Part 1 of 2
Michael Cohen and Miles Taylor SHARE SECRETS from WITHIN Trump’s INNER-CIRCLE
by Michael Cohen
Mea Culpa, MeidasTouch
Premiered Jul 22, 2023 Mea Culpa with Michael Cohen
On this episode of the Mea Culpa Podcast, Michael Cohen welcomes back Miles Taylor who famously served as the Deputy Chief of Staff in Homeland Security only to blow the whistle on the Trump Administration with an anonymous op/ed that pulled the lid off the dysfunction and madness lurking inside the West Wing. After resigning from the Trump Administration, Taylor joined fellow never-Trump Republicans in campaigning against his former boss. He is a frequent guest on CNN and MSNBC and offers the stark truth about Trump in a new book called “Blowback: A Warning to Save Democracy From the Next Trump.” With the 2024 election approaching, Taylor is back with bombshell revelations and a sobering national forecast. Through interviews with dozens of ex-Trump aides and government leaders, Taylor predicts what could happen inside “Trump 2.0,” the White House of a more competent and formidable copycat. You won’t believe what Taylor says, but trust me, it’s all 100% true.
Transcript
okay so miles in a recent LA Times op-ed you describe the problem at the moment
as having less to do with Trump than with the Maga base and you wrote that
and I quote these highly motivated voters are hungry famaga candidates who
share their views and such views will not change overnight the next Trump will
have to feed this Beast to win which means keeping the base radicalized on a
steady diet of conspiracy theories about existential threats to their way of life
if you do me the favor describe for my listeners how this will manifest in 2024
and how do we get past this moment or in all fairness are we just stuck with it
for the foreseeable future uh Michael thanks for having me as always and look I will say this I would
be the first to have hoped that it was just about Donald Trump that the man himself was an aberration and that the
Republican Party had not been rotted to the Corps in fact as you know you know right after the Trump Administration I
gathered a group of Republican Senators and congressmen and former cabinet members to go try to reform the GOP take
it back to where it was before Trump and we failed miserably and and I'll be the
first to admit that we failed and it became really evident to me in the past two years as I was working on this book
that it wasn't about just Donald Trump yes he's a threat to our democracy yes he's an imminent threat to our democracy
but at the same time the threat has spiraled much Beyond his control and really the GOP base has radicalized so
what I was saying in that LA Times piece and what I say in blowback is that if you do a breakdown of the data you will
find that the average GOP voter looks very much like the Maga politicians want
them to look like they have favorable views towards political intimidation and violence they believe in mainstreamed
conspiracy theories why does that matter because even if Donald Trump is not the nominee whoever the GOP nominee is will
have to cater to that Maga base in order to win the presidency and it's the
reason why we Face a generational struggle with the Maga movement is because the base has been so
demonstrably radicalized if you look at the data that the politicians at the top of the party will continue to cater to
it and and that's why I call this book a warning to save democracy from the next Trump because it might be Donald Trump
in a second White House term or it might be a savvier successor a copycat that
tries to carry forward the movement isn't that what they all are I've been calling Ron de sanctimonious or Rhonda
snat knows Iran to Satan I've been calling him Donald Trump 2.0 forever and
you take people even like a Ted Cruz you take people like Matt Gates or Josh Hawley Lauren bobert
um you know uh uh you know name them just name them uh Lindsey Graham they
all are Donald Trump wannabes it's so amazing it's the kind of thing that if
you had a kid who acted this way in school he'd get a timeout or a smack
across the side of the head right I know today you can't hit the kid right but you would certainly give him a [ __ ]
time out and say hey this is unacceptable you know what else is unacceptable racism
sexism misogyny xenophobia homophobia
islamophobia anti-Semitism yeah they're all bad [ __ ] and why would you want to
copy Donald Trump and be a trump 2.0 when you're talking about these you know
these attributes it makes absolutely no sense to me but you know I I gotta say
this mouse I really want to sort of dig in because I see that beautiful book you know that you have over your left
shoulder there your new book called blowback I got to tell you while I was in Otisville I got I think five copies
sent to me by just supporters um who sent me Anonymous and I remember
I was handing them out you know first of all I put one into the library I'll tell you noticeville we had an amazing
Library I must have received over 200 250 of the newest books and I would put
them in there everybody would read them you know we'd have uh you know then we'd have little discussion groups about it I
can't tell you the number of people that used to say to me who do you think who do you think wrote Anonymous I said I
gotta tell you at some points I think it's this person
but then as it moves further down I just I never would have picked you to
be very honest with you but you know I am truly I'm truly ecstatic to know to
know you uh and I gotta tell you I enjoyed that book I am about three
quarters of the way now through blowback um it's fantastic it's definitely
um a a fantastic read and I want to start I want to start today by talking
about this new book blowback a warning to save America from the next Trump
in one chapter you describe the Doomsday Book which contains and I quote the
president's break glass options for keeping the country running in situations ranging from Global nuclear
war to an armed foreign invasion of the United States I mean you then go on to
describe the powers given to the president at that time as extraordinary all right now I'll list a few here from
the book draft authorizations to enable the White House to unilaterally detain dangerous
persons censor the news media flip an internet kill switch take over social media and
suspend Americans from traveling now if you do me the favor describe for my
listeners the nightmare scenario how Trump might have used the documents for
non-emergency situations and how close did he actually come in trying to
manufacture a crisis so that he could invoke these presidential emergency actions
well Michael in writing this book I wanted to paint a very clear-eyed picture of what a second Trump
Administration would look like if he retook the White House and again what it would look like if a copycat took the
White House so rather than people just listening to me and what my opinion would be for my two years you know in
the executive branch during the Trump Administration and dealing with the man I wanted to go interview other senior
officials that worked with Trump in the White House and at every Department uh an agency you know every major
department agency and Senior Republicans on Capitol Hill and ask them and their words to describe what Trump would have
