--:-- [Theme music fades out]
--:-- Ryan Knutson: Welcome to Trump 2.0. I'm Ryan Knutson.
--:-- Molly Ball: And I'm Molly Ball.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: It's Friday, January 31st.
--:-- Molly Ball: Coming up, we'll talk about the Trump administration's effort to temporarily freeze a big chunk of federal spending.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: But first, let's get caught up on the week's news.
--:-- Molly Ball: So, Donald Trump has been president for 11 days. Is it just me or does it feel like he's trying to do everything, everywhere, all at once?
--:-- Ryan Knutson: Yeah, with hot dog fingers? Is that coming soon?
--:-- Molly Ball: [laughs] Yeah, that's right. The hot dogs.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: Uh-huh. That must be the next executive order we should all look out for.
--:-- Molly Ball: How would you say overall that things are going for him so far with this strategy?
--:-- Ryan Knutson: I would say mixed. I mean, Republicans and people in the administration are pretty thrilled with how it's going. They feel like he's racking up wins.
--:-- Molly Ball: Democrats are also sort of getting their moxie back because they see him as doing too much too fast, and they feel like this is going to cause a backlash that's going to bring them back to relevance.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: All right, well, there's a lot to cover here on the show today, so let's get right to it.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: From the Journal, this is Trump 2.0.
--:-- Molly Ball: And I'm Molly Ball.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: It's Friday, January 31st.
--:-- Molly Ball: Coming up, Trump tries to freeze federal spending. And it doesn't quite go as planned. Or does it?
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--:-- Molly Ball: Burlington. Deals. Brands. Wow.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: All right, so before we get into this temporary freeze in federal spending, there are a few other things I want to talk about first.
--:-- Molly Ball: Trump is putting his cabinet together, and this week a few of his more controversial nominees had their Senate confirmation hearings.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: There's Kesh Patel for FBI director, Tulsi Gabbard for director of national intelligence, and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. for health secretary.
--:-- Molly Ball: How big of a battle do you think lies ahead for the administration and these nominees?
--:-- Ryan Knutson: Well, it's been a bit of a battle on Capitol Hill this week.
--:-- Molly Ball: These nomination hearings were pretty rocky. These nominees got grilled pretty hard, particularly by Democrats, of course.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: But there was some skepticism from Republicans as well.
--:-- Molly Ball: And you can tell that while these Republicans want to be loyal and give the president his team, some of them have misgivings.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: And you heard them pressing, you know, RFK, for example, not just for his views on issues important to them, like abortion, like agriculture.
--:-- Molly Ball: But also just his basic knowledge of the way the department works that he's going to be tasked to run.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: And he stumbled over things like understanding what Medicaid does and how it relates to Medicare.
--:-- Molly Ball: And that, of course, is something he would be tasked with overseeing.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: So I think there's a real sense on Capitol Hill that these are sort of going down to the wire and could really go either way.
--:-- Molly Ball: It seems like from the hearing so far that most Democrats are most likely to oppose these nominees.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: But what Republicans do you think might present the biggest hurdles?
--:-- Molly Ball: We saw a few of them flip on Pete Hegseth, the defense secretary, who barely cleared his nomination, needing a tie-breaking vote from Vice President J.D. Vance.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: So I think what we saw with Hegseth is there are Republican senators who feel relatively impervious to Trump's threats.
--:-- Molly Ball: There are at least three. Lisa Murkowski, who has survived a primary challenge before.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: Susan Collins, who represents a very blue state.
--:-- Molly Ball: And Mitch McConnell, who's not running for re-election again and has strong views, particularly on national defense.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: So that's three. And if there is one more senator who feels that one of these nominees is a bridge too far, that's it. They're not going to get through.
--:-- Molly Ball: All right. We'll keep our eyes on that.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: Meanwhile, late last Friday night, Trump fired 17 inspectors general.
--:-- Molly Ball: And if you are not a governmental nerd like Molly and I, inspectors general are the internal government watchdogs who are supposed to make sure federal agencies comply with the law and don't misuse their authority or taxpayer money.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: So, Molly, why do you think Trump did this?
--:-- Molly Ball: Well, he was asked about this on Air Force One and he said... Some people thought that some were unfair or some were not doing the job.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: It's a very standard thing. We don't really know a lot about what was behind this.
--:-- Molly Ball: But it's a sort of part of this general house cleaning that we're going to talk more about today.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: This idea that the whole federal bureaucracy is sort of rotten and has to be cleaned out, sort of root and branch.
--:-- Molly Ball: To critics, of course, it's not a way to make the government more effective or efficient or take out potential, you know, internal dissent.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: It's about enabling corruption and malfeasance by, you know, taking off the proverbial cop on the beat who would be overseeing these agencies and making sure, as you said, that they don't violate the law.
--:-- Molly Ball: So I think there's still more to know about why this has happened and there some concern about this that is somewhat bipartisan.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: Is there any indication that these inspectors general will be replaced quickly or are these jobs just going to be vacant now for the foreseeable future?
--:-- Molly Ball: I don't think we know yet. They haven't appointed new people to these positions yet.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: And as we said at the beginning, they're doing a lot very fast. They're still trying to confirm the cabinet.
--:-- Molly Ball: So this doesn't seem like necessarily the highest priority.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: All right, so I also want to talk to you about this deadly plane crash that happened late Wednesday night in D.C.
--:-- Molly Ball: More than 60 people are presumed dead.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: This is the first tragedy in Trump's second term, and it's actually not something that I would expect that we would be talking about on this podcast.
