Kaitlan Collins: Still Surreal

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Speaker 4 Hello, and welcome to the Bulwark Podcast. I'm your host, Tim Miller.
Shana Tova, to our Jewish listeners and to the Gentiles whose kids are off school today because it's a Jewish holiday like mine.

Speaker 4 I'm here today with Caitlin Collins. You might know her.
Anchor at the source on CNN at 9 p.m. Eastern Time on weeknights.
You can watch that unless I'm on with Alex Wagner. What's happening, Caitlin?

Speaker 3 No, you can still watch, just like put them both on.

Speaker 4 DVR, picture in picture. How are we? I'm doing great.
Welcome to the board podcast. First time.

Speaker 3 Can I tell you, everyone keeps saying to me, like, you only have 30 more days until the election. Like, you can do it.

Speaker 3 And I'm like, yeah, I'm sad about that because I feel the election slipping through my fingers. And I love the election.
And I don't actually want it to be over.

Speaker 3 And I think I'm like the only person who feels that way.

Speaker 4 No, you and I are together. We're cosmic allies on this because I like when people say it to me, I get a feeling in the pit of my stomach.

Speaker 4 And then I'm like, oh my God, I'm going to have to do this podcast in December with either Donald Trump going to be the president again or

Speaker 4 when it's kind of boring, coconut time. I'm like, anyway, I don't know.
I like the rush. I'm with you.

Speaker 3 Yeah, but I think either way, it's still going to be fun. Like regardless, like from a news perspective, regardless of who wins, obviously it's going to be super interesting.

Speaker 3 I think if Harris wins, like, you know, who she puts in her cabinet, if we have a Republican Senate, like there's still so much potentially interesting stories to come that I don't think it'll be over after November.

Speaker 4 That is true. That makes me feel better.
The Republican Party infighting, Donald Trump trials, maybe. Speaking of which, we have news on this front.

Speaker 4 It's our first, like, Donald Trump trial news in a while. Tanya Chutkin unsealed Jack Smith's 165-page brief that outlined his strategy for prosecuting the January 6th case against Trump.

Speaker 4 The Pence stuff was what really jumped out to me. What jumped jumped out to you?

Speaker 3 So I think just reading this as someone who, one, lived this as a White House reporter, two, obviously covered the indictment last year very closely. Still reading this, there's new things in here.

Speaker 3 And it does give us, you know, the biggest and maybe most comprehensive picture of that time period and what Jack Smith would argue in court. He may never get the chance to do so.

Speaker 3 So when I was reading it last night, that's what I was thinking is, you know, this is what we would see at trial, that the trial that may never happen.

Speaker 3 If Trump wins, obviously, it's definitely not happening in the next 32 days. And so I remember that day,

Speaker 3 and it's easy to think back now and you're like, yeah, we know this because we've seen the congressional testimony. I remember that day as all this was happening, I got a call from someone.

Speaker 3 Where were you?

Speaker 3 I was at the White House and watching it all unfold. And I got a call from someone.

Speaker 3 who had been a longtime source of mine, very close to Trump, very like, not one of those people who like shit talked Trump behind the scenes, very much someone who was a believer.

Speaker 3 And they said, I just got off the phone with him and he sounds giddy. And I was like, that's impossible.
Like, look at what's happening right now. This is insane.

Speaker 3 And they were like, no, he sounds almost happy about it. And so we reported that on air.

Speaker 3 And so to read this aide who rushed in, I think it's Nick Luna, but I'm not 100% sure, who rushed in to tell me.

Speaker 4 What was Nick Luna's job for people

Speaker 4 who are not deep in the cremonology of the White House?

Speaker 3 He was basically an assistant to the president and ran Oval Office, not operations exactly, because that was metal and Westerhouth, but he was essentially always there with Trump to help him.

Speaker 4 Capacity level kind of thing.

Speaker 3 Yeah, to help with like logistics, who's coming in, who's going out kind of thing. And

Speaker 3 to read that this person rushed in and testified to the grand jury that they told Trump Pence has to be evacuated to somewhere secure because he's not safe, in part because of what you've been tweeting and saying and your supporters.

Speaker 3 And Trump just goes, so what?

Speaker 4 Yeah. I mean, those things kind of go together, right? The fact that he didn't care about Mike Pence and also that he liked it.

Speaker 4 I mean, this is like, if you're a megalomaniac and all you want is attention and you have like a black hole in your heart and there's like thousands of people like waving your flags and storming a capital, shouting your name, it's got to be about as close as you can get to like fulfilling your megalomaniacal desires.

Speaker 4 You know, I'm not a psychologist, but there's just got to be something to that.

Speaker 3 And this was someone who, you know, for two months had been saying, no, I won the election. No, I won the election.

Speaker 3 Being told by the White House counsel, the attorney general, all these people around him, no, you didn't. And, you know, you got to let this go.

Speaker 3 And finally, he had this crowd of people who were on his side, who agreed with him. And obviously, if you've ever been to a Donald Trump rally, you see how much he feeds off of that.

