131. Epstein: The Race To Release The Files

Speaker 1 With Christmas coming up, why not give someone a membership to the show?

Speaker 2 They'll get exclusive access to bonus episodes every week, ad-free listening, and early access to our live show tickets too.

Speaker 1 Just head to therestispoliticsus.com and click on gifts.

Speaker 2 This episode is brought to you by Revolute Business, the all-in-one business account to manage your finances.

Speaker 1 You know, global business once meant slow business, bureaucratic work, payments lost in transit and transfers, and took days instead of seconds.

Speaker 2 Revolute business makes that a relic of the past.

Speaker 2 Send and receive payments in over 30 currencies to more than 150 destinations during market hours within plan allowance, all at the same interbank rates that banks use without any of the middlemen or the guesswork.

Speaker 1 So whether you're paying a team in Dublin or an invoice in Sydney, your money moves fast and lands clean.

Speaker 2 With automatic orders and price alerts, your money keeps perfect timing moving when the the rate's right.

Speaker 1 Exchange like an expert. Open a Revolut business account today by scanning the QR code on screen or using this link in this episode's description.

Speaker 2 Add money by the 31st of December 2025 to get a £200 welcome bonus or the equivalent in your local currency.

Speaker 1 Feature availability varies by plan. Offer available for new business customers in the UK, US, Australia, and Ireland.
Fees and terms and conditions apply.

Speaker 3 This episode is brought to you by Spotify Portal for Backstage. But you're wondering, what's Portal?

Speaker 3 Well, it's an internal developer portal built to improve developer experience and boost productivity. All software components are centralized.
Documentation is automated and easy to maintain.

Speaker 3 New projects and components? Just a few clicks. With your best practices already built in.
Think less friction, more innovation. Ready to double your productivity?

Speaker 3 Try Spotify Portal at backstage.spotify.com.

Speaker 4 With secure purchase, the process is streamlined and protected. Secure purchase means no DMV visit.

Speaker 4 Sellers and titles are verified, all the paperwork is handled, and financing, delivery, and insurance options are built right in.

Speaker 4 Plus, eligible vehicle purchases purchases are backed by up to $100,000 in protection. Looking to sell your ride? Secure Purchase makes that easy too.

Speaker 4 Your buyer and their funds are verified, and the title transfer and loan payoff are totally seamless. So skip the hassle.
Shop with confidence. Buy your next car on eBay.
eBay. Things people love.

Speaker 4 Secure Purchase is powered by Caramel Dealer Services LLC, an eBay subsidiary.

Speaker 5 At blinds.com, it's not just about window treatments. It's about you, your style, your space, your way.

Speaker 5 Whether you DIY or want the pros to handle it all, you'll have the confidence of knowing it's done right.

Speaker 5 From free expert design help to our 100% satisfaction guarantee, everything we do is made to fit your life and your windows. Because at blinds.com, the only thing we treat better than windows is you.

Speaker 5 Black Friday deals are going on all month long. Save up to 45% off site-wide, plus an additional 10% off every order right now at blinds.com.

Speaker 3 Rules and restrictions apply.

Speaker 2 Welcome to the Rest is Politics US with me, Catty Kay, at the end of another crazy busy week.

Speaker 1 And I'm Athelis Scaramucci.

Speaker 2 We're going to talk about the Epstein files, the latest vote on that in the Senate. It now goes to the President's desk.
How much will we actually learn? How much is going to be redacted?

Speaker 2 What are members of Congress thinking? What are the victims thinking? I think it's most important. We'll talk about that in the first half.

Speaker 2 And then in the second half, we will talk about Saudi Arabia because we haven't had a chance to chat about those extraordinary scenes yet. And let's start with the Epstein files and the very latest.

Speaker 2 So on Tuesday, the Senate approved the bill that would force the release of the files that are being held by the Justice Department.

Speaker 2 The House, of course, had improved it by 4427 to 1 or something. One person, Clay Higgins, voted against it, saying that it abandoned 250 years of criminal justice procedure in America.

Speaker 2 But it then went to the Senate. And then it went to Donald Trump's desk, and he signed it on Wednesday evening.

Speaker 2 And now we wait and see what is exactly released,

Speaker 2 whether this is a sharpie fest of redactions, which I suspect it might be.

Speaker 2 And if it is full of redactions and lots of names are blocked out, if there's a lot of information that is missing, I don't think people who believe that there is some kind of big Epstein conspiracy or who are dissatisfied with the way that the government has handled this, I don't think they're going to stop pushing for more.

