LIVE: Trump’s REAL MOTIVE for WAR REVEALED by Nat Sec Expert | The Weekend Show

It's Sunday, March 8, 2026. I'm Anthony Davis. Welcome to The Weekend Show, where we make the time to consider the news of the week. You can support my work and independent journalism at patreon.com slash five minute news. Our guest today is a professor at the Harvard Kennedy School. She's author of six books, including most recently, The Devil Never Never Sleeps. She's a former senior appointee at both the DOJ and the DHS and is a contributing writer at the Atlantic. Juliet KM, welcome back

to the weekend show. Thank you for having me. I wish it was under better circumstances Juliet because as we speak America is at war. The no new war president has turned on his heels. You would think he doesn't really care about his base or the opinion polls anymore, wouldn't you? But he's now asking Iran for unconditional surrender to bring an end to the offensive launched just over a week ago as the US and Israel carried out some of their heaviest bombardments so far of the conflict. Do you

think that this attack was instigated by Donald Trump or was he kind of stepping in on behalf of other people? Because we still don't really know, do we? Yeah, I mean, I think he's the

President of the United States. He did it. Like understand the sort of Israel and they wanted to do it. But I mean, people, he's a grown man. And whatever you think about his mental capacity, he is in charge of, he is our commander in that was not, where no risk was imminent with Israel, that certainly wanted this, and then didn't appear to have either a day zero theory of why we were doing this,

nor a day one plan for what was likely to happen after. I do think just going to that question, though, like I do think there will be and there have already started to be sort of like, you know, what was he being told by Jared Kushner and Whitkoff, the two the two ambassador lights or whatever.

Real estate.

Yeah, real estate types who were negotiating with the Iranians up to a point. But I think all legitimate reporting has it that the president was pretty much decided on this several weeks ago, which makes the lack of day the day after planning even more shocking. We're seeing it mostly here in the United States with the issue of like how do you strand your population without an exit strategy, but is also being felt across the board in the economy and supply chain and obviously in the

military effort itself, that is just clear that whoever told him that this was Venezuela, you know, in the Gulf was wrong.

Right.

Because, I guess time will tell and investigations will be done as to who instigated this war. And you're right, of course, it has Donald Trump's signature on it. It does not have Congress's signature on it, though. So that's really the first illegal move. And despite trying to kind of, you know, get a war powers vote in Congress and in the Senate, that hasn't really been successful either.

Is it that Donald Trump thinks that because he has a majority in Congress and because the Speaker of the House is, you know, very much in the tank for him, that Congress is now irrelevant? Because, I mean, that is a wider question about American democracy, isn't it? Yeah, it is. very much in the tank for him that Congress is now irrelevant. Because I mean, that is a wider question about American democracy, isn't it?

Yeah, it is. I mean, I tend to like, you know, the legal stuff is important. The constitutional division of labor is important. But Congress has given the president every reason to believe that his assertion of unitary power is OK. So he's reading the tea leaves that Mike Johnson and the Senate leadership on the Republican side are giving him.

And they gave it to him in two votes in the Senate, or one vote in the Senate and one vote in the House, in terms of trying to limit his ability to fight this war. They're playing around with what they're calling this, like is it a war, is it not a war? It's a war, Trump has said as much,

Heg Seth has said as much, it's a war. So we just accept that, and it's a war without, I mean, this was the thing that was driving me crazy, like even an attempt to convince the American public. I mean, that is, I mean, I'm not surprised at what the polling is and whatever,

but like not even a try, like at least Bush and Cheney tried to delude us. I mean, maybe I'm happy that they tried to do that. But this was, I mean, and part of it was, you know, clearly, I think it is the echo chamber of that White House and the echo chamber of Israel and the sense that no one could possibly oppose the killing

of the Supreme Leader, but also I think it is, part of this is also that if you don't think through the consequences of something, then it seems fine, right? I mean, who wouldn't want that,

okay, you were gonna kill the Supreme Leader like that.

But that's the emotional blackmail, isn't it? You know, it's like if you want the Ayatollah dead, then you got to agree to all this other stuff too. But what we're seeing, and obviously the polling suggests the majority of Americans do not want this war. And obviously the rest of the world does not want this war.

Iran does not want this war. Iran does not want this war. In fact, Iran wanted to go back to the Iran nuclear deal that was previously signed that Trump tore up. So the wider problem, I guess, though, is a trust issue, isn't it? Because if the president can take the country to war in cahoots with Benjamin Netanyahu in this case, which is a war that he's wanted for 40 years. Does that mean that now in the US people

are living under a dictatorship? That this kind of fascism has taken hold and that the democracy is a thing of the past?

And I think that's a little strong. I mean, obviously we're all looking to November in terms of what does that mean, not just who wins, but also sort of the way to test the democracy is, are there relatively free and fair elections? I think, and I do think the polling on this suggests that,

and the panic we're starting to hear from the White House about the economy, about oil price, gas prices and stuff, is a sign that we have a government that's still responsive to public opinion, unlike the Iranians. So that, to me, is a sign. I think a couple of things on sort of, what were they thinking and sort of what,

I mean, I think part of it is, I just think Trump doesn't care anymore. Like I think that he, whether there's gonna be elections or not, everyone's worried about that. But I think that he creates a narrative about himself.

And if you don't believe that narrative, you're stupid. And so 80% of the American public or 70% of the American public is stupid. And I think that that is he just doesn't-

Or wrong.

Or wrong, or right. And he just doesn't care at this stage. And I think you're seeing that in a variety of ways. He calls down a bash from CNN this morning and was like, we're onto the next war. I mean, he's threatening Cuba.

And so I think that strikes me as someone who is just throwing a lot of things at the wall. What I tell progressives, I know people who listen to you, I listen to you. What I tell progressives is, you know, we always worry and rightfully so,

but like, I would be more worried if this was popular. The truth is, is that we have to wake up, those of us, and whether you're progressive or center, or even a Republican who doesn't like what's going on, we have to wake up every morning and remind ourselves,

he is wildly unpopular. Maybe not unpopular enough, and I hear people say that, but like, I mean, it is consistently 40% or below. I would be more worried for our democracy if he was at 70.

I would.

