Terry Moran Breaks His Silence: Trump Is Not As Tough As He Seems!

Terry Moran Breaks His Silence: Trump Is Not As Tough As He Seems!

i’m welcoming you to the Bullwork Podcast live on Sub Sub Sub Substack this is the first attempt at this for us so hopefully it goes well for folks that don’t know you I assume everybody here knows you but uh you were senior national correspondent for ABC News up to about two seconds ago previously chief foreign correspondent chief White House correspondent co-anchor of Night Line and now you’re a free man how’s that feeling oh well it’s uh somebody said somebody used the word skiting which is a combination of scary and exciting okay which I’ll buy I I would say it’s exhilarating and daunting and scary uh but but yeah exhilarating you know I was at the point in my career 65 years old in a in a business that just as a matter of demographic fact is is dying i was having less impact in ABC having less impact on the in the world i’m like well what’s next because I have these inappropriately young children and uh and so court substack in a lot of all these new spaces and now that I’m here uh on an accelerated timetable um it I it’s it’s a it’s a brave new world and I and for all of the all the things that come with job loss there is a great deal of of excitement and and joy in my heart genuinely all right it was my first hard-hitting question you look great for 65 what’s your skininc care regimen are you moisturizing you know yeah well I I will say this so I met my wife in 2006 and um I’d never put anything i just washed with bar soap and everything like what a problem because she’s uh up on all that and so yeah I I what use a little moisturizer whatever it’s working okay and name or let’s get to business so the tweet that started it all um for folks folks who missed it I just want to read a little bit from it the the thing about Steven Miller is he’s not the brains behind Trumpism it’s not brains it’s bile miller is a man who is richly endowed with the capacity for hatred he’s a worldclass hater you can see this just by looking at him because you can see that his hatreds are his spiritual nourishment what um what what was what prompted that what was behind it yeah that’s I one thing I can say is that it wasn’t a drunk tweet everybody assumes it was because it was at after midnight and it wasn’t uh I had been thinking during the course of the day on and off you know thinking about the country right as we all are uh ruminating whatever and I was out for a long walk with the dog and something kind of came to me and I thought because I was thinking about that guy like what what what is it and what is it in this moment and there was something there and I thought all right well so I came back we had a family dinner uh we then watched a family movie we watched Oceans 11 and I can’t blame that cuz that’s such an excellent caper movie and then put the kids to bed we were up for a little while it was not a rock and roll wild night it was a normal family night and then you know got in bed and I thought “What was that?” And I typed it out and I looked at it and I thought “That’s true.” And I hit send um I mean it’s you you got to forgive people who think that it might have been a drunk tweet i mean are are you usually popping off at midnight no not Stephen are you is it a concern that you’re thinking about Steven Miller at midnight i mean I I guess maybe it says something about the state of the country that you’re thinking about Steven Miller at midnight i believe so it it it was more the this the moment that we’re in which he represents in such a vivid and to me quite disturbing way i do I will say this i looked at it i thought okay what is that and I thought that’s a description of the public man that I’m describing him yeah i mean there’s no lies detected from my side of things but I’m an opinion podcaster and you do got to admit like you went a little hard in the paint there with that um uh talking about how his hatreds are his spiritual nourishment so you know I I guess it does leave people to wonder like were you and Stephen fighting like was there something was there a news story that prompted it like was it something off of your Trump interview right i mean given like your background as a news man obviously you had a perspective but that’s that’s hot that’s hot material it’s way hot uh and I wish I had a better story Tim i just it was something that was in my heart and mind and I would say I I used very strong language deliberately because he I felt and it wasn’t any I I you see him all the time doing the same spitting venom and lies into our debate degrading our our public discourse debasing it and using the power of the White House and what he’s been given to grind us down in that in that in that bile and uh that’s very disturbing to me i’m actually you know not that liberal at you know I’m like a lot of people some conservative some liberal but there was something about that and what it represented about that movement and Trump himself that I felt to describe it accurately needed that language yeah it’s interesting it does feel like it was something that was weighing on you i I don’t have it in front of me but like maybe a week before that you had sent kind of a long tweet about