Trump Wants $1 BILLION in Taxpayer Money for His Ballroom | Morning Shots Live

0:00 Stein here with Bill Crystal.

0:01 You are not imagining things.

0:02 This is not MAGA Mondays.

0:04 I'm not Andrew Edgar.

0:05 This is Morning Shots Live Tuesday, May 5th.

0:09 Happy Cinco de Mayo, Bill.

0:10 And happy CO to you.

0:12 And just to be clear, Andrew Edgar has not been fired, disciplined, benched, or

0:16 suspended yet.

0:17 He's just has a bad sore throat.

0:19 And so Sam uh u was happy, I think, to

0:24 to step in.

0:26 Thank you for stepping in.

0:27 Thank you for stepping in, Sam.

0:28 As far as I understand it,

0:30 Andrew is at Trump Tower now getting one of those taco

0:32 bowls that Trump tweeted about 10 years ago for Cynio.

0:36 Just can't stay away that guy.

0:37 He loves him so much.

0:39 Um, all right.

0:40 We're going to talk about some stuff today.

0:42 We got a host of uh things to discuss.

0:44 Ballroom shenanigans.

0:47 Pete Hagath had a little briefing this morning.

0:50 Uh, what else do we want to talk about, Bill?

0:52 We'll we'll make it a popery.

0:54 We can go different places you want to go.

0:55 I want to start with the ballroom.

0:57 So, setting this up last night, um, well,

1:00 I guess I got to step back step back a little further.

1:03 Republicans in Congress are considering a reconciliation bill.

1:06 And not to bore listeners right out of the gate,

1:09 but reconciliation bill is something you could pass

1:11 with a partyline vote in the Senate, in the House.

1:14 It allows you to just do budgetary things.

1:17 So, it has to be related to dollars and cents,

1:20 which is why they probably can't do the Save America Act in there.

1:23 So anyways, they're going to do the second reconciliation bill and it

1:25 requires all the committees to put together what they want in that bill.

1:30 And so last night, the Senate Judiciary Republicans put together their wish

1:34 list for what they want in their portion of the reconciliation bill.

1:39 And it's a doozy.

1:40 There's tens of billions of dollars for ICE,

1:43 even though ICE already has more money than they can possibly,

1:49 you know, deal with.

1:50 And then on top of that, and this is what

1:52 we want to focus on because it really got my goat,

1:55 there is a provision in there for 1 billion,

1:58 that's with a B billion dollars to allow for security adjustments

2:02 and upgrades related to the what they call the East Wing modernization project.

2:07 You can see the actual language on there.

2:09 I'm just going to read it out loud so people

2:11 know how this works and then Bill can just appine.

2:13 In addition to amounts otherwise available,

2:15 there is appropriated to the United States Secret

2:17 Service for fiscal year 2026 out of any

2:20 money in the Treasury not otherwise appropriated

2:22 $1 billion to remain available until September 30th,

2:26 2029 for the purposes of security adjustments and upgrades,

2:29 including within the perimeter fence

2:31 of the White House compound to support enhancements

2:34 by the United States Secret Service

2:35 relating to the East Wing modernization project,

2:39 including above ground and below ground security features.

2:44 All right, Bill, I have my thoughts.

2:45 What are yours?

2:47 I guess let me make two points.

2:48 One, a bigger point about the reconciliation bill.

2:50 It is pretty striking.

2:51 The point the reason for this bill,

2:52 it's it's unusual timing and usually they use reconciliation

2:55 for much bigger uh amounts of money and tax

2:58 bills and so forth is that they want is

3:00 that the Democrats won the showdown on Department of Homeland

3:03 Security funding in the sense that they were able

3:05 to fund the then the Republicans ended up conceding

3:07 in the House and they funded the rest of DHS

3:09 with no new money for ICE and Border Patrol.

3:13 uh as you say, they didn't need that new

3:14 money because unfortunately they got uh tens of billions,

3:17 actually over 100 150 billion, I think, right?

3:20 A year ago in that reconciliation bill, but uh Trump promised to get it.

3:24 The Republicans promised that, God forbid, that I should be deprived of any

3:27 of the money they need to run their horrible detention

3:30 centers and go around uh uh persecuting Americans

3:33 on the streets of their cities and so forth.

3:34 So, uh they've got that bill, most of which is is ICE and Border Patrol money,

3:39 and then this extra 1 billion for homeland security.

3:41 It is actually for two of the Trump administration's least popular projects.

3:45 I mean, which is interesting and I well,

3:48 let me make a broad point about that and then we

3:49 can come back to the ballroom which I think is also interesting.

3:51 I mean, I So, you say, well, why why is I mean,

3:53 Trump's at times Trump pulled in the past

3:56 Trump has pulled back uh on issues that he

3:58 knows aren't popular and and still does sometimes

4:01 and did a little bit on on obviously ICE.

