Cliff Sims - White House Myths, Doomsday Bunkers and Holding the Nuclear Football | SRS #136

[Music]. Cliff Sims welcome to the show thanks. for having me it's a pleasure to have. you it's quite a setup out here man oh. thank you it's something else we were. doing a little tour around the room. before I got in here and I felt bad cuz. I didn't bring anything good now now I. feel like when I leave I got to find. something that goes on this wall I got a. couple of things in mind I'll take that. uh White House brightling. emergency don't know if I'll be able. look real good in here yeah I don't know. if I can come off that one.

but yeah I would love to have something. man this is turning into a museum in. here it's amazing you know it's uh. there's some really really cool pieces. of History well there's a personal story. behind all the things too that's what I. like about it it's not just like you. know that's a cool artifact it's like. well there's a personal story behind. that you know former Blackwater guys. that got pardoned you know yeah things. like that they go around the room and. it's like and somebody something. meaningful to somebody's life here not.

just historically man you know the. coolest probably. most important piece that I've got in. here I don't tell everybody this now. we're talking about on the show but if. you look at that flag up there those. rounds you see those rounds yep so those. rounds my best friend was on the. recovery op on the Red Wings operation. are you familiar with that Operation Red. Wings yeah yeah so the hilos that. crashed um.

my best friend was friends with one of. the Rangers that secured the Hilo crash. and he was on the actual site where the. the fight happened where the snipers. were and the ranger his buddy gave him. that a belt of ammunition 60 ammunition. and said that was the only thing that. was not burned up in the crash wow and. so he snapped off one round for every. every US service member that died and uh.

that was like his most prized possession. and then he passed uh later on and and. uh those came to me but that's amazing. yeah some heavy stuff in here man yeah. but um but anyways I'm uh really excited. to dig into what you have to talk about. you got two new book or one new book out. yeah uh I think we'll we'll talk a lot. about both books and uh some of the. stuff that you saw working.

in the white house which I'm sure. everybody's going to find really. interesting so but. um if you don't mind I'm going to give. you an introduction here I got quite the. quite the career so bear with me I'm. horrible at reading out loud especially. on camera but Cliff. Sims you served as dep deputy director. of National Intelligence for strategy. and communication.

helping to oversee the 18 agencies of. the US intelligence community in this. role you're awarded the director's. exceptional Achievement Award in recogn. in recognition of superior. accomplishment and valuable service to. the mission of the office of the. Director of National Intelligence you're. previously Special Assistant to the. president and director of The White. House message strategy under President. Trump you spearheaded Communications for.

some of the administration's most. notable accomplishments including the. successful passage of the tax cuts and. job jobs Act and the Senate. confirmations of numerous cabinet. secretaries you you wrote A Memoir of. your time serving in the white house. which became an instant New York Times. bestseller in 2024 you were appointed by. the speaker of the US House of. Representatives to serve as a. commissioner on the US China economic. and scrw and Security review commission.

you have founded served as CEO and. achieved successful exits in multiple. companies in the private sector you've. appeared on Fox News CNN MSNBC CBS and. ABC and your opinions on National. Security foreign policy and current. events have been published in the Wall. Street Journal the New York Times. Newsweek the national interest and. numerous other Publications you are a. senior fellow in the America First. policy Institute Center for American.

Security and a board member of the. Polaris for Polaris National Security. what is Polaris National Security so. it's a a nonprofit policy organization. focused on National Security is founded. by some former Trump Administration. folks interesting interesting you are a. Christian and have participated in. Christian Mission work on five. continents what continents so that' be. South America now you put me on the spot. South America North America Europe.

Africa Asia right on. yeah husband to wife Megan and your. six-year-old son Shep who have you. adopted from Colombia in 2020. congratulations your new book the. darkest the darkness has not overcome. lessons on faith and politics from. inside the halls of power has been. called the best book ever written in the. genre of faith and politics and has. received endorsements from former DNA I.

John Ratcliffe Senator JD Vance Donald. Trump Jr Tucker Carlson and many others. and I find this fascinating you've been. sued by. Trump and then true he stopped the. lawsuit and then asked you to come back. correct that is true interesting. correct a true Trump World Story Only in. Trump World would would that happen yes. I've seen it all he's got a lot of. people gun him for him but um yeah so we.

got a lot to dive into couple things to. knock out first I've got a a. patreon subscription account uh they're. our top our top supporters they've been. here since the beginning and uh they're. the reason that I get to do this and uh. and you get to be here so I get I give. them an opportunity to ask a question. each show and um we had some some pretty. good questions that.

for you that uh that have to do with the. National Security and intelligence okay. so this is from Steph. Casey what should we do in order to. defang Chinese Global strategy of. dominance asking for a general core. asking for general core principles and. also some practical things both. nationally and individually yeah that's. a great question it's the defining. question of our time in a lot of ways I. mean one of the things that I realized. in the office of the Director of. National Intelligence and seeing all. that Intelligence coming in.

and there's no question China wants to. dominate The Globe militarily. technologically. economically they want to knock us off. our perch they want to set the rules of. the road they want everything done on. their terms and they'll do anything it. takes to to accomplish that so the first. thing I think that we have to do from a. principal standpoint is identify that. fact I was in a US China commission. hearing this past week debating with a. witness over whether.

China wants to follow the rules or not. we were talking about trade trade rules. and she was trying to say that if China. understands the rules they want to. follow the rules and I said basically. ma'am I I'm trying to wrap my mind. around how you could possibly come to. that conclusion based off of their. history and I even cited a specific. example of China the Chinese stealing. the technology of of an American wind. turbine company standing up their own. company and putting that company out of. business to become the dominant Market. market player and this is extrapolated.

across a million different companies and. industries there are still people in. this country in in very senior positions. who are not willing to say that China is. not a friend of ours they are an. adversary of ours now does that mean we. want to go to war with China no but we. got to be honest about this is not just. a friendly competition among Rivals and. peers this is this is something more. Insidious than that from from their end. their intentions and so I think the.

first principle is being willing to say. call China what they are and that is an. an. adversary this who who was who who was. briefing you this that China wants to. follow the rules well that was a uh a. think tank. Economist uh who focuses on trade policy. who is saying that yes I mean do they. have any information to back that claim. up at all or is are they being paid to. so her her explanation was that that I. had basically spent all of my time.

looking at National Security and not. Economic Security and she made a. delineation between between the two. things and said that because I'd been. looking at National Security information. I did not understand that China. economically wants to follow the rules. even if they color outside the lines in. the National Security side of things I. mean it was just like this very tortured. explanation from her end wow yeah so. call him an enemy Callum an enemy is. number one and and secondly uh um I I.

think we've also got to be willing to. call out people in our own country who. are undermining American National. Security interest um to further their. own economic means uh there's a lot of. money to be made in China there has been. over the last you know a couple of. decades um and you know we think about. things like let's take seoa capital for. instance one of the largest Venture. Capital firms in America legendary. Venture Capital firm they taught the. Chinese how to do venture capital and. they set up seoa China over there now. because the the political Dynamic has.

gotten a little hot over the last couple. of years they broke off seoa China now. where it's its separate thing instead of. inside of the same company but you have. to understand that Americans built the. Chinese economy up until only about. three years ago military men and women. in this country who put in money into. their retirement the Thrift Savings Plan. you probably got a Thrift Savings Plan I. was too dumb to sign up for. that just being honest a lot of members.

of the military and government workers. are putting their money in the Thrift. Savings Plan up until just a few years. ago the Thrift Savings Plan was. investing in Chinese state-owned. companies I was ahead of my time all. right so you knew you knew not to sign. up before it was cool not to sign up for. it so they had to pass a law to to. basically say we shouldn't be doing this. uh that's just one example and certainly. that doesn't members of the military. didn't do anything wrong and the people. that are managing that those Investments. on their behalf but we've got to be.

willing to say to Wall Street to Silicon. Valley we got to call these people out. and say uh it's wrong what you were. doing and I'm very hesitant ever to draw. comparisons to you know the Nazis but. there's someone it's analogous to like. would would you have you know would you. have been wanting to be invested in uh. in German state owned companies in the. lead up to World War II would you have. ever invested to the height of the cult. war in Russian companies are Soviet.

companies and the lead up to uh you know. the cold war in the middle of the Cold. War I mean there's some real parallels. here and so being willing that but. that's not popular to do that especially. for politicians because those same. people that are making a bunch of money. off of that are the people that are. donating the most money to campaigns in. this country so being willing to take. very difficult political stands uh is. another thing that I think is is very. very important and I could go on about. this all day but the other thing that we.

have to understand is um from a. principal standpoint we didn't get here. overnight and we're not going to get out. of it overnight the difference between. the Chinese threat that we're facing. today and what happened with the Soviet. Union during the Cold War is that our. economies were not intertwined the way. that ours are with China and the Soviet. Union was not in the global economy the. way that the Chinese have you know put. themselves into the global economy again. we caused this we allowed we brought. China in the World Trade Organization we. normalized trade relations with them we. propped up their economy we invested.

millions billions trillions of dollars. into their economy over there this. happened over the course of decades so. we've got to do this over the course of. decades to kind of get ourselves out of. that but how do you eat an elephant one. bite of a time and we got to start. taking bites every single day little. bite here little bite there Shoring up. our supply chains building our. industrial base back rebuilding our. military um all of these different. things we got to be doing at home while. being willing to decouple from China and.

and and build consensus around the world. that we cannot be in business with the. Chinese that countries around the world. our allies can't be in business with the. Chinese the way that we are right now. only over time by taking those little. bites are we going to get to the point. that we can truly uh confront that. threat what. about what about just buying American. yeah or maybe not even just American cuz. it's hard to do now what if you just. don't buy made in China yeah it's hard. to do it's really hard to do and this is.

also placing a a real expectation on a. consumer to have you know you're a. regular person out there and you're. making 50 Grand a year and you're trying. to put food on the table and trying to. like what what car are you going to buy. what American car are you going to buy. what uh you know the TV sets that you. have in in your house any electronic. device that you have do you have an. iPhone all of those are made in in China. uh at this point I mean go down the list. of these things it would be uh a real. expect for um you know people to take.

money out of their own pocket and pay a. little bit more to buy American 100%. think that's a worthy cause to pursue to. build National consensus around these. things my only problem with that is I'm. going to look the person who's making. $35,000 a year in the eye and say you. should sacrifice and do this while I'm. allowing somebody in Wall Street and. Silicon Valley to make billions of. dollars investing in China um those two. one of those things has got to happen. before I'm to do the other yeah that's a.

good point that's a good point Thank you. thank you for clarifying. that and I have no idea what this is. I've never looked into this but I find. it interesting this is from an anonymous. person on patreon but do you know. anything about a Delta raid on a CIA. server Farm in Germany referenced by. General. McCarney uh I have no idea me neither. okay. I would love to know more about that.

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upset hey what any guesses I want the. gummies oh there you go man there you go. my man my son will will very much. appreciate those I can assure you a. gummy bear fanatic nice so thank you for. these you're welcome well those are made. in America so it might not be the. healthiest thing but uh you know they. taste good so well Cliff I'd like to. start with just what. exactly could you give us some insight. on what deputy Director of National.

Intelligence for strategy and. Communications is yeah so uh in the. office of the Director of National. Intelligence there's a pretty small. front office that are the closest. advisers to the Director of National. Intelligence and they're um you know. some of them have titles Like Chief of. Staff or Deputy Chief of Staff and. others are um Deputy directors or. assistant directors that kind of thing. and so I was in kind of that first ring. of top advisers around the Director of. National Intelligence and my focus was.

on a couple things number one um. interfacing with the White House um I. was had worked in the White House. previously so I knew all the senior. staff there very well all the folks on. the National Security Council very well. and so I interfaced a lot with our. counterparts in the White House on. things that we were dealing with and. then from a Communications perspective I. have to admit that before I got there um. I didn't know how much communicating you. can do when all you can say is I can. neither confirm nor.

denied right and so um but I I'll be. honest we were stunned when we walked in. the door you know the first day we get. there and and um you know the person's. kind of onboarding he like hey do you. want to go and meet the communications. team and I'm like well how many of them. could there possibly be here because. again all they can say is we can neither. confirm nor deny we go downstairs it's. like 25 people on the communications. team there I'm like what are Y no. disrespect respect anyone here but. what's everybody here do you know yeah.

you had a couple of speech writers over. here you had you know people that. interfaced with the Press over there you. had all that I mean dude it was crazy. and really in first kind of insight to. like this ain't right like we shouldn't. have 25 people in here that are press. and comm's people in the office of the. Director of National. Intelligence um and so you know in in. the event that there was a press issue. uh that we were dealing with uh I would. be the one that would have to try to.

navigate that and it's a is a whole new. comms challenge because often you are. talking about me I've gotten phone calls. from you know major journalistic outfits. that somehow found out about something. that we may or may not have been. involved in and some the Delta raid in. Germany whatever that was you know. something like I would get very similar. uh inquiries from reporters and then. having to to navigate those things. because sometimes there's still you know. serious National Security implications.

but also lives could be at stake so is. this something that we need to try to. talk uh a news if a news all is going to. publish that do we need to try to keep. them from from publishing that and make. the case to them of why there could be. lives at stake for them to to publish. this in other cases I just had to. say ignore it or no comment because it. was something that we perhaps were. involved in that I just couldn't talk. about or sometimes we actually weren't. involved in whatever the thing was but I.

couldn't say that we weren't because. that would expose maybe who was invol. you know so it's a lot of different. things you have to navigate uh from a. Communications perspective um my. favorite story about uh intelligence. Community Communications do you know the. phrase where the phrase I can neither. confirm nor deny came from I. don't so way back in the Cold War we. find out that the Soviets have lost a. sub. in the Pacific.

