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COMMENTARY THE COFFEE KLATCH ... SEPTEMBER 6TH 2025 with Robert Reich and Heather Lofthouse Is Trump Doomed? PLAY YOUTUBE VIDEO Original article: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qOhcfr9_n9M
Is Trump Doomed? \| The Coffee Klatch with Robert Reich Robert Reich Premiered Sep 6, 2025 1.31M subscribers ... 214,011 views ... 11K likes The Coffee Klatch with Robert Reich The seeds of Trump’s destruction have already been sown. Between the crashing economy, his brazen corruption, and the Epstein scandal, it's a question of when — not if — he's done for. Let's break it all down on an all-new Coffee Klatch. To find a screening of The Last Class documentary visit: https://www.thelastclassfilm.com/ If you're interested in purchasing a copy of Coming Up Short, please buy it locally or visit: https://bookshop.org/p/books/coming-u... Peter Burgess COMMENTARY This conversation is very useful ... up to a point. Peter Burgess Transcript 0:00 And it is the Saturday coffee clutch with he heather loft house and yours truly Robert Rush. Heather, it is nice to see you again. Did you have a good Labor Day weekend? I did. I got out of town. I went to Kalisoga where there were scary fires, but we we didn't breathe the smoke. It is fire season. I know. It's very um And you you've been traveling. Yeah. Well, I've been on the road selling or flogging. Is flogging an appropriate Of course it is. Hawking. Hawking. Flogging the book. um and uh met with wonderful people all over the all over the country and the movie you had backto-back. You did Yes. Yes. coming up short event and then you rushed over to a The Last Class film event. Yes. In fact, we've done that several times. In terms of the book, what I've loved is you've never once mentioned The Unmentionable, which is where Jeff Bezos sells things and you get them in 24 hours. I don't even know who you're talking about. I know you don't. But so it's all we've seen all these people come out for independent bookstores. So last week we were at Pegasus and so many people wrote in and said yay for supporting independent bookstores are so important 1:05 and and so I I I include a link to bookshop.org bookshop.org which is where you can get around the other place we were talking about. I know. Well, I mean, the corresponding um link that I want to announce is uh your movie and uh Elliot's movie. You can find it if you're interested in the la the lastclassfilm.com. It's all one word, the lastclassfilm.com and it's at over a hundred theaters. You were just at the brattle and there are so many places to see it. And um but you're back. Well, it's a little it's a little unnerving because you've got the book and the movie and then I'm I'm I'm waiting for the the album to come out. I you we've all been waiting for the album. I mean, when is Hello. My backup band 2:01 still has not been here. Yeah, I've booked the Greek. So, it's going to be huge when you launch. The Berkeley launch is going to be big. Heather, uh tell what are we going What would you like to talk about today? I would like to talk about Well, no. What do you want to talk about? Maybe I'm not a verb. What do you feel uh possessed about? What am I required? You and I are required mandatory to save democracy. Okay. So, let's talk about the economy, including jobs report numbers. And then let's talk about Trump's latest antics to deflect. I mean, what he's up to these days. Deflect. I mean, he wants to deflect, by the way. He will beginning today. Certainly, from the economy, but also obviously from Jeffrey Epine and a couple of other things we'll talk about. Uh but the economy uh we are in a jobs crash. Uh it's a big deal. The Bureau of Labor Statistics yesterday came out with uh its August report which showed remarkably only 22,000 net new jobs. Now 3:00 put this into context. You have to what we assume about the economy given just the population growth is you're going to have a 180,000 at least net new jobs per month. So when you get down to 22,000, you think that I mean something is wrong. And then the Bureau of Labor Statistics, even though Donald Trump doesn't believe it, what they do is they revise their previous months based upon new information. They can revise data. The word is data. Yeah. New data, new actual analysis, new facts. Uh and some of those facts, you know, are rounded up and they don't come in every single month, but they do come in. And what the Bureau of Labor Statistics statistics statistics can you say that statistics no you said it beautifully found is that um the June number actually was a negative number negative negative 13% in other words a job loss by thousands right 17,000 or something 17,000 uh this is a huge deal we haven't 4:05 seen a negative net negative job report since 2020 since December of 2020 which was a pandemic which was the beginning. U actually a lot of businesses there were a lot of economic indicators that we were heading into a pandemic. Uh so the the question is what in the world is going on here and when I say a jobs crash I mean that uh