Original Airdate: March 26, 2025 Signalgate is an intelligence travesty. But the problems extend beyond the masterclass in how not to handle sensitive government secrets. Former CIA officer Marc Polymeropoulos joins David Rothkopf and Riley Fessler to break down this stunning mistake from our most senior government officials and why the cascading effects will be even worse.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Original Airdate: November 6, 2024 Donald Trump is officially returning to the White House. With the worst case scenario coming to pass, Rosa Brooks, Ed Luce, David Sanger, and David Rothkopf take a look at what the hell happened and discuss what we can expect from a second Trump term.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Original Air Date: March 3, 2025 What happens when the United States effectively switches sides on the global stage? When allying with Russia upends decades of foreign policy around the world? And what dangers does the Trump-Hegseth administration pose for global nuclear security? Joe Cirincione and Jon Wolfsthal join David Rothkopf for a tough conversation about the future of the established international order and the significant nuclear security risks posed by the Trump Administration.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The White House is trying to fire Centers for Disease Control director Susan Monarez for opposing Health Secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr.’s anti-vaccine policies. This has sent the CDC sliding into chaos. On Thursday, press secretary Karoline Leavitt struggled to spin what’s happening. She said Monarez had never been subject to a vote—but the Senate voted to confirm her. Leavitt insisted the White House had fired Monarez—but Trump’s direct word appears to be required, and as of this recording, he hadn’t spoken. Leavitt pretended Trump is defending the integrity of our vaccine system—but RFK is destroying it. We talked to the University of Michigan’s Don Moynihan, author of a good Substack called “Can We Still Govern?” We discussed how Trump will struggle to defend this move, how the American people will recoil at the looming loss of a professionalized bureaucracy, and how all this is sowing the seeds for catastrophe later. Looking for More from the DSR Network? Click Here: https://linktr.ee/deepstateradio Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Original air date: September 20, 2024 Donald Trump is a crummy candidate, but he’s certainly not the only example of rot in the Republican Party. With so much of the Trump campaign focused on hate and division, we have to ask: how low can the Republican Party really go? The Washington Post’s Jen Rubin and Words Matter host Norm Ornstein join David Rothkopf for an examination of how far the Republican Party has fallen. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week, Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker delivered an extraordinary takedown of President Trump over his deployment of the military in U.S. cities. Trump then exploded about Pritzker’s impudence, calling the governor names and instructing him to bow down and beg for his “HELP” in fighting crime. Trump has threatened twice to occupy Chicago no matter what the city’s residents and their elected representatives think about it, another window into his seething anger. In this standoff, Pritzker did something unusual: He communicated with his constituents from the heart, vowing to use all his power to protect them from Trump’s authoritarian takeover. Rather than let Trump pretend he cares about crime, Pritzker cast Trump as the primary threat to his state’s people. We talked to Brian Beutler, who has a great new piece on his substack, Off Message, taking stock of Pritzker’s response. We discuss how Pritzker is shrewdly reading the moment in a way many Democrats are not, why Trump is vulnerable on crime, and what the punditry is getting so wrong about all of it. Looking for More from the DSR Network? Click Here: https://linktr.ee/deepstateradio Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Trump administration has expressed a desire for “truthful” and “unbiased” AI, yet the reality seems to be a crusade on “woke” AI. Yet the results of such a crusade would go far beyond eliminating DEI from artificial intelligence. The Brennan Center’s Amos Toh joins David Rothkopf to explore the effects the administration’s AI regulations and how AI is playing a larger role in militaries around the world.  This material is distributed by TRG Advisory Services, LLC on behalf of the Embassy of the United Arab Emirates in the U.S.. Additional information is available at the Department of Justice, Washington, DC. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Original air date: November 7, 2024 The election is over, and we lost. Now it’s time to get up off the mat and get back to work. Simon Rosenberg and Tara McGowan join David Rothkopf to break down what went wrong this time, and share the key lessons that Democrats have to learn in order to bounce back and keep up the fight. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Thanks to President Trump’s big budget bill, funding has been canceled for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. This is cutting funding to hundreds of radio stations in rural areas that rely on them for critical information. Speaking to The New York Times, GOP Senator Lisa Murkowski, who opposed the bill, sounded absolutely shocked that Trump and the GOP would harm their own voters so cavalierly. She said this is driven by a “blind allegiance to the president’s desires,” adding that fear of Trump’s anger overrode GOP lawmakers’ concerns for their own constituents. Yet this has been the story on many other fronts, too. Will Democrats ever be able to capitalize? We talked to Lynlee Thorne, a Democratic organizer in rural areas as the political director of RuralGroundGame.org. She explains why rural radio is a lifeline, how Trump’s agenda is shafting those areas particularly hard, what rural voters think about him right now, and how Democrats can repair the party’s deep problems with them. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Original air date: June 22, 2025 The moment has finally arrived: America has bombed Iran. As the dust settles, we’re left with more questions than answers about what the attack achieved and what comes next. Thankfully, Jon Wolfsthal, Gen. Mark Hertling, and Steven Cook join David Rothkopf to provide clarity on what this unprecedented moment means. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In recent days, President Trump has reached new levels of emboldenment when it comes to his ongoing authoritarian takeover. He’s vowing retribution at news organizations that displease him with greater audacity. He’s responded to Democrats and others who criticized him by threatening to send troops to their cities or unleash state power against them in other ways. In recent days, something plainly has changed, and many observers are taking note. We talked to journalist and historian Garrett Graff, who has a great new piece on his Doomsday Scenario Substack arguing that we really are seeing the advent of “American fascism” right before our eyes. He explains that transformations like this are incremental and often hard to recognize, but that Trump’s escalating brazenness strongly suggests we’ve crossed over into something new. The pile-up of new offenses Trump is committing daily, Graff says, amounts to “insanity.”  Looking for More from the DSR Network? Click Here: https://linktr.ee/deepstateradio Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Original air date: February 28, 2025 There’s no way to sugarcoat it — the Trump/Zelensky meeting was a disaster. The betrayal of Ukraine is confirmed, and the administration is past the point of no return. Doug Lute, Rosa Brooks, and Marc Polymeropoulos join David Rothkopf to break down this train wreck of a meeting and what it means for the future of US foreign policy. Looking for More from the DSR Network? Click Here: https://linktr.ee/deepstateradio Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

California Governor Gavin Newsom is breaking through like no other Democrat. This is partly because he’s forging ahead with a state gerrymander to add five Democratic House seats, countering President Trump’s rigging of Texas. But we think there are deeper reasons Newsom is cutting through the noise. These were on display when Newsom recently issued a stark warning about Trump’s long term intentions. Newsom connected numerous dots to offer a takedown of Trump that laid bare the full scope of his ongoing authoritarian takeover in a way other Democrats rarely do. We talked to Will Stancil, a policy researcher and attorney who has developed an interesting analysis of the Democratic Party on social media. We discussed what makes Newsom’s approach different, how he’s attempting to solve the party’s struggles in the information wars, and why it offers the beginnings of an approach for the party to adopt amid Trump’s imposition of authoritarian rule. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On the DSR Weekly Wrap-Up for August 22, we cover the FBI raid of John Bolton’s house, a declaration of famine in Gaza City, the administration reviewing 55 million visa holders, and more.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Original air date: August 26, 2024 National security journalist Michael Weiss joins Marc to discuss how Kamala Harris found her inner Reagan, the Ukrainian raid that turned out to be an invasion, and the blob starts the parlor game of who staffs a future Harris White House.  Plus, the folly of the Ukrainian doomers never ceases to amaze, even when Ukraine is, dare say…succeeding? Looking for More from the DSR Network? Click Here: https://linktr.ee/deepstateradio Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On Thursday, JD Vance delivered a speech designed to reset the political battle over President Trump’s abysmally unpopular budget bill. But Vance’s speech devolved into a series of rants that seemed to ape Trump’s style. Vance lied about the bill’s health care cuts and dissembled wildly about its expected impact on rural hospitals—both times smearing undocumented immigrants with vile Trumpian dishonesty. He also baselessly attacked a nonpartisan agency whose analysis displeased him. All this comes as news outlets in many states are showing that people deep in MAGA country know they’re set to get royally screwed. Vance’s scamming of Trump voters here was extraordinary. But Democrats have work to do. We talked to Michael Linden, an economist and Democratic strategist organizing against the bill. He dissects Vance’s lies about it, explains how badly it will shaft Trump voters and the working class, and discusses how Democrats can keep the focus on it through Election Day 2026. Looking for More from the DSR Network? Click Here: https://linktr.ee/deepstateradio Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On the DSR Daily for Thursday, we discuss the Texas House passing its controversial redistricting plan, the US and EU’s recent trade framework, a ridiculous plan to paint the border wall, and more.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Stephen Miller exploded in a long, unhinged rant about demonstrators who are protesting President Trump’s military occupation of Washington, D.C. It was classic authoritarian agitprop, attacking demonstrators as “communists” who are secretly trying to make the city more dangerous to its salt-of-the-earth working class residents. Ominously flanked by the Defense Secretary and members of the military, he threatened to respond with more troops. But we think this is really an expression of weakness. Trump and Miller were certain that a latent majority is prepared to rally to authoritarian rule. But poll after poll shows voters rebelling. Miller’s hubris has become a major weakness. We talked to New Republic staff writer Monica Potts, author of a great new piece analyzing Trump’s long-term game plan. She explains how Trump is consolidating power right before eyes, why Democrats need to stop calling this a “distraction,” and how the opposition should proceed, secure in the knowledge that the public is not with Trump. Looking for More from the DSR Network? Click Here: https://linktr.ee/deepstateradio Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

There has been a diplomatic flurry around Ukraine in recent days, yet the theme of progress has been hollow words and flip-flopping. Is the White House serious about peace, or is this all just a photo op? Amb. Doug Lute, Max Boot, Andrea Kendall-Taylor, and Rosa Brooks join David Rothkopf to get to the bottom of this diplomacy blitz and put the kibosh on hopes for real peace anytime soon.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On the DSR Daily for Wednesday, we break down the US and NATO considering security options for Ukraine, Israeli approval of a new settlement project in the West Bank, GOP-imposed surveillance on Texas Democrats, and more. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices