Why Fading Trump, 79, Just Keeps Losing: Rothkopf | The Daily Beast Podcast

Donald Trump right now has precisely zero wins. since he has become president again. I mean, you could say the big beautiful bill, but the. the reaction of the public to the bill has been terrible. It's it's hugely unpopular. And and so I think all this is weighing on him. and his own mortality is weighing on him. And the same thing is weighing on him.

And and he he just looks like he can't handle it. I'm Joanna coles. This is the Daily Beast podcast. And what a terrible week for Michael Wolff, for myself to both be traveling. Michael is in London, I'm in Los Angeles, and we skipped a podcast or two because we thought no one would notice. But in fact, what an extraordinary week it's been. The emergence of Governor Cox, this morning with, his press conference. and, of course, a terrible week for President Donald Trump,

who's emerged with a strange, droopy mouth, terrible job numbers, heckled at a restaurant the first time he steps outside the white House. And, of course, the awful untimely deaths. of Charlie Kirk, the young conservative. What a week in America's life. And, of course, the strange Russian incursion into Polish airspace. and the ever looming Ukraine.

and Russia war, which, despite Donald Trump's promise. that he would end on his first day in office, has continued to haunt him. And who better to talk about this with what this means for America. and what this means for America's place in the world, than David Rothkopf, The Daily Beast's brilliant columnist who served in the Clinton administration. He was the editor of Foreign Policy magazine, and he has his own network, Deep State Radio.

A series of very good podcasts. David, let's get into it. David Rothkopf is with us. David, you've written some excellent columns for The Daily Beast this week. Thank you. What an extraordinary week and actually a terrible week. It's just been such a such a bizarre week for for him. And then we see Donald Trump cheering away at the Yankees and on the sofa. of morning television at Fox News today. What what do you make of all this.

Can you can you contextualize this week for us? Well, first of all, I don't think Donald Trump can take many more weeks like this. because among the things. he didn't mention, you know, there was this shot of him. and he looked like he had just had a stroke. You know, this picture of him. Those bear, the droopy mouse. Him. Right. And and, you know, last night at the Yankee game, he disappeared for 55 minutes. He went out of the room and disappeared. And, you know, nobody's nobody's sure about that. But he's looked fragile throughout the week.

When he was at that restaurant in Washington. and he started being heckled, he he looked panicked. He pushed himself up against the wall. He held himself still. He wanted to get them out. He he just didn't look like he could handle it very well. I think he was I think he was really shocked by the murder of Charlie. Charlie Kirk, he looked. I mean, I feel like he felt close to him. and that was part of it.

But I also think Trump has a morbid concern for his own health. I think he's afraid of assassination. I think he he feels. I mean, and rightly so. Right. I mean, he he very nearly got assassinated last summer, not once, but twice. Well, that's right. And we're also living, as many people have noted this week, in a period of political violence. where, you know, each week there is some news story, whether it's some guy shooting up the center for Disease Control or this,

Minnesota legislator and her husband, getting, assassinated or, you know, at cetera, etc.. So, but but I'm just saying Trump seems. stressed out by it and he seems older with each passing week. And and you could even see it with, you know, for example, the, the Russian drones flew into Poland and, and he's handled it badly from a foreign policy perspective. But but you can also see sort of that he's.

he's like, okay, well this will work itself out. I it's like he doesn't have energy to deal with Gaza any more energy. to deal with Ukraine or energy to deal with the Congress anymore. And, you know, perhaps that's normal. You know, he's 79 year old guy's going to be 80th in his next birthday. But but I would say if I was Trump's family, I'd be I'd be worried about his health. Well, let's just talk about him and his relationship with Charlie Kirk,

because I agree that, I mean, first of all, it was a shocking death to everybody, right? Not just Donald Trump, but for Trump, who had himself a brush with, as we said, not one, but two assassination attempts last year, I wondered if it had triggered something for him. I mean, we have no idea if he's ever suffered post-traumatic. stress disorder from what was a close shave with death. We know he went straight into the RNC after that and he seemed booted up by it.