I mean, that would scare me, because then I would think, oh my god, we have a country that, you know. And look, we have seen over the course of the year lots of people acquiescing, the law firms, like lots of things being bent and broken and all, and DOJ that is essentially an arm

of his political wrath and fury, right? But we've also seen pushback and we've also seen them step down on a variety of things, which we're going to talk about later. For example, firing Christine Oh. Like that is, to me, that's being responsive to something that they could no longer manage.

In this, look, the death toll, like you can't hide what's going on. And I think their attacks on the media right now are because the war started with a horrible miscalculation. I don't think we were aiming for it. A horrible, horrible miscalculation of a site that ended up being a schoolyard, which I think everyone now agrees, or a school that everyone now agrees, was hit by the US and not by Israel. We have- That was 165 children killed in that school.

Yeah. And based on old data and old maps and AI and all the stuff that is just horrifying to think that if only a human had sort of stepped in and said, should I look at Google Maps? Maybe we could have saved those lives. And you have a reaction in the market, a reaction by our allies, a reaction by the Gulf countries, and obviously a reaction by Iran. I mean, if I were to describe Trump's philosophy, he never believes the other party has agency.

So those of us who know this world, and many, many years ago I was against the Iraq War for the same reason. Like, countries have the capacity. They're thinking through their survivability, too. And the idea that you would think that killing the supreme leader, and they didn't have—who's in his 80s anyway—and they didn't have a—they didn't already have a succession plan, nor a plan to extract as much pain as they could, even with limited military capacity. Where have you been the last four years, right?

I mean, it's like, oh my God, Iran is reacting.

Yeah.

But isn't Iran, isn't that based in Trump's racism and white supremacy?

I think it's not.

He kind of sees any Muslim nations or non-white Christian nationalist nations as being secondary in terms of intelligence capability to the United States. And they're widely underestimating Iran, which was highly developed and so sophisticated. And if it wasn't for this kind of regime that has been in charge for 30 odd years, then it might be allowed to flourish more, but it doesn't stop them from being highly intelligent

and efficient. And we're seeing that with them using these small $20,000 drones, which are absolutely pummeling these other nations. And in the meantime, we're using $2 million missiles that aren't really able to catch

up with that. And they're taking out our THAAD. I mean, they're taking out, you know, we've repositioned everything for the Middle East. So, forget Europe and forget China. No, that's exactly, I mean, that's exactly right. And I think it comes from such a simplistic view

that we can't seem to get out of our national blindfold. I don't know what it is, about how, about interactions with the Middle East. I think part of that is because it is often narrated by Israel, who obviously has an agenda. The idea that Israel is who we would get information on about what's likely to happen in Iran. We know Netanyahu has wanted this war forever and would have forever war.

So his narration of what's gonna happen in Iran is already, we should already have known it was suspect, but we have lots of smart people in this country who've been studying that country, who have lots of amazing assets in our government. We had essentially massive leaks from the Pentagon

in the days leading up to the same exact thing that a decapitation is not, that this is not how it works, because it is a sophisticated society with resiliency and is now, all we've done from what I can tell, I mean, we've eviscerated a lot of their capacity. I look at the numbers, the drone strikes are less,

all this stuff, but from what I can tell, we've now put in a 30 year younger, more conservative, supreme leader, and we've killed his father and immediate family members. Like, so what's our-

But we did the same thing in Venezuela.

Yeah, what's our strategy? Yeah, we killed- That's the irony of this. Yeah, yeah. I mean, and I think part of this narrative of like what explanation for the war are we in?

We're in number six today, which is the total annihilation. That's what this was about. That the different explanations are for the war are because the first explanation didn't hold. And it didn't hold pretty quickly. The military realized pretty quickly, oh my, their response isn't, we are going to have

regime change from the ground, right? It is, we are going to make this hurt. And in particular, we're going to make the Gulf nations feel this so hard, which is what's happening right now, that we want to break up whatever unity they had before the strike. And you're seeing that now. The Gulf states are—

But it does seem that Trump had absolutely no idea, and nor did, you know, the Department of War under Hegsef. I mean, the irony of the name change kind of makes a whole lot of sense now, doesn't it? But they had no idea that Iran wouldn't just strike back at Israel, that it would actually then start striking back at US bases right across the Middle East.

Right across, throughout the Gulf. I mean, I spent a lot of time in the Gulf. Throughout the Gulf, OK, but also our supply chain. Like, this is the thing that I literally, like, you know, if you study supply chains like I do, because I look at them as their resiliency.

Are they resilient?

Well, it's all connected.

We had a single point of failure. We already knew we had a single point of failure. We already knew we had a single point of failure, which is could you keep the straight-server modes open or not? And if I sound more crazy, more energized than I normally do, it's because one is because it drives me crazy when people do stupid things, but it's because the impact, now we're in day six, the impact of it is going to start to be felt by Americans, but also by the Gulf.

I know we're talking about oil, but the food supply, I mean, if you've been to the Gulf, I mean, it doesn't have any natural resources except for oil. The food supply, the water supply, all that stuff. People are going to suffer. And the Gulf states that have been handing Trump and Kushner and all of them lots and lots of money and been handing conservative businessmen all sorts of money through their

various contracts are now realizing, wait, they're not defending us. So we now have Russia being allowed to sell its oil to India temporarily.

I mean this all looks good for Russia, doesn't it? You know, they don't really have to get involved. They're just sitting back and watching everybody fight it out. The US is pretty much energy independent from an oil perspective, but as you say, there are other things that keep the world turning that are being compromised because of the Strait of Hormuz.

So could you argue that actually this is just Trump doing Russia's bidding as well as Israel's bidding in the long run?

I would say that if you were going to be doing Russia's bidding, it would look like this. I don't, you know, I mean, once again, this is assuming the level of sophistication, but, you know, by Trump and his team about secondary, third impacts. But if you wanted to do, you know, if you allow Russia to sell oil to India, once again, it's like also humiliating to our allies, India.

And you then know that Russia is sharing secrets with Tehran about where we are, because they have extensive intelligence apparatus as well, despite the war in Ukraine. Yeah, it would look like this. It would look like this. And the other would be, would be, of course, China. I mean, China has remained relatively quiet through this because it is literally, I mean it is, this is like, you know, I mean if you're China you're like,

I couldn't have asked for anything better. So it's a gift to America's traditional adversaries which are increasingly becoming allies and allies are increasingly becoming adversaries. I mean just to talk for the UK for a moment, Keir Starmer is getting an awful lot of crap from members of parliament about how he handled this. But it now turns out he didn't even know about it. The US did not tell the UK, its closest ally in warfare,

that they planned on striking Iran.