won what he would have done if he won re-election and what he would do a second go around the Doomsday Book was
one of the more alarming things that I was told and this had never been reported previously here's the short
version of the story is in 2020 as Donald Trump was getting closer to the
re-election B could have potentially accessed a tool
that would have allowed him to cement a a coup now what is this tool well there's a little known book this book
called the Doomsday Book by National Security officials that's kept at the White House for the most extraordinary
moments if the nation's under threat a nuclear war an armed foreign Invasion and it's the responsibility of one top
staffer on the National Security Council to protect this book now when I was doing interviews for blowback I was told
that they actually went out of their way to try to keep the president from being
aware of the contents of the book from being aware of the most extraordinary powers that the president has in those
circumstances because there was worry in the White House that Trump or one of his Maga allies would try to misuse those
National Security powers and then there was this extraordinary moment in the lead-up to the election where the White
House almost installed a Maga loyalist named Christina Bob into that job on the
National Security Council now some of your listeners may know Christina Bob as one of Donald Trump's current lawyers someone who was uh on the one American
News Network as a hardcore Maga uh you know talking head and she was almost
placed in that position now what the White House did not know is that if they placed her in that position she would have had access to one of the most
sensitive emergency manuals in the entire government this Doomsday Book and as we later found out Christina Bob was
involved directly in the efforts to overturn the election thankfully this was thwarted people stopped Christina
Bob from getting named to this position but we were basically that close from one of Trump's closest allies from
knowing he had these extraordinary powers which he could have easily deployed to prevent the transfer of
power in 2020 that was something really worrying to me and it made me think back Michael to when I was still in the
administration and Trump thought his most extreme power was the Insurrection act he'd been told about it he called it
his magical authorities and at one point in 2019 he wanted to write in the State
of the Union that he was invoking the Insurrection act to go deploy the military to the border to stop migrants
from coming in but if he had done that which we stopped him from doing it but if he had done that there's no telling
where he might have used his Insurrection act powers and of course as we know uh Donald Trump clearly had an
interest in doing that potentially on January 6th right so describe it though in terms of non-emergency situations and
I bring that up because you know you don't need
with Donald to have an emergency situation meaning you don't need to have
an attack upon America on American soil Donald will deem anything to be an
emergency situation if it affects him so just if you can give me like a
non-emergency situation that blowback um describes in terms of how he would
use this um you know this doomsday um scenario
this doomsday look one of the worries uh from the people that I talk to and again
keep in mind these are people who've been appointed by the Trump Administration on his National Security Council the folks that I spoke to are
worried that in a second term Donald Trump would use these powers to influence elections so for instance he
might Target social media companies that are opposed to him and a few uh you know
the information that's in my book about what allegedly is contained in the in the Doomsday Book would allow someone
like a trump to potentially do that so hypothetically he could cut off access to an internet provider or a social
media company that wasn't friendly towards Donald Trump he could as one interviewee told me deploy the military
uh to the polls to intimidate voters not to vote for the political opposition and
instead support the Maga side he could potentially go and hunt down innocent
people and political opponents and actually jail them under some of these authorities I mean this is the type of
stuff Michael that you would imagine in some B-movie plot about a dictator overtaking the United States but the
authorities that are again allegedly contained inside the Doomsday Book would
potentially allow a trump to act like an actual autocrat and to exercise the
powers that he wanted to and and that deploying of troops onto U.S soil is something I heard again and again when I
talked uh to people in fact there was this story that I was told uh and I'd had some connection to it early in the
administration about Trump wanting to build his own mercenary Army in the United States so everyone's familiar
with the Wagner group in Russia that Putin has well Trump was jealous of the Wagner group he wanted his own private
Army and in the course of the administration he tried to get AIDS to green light a proposal to work with
military contractors to create his own private Army and this is something that defense officials told me Trump will
pursue in a second term he will want to stand up his own mercenary group that's accountable to him so he doesn't have to
worry about the U.S military exercising a conscience or the oversight committees on Capitol Hill he wants the authority
to tell these troops uh where to go and what to do including deploying them on U.S streets in fact a former top
counter-terrorism official from the Trump Administration called it a junior gestapo that was his worry is that if
the president had been allowed to do this it would have been a junior gestapo and next go around they won't be
prevented from trying to stand up these structures so explain to me then
how it is I mean I can't believe you're right it sounds like a b-rated movie or a c-rated
movie except for the fact that it happened to me I mean what's the difference between the
way you describe a unilaterally detain what he deems dangerous persons how is
it any different than an unconstitutional remand of a United States citizen a Critic as I talk about
in my book Revenge right as a Critic because I refuse to waive my first
amendment constitutional right I mean it's funny because you see all these
[ __ ] Mega morons running around with their AR-15s and their flapjackets and
their Kevlar and their [ __ ] helmets waving the 2024 Trump Banner all
screaming you can't take our guns it's our Second Amendment right okay
grant you that but what about my first amendment what about My First Amendment right to publish a [ __ ] book and
instead because Donald didn't want that to happen he unilaterally has me
detained and thrown back into solitary confinement you could bet your bottom
dollar that's exactly what he will do in another term it's actually why I'm
looking I'm looking outside of the country to potentially move I mean if you think that this country is
going to be anything recognizable to what you've grown up in or what you were
hoping to leave future Generations it will not well Michael you know people like you
and I have joked Darkly in recent years about the prospect of if Trump wins
reelection we will be sent to the terrorist prison at Guantanamo Bay and then in the course of interviewing
