Jonathan Swan: We Only Know 5%

The Bulwark Daily

Jonathan Swan, co-author of 'Regime Change: Inside the Imperial Presidency of Donald Trump,' joins Tim Miller to discuss the inner workings of the Trump administration, revealing that media

Key takeaways

• The media only understands about 5% of what's happening inside the Trump administration, especially in sensitive areas like national security and financial self-dealing.
• Despite public claims of military strength, the U.S. is losing a month's worth of Patriot missiles every day due to ongoing conflicts.

Main topics

• Media coverage limitations in understanding Trump administration operations
• National security and military readiness under the current administration

Notable quotes

"We only know 5% of what is happening inside the administration—particularly when it comes to national security, the money-making, and the self-dealing."

Conclusion

Jonathan Swan underscores that while public narratives are shaped by selective disclosures and political

Transcript preview

Speaker 2 (0:12) Hello and welcome to the Bulwark Daily. I'm your host, Tim Miller. Delighted to welcome to the show. It's been way too long. White House reporter for the New York Times, co-author of Regime Change. You might have heard of it. Inside the imperial presidency, it was number one for, what, like 19 weeks? I've got my trusty copy right here. Nine weeks. It's Jonathan Swan. You know, maybe Speaker 3 (0:30) 19. Nine weeks. Eventually. You Speaker 2 (0:31) might be back up this week. I don't know. We got Sarah Longwell. You're competing again. We'll learn tomorrow. But who knows? You might, you might maul her in the New York Times rankings. We'll see. Andrew, you have a child now. It's a big couple months for you. Speaker 3 (0:43) I have three, actually. But yeah, I have a new one. Speaker 2 (0:45) Yeah. The third is when things go really downhill, I hear. That's what it feels like so far. Oh, yeah. Well, you're looking fresh. So that's good. Praise from Caesar. I was expecting, you know, I don't know, wrinkles, you know, bags, nothing. Well, I've seen your commentary Speaker 3 (1:02) about various men's skincare routines. Speaker 3 (1:07) I did a glow up. I'm doing a service Speaker 2 (1:09) to straight men. I'm trying to offer a service to straight men. You can moisturize too. That's all. And I feel like sometimes I do that via positive feedback and occasionally negative feedback. I've only seen the negative, so I'll take your word for it. Speaker 1 (1:22) It's positive. Speaker 2 (1:23) I want to start here. There's Speaker 1 (1:25) a Speaker 2 (1:25) story about J.D. Vance, another one of my favorites this week, the vice president. Speaker 2 (1:31) anonymous sources saying that he had some skepticism about the Iran war. I know you're not going to talk about the sourcing, right? So I shouldn't ask you whether J.D.'s calling the New York Times. Well, Speaker 3 (1:40) I sort of find the reaction to that kind of... Speaker 3 (1:46) amusing slash farcical because we reported in April, Maggie and I, we did a big takeout for the New York Times. There was an extract from our book, which was a big piece on the, probably the most deeply reported piece, immodestly on the lead up to the Iran war, which opened with that scene of Netanyahu coming down to the situation room and pitching Trump on the war. And in that piece, we report in detail about how Vance was really the only one in the inner circle to argue against the war. in those meetings in front of the other aides. Now, as far as I'm aware, every significant outlet who's done any reporting on the war and what happened in the lead up to it and behind the scenes has confirmed that reporting and supported it. And the reason for that is it's true. And we've heard it from people who hate JD, don't mind him, like him, support him. It just happened. It's just a fact. Speaker 3 (2:43) And the other part of that, I would say, like, you know, we're obviously limited in what we can say about sourcing. But the other part of that that I find like odd is do people actually think that he's incentivized right now to be on the wrong side of Donald Trump when his single goal between now and January of 2028 is to have Donald Trump's endorsement, which Donald Trump has quite theatrically declined to give so far. Yeah. Like when he when he opposed the war. early on, it did not endear him to Donald Trump. Trump was complaining about him, as we've reported. He was pissed off about it. This was not like some wonderful experience that played out really well. It actually empowered some of his opponents, both on the outside and on the inside. So, yeah, I mean, it's true. This is kind of an interesting question, though, about how to Speaker 2 (3:33) deal with that. Because, yeah, let's explore it. Because I don't... I don't like talking about people behind their back. On Friday's podcast, you're Speaker 1 (3:39) a Speaker 2 (3:39) busy guy. You're not listening to every Bullock Daily podcast. Most of them, not all of them. But we've met to tease you a little bit about this line from that article where it said, Mr. Vance, who opposed the war from the outset. And this is the challenging part of that, which is, okay, that could be true. I don't have any reason to doubt your reporting. You've had the best reporting on this. But then simultaneously to that. Like publicly, he's talked about how Trump is not going to allow us to get into a multi-year war. Trump's a