about immigration and it wasn’t a lefty tweet really i I it started with you know a comment about how um you know we we need to be able to have self-government and have our borders here it is um it’s like people have a right to say who comes into our country and at what pace they’re admitted that’s not racism self self-government by turning migration into a moral demand a matter of right rather than policy advocates have ignited a backlash and that was this was you like a week before then you go on to talk about how we are seeing a bunch of people who are being racist in the way and in the ways that they are treating immigration so like there’s something about this issue that has been obviously noodling in your head for a while yeah yeah i would say that you know I’m I’m a I’m a member of the most despised political tribe in America i’m a proud centrist uh and but you know what I mean by that is I guess I’m old and uh and the viciousness and and the intolerance that that you feel when we are when we argue politics somebody asked me the other day in connection with all this so what are your politics and I said well I guess I’m a Hubert Humphrey Democrat you know I mean I’m old enough to remember him and you know get practical things done that people need in a decent way and stand up for what’s right and that is my politics so someone like Steven Miller in my judgment and in my observation which is what reporters do is is degrading all that and and is a danger and that’s that’s what was in my heart i don’t I don’t feel this way but you know I used to be a Republican so I want to steal man the Republican argument for a second with you which is I think that some of my old friends over there or former friends maybe better better put would say look he just admitted it terry Mar just admitted he was a Democrat he was hiding it his whole life he was a Hubert Humphrey Democrat and like one night it just the mask came off you know and this is the problem with the media what would you say to that i have at it you know but my own feeling is you don’t sacrifice your citizenship as journalism and your job I is not to be objective there is no Mount Olympus of objectivity where a Mandarin class of wise people have no feelings about what their society we’re all in this together what you have to be is fair and accurate and I would refer to the interview with the president that I did or a lot of my work and I would also say that this while very hot is an observation a description that is accurate and true yeah and we got 10 years evidence you know it’s the 10 year anniversary today of the escalator did you know that i did not know that one of the most significant moments in American history no question about it 10 years what What were you thinking about it back then that day do you remember uh you know it was a sideshow to me at that point but I quickly came to understand I was actually in London because I was the foreign chief foreign correspondent so I’d covered Brexit and as soon as I started hearing what he was talking about I I thought I told colleagues who didn’t believe me I told I teach in the summer I I said he’s going to win in 2016 uh because partly because I had covered Brexit partly also because I thought I did not understand what Hillary Clinton was saying to me in terms of what she wanted to do with that power uh and I if you had taken a poll a week before the election what does Donald Trump stand for 95% of Americans could have told something build the wall China whatever what does Hillary Clinton stand for i think harder to get a hold of that and you know I think that was kind of an issue but I also felt like he was on to something just like Brexit was on to something brexit was a catastrophe and a disaster and a tragedy for Britain but there was a reason it happened and I could see the same thing happening with Trump yeah that bile and that hatred though goes back to that very speech you know i mean it’s like the rapists and the murderers the the cantaloupe legs and the grievances right i mean it’s not a lot has changed there over the decade i mean your observation we’ve got a decade of evidence I guess about your observation about Steven Miller and and the Trump movement well I would say this i I agree yes that that that’s part of the sale that’s that’s part of the revving up of the resentment and and all of that and you you saw it also in Britain and in other places where Trump is a nationalist the night he was elected I was on ABC News as we were covering the campa the election and I said Trump’s not a Republican he’s a Democrat he’s a nationalist uh we haven’t seen one in a long time and he’s now basically reframing the political debate he’s he’s which he’s now successfully done the Republican party is a nationalist party and I do think that that part of that is going to be hard to get out of our system once it gets there it’s and I don’t mean a patriot I mean a nationalist uh tell one thing about the the they’re sending their rape they’re sending rapes and murders i did I covered a mock election in a little town in the middle of Pennsylvania as part of the story and it was school election and the teachers were kind of gathered around watching the kids vote trump won overwhelmingly and the teacher said “Yeah you guys in the media you saw that thing and all you said was “Yeah he’s sending the rapist.” And I said “Well yeah it was that was kind of bad.” He said “I bet you don’t remember what he said next.” And I said “All right what do you say next?” And they said “They’re sending the drugs.” He said “You the guy said you go into any one of these classrooms you ask how many kids have a loved one or somebody they know who’s been in drug addiction.” And I did it and we put it on night because every hand in that classroom went up yeah that’s um I want to get into a couple other news things for you just just a few more things on on the tweet that changed your life uh so I were you expecting the next morning you know obviously it leads to you leaving ABC i like um I’m sure there’s some limitations what you can talk about but like what were those conversations like like the next morning were you kind of expecting that that it was over that were you bullworthing it were you Jerry Magcguireing this or were you kind of upset that there was even an issue because you felt it was so accurate yeah well the Bullworth reference I have to say I hate that movie but but the Jerry Magcguire No I wasn’t Jerry Magcguireing it either of I don’t want to go into all the gory details about what happened but it was I was rocked clearly and um and full of fear okay and uh and I realized that this was going to be a very serious situation and had to stand up you know and and deal with it and uh and activity is one of the best things to assuage fear but also I thought about it in my own conscience first and I thought as I tell you I I wrote it because I thought it was true and at the end of the day when all the bad stuff has happened my children will know that whatever it means it means that did you feel like you should have been able to stay within the context of what you wrote you know I don’t I don’t know that’s a bureaucratic thing i don’t know you know actually wasn’t bureaucratic it was their calculation and had the the Stephanopoulos press i I shouldn’t get too close to the line because there’s still more stuff but I it was a business decision from from my perspective it looked like a business decision and I I became bad business it feels like yeah I understand those limitations but just one more thing on that it is worth seeing what happened to you in that context right like there was a settlement with Trump over the Stephanopoulos thing which to me was pretty borderline we’re seeing this in some of the other areas 60 Minutes we’ve seen folks have to walk away from so I like what do you make of just the broader environment around you know you having to leave um with regards to the media’s response to Trump 2.0 No that’s a huge challenge because these these media companies are part of bigger companies that have major business interests and Trump has demonstrated with law firms with universities with companies that he will bring all the power he can uh rhetorical and the power that is the people’s to destroy them if they don’t count out to him that is the story in industry after industry the media is no different and that has to be the calculation in the in the calculation of and I’m not talking of any particular person of of any executive and um we can’t live like that so you know one of the great things about where we are right now Tim is that um we are free to speak our minds here in a way that um that people in other ways aren’t i’m not slagging anybody i sure did but I Were you worried after the settlement were you worried after the settlement that things might be going away that were that concerned you i should have been but no I wasn’t i’m I was kind of known at ABC as somebody put it and I think I know who it was somebody who I I don’t think enjoyed my uh explorations of the issues and such said he’s always had a very high opinion of his opinions which is nasty when somebody’s been fired but it’s fair comment i I I suppose but no I didn’t think anything like that was Yeah i mean you got the Trump interview in the meantime like in between that that was accidental it was there were factors like the settlement like the debate like other things i was kind of low man on the totem pole and some of the others were kind of knocked off so three days it was accidental that it was you you mean like you were kind of the default choice is what you’re saying yeah yeah which I was h I had that last of all the things I’ve done at ABC News i’ve been 86 countries and lots of elections and conflict zones i’ve had a wonderful career there i love a lot I love most of my colleagues who were there and have tremendous respect for the work they do under difficult cir circumstances but um yeah that was it was clear that that uh I was not going to I was not first choice there and I had 3 days to prepare and that was the most fun I’ve ever had all right I want to get to the interview right next but just really quick have you seen PI’s commencement i assume you have since he left 60 Minutes yeah yeah i mean like quite powerful stuff i I it is your departure from ABC is within that context right you have somebody leaving 60 minutes and giving a commencement which is who is basically warning that we have real threats to democracy to freedom of speech to the