October 7, 2024 • 17 mins
In this special bonus episode of Fire and Fury, Michael and James are joined by Sam Nunberg, one of Donald Trump’s earliest political advisors. Nunberg, known for his candid takes, discusses his long and tumultuous history with Trump, providing behind-the-scenes insights into Trump’s mentality, his influence over his base, and his impact on the Republican Party.
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Speaker 1 (00:03):
So we have a special bonus episode coming up. An
old source and contact of Michaels, whose name.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
Is Sam Nunberg, is one of my favorite Trump people.
He's a kind of through line of the last Trump decade.
I would say there isn't one person who has covered
Donald Trump who hasn't gone to the Sam Numberg well, many,
many times. Welcome to Fire and Fury the podcast.
Speaker 1 (00:36):
I'm Michael Wolf and I'm James Truman.
Speaker 2 (00:39):
I'm going to tell you about the legend of Sam Nunberg.
Sam was really the first professional political hire of Donald Trump.
So actually you could blame everything that has happened on
Sam excellent, but also Sam was the first among many
(00:59):
many political hires to fall out with Donald Trump. And
Sam is distinguished by the fact that he went to
war with Donald Trump, a real kind of street fight.
And when I was around the White House in twenty
seventeen writing Fire and Fury, that was the moment in
which most of the people in the White House were
(01:22):
actually kind of unfamiliar with Trump. But Trump did not
really have many relationships with political people, with Washington people,
so everybody was effectively a newcomer and trying to figure
this out. And it got around and became a kind
of accepted thing that to understand Trump, and everyone was
(01:45):
desperate to understand him, you called Sam because Sam was
the person who actually got it. He was the Trump whisperer.
And at one point, probably in the spring of twenty seventeen,
when I was rest with these questions, who is Donald Trump?
What is he doing? Is And there was that moment
when we were still thinking that he was playing three
(02:08):
dimensional chess and he was working on a game board
that we couldn't we couldn't see, And I had this
discussion with Sam, just trying to understand this and asking
about this. And then and I remember, and this is
vivid in my mind, Sam looked at me like I
was a Cretan and he said, you don't get it,
do you? And I was like uh. And then Sam said,
(02:32):
he's an idiot. And suddenly it all came clear to
me that we were looking at this and entirely the
wrong way, that Donald Trump was not a political player
in the way that we were accustomed to seeing people
who were in the White House, that it was entirely
(02:53):
a different kind of game. Sam, just give us your
Donald Trump.
Speaker 3 (02:58):
In a nutshell, Donald has major qualities that have made
him the mogul, the magnet, the public persona, which are
quite unique, and he is quite sophisticated in some ways.
In other ways you could be shocked about what simple
to me could be. When I saw Donald in twenty eleven,
it's he packed. What I saw was someone who naturally
(03:19):
had the political type skills that the Republican Party was
going to need. Also with the coming of social media,
with the coming of new media in twenty eleven, so
where Facebook was really just controlling the national discourse and
Twitter as well. So Donald in a lot of ways,
(03:39):
as has been his life, was right place, right time.
But if you ever said to him, have you ever
thought about actually being president? I would kindly get something
along the lines of, don't you fucking worry about it?
I better just win, and if I don't, I'm on
the raid. That was the center of our relationship and
one of the reasons I got pushed out was maybe
to my own death. Mate. I actually cared for him
(04:02):
in his brand. And with that said, we had a
lot of screening matches because he is so reckless when
it comes to himself.
Speaker 2 (04:10):
One of the things I'd love you to do is
run down the handicap of where we are now, because
you're so good at this, you're divining Rod I have
always found in the past to be one of the
best tier. But also let me add that for a
long period of time, Sam was everybody's media source, so
(04:32):
off the record.
Speaker 3 (04:33):
I think I was the only person who would actually
curse him out on the record, because once he had
fired me, I had no intention of ever being invited back.
And when Michael mentions I went to war, I went
immediately to work for Ted Kruz. Past title I worked
for prefer Ron to Sandys. So I've been trying to
go after Donald or it was fashionable but only politically.