people for this book a number of stories surfaced including and resurfaced including the fact that Trump actually
did want to go put innocent civilians in the terrorist prison in Guantanamo Bay
Cuba better known as gitmo and in fact at one point he demanded that officials send migrants from the border into the
terrorist prison at gitmo and the only reason he was persuaded not to do it wasn't because it would have been illegal but because the prison wasn't
large enough to house large numbers of people these types of things will become reality in a second term now there was a
phrase that someone used and again in in this book these officials are mostly cited by name someone warned that in a
second term the motto of the Trump justice department would be to the blue in other words use all aspects of
prosecutorial authority to go Sue political opponents harass them with special prosecutors and arrest them
wherever possible and an FBI official gave me a very alarming scenario he said look we've built an entire
counterterrorism apparatus in the United States to make it easy for us to find
the bad guys and find out derogatory information about them he said it wouldn't be hard for a wayward president
to turn that counter-terrorism apparatus against his political Rivals what was the example he cited for me was pocket
litter at airports so you know when you go through TSA and you get sent to secondary screening and if you really
get sent to secondary they make you open your backpack empty your pockets and they're allowed to go through some of
that information including at the border they can go through in detail your electronic devices this FBI official and
the book said I would worry in a second term about the White House directing that political opponents be sent into
secondary to search their pocket litter so what does Eric swalwell have on his phone what does Nancy Pelosi have on her
computer what dirt can they find out from politicians to use against them again Michael I would be the first to
think that this sounded [ __ ] crazy if you told me a few years ago that very credible people lifetime public servants
would warn that these things could actually happen but that's the worry about a second term is that Donald Trump
and his allies would fully abuse these Powers I mean for instance when talking about the intelligence Community I spoke
to Fiona Hill Fiona had been Donald Trump's top Russia advisor on the National Security Council and her
biggest worry was that the Spy Community the intelligence agencies would be weaponized in a second term another
person who served with Fiona said yes we worried about Donald Trump potentially using fisa the intelligence surveillance
act to use the spy agencies to spy on political opponents and that's something
that I witnessed in the Trump administration at one point the president had asked John Kelly if we
could tap the phones of White House staff because he wanted to monitor them because he was worried about them saying
bad things about them this man will not be held back in a second term from violating civil liberties in an
extensive way you know I'm not a hundred percent certain that all of my listeners
actually know who Miles Taylor truly is right and I want you to take a minute
because I think it's extremely important you and I are having a very very scary conversation right now and I
don't want people for a split second to think oh these are just two guys with an ax to grind
you were one of his former aides do me a favor explain your position right
describe your relationship with Donald I mean how it started you know and where
you know do you still have you know relationships with those who remain in his orbit
because this book is like a horror movie I I mean I it's
it's like another scream or another Freddy [ __ ] Krueger if you think about it it really is it's terrifying if
you read between the lines of what's going on here so if you would again describe the relationship what you did
at DHS and what your role was and so on because I really want people to take not
just this conversation serious but I want them to read the book and I want them to understand the way I see
blowback I see it as almost the um uh we'll call it
the second chapter of my book Revenge which should have scared the [ __ ] out of
people in the first place that in and of itself like a bookend you know to revenge is really what I see it as if
you're not scared shitless from the weaponization of the justice department well we blowback and see what else this
Maniac could do well you know Michael and I'll get to you know I'll go back in
time here in a second but you were one of the first to predict it I mean the title of your book Revenge you said was
going to be Donald Trump's watchword if he won the White House again and some
people may have heard that and thought it was an overreactive well guess who has said it will be the highest priority
in a second Trump Administration Donald Trump he has said retribution will be
his goals so people like you who sounded that alarm weren't you know Fanning the
Flames of outlandish rhetoric you were pointing to a very specific very real incredible threat and Trump has made
clear what that retribution will look like and the purpose of blowback is to spell that out across every department
and agency how will Trump's allies intend to weaponize the federal government against opponents and again
they don't have to hear it from me I I cite people who had been close to the president and some who are still his
confidants in this book but going back in time as you asked Michael you know I had no interest in getting involved in
politics in fact I absolutely hate talking about politics I love talking to you I hate being out there about
politics because like you I started my career in a totally different space and that was in National Security and I
wanted to remain in National Security and I went into government during the Bush Administration after 9 11 worked in
the Pentagon in the White House and vice president Cheney's office on Capitol Hill working on counterterrorism issues
and then at the Department of Homeland Security all throughout that time my focus was cyber security
counterintelligence combating nation-state threats from Russia and China it just wasn't American politics
but when Trump was running for office uh I got very involved in Paul Ryan's
efforts when he was speaker of the house to try to stop Trump because I was really worried about the damage he would
do to the Republican party I thought there was no chance he could win the presidency but I thought in the process he would ruin the GOP so I got involved
in what Paul Ryan called his Trump inoculation plan and clearly we failed miserably we failed to prevent Trump
from winning the nomination and ultimately from winning the presidency now I had no desire to go work with a
man like that but then a mentor of mine someone I looked up to John Kelly got picked to go be Homeland Security
secretary and I was very persuaded Michael by this notion of an axis of
adults that was going to keep Trump stable educate him and the job and try
to keep the executive branch on the rails when this very demonstrably unhinged guy took the job uh we were
wrong though I went in I took a job as John Kelly's National Security National security advisor eventually became Chief
