Harry Litman

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:06):
Welcome to Talking Feds one on one deep dive discussions
with national figures about the most fascinating and consequential issues
defining our culture and shaping our lives. I'm your host,
Harry Littman. Hey, Hey, everyone, it's our latest Molly Harry
mash up where Mullijong Fast throws legal questions my way

(00:30):
and I return fire with political questions. Let me just say,
always a pleasure to be with the celebrated Maullijong Fast,
who has added since the last time we were here
to her long famous resume, a new book, How to
Lose Your Mother, which came out last month, Muzzle time, New.

Speaker 2 (00:50):
York Times bestseller, your.

Speaker 1 (00:52):
Baby bestseller Baby okay. And speaking of the New York Times, man,
you had a great article in there that was sort
of part memoir and part political analysis about the Stephen
Colbert firing. And let me start with that. You wrote
there that you know, canceling Colbert isn't funny, but you

(01:16):
noted how the point of authoritarian coercion is it's a motivator.
And man, we're seeing it sort of everywhere where he's been.
Has Trump in this first eighth of his new term,
pretty damn successful in getting people, including broad sectors of
civil society, to really toe the line or approach the line.

(01:39):
Why is he so much more effective at doing that
and sort of calling the speech of big sectors of
the country than he was last time around?

Speaker 2 (01:50):
Do you think there was actually a really smart piece
in the Times today, an opinion piece from the former
ambassador to Hungary, a bad Victor Orbond and why how
dangerous all.

Speaker 1 (02:03):
Of this is?

Speaker 2 (02:04):
And I would say I think Trump is effective at
doing it because people don't understand the stakes of the decisions.
So if your Sherry Redstone, you think I want to
do this merger so I can have two billion dollars,
and you don't, and you think, well, you know, Colbert,
these nighttime shows, they are not the business they once were.

(02:28):
And all of this is very expensive and it's a
huge headache. So let's just kill it. It'll make Trump happy,
it'll make the deal go, right, That's what she's thinking.
She's thinking, whatever, it doesn't matter, I just got to
get my deal done. This is a consequence of an
imperial presidency, right, a presidency that no longer has any
kind of firewall between regulation and Trump's whims. So Trump

(02:53):
is does not like to be made fun of. His
regulatory body serves at his pleasure. Air goes goodbye to
late night hosts, possibly one and all, because, as you
and I both know, network television and also cable television
has a regulatory body that, unlike the Internet or anything else,

(03:17):
really is regulated.

Speaker 1 (03:18):
They're going to be jumpy at least, right. And then
it's a great article, by the way, because he said
I saw this happening.

Speaker 2 (03:26):
Right, And basically what he says is you don't put
together this one decision with what it ends up happening. Now.
I'm not convinced that Hungary and America are one to
one for any number of reasons, but we certainly have
an orbanic figure in Trump, right orbon putin, you know,

(03:51):
an autocrat who who does not believe the rule of
law applies to him. So I do think that there
is there are a lot of parallels, and it means
so it means really that powerful people must stand up
to Trump. That means that it means it's more important
than ever that a Jeff Bezos, who obviously in his

(04:16):
heart knows all of this is insanitay, that he stands
up that it actually is. And again, all of the
writing about authoritarianism, all of the books about authoritarism say
it's a game of inches, not feed.

Speaker 1 (04:30):
That's so important.

Speaker 2 (04:31):
Yeah, yeah, all right, so bring it. Uh, we're going
to do legal on Epstein. This entire time breaking news
which won't be breaking by tomorrow when people listen to this,
But they're these grand jury Pam Bondi, who is very
much in the hot seat right now, decided she wanted

(04:51):
the grand jury stuff for Epstein, which is, by the way,
just a very very small slice of all of the
Epstein stuff she has on her ask probably from the
FBI to the DOJ, all of that, A very slim
sliver of it is the grand jury grand jury stuff.
And fyi, we know that all the names will be

(05:14):
redacted in grand jury stuff, accusers and victims, which I
think is important data point. So the judge said, no,
go on that. Explain to us why and what that
looks like.