free press to diversity and what did you make of of his remarks i thought I thought Scott was absolutely spoton um I’m now in a position where I can help in that good work and that fills my joy as well we can all put our shoulder to the wheel because I do think He’s right this is a moment of danger and I’m happy to be able to help if I can all right back to the Trump interview so you uh I have a I have many thoughts on it i’ve I’ve I’ve now watched like the Zapruder film like three or four times through um the uh what was going through your head when he starts arguing with you about how Kilmar Garcia actually did have the letters MS13 tattooed on his on his hand there’s a dispute wait a minute wait a minute he had MS13 on his knuckles oh he had some tattoos that are interpreted that way but let’s move on wait a minute oh Terry terry terry he did not have the letter MS13 it says MS13 that was photoshopped u so let me That was photoshopped terry you can’t do that hey they’re giving you the big break of a lifetime you know you’re doing the interview i picked you because frankly I never heard of you but that’s okay i picked you Terry and but you’re not being very nice he had MS-13 tattoo we’ll agree to disagree i want to move on to something else do you want me to show you the picture i saw the picture we’ll look at Photoshop well here we go here we go don’t photoshop it go look at his hand he had MS he did have tattoos that can be interpreted that way i’m not an expert on them i want to turn to Ukraine i want to get to Ukraine no no no no he had MS as clear as you can be not interpreted this is why people no longer believe the news because when he was photographed in El Sal in in El Salvador they aren’t there but let’s just go on they aren’t there when he’s in El Salvador they’re there now right no but they’re in your picture ukraine sir he’s got MS13 on his knuckles all right okay we’ll take a look it’s you such a disservice we’ll take a look at this why don’t you just say yes he does and you know go on to something else it’s contested ukraine i couldn’t believe he went there and also so we were in the Oval Office and we had a time limit so I had a couple of issues to get to and then I I couldn’t let it slide and so I said no sir no mm- no not right you know no photoshop and it was like a dog with a bone okay it was like he was he was nuts about it and I’m thinking and so I’m a little freelancing at this point this this is not something I had intended to grill on him to grill them on and had fact checked everything but I I’m kind of no that in the photographs when he’s in El Salvador they’re not there and people interpret them I don’t know I’m not an expert in tattoos all that stuff and he kept at it so much so he was very angry at the end of the interview and he we were supposed to do a a rose garden walk and he said not after that interview you know it was a bad feeling and he stormed out and of course then I said okay that good good day’s work and of course we were going to put an hour in prime time so we were short so we had to get him back and I the there was executives who went and Susie Wilds chief of staff went back and then he managed to come back and he said “Look I’m I’m just going to sit at this desk you’re going to stand there i’m going to point some things out and then that’s it no for me.” Oh so that was because it ended up being at the beginning when he’s showing you the photos of uh my favorite one favorite part of that exchange is uh you ask him why he has the James Monroe uh photo up there and he’s like well the Monroe doctrine and you’re like well what was it about the Monroe doctrine and he’s like very important it’s very was very important so I was like I’m not uh I think it leaves uh leaves some questions about his familiarity with what the Monroe document actually was um the so my nitpick of you I I know you’re doing it live i have to live through all this i rewatch my now and it’s like it’s it’s harder than it looks but um you know at one point you’re like you know he’s adamant that it’s like it said MS13 and and you go agree to disagree i want to move on to something else and he would not let you stop then he continued and you’re giving him agree to disagree which is maybe maybe wrong and it’s kind of like if Trump was saying “The moon is made of cheese.” And you’re like “Agree to disagree let’s move on.” And then he’s like “No the moon is made of cheese Terry.” Well and the last thing I said in that that’s fair and I’ve seen people who said I I should have gotten up on my soap box and say “How dare you the president?” First I don’t do theater and second I felt the facts had been well established for anyone who to look at them and and third the last thing I said was it’s contested so yeah they agreed to discreet thing was an error i agree yeah but he was adamant that’s the funny and like you had him but he really thought it right i mean like there’s no way to interpret that other than that he really thought that the MS-13 was on his fingers yes not only so back in the uh in his hold or wherever he went he cuz we were in the oval uh he apparently told Steven Chung “Go get the photograph i’m going out there i’m going out there i’m going to show him.” And a that shows he’s got terrible