Preet Bharara:

From CAFE and the Vox Media Podcast Network, this is Stay Tuned In Brief. I’m Preet Bharara. So Trump’s first week back in office has come and gone, and with it came a slew of executive orders. Joining me to discuss all the latest news and its impact are ABC News chief Washington correspondent, Jonathan Karl, and senior writer at the New York Times, David Leonhardt. Jon, David, welcome back to the show, although not together, this is kind of a dynamic duo we got.

Jonathan Karl:

Yeah, it’s not.

David Leonhardt:

Thank you.

Preet Bharara:

Well, we need you. In this first week we had been told that there would be a flooding of the zone. We had been told that the Trump administration wanted to come in with 2.0 with a big bang, shock and awe. Is this what it’s going to be like every week for the next four years? Either one of you.

Jonathan Karl:

I mean, I’ll say I don’t think it’s going to be every week, but it’s certainly going to be every foreseeable week.

Preet Bharara:

Could you let us know in advance which week it won’t be so that’s when we can go camping?

Jonathan Karl:

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it’s kind of a day by day, hour by hour, minute by minute kind of thing. I am told that next week, I was like, “So what do you got? What’s happening next week?” And it’s like, “Oh, it’ll be more EOs every day. Every day.” As you know, by the way, these are not

Preet Bharara:

Executive orders…

Jonathan Karl:

But as you know, they’re all not executive orders. I mean, he likes to sign stuff. He is doing a lot, though.

Preet Bharara:

He has a very powerful signature.

Jonathan Karl:

Yes, it’s a very powerful.

Preet Bharara:

He also likes to sign checks.

Jonathan Karl:

And the Sharpie makes that squeak and the whole thing. And there sure is… There are sweeping changes. There are far-reaching implications to a lot of what he’s doing, but some of them are much less than meets the eye. Like he signed a big proclamation order on returning to in-person work. I’ve got it here.

Preet Bharara:

That’s not momentous?

Jonathan Karl:

Well, that might be momentous, but the thing is it all it refers to as applicable law and that agency heads shall make exemptions they deem necessary. So in other words, I think that’s kind of what it’s been, right? Now he’s got different agency heads, different priority. I’m sure more people will be in person, but there is no, this doesn’t change really a thing. But he did sign it.

Preet Bharara:

Let me ask David, which of these seem momentous to you or not momentous? I mean there’s one about the First Amendment in free speech, which was basically in elongation of the First Amendment, which already forbids state abridgment of free speech, so I didn’t think that one was worth much. But David, what do you think?

David Leonhardt:

Look, he’s clearly made major changes to a whole bunch of policy areas: major changes to immigration policy, major changes to diversity policy. He’s made some of the normal changes that Republicans make when they come in different areas, so I would say that’s one category of thing, which is it’s both typical for presidents to come in and do a bunch of executive orders. He’s on the way aggressive end of that.

Then there are some things that really are kind of beyond the normal scope of American policy, like removing security protection for people who appear to be under threat from foreign governments because he considers them critics of his, like his former aides Mike Pompeo and John Bolton.

Preet Bharara:

Well, can we pause just on John Bolton?

David Leonhardt:

Yeah.

Preet Bharara:

So I don’t know, just hypothetically, play devil’s advocate. I mean, Trump said John Bolton doesn’t get security detail for life. It’s been a few years. Is that unreasonable?

David Leonhardt:

I really think the timing matters here. It’s a little bit like Jeff Bezos’s decision to not endorse, which I think philosophically there’s nothing wrong with the publisher deciding not to endorse. But I think the timing of this, which is we know Trump really doesn’t like John Bolton, he comes in and immediately removes the protection, that’s very different from there being some sort of process and deciding that the threat against John Bolton’s life from Iran has now receded. And I just don’t have a lot of faith that that’s what this was, that this was a decision on the merits. While also agreeing with you Preet, that I’m not saying that John Bolton or anyone should necessarily have security of her life, but this feels like retribution, potentially reckless retribution.

Jonathan Karl:

I mean, I was just going to say, a national security advisor doesn’t have security typically that extends past the service in the White House. That’s not why Bolton, Pompeo and Brian Hook had security. They had security because the Iranians have issued a fatwa, have said that they intend to kill them in retaliation for Trump’s ordered assassination of Qasem Soleimani, the leader of the Iranian Quds force, so there’s a very specific threat from a foreign government known to carry out its threats that targets these three individuals.