Speaker 1 (05:26):
Sure, let me just start with the headline. It's not
just a slim slice. It's a slice that, in the
Venn diagram has zero connection with what everyone's clamoring for.
It's the slice that the probably already started marine Kongmi.
You put to put together an indictment that doesn't talk
about it's all about Epstein and Maxwell and the underage

(05:48):
girls and the people who facilitated. But what's Paul Engelmeyer
up to the rules? Molly say, here's six reasons why
it's a serious thing to uncover grand jury stuff in
any event, and yes, you Readact names. Here's six reasons
why you can do it. Guess what. None of them
is the public interest, which is what this four page

(06:10):
filing by the Deputy Attorney General stunning in itself, says.
But there's no warrant for that in the rules. There
maybe is a little play in the joints according to
one second Circuit opinion, but that was not about public interest.
And imagine if public interest were a reason for piercing

(06:31):
this and going into a grand juria. No, maybe Trump
wants him to deny it. What is he doing for now? Though?
Angel Myer says, I'm going to deal with this quickly,
but I need a few things, like the transcripts which
you haven't given me administration, Like what is Maxwell, as
ulaimes Maskwell's Maxwell's position on this. I want to hear

(06:53):
about the victims. This is just what I need so
I can make the decision. Is there a reason to
do this even though it's clearly not in the rules.
So you know, I think it's a gambit on their part.
They maybe hope he'll turn them down. But the number
one thing to understand, it's got nothing to do with
what everyone's clamoring for. What's that it's an FBI database

(07:17):
of three hundred gigabytes, that's like a million and a
half pages with the motherload of everything and the case
if you look at the indictment, you just didn't need
to prove anything about customers, pals, wingman as we're now hearing,
or bestie. He's got nothing to do with it, nor
even what you know maga's obsession with there being a

(07:40):
whole cabal of pedophiles and a leaf zero zero part
of the case. The case was sealed so that they
could retry Maxwell on the same charge as if they
wanted to. If you uncover it, it'll give nothing, which brings
me to my Epstein question. I only Fire wanted you,
But like man, this is so different. I mean, he's

(08:04):
been flouting the constitution and doing all these outrageous uh
kinds of a legal conduct. But this is the one
that has stuck. He has stepped in it for reasons
that I think a lot of people, I'm one of them,
didn't fully appreciate the real vehemence of the you saw.
Maybe Stuart Rhodes's quote comes out, this is what we

(08:25):
care about. We don't give a shit about uh, any
of that. This is what he's this is what he's there.

Speaker 2 (08:32):
Explain who Stuart Road is.

Speaker 1 (08:34):
Okay, Stuart Rhades maybe number one insurrectionists whom Trump pardoned.
He's the Yale guy, law school guy with the patch
who got like a twenty year sentence, mister Instagram, and
he's coming out and.

Speaker 2 (08:45):
Putting isn't he the head of the.

Speaker 1 (08:51):
You know this was tattooed on me for a while.
I think it is the Proud Boys, not not.

Speaker 2 (08:55):
The three Keepers.

Speaker 1 (08:57):
Okay, they have it, we know, you know, we know
it's general. But so here's my question.

Speaker 2 (09:03):
He shot out his own eye by accident.

Speaker 1 (09:08):
These things happen right when you're all right. Anyway, The
administration is doing everything, throwing stuff against the wall. Maybe
we'll talk about more, But the really big sally in
difference here is it's Maga that's up in arms, and
my you know, my question to you is whether any
of these half measures, like if the grand Jury were
to come out, but even more, uh, will it satisfy them?

(09:31):
Is there a time when Maga, which you know is
even cowing members of the of Congress, the Speaker, et cetera,
will say okay and let go of the bone that
they that they have, or is this not going away
until Trump plays an open hand with whatever the hell

(09:51):
that reveals, because Maga won't let it go away.