Speaker 2 I think there is a liability here for the government if it tries to release only partial bits of this. What do you think, Antonin? What do you think we're going to get?

Speaker 2 And how do you think people will respond to what we get?

Speaker 1 Well, I mean, okay, so first of all, there were rumors last night that the only reason why Trump did sign this was because

Speaker 1 there was lots of ability to redact. And there would be a theory here that lots of investigations are going on.

Speaker 2 Into Democrats, right? They're investigating Democrats, and that gives them the ability to redact some things. Exactly.

Speaker 1 And, you know, I mean, they're making all different types of assertions related to the bill.

Speaker 1 But it really wasn't, though, because

Speaker 1 I looked at the bill. I asked two constitutional legal experts this question.
And the bill does include some exceptions. I'm not saying it doesn't.

Speaker 1 The EOJ may withhold material such as the victim's personal identifiable information.

Speaker 1 Obviously, he had a lot of text going back with with different people.

Speaker 1 That stuff will stay anonymous, particularly if nobody's involved with anything that's horrific or anything like that. But I don't think Donald Trump or whoever is in the Epstein files.

Speaker 1 And again, I'm not saying Donald Trump is or isn't, but I'm just going off of what the congressional leaders like Massey are saying.

Speaker 2 One clarification there, because we know he's in the files.

Speaker 1 Thomas Massey is saying he is.

Speaker 1 If you look at 2,600 emails, I think he's in like 1,600 of them.

Speaker 1 But the question is, has the bill been weakened to facilitate blocking exposure? It doesn't look like that, Caddy.

Speaker 2 Interesting.

Speaker 1 I think the smoke is going to come from Trump. If he's in there, there'll be smokescreen distractions.
This is exactly what I said when I was in Sydney.

Speaker 1 Not surprised that he reversed course.

Speaker 1 He's got to keep his base in line. The best way to keep his base in line is say, hey, I call for the full disclosure.

Speaker 2 Which is what he has said in a long, long truth social post. He's being slightly disingenuous here, though, Anthony, to be

Speaker 2 kind of...

Speaker 1 I love the British. I love the British.
He's being slightly disingenuous.

Speaker 2 Because actually,

Speaker 2 he has sent out this Truth Social post in which he's saying, you know, I have got ahead of this and I'm leading the charge this was all a hoax and it's a Democrat hoax and it's a long screed.

Speaker 2 But he only reversed course on releasing the files because he knew he was going to lose.

Speaker 2 And losing control, what would have looked like losing control of the Republican Party was more embarrassing to him than whatever is in the files, especially if he manages to get the Sharpie pen out before those files are released.

Speaker 1 How does he get damaged by this?

Speaker 1 Could he get damaged by this? And how does he get damaged by this? And let me start with the fact that the Republicans broke from him.

Speaker 1 And let me start with: was it a middle finger, Caddy, that the entire Senate voted unanimously? Or

Speaker 1 was that just a ruse as well?

Speaker 2 So a couple of weeks ago, you and I were talking about this, and I said that the only damage to him would be if there was explicit

Speaker 2 photographic or video evidence of him with underage girls. And to be totally clear, there is no indication that that is what these files are going to produce.

Speaker 2 Nobody has claimed that that is what is in these files. But I think that is the kind of thing that might damage him.
I'm actually going to revise that.

Speaker 2 I think I was wrong because I think there could be political damage to him in exactly what you've just said, which is the perception that Donald Trump no longer has this iron grip on the Republican Party, which for the last, ever since inauguration in January, the party, even over things that we know, you and I, that the party disagrees with him on, whether it's Ukraine, whether it's tariffs,

Speaker 2 whether it's some of his other handling of the economy, whether it's the Venezuela voter tax, we know that there are Republicans who disagree with him.

Speaker 2 They have not not broken from him in big numbers on any of those things. This is the first time.

Speaker 2 And once a president is in a position where his party votes en masse against him on an issue, cracks start to appear.

Speaker 2 He no longer looks quite as terrifying or as scary or as omnipotent as he has done for the last eight months. This is pretty early in a

Speaker 2 presidential election cycle for a president to start becoming a lame duck.

Speaker 2 But if he had gone against the party on this, if he had held out and said, I'm not going to, I don't want to release these files and the party had voted against him, that kind of lame duck status would have been come catapulting down the hill into the White House faster than he could have blinked.

Speaker 2 So I think that actually,

Speaker 2 there has been damage done to him politically beyond the

Speaker 2 potential relationship that he had with Jeffrey Epstein.