smart president, not a dumb president. In July, he said Trump's been successful. He said we created economic, diplomatic, and military leverage. Let's use that leverage to go accomplish an even bigger win for the American people. It's not over yet. So far, so good. And he said so far, so good in July. And so it's kind of hard to... How do you grapple with that? Like on the one hand, saying that he's opposed to war, on the other hand, publicly, he's like, so far, so good. Speaker 3 (4:31) Yeah, the way we grapple with it is in the same story. Who did you say was saying this about the outset, whatever? I presume they read the story because in the subhead of the story and in the body of the story, we say that he's been saying one thing privately and a different thing publicly. The advance has been out there endorsing the war, supporting it, defending it, whereas privately. As we've reported, as The Atlantic's reported, as The Wall Street Journal's reported, as The Washington Post has reported, presumably, I don't know if you guys have reported on it, but if you have, I assume you've found the same thing. The sourcing for the bulwark inside Speaker 2 (5:02) the White House is pretty shaky these days. It is Speaker 3 (5:04) what it is. I mean, that's the fact. But I don't know how much more prominent you can have than the subhead of the story and Speaker 2 (5:12) in the body of the story. Yeah, I guess it's kind of like, the question is, That's like a tough thing for people to navigate, right? Why? At some level. Why is that tough for people to navigate? Yeah, because you can just read it, right? It's in the subhead of Speaker 1 (5:26) the Speaker 2 (5:26) story. Well, Speaker 1 (5:26) because Speaker 2 (5:26) it's Speaker 1 (5:26) like, is that true, though? What do you Speaker 2 (5:29) mean? I mean, is it true in the sense that is this gamesmanship Speaker 1 (5:32) from him, right? You Speaker 2 (5:34) know, it's hard Speaker 1 (5:34) to, you know, divine. Speaker 2 (5:37) You're trying to say, well, we should trust that there's the behind the scenes, that privately he's criticized it, but like publicly all people see. It's him supporting it, you know? Yeah, which we Speaker 3 (5:48) say in the story. But again, what I'm saying is these meetings happened. I mean, we reported on them. It was in front of multiple people. And anyone who's done any reporting on it has verified the same thing. So I don't know. You could not like that it happened. Speaker 2 (6:04) I mean, how do you think he's navigating it? It wasn't like Speaker 3 (6:06) we're reporting on secret one-on-one conversations between J.D. Vance and Trump. These were meetings with the core inner circle team in the White House Situation Room in the Oval Office. Just as we've reported on a whole bunch of- And then he accused you Speaker 2 (6:18) guys of having tapes from the meeting. All I'm saying is- I mean, he accused you of having tapes. People could say, Speaker 3 (6:23) well, how do you know that the Netanyahu meeting happened? Well, we know it happened because we reported it. We did our work, we verified it, and we reported it. You could trust the reporting or not, but you don't have to trust our reporting. You have to then question the Atlantic's reporting, the Wall Street Journal's reporting. Nobody's not Speaker 2 (6:41) trusting the reporting. No, no, no, it doesn't. I'm sorry. If it sounded like that, I don't want it to sound like that. I believe what J.D. is saying is privately is what you're reporting. The question is that like you have this situation that is very unique to this administration, which is very often like they will call you guys and say something on background or I'm not saying that JD called you, but whatever. There's reporting. They're talking to people. They're trying to spin things on background. And then publicly they say the opposite and they call you fake news and then they call you a liar. And so it's like tough to know like who is. Like who is getting, you know what I mean? In this Speaker 3 (7:18) situation, two things happened and we described both of them in the story. One is in meetings with the Trump's core team and Trump in front of other aides, which include people who are big fans of Vance and people who are less so, Vance made an argument against the war. It pissed off Trump. Trump complained about it to people. This happened on multiple occasions. That's a thing that happened. That's a true thing that happened. Also, at the same time, he has been publicly saying that he supports the president, supports the war, defending the war on television. That's also something that's happened. And we wrote that in the story, that he's saying one thing about it. I don't know. I mean... Speaker 2 (7:55) And is that working, do you think, for him internally with Trump? In what sense? No, I mean, it hasn't Speaker 3 (8:00) persuaded. Speaker 2 (8:00) With Trump, yeah. No, as Speaker 3 (8:02) we say in the story, it cost him. This is not something that's helpful to him. The existence of this story, this is why I find it so absurd. It's like... J.D. Vance has one job between now and January of 2028 in terms of his political future. It is to get Donald Trump's blessing and endorsement. The notion that he would be thrilled or excited about stories that drive a wedge between him and Donald Trump is like interesting to me that people think that. You know, I'm limited in how I can describe. Speaker 2 (8:30) No, and this is why it's so