employers are just scared. They don't know what Donald Trump is going to do next. When you have an economy under the thumb of somebody who is as arbitrary and capriccious and mercurial as Donald Trump, belligerent and belligerent. Well, we'll get to the belligerent in a moment. But you just have no idea what's going to happen tomorrow, let alone next week, next month. So, are you going to make new decisions to expand, to hire? No, you're not, obviously. Uh, and um on top of that, you've got inflation. You know, 5:03 Donald Trump is hired not only initially to create hired hired he's hired hopefully he'll be fired, but he's hired especially to to to to get prices down uh and create new jobs. Well, he's obviously not creating new jobs, but prices are not not coming down. Prices are going up uh largely because of his tariffs. Well, no, we sorry. Import taxes. Import taxes. But they're tariffs, but they're import taxes. So you've got you've got I mean what we know already is that u importers are paying huge sums of money. They are not absorbing it themselves. They are passing it on to the companies to retailers to manufacturers to others in the United States who then pass it on to consumers uh and uh to you and me and everybody else. And so food I mean look at vegetables. Vegetables. Eat your vegetables. Do you say that to Ollie? Yeah. And he does. Vegetables. Well, 6:04 produce more generally. We don't do a lot. I have a vegetable. The reason I'm so short, I've decided, is because I hated to eat vegetables. But did you do it anyway? I didn't. Interesting. My mother used to pry open my mouth and shove peas in my mouth. Even peas you wouldn't do. I wouldn't. And she shut my mouth. And I I developed a really Anyway, vegetable prices vegetable prices have gone up 40%. Really? in July they went up. I mean that's the last measure we have. Um and uh it's true electricity electricity is is rising faster uh twice as fast as inflation. So you've got all of these prices going up very fast and you have job growth uh at almost nothing. Uh really important inflection point. Um Trump is blaming the Fed's inability or unwillingness to lower interest rates for the lack of job growth. The Fed doesn't want to lower interest rates if you have inflation on the horizon 7:02 obviously. Right. So, and stagflation is a worry and but he blames Jerome Powell specifically over and over and over. Look, Trump is always going to look for somebody else to blame. Always. And his the blame is now the Fed and Jerome Powell and Lisa Cook and and everybody he wants to replace and the head of BLS and I mean pick it pick it pick it. But but the the fact the re the reality here is that this economy is Donald Trump's economy. He can no longer blame Joe Biden. He now runs the economy. It's his tariffs. There were no tariffs to speak of before Donald Trump. He came up with a whole kakami tariff regime. He came up and what was the what is the average going to be? 18 19%. It's very high. It's very high. It's bigger than we all even thought that he would do. Yeah. and and that means that we're all paying that import tax everybody and it's a much larger tax on lower income people which it gets me to the last point in terms of the economy and it's 8:01 very important. We are dealing really with a two-tiered economy. We have people who are doing very well who are earning hundreds of thousands a year and they are given the stock market they are fine but if you are earning what a typical family is earning 60 70,000 you're really are struggling in fact there was a clip somebody showed me oh yeah of McDonald's the McDonald's CEO can see that it's so good because you said this I think he's copying you particularly with middle and lower income consumers They're feeling under a lot of pressure right now. I think there's a lot of, you know, commentary about what's the state of the economy, how's it doing, and and what we see is it's really kind of a two-tier economy. If you're upper income earning over $100,000, things are good. What we see with middle and lower income consumers is actually a different story. It's that consumers under a lot of pressure. In our industry, traffic for lower income consumers is down double digits. Uh and 9:02 it's because people are either uh choosing to skip a meal. So we're seeing breakfast, people are actually skipping breakfast, or they're choosing to just eat at home. So I thought it was really interesting, Heather, that you get the McDonald's, the CEO of McDonald's saying that he has got to deal with the fact that most of his customers uh are uh in in deep economic doodoo. Yeah. Uh and uh well it it's the economy is between the jobs crash and inflation prices going up and this two-tiered inequality widening. We're in a terrible terrible economy. It's terrible. And all the deflection that's happening is fascinating. So I like to follow this guy Aaron Rupar. Do you ever follow him? He puts up just clips of things. Lots of Trump, lots of the um regime, different people in the regime. And so, and then you get lots of Fox News and you see what's being said on