Speaker 3 And yeah, I think that was it.

Speaker 3 He was so happy to see people who were as angry about the election as he was and didn't care about the truth as much as he didn't either and were willing to push the boundaries on that and acting it out.

Speaker 3 So reading this, I found it really fascinating just because it reads almost like a novel.

Speaker 3 You know, I asked one of our attorneys that we had on set last night when we were off camera, I was like, how do you think Jack Smith feels?

Speaker 3 You know, that they did all this work on this investigation. They've interviewed all these people.
Mark Meadows, Mike Pence, like top, top people.

Speaker 3 And some of this stuff may never see the light light of day beyond court filings that people like you and me are reading.

Speaker 4 What did he say? How did he think Jack Smith feels about that?

Speaker 3 This person didn't know. I was just,

Speaker 3 that's just what I was curious about is like the Jack Smith team. Like, you know, the people who worked on the classified documents investigation obviously disbanded after it was dismissed.

Speaker 3 And to think that you put so much effort into something so serious as prosecuting a former president. And then

Speaker 3 because of what happened with Judge Cannon or because of just how this worked out with the Supreme Court, it may never even even go to court.

Speaker 4 I hope you get the Jack Smith interview so we get to learn about that at some point in the future.

Speaker 3 Can we manifest that? Because I would love. Jack Smith, if you're listening, nine o'clock unseated is waiting for you.

Speaker 4 Hey, Jack. We know Jim Comey listens.
Hey, Jim, maybe you can tell Jack to do it. You know who else I found out listens recently? We should say hello to? Jeff Clark.

Speaker 4 Jeff Clark listens to this podcast to see what the enemies are thinking. So hello, Jeff.
I do think you should probably be in jail, but I appreciate the download. You know, support our sponsors.

Speaker 4 I'm not going to comment on that because Jeff Clark will tweet at me okay yeah smart smart the other thing uh that jumped out to me was that jack smith has the forensic data on trump's phone yeah did you see this yeah so the forensic data on the phone he was on his twitter app watching fox so i guess he had a multi-screen thing because he's in the dining room he's got the super ti vo on he's got his twitter app on he's watching fox

Speaker 4 At the time, they checked at Fox's interviewing a man who says that he's frustrated that Pence was not blocking the certification.

Speaker 4 And then Fox had reported that a police officer may have been injured. So Trump obviously hears this information.

Speaker 4 And that is when he sends the 224 tweet, Mike Pence didn't have the courage to do what should have been done to protect our country. Yeah.
We kind of knew the general sense of that, but I don't know.

Speaker 4 I found that was interesting, like how deep. the prosecutorial team is on on Trump's devices.

Speaker 3 Yeah, because it really paints a picture of just what exactly that day looked like. You know, there's the January 6th Congressional Committee.

Speaker 3 There was like this black hole that they kind of talked about that period of time where Trump was doing nothing. And very few people actually were talking to Trump in this time.

Speaker 3 Lawmakers were calling him, but they're all, you know, sheltering in place on Capitol Hill. And there were a lot of White House aides who were told to stay home that day.

Speaker 3 So there's this very small group of people who were actually in the West Wing and a smaller group who actually wanted to be around Trump.

Speaker 3 I was texting people in the White House that day who were like, and I was like, what is he doing? What is he saying? And they're like, I'm not going anywhere near him.

Speaker 3 Like, people were going out of their way to avoid him or avoid the Oval Office because he was so angry that day that they just didn't want to be around him. And so to read, he's got Twitter open.

Speaker 3 He's watching TV. For those who don't know, it's the Oval Office and he has this small dining room right off of it.
Trump actually spent most of his time there than actually in the Oval Office.

Speaker 3 It's just a little more private.

Speaker 4 It's more like a kitchen than a dining room, kind of too. It's kind of small, right?

Speaker 3 It's very small, but that's where he had his TVs. He did a lot of meetings in there.
And that's where he was sitting, just watching all of this play out for so long.

Speaker 3 And people outside were kind of fretting. How do we get him to say something, to stop, to back off of this?

Speaker 3 And to think of this went to trial and then an FBI agent would be on the stand testifying about what Trump was doing on Twitter, which we know only Trump and Dan Scavino had access to his Twitter, is it's just remarkable to think if that actually happened in court.

Speaker 4 God willing. One of the other things that jumped out to me was the Sidney Powell section, where Trump is muting the phone and making fun of her and calling her crazy to people.

Speaker 4 Like getting into the Trump mindset. Did he really believe it? Was he deluded? Did he kind of know that he was lying about the election?

Speaker 4 I think all of that's kind of silly because like functionally it doesn't really matter. But it is interesting, right?

Speaker 4 Like that he wasn't so crazed that like he had fully bought into the Sydney Powell Lin Wood, like the bamboo ballots and the Chinese are in the computers and all this sort of stuff.

Speaker 4 Like he was, he felt enough to be able to be like, no, this is a crazy person, but I'm going to go along with it.

Speaker 3 And Trump is such an appearance-focused person that when he sees a press conference that Rudy Giuliani and Sidney Powell do where they seem crazy, you know, where Rudy Giuliani has the hair dye streaking down his face.

Speaker 3 Sidney Powell is going on at length about Star Wars references. Trump's watching that like, what? You know, Trump, Trump very much likes a central casting kind of figure.

Speaker 3 He wants someone who has like the gravitas and looks like they're coming out out and the, you know, sheen of legitimacy.

Speaker 3 And so to see that for him, you know, it did show you what he was actually thinking behind the scenes.

Speaker 3 He didn't care how, you know, crazy these people seemed because they were saying what he wanted to hear, he was listening to them and not the actual person who was paid to be his White House attorney, Pat Cipollone.

Speaker 3 And the crazy thing that stood out to me, I had a conversation with Tom Emmer last night, the Republican whip in the House. And he was saying, why are we talking about this?

Speaker 3 This is four years ago, Caitlin. Only the media cares about this, which one, Trump had posted on Truth Social about it 10 minutes before, so Trump cares about it.

Speaker 3 Two, when you read through this filing, everything that Trump was doing then,

Speaker 3 not saying in the months leading up that he would accept the results of the election, sowing doubt about mail-in ballots, saying the only way we can lose is if there's cheating and saying, you know, it's ridiculous.

Speaker 3 We won't know on election night who won. He's saying all of those things now, four years later.
I mean, you could cut the dates out and paste in 2024.

Speaker 3 He's saying all of that on the campaign trail this time around.

Speaker 4 And planning to pardon the people that are in jail as a result of it, you know, so I mean, it is a forward-looking element to it.

Speaker 4 Also, related to January 6th, so we have today on the campaign trail, Kamala Harris is with Liz Cheney for the first time.

Speaker 4 I think there were some questions about whether Liz was going to come to campaign with her or just do her own thing separately.

Speaker 4 They're at the birthplace of the Republican Party in Riplin, Wisconsin for the event. You know, you have your, you're from Alabama.

Speaker 4 We're going to do a little SEC shit talk at the end, but, you know, I have the concerned media background. Like, and here we are, like you and me was an RNC spokesman.
Liz Cheney's with Kamala today.

Speaker 4 It's at the birthplace of the Republican Party. And yet, are there people that are breakthroughable? I guess is breakthroughable a word.
Are there people that can be reached with this today?

Speaker 4 Or on one hand, it's kind of remarkable. And on the other hand, I don't know.

Speaker 3 If I had told you six years ago that Liz Cheney would be campaigning with Kamala Harris in Wisconsin in the lead up to the 2024 election, you would have like had me checked out or like sent to like a psych ward.

Speaker 3 I mean, and now this just speaks to how we are so inured to like what happens in the news cycle now.

Speaker 3 Like a Jacksmith filing comes out like this, and 24 hours later, Liz Cheney, obviously, this is just completely random timing.

Speaker 3 She didn't know that this filing was going to come out, is with Harris in Wisconsin. It's just remarkable to just to see them side by side tonight will be stunning.

Speaker 3 And I felt this way when Dick Cheney came out and endorsed Harris and Republicans were downplaying it, saying, of course he is. Trump's calling Dick Cheney a rhino.

Speaker 3 I'm like, the Dick Cheney is like, if anyone's not a rhino, it's the Cheney family.

Speaker 3 It's a remarkable moment that we're in that someone like Dick Cheney and Liz Cheney crossed party lines, endorsed the Democrat for president, and still people are like, yeah, but is it going to reach voters?

Speaker 3 I mean, it's just a remarkable, remarkable thing. And so, I don't know if it changes anyone's mind.
I do think there's the slice of the electorate that's undecided.

Speaker 3 I don't know how high information of voters they are.

Speaker 3 You know, if they're listening to your podcast, if they're watching my show, these are people who, you know, are working nine to five jobs and taking their kids to practice after school.

Speaker 3 And so, so I don't know. I think that's a really good question of how this resonates with voters in a month from now.
But, just for a historical perspective, it's wild to see this.

Speaker 4 Yeah. I don't know that there's any like Trump voters that are flipping over this, right? Like my question is, like, to me, the Liz Cheney job, and I do this on every podcast.

Speaker 4 We don't need to begrudge it, but, you know, just do it over and over again.

Speaker 4 But if new people came out, and you please should, Chris Christie, Mark Esper, et cetera, et cetera, like is to nudge people that are not Trump, that are college educated, mostly middle to high income, you know, kind of Republicans.

Speaker 4 They've decided they're not going to vote for Trump. Like, can they be nudged over to Harris in the final 32 days to affirmatively support her? Yeah.
These people exist.

Speaker 4 They exist in all of the swing states. They exist in Georgia.
And I think about like the Katie Britt, and Katie Britt is voting for Trump, obviously. She wanted to be his VP, but like

Speaker 4 that type of person, like that archetype, you know, like, is there a person like that that lives in Wisconsin that is gettable? I don't know. What say you?

Speaker 3 The Katie Britt story itself is fascinating if we want to talk about that.