Speaker 2 (09:56):
So this is a real question, and I think it
is is it's wild? I mean, I think we should
start by realizing that it's a great example of how
in twenty sixteen there were things that happened where we
all thought they would matter because they mattered to us,
but they didn't matter to the trump based. The Trumpets
operated in a completely different sphere. Some a lot of

(10:19):
times they wouldn't hear about this stuff because it was
in the liberal bobble, and when they did, they were
sort of immune to it because Trump had in nerd
them to it. He had said, you know, the even
like a really interesting moment was during this whole thing
where he was like, it's a hoax, it's a fake hoax,

(10:39):
like the Russia Russia Russia. Right. So he's like, you know,
remember when he when he speaks, when he spoke during
the election, he would say things like he would say bacon,
and his people would know that he was talking about inflation,
right the weave, I'd say bacon. And that's what this is, right,
This is the base is very tuned into him, and

(11:02):
they they they usually respond, like with bacon, they usually respond,
but here, all of a sudden, that's not what's happening.
And I think it's caught him very off guard, and
he thought he could just sort of bully them into submission,
which he has been able to do with all. I mean,
you have to remember all elected Republicans, from Mitch McConnell

(11:25):
to John Thuon to Mike Johnson, if they haven't behaved,
he's just kicked him out. So there has been no one.
He has effectively had pushback from no one, with the
exception of maybe Elon after he fired Elon, right, but
Elon's out, so he has almost no pushback, and all

(11:47):
of a sudden, the base starts pushing back and he
is not ready for that, and so he just says
don't be weak, which I think was strategically the worst
thing he could have said to them. Like I think
if he had said, I was here to sow you know,
to find the deep state. You know, remember he has
for almost a decade been like I am here to

(12:09):
solve the deep state. And then he gets there and
he's like, you're stupid for thinking there's a deep state,
and I think it's very undermining. I mean, I just
think so the problem here is Trump one point zero
would have fired everyone, right. He would have fired Pam Bondi,
he would have fired he might have fired Bongino, he

(12:30):
might have fired Patel. And what would have happened, I
think is that the chaos would have sort of absorbed
what happened. But instead he's like very into this, not
firing people and just moving them around in the hopes
that they won't leave. And I actually think it doesn't
serve got it?

Speaker 1 (12:49):
And you maybe I got a legal point to that,
But maybe that's what you're gonna ask me, because you
say you're all Epstein all the time, at least today,
So wait, bring it.

Speaker 2 (12:56):
No, No, if you have a legal point, go, My legal.

Speaker 1 (12:59):
Point is just this. You say he's done the stupidest thing.
I politically, strategically, he's done absolutely the stupidest thing legally,
because look, there is some truth to him. You know,
he's some kind of pole. There's not necessarily any reason
to think he's client or anything like that. But he
made it in his reflexive way all about he came

(13:22):
out fake media, and it's all about this piece of paper,
this letter he wrote Tepstein and his saying it's fake
and I'm sorry. We know anybody was sophisticated about the
media knows this is not fake. Wall Street Journal has
it buttoned down. Not just the.

Speaker 2 (13:41):
Rupert knows about publishing controversial stuff, and he's not.

Speaker 1 (13:46):
They are all in. This is not like CBS there
where they're gonna knuckle under. So he's done the exact
strategy that A extends things, beat puts him through a
like discovery and a deposition, and at the end of
the day the card gets turned over and it's exactly
what he's been saying. It isn't. So legally, I can't
think of anything worse than the defamation suit.

Speaker 2 (14:09):
Tina Brown, though, did have an amazing She had an
amazing quip at the end of this new York Times
article where she was like, we have Ruper Murdock is
the only media mogul I mean freedoms, yes, but it
is kind of amazing and also pretty disturb it.

Speaker 1 (14:31):
Yeah, but I think in his universe you would know better, Molly.
But I think look, the news operation of the Wall
Street Journal is just a separate Everyone would just leave
if he totally pulled out the wrung from under them.
It's not Fox.