Now again, maybe the security could be assessed to be no longer necessary, but now you have, not only has the security been revoked against these three individuals: there’s a big neon sign that says the security is no longer there, which seems to me to be a green light for the Iranians to follow through on what they have said they will do.

Preet Bharara:

So how is that smart? Suppose something happens to Bolton or someone else. Will there be hell to pay or does Trump never have hell to pay?

Jonathan Karl:

I mean, I don’t think Trump is particularly strategic about any of this. This is his gut. Like, “Screw those guys,” basically. And by the way, this is a real mystery to me in terms of how Brian Hook, who most people don’t know, not really a public figure, but Brian Hook was the Iran envoy for Trump in the first term. He actually served the entirety of the four years for Trump. Before that, he had been a top official at the State Department, both under Tillerson and under Pompeo, very close to Jared Kushner. He actually worked with Jared Kushner on Kushner’s memoirs. And he’s never uttered, as far as I can tell, a peep of anything critical of Donald Trump. But I think it’s the perceived closeness to Pompeo, who, by the way, also hasn’t exactly been a Trump critic. It’s a strange form of retribution. This isn’t Bolton who is Never Trumper, attacks Trump in very personal terms.

Preet Bharara:

But who Trump picked? He picked Pompeo.

David Leonhardt:

He picked Pompeo, too. It’s very personal.

Preet Bharara:

It’s very personal, certainly, and we’ll see what other kinds of things happen. But I guess with these executive orders, one of the ways I think about it is it’s like a win-win for the Trump administration. Some of them will alter policy. Some of them never will because, as we’ve seen with birthright citizenship, you have a Reagan-appointed judge and an array of experts such as they are who think the constitution is clear, the 14th amendment is clear, it’s not going to change. But in that instance, either they get the change they want, which is good for them in their mind, or they have the message, and it’s getting a lot of attention, and it sends a message not just to their base internally or to other allies who believe what they believe about immigration and birthright citizenship, but also arguably to people beyond American Shores who, hearing the hullabaloo about it, might think twice about coming to America. So are these executive orders in the main about policy or about message?

David Leonhardt:

I think they’re about both. I think some really are about policy and message and others are mostly just about message. You asked a minute ago, Preet, basically, does anything ever come back to bite Trump politically? And I think the answer to that is clearly yes, and I think this is an important thing for Democrats to keep in mind. There really are laws of political gravity that apply to Donald Trump. He tried to repeal Obamacare and he failed in humiliating fashion because of public opinion and a grassroots effort by progressive groups, by disability rights groups.

Preet Bharara:

Because John McCain was still alive.

David Leonhardt:

Yeah, well, it flipped just enough Republicans. And so in part because those Republicans, it’s a mix of principle and worrying about their political future. And let’s remember, Donald Trump lost reelection, so political gravity applies to him in a bunch of ways, and I think one of the things that we’ve seen on a bunch of these issues is that Democrats got really outside of where American public opinion was. I mean, immigration is the central example. The Democratic Party from 2012 to 2020 went from having a very moderate balanced, we believe, and a path to citizenship and border security message, to 2020 in which the Democratic Party platform said nothing about border security. Nothing. It just contained language about making it easier to enter this country, including making it easier enter this country even without legal permission. They didn’t phrase it that way, but that’s clearly what they were talking about, expanding these programs.

And so they created an opening for Trump to come in, and even though Trump’s policies are also substantially more extreme than where American public opinion is, they created an opportunity for Trump to basically be able to run on immigration and have most Americans think that he was closer to them than the Democratic Party was. And so one of the best, most strategic things the Democratic Party can do for battling Trump 2.0 is be reflective about where are the Democratic Party is actually closer to public opinion, like on healthcare policy, like on abortion policy, and where are the areas where the Democratic Party, or at least very prominent parts of it are really outside of public opinion? And I think that’s why we see Trump pushing on immigration, pushing on DEI. That’s why we see Trump being so skeptical of wars. On a lot of these issues, he really is sensing something about where American public opinion is and where Democrats are vulnerable because they’re out of step with it.

Preet Bharara:

You agree with that, Jon?

Jonathan Karl:

Yeah. I mean, absolutely. The thing is on a lot of the major initiatives he’s going to be doing, he’s already started to do, he does have public opinion with him: on sealing off the border to illegal immigration obviously, but also on his talk of mass deportations. The numbers are not quite as wide, but he has a majority of Americans who want to see, especially people with criminal…

Preet Bharara:

But isn’t very complicated? Isn’t that very complicated? I think David, you have written that, I’m paraphrasing, but both sides should be careful about assuming the rest of the country has their views on immigration, that people’s views are mixed. We are a nation of immigrants. When you ask broad questions about favoring certain people being deported, you get a plurality or a majority. When you ask more nuanced questions about the methods by which you’re going to deport people and what the consequences are and how long they’ve been here and if they pay taxes, are they illegal or are they on work visas or student visas? The answers get a lot more complicated.