Fox News and there is, you know, I saw one that was about electricity, blaming Obama on the prices of 10:03 electricity because he tried to go green with electricity. That's why everything's so expensive now. So, you have Trump deflecting on this one big level, right? shouting all caps on Truth Social, but then it's like a trickle down effect where he all the Fox News people and all the people in the manosphere and all the podcasters and everyone are blaming still blaming Dems, still blaming Well, of course, you know, they're going to try to blame Biden and the Dems, but how how far can you go in blaming them when everything that's happened over the last six to eight months has to do with things like tariffs and the big ugly bill. I mean, attacking Medicaid and food stamps and giving a huge tax a trillion dollar tax break to the wealthy. I mean, there comes a time when I'm sorry, you can blame the Democrats if you want to, but this is clearly Donald Trump's economy and it's Donald Trump's problem. But he doesn't live in the present. I 11:04 think he needs to do more meditation and really some work on himself. I the idea that Donald Trump would be the idea of him meditating. I'm sorry. That is the far the far the silliest idea I've heard about the last happened. But so he blames the past. He blames other people. It's Biden. It's Biden. It's Biden. It's Jerome Powell over there. But then the latest thing you saw when he was sitting around the table and he had Mark Zuckerberg to his right and he had Melania and Bill Gates to his left and it was big tech dinner. Um and he said and they said, 'What are you are you what's going to happen with the jobs report tomorrow?' This was on Thursday. And he said, 'Well, I mean the jobs numbers, I mean these numbers, I mean it's there's big beautiful things that are I mean you won't know the real numbers for a year because in a year you'll see the biggest, beautiful, most beautiful numbers. These numbers aren't the real these numbers are different numbers. So it's like it's either the people in the past or you have to hold on and anticipate what I'm going to sell you one year from now. Well, this is all in other words, the hardcore Trump voter is believing him as 12:03 a matter of faith. I mean, this is a religion. Uh but you've got a huge number of people in this country, not just Democrats, but independents and a lot of Republicans who are living in the real world, in the real economy, and they say to themselves, 'Wait a minute. Things are really getting worse and worse and worse.' Uh this will show up, I promise you, Heather, in the midterm elections. I'm going to hold you to it. Well, you do. I mean, it's going to be harder and harder for the Republicans to rig the midterms in terms of changing the districts in Texas and in other c Missouri and in other um other Trump country states. It's going to be harder for them to try to rig the mailin ballots to do so. They can't do it. There's not enough time. There's too much public attention. Uh the courts are too much on it. Yes. I think that uh we're going to see now again I could be wrong and I've I've 13:01 been accused of being a cockeyed optimist. Well, I thought you were going to say I've been accused of being wrong before. But I wasn't. I have been. But and it's turned out they were right. You're right. Um but I I do think that we're going to see a a route. So, some of the polling, did you see this Wall Street Journal poll that said 70% of Americans are doubtful about the American dream being a real thing? Yeah. And that number has gone way up high in terms of doubters. Absolutely. And about 62% of Americans now disapprove of his handling, Trump's handling of prices and inflation. This is a big deal because again, he was he was elected. I was going to say hire it again partly on that on that particular issue. So the next question is what he's gonna what is he going to do to deflect attention? I mean you've got at the same time the House Oversight Committee is moving ahead on Jeffrey Epstein on getting the Epstein files and underlying the Epstein 14:04 files is the client list. That is who was it who were the clients, right? I know clients. clients uh and Trump is doing everything possible uh to I was interested uh at when the unemployment report came out. Trump's first belligerent comment yesterday in his emails. The first one was about Jeffrey Epstein. Oh yeah. I mean, isn't it interesting? He can't get Epstein out of his head. Epste is haunting Trump. Uh so, you know, there has to be something. But also, well, but jobs numbers came out, right? So it's deflecting with the thing he wants to deflect from. But he's deflecting from the deflection. Right. Exactly. But if you deflect from the deflection of the deflection, you know what you have? You're back where you were before. The OD, the original deflection. And so that's what he's trying to do. The other way he's I think he's trying to deflect from both Epstein and the bad 15:01 economy uh is with belligerance. And when I say belligerance, I mean that he's got uh you know the National Guard and