Speaker 2 (14:45):
News, right, no question. And and by the way, Fox
News has not been covering it, yeah right, I mean
like there's been It's been mentioned twice on Fox News
and supposedly. I mean I read this in the in
the so I'm not entirely sure what this means. But
what Murdoch's lieutenant, who spoke on the condition of anonymity,

(15:11):
said was that Rupert was pushing to see whether the
base was still with Trump and if they Because what
Rupert Murdoch, which I think is pretty smart, I mean
bad for American democracy and for all of us, and
morally very dicey, but smart, what he saw in twenty
twenty was that he is that Fox News is not

(15:34):
more powerful than its viewers, that the viewers are actually
more powerful than the narrative. And so if the narrative
goes off the cliff and says Trump didn't win the election,
and Trump says he did win the election, they will
just tune out. They will turn off. And so he's
trying to poke and now see if they are going

(15:55):
to be separated from him, and there's certainly some evidence
to support a possible that they will.

Speaker 1 (16:01):
Yeah, I mean more than some of it seems so far.
It's not just do it road right. You've also seen
like a whole cast of character Ingram and Meghan Kelly
basically finding something they care about more than Donald Trump.

Speaker 2 (16:16):
So it's so stupid because like they should care about
rural hospitals closing but whatever.

Speaker 1 (16:23):
And the constitution and the rule of law.

Speaker 2 (16:25):
But here, Yeah, yeah, yeah, Congress has been talking about
maybe trying to get some of this stuff released. All
there's a huge amount of Ebstein stuff that's at the
Doji right that.

Speaker 1 (16:40):
Bondy gigabytes like a million and a half pages roughly speaking,
depending what's on there.

Speaker 2 (16:46):
Yeah, so if you wanted to get it released, who
could get it released?

Speaker 1 (16:49):
And half Donald Trump or Pam Bondi. It's with the
FBI now so it implicates the whole Bongino Patel uh
you know bondy mess now and we've seen over the
you know in Trump one point zero Congress on paper
has pretty strong you know, they were going to maybe

(17:10):
do it subpoena. I don't see that working basically. I
think you'll see stonewalling, maybe even embedded by the court,
if a Supreme Court, if it comes to it, and
that means it's going to be a decision that will
be on Trump alone, and that means it's going to
be based on the political dynamic. But all this stuff, Mollie,

(17:31):
the the DJ is now wading into it and doing
this grand jury thing. This is not what they do.
It is all funky in the extreme. Normally there's a
case they're investigating or something. There is no warrant for
much less the Deputy Attorney General to go. I just
want to talk to Gilaine Maxwell. God knows what he's

(17:54):
going to try to offer her. On the like, they
are all upriver and doing the sort of thing they
would never have done before because it's so plainly political.
It's a political operation that at least for now you
can imagine they're sort of constructing something that has a
kind of law enforcement hook up to and including you know,
some people say Epstein was murdered, for example, But right

(18:15):
now they're just freelancing for political reasons and inappropriately at
least pre Trump era, because they're obviously the number one
lookout here is solving a political crisis for the White House.
So they've thrown out the rule book long since, and
they're playing by whatever rules they want and making people
try to stop them, and so far on this kind

(18:37):
of thing, anyway, you know, the record of the court
for stopping them isn't good. So the bottom line ANSWER's
going to be it's kind of has to be greenlighted
by Trump. And you would know this better than I,
but I think that's a political dynamic.

Speaker 2 (18:52):
Right, No question.

Speaker 3 (18:53):
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(19:15):
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Speaker 1 (19:21):
So interested in what's going on with young voters who
were among the people who deserted Harris and the others
and really seemed young males, but really young voters in
general to do so much so we have I've never
seen something quite like this, A like reversal from what
was it you know twenty four seventy twenty fourth pro

(19:43):
to like the exact opposite. You know, the buyer's remorse
is super strong. What do you make of the shift?
And do you think it's you know, got legs.

