore that tweet was deleted moments later and then Kelly posted a second post on X showing him with two men in army uniforms with the caption quote when your country asks you to serve you can always answer the call so just showing the spotlight that is on these contenders really in the home stretch here as Harris prepares to make this critical decision and we know that Kelly 3:01 was one of three top contenders that vice president Harris met with in person today here at the Naval Observatory those other candidates being Minnesota Governor Tim Waltz and Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro that ability to meet with them in person obviously giving her an opportunity to get a sense of their character their personality see whether she connects with them on a personal level before she has to make this decision and the timeline for that is getting Tighter and Tighter she is expected to appear for the first time with her pick on Tuesday when she's going to appear at a rally in Philadelphia before she embarks on this major Battleground state tour hitting States like Georgia Nevada Arizona Wisconsin and Michigan and given that timeline this increasingly uh historic historically fast vetting process that usually takes months that she's had to squeeze into two weeks we expect her to use every minute that she has before making this decision which of course has to be made before Tuesday s 4:00 yeah some poor social media uh staffer uh is going to get a yelling at or maybe 4:06 it was all cryptic for a reason NBC's Ali Rafa thank you so much really appreciate it and joining me now Molly 4:12 junk fast MSNBC political analyst and special correspondent at Vanity Fair and 4:17 basil Smigel MSNBC political analyst and Columbia University Professor thank you both for being here uh 4:25 basil I I mean we're like reading like little bits of information that we can get our fingertips on but what do you 4:31 make of this uh since deleted post from Senator Kelly yeah I I feel for the social media 4:39 staffer there if it was indeed an accident uh because you know we we we've 4:44 all been in similar situations where you may make a little mistake like that and you unfortunately set off a whole uh set 4:52 of um uh of media uh engagement how you know but you know if it was something 4:59 that was somewh intentional you know I think it's uh might be a good thing to just keep everybody guessing right um 5:05 but you know Kelly is a man of Inc impeccable you know service to his to 5:11 his country and I think he just wants to reinforce that uh as he's having these conversations to make sure that 5:17 arizonans don't feel that he's leaving them behind whether he joins the ticket or not um the goal is for him to convey 5:24 to them that he always has their best interest in mind I think that's what that tweet uh did get across um but you 5:32 know with all the speculation um they should know not to put something out there and then take it back and and no 5:38 one talks about it exactly but for all we for all we know it could have been a SK a scheduled tweet that just they 5:44 forgot to un schedule and then look at we're talking about on the news uh Molly um look I mentioned that CBS poll today 5:52 uh it shows the race statistically in a dead heat really in a dead heat according to CBS the reason that this 5:59 race is now a tossup is because Harris has seen a boost in Democratic excitement um yeah how does that impact 6:07 or how should it impact I should say how her team goes about this VP selection 6:12 process obviously you don't want to put a wet blanket over that excitement at the same time maybe you're looking a bit 6:19 down the road and saying we need to appeal to a more Centrist independent electorate once we get to officially the 6:26 general election season well Harris is only only been in the race for 2 weeks which is kind of 6:32 incredible and she's raised hundreds of millions of dollars and the uh the roll 6:38 out has been I think as seamless as anyone could have hoped and so I think 6:45 she has really good team and you know I've interviewed her and written about her a lot when she you know as vice 6:51 president and I think her team has gotten really really good and then she had and you know Biden also had this 6:58 kind of amazing apparatus and so now they're sort of Unleashed and you see this on their social media they're kind 7:05 of exciting and and you know there's certain kind of galvanized Force so I'm 7:11 not so worried about who she picks look historically well this is a meaningful 7:16 thing and Biden was like you know a good example of this he was a quite a good VP 7:21 pick for Obama I think that it doesn't totally matter though I do think it's 7:27 important to point out she did want someone who who had executive experience a governor and uh she has some really 7:33 good Governors to choose from including I would not sleep on Tim 7:39 Walls well yeah Tim Walls is uh the candidate peers of the progressive uh 7:45 electorate uh Basel I want to talk to you about the candidate who's kind of you know these are sort of rudimentary 7:50 uh manufactured Lanes but let's talk about the one who seems to be occupying the more Middle Lane which is Josh 7:56 shapira Pennsylvania Governor a few headlines that have come out recently about him quote shapir faces scrutiny 8:02 over sexual harassment complaint against Aid quote some public education Advocates are pushing against Josh 8:08 Shapiro's Harris's vpic