Speaker 3 But on this, you know, I talked to Jeff Flake, who came out and endorsed Harris, lifelong conservative, represented Arizona in Congress for 20 years.

Speaker 3 And then, of course, not a surprise because he went to serve as Biden's ambassador to Turkey. But he came out and he was saying, and he wasn't directing this

Speaker 3 very obviously towards the Mitt Romneys of the world, but he kind of was in the sense of he was saying, you don't get to just not say, hey, I'm not voting for Trump, but I'm also not voting for Harris.

Speaker 3 He was essentially arguing that it's a protest vote and that it doesn't really make a big difference in his view.

Speaker 3 That if you're not voting for Trump, he argued you have to vote for Harris because it's two choices and that's where your difference is going to be made.

Speaker 3 When people like Jeff Flake do it, it does create a permission structure, I think, for those people who are that you were just referencing in that kind of piece of, well, I don't like him, but I also don't love her.

Speaker 3 So why would I vote for her? Jeff Flake is saying, because you don't want him to be president again.

Speaker 4 I obviously really agree agree with Jeff Flake on that. And I do think these people are still out there and are gettable and are nudgeable still in the last 30 days.

Speaker 4 And I'm happy that Liz Cheney's out there doing it. But you've piqued my interest on the Katie Britt story.
Tell me about your insight.

Speaker 3 Well, obviously, I'm from Alabama, and I tracked that Senate race so closely.

Speaker 3 And when she was running, there were several Republicans running for the nomination after Richard Shelby said he wasn't going to run again. She's his longtime chief of staff.

Speaker 3 She kind of seemed like this heir apparent for this role in the sense of, you know, she knew the Chamber of Commerce. She lived and grown up in Alabama.
Her husband played football for Alabama.

Speaker 3 They're just kind of like this like, it seemed like the stereotype of what the next Senate candidate from Alabama would look like.

Speaker 3 Enter Mo Brooks into the picture, who's also running against her, who gets Trump's endorsement.

Speaker 3 And Trump also trashed Katie Britt, dismissing her as like an assistant or something, I think, to, even though she was a chief of staff to a very powerful senator.

Speaker 3 Trump holds a rally in Alabama and, you know, everyone was kind of wondering, will Katie Britt show up to this given Trump has endorsed her opponent? She still showed up. And she was there.

Speaker 3 She was backstage, I think, with all the Republicans and who were there, like, you know, talking to Trump, greeting him.

Speaker 3 And that is the rally where Mo Brooks gets on stage and kind of essentially argues we should move on from the 2024 election. Obviously, you know, one of the most famous.

Speaker 3 Yeah, one of the most famous speakers at the ellipse on January 6th. And the crowd kind of booed a little.
And Trump listening backstage was furious.

Speaker 3 And ever since then, Trump was like, had turned on him. But there was just a long period where it seemed like Katie Britt had no hope because Trump was backing somebody and it was very powerful.

Speaker 3 And she survived that and ended up becoming the nominee and obviously winning that seat.

Speaker 4 Like this person, we know Katie Britt. I feel like especially able to talk about Katie Britt because she's an archetype.

Speaker 4 I mean, you know, and she was a valedictorian or class president or whatever it was, goes to D.C., works on the Hill. Like this person is not MAGA, right?

Speaker 4 Like she's not, like in her, I guess, origin story. So the question is, like, what of her? Like, does she just snap back in a future world if Kamala Harris wins this time? Or has she embraced it?

Speaker 4 Like, what do you hang out with some of these people? Like, what do you,

Speaker 4 have they been MAGA pilled? What do you think?

Speaker 3 I asked a Republican senator recently if they thought it would actually be better for their party overall if Trump lost.

Speaker 3 Because then it would open up the 2028 field for all these young Republicans that we know are dying to run for president, but just didn't have any space to do that with the Trump, Trump in the party, or at the top of the party.

Speaker 3 And I think that's an interesting conversation.

Speaker 3 What did they say? The senator. They kind of said maybe.

Speaker 3 They didn't really fully know, but they didn't say no. They weren't like, we want Donald Trump to win.

Speaker 3 Because obviously these are people who are politicians and they're calculated and they're watching the way the wind is blowing like everyone else.

Speaker 3 I think Senator Kitty Britt Britt is, she's really savvy and she's really smart and she's very young.

Speaker 3 And, you know, people realize what happens to people who don't subscribe to the MAGA part of the party, which is now the whole party, basically. And I think that they're just being strategic.

Speaker 4 Strategic is a nice way to put it. Okay.
So LaCama Harris is trying to reach these voters, these college-educated Katie Britt types that haven't gone full MAGA in Wisconsin.

Speaker 4 Donald Trump put out a video that's a different kind of strategy. Let's listen to it.

Speaker 5 And on June 14th, 1946, God looked down on his planned paradise and said, I need a caretaker. So God gave us Trump.

Speaker 5 God said, I need somebody willing to get up before dawn, fix this country, work all day, fight the Marxists, eat supper, then go to the Oval Office and stay past midnight at a meeting of the heads of state.