Is immigration, which seems to me to be the major issue area of cleavage within the Republican Party, and as between the Democratic Party and the Republican Party, is it easy enough to have a bumper sticker approach for the Democrats? And if not, how do you deal with nuance in an age where we seem to have rejected all nuance? Is that a fair question?

Jonathan Karl:

Well, I mean, Democrats, as David alluded to, they went so far during that primary in 2020, not Biden, but Kamala Harris and the others to supporting the idea put forward by Julian Castro that basically illegal border crossing should no longer be illegal. I mean, it was literally open borders.

Preet Bharara:

That’s an example of something that is clearly political kryptonite.

Jonathan Karl:

Clearly outside. Now deporting people who have committed crimes in the United States, violent crimes.

Preet Bharara:

Clearly inside.

Jonathan Karl:

Clearly, clearly inside. The Dreamers, deporting people who were brought here as young children and have built a life for themselves here, deporting those, clearly outside of what public opinion wants. So there’s a lot of ground between that. They announced in the first 24 hours that ICE, Immigration Customs Enforcement, had arrested 308 people who had criminal records who were here illegally and then listed very serious crimes. 308. That’s not 15 million people.

Preet Bharara:

Well, you got to start somewhere.

Jonathan Karl:

I mean, at that rate, you’d have to do, I think I calculated 108 years if you did that every day. But I’m sure they’re going to want to highlight. I mean, we’ll see. I think what they’ve tried to do so far is to actually overstate how much they’re doing.

Preet Bharara:

Let me ask David: is the goal to deport one more human than Obama did over eight years? Obama, I believe, according to the numbers I’ve seen, deported 3 million people in eight years. That’s not nothing.

David Leonhardt:

No.

Preet Bharara:

Was that the wisest, moderate, inclusive policy for a Democrat at the time? And should it be the policy now?

David Leonhardt:

I mean, wise is a loaded word. I think it had upsides and downsides. I think the upsides were, it was much more popular than Joe Biden’s much more open immigration policy. Obama’s was. And I also think, look, we are a nation, we have a border. There are many, many more people in the world who would like to live here than we are going to admit, than the American public wants to admit. We live in a democracy. And so I think what Obama was doing with those deportations and with his border security efforts, as well as talking about, “We’re a nation of immigrants, we should have a path to citizenship,” is he was saying, “We’re a nation of immigrants, but we also aren’t taking all comers,” and so part of the point of deportation is a version of what you alluded to earlier, Preet, which is it’s to dissuade people from trying to enter illegally.

And I think it’s really one of the things that the Biden administration got wrong, pushed by immigration advocates. And there’s a tragic irony for those immigration advocates. Richie Torres, the congressman from New York, has made this point. They pushed immigration policy so far toward openness that they engendered an anti-immigration backlash that doesn’t need to exist, and so I think Trump is actually going to be fine on public opinion with basically shutting the border for a period of time and even denying asylum to a lot of people who qualify for it, because I think so many Americans are tired after the four years of Biden of the fact that 8 million people entered this country in the last four years, most of them without legal permission. And so it’s engendered this backlash that really does undermine our values as a nation of immigrants because I think a lot of Americans are just like, “Can we take a break for a while?”

Preet Bharara:

Yeah. Can I offer an alternate theory? And Jon, I want to know what you think about it, and that is both sides are practicing the art of reverting to the extreme: that you have, whether it’s DEI or language or immigration, what you say may be true if Trump remains sort of in the mainstream and follows the sort of centrist wisdom of people on immigration. But if we start to see forced family separations again, if we see troops sent to the border, if we see ICE agents in churches and synagogues, he will have overplayed his hand. Is there anything to this notion, that we have a political pendulum that doesn’t have an adult supervisor, which is why arguably Trump won, then Trump lost, then Trump won again. Can you talk about the pendulum, Jonathan?

Jonathan Karl:

Yeah. And by the way, the pendulum also ticked through the midterms. You saw Trump have huge setback in 2018 after his win in 2016.

Preet Bharara:

Is that too easy a thesis or is there something to that?