because he supports School vouchers quote Pro Palestinian groups seek to thwart Josh 8:15 Shapiro's chances for Harris's VP and here's an interesting one quote Federman that would be John fedman has concerns 8:21 about Shapiro for VP AIDS tell Harris's team look this happens obviously as you 8:28 get to this critical juncture but um on a meta point do all these headlines these critical headlines about Shapiro 8:35 just affirm that he is the front runner or is it affirming that he's the 8:41 riskiest candidate for Harris or both yeah I think both things can be true 8:46 that he you know if you listen to him speak on the um in these rallies he's incredibly energetic he knows how to 8:52 push back he knows how to hit hard um and in some ways you know I think that 8:57 is going to be an asset should he ever be chosen to the to the Harris ticket 9:03 because they're going to be so many knives coming at her they they already are um so he'd have this opportunity and 9:10 he's proven that he's had this ability to really be sharp and um and and be able to push back forcefully on the 9:17 other hand uh you know what of the key uh sort of points you want to keep in 9:23 mind is that this pick should do no harm and you know as as Molly talked about 9:29 um she's had this incredible two weeks she's going to have to have a near Flawless you know couple you know 10 9:37 weeks or whatever the case is going forward um and you know they're gonna have to be really careful I'm sure they 9:42 can do it but the last thing you want to do is having to respond to certain constituencies and in the media about 9:49 something that your VP pick has done because that to your to sort to your point earlier does tend to slow things 9:54 down and Tamp down on that energy right and we should know Shapiro just returned home to not answer questions about his 10:01 meeting with Harris um I want to kind of delve on that fedman story um the two 10:07 have a history according to Politico fed's advisor suggested to Harris's team that uh the senator believes that 10:14 Shapiro is excessively focused on his own personal Ambitions um well first of all welcome to politics right uh but 10:22 secondly is should that be I should that be a concern right I mean you want loyalty obviously you want someone who 10:29 you can trust this is not just a sort of a vanity project this is not just an election project it's a governing 10:36 project right you presume you're going to win uh Molly is that something that you think is problematic I guess the 10:42 secondary component of this is do you think progressives will ultimately get in line or be excited about the ticket 10:48 if Shapiro is the choice so I would take I would say two things criticizing a politician for 10:54 being too ambitious is is pretty wild I mean that isn't that what they do and um 11:01 you know I would think actually being ambitious is kind of a good thing for a politician um I I just want to say back 11:08 to Tim Walls for one second here he does he is the only one of these people who has significant military experience so 11:16 even though he may be a progressive choice because of his work with School breakfast and he was an educator I still 11:23 think of him as someone who might sort of you know he has actually served in the military he was an enlisted man so 11:30 that is I think quite relevant and important and I think look so far Harris 11:36 has H Harris has really gotten Progressive as excited in a way that Biden did not she has a really she's 11:43 become a really gifted orator sort of Obama level excitement here so I I think 11:49 she can probably do you know it's the vice president it's not the president but um I do think what basil is talking 11:56 about when he says Do no harm she has so much to deal with and the stakes here are so high that I think both Democrats 12:05 and her team realize that this kind of she has to be careful right well there's 12:11 Do no harm but there's also let's you know dial it up to 11 right and that the case for Tim Walls is basically you got 12:18 all this Progressive uh enthusiasm this Democratic enthusiasm here's a guy who can just amplify it he may not add a 12:25 critical State like Pennsylvania but he's got the message and uh let's just talk about this guy Midwestern Governor 12:32 military veteran teacher football coach legislative experience in Washington uh that could come with some complications 12:38 lots of votes taken but still and now uh some interesting headlines about him apparently Nancy Pelosi thinks highly of 12:44 him according to the hill and Bernie Sanders um quoted this weekend saying that walls would quote speak up for 12:51 working people as VP um look he doesn't bring you Pennsylvania that's the most 12:56 important state but he does add a lot of interesting components the ticket uh talk about what he could bring uh to the 13:02 Harris campaign well you know I've been hearing a lot more about him over the last few 13:07 days so if he's doing his own um Outreach and trying to build support for 13:12 his own candidacy he's done a really great job got a wonderful resume as well and I would tell you there are in many 13:19 ways you know we think in terms of conventional wisdom should the VP bring 13:24 you a state or a region you can also think about it in terms of bringing you a whole constituency right so it could 13:30 be Progressive voters it could be um Suburban voters or independent voters and frankly I think he hits all of those 13:37 