Speaker 2 (04:54):
Well, let's run down where are we right now? As
you say.
Speaker 3 (04:58):
It to let the audience know you might and I
had a conversation a couple weeks ago, and at that
time I would be given its slight lean Harris, particularly
after that debate. But it seems to me that if
there was ever a chance for Donald to pull off
the miracle, things are lining up for let's talk about
the hurricane and let's talk about the Middle East. I
(05:19):
think both of these issues are going to end up
playing to the Donald vanstick. If the facts in the
ground of the following and the fact set has always
been behind Donald's winning election a direction of the country,
You're looking at numbers that have not been this bad
since I don't know Jimmy Carter, and I'm not being
melodramatic here. You look at any of these polls, at
best thirty percent of the country's has positive right track.
(05:41):
You look at any of these polls and Americans are
generally not optimistic. With that said, Harris has a lot
going for namely that she's running against Donald J. Trump.
That debate was a perfect example about why Donald could
blow this election. He doesn't want to prepare if he
wants to wing it, and then he can also have
an off day. Right when he walked in there and
I saw him, I said, Oh, he's tired. This is
(06:03):
not going to go great. He just wasn't ready and
prepared for it. If you look at the stays here,
the reason why Trump has a pathway to two seventy
is because I'm going to give him the VODA, and
that's six electoral votes now. A Republican has not won
the VODA since two thousand and four. This immigration issue
(06:24):
is something where I don't believe that the Democrats can
wrap their heads around it. If you watch MSNBC and
you talk to mainstream reporters, they think, well, Republicans and
Donald Trump have juiced that and they can't get any
more out of that. No, that's a factor. And going
back to rank and file union members worried about legal
immigrants taking their jobs. So if you give him the
(06:46):
VODA and you say that Harris can still get to
two seventy, she wins that district in Nebraska, and then
she wins Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania, which, oh, by the way,
have all vow in unison since at least nineteen ninety two.
I believe I would say you're right, except I would
say facts on the ground are different. And that goes
(07:07):
back to the Middle East. Michigan and UIs Slotnikchise the
Senate candidate. Is a major problem for Democrats is time.
Not only are the major Musslim groups publicly endorsing Jill Stein,
the third party candidate, but there are mainstream Muslim politicians
that are in fact endorsing Trump. I think he's going
to win Michigan in the GOADA. But this map could
be different. Pennsylvania is up for grabs. The idea that
(07:32):
the governor there ever wanted to be selected as VP
is a complete misknowmer. That governor wants to be the
first Jewish president. He has a plan. He's not going
to try to hurt Harris. He's not going to do
anything to help her to lose, but he's not going
to necessarily try to help her win.
Speaker 2 (07:49):
Doesn't the reverse of that happened in Georgia.
Speaker 3 (07:51):
Correct. That's where we could have a weird map this
year where Trump could very well lose Georgia or nor Carolina,
and then even with winning and Michigan, with winning a Nevada,
he still loses the electoral column.
Speaker 2 (08:08):
How does he close strong?
Speaker 3 (08:10):
At this point, you have to understand he's a hybrid
of Bill Clinton and Nixon playing Reagan. He's simply playing himself,
and he'll just say that he's better than Reagan. Right.
I think he may very well not do another debate.
That's what Nixon did in seventy two, and that's what
Jimmy Carter tried to do in nineteen eighty, and it
bit him in the ass with Reagan, because Reagan was
an excellent presenter. But what he does is the following.
(08:32):
To the extent that Bannon smartly was able to take
away Trump's phone the last two weeks of twenty sixteen,
you were able to convince him in twenty twenty four
that the election is still all about him, but he
only does rallies and he posts mostly on true his
social where trees also fall in a forest. And then
(08:53):
the election continues to be a referendum on the Biden
Harris administration, which is what you saw JD do in
the first thirty minute, and it's masterfully of that debate.