uh troops in Washington DC. They're now armed. He is renaming the defense department the War Department. Uh he the Department of War. Can we just pause? I We can't just refer to these things and move on. That is wild. Well, it's it it used to be called the War Department. That's the old name. It was re It was renamed the Defense Department. And I think but when um I believe now people watching this may have a different uh that's fine. Put it in the comments. We accept feedback. Um but I my impression is it was it was right after the second world war. Um on the notion that really what we were trying to project to the rest of the world is we are not wararmongers. We are trying to defend the United States and we're trying to defend democracy. We're trying to defend the free world. Now, we didn't only do that. Obviously, 16:03 uh Richard Nixon, Henry Kissinger, and other wararm mongers did much worse. Uh but the point I wanted to make is that we as a nation have tried to not play up our our power in in terms of just missiles and that hard power. U but Donald Trump is trying to do that and Hegath. Yes. Exactly. I mean, watching him talk about. So, there was a boat that was blown up by someone in the Department of War. 11 people died. Now, they're saying, 'Oh, they were drug dealers.' I mean, they were terrible. They were terrible. They were part of a gang. They were They're alleged alleged to be, but isn't there maritime ethics? Don't you board a boat and say, you don't just Right. I mean, is it legal? No, it's I mean in terms of the rules of war or the Geneva Conventions or any kind of international agreement uh bombing a a boat and killing people because you suspect maybe they are doing something you don't like. No, that is illegal. 17:07 That is a crime. That is a war crime. And uh I you know what what do you I find when I hear about these things like you I'm I'm just I'm at a loss for words. I know how do you how do you even deal with this? How do you explain it? We're we continue to provide arms to Netanyahu. Uh and Netanyahu is literally starving the people of Gaza. it over and over and over. And I mean, what more evidence do we need that there is something fundamentally uh sadistic and immoral and crazy about what's happening in this world? Uh particularly with Trump and Putin and Netanyahu. But so then back on our own soil, we had these 76 Guatemalan kids, these minors who were going to be shipped back, deported to Guatemala. But then a judge swept in and said, 'Um, excuse me, no, 18:03 this can't happen.' This is this is actually important because it raises u I mean, one of the big themes particularly this past week and 10 days is the federal courts doing really God's work in terms of well yman God work. I mean, it's really terms of pushing back against what Trump is doing. And you I mean the it starts with it's the tariffs big decision that the tariffs are illegal. Of course they're illegal because it belongs to Congress the the the right to and the authority to create tariffs. Number two Los Angeles you know taking over Los Angeles illegal. Number three Harvard University uh you know you can't just stop the flow of funds to Harvard University. Uh number four, uh the Federal Trade Commission, uh you know, the firing the the commissioner. Uh number five, what was number five? It was the Oh, it was the Guatemalan children. Well, I mean, 19:03 in almost every respect, and that is just recently, that is just the last 10 days, the federal courts are saying to Trump, no. Now, to me, I I want to say applause to the federal courts for upholding the rule of law. Uh but also I wonder at what point do you get a breaking point where Trump is going to say where the people around Trump you know Stephen Miller or Russell vote or even JD Vance they're going to say well forget it you're go you Trump what you have to do is stand up to the federal courts you've got to say no the federal courts are wrong or Pam Bondi but how many of these are going to go to the Supreme Court well some of them I think that the Trump administration and the justice department will take them up to courts of appeals and then try to get to the Supreme Court. But even though the Supreme Court is hearing more cases these days on its so-called shadow docket, which means that it's not really giving much evidence of as to why it's making 20:03 decisions, a very bad thing for the Supreme Court, by the way. Um the the court is still only taking a small fraction of the cases that come up to it on what's called certerary. Uh so we can expect that some of these most of these trial court decisions they may go to the court of appeals but that that's the end. So and I like on your Substack when you cite some of these things as seeds of hope or kernels of resistance that are happening because we need to be reminded of this. Well we do. We do. Absolutely. And it's it's easy for people to feel like nothing is happening u or there's no resistance at all. But this is important resistance. Hugely important, but it doesn't go on the front. I mean, it's it kind of goes on the front page