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TRANSCRIPT

Ben Rhodes: The line that jumps out to me that you may remember from that speech is when he said, referring to Butler, I was saved by God to make America great again. And that is someone announcing to the country that he doesn’t have to play by rules. 

Jane Coaston: I’m Jane Coaston, and this is What a Day, the show wondering if we will ever see the limits of Republican subservience to President Donald Trump. Here’s Texas Republican Representative Troy Nehls, for example. 

[clip of Troy Nehls] Donald Trump is the best thing to happen in this country in 100 years. He was born, he was born a very special baby. 

Jane Coaston: This is for a president who has an approval rating of 34% according to USA Today. 34%. On today’s show, we talked to Ben Rhodes about Iran, Trump, and Ben’s new book on how famous speeches show us how America has progressed since its founding. Before we get into all that, here’s what we’re following today, Thursday, June 11th. 

[clip of unknown news reporter] Will there be more bombing tonight? 

[clip of President Donald Trump] Yeah, there will be more bombing tonight. It’ll be bigger, uh bigger, more powerful. 

Jane Coaston: President Trump called into Fox and Friends this morning and threatened more military action against Iran. But by the afternoon, maybe after taking a little nap and cooling off, he came to his senses. In a post on Truth Social, Trump wrote in part, quote, “I have, as President of the United States of America, canceled the scheduled strikes and bombings against Iran this evening.” Someone get this man a bike because he’s backpedaling. Trump added that, quote, “discussions and final points have been in both concept and great detail approved by all parties involved.” That includes the U.S., Israel, and other countries. But I won’t hold my breath. We’ll talk more about why with Ben Rhodes later in the show. 

[clip of House Speaker Mike Johnson] Today we just offered a simple, clean three-week extension of the FISA national security law. The Democrats, 199 of them, voted against a clean three week extension for political purposes And when the bill went down, they applauded. They applauded it. 

Jane Coaston: Yeah they did. House Speaker Mike Johnson was up in arms today because a key surveillance tool that allows the U.S. to collect intelligence abroad without a warrant appears certain to expire. That’s because both the House and Senate failed to temporarily extend section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. Democrats said they will not support the renewal of the program in protest of Trump’s temporary pick to head the nation’s intelligence agencies. Federal Housing Finance Regulator, Bill Pulte. They want Trump to withdraw Pulte’s appointment and nominate a permanent replacement. And maybe Trump is feeling that pressure. After the votes, Trump coincidentally announced he was tapping Jay Clayton as his permanent pick for Director of National Intelligence. Clayton is the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York and a former Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman. In a Truth Social post, Trump encouraged the Senate to confirm Clayton ASAP, writing, quote, “Few people anywhere in the legal community are respected at the level of Jay.” Say it with me. Sure. In the meantime, FBI Director Kash Patel is gearing up to chug brewskies with the boys. I mean, take care of World Cup security challenges. Patel told Reuters last month, quote, “it’s a huge lift, probably the biggest lift in FBI history, in American history.” Really? You can’t think of a single other big lift for the FBI in American history? Hmm. He added quote, “literally the first week in office when I got to the FBI, I said we have to prepare for the Olympics, the World Cup, two Formula One races, and the Super Bowl.” I feel like the FBI has some other things they could be focusing on. And that’s the news. Let’s talk about Iran and America. Trump’s war on Iran began in February, with Trump claiming that America was giving the people of Iran, quote, “the prosperous and glorious future that is close within your reach.” But the regime change message faded pretty quickly, and for the last three months, Trump has whipsawed between ideas like paying Iran billions of dollars and bombing the nation into submission. Trump has changed a lot about American foreign policy, and in my view, America. I thought about that a lot while reading Ben Rhodes’ new book. All We Say: the battle for American identity, a history in 15 speeches. The book tells the story of this country through speeches by figures like Ben Franklin, Martin Luther King, and yes, Donald Trump. So I wanted to talk to Ben about what he learned writing the book and ask him what Trump’s actions in Iran can tell us about his presidency and our country. Ben, welcome back to What a Day. 

