0:06

Steve Schmidt has advised presidents

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run game-changing campaigns and

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become an eloquent defender of democracy.

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His writings in the warning newsletter have

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marked him as a singular voice of

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moral clarity in his generation. And

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I'm thrilled he's joining us tonight on Narrative

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to discuss the trial and the upcoming

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election. And we welcome Steve Schmidt to the show

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today. How are you Steve? I'm

0:29

good, Jeff. It's a real pleasure to be with you. Thank

0:32

you for having me. It's great to have you here. You

0:34

know, based on the current swing state polling, if the

0:36

election were held today, it does seem to me that

0:39

Donald Trump could win that election.

0:41

Most of these swing states, he's still six

0:44

points ahead of Joe Biden. Are

0:46

we looking at a likely second administration

0:48

for Donald Trump? I wouldn't

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say likely, but he could win. No

0:53

question about it. In fact, if the election

0:55

were tomorrow, he probably would

0:58

win. The reality is

1:00

that his calculus going into

1:02

this election is that

1:05

there's enough indifference out there, plus

1:08

the fanaticism of his base to get

1:11

him over the top. Chris

1:13

Sinuno was utterly humiliated,

1:16

exposed for really a

1:19

level of cynicism that's hard to

1:21

articulate with George Stephanopoulos

1:23

on Sunday. One of the

1:25

things the New Hampshire governor said is that, you

1:27

know, Trump is supported by 51% of the country.

1:31

That has never been the case. It will never

1:33

be the case. There will never be

1:35

a majority of Americans that support

1:38

this. Question is,

1:40

can it take power with a

1:42

minority over majority will?

1:45

And the answer to that question is yes, that could

1:47

happen. And, you know,

1:49

Biden is a weak candidate

1:52

in this race. He

1:54

has enormous liabilities in

1:56

the campaign because this is

1:58

a communication business. And

2:01

it's going to be a campaign

2:03

where, you know, in the end, the

2:05

American people are going

2:08

to have to evaluate

2:10

a staggeringly easy choice

2:12

to make in

2:14

the context. Of considerations

2:16

around the destiny of the country, where

2:19

we're going, what's happening. What

2:21

is Trump? What is his

2:23

movement? What does it stand for? What

2:26

does it believe in? Is it dangerous? You know,

2:29

all these questions are now in front of the

2:32

country who's had a rather naive

2:34

view about it for much of

2:36

the last decade, which will

2:39

be remembered historically as really the

2:41

Trump era. Incredibly, it's

2:43

gone on for almost 10 years

2:45

in America now. I know it is stunning, that amount

2:47

of time. I was thinking about how long I've been

2:49

doing this podcast. When you think about eight years of

2:51

your life and it's like eight years of how much

2:53

time it's to deal with Donald Trump, it's just unbelievable.

2:57

But we talked about the evaluation that

2:59

you pointed out. You didn't talk about the

3:01

trials that Donald Trump may or may

3:03

not have to deal with. Certainly,

3:05

the hash money case has sort of begun now.

3:09

The Democrats have a lot of weight

3:11

invested in some sort of criminal

3:13

outcome changing what Americans decide in

3:15

November. Do you view that kind

3:17

of optimism that some Democrats have

3:19

that a conviction in this case,

3:21

a hash money case, are enough

3:23

to really push Biden over Donald

3:26

Trump? I've done consulting work

3:28

on political campaigns all over the world.

3:30

And you go into

3:33

a different country and they

3:35

hire American consultants, and there's

3:37

this belief embedded in that hire

3:39

that the American consultant is going

3:42

to bring some sort of magic

3:44

bullet, right? Some

3:46

sort of elixir into the race,

3:48

some alchemy that just because

3:51

through presence, they're

3:53

going to win. And it doesn't work like

3:55

that. These criminal cases

3:58

have been a divide. debacle, a

4:01

debacle for the cause of

4:04

defeating Donald Trump. Now there's

4:07

only one of them that is

4:09

going to trial before the election, and that's

4:11

the one we're in right now. There's

4:14

no question in my mind that the

4:16

lead up to it has

4:19

benefited Trump enormously. That

4:21

being said, watching him

4:23

come into the courtroom is

4:26

a diminishing event. This

4:29

is somebody who is stripped of

4:32

his trappings, his accoutrements.

4:35

The fact is that

4:37

he is now outside of his terrarium

4:39

like a fish outside of the tank.

4:42

There is no crowd assembled as

4:44

in the Mar-a-Lago dining

4:46

room to stand and applaud

4:48

when he appears. He

4:51

is being subjected to the same rules

4:53

like everybody else, and I think

4:55

he appears a lot like the Wizard of Oz. Unmasked

4:59

from behind the screen. So we'll see

5:02

what the accumulation of that

5:04

is over eight weeks' time.

5:06

I do believe this, and I wrote about

5:08

it today. Presidential

5:11

campaign, in my view,

5:14

is the greatest non-lethal

5:16

competition in the world,

5:18

period. And it's a contact

5:20

sport. The contact

5:22

that the debit manifests

5:25

at a psychological level. And

5:28

so you put a picture of Donald Trump

5:30

up on the screen, and

5:32

the one that I gravitated

5:34

to from yesterday is the

5:37

image coming through the doors. Does

5:40

he look happy? He does not look happy.

5:45

Does he look like he's going home with

5:47

a spring in his step to bound through

5:49

the door at Trump Tower to make love

5:52

to his beautiful Melania in the late afternoon?

5:54

That is not what he appears to be

5:56

doing, though. I'm

5:58

going to tell you exactly. what

6:01

he does. He leaves enraged

6:04

and he goes home and he

6:06

puts the television on and

6:08

he surveils it, all of it.