Speaker 1 I find that he has a heat shield on him like no other. I find that he can burn through the Earth's atmosphere and parachute anywhere into the Earth land safely.

Speaker 1 And so the butt is the economy is not doing well as predicted here on Trip U.S. I said that the economy would start faltering by the third or fourth quarter.
We're getting that economic data now.

Speaker 1 It's very going to be very hard for the Fed to

Speaker 1 lower rates with this type of inflation data that we're seeing.

Speaker 1 Moreover, you know the inflation data is bad, Caddy, because everybody knows that that the Department of the Bureau of Labor Statistics is not releasing the data, claiming that it has to do with the White House shutdown, which to quote a Joe Biden term, that's malarkey.

Speaker 1 So obviously the data is very, very bad. And this is Trump's misinformation tour.
But here's the thing I want to ask you.

Speaker 1 Economy is shaky. He's on shaky ground on the tariffs, which is the pillar of his economic program, which is obviously better grade F failure.
He's making money for himself.

Speaker 1 He's turning the crank in the Oval Office, Kaching, Ka Ching, for himself.

Speaker 1 And he's still holding on to this like imperious grip.

Speaker 2 I don't think anything stops him. He is still acting as if he is the same omnipotent president.

Speaker 2 he was a month ago, whether it's kind of suddenly announcing a Ukraine deal that has no Ukrainian or European involvement, whether it's the activities he is doing around the world, whether it's with the Saudi crown prince, whether it's with Venezuela, he is still acting as if he's this incredibly powerful president who other leaders are afraid of.

Speaker 2 But I think something has changed at home.

Speaker 2 And colleagues of mine who spend a lot more time in the White House than I do doing daily reporting are starting to bring out reports of chaos in the White House,

Speaker 2 that they want to try to redirect the president's focus to that issue. I mean, Donald Trump was elected because he was an economic populist and he promised to bring down the price of groceries.

Speaker 2 That is, it's almost as simple as that. And what's he doing? He's not getting out and going to a factory in the Midwest.
He's whining and dining the Saudi leader in a guilt oval office.

Speaker 2 That's not what people elected him for. So I think there is a tension in the White House at the moment.

Speaker 2 At the beginning of his term, well, really for all of his term up until recently, Everyone's kind of been on the same Donald Trump page.

Speaker 2 But I think now you're starting to see splits, some of them emerging in public, of some of his advisors saying, okay, we we do actually need to focus on this thing that could be our downfall in the midterm elections.

Speaker 2 And Mr. President, look at the polls, is your downfall at the moment in the polls.
So I don't know that he buys that, but I sense in his,

Speaker 2 when you read these kind of slightly protesting too much truth social posts at the moment, I read some

Speaker 2 not panic exactly, but an awareness that things are not going the way he wants, particularly around the Epstein issue.

Speaker 1 I I think he has gone lame duck. The Trumpster has gone lame duck.
And let me give you a couple of reasons why. Number one, they did break from him.

Speaker 1 Number two, he's got lots of them criticizing him. Now, he doesn't have Barroso, your buddy, or McConnell or Thune yet criticizing him, but I think that is coming, Caddy.

Speaker 1 He's also got some leakage in the donor community.

Speaker 1 No, not Steve Schwartzman, who lined up with him in MBS yesterday, but Ken Griffin, other guys in the hedge fund community who have asked me to put them in the witness protection programs, although currently remain nameless, I've broken from them.

Speaker 1 They're like, I'm done with this guy.

Speaker 2 And why are they done with him, Anthony? What are they telling you?

Speaker 1 Because the economic policies are outrageous, and the grift is more outrageous than the economic policies. And I don't like bringing crypto into this podcast, but just let you know:

Speaker 1 the grift on the crypto has actually hurt the crypto industry because we were heading for bipartisan regulation, but Mr.

Speaker 1 Trump had to take over $800 million for himself through meme coins and other activity in the industry, which is straight on grift, probably violations of the Emoluments Clause.

Speaker 1 And you've got a lot of older Democrats, anybody north of the age of 60 that's in the House or the Senate and a Democrat has been turned off by this and has slowed down this regulatory process.

Speaker 1 But there's another thing going on: that's his approval rating. He is below 37 right now.

Speaker 2 The lowest approval ratings he's had.

Speaker 1 And what happens is you lose a little bit of the agenda, you lost a little bit of your media leverage.

Speaker 1 By the way, he knows that, which is why he's going after these female journalists, calling them ridiculous names or insulting them in the Oval Office or barking at them on Air Force One.

Speaker 1 And so, party obedience getting a little shaky.