interesting to think about the way, the political machinations of him, the way he's trying to manipulate things, because he's trying to do both, actually. Right? I mean, like, I understand what you're saying, that the number one thing, his number one priority is for Trump to give him the blessing. But his, like, number two priority is to be the most America first person. But Tim, do you... Right, he's trying to do both. Well... Anyway, I got it. And is that not true? You don't think he's trying to do both of those things? I mean, he gave a speech. Speaker 3 (8:57) I think right now. Let's Speaker 2 (8:59) talk about this, Sean. He gave a speech just last week, right? At the midterm convention, where the only time that he brought up the Iran war was he created the straw man where the ghost of Charlie Kirk, had he been alive, would have opposed the Iran war, but still voted for Republicans. And so like that was publicly, that wasn't private. That's not him kind of navigating things behind the scenes. Like in his speech at the so-called convention, he basically tried to alibi, like it's okay to be against the war. And also for Republicans, right? Speaker 3 (9:28) Don't you think it's Speaker 2 (9:29) possible that he just is against, like was against this war and that what everyone has reported is accurate? Well, sure. He Speaker 3 (9:34) was dead against this war and he's been trying to walk this awkward, excruciating tightrope in public and that it may not be the most exciting thing for him to have stories that are elevating a division between him and Donald Trump at the same time. that he's trying to, I think, you know, I think that's possible, but I Speaker 2 (9:52) also think it's possible that he wants to do both again. Like, okay. If that was, if it was not exciting for him, I don't understand why that would be his strategy for the midterm convention. Like his, like Trump has ears. Like he was able to watch the midterm convention speech and what he talked about, how Charlie Kirk would have opposed the war. I think Speaker 3 (10:09) that's a slightly different thing. That's, that's, that. To me, you talk to people internally, they are trying to use him, whether it'll be effective or not, I'm skeptical, as an emissary to that disaffected, alienated, younger part of the coalition that has been felt betrayed. So this Speaker 2 (10:24) is a different thing then, which is kind of like, maybe it's okay. Which is a bit different. Yeah, maybe it's okay with Trump. That's what I'm saying. That's different. I'm trying to figure out. Speaker 3 (10:31) But Tim, Speaker 2 (10:32) let's Speaker 3 (10:32) be clear. I don't think the piece that we did most recently in the New York Times serves that purpose. It's already on the public record. In our reporting, in The Atlantic's reporting, in The Wall Street Journal's reporting, in The Wall Street Post's reporting, the J.D. fans oppose the war. Jonathan, I'm not trying to Speaker 2 (10:48) say you're serving J.D.'s purpose. I'm not saying you're his PR person. I'm not. No, I mean, I think that it's interesting that J.D., it seems to me that he wants to try to have both. But maybe you're saying he doesn't. And that's interesting also in itself. I don't think it's obvious that he doesn't want those stories out. I think that he's trying to. keeping Trump's good graces while also positioning himself as like kind of winking and nodding at people and saying, I'm more with you guys on this. I think he's trying to do both. What do I know? Yeah, maybe. Speaker 2 (11:23) I didn't realize that you were going to feel that strongly that the article was contra J.D. Vance's political interests. I just saw all Speaker 3 (11:37) this. It's a weird experience as a reporter when you write a story and you know how... the stories you write come about and then you see all these people like comment on it and then you also know that in the same story that people like well how could you say that this when he's saying this publicly it's like yeah bro it's in the it's in the subhead and the main body of the story like is this like a literacy problem yeah and they're like i don't Speaker 1 (12:02) know Speaker 3 (12:02) we reported it in april to me this is Speaker 2 (12:04) just javanka all over again though so you can maybe separate yourself out for that because you weren't doing that you know you're in a different role then but like We lived this, right? Like, is that not true? Like, Jared was trying to stay in the father-in-law's good graces, and also he was, like, leaking about how he was a little bit concerned about things before. Like, is this not just the same thing that Speaker 3 (12:22) does that? I Speaker 2 (12:23) don't Speaker 3 (12:23) think Speaker 2 (12:23) it's the Speaker 3 (12:24) same thing, but at all. In fact, couldn't really be further from it. In what Speaker 2 (12:29) way was it further, do you think? Speaker 3 (12:31) Because what I just told you is true, which is that privately in these meetings – Speaker 1 (12:36) J.D.'s Speaker 3 (12:36) worried. Speaker 2 (12:36) You think J.D.'s worried. Because privately I think Jared and Ivanka didn't like some of the stuff from the first term, but they're trying to do – No, Speaker 3 (12:43) no, no. What I'm saying is the Vance stories, the reason everyone's reported that he's against the war is because there were meetings where he argued against it aggressively to Trump. That happened. I understand if people don't like that or whatever,