Ocean they don't know where it is but we. do so we got to come up with a way how. we're going to get this submarine and we. also have to do it in such a way that. the Soviets don't know what we're doing. so um some of your former colleagues in. the CIA uh hatch a plan we're going to. build a giant ship and the ship's going. to open up in the bottom and a giant arm. is going to come out of the bottom of. the ship go down to the bottom of the. ocean and pull. this submarine.

up but obviously that would be quite an. operation so we can't let the Soviets. know what we're doing so we got to cover. up for with a cover story for what we're. going to do so they contact Howard. Hughes what billionaire uh kind of. eccentric billionaire kind of the Elon. Musk of his day in some ways and they. say to Mr Hughes we want you to be the. cover story for this and we want you to. say that you are mining some kind of. rare mineral off of the ocean floor and. because your sust exent Bill billionaire. people will buy this Howard Hugh says.

sounds good to me have at it so they. build this ship the glomar Explorer they. go out they find the submarine bottom of. the ship opens up arm goes down they. pull the submarine up breaks in half. about halfway up when they're pulling it. so they were able to get some of the. ship some of it was lost forever so you. know did we get good intelligence off of. that some say yes some say no you know. but there's a lot of you know you know a. lot went into that billions of dollars. built this ship up the whole deal and.

people thought well whether we got good. intelligence out of it or not no one. will ever even know that this happened. until one day I believe it was the LA. Times some through a weird series of. events finds out what happened and they. contact CIA and they. say did you guys build this ship with an. arm to get a Soviet submarine and use. Howard Hughes as the cover Story the. whole they got the whole thing the first. time ever CIA said we can neither. confirm nor deny the glomar Explorer was.

you know the whole thing that's where. the the phrase we can neither confirm. nor deny came from man so to this day if. one of those requests would come in. somebody would say just glow marum glow. Mar explore in in other words just say. you can neither confirm nor deny man so. does that is the majority of the time. mean. yes I will say. sincerely sometimes it's yes sometimes. it's no I mean I me genuinely and and.

there's a lot of reasons why you would. even if the answer is is no that you. would still need to say I can neither. confirm nor deny but yes it's genuinely. not a tell one way or the other who who. makes that determination on what the. response is going to be is that you it. would be on most things but if it Rose I. mean depends on how important of an. issue it was uh I mean there very often. we Director of National Intelligence and. I talked about the response to. especially operational things if this is. an. operational topic yeah we would.

certainly you know talk through what do. we do and and you know more often than. not you just don't even respond um to. those kind of thing but it's a again it. created some very unique challenges from. a communication standpoint that I'd. never experienced before I'll bet so I. mean so did you have insight into just. about everything that's going on well I. I would say not nobody really does. nobody really does just cuz the scale of.

it is so vast uh and I didn't need to. know you know everything but certainly. most of the things that were flowing. into the office of the Director of. National Intelligence I would have been. in the room for all right what's going. on with the UFO. stuff so I actually talk about that a. little bit in my my new book uh but it's. not going to be very satisfying to. anybody oh man come on well you know. everybody who's ever been you know. wondered what goes on in the white house. or wondered what goes on at CIA or. wonder always wonders like are these.

normal people there or these like you. know aren't you curious too about all. these the answer is yeah when we got. there the first thing I said is all. right somebody will out the bodies like. I want to see I want to see the alien. bodies I want to see you know and I'm. joking about it but like sincerely want. to. know what's what with this I mean how. can you not be curious how can you not. be curious about the JFK files how can. you not be curious about I mean go down. the list of these kind of Legend. you know call them conspiracy theories.

call them whatever you want like we want. to know so when we got there we wanted. to know you know they call it the UAP. program unmanned aerial or or um. unidentified aerial phenomenon or. whatever they call them now the. euphemism for. UFOs so the people who brief on these. programs uh come to the office of the. Director of National Intelligence now to. be in the office of the Director of. National Intelligence you have to have. the highest security clearance that the. US government offers I mean these people. that are in this office see to your.

point everything Ian they're preparing. the president's Daily Brief every day so. they are seeing the most sensitive. intelligence that the US government. has well when we got there you know. naturally kind of the senior team wants. to be in the room to hear let's get the. briefing too let's get the briefing with. the director and they kicked everyone. out of the room are you serious kicked. everyone out of the room said we're here. to give the briefing to the.

director and so even the people who saw. all the most sensitive stuff in the US. government that's how sensitive they. were about being willing to brief that. and that's about all I can say about it. so it is it is legitimately the the top. top top level they are very very. sensitive about who has access to those. programs for sure wow yeah that's that's. pretty telling uh I mean that alone very. telling to me interesting interesting.

well let's move. on how did. you I mean you came from you had a media. company mhm what was the name of the. media compan yellow Hammer news yeah. yellow Hammer news and so it sounds like. how did that. start so yellow Hammer is state bird of. Alabama I was based in Alabama that's. where the name came from but um you know. I had I had worked on a campaign in 2010. first thing I ever did in politics uh it.

was a big year in Alabama because uh. people don't realize this now like. Republicans had not been in control of. the of Alabama politically in 136 years. since reconstruction up until 2010. Republicans took over and so uh it was. the first thing I'd ever done in. politics was manage a campaign during. that election cycle and coming out of. that election cycle you know I had. gotten to know everybody who came into. Power I knew the governor and the. speaker of the house and the protim of. the sen Senate and all these different. people and I didn't know what I was.

going to do next but I figured I was. going to keep kind of doing political. Consulting and so I started a Blog that. was basically the inside story of what's. going on in Alabama politics and my. thought was if I can show that I'm know. what's going on maybe people hire me to. be a consultant for them and what. actually happened was the thing exploded. and just blew up into a full-blown news. outlet and we had millions of readers in. a Statewide Radio Network work and I. hosted a daily radio show it was not.

nearly as good as sea Ryan show but uh. be that as it may I had one uh and um. that's what I was doing and in 2015 uh. one of the guests on my radio program. was an. upstart uh political candidate for. president that people didn't really. think had a chance his name was Donald. [Music]. Trump they thought it was a thought it. was a joke candidacy some people did at. the time and U he was coming to do a big. rally in Alabama and this rally is now. kind of legendary now as the moment.

where people realize this is real. because like a 100,000 people showed up. or something just like completely nuts. uh in a stadium in South Alabama but. Trump called into the radio show to. promote that he was coming to the state. it was the first time that I talked to. to Donald. Trump and um I was. 2015 had a good interview it actually. went viral because it was the middle of. the summer and out of nowhere Trump. started riffing on. Christmas uh saying that you know we're.

not allowed to say Christmas anymore. they want us to say happy holidays and. then you know when I get in there we're. going to bring Christmas back like I. can't remember what month it was like. June at that time but I was like okay so. the interview went viral and about a. year later. um Senator Jeff sessions who became. Trump's attorney general um I had known. him very well cuz I covered him as an. Alabama politician he called me and said. you know they're they're trying to fill. out the team up there uh in the cam. Trump campaign and um I really think you.

should consider going taking a leave of. absence and go and work on the campaign. and if he doesn't win you go back to. running your company but if he does like. who knows where it could lead wow and so. I thought I was going to have maybe a. few month experience up there uh working. in Trump Tower for the president and it. really changed the trajectory of my life. to say the least so that's how I ended. up in in Trump world ended up in the. White House and later ended up as Deputy. dni I mean how do you how was it how was. it leaving your company I mean it.

started from nothing blew up Millions I. mean radio. shows TV shows did you say uh radio news. network like a syndicated Network the. online media hub the whole deal yeah it. was. uh it wasn't hard and and really the. reason was uh I'm all about experiences. in life like money who doesn't want. money right like I'd like to have more. money I'd like you know sure but really.

I want to have a life that I look back. on and it's like man that was. interesting you know to went a lot of. different directions you know I've been. the lead singer of a band I've played. college basketball I've started. companies I've worked in the white house. I've worked at dni I've worked you know. all these things are like wait what you. did all of those things before you were. 40 yeah because I want to do interesting. things so when the opportunity came for. the the president's like do you want to. come work in the White House yeah I want. to work in the white house and then the. White House Council said okay you got to. sell your company I said.

oh okay um and so you know that wasn't. ideal because I had um the people who. wanted were interested in buying the. company knew I had to sell it by January. 20th on inauguration or I wasn't going. into the White House so I had a short. fuse there to sell it so that wasn't fun. and certainly anything that's your baby. like it's hard for me I mean it still. exists to this day and there are times. when I read things on there it's like I. wouldn't have done that or I would have. covered this story differently or I.

would have you know whatever and it's. hard not to be like man that's my you. know that's my thing I so I still have a. lot of affection for it and it was a. season of my life that I loved but it's. not hard to tell the president of the. United States yeah I'll come serve my. country in the west wing of the White. House where the only office between my. office and the O and the uh Oval Office. is the Roosevelt room yeah I'll do that. so yeah it was it was a no-brainer that. had to be surreal what I mean what was. it about you that you think caught Trump. attention well at at that point.

especially people really don't. understand how small the team was there. were I think at the end of The Campaign. there were five Hillary Clinton C. staffers for every one Trump staffer and. before that it was even the the. disparity was even greater I mean the. clintons had this giant Juggernaut of an. operation and really the Trump campaign. was split into two groups you had a. small group of four or five people who.

were on the plane with. him going around the. country and then you had a a group of us. probably 25 of us in a war room on the. 14th floor of Trump. Tower that and that was kind of it I me. people talk about like what was and and. there were other like there Advanced. staffers and there's other certainly. there's other people out there working. on it but in terms of what Trump would. think of as like my camp team the people. that he knows we're only talking a.

couple of dozen people here wow um at. that point and so you know he gets full. credit for the 2016 campaign because. people ask me what was the campaign it. was one guy in a. microphone that's what the campaign and. that's why they thought he was going to. lose because but Hillary has all these. staffers and they're spending all this. money on advertising and they're doing. all these different things in the swing. States I mean and meanwhile it's Trump. going around the country speaking. speaking to tens of thousands of people. every day and even on the last like the.

last 48 hours of the campaign I won't. get this exact exactly right I think he. did 10 rallies in the last 48 hours wow. like back to back to like do a rally get. on the plane do a rally get on the plane. do a rally get on the plane up till like. midnight on Election the the night. before the election he's like in North. Carolina or something doing a rally at. 1:00 in the morning it's like his. seventh rally of the day or something. like that he was just Relentless taking. his message directly to the American.

people so how did I catch his attention. um I think one it was a small team and. then the second thing is one of my roles. on the campaign was anytime that the. president would shoot a video message I. was his guy there with him shooting the. video message and Trump is a TV guy. right that's his background so he really. is particular about I want to be lit. this way I want to be shot from this.

angle you know the way that the the. remarks are written are kind of unique. to a trumpian way of doing things he. likes the background to be a certain way. all of these different like very nuanced. things that are his likes I got to know. those things and I was there with him. for a lot of those things so that's how. I got to know him personally during that. time period And so when I came into the. White House I was still doing that. anytime Trump shot a video. I was there with the White House.

communications office the military guys. Waka that shoot all those videos uh you. know it was me and all the military guys. shooting those things because I knew his. likes and dislikes and here's how we. need to set up the teleprompter and. here's how we need to set up the. lighting and here's how we need to you. know all that I'd look at the remarks. and you know say well he ain't going to. say that let's get rid of that let's do. this other you know so I got to know him. really well and he had a comfort level I. think that I was going to make sure to. take care of him that he was going to be. presented in the way that he wanted to. be presented so that's how I got to know. him very interesting so so before you.

went into intelligence you were in. charge of all Communications so not all. Communications but uh I was in charge of. messaging was mainly so the the the. delineation there is I wasn't dealing. much with the Press directly I was. dealing with you know working with the. speechwriting team building for instance. for the tax big tax cut that Trump. passed uh helped develop how are we. going to talk about about this okay what. is the messaging that we're going to use.

and then the communications and press. teams would push that out in different. ways and we'd come up with different. ways to get the message out so I was in. kind of in charge of the initial message. but even that Trump's in charge Trump's. his own communications director in a lot. of. ways I think we've all figured that out. yeah um so basically you're the you're. the you're part of the think tank and. strategy before any messaging goes out. that's right okay okay when did so you. were on the campaign trail with.

him you had mentioned it kind of started. as a joke on your media Outlet people. didn't take it seriously when did when. did you notice kind of a flip I'm just. curi this is just personal curiosity. what did you notice a flip happening. that rally in. Alabama was really an eye-opening moment. for a lot of people um and I would. include myself in that it was held in. Mobile AL Obama which was strategically. really smart because you had the Florida.

Panhandle that could get there you had. Mississippi and Louisiana down on the. coast that could get there you could. have Alabama that could get there was. kind of this like cross-section of a lot. of the hardcore Trump base that we know. it to be now it gave them all an. opportunity to just like go and have. what the Washington Post described as a. mix between a Leonard skinnard concert. and Talladega uh like they all just came. together and we're like this is our guy.

and when that many people show up to. something people just spent their time. to come and stand out in the heat for. hours to hear what this guy has to say. that that's not a joke anymore that's. that there's something real underpinning. that and of course in retrospect I think. we understand more that Trump had put. his finger on an issue set that was. completely unappreciated in American.

politics you had the immigration. message you had the trade message of how. um China and other countries have. hollowed out America's industrial base. in these towns across the Rust Belt that. no longer exist anymore because we have. allowed other countries to do all our. manufacturing for us and not only you. know we were you know all the economists. said well that's you're going to get. cheap Goods but what they didn't talk. about was you're also going to have a. crisis of the family across the Midwest.

of our country where young men men no. longer have a place to go to work and. and Find meaning and purpose in their. lives um and it's going to decimate. their families economically you're going. to see a rise of opioids that we're even. seeing today the drug issues in those. communities all of these things that. have happened subsequently Trump. intuitively understood that even as a. billionaire in his Tower in Manhattan.

and I and I've wonder how and I can. really only think of like he was a. builder so he's. around Builders all the time he was. around people that work with their hands. all the time and interacted with these. people and heard their problems and. their concerns and the things that they. were scared about and even if they. didn't affect him in some way because. he's a billionaire he understood the. importance of those issues so the. immigration issue the trade issue the. tough on China issue all of these things.

now that we kind of identify with Trump. we take for granted now because he talks. about them all the time but no one was. talking about these things and certainly. no Republican was talking about these. things so I even growing growing up as. like a a conservative um and and being. around political politicians starting in. about 2010 um and so I you know leading. up to that point so for five or six. years had been involved in politics and.

really kind of paying attention no one. talked about those things so when I. started getting calls to my radio show. and getting emails in to readers from. our our you know critiquing our coverage. I started realizing man there's. something much more powerful here from. an issue standpoint certainly the. personality is larger than life but from. an issue standpoint there was something. there that he hit on that it just took. me others I think some time to really. understand interesting interesting.

what's it like Ian what was it like. working for him it's it's he obviously. pisses a lot of people off you know but. um but I'm I'm I'm genuinely curious I. mean cuz there there's people that. I have a lot of respect for you know. that that left that Administration you. know um and I don't know what happened. but let's let's one for for example. General Mattis mhm you know to to.

see a guy with that reputation I don't. know if you're familiar with his. reputation within the military but very. much the and I don't know what it's like. anymore but you know since he left but. wow like Marines everybody yeah once is. dying to work for a y an individual of. that caliber and his you know reputation. it's everybody knows about that guy and.

and so to see somebody like that leave. that. Administration it just leaves me with a. lot of questions yeah well so we can let. we can kind of two questions there one. is what's it like to work for Trump the. second is we can talk about the Mattis. one specifically because I've spent a. decent amount of time with with him. while he was there um and kind of I. think understand some of the backstory. of. that I personally don't have a single. negative thing to say about having. worked for Trump and I've been sued by. the guy at one point you know so I've. seen every side I've seen every side of.

it and we can get into that you know. kind of what happened there but in terms. of actually working for him it is. different it's unlike anything I've ever. experienced um and I could see how it. wouldn't be for everyone but personally. uh I found them the the characterization. is Trump as someone who's just like you. know he's just the your Fired Guy and is. just like flying off off the handle and. yelling at people and going you know. wild all the time to not be my personal.

experience um he never yelled at me in a. way that wasn't any different than like. uh you know been that I found that. unusual uh you know you certainly. wouldn't find un anybody been the. military certainly wouldn't find. anything that he did uh you know unusual. me as a college basketball player my. basketball coach probably yelled at me. 10 times worse than Trump ever yelled at. me for anything so I found that kind of. misar ation I I found that to not be. what he's like the thing I think that.

people struggle with and I could see. where uh somebody especially from a. military background might struggle with. is how free willing it is it's not. regimented it's not very orderly it. there's some kind of Controlled Chaos. that goes on that I have come to the. conclusion is a part of his creative. process he didn't like to have a lot of. structured time during the day uh. because he wants to have time to he. talks all day to a million different.

people he is constantly on the phone. getting feedback from a million. different inputs some of them kind of. Frontline type people some of them the. names you've heard of type people who. are in leadership and everyone in. between if you walked in there today he. would ask you Sean what are we thinking. what are we thinking right now what are. we hearing out there what do you think. so what what do I need to be talking. about what should we be doing and then. you'd go down a you know oh really you. think that tell me about that why do you. think about that about him okay to oh. you're interested in general mat Mattis.

you know Mattis or you know his. reputation let's talk about Mattis why. do you think that about Mattis let me. tell you my experience with me he would. like want to engage with you on these. things so I found um also that the idea. that Trump does not like feedback or or. for people to push back on him to be. entirely false in fact I found quite the. opposite if you were willing to say to. him I don't think that's the way we. should go Mr President he would be. interested to know why do you think that. like so he does take constructive. constructive he will definitely engage.

now he's going to make the decision that. he's going to make but he will engage. with you on why do you think that and. you know what what would lead you to. that conclusion because I'm in a totally. different place so he's willing to be. persuaded on things and in fact I think. one of the unique things that he did in. his white house that was very. constructive was most white houses are. ideological conformists. and and I don't even mean that as. derogatively in a way because if you saw.

a candidate that you wanted to support. so much that you were willing to go. spend all your time trying to get them. elected and then you end up in the white. house with them chances are you agree. with them on pretty much everything in. the Trump White House just look at the. trade issue you had Gary con was the. chief economic advisor he is probably. best described as like a free trade. Democrat you had Peter Navaro who was. the kind of top trade adviser and Robert.

ligh Heiser who was the US trade. representative these are much more uh. they might derogatively be called. protectionist but certainly more uh. inclined to use tariffs as a tool in. economic statecraft you know they're. they're totally different from Gary con. ideologically those were the people in. the Oval Office arguing about trade all. day and so you have a diversity of. opinions that you're not going to get in. most white houses now where it breaks. down is when the president makes a.

decision if one of those two sides lost. the argument they have to be willing to. subordinate their views to the. president's decision and execute on his. vision and I do think there were a break. there were breakdowns at times in the. Trump White House where people were not. willing to subordinate their their own. views to the president's views which. gets me directly to the the John Mattis. question General Mattis res ation came. at a time when President Trump was. trying to get us out of.