He kept saying, that's Harris's record the last three and
a half years. This is a referendum on Harris. She's
the incumber. And that's all Donald does.
Speaker 2 (09:09):
And how will he likely shoot himself in the foot
or the head?
Speaker 3 (09:15):
He could just say something that is so insane that
it really leaves the little echo chamber of people that
fellow politics daily. There are voters this cycle that are
saying to Donald Trump, please just let me vote for you.
Don't be an escort. You will be better off for me,
even though I hate you. Just stop it. He's just
(09:36):
unable to do that. So you could have something along
those lines, or you can have maybe some kind of
later October surprise that would end up helping Harris and
Trump completely misplace his hand.
Speaker 2 (09:51):
We'll be back right after the break, Okay, go leap ahead.
What's life in Trump world like? If he wins?
Speaker 3 (10:06):
I continue to not believe that Jared won't get back
into the picture. I think that there is a plan possibly.
Jared would of course want secretary of State. I don't
think he's going to get that position.
Speaker 2 (10:19):
If they pick up three seats in the Senate. I
think he might be secretary of State. But what else
do you see?
Speaker 3 (10:25):
I see an issue with how much control Donald will want.
He's not going to want Susie Wiles of Chris Losovita
to be seen as getting the type of credit and
be seen as going in senior positions where it makes
them walk as if they're David Apsola or Carl Rose, right,
(10:46):
because Donald will have done this all himself. So then
there's a vacuum. And how has that vacuum filled? Who's
it filled by? Now? I think Project twenty twenty five
is out the door. I think Trump is really really
pissed about it. I can't imagine him giving them any
type of major role at the higher level were for
(11:07):
the day to day contact. But I would tell you
there is somebody in the back of his mind. There's
always somebody in the back of his mind that is
going to come in and suddenly be a surprise for
everyone that that person is suddenly showing up the day
after Donald wins.
Speaker 2 (11:23):
And no, totally it could be. Yeah, I mean, all
logic says that the chief of staff should be Susie Wilds.
But could that logic be reversed and suddenly Kelly and
Conway back the job that she has always felt she
should have rightly had but for her husband. Yeah, and
(11:43):
what's life like in Trump world if he loses.
Speaker 3 (11:47):
He loses the election, You'll see my belief in immediate
fight within that campaign because he'll be words Roy Cone,
He'll be looking for his wordy Julie. And I don't
believe Susie Wiles and Chris losov Or would act like that.
We'll find out, but I don't believe. I just can't
see it.
Speaker 2 (12:04):
Yeah, I think you're totally right. Chris has a career
beyond this.
Speaker 3 (12:07):
And then you have to look at the fact that
of cous Rupert a billion newsmats just had a settlement.
People are really going to roll their eyes. Now you'll
have that group of rank and file voters. They're not
going to be able to take it. How did we
lose it? Stolen from Saint Donald again? Right, Cheeto, Jesus
at the cross and you know, being tested and this
(12:30):
is just another divine test for him to rise and
somehow get back into the Whites. Well, I really do
think that what you will see is something that you
didn't see in twenty one is, for instance, the sentiments
at Tucker Carlson Express where he said, I hate Donald,
I don't want to talk about him anymore. I think
he'll only have people like Tucker Carlson to talk to
(12:52):
about the election being stolen. It will be like these influencers,
possibly this new world of podcasts and Instagram people. Right,
maybe that'll be pushed, but that'll be his immediate thing,
that it was stolen from him, And then you'll see
what's going to happen to all the money. One of
the major criticisms of Wroth Obama by the Democrats was
that he did not do anything to help the Democrat
(13:14):
Party and he kept all the money for his own campaign.
Donald keeps all the Republican money and a lot of
it is for himself indirectly, and I can't imagine that
he's gonna let that go. And you're going to look
at a John fun who would be the next majority
leader of the Senate, really being somebody who how is
(13:35):
he going to be able to handle a Trump loss?