Speaker 5 So God made Trump. I need somebody with arms, strong enough to rustle the deep state and yet gentle enough to deliver his own grandchild.

Speaker 5 Somebody to ruffle the feathers, tame cantankerous World Economic Forum, come home hungry, have to wait until the first lady is done with lunch with friends, then tell the ladies to be sure and come back real soon.

Speaker 4 What the fuck is that?

Speaker 3 I went to church every Sunday growing up, obviously being from the South. I don't remember reading about the deep state in the first, in the Old Testament, but maybe I'm wrong.

Speaker 4 Is there not, though? Is there not a couple people in that church that are like, this feels wrong? Like, this does, this feels a little wrong.

Speaker 4 I mean, you know, I was Catholic growing up, so we had saints.

Speaker 4 So there's certain that you honor certain people for their traits, but the traits of coming home hungry and waiting for the ladies to make you lunch. I don't know.

Speaker 3 I don't know. I haven't heard that, but that was actually really funny.

Speaker 3 The deep state is really what killed me. I don't think god was thinking about the deep state when he was creating the world but maybe i'm wrong i think that you're right on that

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Speaker 4 Here's the thing. You get these questions.
It's like, Caitlin, Caitlin, I get these as well. Tim and Caitlin, help us translate.
Why, Why do the red state people like Donald Trump? What is it?

Speaker 4 And you get that. And I think that you handle it capably.

Speaker 4 You can't put yourself in their head. But there was somebody that was kind of upset with the way that you speak on behalf of Alabama.
And I want to listen to that really quick, too.

Speaker 7 The fact that she has some roots in Alabama does not make her a fair and balanced reporter. I will submit to the record, her biggest sin is not that she is biased, though she is.

Speaker 7 It's that she's boring. She's extremely boring with no personality.

Speaker 7 I have a pro tip for her smile try smiling every once in a while try not to be like in your delivery such a cold-hearted all the time

Speaker 4 feels like kind of a she who smelt it dealt it situation on that accusation from megan kelly but i was wondering what what you made of that i i mean i really can't i i don't have anything on that i really

Speaker 4 you're smiling i see though i don't i don't i do see that you're capable of smiling it seems like i don't know what is happening there.

Speaker 3 I mean,

Speaker 3 I got nothing.

Speaker 4 You got nothing? Jealousy? Did you ever hang out with Megan? Have you met?

Speaker 3 I've never met Megan Kelly. I used to watch her when she had her show in primetime on Fox, and I thought it was interesting.
You know, we listened to her interviews and stuff. I don't know.

Speaker 3 It was a really strong opinion, but it's, I won't feel singled out because I think the next week she went after Taylor Swift and was like, F you Taylor Swift. And

Speaker 4 i don't know i don't the cbs moderators also

Speaker 3 she said f you to the cbs moderators as well very angry i guess there's nothing to call me because i i really am not biased and i do work really hard at my job so i think if the if the worst thing someone calls me is a cold-hearted bitch i'll you know i'll take it but um saying i have some roots in alabama is so funny to me personally as someone who is just home this weekend my entire family lives in alabama still i grew up in alabama obviously went to school there i'm like a rabid Alabama fan.

Speaker 3 And it like totally shaped who I am today. And so to hear some roots is like I have a cousin who lives there or something that I'm like clinging to is quite funny.

Speaker 4 I know it killed me to watch Alabama come back to beat Georgia last weekend knowing that we were going to be on this week. I was so excited to trash talk you.

Speaker 4 After Georgia came back, I was so excited. I was watching the sad Alabama fans after that.

Speaker 3 Well, you were there. I just got my voice back because I was so hoarse.
Like, I don't normally scream at the games.

Speaker 3 I try to be pretty chill, but I was like, I mean, that game really took 10 years off my life. And it was one of the best games I've ever been to.

Speaker 3 And I've been to a million college football games, and it was just so fun. I'm still on a high from that win.

Speaker 3 But to the question that you said you get from people who ask, you know, why do people in red states love Trump so much? Yeah.

Speaker 3 Obviously, we covered extensively what Trump said at the debate with Harris about Haitian migrants eating dogs. Not true.
Obviously, we've gone over that a million times with J.D. Vance and everybody.

Speaker 3 But just to get

Speaker 3 100%. And the people are here, those Haitians are here legally as well.

Speaker 3 And so, but just to give people a sense of how people, other people view that who aren't in our environment or who aren't offended by that, obviously the Crimson Tide was playing the Georgia Bulldogs, and every single person almost to a T in Tuscaloosa on Saturday was wearing a button that was of Trump.

Speaker 3 We're eating the dogs. And it said they're eating the dogs, D-A-W-G-S.

Speaker 3 I mean, they thought it was funny. Like, they're not offended by things like that.
And they found it comical.

Speaker 4 I like generally try not to quiz strangers about politics on the street when I'm in Louisiana because this is my escape from politics.

Speaker 4 But I feel obligated to do it at LSU Tailgate just because like as a cultural, like just hearing from people that are outside my little bubble. It's like, do you feel that way?