But sometimes PTSD takes it takes months. or years to actually bubble to the surface. Yeah, I think that's true. Yeah. I mean, you know, I'd the whole story of the assassination attempt last year. was was kind of weird. And, you know, was he shot? Was he not shot? What hit him? Why didn't he go to a doctor? And all the, you know, there were legitimate questions about it, but clearly, clearly it impacted him deeply.

Yeah. There was something else that came out about all of this. that I think is interesting because most of the commentary has been, you know, from the right. Well, this must have been somebody from the left and Trump fanning. the flames of that from the left being, no, this isn't that. And now then you see the guy and he's the son of a sheriff. from a religious Republican family. And the things that were written on the bullets were not ideological. They were they were gamer phrases that he'd picked up, you know, as a gamer.

And then you think of him and you think of the guy who shot. at Trump, allegedly in Pennsylvania, think of. Thomas Matthew Cook's. Right. You think of the guy they found in the bushes in Florida. You think of most of the shooters that you see and a lot of them what's. what's super worrying to more people about them is they're not political. These are alienated twentysomething males who are online to much,

who are mentally not very healthy and that have too much access to guns. and that. So, you know, a lot of them go and they gravitate towards political violence. because it's visible, because that's what people are talking about. But but, you know, I don't know if we're interpreting what's going on. Quite right. Yes, we are the very divided moment. But if we want to get to the root causes of the violence, it's something else. It's it's a pathology within our society.

But it's not as political as people say it is. What do you mean? It's a pathology in our society. And can we relate this? I, I was very, I was. actually very heartened by Governor Cox at the press conference this morning. when they announced, the arrest of Tyler Robinson. I thought, you know, he went through his his usual spiel of explaining. that they'd got the alleged guy, and then he came back and talked about how. this could be the end of a dark moment, or it could be the beginning.

of an even darker moment. And he talks about Democrats and Republicans getting together. And I thought he thread the needle by mentioning Trump, in a way to acknowledge Trump, something I think as a Republican governor. you had to do, but then went on to be completely, Trumpian. And I thought, oh, if I were J.D. Vance, I would be watching this guy. This is a candidate. Cox emerging. But he referred to the 60s. He said he was born in 1975, but he grew up understanding.

the 60s had been this incredibly dangerous decade. We had three assassinations, obviously JFK, then his brother RFK, and then Martin Luther King. Can you put this in a sort of historical context? And I'm not suggesting you're so old as to remember that I show you up. I think you were born in the 80s, David. I think you were born in the 80s. But, But it wasn't to your time. Take your best shot of me. I can handle it. Okay?

Right. I'm from new Jersey. I'm used to being able to handle that kind of stuff. You, Michael Wolff, you're always claiming the new Jersey defense. Well, it's a look. It's a distinction. We could survive. Jersey. You can survive anything. But but but but but but in terms of this, let me. because you asked two questions effectively. There are 3 or 4 questions I love. It. Let me let me just break it into two parts. As far as the pathology goes, you know, I'm not a shrink. My my daughter's a psychotherapist. I've learned something from her.

And, you know, I think one of the things that we understand. about pathologies is there are many contributing factors. The fact that we're a country that's got more guns than people. and we're the only developed country like that. We have a unique set of, challenges to our society. And 50,000 people or 40,000 people dying every year of gun deaths. That's a part of it. I think it's a hundred thousand die from gun deaths. I think that may be, our victims, but I don't know you.

Maybe you may be right. But the point is this higher than any other developed country by a lot. Why? Because there are a hundred million more guns in the country. than there are people. So that's one thing. I think another thing is that we do have a lot of people who are alienated, disconnected, you know, victims of being online too much. And we, we, we totally, underserved people with mental health in the United States. We don't provide them. with mental health care money and, and and so on and so forth.

And then there is this culture of violence which sort of connects to your other. it's your other question where our political dialog. has been infused with violence, you know, was just a week ago, the president was, you know, was positioning a meme of himself saying, you know, he was going to go to war with Chicago. He uses the language of war. He changed the name of the Department of Defense, the Department of War. He you know, the only thing Pete that likes to talk about is lethality.