Syria and he felt strongly that we need. to get out of. Syria and General Mattis felt strongly. that we had a US National Security. interest in Syria that merited keeping. US troops there continuing to to engage. there in a way that President Trump did. not feel inclined to do and essentially. what General Mattis did was say I can no. longer in good conscience based on my.

sincerely held beliefs execute on the. president's wishes because I disagree. with him on this policy H now I actually. respect that because the dishonorable. thing to do was what so many others did. which was I disagree with the president. but I know better than him and so I'm. going to Slow Roll his wishes I'm not. going to execute on his wish is I'm not. going to do what the duly elected. president of the United States has.

decided to do that's more nefarious okay. in my mind so you know General Mattis. subsequently said a lot of negative. things about President Trump that I. happen to disagree with um but on that. particular reasoning for resigning I. understand why he did even if I would. disagree with him on that and I think he. did the right thing by leaving rather. than not executing on the. president's agenda interesting yeah.

thank you for I mean thank you for. clarifying that cuz that that is that. is that is something that I've always. wondered about you know seeing so many. individuals leave is is it because he. doesn't take constructive criticism and. and and uh so that's good to know I. appreciate that thank. you have you just going to go off on a. tangent here have you heard this is a. little out there have you heard about.

this the the the Trump prophecies stuff. there's a book written about it about. these people all right I'm going to. leave it out then but um it's I just. somebody just BR it across my radar the. other day there's a couple of people. that kind of called everything that's. that's already happened and uh I was. just curious if you knew about it I. haven't but let's talk. about so you're in the white house now. and. it sounds like from what you were saying.

when you first showed up the uh. intelligence uh in in your intelligence. role there was a lot of fat to be. trimmed how much fat in the white house. needs to be trimmed well in the White. House you know it's it's actually not a. I say it's not a large or organization. it it's it's they're much more. constrained uh because the White House. has a finite budget for personnel that. they cannot go over. uh and the way that you.

um subsidize that so to speak is you'll. have agencies detail people to the White. House so I actually found that in the. White House itself there's not a lot of. fat to be trimmed now the government my. God the amount of fat there is to trim. is just like Beyond imagination uh. there's no question about that but the. actual White House itself it's a pretty. small group and um you know in the. westwing itself um. Have You Been In The West Wing before.

I've never been in the White House all. right so we're going to make that happen. hopefully we get an opportunity next. year to make that happen but one of the. things that people are struck by the. first time that they walk in and I. certainly was was how small it. is I'll take you around the white house. real quick the main floor of the White. House where the pre well let's just go. we'll go to the basement of the White. House ground floor of the White House. White House Situation Room White House. mess some. bathrooms couple of small offices on the.

side over here that's it main floor of. the West. Wing you've got press briefing room Oval. Office coule uh president's private. study president's private dining room. you've got uh in our White House you had. Steve Bannon when we first got there. kind of uh couple of offices right there. and white house chief of staff vice. president National Security.

adviser press secretary and a couple of. comm's offices that's it that's it. that's it on the main. floor of the of the West Wing top floor. of the West Wing you've got um kind of. offices on each corner of it you had the. senior adviser for policy and U head of. the domestic policy Council you had. Deputy Chief of Staff head head of. legislative Affairs you had senior. adviser Deputy National Security adviser.

aanka and the head of the National. Economic Council that's it on the top. floor of the White House so in all of. that we're. talking you know 20 principles in there. kind of the top level people in In The. West Wing and then they have some. support staff with them everybody else. is next door in the Eisenhower executive. office building and so there are. hundreds of people people over there uh. but it it really shocks people when they.

walk in especially if your only context. is you've watched the westwing TV show. uh which is kind of what got me into. politics to begin with was like binge. watching the westwing and wondering what. must happen behind those you know white. walls and curtain. windows and the real life white westwing. is so small that you wouldn't be able to. shoot a TV show in there because the. Halls are so cramped you wouldn't be. able to fit people in a camera and like. the walkin talk scenes they do wouldn't. work in the real in the real West Wing. yeah interesting very.

interesting well let's get into kind of. your experience within within the White. House it doesn't sound like it was a a. great experience and so and and I mean. people like me are are fascinated to. know how it works in there is it as. corrupt as is we all think it is is it. as secretive as we all think it is I. mean what's what's the the what's the. driver you know to all these people that.

are trying to. achieve power why do they want it and um. and. so dive. in so I will say my experience in the. White House. was one of the most amazing experiences. of My Life One of the most frustrating. and exasperating experiences of my life. in some ways an experience that I would. not want to have again and an and on the. other hand an experience that I would. love to go back tomorrow and let's dive.

right back into it so it's like every. extreme that you can imagine both good. and bad I feel like I experienced in. there professionally uh and then. also in terms of what it does to you. from a character standpoint what it. reveals about you uh as a person uh I. learned a lot of stuff about myself that. I don't think I would have otherwise had. a reason to to. learn on the good end of that. Spectrum there are just things that you.

see in there that where else in the. world are you going to see some of the. things that they experience some of the. things that you experience if you think. about it anybody who comes in to meet. with the president is at the top of. their field so it's a king it's a prime. minister it's a president it's a CEO of. the largest companies in the world the. most famous entrepreneurs you know all. of those so you're seeing how do the. these people operate how do they run. meetings how do they conduct themselves.

what questions do they ask what do they. what's their demeanor um I mean. everything I've seen how kings comport. themselves in private meetings I've seen. how dictators comport themselves in. private meetings I've seen how. democratically elected presidents and. prime ministers conduct themselves and. I've seen how Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos. conduct themselves and everybody in. between and the EXT ordinary thing about. that is. you um well I I remember a meeting that.

we were having in the cabinet room of. the White House and the meeting was. honestly I can't even remember the topic. but it's the type of people that I'm. talking about it's people at the tippy. top of their field and there was a. moment where I realized that no one here. knows what to do right now no one knows. what decision to make there's not an. obvious decision here is a tough. decision and no one here in the moment. knows what to. do and I found this to be a.

simultaneously terrifying and liberating. realization because Steve Jobs was right. when he said that all of these things in. life that that that you call life were. made up by people that are no smarter. than you and so it's terrifying because. you're like holy crap I thought there. were rooms where people knew what they. were doing knew how to you know how to. tackle these big challenges but it's. also liberating because it's like well. they can figure it out then maybe I can. figure it out too and so you that's how.

you can combat this impostor syndrome so. the first day I Walked In The West Wing. It was like who am I to be sitting in. this office who am I to be standing in. the Oval Office and tell the president. of the United States anything about. anything and uh I think that's something. we all struggle with in different. different ways um that. that that ended impostor syndrome for me. not because I'm smart not because I'm. any better than anybody else but because.

I've seen the people that I thought had. it all figured out and realized that. they didn't that just like me they wake. up every day and are trying to figure it. out too what would what. was all right what was one of the big. decisions that you were a part of that. when you. realized oh [ __ ] nobody has the answer. here I'm trying to think if there was. just like a big dramatic one um did it. generally for the most part seem like.

people knew what they were doing or did. you did you find that and I'm not saying. they didn't know what they were doing. I'm I'm just saying did it seem like you. were at the beginning around people that. always had the right answers no but I. would say there's a delineation between. like excellence and. competence uh and and and being being. and just not knowing the answer in that. moment and needing to work through some. things and incompetence I found myself. around a lot of excellence and. competence people that have risen you.

have a proven track record over their. careers of doing remarkable things. thrust into situations where they're. trying to figure a problem set out that. they've never had to face before let's. use Jared Kushner as an example Jared. Kushner had never negotiated Middle East. peace on behalf of the president of the. United States before he negotiated real. estate deals some of them went well some. of them didn't go as well negotiated all. kinds of different things business-wise. some of them went well some of them. didn't go well he had a baseline um. skill set that he had applied to.

business and been successful in that but. suddenly he's confronted with arguably. the most intractable US foreign policy. problem of recent decades Middle East. peace the place is a total cluster you. know that better than most you know and. so suddenly he's having to figure out. okay how do I navigate the dynamic. between the Israelis and the. Palestinians how do I navigate the the. dynamic between the Israelis and uh.

countries in the region who are more. stable Saudi Arabia Jordan Etc with. other countries in the region that are. far less stable Syria and Iraq go around. the the globe there how do I balance. those interests how do I delineate. between what some of these people say. publicly and what they really think. privately about the Palestinian Ians for. instance for decades everyone assumed.

that any breakout of Peace in the Middle. East was going to be predicated on the. Palestinian getting a Palestinian State. and so every issue started with if we. don't deal with the Israeli Palestinian. issue first we can't get any other. things to happen in the. region Jared looked at this same problem. set along with the president who also. had he had a business skill set that he. was a approaching these things with and. and they kind of said you know what I.

wonder if we flip this on its head if we. can get some normalization agreements. between Israel and other Arab states. that would actually lead to momentum. that might One Day lead to a solution to. this Israeli Palestinian problem and so. they they didn't I won't say they solved. but they started making real progress in. ways we had never seen before with this. the Abraham Accords this series of. normalization agreements with Arab.

states around the Middle East and Israel. as kind of the starting point. for peace and prosperity in the region. so that's an example of when we got. there none of us knew what to do with. middle east peace I mean my gosh what a. giant problem to solve and over time sat. there and worked through those things. immersed ourselves in those issues and. took the same skill set that had made. made us successful in the private sector. and implied them with fresh eyes to.

these tough problems that had caused so. much been such a challenge for other. administrations so there are a million. examples of that that if I thought here. for a second that I could come up with. but that's one that reshaped the global. order in a lot of ways how does how many. of these decisions are you guys going. through a. day well that's the magnitude of is. there something of that magnitude or are. we going to stay in or get out of the.

Paris climate Accords are we going to um. renegotiate the uh trade deal with. Mexico and Canada these kind of giant. things those are few and far between. only a handful of those at least the. conclusion of them will happen in the. course of an Administration but you're. confronted constantly throughout every. single day with the little decisions on. any number of those issues that are. trying to take you down a certain path.

how many of these big decisions get. pushed to the second term because of. because of. reelection I didn't I don't recall any. now at the point that reelection was. happening I was at the office of the. Director of National Intelligence and so. I wasn't in the White House on some of. these more political issues I was just. dealing with the national security stuff. more but I never heard anyone say. hey we could get a win for the country. here but let's just wait a second. because it's going to cost us something.

politically let's just wait till the. second term to do I never heard anyone. do anything like that okay I'm just. curious how it works you know we we only. hear so much and and you see a lot of. things get punted you know or or you. hear a lot of a lot of talk about how. you know presidents would be a. lot braver maybe in their second term y. uh less of re-election obviously well. you know one of the things that I'll say. about about.

Trump that I think is rare among. politicians is there are different kinds. of Courage there's the kinds of Courage. that you have shown on the battlefield. your brothers in arms have shown on the. battlefield physical courage manifests. itself in different. ways and then there's moral courage. which you've also shown and the things. you've been able to tackle on this. country and the things you're willing to. talk about that lot of others aren't. willing to to to talk about and the. question with any president is any.

politician is what kind of moral courage. do you have because you're inevitably. going to be confronted with a decision. that's going to cost you something this. is really the heart of the question. you're getting at is are you willing to. do something that's going to cost you. something if it's the right thing to. do one of the early decisions that we. had to make in the White House was are. we going to you move the US Embassy in. Tel Aviv to. Jerusalem every president since Ronald.