That's exactly right.

So he was several days behind the time.

What's the special relationship? No, and then Hegsef is mad that European nations are now either assisting, you know, as France, as you see what's happening in Lebanon, as Israel takes this as an opportunity, as Netanyahu takes this as an opportunity

to now wipe out Hezbollah in Lebanon without regard for civilian loss again. And you're seeing a bunch of the European countries now saying, wait a second, you've been horrible, right? Like, you're, you know, like, beyond horrible for the last year and now you want us? Like, this is the thing, like, this is again, like he can't process reaction, right?

And so he doesn't know, like, what's the reaction of being a jerk to our allies for a year, right?

It is-

Well, the Spanish certainly aren't standing for it.

Exactly, right? And so it's just shameful. And one of the things that you see in US media is that the perspective of what is going to happen is often narrated by the national security or ideological wing, right?

Or so it's either nuclear or existential threat people, right? And that could be on the left or the right. That could be Democrats or Republicans, but they're viewing it through the lens of that. The lens I view it through,

because I work in the world of supply chain, there is your homeland functioning, right? Is, I mean, is, is this is the disaster.

Yeah, well, we saw how he handled COVID with the shortage of baby food and diapers.

Yeah, and we're hearing, and we're hearing about the panic in the White House about the prices. I mean, I, I mean, it's just like, you know, you know, I'm not living paycheck to paycheck, so I'll be honest there, but my son needs to get tickets somewhere to Europe for later in the year, and I was like, get them now.

Like, get them now, because I don't know what the price is gonna be tomorrow.

Yeah, things are gonna change very rapidly. The war is expanding very rapidly. And you mentioned Lebanon, and now that is getting an absolute pummeling also from Israel. Iran is going to start to get help from Russia if it hasn't already. And there is some talk that Russia is starting to support Iran in that way.

And Iran has a very different type of warfare. They store all their stuff underground. They don't, you know, it's not traditional in the sense. Do you feel that the US military, because Trump has fired an awful lot of insubordinates, you know, and getting rid of the Joint Chiefs and replacing them with a kind of MAGA loyalist, and, you know, he did call in all of the military to a conference and basically say, you know, he did call in all of the military to a conference

and basically say, you know, unless you're loyal, you're out and all this. I mean, it was very weird. It was very totalitarian. And, you know, we know that the military are supposed to only operate under legal orders, but they're never really going to break ranks. Let's be honest. I never thought that the Americans would be praying for a military coup in their own country, but it seems that that's kind of where it's at. And so, you know, this stuff is going on, it's costing an absolute fortune, the debt and the deficit is already through the roof.

Is there a sense that there is a huge lack of intelligence and planning? Because you know, the analysts have been fired. Anybody who questions Trump or Hegseth, they get fired. The lawyers have been fired. Anybody who is a check and a balance on these types of decision-making are out. And it just does seem that this whole operation is so chaotic that it probably just does come

down to Trump being bullied by Netanyahu and Hegseth, who, you know, is an alpha and is desperate with his toxic masculinity to kind of go bomb stuff. It's as simple as that. They really have just got into something and they don't really know how to get out of it.

Yeah. I mean, I think, like, separating the White House decision-making process and what is going on is important. So how I think about it is I think you're absolutely right that another story behind this war is the story of DOJ. And DOJ can mean a lot of things, but it's basically the gutting out of competency within

our federal government. I think the best example of that is the State Department. It's one thing not to be ready, but I mean, I've been in... There were whole offices that existed for the sole function of protecting American citizens that found themselves at war, civil war, or a natural disaster. Those were completely gutted out.

It was telling to me that the State Department, despite three, four days of bad press, could not get a plane moving for three or four years. Because it's hard and you've got to get the plane and you've got to figure out where they're going to take it.

So the repatriation was a disaster.

And I think part of that delay was because when you turn the on switch, it's bad enough they didn't prepare before, but even when they knew they had to do it, you turn the switch on and no one's there, the room is empty. So part of that I think is exactly right, that gutting out for ideological

or fake financial reasons, which we know was a total joke, of competency at the level of how do you make something work?

And replacing quite a lot of it with AI, we should say.

Yeah, exactly. Right. And that's the big mistake. The military part is hard. And I'm just going to be honest. There's a lot of evidence. And I think when we look back that the military, at least through the Joint Chiefs, was absolutely trying to make it clear that this was not going to be a one-day war, right? And we saw those leaks before. We saw the growing—we saw, I think, the chief of staff to the Joint Chiefs got fired

because he had been very, very critical of it. So I do think that there were people within the military who were trying to do it. The killing of the school children was incompetency. I'm going to put that aside, not because I think it's right, but I don't think that's the equivalent of like myelin, of I'm now having a senior moment in Vietnam. I don't think it's the equivalent of like, you know, I think a major mistake happened

and we have to figure out what happened. The story that's starting to worry me a little bit more on this sort of is, you know, are people behaving in a way that we would expect them to behave? Is this story coming out of India with the submarine, US submarine, bringing down an Iranian ship that we now understand, at least from the reporting, that seems pretty correct, that it was for some sort of multinational event or training that the boat was not armed.

Yes, it was in international waters.

The submarine waited for it to come into international waters and then left them to die. Now, I don't know what the guys in the submarine knew. So part of this is I do want to find out. I don't want to be just like, you know, whatever. So what did they know that they were doing as compared to what did the Pentagon know? Because this is an easy kill, right? And I, you know, my worst case scenario is the sub people were told this is an armed vessel

leaving India to go to the Persian Gulf to kill your colleagues. get it. They do it and now they're waking up to headlines that say it was unarmed and it was there for essentially a display. And you didn't save the guys, right? Which is normal.

And Hexeth boasted that it was the first vessel to be shot with a torpedo since the Second World War.

Big deal. I mean, this is the other thing is like, I mean, the day to day, the sort of fascination with weaponry as a sign of strategy is like pathetic. That was an easy kill. And give my kid a submarine and a ship that doesn't know that it's there.