Speaker 2 (19:55):
Funny? You should ask that, but I believe it or not.
We just the other interview on this episode is a
guy called g Elliott Morris who goes through the polling
with me one by one and explain sort of what happened.
But basically, kids, young adults age eighteen two thirty four

(20:20):
have like he just he sold himself on the podcast
and then he got in there and they don't like
anything he's doing. And I think they don't like the
regressive taxation, they don't like the tax cuts for billionaires,
they don't like the dissolving of Medicaid, they don't like
any of it. They're super and you know, they and

(20:43):
I think he had a very smart point. They grew
up in Obama Land. They believed that the government. You know,
they're not Reagan kids. You know, I grew up in
Reagan when the goal of Reagan was to make the
government as small as possible. Drowned in the bathtub, you know.
How dare you want a weather forecast?

Speaker 1 (21:01):
You know, but Obama are.

Speaker 2 (21:05):
Monster. You can control your own air. And I think
that Obama really reset and then COVID really reset again.
So the thing that he said that I thought was
the most interesting, and you should listen to this interview
because there's just a lot of really interesting stuff in
there that I would just to get you you don't

(21:26):
miss it. Just to have him walk through the data
was made was really interesting. But the thing that he
said that I thought was the most interesting was that
the only thing less popular than what they're doing now
was in Trump's first term when he tried that Obamacare repeal.
So because the BBB hasn't it a skinny Medicare Medicaid repeal,

(21:52):
that his sort of was hidden in reconciliation, by the way,
what I don't what happened to the parliamentarian who was like, yes,
you can repeal Obamacare, you know in the in reconciliation.

Speaker 1 (22:05):
Like the ghost of Robert Bird seems to have left
the building.

Speaker 2 (22:08):
Does Yeah, Yeah, but that I thought that I think
is really interesting. And again, so the question is you
have his mid term. We're six months into Trump's term,
which means we're eighteen months for the midterms. The question
is young voters are already unhappy. Where how much more
unhappy can they get? If that ten And again one

(22:29):
last thing, I know, we're out of time, but for Breezio,
Trump's pollster says it about ten percent of his base
are like straight QAnon, Right, They're the paranoid style in
American politics. So that ten percent, here's a real question.
Does he lose that ten percent?

Speaker 1 (22:47):
Right? And if you mean because of Epstein? And if he.

Speaker 2 (22:50):
Loses that ten percent, even if they don't vote for Democrats,
they just don't go out for him and they don't
vote for his candidates.

Speaker 1 (22:57):
Ten percent has a lot of voters him for him
who's been governing on a minority razors ages.

Speaker 2 (23:02):
Right, Yeah, last question, Trump has a lot of fanciful
stuff to try to distract. One of them is he
has decided Tolsea Gabbart has this crazy Barack Obama trees
in She's going to refer to the Justice Department. It

(23:23):
seems insane. But is there a world in which this
really does? Like, do we see Trump trying to arrest
Barack Obama? Or is this just fanciful so we don't
see it?

Speaker 1 (23:34):
And we've had a lot of this, Yeah, I mean
my favorite I gather there's like an AI thing out
there they've created with Obama, you know, talk about the
new world we are in now. It does strike me,
Mollie that these are mainly diversionary tactic. Same thing with
the Redskins, and I'm going to scuttle that if they
don't change the name. You know, really a whole bunch

(23:56):
of stuff that best I can tell is just not
But I don't think there's a world, even our world,
even the hungry version of our world, where he tries
to arrest Obama. And I don't think Obama thinks so either.
Much more to say on that, but don't need to.

(24:17):
I think that's the bottom line. And I know we're
out of time. Always so fun and best of luck
with the book. And by the way, that new York
Times article talks about your grandfather and the McCarthy era,
and it's returning now. Everyone should read that too. Thank
you for tuning in to one on one, a weekly

(24:39):
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(25:02):
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(25:23):
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(25:44):
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(26:08):
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(26:30):
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