Speaker 4 Like hearing from cousins or old friends or stuff? Like, does it give you a perspective on things that like maybe other CNN folks don't get?

Speaker 4 Like, is there anything that's jumped out at you recently to that effect?

Speaker 3 Well, you know, people always say, oh, I don't want to talk to you about work, but I'm like, my whole life is talking about politics, I feel like.

Speaker 3 And so I definitely want to talk to people in, you know, Montgomery and Tuscaloosa or Georgia, wherever you're going about it.

Speaker 3 And so, yeah, I also do think it gives me a way better understanding because.

Speaker 3 I'm related to Trump voters. I spend Christmas with Trump voters.
I spend Thanksgiving with them. I buy them birthday gifts.
Like, you know, I talk to them all the time.

Speaker 3 And so I feel like I have a different understanding of it.

Speaker 3 And this is less so now, but I think really in 2016 when Trump was, you know, taking his iron grip on the Republican Party, I got it because I was like related to these people and I knew that they weren't racist or horrible or misogynist, yet they were still supporting Trump.

Speaker 3 And so it was an understanding of Trump voters that I think was actually really helpful to me as a reporter in covering him and kind of understanding.

Speaker 3 Also working at the Daily Caller, I would argue, helped with that because it's obviously a conservative outlet. And I started there before Trump even was a thing.

Speaker 3 And then when Trump ran, I watched kind of from my vantage point as Trump rose to power.

Speaker 3 But initially, conservatives thought he was a joke too, and thought that Ted Cruz or Scott Walker or someone was going to be the nominee.

Speaker 3 So I watched that kind of evolution as well, which also, I think, made me a better White House reporter when I started covering him.

Speaker 4 I do wonder about the Daily Caller thing, because I don't know about you, but sometimes I put like

Speaker 4 the non-political folks in my life in a different bucket than like the political professionals. And I think maybe vice versa.
Right. And I do wonder like

Speaker 4 now, having gone from the Daily Caller to CNN, like there's got to be some former colleagues that are like F you and that you feel the same way. Like looking back, I don't know, is there tensions?

Speaker 4 And it just is such a changed world from the like 2016 Daily Caller life to being a CNN morning show anchor with Don Lemon. Do you guys still like get to get to talk or like, how was that transition?

Speaker 3 Well, one, I would say a few things. The Daily Caller obviously has a lot of turnover in it, just because when I worked there, I was like, you know, 22 years old.

Speaker 3 So it has a lot of young people who work there.

Speaker 3 So a lot of the people that I worked with have moved on from there as well, like the core group that I was, you know, in the newsroom with hanging out with. But I don't think so.

Speaker 3 Maybe there's someone who didn't like me that now doesn't like what I say or how I report or interview people.

Speaker 3 But there's definitely still some people from there who've moved on to other outlets that I've stayed in touch with who don't have animosity towards me or anything like that.

Speaker 3 I actually think they thought it was cool that I went to work at CNN and that someone from the Daily Caller could have the kind of trajectory that I had.

Speaker 3 And I also think when people say, I get this from the reverse from conservative people who say, well, how could someone who works there go work at CNN?

Speaker 3 And I say, well, doesn't that say something about CNN?

Speaker 3 That they were willing to hire a Daily Caller reporter because they viewed me as a reporter and didn't think that I had like ideological leanings, which I don't.

Speaker 3 And I think it says a lot about both places, that people who were there when I came to CNN were happy for me. And that, you know, people at CNN, like that didn't stop them from hiring me.

Speaker 3 I think that says a lot about both of them.

Speaker 4 I guess don't you think, you don't need to pick on the the Daily Caller in particular, but like at the time that you were there, like there was an aspiration, Tucker stated aspiration, that like he wanted it to be like the New York Times of the right, you know, where they did legit reporting and there was obviously some legit reporters there.

Speaker 4 Like over time, it feels like that aspiration, not just at that place, but like across conservative media, has fizzled a little bit.

Speaker 4 And like, there are a few examples you could point to, but like, don't you feel like it's just a huge propaganda and media criticism operation?

Speaker 4 Like rather than trying to create a second media that has the same, you know, fact-checking, accountability, et cetera, like they've just created like an opinion monster that just throws arrows at the media.

Speaker 3 Well, I won't say this about them in particular, but about conservative media overall.

Speaker 3 One, I think having smart editors and people who, for these young reporters who come in and need guidance or, you know, instruction, I think that is crucial as you're learning how to be a reporter.

Speaker 3 That's what made a difference for me.

Speaker 3 And I think, secondly, a lot of the coverage sometimes since Trump was in office became like anti-anti-Trump coverage, which I thought obviously is not, you know, what initially is like what people set out to do.

Speaker 3 And I know a lot of people who are conservative reporters and will, you know, talk about their ideological leanings. I think the Free Beacon has done some good reporting.

Speaker 3 I mean, they reported about Tim Walls and him saying he was in Hong Kong during Tiananmen Square.

Speaker 3 They were one of the first people to raise questions about that, which was a question at the debate the other night for him.