Ben Rhodes: Glad to be here, as always. 

Jane Coaston: So your new book All We Say, the battle for American identity uses 15 speeches to outline the centuries long debate over what it means to be an American. And it feels like no one in the last 50 years has changed that debate quite as much as President Trump. Your book closes with one speech from President Trump and it wasn’t the one I expected. You chose his second inaugural address. What stood out to you in that speech? 

Ben Rhodes: I think what stood out is there are things when you go back and do 250 years of American history and the debate we’ve been having about identity from the beginning, there are things about Trump that are actually common to US history and then there are things that are a departure. And that speech encapsulates both of those things. Because if you go back the racism, the xenophobia, the kind of populism of the white working class that is targeted both smashing elites, but also kind of suppressing others, um the radical kind of America first isolationism, the anti-immigrant feeling that you know rears its head every so often in this country. Like all of those things were in Trump’s second inaugural speech. And they’re also things that have obviously been prevalent through American history. But there’s also something that’s a departure, which is Trump’s kind of singular focus on himself as being exempted from any of the agreed upon rules of political competition in this country that the line that jumps out to me. That you may remember from that speech is when he said referring to Butler, I was saved by God to make america great again, and that is someone announcing to the country that he doesn’t have to play by rules. He’s he’s operating in a different level like the the competition of stories of identity is over and he’s won. Um. And so therefore he can start wars without asking for permission, enrich himself and his family and his kind of cronies without permission. Or frankly regard for laws and norms. He can ignore the law when ICE is disappearing people without court orders and on and on. And and I think that’s what’s so disorienting now is that Trump is trying to declare this competition that we usually fight out in politics over and he’s also exempting himself from the rules and by the way his clique. I start the chapter with the tableau of oligarchs from Elon Musk to Jeff Bezos, who were giddily sitting behind him at that inauguration. I think we’re obviously at a pretty low point here in our 250 year history, as we’re about to experience with a UFC fight on the South Lawn marking date. 

Jane Coaston: Yeah in that same speech, he also said, quote, “we will measure our success not only by the battles we win, but also by the wars that we end.” And perhaps most importantly, the wars we never get into, which has aged like milk. Trump–

Ben Rhodes: Yes. 

Jane Coaston: –started this war with Iran in late February. And back then among the, I think, 17 different reasons we were given for this war, he said it was about Iranian regime change. He wanted Iran to take back its country and have that glorious future. But Thursday morning today, he was talking about Kharg Island, which is crucial to Iranian oil exports. So what is this war? 

Ben Rhodes: This war is something that I don’t even think Donald Trump could tell you what it’s about anymore. I think at the beginning, he was talked into it by Bibi Netanyahu. Um, I know that not just from the fact that that was reported widely, but Bibi Netanyahu tried to talk Barack Obama into the same war when I was in the White House for eight years. And I think the reason he talked Trump into it is that he made him believe that it’d be easy, that the Iranian regime would collapse, that you could kind of destroy their nuclear program, that this would be a great triumph. And the reality is that every single justification they’ve given, they failed to measure up to. There’s no regime change. That’s clear. If anything, the Iranian regime is more entrenched and more hardline. The nuclear program that Trump said is obliterated is still there or else we wouldn’t be desperately trying to get its stockpile of highly enriched uranium out of the country. Um. The military that they keep bragging is destroyed. Well, if their military is destroyed, how come they’ve shut down the Strait of Hormuz? Um. The ballistic missile program reports suggested up to 70% of it remains in place. This has just been a catastrophic waste of resources, lives, time, impact on the global economy. And he’s just desperately looking for something to grab onto to claim a victory. But I think everybody can see that the costs are clear, the benefits don’t exist. And he can say all he wants about Kharg Island and opening the Strait, but I think people know that the Strait was open before the war. And Americans don’t want to colonize Kharg Island with U.S. service members. 