Because what we did see in that second impeachment was
none of us would be here doing this interview today
if Mitch mccoddle actually had the stones to kick Donald
out into victim for January sixth, and he didn't, and
that's why he's limping off and he gave up his
leadership posts. One of the things I think about Donald,
(13:56):
I'm surprised he hasn't attacked Harrison on the Willie Brown issue.
And one of the reasons I believe Matt is because
he knows he may need her for some kind of
party or for him not to get sent to jail
for the Jack Smith prosecution in DC. And the reason
I say that is because this is something where he
does play five dimensional chests. As he would like to say,
as he has said to me Todd, is he is
(14:19):
very good at thinking eight steps ahead about how he
will work some he is somebody who is a hustler.
He looks at that like if you ever asked him
the difference between Sharpton and Jackson, he would say Sharpton
was a hustler, Jackson was just a con man, meaning
Sharpton was smart and Sharpton had played the long game.
He'll play the long game. And what I say is is, like,
for instance, the line that Roger and.
Speaker 2 (14:42):
I gave him, that's Roger Stone.
Speaker 3 (14:43):
The beginning for him to run on was we need
another Bush about as much as we needed out of
their Clinton. And he wouldn't do that. He wouldn't an
attack Clunton. He said, I'm not going to attack her
until we get later in the primer. Why because had
he lost the primary, he would have wanted her to
get elected president. Had he lost the primary, he would
have wanted to take credit for the fact that he
helps think the Republican Party to help Hillary Ethman fantastic.
(15:04):
So I think that in some ways he's laying off
of him.
Speaker 2 (15:08):
I told you that, literally, Sam is the smartest observer
of all of this.
Speaker 3 (15:13):
I don't know what it gets me now it gets
you like you, Yes, this is fifty cents doesn't get
me The New York.
Speaker 1 (15:22):
Post, Sam, I have a question for you. You were fired,
I think four times during Trump's first campaign. What made
you keep coming back?
Speaker 3 (15:34):
In the beginning when I worked for him, I was
the sole person who took him seriously that would work
for him day to day, and it actually hurt me.
I wouldn't get jobs. I wanted to be a politico.
I didn't really care that much if I got fired
for a BuzzFeed article because we had a major fund.
What it happened was once this Lewandowski, who I like
a moron, brought in after staffing up the primary states,
(15:57):
came in, Donald immediately just liked him more than me.
For whatever reason it is, I don't know. I don't
care anymore. Yeah, that's what ten years and six years
of sobriety and a lot of self reflection gets it.
Uh huh, whatever, it is good for him. You want
to like Lewin Dowski more than me? You lost by
Pudin and Kim john Zille. I don't think a person.
But when he started firing me when the campaign was
(16:22):
going on, that was when I had enough. And I
had worked for him to experience that campaign. I deserve
to experience that campaign. So that's when, as Michael said,
I went to war with him, and I did everything
in my power to try to beat him, and I
just couldn't beat him. I feel like it's a life lesson.
They built something that's so good that I can't even
beat it after I get screwed over.
Speaker 2 (16:41):
As I say, Sam is the one to blame. This
all comes back to you. I'm getting the signal. This
has been great, Sam, as usual, incredibly insightful.
Speaker 1 (16:52):
Yeah, it's wonderful.
Speaker 2 (16:53):
Thank you. You to this day are the person who
truly understands Donald Trump. And I'm not sure what that
is going to get you.
Speaker 3 (17:01):
The one thing it did can be is A've got
room to meet a lot of interesting people like yourself,
and it has been a wild drives for the good
of the world.
Speaker 2 (17:11):
We'll find out, we'll see if it goes on, but
I will speak to you soon, sir, And thank you
so much.
Speaker 3 (17:16):
Thank you gentlemen for the interview.
Speaker 1 (17:17):
Thank you.
Speaker 2 (17:18):
That's all the time we have for today, and we'll
be back next week. Fire and Fury the podcast is
hosted and executive produced by Michael Wolfe and James Truman.
The producers are Adam Waller and Emily Maronoff, executive producers
(17:40):
for Kaleidoscope.