of Staff of the Department of Homeland Security and we spent a lot of time with Trump in the Oval Office on Air Force One and the
White House Situation Room but most importantly DHS we were with Trump in
moments of Consequence the most important decisions he would have to make in addition to those having to do
with the military to protect lives and livelihoods in the American way of life against hurricanes and tornadoes and
terrorists and Chinese spies those are the moments we would go be with the president and I've got to tell you the
thing that shocked me and got me to quit that Administration and campaign against him was just absolutely how
undisciplined and irresponsible he was in moments when American lives were on
the line and you saw Michael firsthand all the time he was very flippant he was disinterested in the facts and he was
incredibly Reckless uh when it when it really counted and moments that really counted and and that worried me that's
why I ultimately quit the administration tried to sound the alarm first with an anonymous opinion piece but then
unmasking myself and and that that's one thing that I write about in this book is it's ironic coming from me but I really
do think anonymity is a danger to our democracy and I wish I had come forward even sooner because pulling the mask off
made it easier for other people to come forward too and I think the worry the second time around is we still have very
senior Republicans like the Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy who still support Donald Trump in public but in
private will still say the man is a danger we need those people to unmask themselves and tell the truth and
ironically Michael some of the people I spoke to in this book some of those senior Republicans looked me in the eye and said I need you not to use my name
in the book and ask me to keep them Anonymous that's a problem these people need to come forward and and throughout
this period I'll be urging the people who spoke to me in the book who didn't want to use their names to come out and attach their names to those comments
yeah and they should by the way do you have any um your remaining in relations with anybody
still in Trump's orbit are you hearing anything um look the funny thing is you don't even
really need to hear it from secondhand people Donald says it himself I will be
your Vengeance right I will be your judge your jury your executioner the
problem though is that the guy's an idiot right and his entire term while he
remains alive because he will never ever leave that office it may I'm telling you
not because of age he will never leave that office he will avoid a one-term
addition he will avoid he will try to become as you said an autocrat as I say all the
time a monarch the supreme leader the fuhrer you know the king that's what he
wants to be he tells us exactly what he's going to do and yet you're right there are still
people like the Kevin McCarthy's that they just don't care and you know when
they start to care you know when they start to care um they start to care when it hap when
something happens to them right so let me just take you back in time for a
second where Trump attacked you via social media as well as at a rally in
Tampa all right you talk about this in the book as someone
who's experienced this you know attacks by Trump on multiple occasions describe
for my listeners how you felt when this [ __ ] was happening to you how it changed
your life not only then but also today now
[Miles Taylor] well no one has to have sympathy for me Michael but like you I think it's a really important to paint a clear
picture of what it looks like when the president of the United States a vindictive twice impeached disgraced
president of the United States comes don't forget sexual assaulter and you got to add that to the list this
guy's got a long rap sheet now um but it's it's pretty extraordinary and we're witnessing this explosion in
political intimidation and violence in our country and when I came out against Trump uh it far exceeded my worst visions of
what could happen now let's say for instance I had quit the Bush Administration in protests and
campaigned against my former boss President W bush which I wouldn't have done and very much enjoyed my time in
the Bush Administration but let's say I had all that would have happened to me is they would have said well you're not in the tribe anymore and we don't
affiliate with you that's about it but quitting the Trump Administration and campaigning against the former president
as I often say ended up costing me my home it cost me my job it cost me close
relationships it cost my family their security and my own security such that I ended up
on Election night 2020 in a safe house in Northern Virginia under armed guard
and facing death threats because of how serious the situation had become now at
the time I thought maybe that was unique in in how extreme it was and how extreme
the vitriol was from Trump supporters after he named me in those rallies and continued to urge people to look me up
but then I heard story after Story of federal state local official officials
especially in the post-election period that experienced the same thing these crowd-sourced death threats the doxing
the attempts to find them I mean I had my I had people posting pictures of my sister and my nieces in their home and
their addresses and saying our blood would be in the streets I mean this is really terrifying stuff and there's no
playbook for it for when your family is hit with this and this was happening across the country now you know for the
book in blowback I talked to a number of people like Adam kinzinger former Republican member of Congress Denver
riggleman and others and they made clear to me that their colleagues in the house those that the very few that spoke out
against Donald Trump they had to go get pistols Concealed Carry Permits for their children and family members I mean
the threats got really extreme and a lot of those people ended up leaving Congress because of it and and saying so
so publicly Fred Upton who was a congressman Republican congressman from Michigan stalwart conservative said he
just couldn't put up with the threats anymore I think his comment to me was you know I'm fast but I'm not that fast and you know these people are crazy
um I I never thought I would see that in my life that we would have public officials running for their lives and
and to put a data point on it Michael the chatter we are seeing about threats to American public servants especially
from the far right is greater in volume than the chatter we saw after 9 11 in
terms of threats to public service so just put that in perspective the largest terrorist attack in the history of the
world we are seeing in some senses a higher statistical Threat Level now than
we did in that window and it's coming from inside the house because in your book
you talk about that Tampa rally you talk about multiple rallies and Donald's line
that he used and I quote bad things are going to happen to him naming you
what let me just be very clear knowing Donald as well as I do and I do know him I haven't been wrong
yet what he was doing is he was sending a coded message
to that veswath of the 28 of the GOP
that is seriously indoctrinated into the cult