4:03 He he got rid of Christian and they're

4:05 less visible in their persecution of people and after

4:08 the killing of of of of good and Petri

4:10 and and Freddy and and and that kind of thing

4:14 but and this he's become less what I'm struck

4:17 by is this that Trump doesn't care Trump doesn't

4:19 care about the polls in some issues he still

4:21 does but in general the megalomania especially with stuff

4:24 that he is is attached to him and this gets

4:26 to the ballroom the megalamania the narcissism uh

4:30 the the the wanting to put his stamp

4:32 on things uh for the future has overcome the kind

4:35 of normal political constraints which if you're a Democrat

4:38 is pretty good because it means you can

4:40 run on this billion dollars for the ballroom you

4:42 know for the rest of the next six months.

4:43 He's making Republicans take something that's a Trump

4:45 weakness and make it a Republican weakness.

4:47 Good for Democrats.

4:48 On the other hand, from a sort of next two and a half years point of view,

4:52 we've got a president who's less constrained than he was because one

4:55 of the reasons presidents back off foolish

4:57 policies is public opinion turns against them.

4:59 And this case and some of this stuff at least

5:02 the megalomania is overcoming the you know the political calculation.

5:07 I I mean look I find it outrageous.

5:12 The whole premise of the ballroom the whole salesmanship of the ballroom

5:16 was that this was going to be paid for with private funds.

5:21 Okay.

5:22 Then it started at $200 million and Trump said

5:25 can I get it done under budget and on time?

5:28 Then it got up to 300 million then 400

5:30 million and now it's taxpayer funded and the notion

5:36 and it's a bill and it's a billion

5:38 and a billion a billion and the notion that they're going

5:42 to say and I actually let me play a game with you

5:46 because I I was thinking of sending um uh our video

5:49 guys to uh the Hill to just ask Republicans about it.

5:51 Unfortunately, they're not on the hill.

5:52 They're on break today.

5:55 What would you predict if they got

5:56 a a microphone and a camera put in their face,

5:59 a congressional Republican would say if they were asked about this?

6:03 It's for security, Sam.

6:04 Secret Service says they needed, you know,

6:06 Secret Service is right in there in that appropriation.

6:08 This isn't just for Trump.

6:09 This is for the next president and God forbid,

6:11 you saw the White House correspondence dinner.

6:13 You need security.

6:14 Of course, I mean, the White House has been, thank God,

6:17 very secure so far as one can tell for the last decades, right?

6:20 That's not where incidents have happened.

6:22 But my point here is

6:24 that's not what you said when you initially outlined this thing.

6:27 Did you think you're going to construct it without security?

6:29 Was that the promise?

6:30 Did you just not factor in security

6:32 into your cost projections when you said 200 million,

6:35 then 300 million, then 400 million?

6:37 I mean, it's just the ultimate bait and switch.

6:40 And the idea that Republicans who would lose their effing mind

6:45 if a Democratic president were to do something like this will then

6:48 go along happily and they are because they put in the freaking

6:51 reconciliation bill that they're going along with this is is ridiculous.

6:54 I went and looked in the archives because I knew that there was had

6:57 to have been something involving Obama and um Obama did some sort of uh

7:04 basketball hoop rec you know they had a tennis court they make it

7:07 into basketball hoop you know they spent some money on it Republicans made up

7:11 a figure was like something like $370 million it was Snopes discounted it

7:16 but they weren't ballistic over the idea

7:18 this madeup figure that was $370 million

7:20 this is a billion dollars and it's taxpayer money and it's for a vanity

7:24 project that no one needed and that Trump

7:26 pledged would be done with private funds,

7:28 which by the way, we don't know where the private funds are coming from.

7:32 We know a little bit about it,

7:33 but we don't know exactly who gave what and how much is being raised.

7:37 So, this is the most secretive vanity project.

7:40 And now everyone who is a taxpayer is on the hook for it.

7:43 It's crazy.

7:44 And and they say it's to build in effect the bunker.

7:47 You know, this real national security reasons

7:49 except they set above ground too in there already was a bunker.

7:53 We know that Trump was taken to it in for example

7:55 in 2020 at the height of the George Floyd protest.

7:58 Uh and I having worked in the White House know

8:00 a little bit that exists and it was used in after 9/11

8:03 and I believe it was one of the things that was probably

8:06 damaged or may just destroyed when they ripped up the east wing.

8:09 So they have to replace it but it there there was no issue

8:12 that I know of with that made people worried about the security of that bunker.

8:15 So the whole as you say it's it's it's a it's a fake security

8:20 and presidential security and national security justification

8:23 for something that's entirely a vanity project.

8:26 Um and incidentally you've pointed this out we pointed this out

8:28 I think when we were together on some one of these shows.

8:31 Um, it also sort of implies that everything Trump

8:34 does is going to be moved to the White House,

8:35 which I think he would like incidentally because

8:37 then he would be the host and he would preside and maybe he can bludgeon uh all

8:41 the groups that have him to speak at other places,

8:43 the Chamber of Commerce and and the White House correspondence association.