for a minute, but it's hard for a second. And also, people don't for the most part understand what it means for a district court or for the court of appeals in here or here or here to say no to Donald Trump. Also, uh there's not 21:04 a great deal of attention to the states like Illinois, JB JB Pritsker, uh or um California, Newsome, uh or Maryland, which uh with you have Wes Moore, uh pushing back against Trump's threats to put federal troops in all of these states. Uh and that push back is also enormously important, right? not very much press, not very much media attention to it, but it's big and it's critical. Another example, too, is Newsome getting together. So, it's California and it's Oregon and it's Washington. And as the CDC crumbles under RFK Jr., we have these new entities springing up to make sure that there are feedback loops around public health and the right data is still moving through the system and that children get vaccines. I was very interested that you have Washington, Oregon, and California. I mean, the West Coast of the United States getting together. 22:02 Uh, I mean, think about this uh in a in a broader context, Heather. Are we going to see more and more blue states getting together? A kind of I know, but I hate this because there's so many blue people in red red states. Well, there are, but maybe they just have to get together themselves. I mean the point is that so much of what Trump is doing and the people under him RFK Jr. for example. Um, you know, most people believe in childhood vaccines. I mean, yes, this is this is it's called science. It's called saving lives. And there was no question. When I was a kid, I you know, I got all of the childhood vaccines. You got all of the childhood vaccines. Of course, my kid got all My kid got extra because we got him measles before he was six months, so it didn't count. So, we had to get him double measles. Double measles. Yeah. I never knew there was a double measles. Yep. But I mean that's why do you of course you do that you want to protect your kids but it's also but you also want to protect your kids from other 23:05 kids. In other words um it's vaccines are a classic public good. Yes. And this is a kind of example and there are many other examples in Trump world where they say there are no such things as public goods. You know we're all individuals. We're all atomized individuals just simply seeking as much money, as much power, as much a little further than that possibly can because I think it's there's no such thing as a public good except I'm going to go get my vaccine. Yes. Let's be real. Because I think Trump's not going to get a vaccine because I'm privileged and I am powerful and I'm wealthy. Right. Exactly. And just to watch measles come back and I know you've written a lot about how polio I mean was a thing in your it was it was a terrible scourge. I mean I remember visiting uh a friend of mine in an iron lung. Yeah. Her name was Holly and I was 5 years old and I was petrified and she was 24:00 petrified. Uh she did come out of it. Yeah. Uh I remember another friend Johnny who had came down with polio. I mean, polio was a parents nightmare because so many of these kids did not come out. Uh they either were paralyzed for life or or they just never functioned. But science and America and the government and organization and public health, it came together and it conquered it. Exactly. It came together, Heather. And this is a very important point. I mean we stood for in the world and in our own minds we stood for science. We stood for uh rational application of research. We we stood for the enlightenment values. When I say the enlightenment, I'm talking about really the 18th century um enlightenment values of of of basically doing what people can for the polity, for the community, for 25:00 society, for uh taking what you learn in science and applying it to the public good. It's gone. or at least Trump and the people behind Trump and around Trump want to create a a kind of a pre-enlightenment world going back to what the dark ages the middle ages labbotom with the labbotoies were common he wants to bring back labbotoies is can I quote quote you on that I mean it just feels like or maybe it's just brainworms but also you science you build you learn it's iterative you can't just take out chunks of years of data and then catch up no You can't. And one of the many things that worries me is that you have all of these people um in research universities who are the vanguard of American knowledge, the vanguard of our competitiveness internationally, the vanguard of our industry, the vanguard of our economy, uh the way we maintain our standard of living. And they are not any longer 26:03 getting funding. uh the National Science Foundation, the National Institutes of Health, uh you know, Congress used to be really behind and Republicans especially behind all of this scientific research from the really I remember from the 1950s with Sputnik. We had a Soviet Union that was competing with us and we had to invest in science or they would they would as Kruev said they