staff work who are too afraid of him to tell him the truth b that he was still fixated on yeah and that he’s like extremely gullible it also shows i I just I mean truth is truth it it did it wasn’t a convincing tattoo really on the fingers it wasn’t but he has demonstrated the capacity to bend reality to bend truth for tens of millions of Americans simply through sheer force of will and he can do it um another thing when I was re-watching the interview this morning that struck me was um there was this there’s a section on his meeting with Alinski that happened in um uh in Vatican City and you were talking about how striking it was and like how was there was this historic photos move you know moving photo maybe or historic meeting between the two of them um in the Vatican and you know there’s that somber photo people have of Trump leaning forward and staring at him and I just watched that with like a month’s difference and it really is striking how that actually was nothing you know like Trump like Trump is very um you said you don’t do theater trump does theater like he was happy for that to be theater like him and Zilinsky having this serious meeting in Vatican City but it unfortunately it’s changed nothing right and um you know I guess we had over the weekend that Trump got a happy birthday call from Putin and nothing has changed well has nothing changed though Tim because he’s it like it’s like he’s disappointed and uh I think he’s still going to abandon Ukraine trump’s fairly bent on that but uh I do feel that he thought he could just wave his bending reality wand and get make peace there and the reason I I did kind of lay it down a little thick this moving photo this historic photo whatever it was was to get them to open up a little bit about it yeah no I was I wasn’t really criticism in that moment it felt that way you there was like a moment of okay well gosh we got a new pope they’re meeting there in the Vatican and you know his fake reality about what Russia wants is you know crumbling right and you know we had it had been a month prior that they had had the shouting match you know the kids you know food fight in the West Wing right and maybe this is a sign of progress and it’s kind of like this guy is not movable i you know I don’t I guess my point is uh the majesty of the Vatican and the reality of Putin’s behavior I just in the directionally hasn’t really changed where Trump’s posture is on all this um he came into office bent on abandoning Ukraine he has uh as far as he has this kind of thing he’s he’s he’s one of the world historical figures henry Kissinger just before he died saw it he said Trump is one of those one of those figures that history brings forward who marks the end of one era right and I thought right that’s Trump how much he has a grand theory I don’t know but he does as far as he does sees great power politics as the world you get Ukraine we get Greenland and and Canada or whatever and that’s the way he sees the world like risk again um was there anything else struck you from the interview and you mentioned earlier he got more and more mad over time i I do I do think it said something about says something about his personality right that he comes in his tone at the beginning of the interview like he’s malleable right like if you had just kind of sucked up to him and just said “Sir look at all this progress on the border.” And you know whatever like and and and Henry Kissinger said you were you know you marked the end of history right like he would have you could have you know he would have went along with you throughout it right like like the dramatic change of his temperament I think is pretty noteworthy because you know I mean a lot of politicians you’ve interviewed probably keep it a lot cooler than that even when challenged yes i’d say a couple things about that first I did say that the accomplishment on the border is staggering and a judgment on Democrats the fact that that that arrests at the border are down to close to zero basically simply because obviously there’s cruelty i believe there’s the the actions in courts have found to be illegal but simply saying we will enforce our laws and you will be arrested that it was it’s the force of that more than any individual arrest uh and the terror campaign that it amounts to against people who are here you know without the authority of law but it really is the credibility that that was lacking in whether in a vicious way or virtuous way there was no credibility to our border so I gave him that i said you know it’s amazing uh the other thing I’d say is that I tried to be as respectful as I could uh he’s the president of the United States people in the constitution put him there and he deserves respect in that regard and I just don’t think he brooks anything but praise and that I I I couldn’t obviously I wasn’t going to do right and that’s the striking thing to me it’s like it’s not like you went you went in there with Trump d you know like like going at him in the hardest possible way or or being rude or whatever but he he just is unable to handle like the sm slightest amount of push back and that I And that is a noteworthy trait when you consider you know he’s going to have to make some high stakes decisions here on the next