8:46 you know, we got to do it in the White House for security reasons.

8:48 And then suddenly it's in the White House and the White House

8:50 controls the guest list and suddenly Trump's controlling maybe the you know

8:53 the the order the order of events and and and it is

8:58 a in that respect it's very much part of Trump's imperial presidency mode.

9:02 Other nations that I visited and you have right have this kind of presidential

9:06 comp less democratic nations have this kind

9:09 of presidential complex where everything takes place.

9:11 Putin does not go to give speeches and hotels in Moscow.

9:15 People come to the Kremlin.

9:16 I mean, and that's the Kremlin is this massive place with all these different,

9:19 you know, buildings basically.

9:20 And that's kind of what it looks like if you live in a that kind of country.

9:24 America has had a relatively modest White House,

9:27 both the working spaces and the residential spaces,

9:29 very nice, but still not as grand as some other countries.

9:32 And the idea is the president with appropriate security,

9:35 which affects these events of course,

9:37 goes to other places to goes to the citizenry.

9:39 And that reverses that whole dynamic.

9:41 I mean, the way the West Wing,

9:43 if we're being honest about the West Wing is, it's like a little dumpy.

9:46 It is.

9:47 I mean, the offices are small.

9:49 It's, you know, it's chaotic always in there.

9:53 There's paper strewn all over the place, but that's its charm.

9:56 Like, it it's not supposed to be a high-end

10:00 office building with a bunch of, you know,

10:02 you know, G, you know, gizmos and things and all,

10:05 you know, new technology and modern.

10:08 It is the West Wing.

10:10 It's the people's place.

10:11 I will say you did raise a You kind of triggered something in me.

10:15 You don't build this stuff.

10:17 You don't have a system in place where

10:19 you're hosting every event if you leave, right?

10:23 Like I mean that's just not and we've talked about this a lot,

10:25 but like you don't spruce up all of Washington DC in the way you want to see it.

10:31 If your plan is to then just depart to Palm Beach,

10:36 I don't know if I necessarily am ready to commit

10:39 to the idea that he's sticking around or trying

10:41 to, but it does give off the impression if he's

10:44 going to the mat this aggressively for these things, like why?

10:49 I mean, I guess I very much agree with that and I think

10:51 incidentally Don Junior's relatively recent kind

10:55 of uh I've noticed I've noticed your tweet

10:57 emergence and reemer reemergence as a sort of player staying at the White

11:01 House and all this but also people talk him talking a little

11:03 bit hinting my political future you know is is maybe if he

11:07 can't if he's not in good enough shape to do it in 2028.

11:09 Maybe you do the classic autocrat hand over to the next

11:13 generation thing which is of course Joe's point of view

11:16 desirable in all kinds of ways in terms of making

11:17 money not having anything he's done investigated and all that.

11:21 So yeah know I I but I I I guess the counter argument to him

11:24 it would be well you do this before

11:26 you leave or if you see mortality approaching

11:28 because you want the grand edififices everywhere

11:31 in Washington as your and you can't count

11:33 he's not he knows that maybe the next

11:35 presidents aren't going to want to build monuments

11:37 to him it's not going to be like Lincoln or Washington or FDR so he

11:41 has to build it for himself that's

11:43 but that's also a dangerous kind of whichever it

11:45 is whether he's planning on staying or has

11:47 intimations and mortality or probably some strange

11:49 combination of both right which would make sense

11:52 if you're 80 years old in a way.

11:53 Um, you know, that's dangerous also because it means that the normal

11:57 constraints sort of start to go away and it's all about him.

12:01 I I just in thinking about his second term,

12:03 a lot of it is just authoritarianism just a lot of it

12:06 is authoritarianism and a lot of it is all kinds of other things,

12:09 lessons he thinks he learned from the first term.

12:10 Don't you have to have loyalists everywhere, but how much a lot of it is

12:14 is the narcissism and the megalomania, don't you think?

12:16 And I think that's gotten noticeably worse just

12:19 in the year year and a quarter that he's been there.

12:22 Yeah.

12:23 Oh, 100%.

12:23 I mean, we did a big riff on the golf course yesterday,

12:26 but it is just him basically wanting to assuming

12:29 that he can just remodel the entire city in his image.

12:33 Uh, I will say there's something I mean,

12:35 the ballroom is unique in in one respect and that they

12:38 just destroyed it first and they haven't quite I mean,

12:42 the reflecting pool, whatever you want.

12:44 Like, look at that.

12:45 It's just an eyesore now.

12:46 So, they destroyed it and then it becomes a question,

12:48 well, what do you do with it?

12:50 Like you can't just leave it like that, right?

12:52 So like I don't know.

12:54 What do you do with this now?

12:55 Like is there a proper way to actually build something in its place?