where maybe he was hoping that something bad was going to happen
to you and by saying it this way he still leaves himself with enough wiggle
room to say I didn't even know this kid I didn't want to see anything happen to anybody but I predicted when you do [ __ ]
like this bad things happen to people right what he's doing is the same sort
of nonsense that he does it's part of the Trump Playbook he was calling to
action these magomaniacs that are willing to go to prison for him right
for periods of time whether it's 90 days or 18 years
simply based upon what they determine and and Michael as you know we actually
have seen people respond to the call not just January 6th of course which is which is the biggest example but you
know when authorities raided Trump's home a year ago looking for the classified documents that he stole you
know he called the FBI the fascist Bureau of Investigation days later we had a guy with an AR-15 and a nail gun
storm and FBI field office on behalf of trump they do respond to this call and
when he came out in my case and he said bad things are going to happen to Miles Taylor it was a dog whistle as you know
it was a command for people to do bad things uh and again no one has to have sympathy for me I went into this fight
clear-eyed but if you just want to get a sample of those message I mean go to my Twitter page at Miles Taylor USA I've
got a clip at the top there of just a sample of the voicemails people like me people like you Michael and others get
from these lunatics who find our information they're not just doing that because they stumbled on us on the web
it's because people like Trump have made it clear that their supporters should harass us and our families and and our
friends and innocent people around us uh and and that's something that I think is really alarming because it's spread
Beyond Donald Trump again his ethos has infected the Republican party don't
believe me again look at the examples people give in blowback and I'll give you two examples now about how trumpism
has spiraled even beyond what Donald Trump was willing to do there was two things in the first term he wanted us to
do that he walked back from one was busing and dumping migrants and Sanctuary cities and another was
cleaning house at the FBI let me drill into both of those on the busing and dumping of migrants president said to us
in 2019 I want you to take the murderers the criminals and the rapists that you catch at the border DHS and I want you
to ship them into Democratic cities to cause chaos and disorder and instability
this was a real request from the White House I had to go to our lawyers and get them to tell me in writing yes this
would be illegal which I passed along to the White House the chief of staff Stephen Miller and said we cannot do
this Trump grudgingly held back second the president wanted to gut the FBI and
we know he fired Jim Comey but then he stopped short because he was worried about getting impeached well guess what those two thwarted Trump policies are
now mainstream positions of the Republican Party Ron DeSantis and Florida and Greg Abbott in Texas have
both picked up the busing and dumping of migrants concept with alacrity and now they're using migrants as political
pawns around the country look at the FBI we all thought that was a fringe Donald Trump policy position that he wanted to
cleanse the nation's Premier investigative agency but now if he returns to power Trump we know wants to
install political loyalists over there and it's become a top talking point of the Republican party was is to take a
wrecking ball to that institution and install political operatives effectively these are two examples of trumpism
infecting The Wider GOP and I think it's what we could expect if Trump or a copycat wins the White House is those
things that he was prevented from doing being implemented on stair droids in a second term
yeah look I I get it um I I really get it uh I
I had a problem with Trump's desire to completely eradicate the FBI
complete I mean literally he wanted to get rid of the entire agency now to get rid of one person I get it you know he
has the right to do that James Comey only serves at the pleasure of Donald
Trump as the president and I'm not a massive fan of Comey uh to be very
honest with you I think Comey has a lot of um personal desires on his own you know
if I ask the average person name two FBI directors well everybody knows right J
Edgar Hoover I mean everybody just knows that name because he's been such a
interesting character over the course of the last you know 50 years uh books
written about him movies made about him about his Antics and so on
and then you ask him well name another name another now I always would say
Louis freed why he was Jewish right and
so you know that for me yeah I was always impressed that there was you know a Jew who could make it you know to the
head of the FBI most people couldn't name another FBI director until James
Comey he wanted to be that number two that number three that everybody would
know his name well my brother this ain't [ __ ] cheers all right and you know
everybody didn't need to know your name one of the reasons most people don't
know FBI directors is because they kind of stay silent they stay to the side but
not Comey he was very much front and center and at like six foot seven you
know not it's not an easy task if you know what I mean well it and I think that we're gonna see
uh unfortunately if in a second Trump Administration and a trump 2.0 other
departments and agencies that you would normally think should be in obscurity being front and center and one of those
Michael that I was again very surprised by in these conversations was the
Department of Veterans Affairs we don't talk about the VA very much people think of it as a sleepy institution that does
the right thing and it takes care of America's veterans in the course of writing blowback I spoke to Trump's top
appointees who were running the Department of Veterans Affairs who revealed to me that there were plans in
a second term to quote detonate the VA and gut veterans health care benefits
why because Donald Trump found out that the VA had the second biggest budget in
the federal government 250 billion dollars and he wanted to use it as a piggy bank he was frustrated spending
money on Veterans as we know he has a long history of animosity towards military veterans because presumably
it's because he's self-conscious about the fact that he himself didn't serve and his top officials told me they're
named in the book that Trump wanted to detonate the VA kick veterans out on the
street and he didn't care because in the in the words of one former deputy secretary of the Department of Veterans Affairs he thought veterans were quote
lazy malingerers and he wanted to spend that money elsewhere this is really
disturbing for a lot of reasons one because Americans want to take care of their military veterans but no no no no
I'm so sorry miles Americans are obligated to take care of the veterans
they fought for us their saved our democracy they put their lives on the
line we [ __ ] owe it to them all right and I'm going to tell you a couple stories also uh as it relates to the VA
don't forget I was the one who brought David shulkin the secretary of the VA to
the table because I knew David from well before um you know way way before Donald ever