Jonathan Karl:

No, I think there’s definitely something to it, and there are a lot of theories as to why our political system has become so captured by the extremes on each side, which doesn’t seem to reflect the overall opinion of the public. And you have to look at things like primaries and who competes in primaries. The House of Representatives is a great place to just kind of do your study. The members who are most successful are those who have become minor celebrities, or some case major celebrities, on the far right and the far left. I mean, Marjorie Taylor Greene doesn’t represent the mainstream of the Republican Party or the mainstream of America, I don’t believe, but she has an unbelievably safe seat in the House.

Preet Bharara:

We all know her name.

Jonathan Karl:

We all know her name, and she has a huge following on social media. She has an ability to raise enormous sums of money without relying on big money donors, but from people, activists, not just in her district, but all around the country.

Preet Bharara:

She’s taken a courageous stance against gazpacho tactics. I’m against gazpacho tactics myself, except in certain seasons. Then gazpacho, it’s just right.

Jonathan Karl:

It’s just right. We’ve been delivered a house that is basically a tie. I mean, there is no real working majority in the house. And the problem solvers caucus, which represents those moderates, is a very, very small group of individuals, but they actually could exercise power because the majority is so narrow.

David Leonhardt:

I was just going to say, if you want a quick dose of optimism, and we could all use some optimism about American politics, I do think Trump is likely to overplay his hand on immigration in many of the ways you just laid out, Preet. If Trump overplays his hand on immigration, and Democrats honestly come to understand how badly they overplayed their hand in 2020 and after, you could imagine, not with Donald Trump, but you could imagine in a way that was hard to imagine before the actual immigration bill we need, which is much tougher on border security and truly trying to make it hard to come here illegally than Democrats have historically wanted, and also creates a real path to citizenship for people who’ve been here for years and followed the law and deals with some of the things that our asylum system. So that’s a double bank shot, but if the simple question is, is Trump likely to overplay his hand on immigration? Yes.

Preet Bharara:

It’s time for a short break. Stay tuned. Can I ask this question that I feel I’m most silly asking because people ask it all the time, and that is, so where is the radical and or sensible center? Because people tell me when you poll Americans, they’re fairly reasonable, even though the left thinks that the MAGA folks aren’t, and the MAGA folks think that the people sort of far on the left, but on basic things like immigration, there’s a consensus about what is within and what is without on gun regulation, there’s a consensus on a lot of things. There’s a consensus. So where are our centrist saviors?

Jonathan Karl:

The record will reflect a long pause.

David Leonhardt:

I mean, I like looking at the Democrats who won in places where Donald Trump won, the Jared Goldins from Maine, the Ruben Gallego, the senator from Arizona, Alyssa Slotkin in Michigan, and they’re much less culturally liberal than Democrats. All of them were in favor of tough border security. They’re still pretty populist. And so I think on a lot of issues, there really is an American center even on some of our toughest issues. I mean, you look at opinion on trans: most Americans believe in basic civil rights for trans people. People should be able to pick what pronouns they use. People should not be discriminated against in jobs or schools. Most Americans also think that medical treatments for people under 18 should be sharply limited and trans girls should not be able to play sports with other girls. And so you can argue about whether that’s right or wrong, but it’s a center that is very different from what you hear from the extremes and so on. A lot of these issues, there’s a center that tends to be culturally moderate and economically sort of center left.

Jonathan Karl:

I believe that you could add to that list on trans the idea of taxpayer funded gender-affirming surgery for inmates in federal penitentiaries is not there very popular position.

Preet Bharara:

Why you got to go there, Jon? Kamala Harris is not going to be happy about that comment.

Jonathan Karl:

And she was never able to say flatly that she doesn’t support that. I mean, she was on tape supporting it years earlier and she was unable to articulate why she no longer supports that or even to say she no longer supported it.

Preet Bharara:

You know what the one funny thing is? And I don’t want to get in trouble, but it would be one thing if certain people on either the left or the right had a sort of non-mainstream position, but in good faith, believed in it with great genuine feeling and ferocity, I think some people do. I think a lot of people both in MAGA, both the leaders of MAGA, JD Vance and Trump in particular, who I don’t think has any ideology, I don’t think he believes anything. And some people on the left, as they were trying to contemplate statewide races or national races, I mean, I think Kamala Harris endorsed positions that she did not deeply feel an affinity for because of putting her, try not to be critical, but people told her that they had put their finger to the wind, and you have to be more liberal because otherwise a lifelong prosecutor from California in that time and in that age wasn’t going to fly.