Reagan had promised to do it we're going. to move the US Embassy to Jerusalem. we're going to uh we're going to just. we're going to acknowledge the fact that. Jerusalem is the Eternal capital of. Israel and we're going to move our. Embassy there as a show of support for. the Israelis and for that. fact and every single president prior to. Trump reversed course and didn't do it. both were Republican and Democrat and I. know why why because I saw the same.

thing I was I was confronted with the. same briefing that all of those other. presidents got you make this decision. and it's going to be mass chaos in the. Middle East people are going to lose. their minds any hope for peace and. stability in this region is going to be. gone by you doing. that and every president was confronted. with this conundrum do I do what I said. I was going to do do I do this thing. that's the right thing to do or do I.

allow myself to be convinced that it's. actually I I shouldn't do that because. it's going to cost lives or it's going. to infect our interest in some other way. Trump was confronted with the same. briefing and at some point he said hold. on just a second I I think everyone here. is confused about there being a debate. over whether we're going to do this I. promised I'm I was going to do it and. we're doing it so the conversation is. over with start executing on doing it so.

the president makes this decision and um. he announces it and after he announces. it uh I'm standing with him in the outer. oval just outside the Oval Office. there's a little room where his. assistants sit there um and he comes out. because I'm getting ready to take him to. the next meeting that we're going to go. into and he looks up and there's a TV on. the wall and every TV In The West Wing.

has four panels on it split in four. it'll have Fox CNN MSNBC and fox. business so you can see in one look. what's the coverage what's everybody. focused on you know traditional media. wise at a at a moment's notice you can. see that all day they don't have the. Sean Ryan Show streaming in there they. haven't got it streaming yet you guys. haven't gone 247 live yet we need to get. a 247 live stream of your life and we. can get it uh put on the screens in the. West Wing we can make that happen but he. looks up on the screen and you can.

immediately see that every single panel. is protests in the Middle East there are. people hanging him in effigy there are. people burning the American flag there. are people chanting Trump trump you will. see Palestine will be. free he is watching this unfold and it's. the most visceral hatred toward a person. that you can imagine I'm watching a. giant Trump head get lit on fire over.

there I'm watching them stabbing his you. know. Trump figure things like that. M the feeling that I had in that moment. I can only compare it to the same. feeling that you might have if you see. someone trip and fall on the sidewalk my. inclination is to look away because I. don't want them to be embarrassed that I. saw them fall you know when people fall. and they look around and see did anybody. see that I would rather like act like I. didn't see it so that they don't feel.

embarrassed not that the president had. done anything wrong but I had this kind. of embarrassed feeling of like man look. what they're saying about the person. standing right next to me it's just s. such V visceral. hatred and I will never forget Trump's. reaction to seeing that though he. watches it for a. minute and then he looks at me and he. goes all right what do we got. next like what's next on our schedule. today didn't even. acknowledge this hatred unimaginable.

level of hatred happening for the whole. world to see directed at him personally. and it rolled off his back like water. off of a duck's back and I realized in. that moment that Trump for all the. things people can say about him has a. level of intestinal fortitude to do if. he thinks something is the right thing. to do and you may disagree with you know. him thinking that that is the right. thing to do you may have difference of. opinion there but if he thinks this is. the right thing to do he will endure any.

amount of. criticism hatred directed at him if he. thinks it's the right thing and that's. why I and a lot of others who worked in. the White House would have crawled over. broken glass for. Trump um because that's a level of moral. courage that we were around politicians. all day and these squishes who are just. like see which way the wind blows oh. people want me to go that way I'm going. to go that way and Trump wasn't like. that and it it was really a rare thing.

to see among politicians for sure I mean. that had to be was that was that an. everyday occurrence for you to see I. mean things of that magnitude that's. what they covered for four years more. than four years I mean it's what it. started probably a year out I remember I. remember watching on the news people. shoving eggs in women's faces because. they were they were going to vote for. him yeah and and it was just nasty at. was 5 years of this at least but and it.

continues on today but you know. so so none of that that stuff doesn't. affect him like Kathy Kathy Griffin you. know what did she do oh yeah when his. head up yeah held his head seed head up. things like that yeah it doesn't affect. him with I think would surprise people. because people again I think they have a. little bit of a misconception of trump. because he he's also someone who lets no. slight go unanswered you know he'll.

he'll attack someone on Twitter for some. seemingly you know down in the weeds. like why you know why are you raising. that to the level of a response so on. one on one hand he's like we'll punch. any anybody who's you know confronting. him and on the other hand is willing to. endure the kind of criticism that I'm. talking about so it is a it's a. dichotomy a little bit there but there's. some parts of it I think are a sport for. him the reason he would go after the.

host of Morning Joe or you know whomever. on Twitter it's the game yeah you can. come after me I'm G come after you let's. play the game let's go let's do it but. on these issues of of National Security. and international importance and things. that impacted people's lives I think he. had the courage to do the right thing. you had mentioned a couple of big names. that that had meetings and the White. House that sounds like maybe you were uh. previous to yeah one of them being Jeff.

Bezos what can you talk about those. conversations yeah the the Bezos one was. kind of innocuous it was like he didn't. spend a lot of time with Trump he came. in I think it was for like one of the. business councils that we had you know. put together and he was one of the. people on there and i' met him and that. kind of thing the one that was that. really stuck with me was the Elon Musk. interactions though because um we we had. a meeting in the cabinet room and the. president was uh working on what to do. on infrastructure uh you know crumbling.

infrastructure all over the country what. am I going to do I'm going to bring. together all these people I knew from. the private sector who can help bring a. fresh eyes to this problem and come with. them interesting ideas so he had a lot. of his friends there who were big. Builders who had done you know giant. projects built skyscrapers all these. things like what are we going to do. about American infrastructure and one of. the people was was Elon. Musk so we're going around the room and. people are talking about the things you. would expect with infrastructure ports.

Bridges roads airports obviously. important things we get to Elon Musk and. Elon wants to talk about a tunnel that. would take people all these people are. in one room at the same time oh yeah all. in all in the cabinet room of the White. House yeah all around the giant table. president sits in the middle fascinating. the back of his chair in the cabinet. room if you ever look at pictures the. back of the president's chair is about. that much taller than every other chair. in the room so you can see which chair. is the president's um so the same.

meetings or same room where we'd have. cabinet meetings we would bring in. private sector leaders and things like. that and the president would use it as. like a giant conference room just like. you used to see on The Apprentice when. the president's sitting at or Trump. would sit at a table and the and people. would kind of surround the table around. him he'd kind of go around the room he. would do the same thing with private. sector leaders and so we get to Elon and. Elon says um I I think I can get people. from New York City to Washington DC in. 29 minutes and we can do it via a tunnel.

hyperloop system he's kind of explaining. this whole the whole thing and Trump. kind of leans back in his chair and he. goes Elon you know this guy's talking. about bridges this guy's talking about. tunnels I mean you're talking about. bridges he's talking about roads and. this guy come he says I've got a tunnel. I'm going to bring a tunnel you know he. starts doing this whole thing like a. trump Riff on like I can't believe. you're bringing a tunnel in here and. Trump goes you know what Elon that. sounds great why don't you just do it. let's just do it and uh it was just kind.

of a funny Awkward Moment where. everybody's like looking around the room. like did the president just approve a. tunnel from New York City to Washington. DC does he have the authority to approve. a tunnel from New York to Washington DC. I don't really know but the thing that I. always that stuck with me about that. with Elon. Musk is the things that you are able to. do in life are often directly. proportionate to the amount of criticism. M and ridicule that you're willing to. take for doing them and here's Elon Musk.

surrounded by some of the biggest. Business Leaders in the world and he. comes with this really out of left field. idea and look I don't know anything. about the like maybe it'll work maybe it. won't work but he was willing to put. himself out to the point that after the. meeting other Business Leaders were kind. of poking fun privately amongst. themselves about Elon coming in with. this hairbrained idea that he had well. you know what else was a hair Brin idea. Tesla SpaceX you know go down the list.

of these things that Elon Musk has been. able to bring to. fruition and and I think there's a. little Trump in that too uh going back. to him being willing to endure all the. criticism on all the decisions that he. made like I find. myself wanting to explain myself a lot. when people misunderstand me or or. criticize one of the some of things that. I have done or said publicly or whatever. because I want to say no no no hear me. out like I I I have good intentions here. I'm trying to do the right thing let me.

tell you why I think that and I think. that that can become debilitating if you. spend all your time wanting to be. understood by people where if you're. going to truly do anything of of any. magnitude and significance you're going. to make enemies you're going to have. critics and if you spend all your time. trying to oh no no no please understand. me you're not going to be able to keep a. Relentless focus on the mission on the. thing that you're trying to accomplish. and I think Elon has proven an ability.

to focus on the mission in the midst of. people sniping at him left and right. that I found really stuck with me after. I left the White House seeing him not. just endure that from the public but. even. from his peers so to speak of like these. Big Business Leaders in the cabinet room. interesting very. interesting I get I just have some. random. stuff I want to ask you because you've. been involved in so much I wanted to ask. you about the football the nuclear.

football what is what can you tell us. about it yeah so nuclear football for. people that don't know if you ever see a. picture of the president chances are a. few meters behind the president will be. walking a military aid holding a. briefcase a leather briefcase and uh is. nicknamed the nuclear football because. it it's you know with him everywhere in. case something happens we need to launch. a nuclear war he can he can crack that. thing open and and get it going so um I. was it's another one of those things I. was very curious about when I got there.

like well what's in the nuclear football. and you know actually I was standing In. The West Wing one day with the. president's military aid and I jokingly. said let me hold that thing for a minute. and uh and to my surprise he let me are. you serious so for about 5 seconds I. held the 45 pound nuclear football at my. side uh and so I've experienced what it. feels like to hold the the nuclear. football. uh but before anybody freaks out that I. for you know 5 Seconds had the fate of. the world in my hands um you know a lot.

of what's inside the the nuclear. football remains classified but what I. can say is there isn't a giant red. button in there that you just crack it. open and like boom and we go to nuclear. war the purpose first and foremost is to. verify the president's identity so. everywhere the president goes he carries. with him a little laminated card called. the biscuit and on the biscuit there are. codes that are his Verification codes. for his identity so in the event where. there was an emergency where the nuclear.

football gets cracked open the first. thing that happens is Communications are. opened up to the National military. command center and the president. verifies his ID identity with the codes. that are on the biscuit uh then from. there uh I have heard it described in. media uh as uh a Waffle House menu of. pre-planned Nuclear Strike options so. you can imagine you know a bunch of. different options um of of pre-planned. Nuclear Strike options the scariest. thing that I've learned um about it all.

is um one researcher estimated that. there may only be a six to seven minute. window in which the president would have. to make a decision about what to do if. someone were to have launched a nuclear. strike on the United States and the. scariest of all potential nuclear. strikes is what we call um a bolt out of. the blue strike which is. uh there hasn't been anything kind of. leading up to this moment at all there. haven't been rising tensions that led to.

this moment this is just a out of. nowhere some somebody with nuclear. weapons just launches it out of the. Clear Blue Sky one day and we're. suddenly confronted with there's a. nuclear missile flying toward the United. States right now so in a bolt out of the. blue scenario this is where you know the. researchers say there may only be a six. or seven minute window where the. president has to decide the future of. the world uh in that and it's and it's. very very scary um you. know people do not have an appreciation.

today the way that I think they did at. the height of the Cold War which even. precedes you know us really of the. danger of of nuclear war and just how. quickly we could lose everything. everything that we know of as life for. the few people that would survive uh a. major nuclear exchange would would not. be a life worth living the the the. living would envy the dead in that. scenario yeah and it's very very scary.

and I don't think we have an. appreciation for how. close um that how real that possibility. is that that could that that could. happen people can't even fathom you. know I mean we have a pretty good here. yeah I mean that it's just yeah it's so. far out of the realm that. that uh I mean I would yeah I would. think that there would be just about. every.

possible scenario that that a think tank. could think of is in that with. predetermined decisions y yeah because. you want to try to for all of these. things you want to try to plan in a. non-emotional state so that when you're. met with a crisis you can R fall back on. the the great preparation planning work. and make a good decision in the middle. of middle of a crisis the thing that I. don't envy any. president is how do you make a good.

decision in that window of time with. those. Stakes literally Humanity hangs in the. balance in some ways and you're you're. trying to decide like first of all. you're trying to take in the information. of like well what's the strike coming. toward us look like is it a nuclear. missile or is it 200 nuclear missiles. and then okay what's the response to. that that's going to you.

know keep us from ending the planet you. know but also protecting. American National Security in some way I. mean it's just an impossible decision. Mak making Matrix that you're confronted. with uh it's just I mean it's. unimaginable and and you know some of. the things that stuck with me the most. from my time working in the office of. the Director of National. Intelligence were the planning for those. for different. scenarios. um one day when I was at um the office.

of the Director of National Intelligence. we got to go inside one of these. so-called doomsday bunkers and the. government has places around the country. uh what happens inside of them Still. Remains highly classified some of the. locations themselves remain classified. um but it's basically if there was a. crisis scenario in which the government. had to be. reconstituted outside of Washington DC. um these are the places that we that you. would go and so I was taken to one of.

those places that was um hundreds and. hundreds of feet. underground um when we got there a giant. metal blast door opened in the side of a. mountain and we kind of go inside and. we're uh down to these tunnels that take. us into basically an underground city uh. that had everything from like a made to. order Grill where you could order hot. dogs and hamburgers and pizza and stuff. in there to uh living quarters uh and. office space and computer space I can.

saw where my computer would be in that. you know a scenario like that um and. some of it was kind of like off of the. movies where you see um you know a room. where they're monitoring a bunch of. different televisions uh things that are. going on all over the country kind of uh. watch Center there conference room space. where we went in and we kind of talk. through some of these different things. of you know what happens if this in this. scenario what happens in that scenario. just to be prepared for um what they. call Cog continuity of government Cog or.

Coupe C continuity of operations uh so. the government spends a great deal of. time planning for these scenarios so. that if we're ever confronted with them. we could have a a competent response to. them and in some ways I found myself uh. uh very surprised about the quality of. preparation that we have and in other. scenarios I found myself terrified that. were that to actually happen things are. going to descend into chaos and we're. probably not ready for for those things.

so it was a an eye openening experience. to say the least it was kind of like. Doomsday prepping on the highest. possible. level wow what's the I mean what's the. entrance look like if you don't mind me. asking if you can I mean is it is it. does it blend in with the environment. I'm talking. about going back up a couple hundred. feet yeah so you or is it a little thing. out in the woods I mean what is what is. it the there are um the one that the one.

that we went to um if you had satellite. imagery you would be able to see that. it's a facility okay there's a there's a. helicopter landing pad there there's you. know some space up there but you. couldn't even get to. it gotcha you know but we we did not fly. into it we drove into it but by the time. that you've driven there you're so far. off of any beaten path you know you. would never get to the point that you. could even see what the entrance look. like outside of like satellite imagery.

um but um there are a couple of these. that are that are not classified that I. that I would encourage people to look at. as really fascinating stuff you can look. up ravenrock you could look up Mount. weather uh there a couple of them that. come to mind for me's Raven Rock. ravenrock is in. Pennsylvania um Mount weather is in the. Blue Ridge Mountains okay um so you can. you can go look at these things they're. they're fascinating anybody that's. interested in this kind of stuff you can. go down a million rabbit holes with them.

in conspiracy theories and all kinds of. stuff are they all over the country are. they all within couple minutes flight. time of DC yeah there there are there. are places that are in different parts. of the country for sure but the ones. that would be used to kind of relocate. the the US government are at least close. enough where you know farther enough out. from you know if a disaster had happened. in Washington DC that you're kind of. away from it but close enough that you. could you could have chance of getting. there who would have access to that. would it be would it be just the. president and his his who he picks.

security people there there are plans. for that too who are the people that get. to get to go uh I say get to go I mean. it's a terrible scenario if you're. having to go uh if you do end up going. it's the people that you would expect a. lot of the senior National Security uh. folks would be there with support staff. there's also staff that is there. 24/7 um congress senate some some Le. some leadership uh for sure there are. evacuation plans for for them to be a.

part of those uh definitely because you. not only need to reconstitute the. executive branch you need to maintain uh. the legislative branch as well uh and. the judicial branch as well so there are. um evacuation plans for for every branch. of government that are that are fully. fleshed out um but this is one of those. things when we first got to the White. House that even uh Trump was interested. in uh and there's there's a way that um. um.

uh I'm not going to say exactly how. because I'm actually not sure how. sensitive this is so I'll just kind of. stay away from there's a way that you. can tell who is going to evacuate in. different scenarios and Trump realized. he noticed this thing and asked what it. was and found out that it was evacuation. protocol under these kind of scenarios. who's going here who's going there who's. who's not and so uh at that point I was. just I was a Communications Aid in the. White House I wasn't at the office of. Director of National Intelligence I.

wasn't one who would be evacuated and so. for the rest of the day Trump would. point out uh who who in the meetings was. would get to go if something bad happen. and he would be like Cliff's not going. to be there guys so say make your peace. with him now tell you know make sure to. say bye to Cliff before we leave today. because if something happens he's not. going to be there so you gota gotta kick. out of that I'm curious. I'm curious to. know how important the power grid was uh.