did well yeah and and Michael I would love to hear your your perspective on this
because this was something I didn't expect uh folks to say is that there would be this priority to essentially
break the veterans Health Care apparatus in a second term and what was more alarming is that department leaders said
they had the authority to do it you know the president had the authority if he wanted to execute that order to destroy
the veterans safety net which not only throw the throws those millions of veterans potentially out on the street
but actually the American Health Care System people don't realize is heavily dependent on the VA a lot of doctors
their very first job is they go into the veterans Health Care system so this would be a major national security
crisis to break that veterans Health Care system I was told the only reason Trump was persuaded not to do that in a
first term his political advisors convinced him that it would hurt him very badly and re-elect him with of
course the veterans community if he broke the veterans Healthcare Network so they shelved it to wait to a second term
to destroy that institution people need to wake up I mean we all remember in 2020 the stories coming out about Trump
being in France talking about veterans being suckers and losers because they died uh you know in combat this
perception is not just a gross Viewpoint it's one that could affect the lives of millions of American veterans if we give
the Maga movement another shot at the White House but Michael I'm curious to hear you know what you thought you know
I'm going to get oh yeah I'm going to get into that in about a half second I did just want to ask you one quick
question because as a result of you know Trump's comments and again I know this
all too well and it's it's [ __ ] painful they you stated in the book that um
there was a billionaire who was actually willing to fund your security detail but
you ended up not accepting it I'm just curious because you don't name who the billionaire is me personally I can't
find anybody you know to help me despite you know all of my cooperation I'm just
curious um who was the billionaire that has enough um Moxie and enough
um uh well what's the right word for it um it's just has enough empathy for
somebody like yourself who put his ass on the line for this country right by
exposing the dangers of trump that they'd be willing to fund your security
well uh you know ironically that person wishes to remain anonymous and and I'll respect those wishes but I but I gotta
tell you Michael you know what it's like in that moment when you turn against the tribe there are very few people there to
support you and this is someone who I didn't know someone who I knew of and admired because they're a public person
who reached out in the wake of trump saying bad things are going to happen to Miles Taylor and someone who was very
perceptive in knowing that that would result in an avalanche of death threats against our family and the person
reached out and said look I know you can't afford it let me help you get protection and I was really grateful for
that Outreach but but you make a really good point Michael most folks especially
these public servants on the front lines who continue to get threatened for defending democracy they don't have a
Silicon Valley billionaire who's going to call them on speed dial and say I'd like to help out I mean we're talking
about something that's become an epidemic the political intimidation and
threats and violence and you know Trump and his allies in the market movement continue uh to promote that such that
we're seen in polls I mean there was an NPR poll that showed one in four Americans have a favorable attitude of
violence towards the government there was a famous University of Chicago survey last year that showed one in 10
Americans some some 35 million American adults believed that force would be justified to restore Donald Trump to the
White House run in 10 Americans believing we should forcibly put him back in the White House we've never seen
numbers like that from a public safety and National Security perspective you know I've made this point on television
which I thought um was going to get more attention but it really didn't
so here I am now the recipient of a lawsuit by Trump a 500 million dollar
lawsuit southern district of Miami it's a complete [ __ ] case it's retaliation Against Me Again by Donald
because of the DA's case and the AGS case and um my case going to trial
against him on July 24th it's all retaliation by Donald and Adam Park
menko God bless this guy went ahead created this website uh GoFundMe right I
had nothing to do with he did it and so then turned it over to my lawyer I think we've raised about 225
000. um the initial is going to be 250 000 that's needed just to get to the
Discovery stages which we're at right now and so it's probably going to cost close to a million dollars this
litigation to defend myself I'm at 225 000. now don't get me wrong I
thank every supporter from the one guy who gave 50 Grand to the person who donated a dollar I thank every supporter
I truly do but then there's this guy on the subway here in New York who choked a
homeless guy out and killed him and he's already raised over three and a half million dollars for his defense fund
right I mean he choked the guy out the guy the guy who he choked out probably
weighed 120 130 pounds wet chokes him out and yet the right the right wing
they're so okay with the violence that in drones they just give money whether
it's ten dollars twenty or a hundred makes no difference this guy has three plus million dollars in the bank for his
use for defense Etc I don't get it I don't get it my lawsuit
is to hold Donald Trump accountable right this is the kind of action that's
going to put Donald on the stand and we're gonna learn a whole lot more about about the guy but for some unknown
reason I can't explain it the conservative
they just I I I don't they just they just give I can't explain it you
know what I mean um they just I mean I think Michael you're the perfect example of how there is an
active strategy right now in Maga circles to sue opponents of the former
president into silence and we've seen that with a number of folks what do you think my 500 million dollar lawsuit is
you think that's not to keep me silent Stephanie Grisham Olivia Troy I mean they're going after people who they see
as a threat and trying to sue them into silence and it's really important for folks to stand up and back those
individuals like you so that they can continue to tell the truth about Trump
and hold them accountable because they actually perceive this to be an effective strategy because they know how
expensive it is to tie people up in litigation that Trump used to talk about it I mean you and I've talked about this before I'm sure he said it far more
often in your presence but I remember him coming into the Oval Office and saying this is how you get people to do
things you want you soothing I used to do that for him but not not to
take away people's constitutional rights I'm talking against you know other developers I'm talking against you know
contractors I'm talking you know [ __ ] like that things that nobody has any
business other than between the Trump organization Donald and the president CEO of whoever the contractor was I mean
we're not talking about Apples to Apples though that's what he learned he learned
that he could take advantage of these contractors of these smaller people by
scaring the [ __ ] out of them into a 500 million dollar lawsuit but at this point
in time I'm so beaten and damaged it ain't gonna happen all right I'm just I
walk with my head up high like you right I'm not thinking about these threats
from these lunatics right I I like you I also don't have a security detail that's
okay right I'm gonna continue to do my thing I'm going to continue to speak truth to power and I'm going to continue
to ensure that Donald Trump is held accountable not the things that he didn't do but for things that he did do
the things that if it was you and certainly as it was for me you end up seeing prison in time right now let me
just jump in for a second and talk to you about the whole thing with the um Secretary of the VA so I knew David
shulkin through mutual friends for years for years and Donald first was looking at a
handful of different people and none of them wanted the job remember he didn't have his book prepared that if
in fact he won the election that we would already be calling up
John Kelly we'd be calling up you know um David shulkin we'd be calling up
whoever these cabinet members might be he thought it was bad luck he didn't
want to do it I took from scaramucci his book on uh Romney that he had to show
Trump what it looks like and he said it was bad luck give it to Steve Bannon you
know or give it to kellyanne Conway I don't want to see it I'm not doing it and it wasn't that he didn't do it
because it was bad luck he didn't do it because he never thought he was going to win and he thought it would be a waste
of time calling all of these people and maybe he would feel that he would owe
them something if they said yes so all of a sudden everybody's now scrambling to find Qualified people that
they knew for various positions including ambassadorships and so on well in this specific case he could not find
anybody to take on the role of the secretary of the VA and I turned around I said to him hey boss there's a guy
named Dave shulkin who I happen to know for a long time in fact David currently
is the under Secretary of the VA under Obama
to which Donald looks to me he goes Michael are you out of your [ __ ] mind I said why so he goes why in the world
what kind of an [ __ ] would I look like if I bring in someone like this guy
who's a Democrat who had previously worked under the Obama Administration as the
assistant under as the undersecretary to the VA I said boss he's a Republican
I said he's really qualified he's an administrator in fact just to give you
an idea when Melania burned herself at Bedminster
he's the one that we got in order to help her through the entire process because she you know she Burns herself
without water uh at Bedminster he goes yeah I'm like yeah and in fact Melania
liked him a lot you liked him you were even sent him a thank you card so he goes oh okay bring him in
and then there were others that were going to work in some sort of a think
tank with the VA but the whole goal at that time was to dismantle the VA and it
was an interesting thought process sell off everything that's the VA and
you'll have a ton of money that's there because the VA there is a substantial in his mind
there's a substantial amount of waste there's facilities that have all brand
new equipment that's not even being used and the service in Trump's opinion
because this is it means to an end that the service is not even secondary
not even tertiary it's sub service by these doctors that are building the
system and this again is all part where we'll sell off the equipment to third world countries and have a couple of
billion dollars sitting in the back but what they wanted to do is to offer to every veteran a special
United States government military insurance card
that every doctor has to accept it be like a Medicare Medicaid but it's
any doctor that you want to go to and they must give you an appointment within 24 hours
that part I kind of liked where that these veterans that are going through
whether it's emotional issues ptsds they need
medication uh they have uh injuries that are causing them pain they must be seen
within 24 hours all right I thought the idea was great
but to dismantle the entire VA simply so that you know they can Bank
all of this money to the side so he could use it for other things like military or just to park to the
side for infrastructure that's just wrong you don't do that to people if you're going to try to make
something right uh out of the VA to improve it try to figure out how to
improve it for the people that need it the most and that's the people that put the most on the line for our country
Michael you said it so well and and I think you make a very important point which is you know the VA system as as a
lot of veterans know is broken it has to be reformed but Trump's own people went
to him at the White House from the VA and said what you want to do with the
Wrecking Ball approach will kill veterans you've got to phase this in if
you want to take this Wrecking Ball and gut the VA to use it as a piggy bank you are going to put lives in danger
that's not what persuaded Donald Trump not to do it what persuaded him is that
it would hurt his re-election to do it and I think that's the big concern is policies like this these zombie policies
uh will come back to life if he's restored to the White House that's that's the big concern
yeah I totally agree so let me ask you so let me just go to one more juicy bit in the book If you would talk to me
about Trump and Ivanka and what he said to John Kelly Chris I've heard him speak
like this before but I want I want it from your mouth I want to know your experience as it relates to uh what was
said and in what context Etc yeah you know the misogyny inside
Trump's world is really well known and you know you've seen it Michael with him
and I saw it with senior female figures in the administration who he made
inappropriate comments about their makeup and their weight and you know things of a sexual nature I mean that
was almost second hand for comments like that to happen in his orbit now the one
that John Kelly had shared with me I wasn't there for this but you know Kelly's unimpeachable in his Integrity
in my view was it comment that the president had made about thinking that ivanka's breasts and her backside were
so attractive that he would want to have sex with her which prompted Kelly to say
to the president you know she's your daughter Mr President the fact that his own chief of staff had to remind him
that the person's body they were talking about was his own daughter it was really disgusting to me and as Kelly relayed
the story his comment was Miles Trump is a very very evil man and I actually
debated Michael about whether to include that story in this book because it's so
disgusting it's so outlandish but I've got to think that even Maga supporters
of Donald Trump will draw the line at incest right there's at least got to be
a line there and that's who this man is it's important for them to know the character of this person that a lot of
them still worship who is the head of the Republican Party who's leading the GOP field right now is a man who's made