over the next three and a half years over the next three and a half years that’s it yeah no he’s a he’s a piece of work as we all know and I I just will also say this you know just kind of batting it back and forth with him for that amount of time you’re looking into someone’s eyes you know what do you see i saw uh he’s he’s mean he’s there there’s he’s can lash out at any moment you can feel that and I think there’s also obviously he’s a you see him on the golf course he’s enjoys people and he’s sociable person but I what I don’t think I don’t think he’s that tough if he can’t handle you you mean he’s not that tough at one point I he said something like you know because I asked the question you do you have 100% confidence in Hexap and he stupid question i don’t have 100% confidence in anything out of 100% confidence this interview is going to even is going to whatever we’re going to finish the interview and I just said no we will and he just all right go on he just gave that up I just felt like and I didn’t really even intend to back him down but he did he’s never mentioned me I have a name built for a Trump tweet and I’ve heard it since I was in third grade Terry I’m I was waiting for the everybody and everybody Everybody says it thinks they invented it right i’ve been hearing it my whole life and he hasn’t he hasn’t whispered anything about not even about this he hasn’t even dunked on me for this not that he not that I want him to i don’t but I don’t know what that means it’s the weirdest part of the whole Trump phenomenon i mean you said you know you said you were kind of on to it you saw the appeal of the nationalism and relate to Brexit at the beginning but something I can’t really grasp is that to me he’s just obviously weak right and that he’s not he’s not the traditional you know kind of tough man and the John Wayne you know kind of which is obviously fake but like you know like the sort of strong silent type that you know conservatives and and folks have traditionally held up as being what it means to be a tough strong guy like he’s the opposite of that he’s like a whiny child and it is interesting to me that that that myth of him as a tough guy persists what do you think that is i I that’s a great point although I I there’s one moment when he rose from the ground after being shot at that was tough and told him told his I got to stand up and he had enough of a sense of his of his own persona in front of the country to do that i’m not going to take that away from but I that’s a fair point but I but I hear what you’re saying which is that you know my dad was I was thinking of my father yesterday yeah yesterday and um he was in World War II he joined right after Pearl Harbor ended up in the airborne paratrooper in the Pacific on the islands you know Philippines Okinawa and then the occupation of Japan never much talked about it he hated braggards he hated blowharts because men of that generation and by tradition Americans we used to like think those guys bullies all those and now he is you know the leader of the biggest and most important political movement certainly of my lifetime if not you know one of one of the biggest in history yeah wild you are right about the Butler thing i know it almost feels like it’s fake it almost makes me think we’re living in a simulation what happened in Butler to be honest um the um uh just one more thing I just was thinking about right now like thinking about your the interview you had with him and the MS-13 fingers and his will like his ability to kind of suspend disbelief when it benefits him you did ask about the other thing that I’m obsessed with which is the Venezuelans that we have now kidnapped and sent to El Salvador without any due process and you asked her about that and you asked and you and you you did push him on it about how like we don’t know some of these people might not be bad people right and and he kind of had the same response you that he did on the fingers Terry he’s like “No Terry.” He’s like “We know these are these these people are bad.” And I do wonder I do I do think that he’s convinced himself of that right and that and to me that like presents an opportunity in the same way that the fingers did that like the bubble can be punct like the disreity bubble can be punctured that does happen with Trump from time to time it didn’t happen on the 2020 election but it’s happened on a Garcia was able to come back you know his buddies in the hotel industry now aren’t going to have deportations right like there’s certain ways that the stuff can and and I I I don’t know what what do you make of that his response to you on the Venezuela issue i you know I what I hear what you’re saying to me and I agree I left a trick on the table there if if you will right I did and it was and it was how the way we figure it out if they’re bad guys is through due process some version of you cannot and you know what you get large majorities of Americans who agree with that he will be stopped but um he needed to be pressed on that because it’s circular how do you know well I know and And it that’s easily punctured and I did leave that trick on the table let’s say yeah on this he did a he did a bleet over the weekend on his uh feed i want to get your reaction too cuz it’s