Speaker 3 (17:41):
Mangesh had to get an old Velocian executive producers for
iHeart On Nikki Ito and Katrina Novell
So we have a special bonus episode coming up. An
old source and contact of Michaels, whose name.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
Is Sam Nunberg, is one of my favorite Trump people.
He's a kind of through line of the last Trump decade.
I would say there isn't one person who has covered
Donald Trump who hasn't gone to the Sam Numberg well, many,
many times. Welcome to Fire and Fury the podcast.
Speaker 1 (00:36):
I'm Michael Wolf and I'm James Truman.
Speaker 2 (00:39):
I'm going to tell you about the legend of Sam Nunberg.
Sam was really the first professional political hire of Donald Trump.
So actually you could blame everything that has happened on
Sam excellent, but also Sam was the first among many
(00:59):
many political hires to fall out with Donald Trump. And
Sam is distinguished by the fact that he went to
war with Donald Trump, a real kind of street fight.
And when I was around the White House in twenty
seventeen writing Fire and Fury, that was the moment in
which most of the people in the White House were
(01:22):
actually kind of unfamiliar with Trump. But Trump did not
really have many relationships with political people, with Washington people,
so everybody was effectively a newcomer and trying to figure
this out. And it got around and became a kind
of accepted thing that to understand Trump, and everyone was
(01:45):
desperate to understand him, you called Sam because Sam was
the person who actually got it. He was the Trump whisperer.
And at one point, probably in the spring of twenty seventeen,
when I was rest with these questions, who is Donald Trump?
What is he doing? Is And there was that moment
when we were still thinking that he was playing three
(02:08):
dimensional chess and he was working on a game board
that we couldn't we couldn't see, And I had this
discussion with Sam, just trying to understand this and asking
about this. And then and I remember, and this is
vivid in my mind, Sam looked at me like I
was a Cretan and he said, you don't get it,
do you? And I was like uh. And then Sam said,
(02:32):
he's an idiot. And suddenly it all came clear to
me that we were looking at this and entirely the
wrong way, that Donald Trump was not a political player
in the way that we were accustomed to seeing people
who were in the White House, that it was entirely
(02:53):
a different kind of game. Sam, just give us your
Donald Trump.
Speaker 3 (02:58):
In a nutshell, Donald has major qualities that have made
him the mogul, the magnet, the public persona, which are
quite unique, and he is quite sophisticated in some ways.
In other ways you could be shocked about what simple
to me could be. When I saw Donald in twenty eleven,
it's he packed. What I saw was someone who naturally
(03:19):
had the political type skills that the Republican Party was
going to need. Also with the coming of social media,
with the coming of new media in twenty eleven, so
where Facebook was really just controlling the national discourse and
Twitter as well. So Donald in a lot of ways,
(03:39):
as has been his life, was right place, right time.
But if you ever said to him, have you ever
thought about actually being president? I would kindly get something
along the lines of, don't you fucking worry about it?
I better just win, and if I don't, I'm on
the raid. That was the center of our relationship and
one of the reasons I got pushed out was maybe
to my own death. Mate. I actually cared for him
(04:02):
in his brand. And with that said, we had a
lot of screening matches because he is so reckless when
it comes to himself.
Speaker 2 (04:10):
One of the things I'd love you to do is
run down the handicap of where we are now, because
you're so good at this, you're divining Rod I have
always found in the past to be one of the
best tier. But also let me add that for a
long period of time, Sam was everybody's media source, so
(04:32):
off the record.
Speaker 3 (04:33):
I think I was the only person who would actually
curse him out on the record, because once he had
fired me, I had no intention of ever being invited back.
And when Michael mentions I went to war, I went
immediately to work for Ted Kruz. Past title I worked
for prefer Ron to Sandys. So I've been trying to
go after Donald or it was fashionable but only politically.
Speaker 2 (04:54):
Well, let's run down where are we right now? As
you say.