12:59 I don't I I have no clue what the actual step forwards are here.

13:03 I mean you could rebuild a version of the East Wing and or have if you want

13:07 to have some kind of ballroom have a you

13:09 know a room that appropriate room that seats 200 people.

13:13 Not this thing that's so large.

13:14 The the grandiosity of it all.

13:16 It sounds trivial to complain about.

13:18 Okay.

13:18 It's a little bigger than, you know,

13:19 900 people, 100,000 people are supposed to join 50.

13:21 But if you put that together with the arch,

13:23 the size is is very Trumpy and and really bad.

13:26 I mean, that is is again very third world dictator Kim Jong-un,

13:30 the biggest one ever.

13:31 Is that arch is unbelievably large.

13:34 The New York Times did an excellent an excellent sort of videographic of what

13:38 it would look like as you come across Memorial Bridge and and yet that we

13:41 have that wonderful you do have that wonderful view of the cemetery which is

13:44 very low obviously does not it's just you know flat graves almost right and then

13:48 very beautiful with all the the white

13:51 head gravestones and then suddenly this now

13:53 right at that circle you you hit

13:55 when you come across Memorial Bridge there's going to be this this arch that's I

13:58 don't know twice higher than everything in Washington

14:01 I think right 2 I mean it's really massive other than the Washington Monument,

14:05 it will be higher than everything in Washington.

14:06 But the Washington has that ordinance that you can't build over 30, right?

14:09 The Washington Monument is kind of thin, you know what I mean?

14:11 So, it's like a little No, it's a little, you know, whatever spire into the sky.

14:15 But this thing is just going to be so dominant at a place that's a moving.

14:18 It's one of the main bridges and you see from one side the Lincoln

14:21 Memorial and the other side Arlington kind of a very uh iconic almost place.

14:26 Yeah.

14:26 It's Roberty Lee's old house and then on the other side is Abraham Lincoln,

14:30 the Lincoln Memorial.

14:31 There's like a real symbolism there and then you're going to have

14:34 this big old freaking arch that's right

14:36 in the middle of it obstructing everything.

14:38 Uh last thing on the ballroom, um Democrats now have opportunities here.

14:43 Uh I'm going to put up a tweet from uh Brian Shod, senator from Hawaii,

14:47 who uh noted that by doing this, by putting this reconciliation bill together,

14:53 there will be an up and down vote on the ballroom.

14:56 And I I believe procedurally and I'm

14:58 citing Steve Dennis uh longtime reporter in DC

15:01 who knows this stuff uh in the back of his like the back of his hand.

15:04 They can make a motion to strip anything and it'll be a partyline motion.

15:09 So I I suspect Democrats I mean let let's assume

15:13 they will do this because obviously it's like a te-ball here.

15:15 They're gonna say, "All right,

15:16 let's strip the one billion and we're gonna make you guys go on record saying,

15:21 "No, we want to spend this money at this time,$1

15:24 billion dollars when we couldn't do the Obamacare subsidies.

15:28 We're going to spend that uh on a ballroom." And that that that I don't know.

15:32 I'm not a polyai guy.

15:33 I've never worked on a campaign.

15:35 Uh but that seems like an easy one for me.

15:38 Yeah.

15:38 Know reconciliation bills have this Yeah,

15:39 that's why they have that voter thing, right?

15:41 you get individual uh it allows individual mo motions to strip

15:47 particular you know line items from it budget items from it

15:50 and this one will certainly be won they'll also go after

15:52 ICE and border patrol and stuff incidentally but um no I think

15:55 it's a very good vote for the for the Democrats I

15:57 don't know maybe some Republicans get a little queasy about voting

16:01 for it it's it's um it's a billion dollars but over three

16:04 years but you think they never they never point in time bill I know I know

16:10 well But it does, you know,

16:12 one of the challenges Democrats have minor concerns

16:16 I say Democrats have had is Trump's numbers are

16:19 been going down very fast and very badly

16:21 and and that's the key determinant for a midterm election,

16:24 the president's approval if he also party also controls Congress.

16:27 You want them checked, voters want them checked.

16:29 But there's been a little worry about the generic ballot isn't moving as fast.

16:32 Now, it never moves quite as fast because there

16:34 will be Trump disapprovers who will still vote Republican obviously,

16:37 but it's begun to pick up a little steam.

16:39 Having the Republican party, I think,

16:41 vote for it makes it different from a Trump vanity project.

16:44 That is, in the in the P,

16:45 you could have told yourself if there weren't such a vote,

16:47 a really I really wish Trump wouldn't do all this stuff.

16:49 But the Republicans in Congress, they're still for lower taxes.

16:52 Well, some people can still say that.

16:53 But now the Republicans are on the record,

16:56 not just sort of silently acquiescing in, but voting for Trump's vanity project.

17:02 What what is distinct about this is that sometimes you got to take tough

17:05 votes as a party and you do it because you're going for an ideological project

17:09 and you know it might not be popular at the time but you have some

17:12 sort of conviction in the back of your head

17:14 that over time you'll be proven right.

17:16 So for instance uh I think back

17:18 to the Obama years a bunch of house rep Democrats

17:22 took a vote that they knew was going to fail in the Senate on cap and trade.

17:26 They did it because they wanted to advance an ideological project.

17:29 They knew it was going to cost him,

17:31 but they felt it was important to go on the record and at least

17:33 take the vote and at least try to move the project forward.

17:35 Same thing with Obamacare.

17:37 It was widely unpopular by the time it was getting ready to pass.

17:40 And they knew they had to take the vote and they

17:42 did it because they wanted to make progress on healthcare.

17:46 In this case, there is no ideological project.

17:49 The project is Trump.

17:50 And so what he's asking these people to do is

17:53 essentially risk political capital so that he can get his edifice,

17:59 he can get his ballroom.

18:00 And there's no upside to it.

18:02 It's not like they can say, "Ah, we got a ballroom for the voters." I mean,

18:05 that's not something you're going to sell.

18:06 So he's just shoving it down their throats and they're going to take it.

18:09 And I think that's the remarkable thing for me is that they're doing

18:12 this willingly without any actual tangible realistic

18:16 gains that they can go back to say,

18:18 "Hey, at least we advanced something that you guys

18:20 cared about." Who what voters care about this stuff?

18:23 I mean, they'll say the Democrats don't care about protecting the president.

18:26 See, they first they incite people to do these these assassinations

18:29 for their irresponsible rhetoric and James Comey and all that stuff.

18:33 And now they don't want to give him a suitable protection.

18:36 See, this is money for the Secret Service.

18:37 I don't think this is going to work.

18:38 I'm just saying that's their

18:39 sure that the way they've tried to set up their their response their counter.

18:42 I would just note that we and and I'll go we'll go to break after this.

18:45 We did a a focus group um we wrote

18:48 about this Will Summer wrote about this yesterday for falsified.

18:50 We did a focus group of two-time Trump voters.

18:52 Now, they were souring on Trump and that was part of the focus group,

18:55 but they were two-time Trump voters nonetheless.

18:57 And even they were blown away by the ballroom stuff and they felt

19:01 like I mean there there's so much conspiracy stuff around in our politics,

19:07 but this kind of blew me away.

19:08 They thought that the White House

19:09 correspondents dinner assassination attempt was a scup

19:12 and a false flag because Trump wanted

19:15 to have a predicate to push for the ballroom.

19:17 So, there is even among Trump voters a sense that this is not on the level.

19:22 And with that, we need to take a quick break to hear from our advertisers.

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20:43 So, Bill, I just want you to know I I I got an aura

20:46 frame and I'm only putting pictures of Bill Crystal in my aura frames.

20:50 It's just like continuous loop.

20:52 I I expect no less.

20:53 I mean, it's kind of a requirement, isn't it?

20:55 It's part of my office.

20:56 Sarah Long, well, Sarah will Sarah's now going to be upset.

20:59 You know, I think the I think the memo was Sarah gets 50% of the photos.

21:03 You know, Tim Tim and I and JBL and you get 10% and everyone else gets whatever.

21:09 Yeah, the leftover scraps.

21:11 My frames just off the screen.

21:13 You don't see it there, but it's just Bill going.

21:15 All right.

21:15 Um, the other big thing that happened this morning is

21:18 or I should say over the last day and a half,

21:20 two days, um, more activity uh, with Iran.

21:25 We announced uh, that we're going to have some some sort of um,

21:31 military naval exercise to help ships get through the straight of Hormuz.

21:36 It's unclear uh what exactly that entails.

21:40 Um we're not like what is

21:44 your understanding of actually what's happening right now?

21:46 So it's a little murky.

21:47 I was thinking ready for it this morning for morning shots.

21:49 I said, you know, I'm going to wait and see

21:50 what happens and we'll know more by by tonight.

21:53 We want we want to huff and puff and get the straight open without I

21:58 think actually using ground troops and even without

22:00 it seems like at this point for Trump

22:02 massive bombing campaign because he worries about

22:05 what Iran will do in retaliation in terms of other energy sources in the Gulf

22:09 and and and its effects on the world economy.

22:11 Iran wants to prove that they can close it and can

22:14 still close it and will close it when they feel like it.

22:16 And though they didn't kind of go along with Trump's, hey,

22:19 this is just to help ships from neutral nations go through

22:22 and and so both sides are sort of poking at each other.