marks you know I I wonder if um you know how much young voters are going to 13:43 respond but you know he was a coach you know if he talks in those terms if he talks about the kind of relationship 13:49 that he has with young people right um that you know I I I think that that certainly resonates but I there is no as 13:56 far as I can see I've been a bit agnostic on the choice but if he were the to be the the choice um I do think 14:03 he he resonates with a lot of constituencies that if you don't even if you don't get the region you can even 14:09 get the turnout in in blue States for example and help you down ballot right 14:15 well this is truly the silliest of silly seasons in political reporting I will say we have late breaking news on X uh 14:23 Senator Kelly's comms director tweeting this this is not news go back to your 14:28 Sundays every bu um noted I will take that under advisement although we do 14:33 have another hour and 45 minutes of the show so don't go back to your Sunday too quickly stick around including you too 14:38 Molly and basil we will have more from you later in the show because we have to talk about Trump snubbing his own VP 14:45 pick and while JD Vance sees it as a badge of honor that and more after the 14:54 break for Donald Trump it's clean up on Isle 47 with his historically unpopular 15:00 running mate JD Vance who continues to get hit by a series of seemingly 15:05 NeverEnding Revelations from his past just listen to Trump's low energy pitch to supporters in 15:12 Atlanta they go after JD you know why he's for the worker he's done great he's 15:18 done great he's been everything we could have expected and much more so JD thank 15:23 you very much heart didn't really seem into that one sure Trump might be blaming others 15:28 for attacking his running mate but in reality no one's undermined Vance more than Vance but Trump hasn't really 15:34 helped either take Trump's highly criticized interview at the National Association of black journalists 15:40 conference last week when he said this about Vance's impact on the upcoming 15:46 election historically the Vice President in terms of the election does not have any impact I mean virtually no impact 15:53 you're voting for the president and you can have a vice president who's outstanding in every way but you're not 16:00 voting that way you're voting for the president you're voting for me and even more baffling now I guess he 16:07 has to do because Trump said it is how Vance himself is downplaying his own 16:12 relevance my attitude is it doesn't really care as much as this is doesn't really matter as much as this is hit to my ego people are going to vote 16:19 primarily for Donald Trump or for kamla Harris right that's the way these things 16:25 go even fox fox is asking Vance if Trump made a mistake picking 16:31 him some people are saying you were the wrong pick for Trump's running mate what 16:36 are you doing about it I actually take their criticism as a badge of 16:42 honor all right my panel is back with me now uh basil uh Trump can try and make 16:49 the case for JD he can all he wants does not change the fact that they've both 16:55 undermined JD Vin's importance on the race in just the last few days saying he doesn't even matter what do you make of 17:01 this is this just like cutting bait basically well that's how it certainly 17:06 comes across and I feel that way it is true that voters tend to pay attention more to the top of the ticket but the 17:13 person you choose as your number to is going to signal to the voter your governing style your leadership style um 17:20 now going back to the point I made earlier about Do no harm if you the top of the ticket Donald Trump in this case 17:27 has to constantly you know apologize for or talk about your running mate and not 17:35 what you're going to do then that's that in and of itself is a loss the old the old adage is if you're explaining you're 17:41 losing and JD van is explaining a lot about himself in his past Donald Trump 17:46 seems to be uh in a position to have to explain him away in many instances and 17:51 look I think it's all a big sign that the campaign in many ways is flailing um 17:58 they uh have to go after KLA Harris and they don't know how to I mean nothing they're working they're doing is 18:04 sticking it's not working and this is sort of the result that they're spending most of their time talking about Jade he 18:10 fan you're right well I want to actually stay on that idea of whether VP picks 18:15 actually matter right so in recent history let's just go through a couple I would argue Mike Pence really did help 18:21 Trump reach Evangelical voters in a way that he couldn't at least in 2016 that's 18:27 wholly different get to that in a second I would argue that Joe Biden helped Barack Obama sort of flush out the 18:34 ticket by giving him a little bit of sort of senior Statesman gravitas and foreign policy experience in a way that 18:39 Obama locked on the flip side I'd argue that Sarah Palin was objectively a disaster for the McCain pick I think the 18:45 McCain veterans have said as much so Molly look are we at a place with Trump 18:52 that everyone knows who he is you either hate him or you love him and it doesn't matter or is this a missed opport 18:59 or could it possibly hurt him uh that the way that van pick has been uh sort 19:04 of unveiled this way well I want to go back to what you were saying before about Mike Pence 19:11 because Mike Pence