Speaker 1 He's got the foreign respect for now, meaning they're going to kowtow to him, but the undercurrent of that is also shaky. So

Speaker 1 I got him as a lame duck, quack, quack, quack. Am I going too far, Caddy?

Speaker 2 No,

Speaker 2 I think there's

Speaker 2 a real argument to be made that pretty early on

Speaker 2 comparatively in this presidential cycle, people are now starting in the Republican Party to talk about the future and what comes after Donald Trump.

Speaker 2 And I think we were not perhaps expecting that to happen as quickly as it did.

Speaker 2 But the whole Epstein saga has accelerated the pace. The tariffs were causing problems.
The economy has been shaky, as we've reported for the last quarter.

Speaker 2 I mean, it's been shaky since the beginning of the summer. And the tariff, the tariff implications are starting to bite.
The immigration implications are starting to bite.

Speaker 2 And the comparison, I think, the other thing that's happened, and this is,

Speaker 2 it's a photographic image almost, the pictures of the Oval Office with all of the gold, the pictures of the East Wing being knocked down in favor of a massive, what is it, $300 million ballroom.

Speaker 2 Those images don't sit well with people who are heading into Thanksgiving and realizing that their whole Thanksgiving meal is costing them more than it did last year.

Speaker 1 Social media

Speaker 1 has turned on Trump. Some of it is picking on Trump related to what Jeff Epstein has said about him and his sexuality.
Some of it is picking on him as it relates to his

Speaker 1 behavior with the journalists. Some of it's picking on him related to potential health issues.
And again, I'm not saying he has worse health issues that's been reported.

Speaker 1 I'm just talking about the chatter in social media.

Speaker 1 Now, the reason why you're so respected, Gaddy, is that you are in the mainstream media by and large, and you report the stuff objectively, but in the cesspool of social media.

Speaker 2 There's been a shift.

Speaker 1 Yes.

Speaker 2 I think some of this stems from what you and I talked about a couple of weeks ago, which is the kind of splits within MAGA around

Speaker 2 when you see MAGA fracturing, when you see Joe Rogan, as he did yesterday,

Speaker 2 kind of mock Donald Trump for his position on the Epstein files.

Speaker 2 That then gives permission to other people on social media in the MAGA world or in the kind of Trump voters to also start questioning and mocking and

Speaker 2 behaving the way parties normally do, which is with fractions between them.

Speaker 2 And what's, I guess, what's remarkable about this conversation that you and I are having today, and then we're going to move on to Saudi Arabia after the break, is that it hasn't happened.

Speaker 2 I mean, it's a reflection of how dominant Donald Trump has been for the first eight months of his presidency, that what we are seeing now, which is kind of normal behavior in social media and in a party of people having disagreements and saying things in public against the president of their own party, and that is what normally happens in American politics.

Speaker 2 That in a way is healthy American politics. It's good to see these kind of fractions.

Speaker 2 What has been unusual has been the kind of slightly terrorized Republican Party, which felt that Donald Trump was so omnipotent that they could never break from him.

Speaker 2 And now I think we're seeing a resumption of, you know, turn your channel, guys, and take your remote control because we're back to programming as normal.

Speaker 1 The poll numbers are really not great, but the crosstabs are really bad. Let me just go over one of them.
Hispanic voters. Trump's favorability six months ago was 44%.

Speaker 1 Today, adult, Hispanic adults are at 25%.

Speaker 1 Okay, that has to do with ICE. That has to do with the menacing behavior of his policies.
That has to do with the economy and affordability.

Speaker 1 And so, what I love about this situation, square the circle for me, because he shows up bombastic. He shows up with this hyper-masculine confidence.

Speaker 1 He's sauntering into the state dinner with all the brolegarts there and MBS. But I see way more than surface cracks based on the data.
So, I'm calling it right here. He's gone lame duck.

Speaker 1 And as we get into the new year, you're going to see these guys go after him and you're going to see Republican donors stall on him. Do you think I'm right or wrong, Caddy?

Speaker 2 I think you're right. The new year is 2026.
And what is 2026? It's midterm year, and everybody is going to be out for their own skins. And if they think he's an asset, they'll stick with him.

Speaker 2 If they think he's a liability, they'll drop him. Politicians are, you know, conniving and self-centered and self-serving.

Speaker 2 Okay, we're going to take a break, come back and talk more about MBS, this Ukraine plan.

Speaker 1 Before we take a break,

Speaker 1 I'm going to sing a little bit of a munchkin song from The Wizard of Oz, okay? You are? Haley, Yunkin, and Scott, oh my.