Speaker 3 And he's since talked about it and addressed it and said that he misspoke about the dates. And so I think that there is good reporting out there.
And I think that there should be critical reporting.

Speaker 3 If there's reporting from the left, there should be reporting from the right. I personally think that there should be more reporting that's just totally non-biased.
Yeah.

Speaker 4 Here's the problem with that. They're like, look, you got K-File over there and other, you got plenty of investigative reporters at CNN.

Speaker 4 And if they had the TNM and Square thing about Tim Walls fall in their lap, they would have gladly reported on it. Yeah.

Speaker 3 It was the CBS reporter. It was a

Speaker 4 Yeah, it was a CBS reporter that, you know, that asked him about it at the debate. If we won't pick on the free beacon, but if most of the people in conservative media had a J.D.

Speaker 4 Vance lie fall in their lap, is there an example of that? Is there an example of a conservative outlet recently doing like an expose

Speaker 4 on Donald Trump or one of his minions? Like, I don't really think so.

Speaker 3 Well, and that's a good point in the sense of if you're going to do it to one side, you should do it freely to either side.

Speaker 3 You don't just pick one and then you know stick on that i think that's that's a really good point

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Speaker 4 So, these guys, I think we're kind of learning a little bit from this interview. You give them the business when they go on CNN.
I've asked every Republican member of Congress to go on this podcast.

Speaker 4 We just

Speaker 4 made some interns, send an email out to all of them. Not an intern, actually.
I'm sorry, Tony. That was rude to you.
You do great work.

Speaker 3 Or Tony.

Speaker 4 Tony is amazing, actually.

Speaker 4 I'm getting old. This is more to comment on me that like a 28-year-old professional.
I'm like, you're an intern. This is more about my aging issues.

Speaker 3 Get off my lawn.

Speaker 4 Yeah.

Speaker 4 But none of them will come on. Nobody will come on.
Since Spence or Cox will because they know I'll just give them shit about Trump. But they do it with you and you give them the business.

Speaker 4 Like, what do you think explains that? Is it something about like the CNN, like feeling like they have to do it with the platform? Is it Bama Rush talk?

Speaker 4 You know, are you charming them? Like, talk to me about booking these guys. Are they not? Why aren't they scared of you?

Speaker 3 My southern charm is what I'm utilizing. I don't know.
If you asked Megan Kelly, she probably wouldn't agree with that. No, I don't know.

Speaker 3 I think it's that one, you know, from being a reporter, I understand the importance of a relationship and establishing like trust with someone and credibility.

Speaker 3 People don't like what you're going to report all the time, but I think they'll know that you're going to give them a fair shot.

Speaker 3 And I think that's what we've tried to argue when we have people on the show.

Speaker 3 And often, sometimes people will just come on, but often, as anyone who's ever tried to book anyone knows, it takes a lot of work to get someone to come on.

Speaker 3 And there's a few guests that I have really had a lot of conversations with behind the scenes before they finally agreed to do this show.

Speaker 3 And I think we do a few things, which is one, I believe if you're inviting someone on, you should let them speak. Like you're inviting someone on to hear from them.

Speaker 4 And yeah, this is a problem that I have. Yeah, that's a good, that's a good sub-tweet criticism of me.

Speaker 3 It actually wasn't of you. I was just saying, like, I've seen interviews before where, like, the person gets cut off.
And I just think, you know, I want to hear from them. You know,

Speaker 3 you got to ask questions. And yes, you have to interject or, you know, point out when what they're saying is exaggerated or just not true.

Speaker 3 But I think we let people talk and then also I think we give people a fair shot, but it's also never going to be a walk in the park.

Speaker 3 I have found these are lawmakers who are professionals at this, professional communicators, they like to be challenged.

Speaker 3 I don't think anyone wants to just come on and have like a really easy interview where they don't get pushed back or anything like that.

Speaker 3 And I think that's not just for Republicans, for Democrats too, and for administration officials as well.

Speaker 3 And so it's just a better conversation when you're kind of taking someone's conventional wisdom and poking holes in it or testing it and seeing, you know, how far they can defend it.

Speaker 3 I think that's really interesting.

Speaker 4 Do you get, again, and again, just generalizing, you don't need to pick on one of your interviewees, but like the mega like willingness to just kind of say day is night like in these interviews like does create a little bit of a different environment.

Speaker 4 I mean, I think that there are plenty of examples of Democrats who lie or exaggerate, you know, or do the shit that I used to do when I was a spin meister or spin or duck the question.

Speaker 4 But like some of these times with the focus, I mean, obviously with the 2020 election stuff in particular, but other stuff, you come in and they're just like, no.

Speaker 4 And how do you think about dealing with like the potential difference there? Or maybe you don't agree that it's a difference.

Speaker 3 No, I do think it's a difference because there is, there's one thing where you're like, okay, I know you're going to, that's your talking point.

Speaker 3 But then there's another one when they're just coming on and saying something that's flatly not true or just so, so wild. I think of this.