was actually an incredibly important pick for Donald Trump he did give a permission structure 19:18 for evangelicals to support him and Pence was you know a red State Governor 19:23 an old school guy he had been a conservative radio host he had this kind 19:29 of real kind of cred with these evangelicals which really did give them 19:35 the permission to support him so I I think it's interesting that Trump is so 19:41 negative on his vice president now and and it you have to wonder but yeah I mean I think that it does matter and I 19:49 mean you know look in a in if elections are as tight as they have been previously then everything matters right 19:56 then there's no nothing you want throw off and you know what state and who the person is and who they excite those are 20:03 all important so I think you're right and I think a good pick balances the ticket so yeah I think I totally agree 20:10 with that well Basel let me let me press to you then I guess the same sort of question which is there's there's a case 20:16 to be made that opinions on Trump are just so cemented at this juncture that 20:21 it really actually doesn't matter who he picks right like you either love the guy or you hate the guy you're not going to 20:26 win over new voters because you picked Marco ru or Doug bergham and you're not going to lose him if because you picked 20:31 JD Vince do you not does that not uh hold sway for you do you think there is something changable to be gained or lost 20:38 by this pick yeah know I actually go to Molly's point because it's a it's a very important one when when voters weren't 20:45 sure about who Donald Trump was and what he would bring to an actual presidency 20:51 um Mike Pence definitely gave him that permission a certain constituency that permission structure I don't know what 20:57 you get from from J what he gets from JD v um frankly and I think he's realizing 21:04 that right now he he's not exactly sure what he's getting from JD vs um and again I go back to the point if you're 21:11 explaining you're losing he getting headaches if you're explaining you're losing and right now you know he's not 21:17 it's it's campaign should be additive um right you got to add constituencies you got to add voters add regions uh add 21:25 geography build your base build on your base don't subtract from it and I think 21:30 what the Trump campaign is realizing that all of the gains that they thought they had or were going to get are now 21:38 starting to whittle away well hey Molly let's take a look at how Vance is acting 21:43 on the trail he's not really doing himself many favors uh take a look at these remarks that he made on the trail 21:48 as he did last night in in Atlanta for the rally take a watch here she wants to take away your gasos 21:55 she even wants to take away your ability to eat red meat we think it's weird that 22:01 Democrats want to put sexually explicit books in toddler's libraries we think it's weird that the 22:08 far-left wants to allow biological males to beat the living crap out of women in 22:14 boxing so is he not proving the point sort of by just focusing on the quote 22:19 weird things and the culture War stuff that he in fact is kind of obsessed about that stuff and almost weirdly 22:25 obsessed about that stuff I I don't know what's in his head but I do remember the uh gas stoves and 22:33 the takeaway or hamburgers from previous cacs and this has been something that Trump has run on and it hasn't been 22:40 super successful right this is nobody really thinks conservatives are going to take away gas stoves you know uh the 22:48 green New Deal remember when they were so mad about the green New Deal and hamburgers I mean I I think that this is 22:54 like not a I don't it doesn't seem Salient to me and there are you know ways in which 23:01 they can you know that they could make more of a case for themselves but again I would hearken back that a lot of these 23:07 Republican policies like abortion are not super popular so he's just sort of 23:12 you know they're just trying to figure out what to run on and it's not abundantly clear yeah well M Jun fast 23:21 Bas Michael thank you so much really appreciate it great conversation we'll be following all the tweets from vice presidential contenders in their comms 23:28 Direct all night I'm sure and up next what ties Donald Trump Egypt's President 23:33 and $1 million together stick around for the 23:39 answer throughout Donald Trump's 2016 election campaign he had a bunch of 23:45 questionable friends but there's one in particular that many didn't quite understand especially after months of 23:51 vitriolic anti-muslim reic from Trump he's a fantastic guy took control 23:58 of Egypt and he really took control of it and I thought it was a great meeting we met for a long time actually we had a 24:04 long meeting and got along there was a good chemistry there you know when you have good chemistry with people you're 24:10 the king of that and there was a very good chemistry good feeling between us now Trump was referring to Egyptian 24:17 president alisi his comments came at a time when he needed a critical Financial 24:23 boost to his election funds and about a month later Trump made a personal donation to his own presidential 24:30 campaign another check for $10 million I'm spending money 24:35 like crazy now a new investigation by The Washington Post is shedding some light 24:42 on the potential source of this money it reveals new details about a