Speaker 1 Haley, Yunkin, and Scott, oh my.

Speaker 1 Because these people all see themselves as president, and they're coming for those donors. Okay, we'll take a break now.

Speaker 2 This is an ad for better help.

Speaker 1 You know, Caddy, as the days get shorter and colder, it's easy to drift slipping into personal routines and letting connections fade. But winter doesn't have to be the season of silence.

Speaker 2 Anthony, I'm definitely a summer person.

Speaker 2 I don't look forward to winter myself, and I know that this time of year isn't easy for everyone, which is why staying connected to your friends and family really matters.

Speaker 2 We're stronger when we have community and support. Even a quick call, a message to someone you haven't spoken to in a while, it can really mean a lot more than you think.

Speaker 1 Those moments remind us that we're better together and reaching out can change how a day feels. That's the idea behind BetterHelp's message this month to reconnect and check in.

Speaker 1 And if light starts to feel heavier, talking to a therapist can help lighten the load and steady your footing.

Speaker 2 So this month, don't wait to reach out. Whether you're checking in on a friend or reaching out to a therapist yourself, BetterHelp makes it easier to take the first step.

Speaker 1 Our listeners get a 10% off their first month at betterhelp.com/slash tripus. That is better, H-E-L-P.com/slash tripus.

Speaker 2 Christmas, a time for family, friends, and reflection. As the turkeys carved, one side of the table praises the portion sizes, the other demands a recount.

Speaker 2 If you're shopping for the politically obsessed this Christmas, give them something calmer than cable news. A founding membership to the rest is politics, U.S.

Speaker 1 What could be better than ad-free listening, weekly bonuses, a question and answer session, early access to our live shows and our deep dive series on people reshaping modern America.

Speaker 1 We've already explored President Ronald Reagan and unelected President Elon Musk. And let's just say the casting calls keep coming.

Speaker 2 It's measured, intelligent, and global in outlook with just the right dose of perspective and humor in a world that's running short on all of that.

Speaker 1 Well, listen, whether you're in New York or New Castle, democracy still deserves a closer listen.

Speaker 1 So, if you'd rather give a gift that sparks the conversation instead of another argument, Make Christmas great again.

Speaker 2 Head to therestispoliticsus.com and click on gifts.

Speaker 1 That's the RestisPoliticsUS.com and click on gifts. Merry Christmas, everybody.

Speaker 2 Welcome back to The Rest is Politics U.S.

Speaker 2 It has been a crazy busy week with Donald Trump meeting Mohammed bin Salman, the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia, in the White House and at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C.,

Speaker 2 offering to give, it would seem to me, Anthony, and I want your take on this as a businessman, that basically business is now American policy. And that Donald Trump got MBS into the White House.

Speaker 2 MBS said that he was going to give a trillion dollars of investment to the U.S., who knows over what time period. My understanding is that's about the total amount of the Saudi sovereign wealth fund.

Speaker 2 So it seems to me pretty implausible he's going to give that money. But this then got in return a promise from the president to sell the new American fighter jets, the F-35s, to Saudi Arabia.

Speaker 2 This, I know, has caused some consternation. I've spoken to some amongst national security officials because the Saudis are still also working with the Chinese on on security issues.

Speaker 2 And there is some concern that this F-35 technology may find its way into Chinese hands, which in a global power struggle between the Chinese and Americans is probably not the best security idea that America has ever had.

Speaker 2 But it seems to me that you look at what's happened, that Donald Trump's theory of the case is that if I can just do these business deals, I don't have to worry too much about the security issues.

Speaker 2 There was no real talk in this visit from MBS about the Abraham Accords, about a two-state solution for the Palestinians, about that big security problem in the Middle East. It was all about business.

Speaker 2 And I think Donald Trump basically believes, the businessman, the real estate developer in him believes, that that is the most important thing for the United States.

Speaker 2 And the problem is it means that he takes his eye off some real threats. I mean, I've just been in Norway.
The threat of Russia is real. The Europeans feel it very intensely.

Speaker 2 There are reports of a Russian ship pointing lasers at RAF pilots off the coast of the UK at the moment.

Speaker 2 He's ignoring some of the genuine security threats in the world and thinking that business deals is going to be the best outcome for America and that that's all it takes for American security at the moment.

Speaker 2 The two seem to have morphed in his mind, and I'm not sure that they have morphed in the real world. What do you think about that?

Speaker 1 Well, listen, I think what you're saying is an accurate analysis, but what I find so fascinating about the whole thing

Speaker 1 is

Speaker 1 the

Speaker 1 real politic of it. And so hear me out for a second.