And I'm sure there's another there. And he can figure it out in 10 minutes.

Did it not remind you, though, of the strikes on these fishing boats in the Caribbean Sea?

Why are these... Yeah, these are not impressive. Like, if you want to impress me, you know, like, you know, get the Martians or something. But like, these are not impressive, but the media loves an impressive TikTok. I will say, I am looking across the spectrum of at least television and whatever.

I would say if I were the White House, I'd be panicked. It's the story is not-

It feels like they're panicked, doesn't it though?

It does feel like that. I mean, because the story is, yes, the Supreme Leader is now replaced. All accounts so far is that the regime has held. They're getting bombarded, but we don't know. We don't have all the details of that. They're still able to exert. I mean, we're on day, what are we, day

six? I think we're on day nine and Trump initially said it would be, you know, brief, then they said it would be three to four weeks, then four to five weeks, and now they're talking up to six weeks.

Yeah, yeah, that will be six months in like no time, but like, you know, that we have not, we have a Navy. Do you know what the Navy's tagline is? We protect the world's open oceans. How are we not able to get a two-mile freaking little canal open to begin commerce? And I think part of that was we never thought that the Iranians would do it. Once again, countries have agency. Cuba is going to be a great example. What's our mass migrate?

I hope a reporter asks this. It's not enough to say, you know, do we kill the leadership of Cuba? I'm pretty convinced that Trump thinks that Castro, the Castro brother, is still in charge. And there's no Castros in charge of Cuba anymore. What's our mass migration plan? Because if you're a Cuban and this is happening, you are just a couple miles from Florida. This is your chance. Do we have a mass migration plan? You are inviting me back on the day after Cuba because you and I are going to

sit here and I was like, they didn't have a mass migration plan. Right, right. I mean, you know,

what we're seeing now in Gulf nations, and obviously, you know, there is a significant military that is the UAE effectively that kind of polices most of these nations. But Dubai has taken fire. You know, a hotel was set alight by a drone. And we're now looking at the Kurds even getting involved, and Kurdistan, who don't want to have anything to do with it necessarily, but are being drawn in through allegiance. And then, so once you've got places that, you know, try to appear civilized, and Dubai

and the UAE have obviously done a huge marketing effort over the last 25 years, so that they are free from conflict, and that they are far from conflict, and that they are cosmopolitan and metropolitan.

They're not Lebanon. They're not Lebanon.

They're not Lebanon.

And now, and now, and now...

And so that veil is slipping because they're now on the receiving end of a bombardment of weaponry from Iran. This is going to change not just the food supply and the oil supply, but it's going to change the world economy also, because these regions are a safe haven for expats and people that want to, you know, kind of start over. And it's going to be very problematic to kind of rewrite the narrative or maintain the narrative

if you're that close to conflict.

I think the window is closed. I think you're absolutely right. I mean, I wrote that the, you know, this war ends quickly if, and I believe it to be true, if the Gulf nations love their money more than they hate Iran, right?

That the pressure, and you're already seeing it, I can't believe that I still see people on TV like not even acknowledging like that whatever the Gulf states wanted before this is was not, and I don't believe that they wanted this, that them starting to push back, to reassess some of their investments in the United States, their oil refineries, are being hit by Iranian missiles,

their commerce is all impacted. And exactly what you said, the 30 years that they have built up of goodwill and a place of capital, that your capital would be protected is right. And now what you're seeing is, of course,

you're already seeing it in the financial markets is a move to Asia, which isn't good for diversification. So, I mean, I've been to Dubai, I mean, I've been to the Gulf a dozen times now and it makes me sad too

because I do think that they were trying and I think that window is still open. I think, you know, I think if people start to starve to death in Dubai, then you're gonna have a different scenario. But I think some of the panic in the White House isn't just simply domestic crisis,

but it is what they're seeing in the media, what you and I are seeing. And I urge viewers and listeners, like open your lens to like, what is coming out of Arab and Gulf newspapers? You know, it's really easy to find now.

Their assessment of what's going on is just very different than what you're seeing on, you know, with the strikes. There's a different war going on.

Well, the propaganda out of the White House has been turned up to 11 in the last few days. I mean, they put out a video of Tom Cruise flying, you know, and all of these superheroes. I'm sure the actors involved are gonna want to have their names taken off of that straight away.

I'm sure they use these clips without any permission. But it was a joke of a video that tried to show kind of American might intercut with clips of Pete Hegseth being... show American Might intercut with clips of Pete Hegseth being extra masculine in an ill-fitting suit. And what that suggests to me is that Trump still thinks that he is on a reality TV show.

Hegseth is an actor playing the part of the Defense Secretary. Rubio is mostly ineffective and just cleans up both of their messes by having to...

And J.D. Vance doesn't exist. Did he die? Where is he?

J.D. Vance is a mirage.

But where is he? I mean, it's ridiculous.

Right. So, well, he's waiting for the Führer to fall so he can step in, I guess. You know, he's playing that role. But, so what we've really got here is people that, you know, they think it's like playing Mortal Kombat or some kind of computer game where it's all super fun, but there is no empathy because of their narcissistic personality disorder.

So they don't flinch when 165 kids get murdered. They don't flinch when there's this huge kind of mass exodus of tens of thousands of people out of Tehran. They don't, you know, where are these people gonna go? And who's gonna absorb them?

And what are the plans? Nothing, it seems, has been learned from Iraq or Afghanistan. And so they are just not living in reality. For me, that's the most dangerous part of this, is that we're talking about, you know, you can have your own opinion as to whether America has fallen to insanity and an insane despot

who has no empathy for the consequences.

I think that's always been true of Trump. I mean, I think it's just, you know, I just... I mean, you go back to... God, I was thinking the other day, I had not thought about it a while. I remember when he criticized the father of the Muslim soldier who had been killed.

Remember that in the convention? Like, you just think like, this is someone who's like the, exactly, that the sense of responsibility and empathy that comes from just being a human being, let alone.

Or even a parent.

Yeah, like let alone.

The way he talks about his own kids.

