The inspector general’s report on fired FBI director James Comey changed the way students of the Trump-Russia affair view one of the key moments in the investigation. The players: Comey, President-elect Donald Trump, an FBI laptop, a secure video tele-conference, and the Crossfire Hurricane team. Remember when Comey told Trump the FBI wasn’t investigating him? It wasn’t true.
Note: there were some audio issues with the recording of this show. We apologize in advance.
A look at the dynamics inside the Democratic presidential race — in these post-Great Awokening times, can the party accept Joe Biden’s back-to-Obama appeal, or will voters choose a left winger? Also: Do we need to pay attention to NeverTrumpers? And finally: Should anyone care about anything that happens in Canada? That and more with the Heritage Foundation’s David Azerrad.
The world waited for Robert Mueller to testify about his Trump-Russia report. And then, when the moment came, the story quickly turned into the state of Mueller himself. Slow, confused, not up on his own investigation, Mueller’s performance denied Democrats their desire to turn his report into a “movie” that would capture the imagination of millions of Americans. We talk with Eric Felten, who has written some of the most perceptive pieces around on the Mueller report and the politics behind it.
The Democrats headed to South Carolina recently, and there could be something strangely familiar going on, with Joe Biden in the role of 2008 Hillary Clinton and Kamala Harris in the role of 2008 Barack Obama. Plus, will all the craziness in Washington cause any South Carolina Republicans to lose faith in President Trump? A visit with Katon Dawson, former chair of the South Carolina GOP.
2016 Trump campaign veteran Corey Lewandowski flew with the president on Air Force One to the big 2020 campaign kickoff in Florida this week. What do they talk about on the World’s Greatest Airplane?
Plus: How does Trump win over voters turned off by his style? Were the first six months of the Trump White House really that crazy? (They were.) And what was it like sitting down with Robert Mueller’s prosecutors?
So much writing on President Trump, and especially his business career, comes from journalists who aren’t businesspeople. What do they know about being hundreds of millions of dollars in debt? Conrad Black is a former press baron who sees Trump’s business life from a businessman’s (and a historian’s) perspective, and his new biography of the president puts Trump in a new light. How much hucksterism is good? Was there strategy behind Trump’s professional wrestling antics? And what about the president’s near-death experience with debt? Black talks about it all (and yes, he discusses the pardon).
A special solo edition of the podcast — it’s just me going through the latest in the Trump-Russia investigation, and, more important, the investigation of the Trump-Russia investigation. What to look for after the president’s declassification order, plus a little-discussed reason why pressure is building for Democrats to impeach.
So where should U.S. Attorney John Durham start as he investigates the Trump-Russia investigation? Well, he might start by talking with former prosecutor Andrew McCarthy. Then: You want to get into the Trump-Russia weeds? This is the place. What about the CIA’s involvement in starting the investigation? How come we don’t hear much about that? Did the FBI, with Carter Page warrant, surf the “upstream part of the Internet” for Trump info? And what about that 2-hop thing? That and more from a man who really knows his Trump-Russia stuff.
In a weird coincidence, the same lawyer who represents accused spy Butina also represents a key figure in the GOP platform brouhaha. Attorney Robert Driscoll goes inside two of the weirdest cases of the Trump-Russia affair — cases that started with sensational headlines and ended as nothingburgers.
Carter Page, the only man wiretapped — that we know of — in the Trump-Russia probe describes what it was like in the grand jury with Robert Mueller’s prosecutors. Also, what did the FBI ask in five, count ’em five, interviews? And then the question: Can you tell if you’re under surveillance?
In this interview, George Papadopoulos describes —in crazy detail— why he believes a series of shady figures recorded him when he was he was working for the Trump campaign. Plus, why did so many foreign spooks want to buy him a drink? The answers to this and more in this episode of the Byron York show.