incestuous comments and I actually didn't even realize Michael until this story came out how extensive that
history is of his perverse comments about his daughter until people started to send me Super Cuts of these radio
interviews and TV interviews and print interviews where he's made these sexualized references
uh to his daughter so look I'm a national security guy not a political guy but dear God if I have any political
Instinct whatsoever it's hopefully that people will hear about a politician expressing incestuous feelings towards
his own daughter and think that person's not fit for public office yeah I mean
maybe that person is not fit to to walk around our streets in in our you know in
our great country I mean well they have a place for people like that Michael they have a place for
people like that and it's pretty yeah it's it's called hell right so if if you would Jay talk to talk to me about
schedule right they I've always heard there was that thing right there's a special place in hell for people like
that incest come on man you know I mean he used to talk about Ivanka as being you know every girl wants to be like
Ivanka and every guy wants to sleep with her that's why he would send her on certain tasks and I've said that you
know publicly before so obviously everything that you're saying here is um
you know as far as I'm concerned brings truth so if you would talk to me
about what is schedule f um I mean what it what what exactly is it and how will it affect the government
should Trump get reelected yeah well you know schedule F is one of
those things Michael that sounds like a boring bureaucratic term and could also be a bulldozer in a second Trump
Administration so this is an authority that the president had developed When
Donald Trump was still in office that would have given him the ability to fire America's civil servants at Key
departments and agencies so the public servants who aren't political they're appointed you know experts across the
government and you know at the time people thought again this was outlandish because we have Civil Service
protections of this in this country so that if you get hired to work for NASA or you get hired to work for the
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration as an expert that you keep your job regardless of who's
President democrat or republican that those experts stay and we don't replace them with political campaign AIDS and
lackeys and Loyalists because we want a federal government that functions right the person who disperses the social
security check could not be a trump minion it's just someone who you know needs to know how to disperse Social
Security checks but Trump wanted to fire these people because he believed there was a so-called deep State out to get
him and so they developed this Authority called schedule F to be able to fire tens of thousands of federal civil
servants since that time and this is another example of trumpism extending
beyond the former president a lot of his acolytes have praised the idea of
schedule F and have said they will bring it back if they are elected to office and you can count on the fact that in a
second Trump Administration that they would fire tens of thousands if not hundreds of thousands of civil servants
to cleanse the government to install political loyalists again don't believe
me believe Trump's own aides who in this book talk to me about the different places that could happen and especially
there were concerns among the people I talked to about the emergency response functions of the government and Trump's
desire to install in those agencies people who would weaponize federal aid
to support red States and to punish blue States and I also saw this firsthand when there was a tornado or a hurricane
Trump was always looking for leverage in the form of Federal Aid ah is the government going to send billions to
help people whose houses have burned down well is it a blue state if it's a blue State I want you to hold back the
money until I get something from them that's not how the federal government's supposed to operate when you dial 9-1-1
they don't say are you a democrat or a republican before they come respond they come respond in a second Trump
Administration there will be a litmus test a political litmus test for whether Americans get the federal aid they need
in emergencies and he'll do that by being able to gut the bureaucracy of those experts with scheduling absolutely
100 so look Mom the hour goes by really quickly I could sit and probably have
you on for two hours I want to ask you one last question because some of this
actually resulted from your first book Anonymous which my understanding in speaking to people that were still in
his orbit at the time was driving him [ __ ] crazy they couldn't figure out who was uh who was it that wrote this
book and how many other as he would call them leakers are there out there there
came a point in time that Trump actually talked about having White House AIDS
phones tapped I mean this is unfucking precedented right I mean the closest of course would
be Nixon but that doesn't it pales in comparison what do you know about this
you know Stephanie Grisham who I spoke to for both this book and a podcast with
I heart media called the whistleblowers actually told me more about this than I
had even realized at the time which was you know she said that the op-ed when it
dropped the anonymous op-ed and then and then my book a warning drove the president so crazy that they would be in
completely unrelated meeting and he would quiz everyone in the room about who it was he tweeted at the time reason
question mark formed a task force to try to hunt down the author and became so
paranoid that he said the white house chief of staff John Kelly that he wanted to wiretap the phones of White House
staff and I remember that being shared with me at the time and and being just
so astonished that the president of the United States could be that ignorant of the law to think that he had the ability
to just wiretap innocent civilians even if they worked for him to monitor their
phones and get away with it these are the types of things that we should fully expect him to do if he comes back into
office there won't be John Kelly's to tell him as Kelly did at the time no Mr President you cannot do that that's
illegal there will be people who say yes and you know there were folks who in
writing blowback told me exactly that that they believed that Trump will try to weaponize the U.S intelligence
Community to monitor political Rivals and also his own team potentially in a second term and it's not speculation
because he tried to do it we know he tried to do it we were there and you
know just there's an avalanche just a mountain if you will of evidence of how
absolutely unfit this man is for public office I even though was astonished by
the things that people shared might happen in the second term if Trump or a copycat goes back to the White House
well as always miles great to see you my friend great to speak to you stay safe
thank you for joining me thank you for
providing this information which is so desperate as we you know come close to the 2024 election which is why I
constantly say not just here but on my other podcast political Beatdown vote
blue thanks Mike to see you my brother I'll see you soon