6:11

He watches all the jokes made about

6:13

him for his enemies

6:15

list. He evaluates all

6:17

of the sycophants that are auditioning

6:20

to be Vice President. He's

6:22

available for flattery from

6:25

the detritus that surrounds him.

6:28

This is a time where you know where

6:30

he is, what he's watching and

6:32

this is when he should be visited by

6:34

the campaign taunting

6:36

him, mocking him, diminishing

6:39

him, destabilizing him and

6:41

his team to put him off

6:44

balance. In the end whomever

6:47

the person is that wins the

6:49

race is going to be

6:51

the candidate that is able to make the

6:53

race about the other person. In

6:56

other words, if the race is

6:58

about you, you will be

7:00

the losing candidate. The race

7:02

has to be about Trump. Incredibly,

7:05

this massive propaganda

7:09

apparatus that surrounds MAGA,

7:11

manifested in Fox, Newsmax,

7:14

OAN, all this bullshit has

7:16

been able to destroy

7:19

Biden's reputation for competence,

7:21

for probity, for rectitude

7:26

after a lifetime of getting to know the

7:28

guy. It's incredible to

7:30

watch, it's a huge failure on the

7:32

part of the White House, but

7:34

this is a rocky Apollo

7:36

Creed fight. Middle of

7:38

the ring, president has to

7:41

debate him, has to face him

7:43

and has to do the equivalent of knocking

7:46

this disgraceful,

7:48

disgusting bully on

7:51

his ass. That's

7:53

the job that at age

7:56

82 Biden has demanded

7:58

that he get the to do again. And

8:01

so he needs to do it. And we

8:03

have 202 days left for him to be

8:05

able to do it in a

8:07

time of growing momentous crisis

8:10

in the world. Let's,

8:12

let's ask follow up on some of this stuff, because if we

8:14

have a trial here that ends

8:16

up in a conviction for Donald Trump,

8:19

what does that do to the race versus let's say

8:21

a hung jury in this case?

8:24

I think it shrinks him to

8:27

nothingness. He will

8:29

be revealed over the course

8:31

of the trial to be

8:33

what I believe him to be, which is

8:36

a low life criminal.

8:38

That being said, and I've said this

8:40

right through all of this, is that

8:43

the American people have to believe in

8:45

their institutions here, right? And have to

8:47

have faith in them. What

8:50

Donald Trump did, and

8:52

I say this to someone who placed a concession phone

8:54

call, I placed it for John McCain to Barack

8:57

Obama, is break

8:59

his oath and assault

9:02

in the most defeciturably

9:04

way possible the cornerstone

9:07

of American civilization, the

9:09

peaceful transition of power and

9:12

the apportionment and political power through

9:14

the outcome of an election. Now his

9:17

fate rests in the hands of

9:19

a jury of his

9:21

peers. And make no mistake,

9:23

right? This man, and jury

9:25

is a jury of his peers. Donald

9:28

Trump is of this place, court

9:31

and soul. And so even

9:33

his most ferocious critics

9:36

like me have to be the people

9:38

who are the most steadfast

9:41

in demanding that those jurors,

9:43

those citizens, follow

9:45

their oath and give him a

9:47

fair trial. But if he's found

9:49

guilty, then it's going to hurt

9:51

him, is what all of the

9:53

polling seems to suggest. And I just

9:56

don't believe that there is

9:58

a movement of Americans out

10:00

there that will rally to

10:03

the jailhouse and surround it to

10:06

break their guy out. You

10:08

have a couple hundred people at the most

10:10

on the streets. This

10:12

is a TV show. And

10:15

Trump, at the end of the day, is

10:17

a philosopher of fuck you-ism. That's

10:20

his appeal. If you

10:22

obliterate trust in

10:24

every institution in the country, and

10:27

your average person out there looks at

10:29

government, they're not expecting the result. They

10:32

just want to deliver a little

10:35

bit of agitation back towards

10:37

the people that have been,

10:40

for the last 10 years, completely

10:43

destabilized by Trump. The

10:46

banks, the tech

10:48

companies, whatever it may be,

10:50

the elite of the country, Trump

10:52

is their vessel, not to

10:54

make their lives better, but

10:57

to deliver a type of sugar high. Or

10:59

fuck you. Because sometimes that fuck

11:01

you feels good, right? Whether you're

11:03

driving down the road. Sure. Yeah.

11:07

Any time, any day of the week

11:09

might be time for a delicious fuck

11:11

you to someone. And mind you,

11:13

Sam, we

11:16

have this situation, and that's what this

11:18

guy is. In order

11:20

to beat him and put it away, you

11:22

have to offer better. And

11:25

the reality is, this

11:27

is true, there's 500 background

11:29

quotes to back it up. The

11:32

Biden team wanted Trump. They did. They

11:35

wanted him in the race, right? Because he was the patchy.

11:38

He was the easiest opponent. He was

11:40

the guy that justified the rationale for

11:42

Biden to run for a second term. Only

11:45

Biden can beat Trump, beat him again, he'll knock him

11:48

on his ass again. Uh-oh.

11:51

Somewhere along the way, right? Now

11:53

Biden's the incumbent. Trump's the challenger, right?

11:56

What was up is down and down

11:58

is up and red is blue. and

12:00

blue is red and voila, all

12:02

of a sudden Trump looks like

12:04

he's the only guy, right,

12:07

that any Democrat, right,

12:09

could conceivably be beaten by. Right,

12:12

he's Biden. And so,

12:15

but at any rate, wherever we are right

12:17

now, in this moment, the

12:19

choice is the choice. And

12:21

the choice is Biden versus Trump and

12:24

its close race. I'm Steve Schmidt. This

12:26

is The Warning. And I invite you

12:28

to join, subscribe on our

12:30

sub-stack on our YouTube channel. Follow

12:32

us. Welcome to the community.