22:27 It could escalate or it could be just a kind of you know

22:32 kurfuffle on the way towards I don't know on the way towards what

22:34 on the way towards a de facto I guess agreement where we basically

22:38 you know whether the ceasefire continues

22:40 or becomes semi-permanent uh and the the strait

22:44 sort of reopens but basically Iran I mean I'm struck how much

22:48 Iran wants they know what they're doing they want to really keep

22:51 in people's mind the principle that they can close the straight when they

22:54 want they've sort of shown that and you could I kind of thought,

22:57 well, maybe they'll just decide to let it open now,

22:59 and they know that people can't unsee what they've seen over the last 30,

23:02 45 days, you know, uh, and the effects on the world economy,

23:05 but they they're pretty insistent on either humiliating us,

23:09 Trump a little more or reminding everyone

23:12 that it's kind of there straight now or anyway,

23:14 I'm struck by that, but I I don't know what happens now, obviously.

23:17 Yeah.

23:17 Well, you know, it's it gets back to this um idea who holds the cards,

23:22 which Trump loves to say, and he's always saying, well, they have no cards,

23:25 but they it's very clear they have a card.

23:27 They're playing the card like that that otherwise we wouldn't

23:30 having to be doing this new project that we're up to.

23:32 But you're right, you mentioned a ceasefire and um

23:36 look, I don't think we have to play by their semantical games,

23:39 but um we have a blockade on them.

23:42 That's an act of war.

23:43 And then uh the other day they they bombed

23:46 a facility in the UAE uh which suggests there's regional fighting.

23:50 And now we have this project that we're undertaking to try

23:54 to help shepherd ships through

23:57 the straight which they're calling project freedom.

24:00 Uh so it to any objective observer it doesn't quite look like a ceasefire.

24:06 But then Pete Hexath was asked about whether the ceasefire

24:08 is still in effect and here's what he had to say.

24:12 Hex Seth.

24:12 Um, last 24 hours or so, Iran's fired at US, we fired at Iran.

24:17 Just going to ask you more directly, is the ceasefire over?

24:21 No, the ceasefire is not over.

24:24 Uh, ultimately, this is a separate distinct project.

24:27 Uh, and we expected there would be some uh some churn at the beginning,

24:33 which which happened, and we said we would defend and defend aggressively,

24:35 and we absolutely have.

24:37 Iran knows that.

24:38 uh and ultimately uh the president's going to make a decision

24:42 whether anything were to escalate into a violation of a ceasefire.

24:45 But certainly we would urge Iran to be prudent uh

24:48 in the actions that they take to keep that underneath this threshold.

24:51 This is about the straits.

24:52 This is about freedom of navigation.

24:54 This is about international waterways.

24:56 This is about free flow of commerce.

24:58 All the things that happened before uh and only Iran is contesting.

25:02 Uh so so right now the the ceasefire certainly holds,

25:05 but uh we're going to be watching very very closely.

25:08 So, I'm struck by two things there.

25:09 One is that he's basically admitting that they're

25:12 trying to get back to the prior status quo, right?

25:14 All the things that happened before we're trying to restore,

25:17 which implies that he it up.

25:19 But two is it seems clear to me that they don't want to say

25:23 that the ceasefire is out of place because

25:24 they don't want the war powers debate to restart.

25:27 And they had that 60-day threshold, which they violated clearly.

25:32 Um, they don't want to vote and they don't want the war to restart.

25:36 It doesn't see I mean I was struck by the exact same things you were

25:38 with alter at one point to so

25:40 the first point is very interesting right that he's

25:42 just saying we want to get back to the status quo when the street was open

25:46 before we began this whole thing that's kind

25:48 of striking but secondly yeah the the un

25:51 all that bellose god knows rhetoric that we've

25:53 seen from hexath over these two months

25:56 that and there was some of that today but that was a very different tone right

25:59 we keep it under the threshold that we don't want this thing to restart you

26:02 know we want Iran to be prudent that's

26:04 very different from the we are obliterating them.

26:07 We are We love beating up people who are weaker than us.

26:10 There's no no Iranian military left.

26:12 There's nothing left there.

26:13 Suddenly it's could you guys be a little prudent

26:15 here and the way you're handling your, you know,

26:17 uh stripping through the straight.

26:18 I mean, that is pretty striking.

26:20 It I think it shows both of you they don't want the war powers vote,

26:22 but also Hex has gotten the message from Trump.

26:26 We want this thing to kind of end with a whimper,

26:30 not with a not with not not with a, you know, rees, not with an escalation,

26:34 a bang again.

26:36 Let's get to that in a second.

26:37 But the war powers thing, I just want to linger on for one minute because,

26:40 you know, it was a point of contention when he went to the hill last week.

26:45 No one actually believes that you can say, "Oh, well, we're in a ceasefire.

26:49 The air go the the 60-day clock is reset or paused

26:52 or whatever it is." And he was pressed on this by Tim Kaine.

26:54 So, let's play that clip.

26:56 However, we are in a ceasefire right now,

26:58 which our understanding means uh the 60-day

27:01 clock pauses or stops in a ceasefire.

27:03 I you're not in that's it's our understanding just so you know.

27:07 Okay.

27:07 Well, I I do not believe the statute would support that.