related to sort of all these issues um ICE officers are here with He’s He’s come up with an old English word he likes now herewith ice officers are here with ordered by notice of this truth to do all in their power to achieve the very important goal of delivering the single largest mass deportation program in history in order to achieve this we must expand efforts to detain and deport illegal aliens in LA Chicago New York where millions upon millions of them reside and other such cities which are the core of the Democratic Power Center where they use illegal aliens to expand their voter base wonder what you made of that that’s the real thing we’re there he wants to send troops into the homes homelands of the the strongholds political strongholds of his opponents and punish them for objecting to his policies and and trying to stop him from uh exercising the authorities of the office that he has in this way and and I I think that we’re there we’re there right this is a threat to send troops into the cities in run by Democrats so he can do what he wants there and I I also get a feeling is the there in that sentence authoritarianism what is the there yeah at a crisis where we’re there at the crisis of our free our free government if if a president of the United States is saying I’m sending troops into cities in part for political reasons because my my the my political opponents are in power there and I want the troops there in defiance of the of the black letter of the law uh I think I think it’s safe to say this is we can’t turn our eyes from it anymore this is an attempt at changing the nature of the American democracy right and they do so with lies let me just raise Steven Miller once again when the Supreme Court said that Ambrego Marcia that the government must facilitate the return of Grego Garcia Garbrego Garcia to the United States Steve Miller came out and said with his venomous demeanor the Supreme Court nine to nothing upheld the president’s right to what the Supreme Court says no no court can tell you how much money to spend what flight they have to be on by what date but the order is law and you must facilitate it you must you must do it under this order and he spit on that with his lie that Supreme Court upheld the president’s position 9 to nothing that kind of lie and then this kind of decree what would you call that if you saw that in another country what would you call it yeah i mean it’s a path to organism for sure it’s a crackdown on on due process and so you know we can we can come up with words you want authoritarian authoritarianism light orbanism every you know we can uh we can debate that academics can debate that but I think the true facts are there to me Derry it’s like and I see Stephen in this in this post from Trump it is in addition to everything you said um it is him ensuring that there is no misunderstanding about his statements from last week about how maybe trips should maybe maybe the ICE agents should chill out on the farms and the hotels right like and I think that he that there was a concern that there was a misread of that and he wants to reassure everybody that no my top priority is we are going to deport these people we’re going to deport these people no matter what no matter whether they’ve committed crimes or not like we want to have the biggest deportation in history and we’re going to come into your towns and to your businesses and do it and I think that was the point it was the point but combine those two uh social media posts and statements and what you get is we’re going to come into their towns and their cities and if you are on my side I can do a deal with you but if you stand up to me then I will send the troops into into your your towns and cities and that is not just organism look at the godfather of all this is Putin right kjb but never forget was a lawyer right and I think he if you look at how because I covered I’ve been in Russia since 1999 probably I don’t know 12 15 times and I and I have seen and have felt and my friends and colleagues there have felt the civic space shrink more and more I and in Poland as well dear friend in Poland when the law and justice government there was was bring was trying to destroy the judiciary and I asked my friend and colleague Tom Mcolski I said we were late one night at the bureau in London and I said what does it feel like what how do ordinary people do it and he said this he said “Your life gets smaller you don’t put your head up over the parapet you don’t look at at it you’re like you go to the cafe you have the best life you can.” Think how many people are already leading that life in the United States and may and may be soon and you see that happening here not just among immigrants but also among the broader population or right now you’re saying that that’s kind of limited to the that’s kind of the first step as the immigrant class well whatever one decides about the journalistic ethics of my post right and I’ll let that conversation continue i’m happy to I think it’s an important conversation at this moment and people can make up their minds one way or the other i’m proof that you don’t want to get in the way of this uh of this administration not that I want to make it about me let me let me withdraw that but say a