Jane Coaston: Yeah, it’s interesting because earlier this week, Trump said we were just days away from a deal with Iran. But that’s becoming like the two weeks thing Trump has because he’s been saying this for–

Ben Rhodes: Yeah. 

Jane Coaston: –months now. How can we get to a deal if he keeps moving the goalposts and Iran doesn’t care? 

Ben Rhodes: I think that the problem that we’re in is that everybody knows what the deal would be. The Iranians open up the Strait. The US lifts this blockade we have on Iran. Iran is going to have to get some revenue from sanctions relief, billions and billions of dollars worth, and then you try to negotiate some nuclear deal that probably looks something like Obama’s nuclear deal, where they still have a program, but you know they ship the stockpile out as they did under the Obama deal. And they accept some restrictions on their program, as they did on the Obama deal. And I think what’s happening is there are three parties to this war. Israel doesn’t want it to end. Netanyahu kind of needs a war to justify his political survival. Um. Iran feels like it has all this leverage because they’ve taken our strongest punch. They’re still there, and they can close the Strait of Hormuz. And Trump desperately wants to make it appear that when he does make these concessions and give Iran a bunch of revenue from sanctions relief that he’s somehow won a military victory. And so he’s periodically trying to bomb them and make it look like whatever deal happens happened because he’s so tough, but I don’t think anyone buys it. You know and at some point, because of the economic impact of this war on the whole world, he’ll just have to accept that it is what it is. He’ll try to spin it, um but I you know every one of these you know times that we hear that the deal is imminent, it feels like it’s meant to kind of impact markets more than it is an imminent deal. But one of these times, the stop clock will be right and and Trump will spin it, but you know it won’t change the fact that this war is one of the dumbest and most catastrophic things that have happened in American foreign policy. And that’s that’s saying a lot given our track record. 

Jane Coaston: We’ll be back in just a moment with more on Ben’s new book highlighting some of the most influential American speeches in history. If you like the show, make sure to subscribe, leave a five star review on Spotify and Apple Podcasts, watch us on YouTube, and share with your friends. More to come after some ads. 

[AD BREAK]

Jane Coaston: Let’s get back to my conversation with Ben Rhodes. So turning back to your book, one of the speeches that you chose that I was really interested in was by Maria Stewart. She gave it in 1832. And you write that it was the first recorded speech given by a Black American woman to a mixed race, mixed gender audience. And I couldn’t stop thinking, Ben, about how her demands for Black empowerment. She says, quote, “where are the names of our illustrious ones?” They’re being made in the midst of slavery. But her demands for Black empowerment, and for a conversation about the Black community sounds like something that could have been said in 1965 or that Jesse Jackson would have written in 1972. Why did you choose that speech? 

Ben Rhodes: I chose it for a number of reasons. I mean, first of all, this is, it’s such an extraordinary person and story. She, she loses her husband. She loses all of her money. She loses her pastor, who is a very famous, uh, uh pioneer of the Black church, Thomas Paul. And she shows up in the office of William Lloyd Garrison, the most prominent white abolitionist, the publisher of the Liberator, an abolitionist newspaper, and she just has something to say. And Garrison sees this immediately. And she has four speeches that are recorded that clearly were like a bolt of lightning in the Black and abolitionist community in Boston. People knew at the time this woman had something worth listening to. It was reprinted in the Liberator. And so I think in the first instance, her message, which combined the demand for Black rights and Black empowerment with a demand for women’s rights and women’s empowerment through education, um that felt very contemporary. It felt like. Um, you know, she was talking about intersectionality before–

Jane Coaston: Right. 

