Overtime – Episode #697: Jake Tapper, Rep. Seth Moulton

Welcome to an HBO podcast from the HBO late-night series, Real Time with Bill Ma.

All right, here we are in Overtime with the anchor of CNN's The Lead with Jake Tapper and co-author of the new book, Original Sin, Jake Tapper.

And a Democratic congressman from Massachusetts, Seth Moulton.

All right.

First one is for you, Congressman.

As a veteran, what is your reaction to Trump's plans for a military parade next month, which will reportedly include 28 Abrams tanks, 6,700 soldiers, 50 helicopters, 34 horses, two mules, and a dog.

That's what it says.

But he is having his military parade for his birthday.

Well, it's, you know, he's a draft Dodger.

It's his first military thing that he really gets to do.

But I think,

obviously,

he likes Putin.

He worships Kim Jong-un.

He wants to be like that.

That's what he wants to do.

He wants to be a dictator like those guys, and they have big military parades.

I mean it just seems to me like if we were taking seriously the idea that our government spends too much money, that Doge comes in there and like says, okay, we need to cut 80,000 jobs from the Department of Veterans Affairs and we're going to get rid of USAID and we're going to do this and do that.

I mean this seems like it's unnecessary.

You can help.

I just don't like the idea.

I mean.

To me, the worst part of it is getting used to the sight of tanks in the streets.

That is is something we don't see in America.

By the way, as a driver in Washington, D.C., like our roads are bad enough

before the tanks go.

Let me also be clear about something that if you didn't enter, you might not know.

We hate parades.

Like, you do not want to, you don't sign up for the military to be in a parade.

And $140 million, that could help a lot of vets.

It's a lot of money.

I mean, that's, you know, honestly, like, if we take them at their word, that Doge is about,

you know, our deficits are too big, the national debt is a disaster, we need to get control of spending.

If we take that seriously, this just doesn't make any sense.

There's literally nobody in the military community who wants this.

Why don't you guys like parades?

Because I thought everybody loved a parade.

I guess you got to march.

Because you got to march.

Yeah, I didn't sign up to march.

It's not my thing.

I'm with you.

Goose step or not.

Yeah.

That's probably what he's looking for.

What does the panel think of the Supreme Court ruling that the Trump administration can revoke legal status for 500,000 immigrants who have been granted parole for human

parole?

That's a strange word for that, for humanitarian reasons.

What they're talking about is 500,000 people that the Biden administration let in from, I think, Cuba, Nicaragua, Haiti.

And Afghanistan.

Venezuela.

And Venezuela.

Well, but also

from Afghanistan for people who risked their lives.

Right.

Not just for Afghanistan, but for the United States of America, who served all, I would not be here today if not for the translators that I had in Iraq.

I'm sure.

They saved our lives more than once.

And that's why veterans are so pissed off about this, because we've fought like hell to get them out of Afghanistan, and now Trump wants to just send them back home to that murderous regime where they'll be killed.

And it's not just in Afghanistan, but that just shows how morally corrupt he is.

And now, look, let's be honest, he's a racist.

He doesn't like black or brown people coming into the United States.

White Afrikaners, sure, roll out the red carpet.

But black or brown people, nope, not allowed.

The way that the U.S.

has treated the Afghan allies, not just now, but also right after the collapse of Kabul in August 2021, it's not just a disgrace and it's not just a violation of a promise that was made to these people.

It's also bad thinking because we will be less likely as a country next time we have one of these forays into foreign policy abroad, we'll be less likely to have people who will help us in whatever country it is because they will know that we didn't honor our promises last time.

I remember one of these conversations really well where my translator showed up for work and he said, I can't work for you anymore.

My family's been threatened, they're going to kill everybody at home.

And I had to make the case to him that we're the United States of America, we've got your back.

And he bravely kept working for us.

And I fought like hell to get him to America.

Now my family's worried he might get sent back.

Right.

Well, we don't have a great history of sticking by our promises.

No, the same happened in Vietnam, obviously.

And the Kurds.

Yep.

Remember the Kurds?

Promised them a lot?

Yeah.

Yeah, although, to be fair, we took in a lot of Vietnamese refugees, and they're around Northern Virginia today, and they're great contributors to our society.

I mean, let's also not forget what immigrants do.

I mean, immigrants founded Google, eBay.

Right?

I mean, they're great contributors to our economy, to our society.

We are a country of immigrants, right?

I think five of our top tenants Biden let it go too far.

This is a backlash to that.

We had an open border policy.

That's under the bite.

Okay, but you would admit that that's where this

feeling comes from.

Of course it's carried out in a horrible way.

But that's where if you do something, there's always going to be a counter to it.