And, you know, Trump is talking about, you know, the. the left as being violent lunatics and so forth. And, and so that that contributes to the pathology in this country. But the governor. of Utah tried to counteract that in some respects. I mean, he sounded in some respects very much like a typical. Republican politician in mentioning Scripture. And, and, and he was sort of playing to the base,

but he did something very different from Trump. And you're right to point it out. He said, we didn't have looting. We didn't have riots. We talked to one another. We listened to one another. We came together. And it's time that we need to all come together as a country. And Trump presented with the exact same. opportunity on Fox News this morning, where they said, well, the people on the right and on the left that do this, he said, no, the ones on the right, they just want us to fight crime.

It's the ones on the left who are dangerous that worry me. So Trump is is a voice of division. And it you raise a really good question, which is are people getting sick of this? Do they see the violence in this? Are they looking for something different? JD Vance is like a barnacle, you know, just doing whatever Trump does, sticking to his side, and and mimicking the words of division of Trump. But is there room for a Republican?

Is there room for a Democrat that says this division is a big problem. and we have to find a way to heal the division, because I think a lot of Americans believe that, and, you. know, you know, it it was a different. kind of sounding GOP leader. And and it was encouragement. I mean, I think one can take some hope from that because surely. we have a problem and it is like the 60s.

There is this kind of craziness in the land of people. going out and acting out their anger. That that leaves a death toll and leaves many other victims. Well, and and the rhetoric is amplified by social media. You're right. Which which there wasn't in the 60s. Do you think that. Well, what do you think China and Russia are thinking as they look at this? The, the they couldn't be happier. I mean, what they're seeing is the United States,

their principal rival, the principal counterbalance to their power, getting weaker and weaker with each passing debt. They see the president of the United States embroiled in a sex scandal. They see the president of the United States aging and not handling it. They see the president of the United States without any, expert advisors bumbling his way through global affairs. They see the U.S. economy, which for most Americans is the big story of the week. Prices are going up with the turned out, we also learned this week that we.

we actually created a million less jobs than we thought we had. The economy could be heading for stagflation, kind of a condition. that's bad for everybody, but nobody knows how to solve it. And, and and they say, well, they're falling behind. XI Jinping, meanwhile, having big parades, having summits, gaining power. Putin tests Trump every couple of weeks. He test Trump this this incursion into Poland was a test of Trump.

And every single time Trump fails the test or he succeeds from his point of view. But even today on Fox News, he was like, well, you know, the poles. shot down the drones. That's why they landed in Poland. And you can't you go like, Holy mackerel, are you kidding me? That's the problem. If they had only not shot down the drones, you know, and there were. scores and scores of drones and it's like, well, it could have been an accident. They may not have meant for it to be there.

And immediately the poles are like, no, they mean for it to be there. And, you know, the you know, finally, the problem with that is. why are the Russians are testing for a reason? The reason is. they want to see where they can advance next. If they do advance next, whether we are engaged or not. And they're likely to advance because of our own weakness, there is going to be a war on a scale that no one has seen for 80 years. And and the weakness of the American president,

like the weakness of appeasers that came before him. And that's what he was doing on Fox News this morning. It looked like a morning chat. Right. But he was appeasing the Russians that. that could lead to consequences that will make us forget. everything else you've talked about in the course of this, pot. Well, what are your sources. in the diplomatic arena? In other countries? What are they telling you about?

About how America presents at this point? Well, I think it's a little bit like what we've talked about in the past, but what I'm hearing is that they don't trust us. And so while they go in and they flatter Trump sometimes, or they try to deal. with Trump and Rubio, you know, at, you know, in much the same way you, you know, you'd sort of humor an older relative was losing it. They're all planning to to go their own way. They're all becoming less dependent. on the United States and more dependent on one another.

And in some respects, maybe that's a good thing. Maybe the US had too much influence. But from the point of view of all these other countries, the US was the the foundation of Pax Americana. The US was the basis that have kept us from having a world war for eight years. And with that gone, and with people wanting to test the limits. of what they can do, like Putin, like Netanyahu, like perhaps XI Jinping,

it's super dangerous to have a void where once you had. the world's most powerful nation, and they all fear that. It felt this week. as if Trump was out and about because he was responding. to all the rumors that suggested he was ill, that possibly he'd. actually died, over the, over the weekend. He was obviously under instruction or he decided to get out and about. And yet, as you said earlier, he seems deflated.