Right, right. No, no, sometimes I'll say like, these are the nastiest people ever to be in the White House. And then I'm like, these are just the nastiest people one will ever encounter in their lives. Like, we don't encounter the lack of empathy

in our day to day. That's maybe that gives me hope about America that Americans are generally better than this stuff. But I do think, look, I mean, that's where, as he becomes more desperate for the narrative, for the quick exit, it's not surprising to me

that he's already moved on to Cuba. I view that as both horrifying, but also maybe we will get this quicker exit out of this, what's a regional war. I remember the best description of Trump that I ever read was,

to Trump, there is no yesterday and there is no tomorrow. And I thought, I mean, in terms of national security, there's nothing to be learned from the past. How will, you know, the Iraq war, you know, what the Iranians would do, what Netanyahu had already done to us.

There's no muscle memory for any of this stuff.

And there's no consequences, right? So it's just, it's like, you know, it's childish. So, and he does have a staff that sort of promotes that or they go into hiding when they know they can't control it. And the Democrats are, you know, I will say, I think the Democratic senator,

the senators in the Democratic Party, their messaging has been pretty good. I think, you know, I was getting frustrated with the sort of focus on the legal aspects. And I was like, either this is right or wrong, and just man up and say it.

I think now it's, you know, now they sort of are seeing what's happening, they're getting out there. But this, the Democrats in particular, that couldn't have the guts to just assert the War Powers Act because we had Republican votes in it.

Like, I'm not quite getting that. Like, I'm like, what world are you living in? Not just where your base is and where the electorate is, but like, you can't possibly think that this is, it's like the Supreme Court with their opinion. They can't possibly think giving this person

more authority is a good thing. And I think for my colleagues in the national security arena who tend, they don't like to get as personal as I do, but I think those who have wanted some sort of reckoning for Iran for a variety of reasons, and you see them, I think it's very shameful to separate the sort of military cause or the national security cause from the commander in chief. what makes you think in this one instance,

they're gonna do it right? Is it because you hate Iran so much? Is it because you're so pro-Israel? Well, then just say it. But like the idea that in this one thing, Trump, we gotta give him the benefit of the doubt.

It's like, I don't see that. I mean, and I think the proof is in the pudding, of how the White House is behaving right now.

But my fear is that he won't stop at one. As you say, he'll do this and he will enjoy all of the attention. Because remember, he lives off of the negativity, he thrives off of it. You know, he's so empty that even criticism gives him some kind of life force because at least they're saying his name. And that's all he really wants.

And so my fear is that he will continue this bombardment of Iran. There will be wider consequences with former allies falling out with the US even further than they have been. He'll then do Cuba as well, and then he'll get a taste for the rest of South America. And then Canada will be in for it, because it's all about hemispheres. And that's where you have to look to the Board of Peace and see what that's all about. And these are just business deals. This is a way to profit. And he wants to own the Western

hemisphere. That's his jurisdiction. But what's interesting though is that the fact that he doesn't do follow through, right, means that these efforts are just like this moment in time of which he's disruptive for disruptive sake. And as you said, I think that's exactly right, that the attention and, you know,

there are people who think, well, then now we're not talking about Epstein and stuff. Like, I think that's right, that the attention and you know, there are people who think, well, then now we're not talking about Epstein and stuff like, I think that's right that the attention is on this. Cuba, Cuba is next. I don't I mean, and I didn't doubt that we were going to go to I mean, we, you know, over the last three months, we put about 80% of our military assets in the Persian Gulf like we were going to war. He called it an armada. Right? I was like, this wasn't to give Jared Kushner, you know, extra oomph in his great negotiations.

I mean, the guy, at best, the guy lied to his father-in-law about what the Iranians were doing. At worst, he's such an idiot. He didn't know what the negotiations were like. I mean, those are your only two options at this stage, right?

Well, I happen to think the negotiations were just a distraction I don't think they were ever real

So, so I think You know, we take the president at his word Yeah, and I think I think I think Cuba is next

Okay, the irony is they're now asking Zelensky to help them fight off the drones.

Because, yeah, because like we couldn't have thought of that before. Once again, there's no yesterday for these people.

Yeah, okay, we have to take a quick break, but we're going to come back and talk about the DHS as Kristi Noem is out. But could her replacement be worse? We'll do that next here on The Weekend Show. Cold days, big goals, and honestly no time to cook. I've definitely had weeks where I want to eat healthy, but the planning, grocery shopping, and cooking just isn't happening.

That's why I've been loving Factor. Fully prepared meals designed by dietitians and crafted by chefs so you can eat well without the stress. One of my favorite meals lately is their Mediterranean style chicken with roasted veggies. It's perfect when my schedule's packed because it's got lean protein, colorful vegetables and whole food ingredients that actually leave you feeling full instead of sluggish. Factor focuses on quality, functional ingredients. Think lean proteins, healthy fats and real veggies, with no refined sugars, no artificial sweeteners and no refined seed oils. So whether

your goal is healthy eating, managing calories or getting more protein in your routine, it fits right in. And the variety is honestly great. Factor has a hundred rotating weekly meals, so things stay fresh all winter. You'll find options like high protein, calorie smart, Mediterranean diet, GLP-1 support, plus ready to eat salads. They've even got a muscle pro collection designed to support strength and recovery. The best part, convenience. These

meals are always fresh, never frozen, and they're ready in about two minutes. No prep, no stress, just heat and eat. I use it, and so should you. Head to factormeals.com slash weekend50off and use code weekend50off to get 50% off and free breakfast for a year. Eat like a pro this month with Factor. New subscribers only, varies by plan. One free breakfast item per box for one year while subscription is active. Thanks to Homeserve for sponsoring this episode. Owning a home is amazing until it's not. One minute you're relaxing with a cup of coffee, the next minute something breaks,

and suddenly you're dealing with water where it definitely shouldn't be. Repairs never seem to happen at a convenient time, and they definitely don't care about your budget. Think about it, we protect a lot of things in our lives, our health, our cars, even our phones,

but what about our home? For most people, that's the biggest investment they'll ever make. And when something goes wrong, like a burst interior water pipe, a broken water heater, or even electrical outlets that suddenly stop working, the repair bills can get expensive fast. And that's the thing, regular homeowners insurance usually doesn't cover a lot of those day-to-day