when it comes to National Security very. much I think this is one of the areas. where we're more vulnerable than uh. people would realize um industrial cyber. security uh in general is an area where. we've got a lot of a vulner a lot of. vulnerabilities around the country our. our infrastructure does and. um I'm actually getting ready in a in. about a month to to chair a hearing on. China's preparation.

for crisis scenarios or potential war. and things like that when is when is. this that'll be in mid June where's this. um in DC uh the US China commission is. is hosting it uh so it'll be in in. Congress uh in one of their hearing. rooms there and uh one of the things. that we're kind of learning about is. what what is China doing to prepare for. things like this and where are their. vulnerabilities and then how are we. preparing and where are our. vulnerabilities in this regard and this.

is one of the things where. um cyber Espionage or cyber attacks or. cyber warfare these are things that have. um existed in theory for a long time. they've also existed even when they're. happening below the threshold of war and. kind of a gray Zone uh for a long time. uh and the question is what's going to. happen. in the event of some conflict what role. is cyber war going to play in that and.

the first time we've really been able to. see this in some ways is what's happened. in in Ukraine with the Russians because. the Russians have pretty robust cyber. capabilities and um uh we've seen them. have some successes there we've seen. them not be as successful and maybe not. done some things that we thought they. might have done uh but in the United. States one of the areas where there is a. lot of focus but I think needs to be. more focus in what are we doing to. harden our infrastructure what are we. doing to our power grid to ensure that. we're not vulnerable in the event of you.

know war or an attack uh of some point. from a cyber perspective uh that we're. not extremely vulnerable because right. now I think we're more vulnerable there. than we would like to admit yeah I've. interviewed I'm really into the the the. the China threat in the in the power. grid and I've interviewed a handful of. people on the subject and it it sounds. like we're extremely vulnerable right. now very vulnerable like it's a good.

possibility it could happen would you. agree with that I would agree with that. in the event of conflict that that would. be a a good possibility what are their. vulnerabil vulnerabilities what would we. do if they shut our power. off well in some ways I I'm not going to. talk about it and in other ways I don't. know okay um and and these are the kind. of eventualities that are people are. planning for these things but the the.

thing that's difficult is how uh. civilization as a whole is so dependent. on electricity at this point how quickly. it would affect our food supply people's. ability to get access to food and and. clean water and all of these different. kind of necessities of life and how. quickly we could devolve into cha chaos. here. domestically irregardless of kind of. what's going on externally who's.

attacking us so I I think you're spoton. this is an area of extreme concern and. vulnerability we need to do a lot more. on what about the water supply same same. same stuff y anything that's an. industrial control system at this point. uh there are people really smart people. who are devoting their lives to this. problem but it needs a lot lot more. focus on the government side gotcha. gotcha well Cliff let's um let's take a.

break when I come back I I would like to. I would like to talk about your book I. think it would be best to start with the. lawsuit and then and then talk talk. about why you were getting sued by Trump. and then why he redacted it and then. we'll get into the weeds let's do it. perfect fabric by Gerber Life is term. life insurance that you can get done. right here right now you could be. covered from your couch in under 10.

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shopify.com. Shan that's all lowercase again go to. shopify.com. Shan to upgrade your selling today. that's shopify.com. Shan all right Cliff we're back from the. break and we're getting ready to dive. into kind of why you wrote the books and. and and but first I think it I think. it's important to talk. about why he got.

sued by Trump and then and then why he. redacted that and invited you back on so. there's a funny story when uh my wife. and I left DC were moving back to. Alabama and we're buying a house and the. uh the mortgage guy calls and he says. hey we're doing our due diligence on the. mortgage here and one of the things we. had to search was there any pending. litigation going on and I noticed here.

that it says that you're engaged in. you're involved in a lawsuit right now. and now my mind is like oh yeah yeah. yeah I am he said. um well it says here uh that it's Donald. John. Trump and is is that the president of. the United States that you're involved. in a lawsuit with my and I was like oh. yeah but it's no big deal it's going to. be fine don't worry about it it's it's.

just a misunderstanding it's going to be. good it's going to be good and uh uh. long story short they didn't give us the. mortgage they couldn't they couldn't do. it they couldn't do it because of the. pending litigation uh so that was kind. of like ah man but yes I did get sued by. the president of the United States it. was um not the most fun experience of my. life but basically I had uh left the. White House and I decided to write a. memoir of my time there and a lot of it. has been like a lot of it was because of. the things we've been talking about in.

this interview like misconceptions about. what it was really like what Trump is. really like you know and I and I really. wanted to. give what I was. calling the first honest insiders. account because you had books that fit. into a few different categories you had. haters people were going to leave just. say oh Trump's the worst thing that ever. happened and it's oh it's so bad and. then next thing you know they got. themselves a CNN or MSNBC contract and.

you know you get what's going on there. then you had people that were uh on the. opposite end of that Spectrum who really. didn't talk about anything meaningful. because they didn't want. to even be the slightest bit critical or. say we could have done this better or we. could have done they're just totally. sicop fantic and like you know you're. not getting an honest look at things. there no matter who it is and then the. third was journalists most of whom are. dishonest but even the honest ones are. subservient to their sources they're not.

actually in the room they have to have. somebody tell them what happened in that. room and so it's always a secondhand. account and so what I wanted to do was. give a firsthand account was honest look. of of what the first year and a half of. the Trump Administration what the White. House was all about and uh my intention. was not to attack Trump and in fact my. view was if people know what it's really. like in there they're actually gonna. have a more favorable view of the. president when they get the real inside. scoop on it than they do from what.

they're getting through the filter of. the media but one of the variables was. the staff in the White House was not a. cohesive unit and part of that came from. when the president. wins uh number one at the time he's not. a DC person he doesn't know anybody in. DC all he knows is well I've got this. campaign team who's been with me and now. I've got the RNC kind of more. establishment Republicans the kind of DC.

people I only have a handful of people. on my campaign team it's not that many. people I'm going to have to staff a full. government I need to bring these people. in and we're going to try to build a. government with these kind of different. factions so to speak and what happened. very quickly was um instead of coming. together and and uniting and being able. bble to kind of work together there was. these factions that broke off that were. all kind of self-serving and you had a. dynamic where the establishment folks.

come in and they're trying the best they. can to get rid of the campaign people um. who they look down on because a lot of. them were like me I never worked in the. government before I never worked in the. white house before I was an entrepreneur. I was uh you know I was doing things in. the private sector I was from some other. part of the country I didn't you know. and I went because I believed in Trump. and like let's go try to accomplish. something here but I didn't know how to. govern I had never governed before and. they want you to think governing is some. kind of superpower that only the Chosen. Few in DC know how to do this Sean you.

wouldn't know if you came to DC you. wouldn't know what to do because you're. not one of the chosen ones you know it's. this very egotistical condescending. point of view that these people have. toward people who've been successful in. the private sector and never done it. before so this just like it was just. non-stop fighting and so the book was. titled team of vipers and it was a play. off of Lincoln's Team of Rivals and so. he famously had this Team of Rivals he. brought different people together and. they were his cabinet and they worked.

together and this team didn't gel in. that way it was constant fighting and so. one of the themes of the book were those. Dynamics and how they were kind of. working and so when the book comes out. the president uh has immediately has the. false impression that I'm attacking him. that I'm gonna be one of the ones who. has now left and is now gonna stab him. in the back and say all of these. terrible things about him um and so he.

sued me uh when the book came out and um. basically in violation of a. non-disclosure agreement that we had. signed on the campaign and so I. countersued him uh because I had to I. didn't want to sue the guy but they had. counter sued him on First Amendment. grounds and saying that you know as a. government employee as long as I don't. disclose classified information you know. I'm not bound by you know an NDA.

basically the sign in the private sector. that apply to my Simon government. service that was the gist of it pretty. soon the president sees me on TV sees. things being written about the book sees. the things I'm saying and realizes that. I'm not attacking him I'm not even at. the time when we're in the middle of a. lawsuit you know I'm still very good. friends with Don Jr at the time has. become one of my best friends. you know Jared and Ivanka were my. friends like everybody kind of. understood what was going on the. president had been given a false.

impression of the book by some of the. people inside of The White House that I. criticized um that were my former. colleagues and they used that. opportunity to try to get back at me by. spinning him up to to come after me so. realizes that I'm not we kind of make. peace uh there after a very that brief. legal dispute and uh he asked me to was. that a phone call I don't want to get. into the yes we did we did talk I won't. talk about the details of it but we had.

a very good and very funny uh. conversation um and put all that to rest. pretty quickly and he asked me to come. back to do a couple of things one uh to. run speech writing for the Republican. National Convention in 2020 and I did. that and then to come back as as Deputy. dni uh so it's a full circle kind of. I've been in I've been out and I've been. back I've done it I've done it all at. this point so that's the the story of. the. lawsuit what is it that you wanted to.

convey in that book what it's really. like I wanted to just tell the truth. about like you see this is the most. talked about story in the world. everybody wants to know what it's really. like in there well here's here's what. it's actually like in the room with. Donald Trump here's what it's actually. like to work with his staff here are. some moments that have been covered. throughout our time in the White House. that were covered wrong and I'll tell. you what really happened me I'll tell. you one of the things things that was. like a huge Revelation to me and maybe. it shouldn't have. been when I started being in rooms that.

reporters were writing about that. journalists were talking. about I realized how wrong so much of. what they're saying about what happened. in those rooms was I mean I I'd see. these things about like something that. happened in some meeting I'm like I was. in that meeting and that's not even. remotely what it like what happened um. and maybe this shouldn't be a revelation. because like I've always felt like. there's kind of a pervasive liberal bias. in the. media but I didn't have a full.

appreciation for it and it's hard to. have a full appreciation for it until. they're writing about things you. actually saw firsthand and you're like. that's just total BS is there one is. there anything specific that sticks out. into your in your head so there's one. that I wrote about in my book that made. me this is maybe a small thing but it. illustrates the broader point. who's the most famous American. journalist perhaps of all time Bob. Woodward Woodward and Bernstein.

Watergate they're the ones who broke the. stor of all the all the things that were. happening in Watergate during the Nixon. Administration well Bob Woodward wrote. two or three books about the Trump. era and there's a scene in one of his. books where he talks about it's during. the campaign when Steve Bannon first. joined the Trump campaign and there's. this scene where Steve walks into the. 14th floor of Trump Tower into the war. room and there's nobody there except for.

one person his name's Andy serabian he. was the War Room director and Steve's. like where is everybody and Andy says. you know oh well that this is everybody. there we don't really have a you know. basically it's like this whole scenario. of dialogue that happens and Steve you. know dramatically says I want everybody. back in here from this moment until the. day the election happens it's just like. dramatic scene of we're going to rally. the troops and we're going to have. everybody in this room it's going to be. a whole thing it's really Dynamic story. except for the sto except for the fact.

that it never happened Andy caban is one. of my best friends seeing this I'm like. did this happen serabian he's like dude. nothing even remotely like that ever. ever. happened and Bob Woodward never called. Andy sban to ask him if this story ever. happened I don't know where he got this. story there's only two people in the. room Steve Bannon and Andy caban and one. of the two people in the room he never. even talked to to find out if this story. even happened I don't know if he talked. to Steve Bannon or not I'm just saying. at least one of the people in the in the.

middle of this story he never even. called to to a ask about this scene and. yet it's a prominent scene in one of his. big best-selling books this is the most. famous American journalist in history. and that's how little he cared about. getting the story right now imagine you. know the Bible says if you're faithful. in small things be faithful in big. things if you're not faithful in small. things you won't be faithful in big. things if Bob Woodward couldn't care.

enough to get that story right what. makes you think that he would get any. story of any meaning and substance right. the answer to that is he doesn't give a. crap about the truth what he really. cares about is what's going to move. books and what's going to get clicks and. what's going to drive conversation and. the incentives in the media right now. are so perverse that they are not they. are not not leading to outcomes that. produce truth that get us closer to. truth and understanding which is why the. podcast format has blown up because it.

gives you an opportunity to really dig. in and like have a conversation with. somebody and find try to try to find. common ground or try to find truth um. that the current media environment. doesn't is not conducive to so I saw. that extrapolated across name an issue. and topic um especially with Trump. because such a divisive figure so the. media had a strange relationship with. Trump because on one hand they needed. him to prop up their business he drove.

interest he people were clicking on. things and watching things and now and. he's gone those numbers go way down but. they also hate his guts because he. doesn't just like roll over and take. he'll punch him back in the mouth twice. as hard as they punched him and so it's. a really difficult Dynamic there but. none of it leads to getting closer to. the truth that's for sure. it sounds like some of the things that. were going on in the White House didn't. really align with with your values as an.

individual. what what were some of those things one. of the things I talked about in my first. book was most people who write a book. are the heroes of Their Own Story and. I'm not the hero in my book uh because. it was not a book that was like oh I saw. things that I didn't agree with and I. was you know standing a thwart history. yelling stop you know and I was so brave. and so what I learned about myself.

was I was much more susceptible to the. attraction of power than I otherwise. would have ever known because I never. had power I I grew up with nothing you. know in a working class family uh I. didn't know I'd never met anybody who. worked in the government much less. somebody in the white house uh I'd never. met anybody who had money what do people. do with if they have money I don't know. I've never met anybody who has money.

I've never met a business owner I've. never met an entrepreneur I've never met. a politician I've never met never met. anybody so you only know the universe. that you've been exposed to so if you've. lived your whole life and you never had. any power so to speak of how are you. going to respond when that ultimate test. comes because power is the ultimate the. ultimate test so some wrote about. Lincoln's Legacy um he. said um any man can endure hard times.

you want to know what a man's really. made of give him power and so what I. learned in the White House was. uh I I was much more susceptible to the. Allure of power than I thought and what. does that look like well in in the white. house there's an org chart just like any. other organization the chief of staff. you know president presid Chief of Staff. everything kind of flows down from there. in the Trump White House that org chart. existed but the real org chart was.