There is so much going on, and his usual bluff and ability. to throw it off and change the narrative, it doesn't seem to have happened. Do you think the Russia and Ukraine situation is weighing on him? I mean, it is something he promised he would sort out on his first day. We overheard him on hot. mic saying to Macron, oh, I think that Putin wants to do a deal with me. I know it's crazy, but you know, when you have pointed out on this podcast.

that he uses his personal relationships with people in lieu of actually having any. kind of strategy with foreign countries, with the international community. Do you. think that particular situation, and his failure. to resolve it in any way whatsoever, is weighing on him? I think all these everything, everything he said he was going to do, he can't do right. He said he was going to starve Ukraine in a day. It's not going to be solved. He said he could solve the problem in Gaza.

It's getting worse. He said he was going to bring peace to the Middle East, getting worse. He said he was going to make America stronger. Vis-a-vis our allies. He's not. He said he'd fix the economy and fix inflation. Inflation is going back up. Jobs are not being created. He said he would, you know, rebuild the country from within. with his new policies of immigration and, you know, getting tough on and in cities and stuff. Those policies are super unpopular. His policies of of of of, you know, gutting health care,

you know, 11 million or so people are going to be kicked. off of Medicare next year and they're worried about it. The people he's put into the government are not competent. Donald Trump right now has precisely zero wins. since he's become president again. I mean, you could say the big beautiful bill, but the. the reaction of the public to the bill has been terrible.

It's it's hugely unpopular. And and so I think all this is weighing on him. and his own mortality is weighing on him. And the ABC thing is weighing on him and, and he, he just looks like he can't handle it. I give you an example. The other day, yesterday, I guess somebody came up to him outside the white House. He's doing one of these, conversations with the press. Who are there, who are allowed near him, which is not really the press these days,

but he's doing one of these conversations, and somebody says to him, oh, I'm. very sorry to hear about your friend Charlie Kirk. How are you holding up? Print. That's a kind of a softball question, right? You know, Charlie was a good guy. I don't feel so bad about it. It's a big loss for his family. He goes, you know, I'm holding. I'm holding up pretty good. You can see the trucks here, and they're building the ball room. And, you know, they wanted to have a ballroom here for 150 years, and it's just going to go over there and you're like, what with.

Hello? Is anybody home? What's going on. between those ears and and the and the reality is we get that a lot. They get meandering. We get him searching for an answer that, you know, it's like I don't know somebody with dementia. And I'm not saying that that's what he has. Searching for the right word or phrase, trying to recall. what it was that got them to where they are right now. And I think he's I just think he's losing it.

So this does seem like an opportunity then for a Democrat. I actually think you saw Governor Cox stepping into an opportunity. sometimes history gives you a moment and you seize it. And I thought, oh, we're seeing perhaps this is an emergence. of a kind, GOP and and you said earlier, oh, it's like, you know, a normal GOP person and you've forgotten. about the normal Republicans because the MAGA Republicans have been so. noisy and so loud and you feel like they've eclipsed or other, Republicans.

But as we know, the voters are largely moderate. They're they're in the middle. This is an opportunity for Democrats. who is emerging. Well, you know, you always turn it to that. It's like things are going well. and it's like, I feel like I have answers for things. And and that one I'm not so sure. But let me let me ask you a couple things. One, this week we saw a win for a Democrat. That was kind of a big win, and it hasn't gotten a lot of attention.

But Donald Trump decided not to go to Chicago. You know, Pritzker and the people of Chicago said, no, you're not coming here. We're going to block you. We're going to make this difficult. We're going to challenge it in part. And Trump changed his tune. He said, no, we're going to go to Memphis instead and said, we're going to go. And you know, we're going to take my campaign someplace else. So Pritzker kind of won on that ground. You've also started to see that some of the Democrats who are new voices, like Mamdani in New York or, or, the mayor,

in, Boston, who are. seen as progressives are doing better and better. She won a big victory in Boston against the others. And then, the Kraft Sons stepped out of the race. She's a rising star. Mamdani just yesterday met with Bloomberg. People are starting to realize he's going to win. And, you know, he even stepped back some of his criticism of the NYPD because. he's moving from one kind of campaign into kind.