Speaker 3 (04:58):
It to let the audience know you might and I
had a conversation a couple weeks ago, and at that
time I would be given its slight lean Harris, particularly
after that debate. But it seems to me that if
there was ever a chance for Donald to pull off
the miracle, things are lining up for let's talk about
the hurricane and let's talk about the Middle East. I
(05:19):
think both of these issues are going to end up
playing to the Donald vanstick. If the facts in the
ground of the following and the fact set has always
been behind Donald's winning election a direction of the country,
You're looking at numbers that have not been this bad
since I don't know Jimmy Carter, and I'm not being
melodramatic here. You look at any of these polls, at
best thirty percent of the country's has positive right track.
(05:41):
You look at any of these polls and Americans are
generally not optimistic. With that said, Harris has a lot
going for namely that she's running against Donald J. Trump.
That debate was a perfect example about why Donald could
blow this election. He doesn't want to prepare if he
wants to wing it, and then he can also have
an off day. Right when he walked in there and
I saw him, I said, Oh, he's tired. This is
(06:03):
not going to go great. He just wasn't ready and
prepared for it. If you look at the stays here,
the reason why Trump has a pathway to two seventy
is because I'm going to give him the VODA, and
that's six electoral votes now. A Republican has not won
the VODA since two thousand and four. This immigration issue
(06:24):
is something where I don't believe that the Democrats can
wrap their heads around it. If you watch MSNBC and
you talk to mainstream reporters, they think, well, Republicans and
Donald Trump have juiced that and they can't get any
more out of that. No, that's a factor. And going
back to rank and file union members worried about legal
immigrants taking their jobs. So if you give him the
(06:46):
VODA and you say that Harris can still get to
two seventy, she wins that district in Nebraska, and then
she wins Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania, which, oh, by the way,
have all vow in unison since at least nineteen ninety two.
I believe I would say you're right, except I would
say facts on the ground are different. And that goes
(07:07):
back to the Middle East. Michigan and UIs Slotnikchise the
Senate candidate. Is a major problem for Democrats is time.
Not only are the major Musslim groups publicly endorsing Jill Stein,
the third party candidate, but there are mainstream Muslim politicians
that are in fact endorsing Trump. I think he's going
to win Michigan in the GOADA. But this map could
be different. Pennsylvania is up for grabs. The idea that
(07:32):
the governor there ever wanted to be selected as VP
is a complete misknowmer. That governor wants to be the
first Jewish president. He has a plan. He's not going
to try to hurt Harris. He's not going to do
anything to help her to lose, but he's not going
to necessarily try to help her win.
Speaker 2 (07:49):
Doesn't the reverse of that happened in Georgia.
Speaker 3 (07:51):
Correct. That's where we could have a weird map this
year where Trump could very well lose Georgia or nor Carolina,
and then even with winning and Michigan, with winning a Nevada,
he still loses the electoral column.
Speaker 2 (08:08):
How does he close strong?
Speaker 3 (08:10):
At this point, you have to understand he's a hybrid
of Bill Clinton and Nixon playing Reagan. He's simply playing himself,
and he'll just say that he's better than Reagan. Right.
I think he may very well not do another debate.
That's what Nixon did in seventy two, and that's what
Jimmy Carter tried to do in nineteen eighty, and it
bit him in the ass with Reagan, because Reagan was
an excellent presenter. But what he does is the following.
(08:32):
To the extent that Bannon smartly was able to take
away Trump's phone the last two weeks of twenty sixteen,
you were able to convince him in twenty twenty four
that the election is still all about him, but he
only does rallies and he posts mostly on true his
social where trees also fall in a forest. And then
(08:53):
the election continues to be a referendum on the Biden
Harris administration, which is what you saw JD do in
the first thirty minute, and it's masterfully of that debate.
He kept saying, that's Harris's record the last three and
a half years. This is a referendum on Harris. She's
the incumber. And that's all Donald does.
Speaker 2 (09:09):
And how will he likely shoot himself in the foot
or the head?
