It's hard to be in a celebratory mood about America 250. The administration only wants to tell a narrow story of the country without all the contradictions and complexities of its history. And for the past 18 months, it has also been a particularly challenging time for black members of the military under Hegseth, who brazenly disregards their service, blocks promotions of black officers, or expunges them from the ranks. But the aspiration of America as a multiracial, multiethnic, multi-faith democracy is a noble one, and our job is to keep trying to build the country we want it to be. Plus: the man who's trying to stop the magafication of the Smithsonian, advice for how to talk to kids about the country's history, and the simple joys of a July 4th cookout.

The Atlantic's Clint Smith joins Tim Miller for the holiday weekend pod.

show notes

• Clint’s piece on being black in Hegseth’s military
• Clint on the man who’s put himself between Trump and the Smithsonian
• Clint's "How the Word Is Passed"
• Thursday’s “Morning Shots” on the words of Gerald Ford
• Tim’s July 4th playlist
• This week only, a full Bulwark membership for everything we offer on our website is $86 a year. That's 14 percent off at http://thebulwark.com/july4 

Not only did Trump pocket $2.2 billion last year—vastly increasing his pre-presidency wealth—he shamelessly showed off his new hand-me-down plane from Qatar which Americans paid hundreds of millions of dollars to upgrade. Not to mention, there's a massive conflict of interest involved in Trump taking a gift from a country that is directly impacted by his administration's foreign policy decisions. Plus: Vance can't tell a joke to save his life, Trump is the polar opposite of Teddy Roosevelt in almost every way, the Russian casualty count from the war in Ukraine has been catastrophic for the country and potentially destabilizing, and the challenge of celebrating 250 when Trump has inverted the American dream.

Susan Glasser joins Tim Miller.

Show notes:

• Susan's 'Political Scene' podcast
• Tim's July 4th playlist
• This week only, a full Bulwark membership for everything we offer on our website is $86 a year. That's 14 percent off at http://thebulwark.com/july4

Trump leaves ice cream cartons, potato chip bags, and candy wrappers all over his personal space at the White House. His diet aside, his aides are working overtime to keep the state of his health a secret. And it turns out that his loss in 2020 made him more powerful: He didn't have to deal with post-Covid inflation and the withdrawal from Afghanistan. Trump also wouldn't have been prosecuted, which ultimately led to him getting his get-out-of-jail free card to break all the laws, courtesy of the Supreme Court. Maggie joins Tim to discuss some of the revelations in her new book, including the pardons Trump is promising and the relationship between POTUS and a young aide who writes him "raw" and "emotional" love notes. Oh, and Marco—who's having the time of his life—was the guy who set up the deal to send people to the gulag at CECOT. Plus: Cam Kasky on why DSA candidates are resonating with voters and how things feel on the ground around Platner in Maine and Abdul El-Sayed in Michigan.

Cameron Kasky and Maggie Haberman join Tim Miller. 

Show notes:

• Maggie's and Jonathan Swan's book, "Regime Change: Inside the Imperial Presidency of Donald Trump" 
• This week only, a full Bulwark membership for everything we offer on our website is $86 a year. That's 14 percent off at http://thebulwark.com/july4

SCOTUS did manage, for now, to stop Trump from recreating the American republic, but four of the court's justices believe that the fundamental law of birthright citizenship in the Constitution can just be repealed—along with the very nature of what American citizenship means. But overall, while Trump had some big wins from the Supreme Court this term, he also had massive losses. David runs down some of the latest rulings with Tim. Plus: Mamdani doesn't think the Constitution should be changed so he can run for POTUS (David thinks he's wrong), Platner is not winning over white working-class voters, Dems need a bigger tent but there have to be lines the party won't cross, and the DOJ is (mostly) losing its immigration protest cases.

David French joins Tim Miller.

Show notes:

• David's Newsletter on one-party rule
• David on the purging of Gen. Donahue

• More on the Broadview case in Chicago, from David

  This week only, a full Bulwark membership for everything we offer on our website is $86 a year. That's 14 percent off at
  http://thebulwark.com/july4

The most powerful person in the world repeatedly creates his own narrative about a news event despite what we can see and hear with our own eyes and our own ears. Media organizations that don’t fight like hell in response are failing at doing their most basic job—and they’re failing the country and our democracy as well. That’s what CBS News did when it settled Trump’s frivolous “60 Minutes” lawsuit and when it tried to change the story of the Minneapolis protests to benefit Trump. Plus: Dems are on the cusp of a big fight, the Iran war is being fought on social media (and on the weekend), Sen. Jon Ossoff is deploying a clever strategy, and why isn’t the left talking about climate change? Oh and this: How do you live a life of value and meaning?