wear and tear issues. Things like plumbing failures, HVAC breakdowns, or electrical problems, and a lot of the time you're on your own trying to find someone to fix it. That's where HomeServe comes in. They offer plans that help protect homeowners against the cost of covered repairs. It's kind of like a subscription for your home. And plans start from as little as $4.99 a month. Instead of scrambling to find a contractor in a panic, you can call HomeServe's 24x7 hotline

and start the repair process. It's simple. Just choose a plan that fits your needs and budget. If something covered by that plan goes wrong, you call and they help schedule a repair with one of their local, experienced contractors. HomeServe has been helping homeowners for over 20 years, working with a trusted national network of more than 2,600 local contractors. They've got four and a half million customers, a 4.8 out of 5 post repair rating, and an A-plus rating with the Better Business Bureau. So they're the real deal. Emergency home repairs can get expensive fast, so having that extra

peace of mind knowing someone's got your back is huge. Help protect your home systems and your wallet with HomeServe against covered repairs. Plans start at just $4.99 a month. Go to HomeServe.com to find the plan that's right for you. That's HomeServe.com. Not available everywhere, most plans range from $4.99 to $11.99 a month for your first year. Terms apply on covered repairs. We're back on The Weekend Show with Juliet KM. I'm Anthony Davis. Juliet, I'm keen to

tap into your DHS knowledge because Donald Trump has unceremoniously fired Christine Noem, much to the celebration of much of the world. However, he's replaced her, or will be replacing her, I think she's in place till the end of the month, with Mark Wayne Mullin, who is a senator who has some history of his own, not least wanting to start a fight during a Senate hearing one time with somebody who was giving evidence and actually stood up and tried to take his ring off so he could land a punch. Let's talk first first about Christy Noem because there are questions as to why she was

removed when she was removed. I mean she was making a speech elsewhere when Trump made the announcement and clearly didn't know herself. My feeling is this all kind of kicked off off the back of the hearing, the Senate and the Congressional hearings that she was involved with, where she was royally humiliated by Democrats. And she really landed Trump in it when she said that Trump had agreed that she could

spend $220 million on an advertising campaign. That seems to be the focus of where the media has gone with the explanation for it. I'm not so sure and I'm kind of keen for your theory. To me it's more about the the bidding for the contract for the you know the production company and a kind of potential fraud there that they just did not want to get into because that would really show them

with their hands in the cookie jar. I think that's exactly right. I mean I think so basically there were 200 million plus no-bid contracts that went out for two different purposes. One was to get more people to work for ICE and the other was for an ad campaign. And the ties to her network, her Republican network, and her, I think clearly her lover or someone, whatever the relationship is between her

and Corey Lewandowski, the purported chief of staff.

He's been fired as well now.

Right, which has been well reported. Their relationship and how they were steering money to family and friends of massive sums of money in no-bid contracts, which I think the White House knows that if the Democrats take control of the House, this will be a criminal... I mean, this is something, I mean, if I had that money in hand, I don't know if I would spend it right now

because I'd be a little bit worried about whether I had to give it back because it could be canceled under House Democrats. So I think that that piece of the absolute corruption that was so clearly exposed by good reporting just became just really hard

for the White House to sustain because it wasn't one of their own people. Like they could do that for Jared, they could do it for Whitkoff, but that it was just hard to do for a cabinet secretary. But I will say a couple other things that,

you know, she was dead woman walking for a long time. Part of that was her making it clear that, you know, she was dead woman walking for a long time. Part of that was her making it clear that, you know, she viewed this as a stepping stone to something higher and using that position in the oddest way, performative way in terms of, you know, wearing the CBP outfit and being armed and being on a boat and these pictures and the Botox and the fillers and the whole thing was more performative than Trump.

And that's the one thing you can't do. And so I think that there, and then you had her complete fumbling out of the killing of the two Americans, calling them domestic terrorists, essentially, and then having to unwind that

so that that became the story as much as the fact that we killed all of it. I will say, I have fewer friends at DHS. There is not a single person except for possibly Corey Lewandowski who is upset by this. And I mean that every agency had gone to war with her. They were abusive.

They were horrible. They focused only on like, you know, what was the, you know, what was the, what were her, what was her calm strategy? So no one is gonna miss her. But I do think that the White House pulling the plug that quickly was in direct relation to,

I think just like when you hear the story of that corruption being told and she implicated the White House, you just, you gotta sever her.

Yeah, well, it gives them an out, which is that, well, the moment we heard about that, we fired her. Yeah. But I was of the opinion that she wasn't gonna be fired. And I agree with you that she was upstaging the star

too much and that, performance-wise, that's obviously a mistake. But she was very loyal to Trump, and it does seem that loyalty really goes further than anything else. So yes, you can behave in the most abhorrent ways, but as long as you are completely loyal

to the commander-in-chief, then you can kind of get away with it. And so, you know, I was actually surprised when she was fired.

Yeah, I would put a little bit of a wrinkle on that that might help explain it, which is she was very loyal to Stephen Miller, not knowing that Stephen Miller is only loyal to himself. So I have no doubt that as things started to get bad on immigration, in particular, as the polling started to plummet on his signature issue, why is Steve Miller still standing?

And my guess is, you know, he had, you know, it was him that was feeding her all of this stuff about domestic terrorism. It was him who was pushing these raids. It was him who was, he, Stephen Miller is on a phone call with CBP and ICE telling the, you know, we gotta meet these quotas, whatever.

She thought that Stephen, if she were loyal to Miller, that would be enough. And what she, once again, you know, do your homework, people. The first Trump administration, right? Stephen Miller did the same thing to the second DHS secretary, whose name I'm forgetting,

Kirsten something. And so that's where I think it's different. I don't think that being loyal to Stephen Miller matters to Stephen Miller.

The other angle, aside from immigration, we'll talk about that in just a moment, is FEMA of course, because that came under her jurisdiction as well, and she didn't seem to care for dealing with the aftermath of natural disasters. And that is, in a country like the US, which is so vast and has varying climates and different issues to contend with, to kind of lose that. I mean, was that Doge or was that her?

Because there's clearly an evil within her. And the thing for me that connects a lot of these characters that we've described is that they actually want people to die, that the poor are not worthy and the people of color are not worthy.

I think that's true. I will say, I think, I think one of it is that most of them have lack and empathy genes. So I think the other is, I don't know if one, I would put it to, I think the other is, I don't know if it's one, I would put it to, I think that they don't view government's responsibility to protect people from dying.