Donald Trump in the middle and anyone. that he knows is a Spoke off of him he's. like the Hub of activity and most of us. would do anything that it took to be and. remain one of those Spokes and I was the. same way if I saw an opportunity to stab. my colleague in the back because they. were encroaching on my Lane a little bit. I'd do it if that's what it took to make. sure to get them out so that I'm going. to maintain my proximity my access those.

kinds of things so it's not that I was. witnessed to things that were oh so. horrible that I couldn't believe were. happening it was that my own character. was being revealed in these situations. that I'd never been confronted with. before so I I wrestle with that a lot in. in my book one of the great things about. working in the Trump Administration as a. as a Christian is I was never asked to. do anything that violated my sincerely. held beliefs and all the a lot of the.

policy things that we were advancing. were things that I had been hoping would. happen for years and years and president. rescinded the Mexico City policy which. funds abortions overseas with US. taxpayer money he told the Department of. Justice that we're no longer going to go. after the nonprofit status of. faith-based nonprofits that speak into. political issues which had been a threat. that many churches and faith-based. organizations were worried about for. years and years um he you know right now.

at the state department whether you like. it or not your pronouns will be in your. email signature whether you like it or. not. automatically in the Trump. Administration something like that would. never happen a lot of the power of these. Dei offices that exist now and imposing. all this woke ideology on government. workers and bullying them into Mission. cuz they're scared to speak up about it. things like that never would have. happened in the Trump. Administration there's a my favorite.

monument in Washington DC is the. Jefferson. Memorial Jefferson is my favorite. founder he's the most fascinating. interesting person I think from that era. to read and there's a quote inside the. Dome of the Jefferson Memorial I have. sworn upon the altar of God Eternal. hostility over against any tyranny over. the minds of men I have sworn upon the. altar of God Eternal hostility against.

any tyranny over the minds of. man what that means. is any. government censorship oppression or. attempt to subjugate someone's freedom. of thought and expression religion. sincerely held beliefs of any kind is. tyranny and then any true Patriot will. stand up to. that and right now the government that. we have in place is trying to impose a.

tyranny of the mind on millions of. Americans and including the government. workers who work in this government who. would don't want to abide by things like. calling a man a. woman that is not a. woman and they are being forced to. decide am I just going to go along to. get along because I've got a family to. feed and these are tough choices I'm not. casting blame on these on the people who. do just put their head down and don't.

have the means to fight those kind of. things that they're just a career. government employee in there making ends. meet every month and they got to decide. whether they're going to take a stand on. stuff like this or not in the Trump. Administration things like that would. never happen president would never have. allowed people to be um tyrannized in. that way and yet he's the one that they. try to say is an authoritarian wannabe. yeah yeah it's.

uh the mental gymnastics we're seeing. people perform today that's uh it's. something how long did it take for you. to be in the white house before you. started seeing your character. shift I I don't know but it's really one. of those things where I in. retrospect more than in the moment that. I I I'm able to look back and say I had. lost something there so in the moment I. mean one of the things I found in life. is very few people think they're a bad.

person or think they're doing a bad. thing most people rationalize the. decisions they make even the bad. decisions with something and so I had a. million rationalizations for why I would. stab a colleague in the back to maintain. access I'm giving him better advice. they're trying to give him the wrong. advice I'm trying to do the right thing. for the president I'm trying to do the. right thing for the country and it in. retrospect a lot of times I was trying. to do the right thing for me and. maintain my position you know you're. trying to justify all of your decisions. that you maybe weren't particularly.

happy with yeah okay definitely I think. everybody does that yeah I think. everybody that's right very rarely does. anybody in life say you know what I'm a. bad person and I'm going to do a bad. thing right now most people rationalize. even the bad decisions that they make. yeah yeah was so there wasn't any. any any one particular thing that kind. of made you I mean when did. you what was it what was it even looking. back in retrospect what what was the.

what was it what made you look back and. go man I'm not I'm not really happy with. how my character changed I'm not really. happy with the the influence and and and. what it cut well one of the main things. that happens when people I think there's. a lot of good about people from outside. of DC coming to DC people in the private. sector fresh blood in the in the. government. the flip side of that is. um you don't know how your character is. going to respond to these things and so.

you leave your support system wherever. you're from for me my church small group. people that couldn't care less that I. work for the president of the United. States you know the people that you know. my son goes and plays with their kids. and you know they know you know all the. things about me good bad and otherwise. um and suddenly I'm in DC and I don't. have that anymore. and uh so I think part of it was. losing those people that were around me. who would say hey what are you doing or.

like hey I think you you're looking at. this wrong or I think you've lost. yourself a little bit in this thing like. who's going to be that person certainly. in a city like Washington DC uh to say. something like that you and I were. talking off camera a little bit there. are cities around the country that. represent certain kind of mortal sins if. you will. you've got Las Vegas for sex you've got. La for fame notoriety you've got New.

York City for money greed and you've got. Washington DC for power it attracts a. certain type of person who wants to go. to Washington DC because the only thing. going there is power so it attracts the. people that are susceptible to that. attraction already and then it gives. them like a junkie the drug that they. are already addicted to before they even. know they want it that bad like oh you. came here to get a little power to be a. part of this we'll give you a little bit.

oh you like that you want a little bit. more let's keep going that's the thing. that I I. didn't have any exposure to and so for. me it was power and and I never would. have said first of all who am I to even. have like what power did I even have I'm. a White House communications Aid or I'm. the deputy dni or whatever the. president's the one with the power but. it's the proximity to that that is. intoxicating everything you do plays out. on TV screens around the country and.

around the world every single person you. talk to wants to know what it's like. what's it like what's he like what's it. what's what are you doing there what's. it and you know it feeds that ego. non-stop it's constant like so if you. don't have anybody around you anymore. who doesn't give a crap about that it's. just constantly being reinforced to the. point that you just even forget that. that's not what things are all about you. didn't have anybody to ground you well. you know nobody does over there sounds.

like yeah yeah I mean my my wife I. didn't change the way that I spoke to my. wife coming home my wife wasn't like. what's wrong with you why are you. treating me differently so it was kind. of like siloed in a in a way it's. professional ambition and in some or or. or in some ways it's even things that. the world doesn't say is bad so what's. if you're an alcoholic that's bad if. you're a drug addict that's bad oh you. run around cheating on your wife that's.

bad but if you're really. ambitious and you're trying to fight. your way up the ladder you're trying to. build a company or you're trying to do. something. [Music]. remarkable who who says that's bad. nobody stops you and says don't climb so. high they say wow how'd you get there. keep going like man wow that's amazing. wow you youve made it you know and and. it's not that ambition is is. bad um or that wanting to achieve things.

or want to do things of of significance. is bad but there has to be a check on. that and the check in my life is my. relationship with God so the thing that. a relationship with God does for you is. it is an everpresent reminder that you. are not the most powerful you not the. most important there is a higher. authority than you are and it forces you. to be subservient to something other. than yourself everything in this life.

that most people go through their day. doing is an attempt to get for. themselves more comfort more money more. power more Fame more more for me build. myself up and everything about the. Christian faith says I'm not great he's. great I'm not important he's important. and so if you're in a daily if you have. a daily if you have a relationship with. God and you are reminded of those things. daily it helps you keep these other.

things in check your Ambitions in the. proper place the importance you put on. your work is in the proper place um. that's what I was missing and I would. justify it any number of ways I don't. have time to be in the Bible today I've. got 46 briefing that I got to get ready. for the president of the United States. is depending on me to come in here and. and be able to talk with authority about. these issues I I don't have time for.

that right now but thankfully I did that. some other time I you know I've got that. filed away somewhere and you know and I. wouldn't necessarily make a conscious. decision so often like that but over. time that's what your actions say um. that's where I kind of lost myself in it. I think is are these why did you. leave so. I left the White House initially because. uh you know I had helped been a part of. orchestrating other people getting.

pushed out of there who were my rivals. and the day came when one of my rivals. helped orchestrate getting me pushed out. of there so when John Kelly became the. chief of staff at the at the White House. um you know we we buted heads pretty. strongly um he tried to get me to leave. uh previously he tried to make me the. assistant Secretary of a an agency and I. declined cuz I said I didn't come to DC. to work for the government I came to. work for the president and then um I. helped run the confirmation for Mike. Pompeo to be Secretary of State and.

through that process Pompeo asked me if. I would come be his senior adviser at. the state department and so I thought. you know what here's a good kind of. off-ramp I'll go have a new experience. at State being senior adviser to the. Secretary of State and so uh I resigned. from the White House to go and take that. job and then John Kelly as white house. chief of staff blocked me being able to. go ultimately to the state department.

and that's how I ended up out of. government before coming back. later so in retrospect do you think that. was a good thing best best thing that. could have happened best thing that. could have happened for several reasons. one it's like going cold turkey if. you're you're a drug addict and like you. just got I had one day I was walking in. The West Wing and the next day I wasn't. and there wasn't no going back to it it. like broke that uh so that was really. helpful healthy um the other thing is.

getting blocked from going to take this. like amazing dream job at at the state. department was that. um the book that I wrote that made me. wrestle with a lot of these things never. would have. happened the lawsuit with the president. never would have happened what which. ended up being a great thing for me to. have experienced that for several. reasons number.

one the the president attacked me on. Twitter in the um in the middle of all. of that and the when he tweeted about me. I was actually sitting in a live CNN. interview and the interviewer said the. president has just tweeted about you. would you like for us to read it live on. the air. [Music]. man and uh and the president you know he. attacked me whatever and and they and.

and the interviewer said how would you. like to respond to that what was the. Tweet Cliff Sims I'm not going to get it. exactly right but this is a gist of it. Cliff Sims uh who I hardly. knew um wrote a book with madeup stories. and fiction he acts like he was an. Insider but he was nothing but a gopher. you know he was nobody you know that. that kind of. thing um which in. retrospect shout out to the president. for for uh like I know when his heart's.

really in wanting to get after somebody. and he didn't I can tell he he did it. but he didn't like give it his all it. could have been much nastier he could. have been much more hardcore about it um. but the interviewer asked me what do you. how do you want to respond to that and. in the moment I said um my identity is. not wrapped up in being a trump staffer. or or in anything that the president or. anyone says that I am my identity is. found in Jesus Christ and who he says.

that I am and he says that I'm his and. um I meant it it was the right. answer but in retrospect I don't think. that that was an accurate reflection of. where I was at in my life at that point. because it hurt me a lot more than was. willing to admit. publicly because my career mattered so. much to me and and getting attacked by.

the president of the United States in. that way bruised my. ego much more substantially than I would. have. admitted and this the reason that was. such an important experience. is God created work the first thing that. we see Jesus or that we see God doing in. Genesis 1 is creating created the whole. world and it is part of his plan for our.

lives that we would reflect his. character by being many creators. ourselves and so work is an important. thing but it also says in the Bible that. do anything as if you were doing it unto. God not for man and so when I left the. White House I realized I had found my. purpose in that job and and and I. thought that defined. me and and what I was able to realize.

is um no matter what you were doing if. you do it unto God you can find purpose. in that I mean I remember thinking like. especially even after I left mean the. last day uh the day that Joe Biden was. inaugurated president I was standing in. the lobby of the CIA and inauguration. day is you know basically a government. holiday it may be a government holiday. like nobody's there near empty halls and.

I'm walking around in there because I've. never really taken a lot of time to like. really soak it all in and I'm like. looking at the the memorial wall and I'm. looking at the book of Honor with the. names of the people who've you know. given their lives and service to their. country there and the CIA seal and the. hallway there I'm walking all the way. through I'm looking at the CIA Museum. I'm like going through stuff I've never. had a reason to had a look at while I'm. there just to kind of soak it all in. because I thought that the day that I. walk out these doors that I'm it's never. going to be nothing I do will ever be. this cool this important this great.

again and that was ego talking but it's. also not true. because if you are truly doing anything. that you're doing in life as unto God. and not for men it doesn't matter if. you're working at the white house or at. a coffee house you can find meaning in. that work because your work becomes an. overflow of. worship and it changed my perspective on. work which is why I genuinely think that. was the best thing that could have.

possibly happened to me being attacked. by the president of the United States in. that way and and losing the things that. I had allowed to Define me in my job. because otherwise what would have ever. broken that mentality in me and so a big. part of the book that I've written now. is talking about wrestling with that in. a way so that other people can have the. same perspective that it took me going. through that to gain for myself. interesting so it sounds like your first.

book became a New York Times bestseller. damn near overnight mhm and you went on. all kinds of interviews I mean what what. was it what. was what was it specifically about that. book that just made it take off like. that it was about trump it was a trump. Insider writing about Trump so it's the. biggest story in the world and all the. people wanted to hear about it and all. the news outlets want to cover it um and.

you know it's really really hilarious. now reading the Amazon reviews of that. book because it's it's uh two camps of. people it's um uh liberals angry because. they thought the book was going to. eviscerate Trump and so they bought it. and then they read it and they're like. he didn't he didn't go where couldn't. find it and then it's conservatives who. didn't read the book but you know. understand namly thought that it was.

going to be an attack on Trump attacking. me for turning my back on Trump uh and. you know the inp first in there are some. people who actually did read read the. book who were like actually it's a great. book you know whatever um so it's really. kind of really kind of funny but um man. I I never would have imagined I would be. doing The Late Show with stepen Cole. bear or going on The View with the the. ladies of the view but uh but there I. was how was the. view honest it was interesting it was.

interesting you know I I normally on. interviews I don't like to meet the. hosts. beforehand uh. because th this is probably unfair but. um I saw Jake Tapper one time at CNN. interviewing the deputy campaign manager. for Trump and prior to the interview. cameras aren't rolling he's like buddy. buddy with the guy you know oh man we. ought to get our kids together and get. them to play and uh man it's great to.

see you and man you guys are doing great. man looking like Trump's doing really. well he's gonna you know whatever like. has this buddy buddy conversation and. the second that the lights came on he. said um how can you as a father allow. your daughters to be in the same room as. Donald Trump you know stuff something to. that effect it was just like jarring and. I'm like two seconds ago you this guy's. buddy and now you're like so it made me. not want to interact with people before. the interviews because I like are they. softening me up here to just try to give. me the oky do once I get on there so at.

the view I'm like sequestered in a you. know backstage back there waiting for I. don't want to meet anybody and I'm just. kind of in the room so they finally. bring me out and um and it was funny. because uh I mean I got cheered I got. booed I got everything in between that. you could possibly imagine on that show. um but I really I think I got the. audience uh early on in the interview. because I was talking about the the book.

and I said you know I would compare. myself to Eminem in8 mile when he gives. the big battle rap at the end where he. basically says every terrible thing. about himself and the other person. doesn't know what to say because now. he's already said all these bad things. about himself how could he like attack. him in this rap battle and that's. basically what this book is is like I'll. tell you everything good bad and ugly. about me and everything else that that. happened there and so that that it kind. of softened up the audience and they you. know we we had a good time and the.

interview was mostly uh uneventful I. mean I remember uh one of the questions. being um something to the effect of you. know we get all these former Trump. people that come on here and they want. to go on an apology tour for working for. Trump and why should we take your. apology and I said I'm not here to. apologize I'm proud that I worked for. president I'm proud to worked for the. White House American people and I'm. proud the president that I served was. Donald Trump and they're just like. befuddled by the whole thing like I. can't make like the cognitive dissonance.

inside of their own head is just like I. can't don't worry I don't need your. forgiveness yeah no yeah thank you God. yes exactly thank you so much for. bestowing your forgiveness upon me but. I'm good um and uh but you know the the. thing that I remember more than the on. camera stuff was after the interview was. over with we go backstage and joy bear. pulls me off to the side and my wife was. there with me and she's probably the. most I mean they're all really. anti-trump on there for sure but I mean. she's like vehemently you know very.

leftist. anti-trump and she said to me um what's. a what's a nice young man like you doing. working for a guy like Donald. Trump and in the moment I kind of played. it off oh well I'm probably not as nice. as you think I am and you know what we. just kind of like laugh it off but that. kind of like stuck with me after I left. because the real question that she's. getting at I think is important for for. everyone to think about how can.

you love someone with whom you disagree. or how can you support. someone even when you disagree with some. of their actions some of the things that. they. do and the answer of that question is. really a lot more simple than I had. really thought about prior to that which. is it's easy I've been doing the same. thing with myself my entire. life Paul writes about in the New. Testament the thing that I want to do I.

can't do and yet the thing that I don't. want to do I keep doing I'm going around. and around he's like wrestling with you. know I can't bring myself to do the. right thing but for all of us how much. grace have we extended ourselves and all. the things that we've screwed up in the. past and yet you can't find it within. yourself to extend that Grace to anybody. else people ask me about Donald Trump. all the time he did this that or the. other that I disagree with and how could. you work for the guy when he did this. that or the other uh and even the things. that I disagree. with it's.

easy I extend to him the same Grace that. I've extended to myself so many times. that I can't even count it and thank God. that Jesus Christ extended that Grace to. me because I definitely didn't deserve. it from him so that whole. experience I try to reflect in the new. in this new book. um because I think there were so many. Faith lessons to take away from working. for Trump but also interacting with. members of the media I mean I've seen it.

all I went on The Late Show with Steven. coar and um I mean that's another one I. definitely didn't want to meet before we. went out there because like I'm like. putting my my battle armor on like we're. going to go out here and it's going to. be like. on and step Co in the commercial break. right before I went out to to go on the. show. comes up to me backstage and shakes my. hand and says thank you for being. willing to come on my show he said I. want you to know if the audience booze.

you or heckles you I will stop the show. stop the cameras and say we're not going. to treat our guests that way you can. disagree with them but you're not going. to mistreat our guests and I just want. you to know if that happens that I'm. going to have your back when we go up. there I don't agree with stepen coar on. anything politically and we joked and. had it out on different things and you. know whatever and it was totally. fine but I think that's such a rare. thing especially people in the media.

today yeah the first time I went on Good. Morning America it's the first interview. I did for my book and George. Stephanopoulos is going to interview me. um and I'm waiting sitting there waiting. at the table for him to come over in the. commercial break and he's walking over. and I'm sitting there and they start. counting down camera is going to come on. in 5 4 3 2 and at two the production. assistant walks over and pulls. the the pad in my chair out from under.

me so that I'll like sit down and look. shorter than George Stephanopoulos on TV. just to screw with me right before the. interview starts and the first thing. Stephanopoulos does is ask some trumped. up story about like we hear you actually. got fired from the white house instead. of you know it's just like a picture. into you talk about people's character. in the media I've seen I've seen all. from the good surprises like a Steven. coar who treated me well to you know the.