27:10 I think the 60 days runs maybe tomorrow and it's going

27:13 to pose a a really important legal question for the administration there.

27:18 We have serious constitutional concerns and we don't

27:20 want to layer those with additional statutory concerns.

27:25 So what happens on Congress is this I'm assuming this is just

27:28 another case where Republicans kind of swallow

27:31 their pride and don't do anything.

27:32 But um at some point it gets a little

27:34 bit you know too much to you know just ignore.

27:39 Yeah.

27:39 I noticed a couple of Republicans who talk about well maybe

27:41 we should just vote to authorize the use of force in Iran.

27:44 I mean, people kind of misunderstand the war

27:46 powers thing doesn't end the use of force.

27:48 It requires a vote on the use of force.

27:50 If they want to vote to authorize the use of force, they can do it.

27:52 They could have done it 60 days ago.

27:53 They could do it now.

27:55 Yeah.

27:55 Have some courage of your convictions on this.

27:57 Yeah.

27:57 I mean, I'm not even sure incidentally that it would be I mean,

27:59 given that the the war is unpopular,

28:01 but they had done this incidentally a week in, I think they could have gotten

28:03 I'm not so sure they wouldn't have passed

28:05 it with with maybe some Democratic votes, too.

28:07 Remember how everyone at the beginning was, well, you know, we're taking a look.

28:10 you know, Chuck Schumer didn't, you know,

28:12 no one really wants to be pro Iran, nor should they be, right?

28:14 So, right, they've sort of botched the politics of this of that in this respect.

28:18 I was very struck, you know, we talked about the ballroom.

28:20 I looked just before the show, I looked up this the most recent poll that I've

28:23 seen on that is almost exactly 2 to1 against.

28:25 I think it was 52 26% against and others didn't know.

28:29 The most recent poll I've seen on Iran,

28:30 I think it's the Washington Post ABC poll from the weekend

28:33 was also exactly almost 2 to1, maybe 66 33 something like that.

28:37 So, um I mean they are on the big the ballroom the war.

28:42 I mean they are running.

28:43 This isn't just your normal, you know, we're down a few points, right?

28:46 You know, 54 44 kind of thing, right?

28:49 We're at 2 to1 against and this is

28:51 the position the Republican parties put themselves in.

28:54 It's it's bleak.

28:55 And I guess now back to the thing that you were mentioning earlier,

28:59 which is how do you end it?

29:00 Uh with a whimper or with a bang?

29:04 and everything suggests that Trump is either bored

29:08 of this or spooked by it and wants out.

29:13 And it's just a matter of sort of getting to a place where he can say,

29:16 "We're done." And maybe it's just attrition, right?

29:18 Maybe he's just like, "Well,

29:19 we have the ceasefire and people are getting sort of, you know,

29:24 used to the new status quo where gas is through the roof." And actually,

29:27 let's put up the uh Gas Buddy uh tweet here.

29:30 This is this morning.

29:31 So, here you have uh Oklahoma,

29:33 the last state with average diesel prices below $5 a gallon,

29:36 has just hit the $5 level.

29:38 Zero states have diesel, averaging less than $5.

29:40 Well, you know, have about six.

29:42 So, maybe Trump's like, well,

29:43 that's just where people get comfortable with this new status quo.

29:45 I can't imagine that's the case.

29:48 Um, but how does how does he get out?

29:50 Like, what what are the options here?

29:52 Yeah, I mean, that's that is the question.

29:54 I mean, and also even if he wants to get out,

29:56 there could have a lot of miscalculations

29:57 that could lead to another escalation obviously.

30:00 No, I mean he really he needs Iran to agree basically to reopen

30:04 the straight because I've noticed a couple

30:05 shipping companies even said last night, "Hey,

30:07 we're not we're not going in there if Iran's taking pot shots." Even if it's

30:10 a few small boats and even if

30:12 the US military is vaguely committed to this project,

30:15 Freedom or whatever, it's very nice that they're vaguely committed to it,

30:17 but we're not sending actual, you know,

30:20 multi-illion dollar oil tankers in there.

30:22 So, he needs the he the global economy is a real risk.

30:26 And I think the people Tim talked to this fellow last night,

30:29 but I think a lot of economists,

30:30 Katherryn Rampel has been talking about this too,

30:32 now think we're getting pretty close to a point where you

30:34 hit a tipping point and you don't recover for months from this.

30:37 I mean, there's just actual physical shortages.

30:39 This isn't psychology.

30:41 This isn't, you know, kind of feels bad.

30:44 People think inflation's up.

30:45 This is just there's not enough petrochemicals,

30:48 for fertilizers, for gas, for other things.

30:51 And at some point that has real and it is having

30:53 real effects both in on the inflation side and on the real

30:56 econ let's call it the you know the productivity side and they're

31:00 getting they get a lot worse pretty fast it sounds like.