secret probe by the justice department that looked 24:48 into whether money moved from Cairo to Trump which would be an illegal move and 24:53 if a contribution from Ali may have factored into Trump's decision to pour his own money into the campaign 25:01 in the final years of Trump's presidency the case died a slow death because of a key Ally or key allies I should say in 25:08 the administration including then attorney general Bill bar joining me now 25:13 to help make sense of all of this is the Washington Post investigative reporter Aaron C Davis he is the author co-author 25:21 of this amazing piece of Journalism Aaron thank you for joining us even though uh the post was not able to 25:27 conclude whether the transaction between CC and Trump actually occurred uh what do the new details tell us about the 25:33 likelihood that it did well they tell us a couple of really interesting things um we were able to 25:39 find that there was uh not just a talk of this there was actually nearly $10 25:46 million that left a bank in Cairo five days before Donald Trump was inaugurated 25:53 this was a a transaction that actually information about this the inkling of this had come to the US government via 26:01 the intelligence community and they had an informant uh providing information that such a transaction was underway 26:07 they also had uh the CIA had corroborating information that CC wanted this transaction to Donald Trump to take 26:14 place and with that information at hand the Mueller team uh the for for former 26:19 special counsel went looking for this transaction fought the Bank of Egypt for these records and lo and behold when 26:26 they did find them uh found a withdrawal and not just any $10 million withdrawal 26:32 one in cash specifically $100 bills and US currency uh weighing some 200 pounds 26:40 uh that was carried out of by the Banks own admission was carried out of the bank by for men 5 days before the 26:45 election so this was a lot of smoke uh everybody involved with this investigation thought there was just far 26:51 more uh information than you usually have to go on in a moneya laundering case uh and you know what we found is 26:57 can so take a minute but we found that they basically over the course of a couple years really backpedal slow pedal 27:04 this investigation Bill bar uh Trump appointed us attorney Jesse Lou questioned whether was there was 27:10 evidence to go forward and keep looking at this well let me start from the Trump 27:16 perspective this would have been a huge risk for Trump uh to do it's against 27:22 federal law uh and if his team did receive the money what was there to gain 27:27 I mean how desperate was he for cash at that point well we do know from the 27:33 interviews that the Mueller team did uh that uh Steve Bannon Michael Flynn were 27:40 all uh you know Jared Kushner were all seeing different pieces of just how uh 27:46 short the campaign was on cash uh one of the 302s from the FBI at the time said they were really pressing him for $50 27:53 million they couldn't get 50 they couldn't get 25 eventually uh you know they kept pressing him for 10 and he 27:59 only agreed to do it on the condition according to Steven bannon's interview with FBI that it was a loan that he 28:05 could be repaid for this $10 million remember at that point in time though he did win the election it didn't look like 28:11 he was going to win the election uh and everyone around and believed he was no longer willing to put any more money into his into his campaign and you know 28:19 it's funny it's not funny I shouldn't say that I do recall at the time uh special counselor Robert Muller is 28:24 leading this Russia interference probe um he's also leading this uh investigation or uh he's looking into I 28:31 should say this interference case the public does not know about the Egyptian one it is hyperfocused hyperfocused on 28:38 the Russia investigation Trump's out there saying oh it's all a Witch Hunt um from a strictly political lens was was 28:46 this almost like in a benefit to Trump that so much attention was being paid to a more complicated esoteric Russia probe 28:54 and that the simple sort of financial transaction from Egypt went completely 29:01 unrecognized it's an interesting question you know this one was in the eyes of many people around it familiar 29:06 with it but we've spoken to this was the one that seemed uh to many really the red hot one they had $10 million was it 29:14 was much a clearer case to look at and it broke down because uh the Muller team 29:20 did go forward and pulled some of Trump's bank records from 2016 uh analyzed those didn't see any 29:27 money from Egypt but then just as the Muller team is is closing down they 29:32 finally win the case with the Bank of Egypt and realize this money actually come in in the early 2017 and it really 29:38 there was a really unfortunate timing for this investigation uh because you know politically aside uh investigation 29:45 structure really was changing and it was going back under the normal doj process where Bill bar Jesse Lou people that 29:53 Trump had appointed were the ones who would make the final decision about it Aaron just quickly we only have a minute 29:58 left but it's my understanding that President Biden and the doj current doj could have reopened this case why 30:06 haven't they well uh there was a comment by the by the former acting us attorney who 30:12 closed the case saying that you know there's a problem