Good Morning America folks who tried to. screw with me when I get on there so. I've seen it all was Steven colar a uh. was that a. rarity what that that approach they're. going to back their guest oh yeah so so. few so few I mean that I mean really. unheard of uh honestly I mean I never. had especially you know in what's. anticipated to be an adversarial. interview just doesn't really doesn't. really exist and frankly even some of. the conservatives that I know and you.

know it reminds me of um when I was. growing up I was the lead singer of a. band for a while and um got to meet a. lot of famous musicians uh in Christian. musicians especially and I met this one. band and I won't call him out on here. there's no reason to do that but that I. had really. idolize probably too strong of a word. but like somebody really looked up to. it's like man that's they made it and. they're like real Christian guys and. they're like doing this and I meet the.

guy and he's like a raging alcoholic. who's bragging about how many women he's. slept with that weren't his wife since. he's been and it's like jarring it's. kind of like when you meet your Heroes. and it's not what you think it's going. to be it's like a jarring thing and. meeting a lot of people in political. media I'm kind of Jaded by it now I. guess and like nothing surprises me but. certainly at first when you see these. people that you like looked up to it's. like man they're out there just trying. to like fight the good fight so to speak.

every day and you meet them and they're. not what you think um there's a lot of. those and that's why the good guys Stand. Out Tucker Carlson is a great example. people can say what they want about. Tucker Carlson I've spent a ton of time. with. Tucker off air offline talking texting. at his house in Maine the whole thing. and I can say beyond a shadow of a doubt. whether you agree with Tucker Carlson or. not he's a good person he's a good man. and he trying to live a good life he's. trying to do the right thing he's trying.

to tell the truth he's trying to search. for the truth he doesn't think he has a. monopoly on the truth he's curious seen. the way he treats his wife he treats her. well see the way he treats his dogs he. treats his dogs well you know I've seen. the way he treats his employees he takes. care of them uh and respects them most. people that talk for a living have a. very difficult time not being the center. of attention at all times and Tucker's. just not not like that and it's an. anomaly though I'm telling you it is an.

anomaly uh you I'll tell the folks Sean. Ryan off camera great guy not a jerk all. right hadn't let it get hadn't let the. fame get to him yet he's still a good. guy yeah yeah how long was it before you. wrote your next book so this one um see. the first one came out in early. 2019 and this one has just come out now. in in uh summer of 24 so about five. years between the two the two books and.

this one includes you know more from the. White House experience but also uh I had. not yet gone to the office of the. Director of National Intelligence in the. first book so this one includes a lot of. stories from inside you know odni and. CIA and uh the intelligence Community as. well what was. your I mean you had have you had you had. much experience within the intelligence. world before no no none what was it. about you that got you that job so I.

helped run the confirmation for Director. of National Intelligence John ratliffe. and helped get him through the Senate. that was one of the things I did when I. was in the White House was kind of a. specialty of mine was kind of helping. run these confirmation battles in the. Senate so I did that for him and got. really close to him in that process um. and so he gave me the opportunity to. come come in in that role well well I'm. curious to know what your first. impression of the intelligence agencies. were I mean you. have coming in as a civilian how old. were you if you.

know7 so you've got a lot of assumptions. on on what it would be like what it. looks like what the culture is how did. those play out when you actually saw it. for yourself was it were you impressed. were you disappointed was it completely. different some of both some of both I. mean our our technical. capabilities Boggle the. mind um the ways that we can acquire.

information boggles the Mind any corner. of the globe in. any you know from from human human. intelligence to signant the signal side. of things and intercepting phone calls. and other things to you know uh what the. National geospatial Intelligence Agency. can do and satellites and I mean it's. it's remarkable remarkable our. capabilities and there were definitely. times when there were just like holy. crap we are good holy crap we are good.

um so that. was I mean I had a I had an I had that. impression to some extent outside. looking in you watch movies and wonder. is can we really do some of these things. and the answer is a lot of times yeah we. can you cannot confirm or. [Music]. deny exactly. join me and my special guest for the. next behindth scenes experience. exclusively available on vigilance Elite. patreon the behind the-scenes footage is.

raw and uncut this is as close to the. set as you can possibly get you can. expect anything from off-topic. conversations Studio tours the final. moments before the interview starts and. everything in between the behind the. scenes content is constantly evolving. and will continue to bring you more as. we grow you can gain access for just $15. a month exclusively at vigilance Elite. patreon I know everybody out there has.

to. be just as frustrated as I am when it. comes to the BS and the roric that the. mainstream media continuously tries to. force feed us and I also know how. frustrating it can be to try to find. some type of a reliable news source it's. getting really hard to find the truth. and what's going on in the country and. in the world and so one thing we've done. here at sha Ryan Show is we are. developing our. newsletter and the first contributor to.

the newsletter that we have is a woman. former CIA targeter some of you may know. her as Sarah Adams call sign super bad. she's made two different appearances. here on the Shawn Ryan Show and some of. the stuff that she has uncovered and. broke on this show is just absolutely. mindblowing and so I've asked her if she. would contribute to the newsletter and. give us a weekly intelligence brief so.

it's going to be all things terrorists. how terrorists are coming up through the. southern border how they're entering the. country how they're traveling what these. different terrorist organizations. throughout the world are up to and. here's the best part the newsletter is. actually free we're not going to spam. you it's about one newsletter a week. maybe two if we release two shows shows. the only other thing that's going to be. in there besides the Intel brief is if. we have a new product or something like. that. but like I said it's a free CIA.

intelligence brief sign up links in the. description or in the comments we'll see. you in the. newsletter so we got incredible. capabilities on the on the other side of. that I was stunned dismayed horrified at. the p power of the intelligence. Community Dei. office uh both at odni and at the that. the different agencies I mean I'll never. forget the first time I walked into CIA.

first time I'd ever been. there I don't care how what your view of. the CIA is how negative it is or how. awful you think if you walked in side of. the CIA the first time you're. like I mean this is this is something. this is like legendary stuff has. happened in this building good bad and. otherwise you know. whatever I turned the corner to walk. into the cafeteria and headquarters. there and there is a. giant trans lives or human lives poster.

hanging outside the. cafeteria what is this and I keep. walking up and down the halls and I see. all these posters that they've got in. there for the you know talking about. people's identity and you know diversity. Equity inclusion how important it was. there and you know start talking to. people there and how bullied frankly. they felt I mean they did you know. earlier this. year there was an internal publication. that the office of the Director of. National Intelligence put out inside the.

intelligence community and it was a. crossdresser explaining how being a. crossdresser made them a better. intelligence officer are you serious. dead serious in that same. publication they were talking about the. importance of the use of words that. we've got to be careful with the words. that we use for instance when we're. talking about Chinese malign influence. we should be very careful that the way. that we're doing it is not bigoted. toward Asian.

people or when we're talking about. terrorism we should be very careful not. to say things like Islamic terrorism or. radical Islamic terrorism or jihadist or. you know all these different terms that. they're saying are offensive in some way. or another. now imagine if you are a totally normal. professional intelligence analyst and. you're sitting at your.

desk taking all these threat streams. that are flowing into you trying to make. sense of this stuff and analyze these. things and produce reports so that the. most important decision makers in our. country can make the most informed. decisions that they can and you're. having to spend half your time making. sure you don't write anything offensive. in your analytical writing I mean that. is not just absurd it's dangerous it's. dangerous so given the opportunity to.

come back you know this is some of the. stuff that's happening in the Biden. Administration right now I think the. Trump Administration would would. definitely you know try to fix some of. those. things the I mean we we were talking off. camera when we were setting up in here. about some of the implications that the. Dei in the in the woke agenda it had on. intelligence agencies and anybody who's. watching this from one aspect from the. left aspect is probably thing you know.

we had talked about how many people have. left the. organization and I'm sure. there's 50% of the people out there. think oh good out with the old in with. the new the problem with that is all of. the experience that you've just. lost by implementing something that has. no business being in the intelligence. World anyways it just gets in the way of. collection. and and I mean what we were talking.

about offline I think it's important for. people to think about this is I mean we. just we just got out of a 20 plus year. war and a lot of experience comes from. war and we've never been in a war like. this. and so we developed all this experience. and capabilities and. and people that have been on some of the. most.

high-profile missions in the world in. the in the history of the. US left because of these policies. because they got in the way of. intelligence yep it's intelligence isn't. worrying about that kind of [ __ ] it's. it's collecting and then. and then presenting you know what we. found and and all of the I mean this. this isn't you don't just regain 20-some. years of experience overnight MH you.

know and so many assets are lost now the. military and the agent and the. intelligence agencies all over all over. various government you know roles and. it's really you know it's a tragedy. because all that experience will have to. be regained through more conflicts and. that's going to take it very long time. no I agree there's a serious brain drain.

uh that has happened as a result of that. because people just don't want to fool. with it I mean they just really don't. want anything to do with it so I think. there's some things that we need to do. um you know going forward to to prevent. this and and one is even the places. where the intelligence Community is. recruiting Talent um a lot of them come. out of Ivy League schools MH um and look. what's happening on campus these Ivy. League schools right now and these. people are getting indoctrinated into um. this kind of woke.

ideology um it's certainly not the place. especially with the anti-Semitism we're. seeing on these campuses right now is. that really the place that we're going. to draw from to have a truly diverse. Workforce because here's the thing. diversity is actually important in. intelligence just not the way that. they're talking about mhm it's important. I remember back during covid when we. were trying to analyze streams of. Intelligence coming in to try to make. sense of covid Origins and all of that. kind of stuff it's really helpful to. have a mandarin Mandarin speaking. biologists to be able to decipher that.

stuff that's the kind of diversity that. we need to operate on the streets of. Tyron who's going to have a better. chance of pulling that off a native. farsy speaker who lives is from there or. me probably not a blond hair blueeyed. Alabama boy that's exactly right that's. exactly right this is the kind of. diversity that's actually important in. the. intelligence um in the intelligence. world that we've we've lost that in. favor of this woke stuff so I think. getting more kids that are top students.

out of state schools and. HBCU and you know different places with. different backgrounds um than we have to. this point I think that's another thing. that would be really really. important how has. so this talks a lot about your your. faith as well correct yeah how has that. developed since. leaving well the great thing about. writing a book is it forces you to think.

deeply about whatever your topic you're. writing about and so my goal was um let. me take some of these cool stories from. inside the White House inside the. intelligence community and let me think. about a faith takeaway from each of them. a Biblical lesson that could come from. them and so it forced me to really dig. into the Bible more deeply than I ever. have before to to come up with these. lessons I had this kind of like these. columns I had a a cool story column and.

then I had like lessons that I would. like to to talk about column and so I. was trying to kind of like mix the two. of them together find the story that fit. with the lesson and then sometimes it. was like I've got a cool story but I. don't know what the lesson is and it. forced me to like really dig in and like. explore that and so that really deepened. my faith in a lot of ways having to. having to search for those those lessons. for sure man how long did it take you to. write that a couple of years I would. imagine in fits and starts I mean I I. didn't write it all at one time so I.

would I you know I'd get a little. inspiration and go for something for a. little while write a few entries and. then put it away for a while and then. come back to it so yeah over the course. of a couple of years anything specific. you want to bring up any specific. stories gosh I'm trying to think of what. would. be. um man there's so there's so many that I. could that I could point to I'll just. give you a couple that'll like help you. understand like what the book is like so. the story that I told earlier about.

going into the doomsday bunkers and that. experience so I walk through like what. it's like inside there and all these. different things that we saw and then I. talk about. how think about the people who actually. work in there. 24/7 that that work in that facility all. the time that every single day their. entire our life is devoted to thinking. about our impending potential doom and. how much anxiety it must take it must. have those people must have about things.

if that's the environment that they live. in every day and that sent me down a. rabbit hole of um understanding how big. of an impact anxiety is having on. American society right now 80 something. percent of Americans uh say that they. feel anxious on a day-to-day basis and. they're worried about the future uh and. then that led me down a rabbit hole of. like what does the Bible say about. anxiety and how do we live a life where. you know the Bible says don't worry. about tomorrow for tomorrow will worry.

about himself um and it also talks about. how uh you know if God uh cares about a. tiny Raven what happens to a tiny Raven. how how much more does he care about. what's going to happen to you also talks. about how uh God raises up Kings and he. takes down Kings our God is Sovereign. he's in control of everything but we. also see in the Bible that. preparation uh and Faith are not in in. conflict with each other so it's not. saying don't worry about the future. everything will take care of itself.

don't prepare Moses built an ark to. prepare to save his family even the. Bible says that even God sent John the. Baptist to prepare the way for Jesus so. we prepare we do the right thing but we. do it in faith knowing ultimately that. our God is in control of everything that. happens so that's an example of how I. take a cool inside story of what it's. like in the Doomsday bunker and then. talk about what does the Bible say about. anxiety there are a million examples of. that in in the book um we talked a.

little bit earlier about the Allure of. power CS Lewis wrote a lot about power. he called it the attraction of the inner. ring or the Inner Circle so all. throughout life we are attracted to the. inner ring when you are uh in elementary. school or in school you want to sit at. the cool kids table at lunch when you. get get into college you want to be in. not just a fraternity or a sorority you. want to get in the good fraternity the. good sorority you want to be inside that. Circle when you get into your. professional life you want to be in the.

you want to be in the good unit you. don't want to just be in the military. you want to be a seal you want to be on. Seal Team too oh and if you can you know. after we get done with that you know. what I think I want to go in CIA I want. to go get in that unit right there. that's doing that classified mission. that I can't even talk about so in the. military aspects of it there's the the. way and in our professional lives you. want to work your way up I remember for. myself when um I would often walk with. the president in the morning he would. get down uh from the residence off of. the private elevator on the ground floor.