Speaker 3 (09:15):
He could just say something that is so insane that
it really leaves the little echo chamber of people that
fellow politics daily. There are voters this cycle that are
saying to Donald Trump, please just let me vote for you.
Don't be an escort. You will be better off for me,
even though I hate you. Just stop it. He's just
(09:36):
unable to do that. So you could have something along
those lines, or you can have maybe some kind of
later October surprise that would end up helping Harris and
Trump completely misplace his hand.
Speaker 2 (09:51):
We'll be back right after the break, Okay, go leap ahead.
What's life in Trump world like? If he wins?
Speaker 3 (10:06):
I continue to not believe that Jared won't get back
into the picture. I think that there is a plan possibly.
Jared would of course want secretary of State. I don't
think he's going to get that position.
Speaker 2 (10:19):
If they pick up three seats in the Senate. I
think he might be secretary of State. But what else
do you see?
Speaker 3 (10:25):
I see an issue with how much control Donald will want.
He's not going to want Susie Wiles of Chris Losovita
to be seen as getting the type of credit and
be seen as going in senior positions where it makes
them walk as if they're David Apsola or Carl Rose, right,
(10:46):
because Donald will have done this all himself. So then
there's a vacuum. And how has that vacuum filled? Who's
it filled by? Now? I think Project twenty twenty five
is out the door. I think Trump is really really
pissed about it. I can't imagine him giving them any
type of major role at the higher level were for
(11:07):
the day to day contact. But I would tell you
there is somebody in the back of his mind. There's
always somebody in the back of his mind that is
going to come in and suddenly be a surprise for
everyone that that person is suddenly showing up the day
after Donald wins.
Speaker 2 (11:23):
And no, totally it could be. Yeah, I mean, all
logic says that the chief of staff should be Susie Wilds.
But could that logic be reversed and suddenly Kelly and
Conway back the job that she has always felt she
should have rightly had but for her husband. Yeah, and
(11:43):
what's life like in Trump world if he loses.
Speaker 3 (11:47):
He loses the election, You'll see my belief in immediate
fight within that campaign because he'll be words Roy Cone,
He'll be looking for his wordy Julie. And I don't
believe Susie Wiles and Chris losov Or would act like that.
We'll find out, but I don't believe. I just can't
see it.
Speaker 2 (12:04):
Yeah, I think you're totally right. Chris has a career
beyond this.
Speaker 3 (12:07):
And then you have to look at the fact that
of cous Rupert a billion newsmats just had a settlement.
People are really going to roll their eyes. Now you'll
have that group of rank and file voters. They're not
going to be able to take it. How did we
lose it? Stolen from Saint Donald again? Right, Cheeto, Jesus
at the cross and you know, being tested and this
(12:30):
is just another divine test for him to rise and
somehow get back into the Whites. Well, I really do
think that what you will see is something that you
didn't see in twenty one is, for instance, the sentiments
at Tucker Carlson Express where he said, I hate Donald,
I don't want to talk about him anymore. I think
he'll only have people like Tucker Carlson to talk to
(12:52):
about the election being stolen. It will be like these influencers,
possibly this new world of podcasts and Instagram people. Right,
maybe that'll be pushed, but that'll be his immediate thing,
that it was stolen from him, And then you'll see
what's going to happen to all the money. One of
the major criticisms of Wroth Obama by the Democrats was
that he did not do anything to help the Democrat
(13:14):
Party and he kept all the money for his own campaign.
Donald keeps all the Republican money and a lot of
it is for himself indirectly, and I can't imagine that
he's gonna let that go. And you're going to look
at a John fun who would be the next majority
leader of the Senate, really being somebody who how is
(13:35):
he going to be able to handle a Trump loss?
Because what we did see in that second impeachment was
none of us would be here doing this interview today
if Mitch mccoddle actually had the stones to kick Donald
out into victim for January sixth, and he didn't, and
that's why he's limping off and he gave up his
leadership posts. One of the things I think about Donald,
(13:56):
I'm surprised he hasn't attacked Harrison on the Willie Brown issue.