I think there's a bit of just racism baked in.

There's Trump's thing.

There absolutely is.

But there was also an open border policy, it seemed like under the bite.

And we couldn't admit it was a problem.

Can I explain that?

And the Democrats...

Okay.

Yes.

I think you're complimenting it by calling it a policy.

Just

not to talk about my book again, but one of the things we discovered when we did this book, Original Sin, me and Alex Thompson, is

there's a

Senator Bennett from Colorado who went to an event in June 2024 where Biden seemed non-functioning, and he left that event, and this is in the book, thinking this is why our our border policy, our immigration policy is such a mess.

This guy can't manage the portfolio.

There are competing groups within the administration, and he's not engaged for whatever reason and that's why this policy is such a mess.

And I know that the Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, Mayorkas, he thought there was going to be an order early on in the Biden years shutting down the border or at least providing more security and the order never came.

So people talk about what are the repercussions of Biden not being

what we expect a president to be just in terms of functioning 100% of the time.

This is one of those things.

So I think calling it a policy might be a little optimistic.

Honestly, it's not just Biden.

I mean, I mentioned this during the show that our governor here recently reversed one of the policies we had here, which was free medical care to undocumented migrants, which pissed off a lot of people who think that that shouldn't be happening, that we should take care of our own, and that's why our taxes are so high.

And it was a rather generous

policy you got

as someone who wasn't even a legal citizen, including like being driven to appointments, I think I read.

Now, I mean,

if that's something that a state like California, which is right on the border of Mexico, is offering, can you blame people for pouring over?

I love all these changes that Newsom's doing, the conversion on the road to Des Moines.

Somebody's got to do it.

I mean, this is what we were talking about.

Look,

I'm a Democrat who believes that health care is a human right, but the bottom line is there are a lot of Americans who don't have health care.

And it's about to get a lot worse because of the bill that Republicans just passed in the middle of the night.

15 million Americans, not illegal immigrants, 15 million Americans who are going to lose health care because of what Trump and the Republicans are doing.

So we've got to keep that context in mind.

But the reason why people are pissed off is because a lot of people don't have good enough health care in America to.

But what the Republicans would say, what some people would call a conspiracy theory, and what they would just say is just their theory,

is that it wasn't a mistake that the border was left open.

They think that the people who come will vote eventually for the Democrats, and that was their plan.

Yeah, at the same time as Trump goes around telling everyone that all the Mexican immigrants, all the black people, they all voted for me this time.

So it doesn't matter if you're consistent here.

They're just trying to scapegoat people.

I think there's a much more innocent explanation, which is there are a lot of people, a lot of progressives, who think that the United States should be a refuge for anybody who wants to come here and build a better life.

I mean, it can be

well-meaning, if even a mistake.

I'm not saying it's the right policy, but I don't necessarily think it was a nefarious intent.

I think they think this is a much better country to live in than

if you took everyone who actually wanted to come there, you would double the policy.

Not my policy, but I'm just saying I think

you should incentivize legal immigration, right?

Not illegal immigration.

When I was talking about my translator who lived in my hometown, I was on my fourth deployment to Iraq and he was living in my bedroom back home, ironically.

And he was fighting through the legal process to get qualified to become a citizen, which he did, and he's a citizen today.

But along the way, someone told him, you know, you ought to just go to Mexico and walk over.

That's the problem.

When people think you can do that and get away with it, it doesn't.

Immigration is great.

It's been essential to our society.

None of us would be here today without our immigrant ancestors.

But let's make it legal.

Let me ask you one last question as a

person with military background.

I saw in the paper today Trump is talking about his golden dome.

You know, Israel has the iron dome to shoot down missiles, and it's been a tremendous success over there.

He, of course, wants to up that to a golden dome.

I mean, someone's going to be a good one.

It's

very hard to parody this guy.

He beats you to it every time.

It's a golden dome.

Okay.

He offered Canada this deal.

Join as the 51st state, and you'll get the golden Dome free.

The Golden Dome will cover you too.

Otherwise, it's going to cost $61 billion if you want coverage of the Golden Dome for Canada too.

I mean, we could do it, but it's going to cost $61 billion.

Or you can join as the 51st date and get it for free.

Your choice, and we will throw in the undercover.

I mean,

what is your?

We have a problem with terminology here because Israel also just unveiled what they call the Iron Beam.

And part of the Golden Dome is shooting things from space, but we also want the iron beam or the golden dome shooting things up.

So we're trying to decide how do you distinguish

the golden beam here from the golden beam there.

And I think we should call the one coming down the golden shower.

And then that's probably something that Trump would like even more.

All right.

Thank you very much, ladies and gentlemen.

We're not going to tap that.

All right.

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