would kill us. They would, you know, they would eat our lunch. And we had American scientists and we attracted scientists from all over the world to come here and build it here and do it here because of all of our resources and all of our tenacity. And this is now being eaten away and undermined by Donald Trump and the people around him. JD Vance is to me one of the evil forces here because JD Vance for years has been saying American higher education these big research institutions of higher education they are our enemies now what is he talking 27:04 about enemies enemies I know says the guy who went to Yale well it's not only hypocrisy uh it's also a a kind of a a a small-mindedness uh in which he's worried about ideology. Mhm. Um and you know and control and the the assumption is that somehow universities are uh places where leftwing ideology is born or coddled or generated. U well you know there's another way of putting that you could say that universities are are places where understanding science broad-mindedness uh a kind of worldview is cultivated. right and thrives. But this is all another attempt. Uh and what we're doing today, and I didn't know we were going to do this, but it's interesting. And thank you. I know. I was thinking the same. Um we're we're exploring what is 28:02 actually uh behind Trump's deflections. Uh and I started this conversation thinking, well, he wants to deflect attention from Jeffrey Epstein and also now the bad economy. Uh but what you are suggesting is that he wants to deflect attention from uh really modernity which is much more profound and depressing. I mean that is wild. It is wild. What is he he's able to accomplish or almost accomplish or well he's casting doubt in a lot of people's minds about you see it in the polls about facts and data and analysis and science and truth. Um, and that's what a democracy depends on. That's what our and that's what dictators depend on people having that doubt. Exactly. Um, but you do see in the polls that people aren't thrilled with him. I mean, we've said this, so he's doing this and some his serious base is still behind him. 29:04 Well, this is important. Um, and I think that we have to continue to uh remind ourselves that we are in the majority, that most Americans don't like what he's doing. Most Americans don't want an attack on immigrants, don't want an attack on science, don't want an attack on children, um, don't want to be as sadistic as he and the people around him are, and don't want to listen to RFK Jr. saying we don't need the vaccines. That's really good, Heather. That is fabulous. It was really good. I had it inside me. I was like, let's try. No, it's fabulous. Thank you for that. Um, so uh there there there Sorry. It's great. Um I think there is reason and um and and I think it is it is rational uh to be not optimistic. I 30:00 mean, I think that optimism itself may not be called for now, but at least not to despair, not to feel hopeless, not to feel certainly lonely. But that's one of the reasons we all keep coffeeing with you. Yes. And well, me. Well, we coffee with me, too. But I show up with you. I show up for you, and you can show up for me, and we all show up for everyone. But it's thank you for reminding us not to give into despair, to remember the courts, to remember science. Well, remember the courts and science and the states that are pushing back and most Americans pushing back. It is it is very let me just say this. It is very easy in this crazy environment we're in uh when flooding the zone which is what Trump is doing basically overwhelming us with initiatives every day that make us feel like we are going 31:02 crazy that the world is upside down. Um it is very important that we understand and continue to understand that we are in the majority and that rational thought and not only rational thought but uh decency uh social justice u the rule of law. These basics are shared not just with you and the two of us but with the majority of Americans and majority of people around the world. We are now suffering the consequences of Vladimir Putin and Netanyahu and Donald Trump and a few other dictators around the world who are having a heyday. They are having just a playing field to themselves. But hopefully 32:01 and my faith is that we will get through this and we will have once again a country and a world that values democracy, the rule of law, and social justice. Thank you for being with us, Heather. Thank you, Bob. We'll see you next weekend. When I was in Catalosa, I went into this little shop called the Vintage Treehouse and there was silly coffee mugs. Silly, silly. So, I had to get you one. And I think this is going to be my new thing where anytime I go somewhere new, I'm going to get you a ridiculous coffee mug. I'm excited. This is a It feels like a It's very small coffee mug. It feels like um it might be gimmicky and a little might be gimmicky. You asked for half a cup of coffee. Okay, I like that. I like Okay, I have a present for you. Liar. I have a present for you.

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