of a more of a governing mode. And finally, I think, you know, one of the and one of the little. things that gets under. my nerve is a lot of people go, oh, Mamdani, that's just a New York story. It can't apply anywhere else. And I think the reason they say that is because it applies everywhere else, because authentic, young, real change. agent sense of humor understands how the modern media works. All the things that are appealing, and especially people are listening.

to people and try to deal with the problems. they've got, which is food costs too much, rent costs too much. They feel like the top. 1% are getting everything, and everybody else is being left behind. And whether it's you know, that they can come up. from across the political spectrum, like gubernatorial candidates. in Virginia and New Jersey, both women, both Democrats, both with strong national security background. who look like they're going to win their race is pretty handily.

And so there are encouraging stories. Elissa Slotkin in Michigan is another person like that. Wes Moore in Maryland is another person like that. There are encouraging stories out there. And I just think that these. two things that we're talking about here intersect. the era of Trump is going to come to an end. There is no clear or appealing heir apparent to Trump. Whether it's is Trumpism over when Trump eventually dies, is Trumpism gone?

Well, I think that's something people have debated. But my guess is it is. My guess is it is because the degree to which Trumpism was very much. about one guy, and his style of dealing with things. and the fact that people believed he was, you know, going to shake things up. because he was who he was, that's going to go and I don't, you know, you're not going to believe that about JD Vance or Marco Rubio or those guys. Is is the effort of the far right.

to try to control the courts, use all the scorched earth tools they can to control. the Congress controlled states, get their cultural agenda. advanced, going to end where Trump has gone now. Because because it existed before Trump, you know, it's existed for 40 years, that effort. And so that'll continue. But it's going to take on a different tone. And, you know, when you talk about Cox, I think it's a very interesting point.

because where is he from? Utah. Who does he sound like? He sounds like the most demeaned. loser in American politics in the past ten years. The victim of Trump, Mitt Romney. Yeah. You know, Mitt Romney, the guy who was actually right. about Russia, Mitt Romney, who, you know, was from Utah. and from Massachusetts, who, you know, had a but but but yeah, I. I couldn't have been more middle of the road. Right, right. That's total centrist.

Right and right. And and you know, there are plenty of you know, he shouldn't have left his dog on the car. You know, he should have a bunch of things about Mitt Romney. But if that's the only thing that you have against Mitt Romney, that he put his dog in a box on the car roof. compared to the modern politician there, compared to the the macro politicians. That's, you know, how quaint to think that that was an issue for people. that, It's it's adorable, you know? No, seriously, to think about what.

we were talking about ten years ago is just adorable. You know, Barack Obama's tanned suit, you know, you know, this, this, this kind of stuff. It's it's just adorable. But there was a pernicious sub current. Mitch McConnell was around. Dick Cheney was around. Leonard Leo was around. The Koch brothers were around. There were things happening that led us to this point.

The question is, you know, it's I don't think Trump's going to go away. and we're going to flip the switch and have a whole new America. But the question is, what's the trend line? And are we moving back a little bit. towards civility, back a little bit towards substance, back a little bit. towards public service again as being a principle. we like to see, the guiding, you know, are people in high office. and I think the signs are that's quite possible. Well, I liked Cox's message about get off your phone,

go out into the community, do some public service, hug your friends. Feel it, feel the grass. Feel the grass. I thought all of that was a very positive message. And it was surprising to have, a Republican. politicians say something like that because we've moved so far. But I thought there were two things that seemed very symbolic. One, the paving over of Jackie Kennedy, his rose garden. Just the metaphor of that. And then the other was that at the restaurant where he got heckled.

I thought that Pete Hegseth, Marco Rubio. and JD Vance looked embarrassed for Trump. They looked embarrassed, and he knew that they were embarrassed and he was caught. And as he said, he. sort of backed into the corner and the Secret Service have come in for, some pressure because. it was felt that they should have managed to get CodePink out of the way. Where did CodePink the protesters come from? But there was something in that moment that I thought was very telling.