So it's not like they want people to die, it's just like, why is that my problem?

And this is the Democrats-

But that's a Christian nationalist thing as well though,

isn't it? Yeah, this is the Democrats, like Democrats need to tell, you know, this is what we didn't do, is tell the American public why government matters. It matters because you don't want to leave, you know, a couple thousand Americans stranded in a war zone.

It matters because you want to be able to deliver resources during a hurricane. The person I think who does, and I don't think he would deny it, have a sort of, you know, the sort of, you know, we from the chaff attitude about the human species is of course Kennedy. I mean, I think when I hear him speak, that he strikes me as someone who,

you know, people who need help are lesser so that their demise is not worthy of stopping. Anything preventative, right? So this is, I mean, I think this is vaccines, right? If he can survive sniffing cocaine off a toilet bowl,

why can't you?

Well, I like the fact that he uses himself as a perfect example of somebody who it did no harm to. Meanwhile, he's the most compromised individual. But you could argue that Dr. Oz is similar. These people have been selling miracle cures on TV for years and never really caring about the consequences, whether it's horse dewormers and for COVID or anything. I mean, you have to be,

there has to be a kind of evil streak in you to think that you're doing good through.

Lack of empathy. I think there's also like, I do, I mean, one is I don't think many of them are that sophisticated. So you probably like, you just, you know, they're, you know, it's like, oh, this is like,

they're not critical in a way that you would want your leadership to be.

But I always- And the money comes first.

Yeah, and I think some of them are mentally unstable. Like I think our nominee for Surgeon General, I think she's not right in the head. And I think some of them are on drugs. I mean, there's no question about it. I think some of them are on drugs. I mean, there's no question about it. Do you see, I mean, you look at,

I won't say any names, but I mean, the behavior is behavior of people on speed, on various drugs, on whatever. And most of them don't hide it. I mean, at least Kennedy doesn't. So I think it's a combination of factors, but yeah,

that are but I think it comes from the top which is you have a president that has no empathy and it's the hardest. I mean, he's got a lot of problems, but ultimately he just doesn't care.

Well, it occurred to me because you know, we all spend our time trying to analyze these individuals and work out you know what they must be thinking and it's very difficult when you deal with insanity to try and negotiate with it or make sense of it unless you're a psychiatrist. But it occurred to me that what does connect them all, aside from this lack of empathy, is that they are almost like a crime family, like a criminal fraternity.

And on every level, whether it's selling miracle cures that don't do anything, you know, placebos on television, through to telling people that you can't take a vaccine for measles and then seeing an outbreak or whether it be you know, the killing of a hundred and sixty five girls in a school and feeling nothing and not changing your policy based on that alone.

Yeah.

Or

the kidnapping of people despite there being video evidence of people being snatched and grabbed off the street, bundled into unmarked vehicles, And then the line in the sand for me was the killing in cold blood of two American citizens on video and still lying about it. Does that not just mean that if all of these heads of all of these departments are all so compromised,

that the one thing that connects them is that they are all at heart criminals and they are now in charge.

Yeah, I mean, some of them are criminal behavior. Like, there's no question about it. And I think if you're a gnome, you're nervous right now. I mean, I don't know. It's not going to happen under this DOJ. But I mean, yeah, I mean, unlawful behavior, criminal behavior, outside authority behavior, careless behavior, you pick it. These are people, most of them, the difference between Trump 1.0 and Trump 2.0 is really, what people have to remember is this group of people, minus, I

think, minus Rubio and Besson, the Treasury Secretary, almost every one of them, the rest of them, it's true, had flatlined in their career. Right. They could have, and this is to the, you know, they could have never imagined that I am gonna be the,

you know, I'm gonna be the Secretary of Homeland Security. Christine Nome was selling dental products. So part of this is that they'll do anything because there's nothing else, right? There's nothing else for these people.

But you have to be a certain type of person to accept the job when you are entirely unqualified. I wouldn't do it.

I literally am like, yeah, I'll get imposter syndrome about something. I'm like, what the fuck? Sorry for the French,, like, I literally am like, yeah, I'll get imposter syndrome about something. I'm like, what the fuck? Like, I'm sorry for the French, but like, I'm literally like, what? These people can be X, Y, or Z, right?

If a 22 year old intern can run, or 24 year old former gardener can run the terrorism center at DHS, like I shouldn't worry about my qualifications.

But the reality is they're not running it. Kash Patel is not really running the FBI, and Chrissy Noem was not really running the DHS. These people are figureheads. They love the camera and they love the TV, but really, they're just part of a crime syndicate

that is this federal government. And that just goes, to me, goes back to Project 2025. It's the deconstruction of the state by putting imbeciles in senior positions.

That is why we have to, I mean, I hate to say it, but I mean, it is like, you know, people are going to, people are realizing and they will soon realize that competent government does matter, right? And that's the story that we failed to tell. I will tell you, I think Pam Bondi is in charge of DOJ though.

I think when you say like, I agree, I think there's two types. Like I think that, but I think Bondi, wow. Wow. She runs that place.

But does Bondi not also, I mean, to me, she is a kind of identikit version of Christy Noman as much as it's very performative, but arguably she's entirely unqualified for that job. She sounds like a kind of teenager.

She's changed. I mean, I've known Bondi a while. I mean, she was always conservative. She was always a very conservative AG. But when I saw her testify recently, I thought, well, maybe you're right.

Maybe they get in this and then you're just absorbing. You have to talk this way. you have to be this way. She testified she was going on on about the about Wall Street and talking about it was the storm You know, yeah, because you just I mean you're you're yeah, I think I think that I think I think you Whatever you might have had Different from this once you go in I mean look at Besson. I mean, everyone was saying, oh, he's got this great background, blah, blah, blah,

I mean, the guy.

Appalling.

Yeah.

It's so interesting to me, isn't it? Because as you say, the Republican and the conservative thinking is small government, small government, small government. But it's fine to have small government if it's competent. But here there is obviously a clear desire to screw everything up and burn everything

down. And so it and then the only way to really do that for Trump is just to have loyalists in every senior position. So if there's no separation now between the executive and the Department of Justice, she clearly was his personal lawyer, still is his personal lawyer. The guy under her, arguably Todd Blanche, was his personal lawyer as well, is actually doing more of the work than Pam Bondi is, and we've heard that from many sources. So if you don't have an authority to keep checks on the executive, she was screaming,

you know, Donald Trump is the greatest president America has ever had while she's giving evidence.