31:02 So I think there's some pretty real pressure on Trump

31:05 to to uh to give in which is why Iran's being tough.

31:08 Incidentally Iran feels like they they the Trump

31:11 people I was struck with talking to some Trump

31:12 defense semi-defender the other day we can't cap

31:16 the wells the oil they can't store the oil anywhere.

31:19 That was kind of the story they told themselves.

31:21 It wasn't totally false.

31:22 There are some problems with that.

31:23 But everything I've looked at read suggests they've

31:26 got weeks and months of ability to work around

31:28 some of that stuff and store oil to other

31:30 places or cap some of the wells in ways.

31:32 You know, they'll take some hits on this.

31:34 Obviously, they're getting less revenue from exporting oil.

31:37 But I don't think the pressure on them is

31:38 as great as it is on the global economy, right?

31:40 It's like a it's a question of pain pain threshold at this point.

31:43 Can they tolerate it more than we can?

31:45 And I, you know, the global economy is getting killed.

31:47 I think we're insulated a little bit because

31:50 you know we we have our own oil supply and we can we can endure

31:53 some of the pain but at $5 plus for diesel things start to pinch really bad.

31:58 Um so we'll see where it goes.

32:00 One other thing I want to talk about wasn't

32:02 on a rundown list but Andrew uh did write about it

32:04 in morning shots was the situation in Ukraine uh which you

32:08 know we are now 15 months into the Trump second term.

32:13 He has done exceedingly little uh for Ukraine.

32:17 If anything, he's been uh he's harmed it by uh

32:21 lifting some of the Russian sanctions and you know,

32:23 basically choking off any support for the Ukrainians.

32:26 And yet here we are and Ukraine is still standing.

32:30 Uh there's talk of a ceasefire on that front as well.

32:34 Um what is your take on how we've ended up at this place surprisingly?

32:38 I mean really an amazing performance by Ukraine

32:40 and and a fair amount of stepping up

32:42 by European nations who people were skeptical four

32:45 years ago February after the invasion would step up and I've got to say I think

32:49 they have not perfectly but pretty impressively a lot

32:52 of uh arm a lot of money a lot of arms but Ukraine ability not just

32:57 to fight courageously but then to you know

32:59 to improve the drone technology and to be

33:01 ahead of Russia and ahead of everyone so

33:02 far as they're now going around Zilinski is literally

33:04 going to extremely wealthy countries in the Middle

33:07 East and making deals where Ukraine's going to share

33:09 their technology with them and they seem

33:11 to want Ukraine's technology as as much as ours.

33:13 So, we've managed to not help Ukraine, which is very bad in my from my point

33:18 of view in a moral sense and in a geopolitical sense,

33:21 and Ukraine's managed to do do amazingly well without us,

33:24 which also sends a message to others around the world.

33:26 I think the degree to which Ukraine will now be at the center assuming they

33:30 can hold on here and even do better of a European uh consortium that we'll see,

33:36 you know what, we can defend ourselves pretty well and Trump wants

33:39 to bust up NATO and you can't really stop Trump from doing that.

33:41 We can really stand up to Russia and we can be our own kind of power center.

33:45 Maybe that's a good thing.

33:46 It's certainly better than them not stepping up.

33:48 I think NATO would be better still.

33:50 And I still think it's problematic without the US and all that, but uh

33:54 it's really been impressive what Ukraine's been able to pull off, though.

33:58 No, it's it's remarkable.

33:59 Um and I mean, obviously got to keep monitoring,

34:01 but it's it if if you had predicted uh this situation 15 months ago,

34:06 I don't think anyone would have taken that.

34:07 Um all right, Bill, this has been a pleasure.

34:09 Uh I know I'm not Andrew Edgar, but I hope I was a reasonable substitute.

34:13 You did.

34:13 You're good.

34:14 Pretty good.

34:14 Pretty good.

34:14 I mean, you're not you're not, you know, you're not Andrew,

34:16 but it was it was we made it through.

34:19 We made it through.

34:19 So, thank you, Sam, for stepping in.

34:21 All right.

34:21 All right.

34:21 Quick program quick programming note before we go.

34:24 Uh, as always, we are getting very close to our live shows.

34:28 May 20th, May 21st.

34:30 May 20th is in San Diego.

34:31 May 21st is in Los Angeles.

34:33 It's going to be me, Sarah Longwell, Tim Miller out there.

34:36 Those are fun shows.

34:37 Bill's part, Bill's been part of them.

34:39 He can attest.

34:40 They're quite fun.

34:40 If you don't have your tickets, go and get them quickly.

34:42 It's at the bullwwork.com/events.

34:44 That's the bullwork.comvents.

34:47 We'll drop the link in the show notes, too.

34:50 Come and say hi if you are in the area and we'll see you there soon.

34:53 Bill, thanks again.

34:54 I'll talk to you soon, buddy.

34:56 Thanks, Sam.

34:57 Bye.

34:57 Bye.