here they could have reopened the case you have to do 30:17 remember that this was the new Administration is coming into January 6th hundreds of cases uh they've also uh 30:24 the whole way that Meritt Garland came in and wanted to change the way that the justice department was working was to 30:30 not be the one the political appointee saying you should investigate this you shouldn't investigate that to let it Bubble Up From The Bottom and so as we 30:37 understand it no one brought it to him no one was even aware of of Bill Bar's direct involvement in this 30:43 case remarkable remarkable Aaron C Davis uh incredible uh bit of Journalism that 30:49 you have in the post thank you very much and after the break we will follow the money even further with a paper trail 30:55 leading to Trump's Media Company stock [Music] 31:01 for anyone following the media industry you know that it's been a pretty volatile time there are regular stories 31:07 about layoffs consolidation a very uncertain future ahead which makes the 31:13 story of a media company trading on the NASDAQ stock exchange under the name 31:18 djt quite notable despite operating at a staggering loss losing 31:23 327 million that's within M dollars in the first quarter of 2024 despite having 31:29 a small user base and despite most Wall Street analysts thinking that the stock is pretty much worthless this past week 31:36 djt was trading at close to $30 per share that put the company at a roughly 31:42 six billion with a B dollar evaluation all right so what exactly is 31:48 this company doing right are they industry Geniuses who figured out a way to build a modern and sophisticated and 31:55 profitable Media Company not exact L the letters djt stand for Donald John Trump 32:03 and that ticker symbol represents his company Trump media and Technology Group 32:08 whose sole product is the not exactly po not exactly popular social media site 32:15 truth social all right so what's going on here New York Magazine took a deep dive into the company this week and 32:21 concluded two things first that Donald Trump's media company is basically a six 32:28 billion dooll meme stock like GameStop AMC and others before it this Stock's 32:33 ups and downs aren't related to the actual strength of the company but to Vibes and unlike GameStop and AMC the 32:41 value of this company is completely tied completely to the perceived power of one 32:46 man you guessed it Donald Trump and as a presidential candidate that makes this stock an unprecedented opportunity for 32:55 corruption Donald Trump is the largest St shareholder ER in this company controlling an almost 60% stake so 33:02 anyone looking to Curry favor with Trump could in theory just buy advertising on 33:07 Truth social at inflated prices or they could buy lots of shares of the stock 33:13 basically filtering cash into Donald Trump's pockets and boosting his net worth and currying his favor Trump is 33:21 temporarily barred from selling his shares but that restriction expires in September so come September 33:28 Trump can begin to turn his paper gains into real ones but there's another way Trump's 33:34 company is R for corruption propublica reported last week that Trump media has 33:39 quietly entered into a deal with a company run by an energy magnet and a 33:45 large Republican donor named James E Davidson as Pro republ notes Davidson 33:50 owns a major stake in Genesis energy it's a large oil Pipeline and Mining 33:56 firm Davidson family also has a stake in a regional bank and owns a small defense 34:01 contractor now here's the catch some of these companies already lobbied the first Trump Administration for tax 34:08 breaks what might they do what might they want if Trump gets a second 34:14 term when we come back I'll be joined by the author of New York Magazine's how to buy a president David 34:23 friedlander now before the break I told you about how Donald Trump's public publicly traded Media Company should be 34:30 raising huge red flags as New York Magazine puts it Donald Trump's joke of a media company is also a $6 billion 34:38 doll meme stock and an unprecedented opportunity for corruption well joining 34:43 me now is the author of that piece David freedlander David thank you for joining us really appreciate it uh this is a 34:50 fascinating and somewhat troubling story uh as with uh so many things Trump uh 34:56 related you write about how this new meme stock might not have happened if it wasn't for The Apprentice can you 35:01 elaborate on that yeah it's kind of an odd story um in order to sort of figure out why 35:07 Donald Trump is about to get you know a major payoff you have to go back uh to season two of The Apprentice uh where 35:13 two of the contestants who were fired really because they screwed up um 35:19 putting together a blue jean catalog um Donald Trump thought that they uh had 35:24 not included enough butt shots um in catalog they put together so he like you 35:31 know cut him off right there that was the end of them and but they they sort of um they kind of stayed in the larger 35:36 Trump Network um in various forms and then once uh you know it's kind of hard 35:42 it's kind of been a you know if you haven't been paying attention the last 15 years how the guy who thought the the butt shots were missing from the catalog 35:49 he then became president of United States um and then got kicked off social media for inspiring a riot at the 35:56 capital and these guys came back into his life um