lot of people a lot of people are watching what they say and where they say it and just from your experience in Russia like how much of a parallel do are you seeing well all right i mean look obviously right I mean like we’re at a different level now but it’s been a long arc from Gorbachoff to now so like do you see do you see us on that trajectory somewhere i I would have to say we’re such a different country the instruments of oppression were were at hand in in Russia uh and their their civil institutions were were not we have a robust uh system and I it’ll withstand a lot but the the idea that one person defines the national interest one person defines what’s what’s what’s good about the country what’s not one person defines who’s a good guy who’s a bad guy one person exercises the power uh that they have in in those ways yeah it it’s similar but I what I feel is the experience of of that that’s that space shrinking right for for people um and I I don’t think it’ll work i I’m I’m mean I could be wrong but the the good guys are going to win and and as I said in in one of the first Substacks you know what a joy it is to be an American and alive at this moment in our history this is a privilege that we have right now to speak out and use our voices and and to say you know what those no kings pro protests were a moment right got to build on it but it was a move all right so that takes us to the last thing so you are free now you’re a free man just you you and your Substack your subscribers people can go check him out on Terry Maria on Substack um you know at least until the ICE troops come into Fred come into Frederick Maryland um you’re a free man what do What do you want to do what are you wanting to pop off on i mean it could go a lot of different directions are you going to be get let all those opinions out you’ve been stifling are you going to do interviews what what do you think is the most valuable thing for you to be doing right now yes all the above and more look I’d like to do some more uh of what I was doing at ABC look the great thing about ABC and all those legacy media organizations and they are great in their way and I as I say I’ve got nothing to say against them i had a wonderful career we’re working out some detail details at the end but the great thing is the resources that they can bring around the world to doing that uh I don’t have those resources uh at this point but I’d like to keep doing reporting as I did one I’ll tell you the first place I want to go i want to go to Springfield Ohio go back to Springfield Ohio where I spent a week or so uh twice during the campaign and I want to go back to the Haitian community that was there and their neighbors now that they are being uh you know sent sent out sent back to Haiti uh and what that’s going to do to the town and not just the the Haitian people there but the town had come to depend on them that the town was falling flat and now it had had risen the mayor wanted them there governor Dwine wanted them there and now uh that’s going to be a radical and and cruel change and so that kind of thing I’ll do but um interviews I hope uh newsmaker interviews and and you know have I I love by the way I love the bull work um and um it’s why I I wanted to to be with you it’s it’s it’s absolutely thrilling to be in these new spaces i don’t have a great idea what the brand is going to be but uh if there is such a thing but I’m keen to find out i’m obsessed with that Springfield story too so that’s great check in let’s do a checkin uh when you get out there um I would love to do that um and final thing do you do you see a beer summit coming for you and Steven Miller or are you planning to meet in his cave somewhere or uh any thoughts on that i’m going to I’m going to emphasize I was describing the public man i I don’t by my nature want people to feel bad from something I said or wrote or did and if you know but sometimes that’s the difference between you and me Terry we we found the one area of disagreement but you got to tell the truth right that’s the That’s the job you got to tell the truth so I don’t see a beer summit in fact I see probably maybe a couple of cop cars pulling up and uh and then then I need a lawyer all right good luck out there man i really appreciate you doing this i’m excited to watch what you’re going to be doing um going forward and uh let’s uh let’s check in from time to time how about that that’s great thanks Jim all right good luck brother we’ll see you soon hey YouTube fam if you want to support the bull work the best way to do it is by becoming a YouTube bullwork plus member the bull work is truly independent we have no corporate overlords we’re not settling any dumb lawsuits with Trump by joining you help support our work and you can get a bunch of perks right here on this platform adree content bonus videos live streams and some emojis of me which I 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Journalist Terry Moran was fired from ABC after a tweet criticizing Stephen Miller sparked an overblown backlash from the Trump administration. But Moran isn’t done. He joins Tim Miller to talk about Trump’s attacks on the free press, his Trump interview and what comes next.

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