Speaker 1 The unspeakable tragedy of the murder of Khashoggi, the journalist, unspeakable tragedy. I'm not trying to make light of it, but the bald-faced political realism of Donald Trump in the Oval Office.

Speaker 1 I think people are taken aback by. And so let me hear me out for a second.
They're our largest

Speaker 1 oil exporting partner in the Middle East, and what they did was a direct violation of human rights. Everybody has to be aghast about it.

Speaker 1 But yet, how can the U.S. break off its relationship with its largest oil trading partner in the Middle East? And you know this saying as well as I do.

Speaker 1 Stalin once said that the death of one person is an unspeakable tragedy. The death of a million people is a statistic.
And Trump just ran right over it. Okay.

Speaker 1 And Trump said things in the Oval Office about it that I was taken aback by. I think most people were.

Speaker 2 Things happen is what he said. Things happen.
Things happen.

Speaker 1 I guess the only thing

Speaker 1 I would say is that MBS, I'm very surprised because the widow of

Speaker 1 Mr. Khashoggi has said, hey, you should be compensating me for his death.

Speaker 1 And he's obviously, MBS is maintaining he didn't know about it. I'm not going to say whether he he knew about it or he didn't know about it.

Speaker 2 American intelligence says he did know about it. They did.
They did. That's correct.
So Donald Trump is directly contradicting U.S. intelligence findings when he says that MBS didn't know about it.

Speaker 1 Exactly. But if I were advising the Saudis and I'm not, have an undisclosed settlement.
Try to get the thing behind you. But here's the thing I will say, three quick things.

Speaker 1 Trump is a predictable partner for them. They like Trump way more than they like Joe Biden.
You caught that whole, I'm not giving you a fist bump like Joe Biden. I'm shaking your hand.

Speaker 1 He's got a good personal rapport with MBS, but watch the body language. Go back to the videos in the Oval Office.
There was a lot of hand grinding by the young prince. Okay, he's nervous around Trump.

Speaker 1 He doesn't like the unpredictability of Trump, although as a trading partner, Trump is quite predictable.

Speaker 2 Do you think they actually do invest a trillion dollars in America?

Speaker 2 That's what I think. That's what I'm trying to say about his foreign policy.
He throws out these business deals that nobody really believes. They don't have a trillion dollars.

Speaker 2 They've just spent far too much money trying to build a city that's never going to be a futuristic city. Their fiscal situation doesn't allow them to do this.

Speaker 2 And I think that's another thing that we talked in the first half about his approval ratings. I think people now hear these numbers from Donald Trump because he says them every time.

Speaker 2 The Japanese are going to invest billions. The Europeans are going to invest billions.

Speaker 2 I think people are starting to wake up to the idea that this money may never be invested and that you can't just throw out numbers and say that changes policy.

Speaker 1 He can say all this stuff, all this chatter.

Speaker 1 The food prices have gone down. Duh, the food prices have gone up.

Speaker 1 But remember,

Speaker 1 the oil prices you and I are talking about $64, $65 a barrel, that is not where the Saudis need to be.

Speaker 1 They need oil prices between $85 and $90.

Speaker 1 And unless they've got that, they're going to start running significant deficits. You just mentioned all of the investments that they're making in NEOM and the Red Sea project.

Speaker 1 This is sort of on the western side of Saudi Arabia, up by the Red Sea.

Speaker 1 They're bleeding money. They're hammering money.
And so there's no way, and there's absolutely no way they're going to put a trillion dollars into the U.S.

Speaker 1 And it'll it'll have to be seen whether or not we give them F-35s. Remember, we dangled the F-35s in front of the Emiratis, and we said, sign the Abraham Accords.

Speaker 1 We're going to be delivering you F-35s.

Speaker 1 And we never delivered the F-35s. We're still wrangling over whether or not we should deliver them.
And that's, of course, everything that you just said about stealing our technology.

Speaker 1 You know, Americans

Speaker 1 You know, they need to know, Americans need to know that our friendlies, our frenemies, sell our technology. You know,

Speaker 1 when the stealth helicopter landed and crashed into the wall during the Osama bin Laden raid, the back part of the copter,

Speaker 1 it crashed and landed on the other side of the wall. So when the SEALs blew up the front part of the copter, that was fine.
They killed the dashboard.

Speaker 1 But a lot of the noise cancellation technology was in the back part of the copter on the tail. And guess what the Pakistanis did? They sold that to the Chinese.

Speaker 2 That's valuable.