of the residence and I would walk with. him out to uh into the Oval Office and. we'd talk about the news of the day. things that were going on that day. whatever it may be and this is when I. was a com staffer before I was at uh dni. and I would get into the oval and often. waiting for him were the CIA director. the chief of staff the Director of. National Intelligence maybe the vice. president and they were ready for him to. come in and have his intelligence. briefing so I would get ushered out of. that room and that door would close.

behind me and I it would eat me up. inside because I just like what's going. on behind that door right now what are. they talking about I want to be in that. room like I always want to be in the. room in the no in the inner ring and. this attraction of the inner ring is. something that follows us throughout our. entire lives and if but but here's what. CS Lewis says about it he said it's it's. like an. onion even if you peel it you keep. peeling it one layer to the next one. ring to the next closer and closer into.

the inner ring until there's nothing. left because when you peel an onion. ultimately it's it's gone once you peel. off that last layer so unless you can. conquer the fear of being an outsider an. outsider you will remain your entire. life and so I talk about how that the. interplay with that and what God's. vision of work in our careers are are. these are the kind of stories and. lessons that I try to get into in the. book very interesting you know earlier. we had talked about the attraction of. power in DC and anybody that wants to.

get into the White House politics into. into upper level government is seeking. power do. you I've had a little bit of interaction. with DC when it's is actually due to. this due to the show of some friends on. the in Congress and Senate St whatever. but. um and that and this last round there's. been a lot of veterans that ran and that.

got in there some have done a fantastic. job some have fallen flat on their face. and uh a lot of us are disgusted with. how how it turned out I don't feel like. and I knew some of these guys from. before and uh for the last state of the. union I just uh got invited there by uh. Tennessee Congressman Tim burett and um. so I got to a little bit of a peak.

behind the curtain not much but you know. and I've been there a couple other times. for some other stuff and you can you can. you can see the change and some of these. guys I really think they had good. intentions yeah you know and I don't. think it was about power I agree with. that Y and then they get in there and. it's I mean [ __ ] they haven't even been. in there two years and it's already some. of them been there longer than 2 years.

but it's you see a switch flip in a lot. of these guys and. it's it's disgusting yeah. but so I guess this is kind of two. questions one I mean with that being. said do you do you think there are a lot. of people with good intentions that go. in and then get flipped yeah sure sure. that's so it's not always about power. 100% 100% you know there are a few. different aspects of this so first of.

the military guys to go first of all I. think that's a great thing I would love. for more people who have least you know. shown that they're willing to serve our. country and put it all on the line those. to be the kind of people that go and. serve in the halls of Congress that'd be. amazing thing to get more of those folks. in there so great deal of respect for. you and all the people who served in. that way. the other side of that is what we talked. about earlier too that physical courage. and moral courage are not always in the. same package sometimes they are they can. be but a show of of physical courage is.

not. necessarily a guarantee that the moral. courage will will exist there and so. sometimes it's just people their. character gets exposed just like I was. talking about for myself you get in. there and you learn things about. yourself that you wouldn't have. otherwise and people get Aid up with it. man people get ate up with it I mean I. see it all the time people who plan. their lives around election Cycles uh. because they're angling for the next job. to run for the next thing to climb a. little bit higher up the ladder um and.

it's really really. hard to guard against that and. DC um the entire incentive structure it. perpetuates that everybody there I. guarantee you if you were there and and. they didn't know who you were the first. question would be who do you work for oh. man it was it it was disgusting yeah you. know there was some good people there. was a lot of people it was I this is how.

it would go I would get. introduced but and this is I don't like. I don't like parties I don't but I I. went cuz it's the State of the Union. whether I like the guy that's you know. doing it or not I don't it's history. right and and it's it's just cool to. witness something like that. and when I get introduced hey this is. Sean former Navy SEAL they could give. two shits former CIA they could give two. shits Sean has a top 10 podcast in the.

world now they care now they [ __ ]. care yeah and now they want to shake my. hand and now they want to be my my buddy. yeah and it's and and you know we were. talking about Fame and all this other. [ __ ] downstairs. and I don't buy into it cuz it's not. real and and but this see like man it's. just it just makes you look like such a. [ __ ] scumbag no doubt you know when I. left the i' always heard it said you. know when you leave here your phone's. going to stop ringing and I didn't fully.

appreciate that because I'm special Sean. how could these people really like me CU. I'm like such an interesting guy and. they like are really into me personally. and the day I left the White House my. phone legit did not ring like the for. the next 24 no one reached out no one. gave a hoot and a lot of those people I. have not spoken to since people that I. would have spoken to at least every week. if not every day the second that I was.

no longer in proximity to the president. of the United States phone don't ring. anymore um and again that's why I think. it was like a good thing for me to. experience this uh and all of these. things I mean I'm a firm believer that. God is preparing us for whatever the. plans that he has for us in the future. going through that now being able to go. back even when I went back to dni after. being in the white house I was much. better prepared for all of these. Dynamics having experienced all sides. the good and the bad sides of it before. going back into it DC is a sick Place.

bro it is a sick sick Place P full of. sick sick people and not sick in the way. that you you know you might think these. are these are people who honestly in a. lot of ways they don't know they're sick. they don't know they're ate up with. power in the way that they are they. still think that they're good people. they don't think that they've lost. themselves to it but they have and they. don't know it cuz they can't snap. themselves out of it because they're. surrounded by people who have the same. problem that they do and so that's why I.

think it's a great thing for people to. come from outside of DC into it to serve. for a period of time this is the vision. that our Founders had not that people. would be career government employees or. career uh politicians but they would. come in and serve for a season and then. go back to their lives well on top of. that you're not supposed to be living in. DC you're as a congressman right you're. supposed to live in your district and. work in DC and work in DC yeah but it's. it's now it's everybody just becomes a. DC resident yep and you know Screw their.

District yep you know the most the most. politically untenable position that I. hold I can't believe I'm going to say. this so maybe should cave out this by. saying I'm not actually proposing this. but as a thought. exercise we should triple the salary of. a member of Congress now you say that is. an insane idea right it's an insane idea. let me tell you why now it'll never.

happen it's a thought exercise there are. two types of people that serve in. Congress right now one type of person is. Rich and they don't need the paycheck so. it doesn't bother them that they're. going to have to have two residences a. place in their district and a place in. DC doesn't matter their family is not. going to have trouble making ends meet. on $180,000 a year even though the cost. of living in DC is nuts so $180,000 or. whatever it is sounds like a lot of. money and it is so don't don't get me. wrong not in downtown DC but when you're.

you have two. residences all the things that go along. with it it makes it where you got to. either be rich or it's the best job. you've ever had so now it's the other. end of the spectrum where it's like oh. man if I can get into Congress it's. going to be the most money that I've. ever made I'm going to have power I'm. going to be able to go to a dinner every. night where some lobbyist is paying for. dinner uh so I'm going to have all these. experiences that I otherwise wouldn't be. able to afford and what's missing in.

Congress is the middle of that which is. successful. entrepreneurs uh people who are ex have. shown excellence in the private sector. and doing some things outside of the. government but they haven't had a huge. exit where they made 100 million bucks. selling their company. you know they've got a family they don't. want to you know why would they subject. themselves to the scrutiny that's going. to go along with that they're going to. have to sacrifice the the lifestyle that.

they have in their small town somewhere. with their family and they're going to. be gone from their family all the time. they don't see a pathway granted it is. service so sacrifice is expected right. but also it's very difficult to do this. with if you're a a um a upper middle. class entrepreneur type person with a. family of five how in the world can you. see a pathway to running for congress. and representing your people that is not.

financially ruinous to your family yeah. now again it's a bad idea it'll never. happen but my point is that we're. missing a huge segment of talent that. has absolutely no interest and no. pathway in ever serving in government. how do you think that how do you think. this flip happens so fast this this this. obsession with. power money greed whatever whatever it. is that that yeah cuz i' I see it now I. see it now I knew I knew people before.

they were in there and now I see them. after they're in there yeah. and so the reason that I support term. limits is because of human nature if. every single day every single person. that you talk to tells you how great you. are and they need something from you and. they're asking you for something please. help me with my issues Sean we really. need you are the greatest I'm so glad. that you're representing me would you.

please help me with this and then every. lobbyist that comes to you is like hey. come out to dinner tonight man we'll. take care of you it's G to be a fun time. let's go out and hang out let's have a. good you know every person is you're so. great you're so great you're so great. some point human nature says you wake up. one day and you say to you. yourself I'm pretty great I am pretty. great all these people are right about. me and the second that that happens and. it's a subconscious. thing you've been had and that so I.

think it's human nature is what we're. complaining about more than it is just. DC and the only check on human nature I. mean sound like a broken record but like. I really believe that number one um a a. sincere faith in which you um truly. believe that there is a higher power in. this universe than you it's more. important than. you uh second thing uh I think having. people with families up there is a a a a.

big deal a big deal making policies that. are Pro-Am policies um I think that's. getting harder and harder to do. because I mean I'm I'm not going to. [ __ ] i' I thought about running the. last time been a lot of vets were. thinking a lot of my friends were. thinking about running because everybody. everybody in my. circle is very concerned with the way. the country is going and you know what.

the one common denominator is on why. nobody wants to do it family they don't. want to put their family through that. [ __ ] y 100% through the scrutiny through. the lies through the Y through it you. know and and yeah I mean I think I think. that was designed on purpose yeah no I I. I agree with with that it's hard for me. to uh I mean in some ways it's kind of. hypocritical of me cuz I think about. that too I I don't want to I love the. fact that I get to spend so much time.

every day with my six-year-old years. that will never get back you know I love. the fact that if he wants me to sleep in. bed with him every. night I can do that if I want to if we. want to just hang out one day and just. go to the trampoline park all day I've. got the ability to do that with him um. so I I I I feel hypocritical saying like. more people with young families need to. get out there and do it but I just think. it also changes so much about being a. dad has changed my perspective on a lot. of these policy issues and it's a much.

more personal thing when I'm thinking. about the impact that this stuff has on. on him I mean think about all the wars. that we have gotten into where other. people's Sons were sent off to bleed and. die because some politicians. whose kids all the time do it made that. decision the whole GW man the whole Iraq. War I think was a big money grab for the. for the HTT and Chen's Chen's.

organization but uh and in a lot of. other Wars y but uh but that that's a. big one for my generation what I was. getting to though is I'm not I'm not. talking about the separation of family. I'm talking about the scrutiny the. coming home and seeing your sixy. six-year-old boy overheard something on. the media of them just ripping you apart. maybe it's lies maybe it's trueu that. you never wanted to come out of a. mistake that you made 25 years ago y you.

know and and that's more what I was. getting at is the is. the the slander the defamation toally. that's that type of stuff yeah one of. the one of the things. that I don't think I'll ever forget it. being at the White House when. you're when you walk from the from the. West Wing to the east Wing the residence. in is in. between and on one side closest to the. West Wing is the Rose Garden very famous.

everybody's seen it a million different. times but on the other side in the same. place where the Rose Garden is on the. other side there's a small little Garden. on the East Wing side of the house. there's never any press over there. there's never. any um people from the outside allowed. to go over there White House tours don't. don't go over. there and I remember walking over there. one day and seeing Baron.

Trump can't remember how old he must. have been at the time so now he just. graduated high school so he's 18 now so. this would have. been so he's probably 11 years. old and there's a soccer goal set up out. there and his secret service security. detail is out there and they but they. have their backs to him they're looking. out you know protecting him they're. doing their job and it's Baron Trump. there by himself kicking a soccer ball.

into the soccer goal over and over again. by. himself and I started thinking about. exactly what you are right now that this. 11-year-old boy is has to. endure everything the left has thrown at. his dad at his family um the things that. they've written even about him a little. boy whether he likes it or not uh and I. just couldn't help but like stop and. like say a prayer for the kid that he's.

like going to have to endure this you. know because the life that they live and. the sacrifices that they have made for. for the country um it affects families. in a different way I mean I even think. about like my stuff now you know I get. plenty of criticism people say wild. things about me and you know whatever. doesn't really affect me anymore doesn't. really bother me but it bothers my wife. when she sees it yeah uh so I get. exactly what you're saying yeah I. mean so being a uh a man of the word and.

a a a. Christian what do you you you think. we're in approaching end times here I. think we ought to live like we are I. mean there's a lot of there's a lot of. things happening that are in that book. yeah y so so the the title of the book. is the darkness has not overcome it. comes from the gospel of john: 15 the. light shines in the darkness and the. Darkness has not overcome it and I name. the book that because I do think that. we're at a time where it feels very dark.

out there and there's a lot of really. bad things going on but the end of that. book is clear about who. wins and so I think that we have a lot. of Hope in the midst of this Darkness if. we're looking for it in the right places. and even in. Congress State of the Union not this. year but last year I went up there as. well a friend of mine in Congress. invited me the next morning 6:00 in the. morning to meet him at this house office. building and I walk in and there's eight. or nine members of Congress there have a.

Bible study with each other and nobody. would ever know about it I write about. it in the book um they weren't looking. for credit they weren't looking for. publicity the guys sitting there talking. about things they wish they had done. better the week before opportunities. that they missed that they wanted to. share the gospel colleagues they were. praying for talking about the things. they were struggling with eight or nine. guys and I had such a cynical view of. Congress and still do in so many. ways but it changed my perspective on.

things a little bit not because there. are people in Congress that we should. Place Our Hope in but there are people. in Congress who place their hope in. Christ so I do think even though it's a. really dark time that there is hope if. we're looking in the right places but. we're not going to find it on the never. ending C news TV programs we're not. going to find it in uh in politics at. all you. know the most important event in human. history most important event in human.

history it's a big statement now so this. better be good whatever it is that I'm. going to say the most important event in. human history is the death and. resurrection of Jesus. Christ tiberias was the emperor of Rome. when that happened Pontius Pilate was. the governor. of Judea when that happened but they. were not the central characters of the. story Jesus was so why on Earth would we. make politicians the central characters.

in our story today when politics has. consumed everything talk about it. non-stop it's every aspect of life it's. politics politics politics and the. Bible's sitting there saying politicians. aren't the central characters Jesus is. sitting there waiting for you that's. where our hope is so for me it is a dark. time feels like the end times we better. be living like it is because the Bible. says no no man knows the day or the hour. that he's coming but he's coming so we. should live like he's coming back today.

but we have a hope in knowing that that. our God is still in. control man that's uh very well said and. I I think that's the perfect spot to end. the interview um so thank you thank you. for having me I will ask one more thing. if um. you got to get back in the ring yeah are. you yeah stay in the ring man a fighter. man I want it I want it let's go let's. get after it right on all right Cliff.

well man what a what a fascinating. interview and and uh which just covered. so many aspects of your career and and. your experience in government and. intelligence and and and with the books. and man thank you for coming and I'm I. just want to say man I'm I'm very. thankful that we connected me too no and. thank you for this platform what you. have built it's extraordinary and. conversations like this that never. happen in the mainstream media could. never happen not just because of the.

format but because they don't want to. talk about the things that you're. willing to talk about on here and so uh. you know I told you off here I'll tell. you now you know the reason Tucker. Carlson came on on your podcast he said. I was looking at this and I said this is. an honest man and I met him and he is an. honest man and uh so you keep doing that. and this thing's going to keep blowing. up so I will thank you so much all right. God bless God bless. [Music].

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