So I don’t know where we’re left. If it’s true, as I’m just speculating, that some of the people who espouse these divisive views that are out of the mainstream don’t even believe in them. What do you make of that?

David Leonhardt:

I think that many of the kind of activists, so to focus on the Democratic party for a minute, I think many of the activists who have pushed the party, the left, genuinely believe in their position.

Preet Bharara:

Yes, yes. I agree.

David Leonhardt:

I absolutely think you’re right.

Jonathan Karl:

And on the right, by the way. I think a lot of the activists on the right really believe it, as well.

David Leonhardt:

Absolutely. They genuinely want to restrict abortion much more than most Americans do. Yeah, I agree, Jon. But I think you’re also right that we used to have politicians who often to their own benefit in the long run, were much more willing to stand up to the kind of far parts of the spectrum in their own party. I mean, boy, everyone remembers that Bill Clinton stood up to the far left, but boy, did Barack Obama spend a long time standing up to the far left on issue after issue and something about what happened with the Democratic Party caused even Joe Biden, whom Preet, he’s a perfect example of your point. I mean, he just doesn’t have these really progressive instincts on a lot of these things, but he kind of folded on a lot of it. And it’s going to be really interesting to see whether the next generation of politicians in both parties, because both parties are going to need a new nominee in 2028, are just more willing to be ruthlessly strategic about doing things to try to win rather than listening to the far side of the spectrum in their own party.

Preet Bharara:

A couple of quick more things before I let you folks go about things from this week. Tariffs. What’s going to happen with tariffs? And when’s inflation going to go up?

Jonathan Karl:

Well, Trump’s going to… He wants to do his external revenue service. He certainly has this one in his head. He certainly emphasized it over and over and over again in the campaign. I mean, I think tariffs are coming. They’ve put out February 1st as a date for tariffs on Mexico and Canada, 25%. He’s preparing tariffs on China. He’s talking additional tariffs/economic sanctions on Russia.

Preet Bharara:

So he wasn’t bluffing, because a lot of people, including some folks who came on the podcast said, “Yeah, people don’t like inflation.” Tariffs by and large are considered to be inflationary, but it’s just a way for him to sort of bargain and set the stage for negotiation. David, do you agree they’re coming?

David Leonhardt:

I think some tariffs are coming, but I don’t think we yet know the extent. I mean, on immigration, he’s already enacted a whole bunch of policies. On DEI, he’s already enacted a whole bunch of policies. He hasn’t actually enacted tariffs. And if you read the stories about why the stock market had such a good week, one of the things people say is that Wall Street was relieved that he didn’t immediately enact tariffs, so I think they’re a little torn about tariffs. I think they are worried about how Wall Street will react and what will happen to inflation. I am sure some tariffs are going to come, but I think that is an area where there’s a lot more uncertainty about what they’re going to do than there is in some other areas.

Jonathan Karl:

I will say he did impose tariffs last time around, and he did it in the face of dire warnings that there would be steep economic consequences.

Preet Bharara:

And Biden kept some of them.

Jonathan Karl:

And Biden kept some of them. And by the way, some of those warnings were coming from people that were in the top echelons of his staff, his advisors. Gary Cohn was totally blindsided on the steel and aluminum tariffs. I remember the day very keenly when everybody at the White House seemed to be surprised. He just fricking went out and did it. And he’s now staffed, his economic advisors are largely with him on this stuff and actually have a theory of the case as to why they believe that tariffs actually aren’t necessarily inflationary, that not necessarily all the costs will get passed on to consumers, because those that are exporting goods to the United States have some flexibility. They have market prices, and to a certain level, the tariffs can be borne by those that are actually selling the goods. You’ll eat into their profits as opposed to cost…

Now, I’m not saying I believe in any of these stories. David knows this much better than I do, but I’m saying there is a theory of the case. He has staffed his economic team with people who by and large believe that tariffs can be done effectively and not have the negative economic consequences that most economists would say they do.

Preet Bharara:

Final subject, quickly: Trump’s cabinet, and I sometimes do the following thought experiment, and this is true with impeachment, this is true with certain other votes that senators have to cast consistent with their constitutional obligation of advise and consent and on other things, on bills, et cetera, as well. To the extent there, how big a delta does there have to be between the vote you would see in the way the system works now, which is an open and recorded vote versus the vote that you would see if it was behind closed doors in the way the vote is for leader? Like John Thune was elected on an anonymous secret ballot and he won. And to what extent can you pronounce a judgment, a harsh judgment on the spines and courage, or lack thereof, of, in this case, Republican senators when that Delta gets large? And how large is that Delta, for example, on the future of cabinet secretary Pete Hegseth?