John Dickerson joins Tim Miller from the Aspen Ideas Festival.

show notes

• John's Substack
• John's long-running pod, Slate's "Political Gabfest"

The "eating the cats and dogs" blood libel worked so well that SCOTUS agreed to end humanitarian protections for Haitians. Justice Alito, who complained about the way Italian-Americans were depicted in "The Sopranos," just couldn't see any racism in Trump's repeated disparagement of Haiti or its immigrants. By the way, Megyn Kelly: You didn't do anything to build this country. And while JD thinks Nixon's Watergate crimes are now no big deal, the federal government just sentenced an American to 30 years in prison for moving anarchist zines out of his home. Plus, Jane's nostalgia theory explains why Vanilla Ice thinks the early 90s were the best era, the white male obsession with Caitlin Clark, and the men who can't quit blaming the 19th Amendment for the country's ills.

Jane Coaston joins Tim Miller for the weekend pod.

show notes

• Jane’s pod, “What A Day”
• Roy Cooper’s new ad
• The reporting on Rep. Hamadeh
• Tim’s playlist
  
  

The POTUS speech to kickoff the "state fair" in honor of America's 250th year was all about how the country is great because of him. Meanwhile, Hegseth is continuing to purge the Pentagon of some of our best warfighters for political and cowardly reasons. Plus, Bill Cassidy caved to Trump yet again, another son-in-law is following in Jared's footsteps and angling to get in on the family's hustle, some love for George Washington, and the administration's levels of corruption are so epic it's like Watergate every day.

Tom Nichols joins Tim Miller.

show notes

• Tom on making the 250th "small"
• Tom on the capitulation to Iran
• Netflix's "The American Experiment"

The Mamdani sweep in NYC shows that the populist left is winning the arguments about Israel policy and going after billionaires, but it sure seems like there may be limits to their success outside the blue urban core. And Republicans are likely to make hay with at least one of Tuesday’s congressional primary winners—Darializa Avila Chevalier—who wants to end policing and won’t say whether murderers should go to jail. But the GOP colossally screwed up in North Carolina and Georgia, and Tim makes a bold prediction about how the party will respond. Plus, Trump is showing clear signs of aging, another one of his candidates lost on Tuesday, AOC's silence at this moment is noteworthy, and never underestimate the power of charisma in politics.

Peter Hamby joins Tim Miller.

show notes

• Peter's podcast, "The Powers That Be"
• Peter's columns at Puck
• For a limited time, get 60% off your first order, plus free shipping, when you head to .

The era of hell that we are living through may have been ordained in the 90s by angry Republican voters who felt screwed by the corporate elite—and political leaders who didn’t represent them. Trump watched Pat Buchanan and David Duke and saw how their protectionist, anti-immigrant, culture war messaging was resonating. More recently, Trump returned to his New York wheeler-dealer vibe by getting us in a war because he needed to look strong after SCOTUS struck down his stupid tariffs. Plus, more on Vance’s insincere religious discovery, Platner’s tattoo, the Dems’ nerd problem and its incompatibility with the base’s desire for a fighter, the jock/creep administration, and the Dan Goldman coffee shop incident.

John Ganz joins Tim Miller.

show notes

• John's book, "When the Clock Broke: Con Men, Conspiracists, and How America Cracked Up in the Early 1990s" 
• John's Substack 
• Tim's interview with Jon Ossoff 
• Start your new morning ritual & get up to 43% off your @MUDWTR with code THEBULWARK at mudwtr.com/THEBULWARK! #mudwtrpod
  

Trump is so embarrassed by his own personal vandalism of the Reflecting Pool that he's got the Justice Department investigating his latest conspiracy about bad guys that don't exist. Of course Fox News is happy to oblige by menacing journalists who dared to report on the damage POTUS did to the national monument. Meanwhile, Vance's Catholic conversion story is almost more fake than Trump's tough stance against the Iranian regime. Plus, Tulsi has been under the sway of a cult leader, Italy's Meloni is a pleasant surprise, Brexit was stupid and ruined the political careers of British prime ministers, and the World Cup is the perfect patriotic antidote to Trumpism.

Bill Kristol joins Tim Miller.

show notes

• Monday's "Morning Shots"
• Tim's and JVL's live reading from Vance's new book
• Clip from Douthat's interview with JD
• George Packer's piece, "The Talented Mr. Vance"
• Jon Swaine's reporting on Tulsi (gift)
  
  

Obama never thought Trump could win in 2016, perhaps because he underestimated how much the opposition loathed him. At the opening of his new presidential center on Thursday, he spoke of presidents acting with duty, honor, and kindness—even though the current occupant at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue is all about destroying things, being mean, hurting people, and starting dumb wars. Indeed, Trump's foreign policy may be more in the American tradition than Obama's. Plus, a debate over whether Kamala's response to Gaza cost her the White House along with her standing in the party. Also, some Knicks love and another installment in the perils and pitfalls of wokeness—this time with some Talarico comments from 2020.

Ta-Nehisi Coates joins Tim Miller for the Juneteenth holiday weekend pod.

show notes

• Ta-Nehisi's latest piece in Vanity Fair
• Tim's playlist