Ben Rhodes: –that was a word. She was talking about women’s rights before Seneca Falls. She was taking about abolition in an uncompromising way before Frederick Douglas, and I think American history is full of these people who’ve been forgotten, but who are quite impactful because her words clearly entered the kind of subconscious of these movements, um, and then help inform people like Frederick Douglas and those that come after. And again, I also included it because those words would have been forgotten except for the fact that late in her life, Maria Stewart is living in Washington DC and she finally gets access to her husband’s pension because he had fought in the war of 1812. Black people were fighting in America’s wars before the Civil War. And she uses all of that money to reprint her own speeches. And I found something so poignant and powerful about that because we probably wouldn’t have them, the record of them, without her doing that. And I think that if we want to figure out how we got here and who we are and where we might go, we can’t just look to the Lincolns and Benjamin Franklin’s, although I have them in my book. We have to look to the Maria Stewart’s too, because these people um have something to tell us from history. And these people had an impact on history that has been too often whitewashed, which is a word that has many meanings. 

Jane Coaston: Yeah, it’s it was striking that throughout the book, like with you using the cornerstone speech from Confederate vice president and noted loser, Alexander Stevens, which–

Ben Rhodes: Yeah. 

Jane Coaston: –defended slavery as a positive good on the eve–

Ben Rhodes: Yes. 

Jane Coaston: –of the Civil War, it felt like each speech, and I know this is a strange term for it, was kind of rehashing the same conversation from different views. Who’s an American? Who gets to be in charge? Who matters? Do you think we will ever stop having those conversations? 

Ben Rhodes: I don’t, you know, and I’m glad you saw that because that was kind of part of the intention is that we set up this country, we compromise about identity, right? The Constitution left slavery in place. It did not really define who got the full rights of citizenship, it was pretty limited. Um. It didn’t really deal with immigration. And all the debates we’ve been having have been different versions of the same argument. You know, Maria Stewart makes her case, Stevens is the next speech in the book, and he’s saying, no, no, no, no, actually. It’s not just slavery, white supremacy is the cornerstone of the Confederacy and the mistake of the founders was to talk about equality and, and look, the issues change. It goes from, you know, if you’re just talking about race, it goes from slavery to segregation to, I don’t know, anti DEI, but actually the arguments are eerily similar. And I think there’s a lot of value in going back and looking at how different Americans made those arguments, because on our side of it, the kind of progressive exceptionalism that America is a struggle to actually live up to the words in the Declaration of Independence. And we can learn from the people who made those arguments before and built movements and how did they overcome circumstances that in some cases were even worse, you know, many cases actually, than where we find ourselves in today. Um. And look, I guess I will say as a hopeful note, even though the arguments continue, the country keeps getting more diverse. Um. We do get rid of slavery. We do get rid of segregation. Immigration does continue. Um. The demographics of this country look different. That kind of universal notion of American identity being available to anyone, despite what Trump or JD Vance might say, that’s actually the story that tends to win over time. Um. So there is a positive trajectory, even if there is kind of repetition of progress, backlash to progress, repeat, rinse, repeat. 

Jane Coaston: Ben, as always, thank you so much for joining me. 

Ben Rhodes: Thanks, it was great talking to you. 

Jane Coaston: That was my conversation with Ben Rhodes, co-host of Pod Save the World and author of All We Say, The Battle for American Identity, A History in 15 Speeches. We’ll link to his book in the show notes. 

[AD BREAK]

Jane Coaston: That’s all for today. If you like the show, make sure you subscribe, leave a review, celebrate the clearly good vibes offered by the Wu-Tang Clan, and tell your friends to listen. And if you’re into reading, and not just about how the Wu performed at halftime at Game 4 of the NBA Finals, inspiring the Knicks to come back from down 29 points to win, like me, What a Day is also a nightly newsletter, check it out and subscribe at Crooked.com/subscribe. I’m Jane Coaston, and the Wu-Tang Clan inspire victory, and Donald Trump inspires defeat. It appears that just one of these entities is nothing to fuck with. What a Day is a production of Crooked Media. Our show is produced by Caitlin Plummer, Emily Fohr, Erica Morrison, and Adriene Hill. Our team includes Hayley Jones, Greg Walters, Matt Berg, Joseph Dutra, Johanna Case, and Desmond Taylor. Our music is by Kyle Murdock and Jordan Cantor. We had help today from the Associated Press. Our production staff is proudly unionized with the Writers Guild of America East.