Speaker 3 We had Ralph Norman on, who is, for those who don't know, a congressman from South Carolina. He was a rare Nikki Haley Republican backer, and he was one of our biggest surrogates.

Speaker 3 And obviously, you know, that was kind of notable because he's pretty MAGA-ish is that wing of the people.

Speaker 4 He also spoke at the ellipse.

Speaker 3 Exactly, exactly. And so he, and he was someone who he had done all these interviews pushing for Nikki Haley and advocating for her.

Speaker 3 And I was like, wasn't he the one who sent the text about martial law that was discovered by the congressional investigation?

Speaker 3 So before we had him on, I looked it up and he had sent a text ask like saying Trump should declare martial law.

Speaker 3 And he was not getting asked about it, which I found kind of surprising because I think, obviously, we get busy.

Speaker 3 It's the day-to-day of everything, but that's a huge thing to say the president should do after a fair election.

Speaker 3 So he talked about Nikki Haley and then I asked him about the text and his response, he said, the only thing he regretted about that text was not saying that someone should declare martial law.

Speaker 3 It was that he misspelled martial.

Speaker 3 He spelled it like the name instead of M-A-R-T-I-A-L. And so there are moments like that where,

Speaker 3 you know, I always appreciate an interview when I'm just totally taken by surprise. And

Speaker 3 that was one of those moments.

Speaker 4 What did you follow up with on that? Just really? I feel like really is

Speaker 4 what have been my follow-up question.

Speaker 3 I think my face kind of said it all, but it was one of those moments where

Speaker 3 we were like, you really think he should have declared martial law after an election that clearly was completely legitimate? And he said, yes, totally stood by it.

Speaker 4 It's just a little bit of an asymmetry. You're not going to have Chris Murphy on talking about how he wanted to have martial law, you know? Right.

Speaker 3 So it's just a different world, you know, in

Speaker 3 some of these interviews. But I always find them really interesting, you know, whether it's like a Bill, our Bill Barr interview was, we had two really interesting interviews with him.

Speaker 3 I always appreciate an interview where someone's totally candid and forthcoming and isn't full of talking points.

Speaker 3 That's really an interview that I appreciate having the most because I think that's what our audience finds to be the most interesting.

Speaker 4 And you're doing a good job with that. Okay, just really quick, two things.
We got to go. But I meant to ask you on the Daily Caller on Tucker.
Do you have any Tucker insights for us?

Speaker 4 Did you get to hang out with Tucker when you were there?

Speaker 3 Tucker was running the Daily Caller when I was there. So he was my first boss for my first like big real job.
But that was when he was on Fox and Friends weekend. And yeah.

Speaker 4 Do you look at the Tucker stuff and say, oh, I know that guy. He's just something a little different.
Or do you look at him and be like, wow, you put on a new skin face?

Speaker 3 Or like what? I don't have any insights into it. I think Tucker, I do.
The one thing I get asked is people ask,

Speaker 3 does he really believe this? Is this like just like an act? I think some people think it is. I think Tucker is totally genuine, and that is what he genuinely thinks.
I think he says what he thinks.

Speaker 4 He genuinely thinks we should be revisiting whether Churchill was the hero of World War II or not.

Speaker 4 Maybe he genuinely is just open to thinking about it, genuinely just open to thinking about it. I don't know.
The Tucker thing is an ongoing mystery. All right, final thing.

Speaker 4 You were on SNL this weekend?

Speaker 3 Yes. Well, not me personally.

Speaker 4 Did you know beforehand? Did they tell? Did you get a text from the actor?

Speaker 3 No, I didn't know because the Bama game had just ended and we were still like hanging out in the stadium and hadn't left.

Speaker 3 And my phone had like five percent battery and started blowing up which i thought it was about the bama game it was not it was about snl it was a great game which was it was just really fun and chloe fendeman i think is amazing and i thought that her eyebrows were great which was a huge compliment you thought she nailed the eyebrows did she miss anything do you have any notes no notes no notes no notes Caitlin Collins, I really appreciate you coming on the podcast.

Speaker 4 After the election, since you and I will be the only people that are like down, we should do it again like in December, December, like on the darkest day of the year in December, and kind of buck each other up and be like, you know, there's still fun stuff to talk about.

Speaker 4 I love it. We'll still be good.
We'll survive.

Speaker 3 I'm totally here for that.

Speaker 4 All right, we'll see you soon. Thanks to Caitlin Collins.
We'll be back tomorrow. We got a big one, a double header.
See y'all then. Peace.

Speaker 5 It's a human sign

Speaker 5 when things go wrong.

Speaker 5 When the sand of hurlings

Speaker 5 and temptation

Speaker 5 strong

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Speaker 5 hearted by you.

Speaker 5 Some things looking better,

Speaker 5 baby.

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Speaker 5 And I think it's gonna be a long, long time. Till touchdown brings me round again to find.

Speaker 5 I'm not the man they think I am at home.

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Speaker 4 The Bullard Podcast is produced by Katie Cooper with audio engineering and editing by Jason Brown.

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