and said you know we have an idea for a social media company and and 36:03 Trump was interested yeah you're just your classic Shakespearean drama 36:08 there how every president becomes ex such a classic political story um so you 36:15 you do write uh how like other meme stocks um the up and downs of this one aren't really related to any actual 36:22 perceived business strength right it's mostly Vibes and in this case it seems like like when Trump's in a good 36:29 political moment it goes up and when he's in a bad one it goes down I want to actually show you this amazing headline 36:36 uh from a few days ago it it reads this quote Trump media shares close up more than 30% after assassination attempt uh 36:44 one estimate said that the value of Trump's stake ballooned by $1.2 billion putting his stake at 36:51 4.7 billion dollar um you know obviously 36:56 the reason it went up is because they thought he was going to get elected or more likely to be elected after the assassination attempt my question is the 37:03 inverse though what happens to the company if he starts to look like he's going to be a loser or if he does lose 37:09 does does the stock just Bott him out yeah I mean I think the stock probably starts B Bing out a little bit 37:16 I mean there there's no real business here like if if someone were to think of the the kind of fast food franchise 37:22 nearest their home that has roughly the revenue of true social um you know if anyone 's ever been on true social I 37:29 mean you get pretty bored pretty quickly just because there's really nothing on it um you know they've talked about sort 37:35 of expanding into other areas um you know video on demand component things like that um but there's no there's no 37:41 real underlying business here so yeah I mean I think that uh should Trump's political fortunes uh start to tank I 37:47 think the stock would tank and you would imagine he would sort of start to look to sell at that point um I mean we're 37:53 kind of nearing the end of of the lockout period right September is the end of the lock period so call could all 37:59 come crashing down in spectacular fashion or it could be the greatest stock purchase ever right um explain 38:05 though how this is a vehicle for corruption uh or could be potentially because it's a worthless stock the 38:10 company loses a ton of money and yet it's valued at6 billion dollar is that just people who want to Cay favor with 38:16 trump propping it up well I think some of it is just people you know like there's there's a bunch of trump super 38:21 fans out there I mean I think if you sort of like have bought all the Maga hats and the sneakers and the NF sees 38:28 you know this is probably a good you know another place to like show your enthusiasm for Donald Trump right um so 38:35 so there is like that group of sort of like you know people buying shares in it and then there are another group of 38:41 people who I think do want to influence um the next president I mean you you talked about that that great propublica 38:47 story um you know I mean there's all sorts of people it's it's a great way to just 38:53 like well I think some of it is just people you know like there's there's a bunch of trump super fans out there I 38:58 mean I think if you sort of like have bought all the Maga hats and the sneakers and the nfts you know this is 39:04 probably a good you know another place to like show your enthusiasm for Donald Trump right um so so there is like that group of sort of like you know people buying shares in it and then there are another group of people who I think do want to influence um the next president I mean you you talked about that that great propublica story um you know I mean there's all sorts of people it's it's a great way to just like put money in Trump's pocket in fact there's probably like never been a better way to put money in Trump's pocket than than this vehicle I mean it's better than the club in Florida it's better than the hotel in Washington you know there it sort of just goes right right into his pocket and then I think there are some people that are aware of the fact that like there are those two groups figure okay maybe there are people buying these shares let's let let let's sort of capitalize on that right like unlike Mar Lago you anyone can buy this stock right it's not like you need to apply for membership and then put up the in initiation for you can just buy the stock um let's Circle back and and close 40:02 the story you always got to go back to the intro with the two dudes who didn't have enough butt shots in the magazine uh where are they now how are they running the business should we expect anything materially different about this business are they you mentioned it but like are they going to try to like maybe prop it up a little bit juice it up a little bit or is it just going to be an Avenue for Trump to post whatever comes to his mind I mean the thing about this story here is that it it almost immediately as soon as it began became incompetently run in a hive of corruption with all sorts of Bad actors involved in it so those two guys have been iced out of it I think yeah I think there have been at least three or four people who have either been uh found guilty or or admitted to insider trading early on um it's just it's a whole it's a whole mess of a business story yeah that sounds about right all right David Freelander thank you so much

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