Can you imagine if Merrick Garland had started screaming that about Joe Biden? It's just, it's incomprehensible that, you know, that like, and, you know, people are always like, well, you know, how will, you know, how do you fix this? I mean, I don't know. I mean, I think we're gonna have to figure out, like, what's left? What does it mean?

Where are we three years from now if this group gets out? How wildly unpopular is it? And also thinking about allies. I think about, you mentioned FEMA, and I forgot to mention this, but why does FEMA still exist? Because they were going to end it. It was because of Republican governors, and you can bitch and moan all you want about the GOP, but figuring out ways in which there is a common bond.

So it was Republican governors who called the White House and said, no way are you getting rid of FEMA because it's our states. You can be mad at Newsom for a fire, but it's our states that are getting hit left and right, Oklahoma, Louisiana, Florida. So, I mean, it's, but it's, it is, it's, it's whack-a-mole. It's, it's not, it's, it's whack-a-mole, but I do urge people to remember, like, the whack-a-mole has kept him at 40% or below. So however painful and tiring it is, like I remember people are going to be mad at me because

I'm going to quote Schumer who I know a lot of people don't like, but I saw Schumer at the beginning. I saw him give a podcast like at the beginning of the administration and he said, what's the strategy? And someone said, well, he's like, look, we don't have the House, we don't have the Senate, we don't have I don't, we don't have the house. We don't have the Senate. We don't have the white house. We don't have the court essentially, although there's pieces of the court that we do have now. And he said, um, 40% or lower.

That's the strategy for the first two years. And if you measure by that, right. Like, okay. Like that's, that's a metric at least. Because it's not, you can't think success now is like good. I don't mean to be negative. It is, you know, I'm in disaster management.

So it's less bad, right? And so in some ways, what's less bad is this is wildly unpopular that's going to translate in some ways. So immigration, it's translating. We're about to, you know,

look who the biggest critic is of the immigration overreach. It's Oklahoma Governor Stitt. You know, it is, you know, you can hate his politics or whatever, but I'm glad he's on our side.

So let's talk about the midterms finally, because this is where it all either gets cleaned up or we're stuck with it for at least a couple more years. My concern is that the reason that Trump has checked out of trying to kind of be a populist is because he feels like the midterms are sewn up for him already, that he's done his due diligence in the legislatures and in the districts,

and whether it be voter roll purging, whether it be changing the rules on voting, voter suppression. I mean, there are multiple ways now that they plan to fix the election. And so is that the reason why he's checked out? Or is it simply that whatever the results are, he is going to decertify them?

He does not care about the party. He does not care. He's not ideological. So I worry about the election. I want to make people feel a little bit like, you know, not better, because I do think it's going to be vigilance

and stuff. You know, these numbers that we're seeing now, it's too big to steal at this stage. And all we need to focus on is keeping up those numbers, right? Don't you know, and Texas is now going to be in play because like, so, but one of the benefits on election for us is the distributive nature of our line-ranked election security, right?

So we have over 3000 jurisdictions of voting in a country with only 50 states. So like, it's so distributed. And that doesn't mean like they can't flip a switch or pull out the National Guard. I understand that.

I think courts are gonna step in the way. I think AGs are getting ready. But I do think that you can view his behavior as he thinks the fix is in for him. You can, oh, sorry, that was weird. You can also view his behavior

as he knows he's going to lose and this is, and he is, this is gonna be scorched earth forever, right? And I don't know yet, I don't know yet, but I do-

But the too big to rig thing is very interesting because that's a Trump phrase that he kind of used as projection last time around. But this time around, what you're saying is that if there is enough turnout, and that if there are enough people opposing the wall, which might come back to bite Donald Trump, aside from the immigration, which was the thing that already had turned half the people

off of him, that it's basically too big for Trump to rig, even though he has all of these policies in place now and potentially he's in charge of the technology, you know, with the Dominion voting systems and everything else, that he won't step up his authority and say, as the president, I will not allow these to be certified because we're, you you know, there's a war on and you know, and

I Think he could try But you don't remember he he constantly sort of pushes that he definitely could try but but there's I I'm not gonna go on I am going on the record the idea that a war abroad would justify the,

even this Supreme Court would view as an on-off switch to the Constitution and to democracy is, I think, I wanna tell you, I think, spend your energy elsewhere. Like in other words, your energy is don't look for the perfect candidate. Get a bunch

of D's in. Tell all your friends to vote. Don't, don't like, you know, don't, don't fight your friends, fight your enemy. It's like we waste so much energy on all of this stuff where again, wake up every morning and say, how can I keep him below 40%? Yeah. Interesting. Right? If you were at 80% again, just remind people. I'd be, you know, packing up if you were at 80%.

Are you not shocked though, that he's in the mid to late 30s? I

mean, I've said this before. I think he's in mid 30s, but I think he's lower than that.

I think it's just very hard for some people. Because you're still talking about 70 odd

million Americans. Where do those people go? What happens to those people? Where did all the Germans who, I mean, populations shift with the winds. And where did all, you know, what did, what was his name, Bota in South Africa said, in 20 years, no one would have ever supported apartheid. Like, populations shift. We voted for Biden four years ago.

We voted for Obama 12 and 16 years ago. Like, the populations shift, but it's incumbent on us not to tell the story in a way that is, I mean, I'm obviously, you know, we may differ on certain things about enforcement or whatever,

but like, focus on making sure well-meaning people wanna stay focused on it. And that's, and that is, and it's 40%. That's what you focus on every day.

Okay, I'm so grateful to you. Thank you very much for joining us, Juliette Kayyem.

My pleasure. And fun.

I'm Anthony Davis. Don't forget to support me and independent journalism at patreon.com slash five minute news or on my sub stack, the Anthony Davis. You can also join the five minute news YouTube channel. I'll come back next Sunday with a brand new special guest and more factual I'll come back next Sunday with a brand new special guest and more factual

news to discuss on the 5 Minute News weekend show with Midas Touch.