Yeah. I mean, also the fact that Trump was surrounded by Moe, Larry and Curly, right? I mean, those three guys that you just mentioned, you know, the. Three states of. The Three Stooges is, you know, but it says something because that's what he's chosen. I mean, you know, think think about, you know, the fact. that when this horrible crime happened, who did they dispatch? You know, Holmes and Watson, you know, Cash Patel and Dan Bongino, the the the Keystone Cops,

every single thing they have done or said. with regard to this particular crime he has has been a mistake. And it's because Trump has surrounded himself with losers. And this is going to prove to be a particular problem for him, because as he ages and as he faces all of these complex issues. and he doesn't have his family around him and he doesn't have anybody around him. who, who he can turn to and say, you handle this. because none of them have the capacity to handle it.

I thought it was a strange comment at the end of his, spiel at the press conference, Kash Patel, referring to Charlie Kirk, said, see you referring to Charlie. Kirk said, see you in Valhalla. When I was growing up, Valhalla was a place that Vikings went to. They went off on a ship when they were dead. and you pushed them off into the sea or the lake. That's about all. That's when when you were a Viking.

You up bro? I grew up in the north of England on a Viking stock. And you're probably part Viking. I think I am part Viking. And not that, not. Yeah, whatever that means. You know, however long it was that they came to, that was to England. Well, first of all, kind of weird to choose Valhalla when you're talking. about a guy who was so, you know, overtly Christian all the time. Right? Because that's not the Christian habit, but there's a reason for it,

and it's it's a little dark, but the reality is that. the people who talk about Valhalla a lot are white supremacists. There are a lot of those. those kind of white supremacist groups like to evoke Vikings. They like to evoke that kind of thing. And you know who who did go to Valhalla, by the way, in Viking and Norse mythology, it was warriors. The reason they celebrated is because they feel they're all in involved. in an existential struggle to restore,

you know, the white male, you know, domination to the United States. and, and, and so I think, you know, that's one of the other things. we have to look at and all this stuff, and it comes exhausting after a while. But it's it's like there's code. being spoken and, and, and that the, the, the story, somebody is always trying to twist, twist the story a little bit to suit, you know,

you know, audiences and, and Cash Patel was trying to do that. And I think Governor Cox saw that, knew that and seized back that narrative. Anyway, I see Candidate Cox emerging in an unexpected, an unlikely way. I'm sure he's going to be very happy. to have the Viking vote from northern England behind it. Okay. David Rothkopf, it's always good to talk to you.

Thank you for shedding some wisdom. and some light on what has felt like a very dark week. And we will come back to again and again for more wisdom, please. And I always like to come back because I enjoy the conversations. Well, thank you, thank you. And I want to just refer listeners. to your columns in the Daily Beast every week you write and again, from a position of great knowledge and and wisdom, something. which is not appreciated as much as it should be these days.

Thank you very much, David. Have a very pleasant weekend. Who better to. unpack a very complicated week like this than David Rothkopf? He brings such wisdom and insight and perspective to everything he talks about. And what an extraordinary week it was a terrible, untimely death. and clearly the emergence of a new Republican candidate in Spencer Cox. If I were JD Vance, I would be very nervous indeed.

that there is an alternative to Trumpism. And this morning we saw its emergence. Anyway, if you have been, thank you for joining us. Don't forget to subscribe to The Daily Beast just at the Daily beast.com. Also, join the Daily Beast Network, which you can do by pressing the join button. Under this under this video, if you're watching on YouTube, subscribe on Apple, Spotify or wherever else you get your podcast.

Don't forget to share it with a friend. Leave us a comment on YouTube and you can leave us comments now. on The Daily Beast too. And this week we've had lots and lots of you writing in to share your thoughts. about Charlie Kirk's untimely death. So thank you for that, and know that we read the comments. and some of your suggestions for guest and stuff we're really trying to act on. I'll be back tomorrow with Michael Wolf. Michael Wolf is in London. Neither of us will ever travel again after this week. But I look forward to getting Michael's perspective from from Europe, too.

And as our first lady who emerged from wherever she's been hiding, to talk about. AI and the robots are coming and to be at her husband's side. at the 911 memorial, as our first lady would have us say, beast. And thank you to our production team, Devin, Roger Reno and Ersan and. our editor, Jesse Millwood.