And one of the reasons I believe Matt is because
he knows he may need her for some kind of
party or for him not to get sent to jail
for the Jack Smith prosecution in DC. And the reason
I say that is because this is something where he
does play five dimensional chests. As he would like to say,
as he has said to me Todd, is he is
(14:19):
very good at thinking eight steps ahead about how he
will work some he is somebody who is a hustler.
He looks at that like if you ever asked him
the difference between Sharpton and Jackson, he would say Sharpton
was a hustler, Jackson was just a con man, meaning
Sharpton was smart and Sharpton had played the long game.
He'll play the long game. And what I say is is, like,
for instance, the line that Roger and.
Speaker 2 (14:42):
I gave him, that's Roger Stone.
Speaker 3 (14:43):
The beginning for him to run on was we need
another Bush about as much as we needed out of
their Clinton. And he wouldn't do that. He wouldn't an
attack Clunton. He said, I'm not going to attack her
until we get later in the primer. Why because had
he lost the primary, he would have wanted her to
get elected president. Had he lost the primary, he would
have wanted to take credit for the fact that he
helps think the Republican Party to help Hillary Ethman fantastic.
(15:04):
So I think that in some ways he's laying off
of him.
Speaker 2 (15:08):
I told you that, literally, Sam is the smartest observer
of all of this.
Speaker 3 (15:13):
I don't know what it gets me now it gets
you like you, Yes, this is fifty cents doesn't get
me The New York.
Speaker 1 (15:22):
Post, Sam, I have a question for you. You were fired,
I think four times during Trump's first campaign. What made
you keep coming back?
Speaker 3 (15:34):
In the beginning when I worked for him, I was
the sole person who took him seriously that would work
for him day to day, and it actually hurt me.
I wouldn't get jobs. I wanted to be a politico.
I didn't really care that much if I got fired
for a BuzzFeed article because we had a major fund.
What it happened was once this Lewandowski, who I like
a moron, brought in after staffing up the primary states,
(15:57):
came in, Donald immediately just liked him more than me.
For whatever reason it is, I don't know. I don't
care anymore. Yeah, that's what ten years and six years
of sobriety and a lot of self reflection gets it.
Uh huh, whatever, it is good for him. You want
to like Lewin Dowski more than me? You lost by
Pudin and Kim john Zille. I don't think a person.
But when he started firing me when the campaign was
(16:22):
going on, that was when I had enough. And I
had worked for him to experience that campaign. I deserve
to experience that campaign. So that's when, as Michael said,
I went to war with him, and I did everything
in my power to try to beat him, and I
just couldn't beat him. I feel like it's a life lesson.
They built something that's so good that I can't even
beat it after I get screwed over.
Speaker 2 (16:41):
As I say, Sam is the one to blame. This
all comes back to you. I'm getting the signal. This
has been great, Sam, as usual, incredibly insightful.
Speaker 1 (16:52):
Yeah, it's wonderful.
Speaker 2 (16:53):
Thank you. You to this day are the person who
truly understands Donald Trump. And I'm not sure what that
is going to get you.
Speaker 3 (17:01):
The one thing it did can be is A've got
room to meet a lot of interesting people like yourself,
and it has been a wild drives for the good
of the world.
Speaker 2 (17:11):
We'll find out, we'll see if it goes on, but
I will speak to you soon, sir, And thank you
so much.
Speaker 3 (17:16):
Thank you gentlemen for the interview.
Speaker 1 (17:17):
Thank you.
Speaker 2 (17:18):
That's all the time we have for today, and we'll
be back next week. Fire and Fury the podcast is
hosted and executive produced by Michael Wolfe and James Truman.
The producers are Adam Waller and Emily Maronoff, executive producers
(17:40):
for Kaleidoscope.
Speaker 3 (17:41):
Mangesh had to get an old Velocian executive producers for
iHeart On Nikki Ito and Katrina Novell
Hosts And Creators
James Truman
Michael Wolff
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