David Leonhardt:

Thune is such an interesting example because he was the Trumpists’ last choice of the three possibilities, right? So he’s the perfect example.

Preet Bharara:

He wouldn’t have won if it had been an open vote, right?

David Leonhardt:

Absolutely. No, that’s absolutely right. I think you can…

Preet Bharara:

So we’re reaching a point where ironically, I don’t know ironically is the right word, or paradoxically, democracy in certain circumstances is better served by secret ballot.

Jonathan Karl:

Yeah, yeah. Less transparency.

David Leonhardt:

It’s tricky though, right?

Preet Bharara:

Because when everyone’s a weenie, less transparency helps.

Jonathan Karl:

Thune I think is maybe the most interesting Republican figure right now. Maybe I would put Amy Coney Barrett up there, as well. Thune has shown that he is capable of defying Trump and speaking candidly and not mindlessly bowing to him, Trump wanted to, he survived a Republican primary in South Dakota as well. By the way, Trump wanted him out, not just to be leader, but not to be in the Senate anymore. So he survived in one of the most pro-Trump states in the union. He got elected a speaker and he did it without, I mean, he certainly wasn’t out there publicly slamming Trump, but he has not done the kind of things that Mike Johnson has done to say, “Look, anything Trump is wonderful.” So he’s going to be fascinating.

Look, but I think that the fundamental truth about even in the United States Senate is there is a clear “let Trump do what he wants” majority in the Senate, and I think the vast majority of those 53 Republican senators in an open ballot or a secret ballot would be voting to confirm Pete Hegseth and the others. Would Pete Hegseth get 50 votes in a secret ballot? Maybe not.

Preet Bharara:

Right, but that would mean his defeat.

Jonathan Karl:

Yeah. If it were a secret ballot, maybe he’d be at 47 or something. This is something very different from 2017 and the first four years of the Trump presidency. Even in the United States Senate, which is usually that bulwark, it is a very pro-Trump. Thune, sure, he got elected leader, but it is a very, very pro-Trump majority in the Senate, and obviously the House, too.

Preet Bharara:

David, say something wise and astute in the last 45 seconds.

David Leonhardt:

I’m not sure I’ll meet that bar, Preet, but I actually find it’s very healthy for democracy when we see both nearly unanimous or unanimous votes confirmation in the Senate, right?

Preet Bharara:

Like Marco Rubio.

David Leonhardt:

As we had with Marco Rubio, right? Obviously, many of the people who voted to confirm Marco Rubio disagree with him, but they were saying, “He is qualified and a president is allowed to pick his Secretary of State.” I also think it’s healthy for democracy when we see some people defeated. I think the party-line votes or near party-line votes where all Republicans vote to confirm someone and he or she gets confirmed as looks like it’s going to happen with Hegseth and all Democrats vote against, is a sign of something that is a little bit broken, and we clearly have a whole bunch of stuff that’s broken right now in terms of our Senate.

Preet Bharara:

Gentlemen, Jonathan Karl, David Leonhardt, thank you so much for being with me. We’ll have to do this again.

Jonathan Karl:

Great. Definitely. Thank you.

David Leonhardt:

Let’s do it. Thanks so much.

Jonathan Karl:

Great to see you, David.

David Leonhardt:

Good to see you, Jon.

Preet Bharara:

For more analysis of legal and political issues making the headlines, become a member of the CAFE Insider. Members get access to exclusive content, including the weekly podcast I host with former U.S. Attorney, Joyce Vance. Head to cafe.com/insider to sign up for a trial. That’s cafe.com/insider. If you like what we do, rate and review the show on Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen. Every positive review helps new listeners find the show. Send me your questions about news, politics, and justice. Tweet them to me at @PreetBharara with #AskPreet. You can also now reach me on Threads, or you can call and leave me a message at 669-247-7338. That’s 669-24-PREET, or you can send an email to letters@cafe.com. Stay Tuned is presented by Cafe and the Vox Media Podcast Network. The executive producer is Tamara Sepper. The technical director is David Tatasciore. The Deputy editor is Celine Rohr. The editorial producers are Noa Azulai and Jake Kaplan. The associate producer is Claudia Hernández and the CAFE team is Matthew Billy, Nat Weiner and Liana Greenway. Our music is by Andrew Dost. I’m your host, Preet Bharara. As always, stay tuned.