Speaker 1 Yeah, so the Chinese could copy our technology. So it's a very, very rough world out there.
And you said something interesting that I want to expound upon. Trump doesn't care.
Trump wants to do deals.

Speaker 1 Trump wants a real estate project for the Trump organization somewhere in Saudi. And it just bothers me a lot as an American that we have an American president that's this transactional.

Speaker 1 And by the way, we have to have a relationship with Saudi. And I have lots of relationships in the kingdom and we get on with the Saudis and going all the way back to Ibn Saud and Franklin Roosevelt.

Speaker 1 It's a 90-plus year relationship. But Caddy, I'll just say it's a dangerous world.

Speaker 1 And

Speaker 1 I think we've become sloppy in terms of understanding how dangerous.

Speaker 2 And I think

Speaker 2 by taking the focus off security issues primarily around Russia and Europe, but also other security issues around China, around the Palestinian issue in the Middle East, and presenting American policy and White House successes as these business deals and as these big headline figures of a trillion-dollar investment from Saudi Arabia, for example, when those deals are just announcements.

Speaker 2 I mean, they're not actual deals. A trillion dollars is not folks actually being invested in the United States from the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
So the deals may or may not amount to very much.

Speaker 2 They get announced as a great success. And at the same time, the president is not as focused on some of these traditional security issues.
And so what's the policy?

Speaker 2 What is the success when the deal is just a number that is announced on television?

Speaker 2 Talking of deals being announced, there are reports, this was broken at you by Barak Ravid, who's a very reliable reporter, one of the best connected people in this field, has announced this proposed deal that is being made between the Russians and the White House over Ukraine.

Speaker 2 It turns out that there have been secret visits from top American military officials to meet with Russians, and that the White House is thinking that because Vladimir Zelensky has had some corruption issues back in Ukraine and because the battlefield situation is not looking great for the Ukrainians, that the Ukrainians may be willing to capitulate to this 28-point peace plan that reportedly has been drawn up by the White House and by the Kremlin, and that may be announced as soon as next week.

Speaker 2 The Europeans, this is Thursday morning, the Europeans are already saying no peace plan without the involvement of the Ukrainians and the Europeans. Don't think that you can just do a stitch-up.

Speaker 2 The Russians are saying we're very happy. The Russian security situation is finally being addressed.

Speaker 2 That is not going to be good news to people sitting in Kyiv where there are still Russian cruise missiles landing in apartment blocks around the country.

Speaker 2 So, I don't know whether this is just a distraction from the Epstein files.

Speaker 2 I don't know if this is just Donald Trump getting so frustrated that he can't fix Ukraine that he's just going to think, okay, we'll give the Russians what they want.

Speaker 2 I just want this off my desk, out of my inbox.

Speaker 2 Of course, not realizing that things are more complicated than that, and you can announce something in the White House. It doesn't mean the Ukrainians are going to stick to it.

Speaker 2 Do you think this peace plan comes to anything from what you've heard of it, Anthony?

Speaker 1 I would be shocked if it does, because I think the Europeans have figured out that they can't afford to have it happen.

Speaker 1 Also, you know, because we're talking about Saudi and oil prices, I just want to remind people: yes, there may be some incremental wins by the Russians on the battlefield, but they are hammeraging money in their economy.

Speaker 1 40% of the government revenue comes from oil.

Speaker 1 Lower oil prices, which we have right now, are less money for the Ukraine war.

Speaker 1 There's less money for these Wagner-type operations that are more or less terrorism. Less money for cyber warfare and their intelligence and propaganda schemes.

Speaker 1 And so weirdly, and I think people know this, but let's just restate it, lower oil prices better for European and better for U.S.

Speaker 1 national security because it puts heat on our adversaries who are dependent upon oil. So again, it's so odd to me.

Speaker 1 It's so odd to me that we're not flexing because of a very sharp American president committed to Western liberalism would put a flex on Putin right now and would say, Look, my man, we took you off the SWIFT banking system.

Speaker 1 We've got the $300 billion that we've frozen. I've been reluctant to release that because I want to have a friendship with you or some type of relationship with you after this war is over.

Speaker 1 But you're pushing me. And so knock it off.
Retreat. Let's redraw these lines.
You can have Ukraine while I'm president. And

Speaker 1 I'm in lockstep with the European leaders, but Trump is not doing that. And I maintain they've got something on them, and maybe that's going to be the trigger.

Speaker 1 Maybe the Epstein files will show something that he's got. And then we'll be looking around saying, ah, okay, that makes sense.
And then maybe that will really lame ducify Donald Trump.

Speaker 1 I don't think this is the glass gas for the Ukrainians here.

Speaker 1 I think the Europeans are going to show some gumption and some courage here and some backbone, and they're going to push back hard on this plan.

Speaker 2 When I was in Norway, there was a Ukrainian general who came to speak to us, and I also interviewed the prime minister and asked him if I said, listen, I've listened to a whole day of people talking about the security and energy situation, and they sound very worried.

Speaker 2 Is Ukraine on a war footing? He said to me, no, but Ukraine is on a defensive footing.

Speaker 2 And when the Ukrainian general spoke to me, got a standing ovation, and the Norwegians were saying, that war in Ukraine is our war, too.

Speaker 2 We know what the threat of Russia is, so the Europeans aren't going to. I don't think the Europeans are going to tolerate.

Speaker 2 They're not going to accept a peace proposal that has not got Ukrainian involvement.

Speaker 1 Caddy, ask the Poles about the drone incursions into their territory. Ask the Finns.

Speaker 1 Okay,

Speaker 1 they're not happy.

Speaker 1 You and I both know that the Russian military is weaker, but the culture of the Russian military is to behave like savages.

Speaker 1 They go after civilians, they rape people,

Speaker 1 they deal with civilian populations with impunity, and that whole area of the world that borders them is frightened by this.

Speaker 1 And it's just astonishing to me that the American leader is siding with the Russians on a right or wrong issue like this. Just astonishing.

Speaker 2 I think he's got frustrated and he doesn't know how to end it. And he thought he could fix it quickly, is what I'm told.
And now he doesn't know what to do. And so he just wants it out of his dog.

Speaker 1 No, I mean, listen, I hear you on all that, and I know that's what you're told. But let me tell you, I know the son of a bitch.
Okay, this guy is like, Putin's got something on me.

Speaker 1 I'm going to kiss Putin's ass until the end here.

Speaker 1 And I wink-winked at him in Alaska. And I can't overly tip myself because it'll be just too obvious to the rest of the world.

Speaker 1 So this is going to be a stalemate, as I predicted, as long as Trump is in power and not politically, mortally weakened. Because remember, Trump has political mortality.

Speaker 1 Before we end this program, ladies and gentlemen, Trump is politically mortal, and his time is coming to an end faster than people think.

Speaker 2 I think the way that he spoke to journalists this week,

Speaker 2 calling them terrible people, calling a female journalist, you know, telling her quiet quiet piggy on Air Force One is also actually not something.

Speaker 2 There are parts of the MAGA base that may love that, that believe that the fourth estate has been captured by liberals.

Speaker 2 I also happen to know from Jonathan Carl, who's an ABC journalist, that there are times when Donald Trump berates him when the cameras are going.

Speaker 2 As soon as the cameras are off, he'll turn around and say, okay, John, we're fine now, right? Yeah, you know, we're good.

Speaker 2 And that some of this is a show for the cameras. But I don't know that it's a show that the American people necessarily appreciate or want to tune in for more of.
Okay, we're going to wrap it up.

Speaker 2 Before we go, we have something very special coming up. Anthony and I are recording a little mini-series on Jeffrey Epstein.
We're going to dig into where his money actually came from.

Speaker 2 It seemed to come out of nowhere. It opened doors.
to him, to presidents, to prime ministers, to billionaires and royalty.

Speaker 2 And of course, behind all those private jets and the private island was something a lot darker, a big system of exploitation and sex trafficking of girls that operated for years, over a thousand young girls while institutions looked away.

Speaker 2 So we're going to dig into that.

Speaker 1 So Katie, I'm looking forward to this because I have spent 37 years on Wall Street and I have known of Jeffrey Epstein for 36 of the 37 years. And so woven into this is what he did.

Speaker 1 in terms of the relationship tentacles, okay?

Speaker 1 Why guys like Jeff Staley, the CEO of Barclays, people like Leon Block, the CEO of Apollo, one of the largest private equity firms, have been forced to step out of their business professions.

Speaker 1 How did he knock Larry Summers, who's a former Secretary of Treasury and a former president of Harvard University, out of Harvard?

Speaker 1 So there's a lot of interesting things here, and it's a cautionary tale for people.

Speaker 1 And we'll get into that discussion and much more.

Speaker 2 And we'll have the final episodes of the J.D. Vance series, The Real J.D.
Vance, by Alastair Campbell and Rory Stewart. We're going to put those out this weekend.

Speaker 2 If you want to hear that, do sign up at the restispoliticsus.com. Thanks for listening, guys.
We will be back soon.