--:-- Molly Ball: But President Trump weighed in on it in a press conference on Thursday morning in a way that has drawn a lot of attention.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: It's all under investigation. I understand that. That's why I'm trying to figure out how you can come to the conclusion right now that diversity had something to do with this crash.
--:-- Molly Ball: Because I have common sense, okay? And unfortunately, a lot of people don't.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: And unfortunately, a lot of people don't. We want brilliant people doing this.
--:-- Molly Ball: This is a major... What did you make of what the president had to say about this?
--:-- Ryan Knutson: Well, it was certainly striking how political the president immediately chose to make this.
--:-- Molly Ball: I think the normal thing to do in these situations is to refrain from seeming to politicize a tragedy and to focus on the people dealing with the loss of their loved ones.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: Just a horrible tragedy that does raise a lot of potential policy questions.
--:-- Molly Ball: It raises questions about the crowding of the D.C. airspace, about the staffing levels and the funding and the personnel in the Federal Aviation Administration.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: And then there also have been questions for years about the diversity initiatives undertaken by the FAA.
--:-- Molly Ball: Trump wasn't making that up.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: But, you know, he is not waiting for an investigation to say whose fault this actually is, right?
--:-- Molly Ball: We don't know if it was the air traffic controller's fault at all.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: We don't know if it was, as Trump also said on social media, if it was the helicopter pilot's fault.
--:-- Molly Ball: We don't know if those diversity initiatives, while real, had anything to do with any of the staff who were involved in this.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: So I think it was shocking to a lot of people that the president didn't hold off on sort of casting blame for this.
--:-- Molly Ball: But also deeply familiar. You know, Trump was president before for four years.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: He has been on the political scene for a decade.
--:-- Molly Ball: He has never hesitated to point to his enemies and point to scapegoats for whatever is happening on his watch.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: And so in a lot of ways, I think this felt deeply familiar in Trump's political style.
--:-- Molly Ball: And I think some of his allies would say this is what people like about him is that he's not politically correct.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: He's not pulling punches. He's not going to sort of be unifying and nice when what you need is actually a fighter.
--:-- Molly Ball: All right. So one of the big stories of the week was the Trump administration's effort to temporarily freeze a big chunk of federal spending.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: And we are going to talk about that right after this break.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: Tuesday on NBC, Jimmy Fallon and Bozema St. John hosts the highly anticipated new competition show.
--:-- Molly Ball: I hired 10 creatives from all walks of life. They will be battling it out to see who can impress the world's biggest brands.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: This is a huge opportunity. This is the battle for the next big idea. This is not play play.
--:-- Molly Ball: We're spending millions of dollars. I'm so excited to embark on this adventure with all of you.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: Make the best I do win! On brand with Jimmy Fallon. Series premiere Tuesday on NBC.
--:-- Molly Ball: This episode is brought to you by State Farm.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: Checking off the boxes on your to-do list is a great feeling.
--:-- Molly Ball: And when it comes to checking off coverage, a State Farm agent can help you choose an option that's right for you.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: Whether you prefer talking in person, on the phone, or using the award-winning app, it's nice knowing you have help finding coverage that best fits your needs.
--:-- Molly Ball: Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: So on Monday, the Trump administration issued a memo that said it was going to pause a big chunk of federal spending in the ballpark of $3 trillion worth of federal grants and loans.
--:-- Molly Ball: And there has been a whole lot of development since then.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: So to help us understand it, we brought on Damian Paletta, our Washington, D.C. coverage chief.
--:-- Damian Paletta: Hi, Damian. Thank you so much for being here.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: My pleasure. Thanks for having me.
--:-- Damian Paletta: So can you walk us through what happened here? What is the Trump administration trying to do and why?
--:-- Ryan Knutson: Sure. So when it's numbers, it's easy to unpack it a little bit if we just talk.
--:-- Damian Paletta: We start with the numbers. So the federal budget's about $7 trillion.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: We know that the Trump administration wants to cut the budget dramatically from $7 trillion down to who knows what.
--:-- Damian Paletta: You know, Elon Musk said he wants to lop $2 trillion off the budget so that we could get it down maybe to $5 trillion.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: So we know they want to do this, but obviously spending stuff all runs through Congress.
--:-- Damian Paletta: But what happened here is one week, exactly one week after Trump was sworn in, they put out this memo, this two-page memo, and it says, first of all, it says there's a $10 trillion budget, which is not true.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: There's a $7 trillion budget, which is still a lot of money, but like every trillion counts.
--:-- Damian Paletta: There's a $10 trillion budget. $3 trillion of the 10 is used on woke stuff and this and that, financial assistance.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: And so we're going to freeze it, and it's going to be frozen effective tomorrow at 5 o'clock.
--:-- Damian Paletta: The only thing they really said, the only exemptions that they offered in this memo, deep in the footnotes were Social Security and Medicare.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: And so for a lot of us who follow the budget closely, that said everything else was fair game.
--:-- Damian Paletta: And so what happens after this memo goes out?
--:-- Ryan Knutson: Well, I mean, Head Start, programs that get money for, you know, the children, community centers, states felt like their money was going to get frozen.
--:-- Damian Paletta: And then, so the memo went out on Monday. By Tuesday, it appeared that the Medicaid system in this country had completely frozen up and seized up.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: And so the system that paying the hospitals, paying the health care providers for all those people completely seized.
--:-- Damian Paletta: I've never seen anything like that before.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: That happened less than 24 hours after this memo went out.
--:-- Damian Paletta: There was a ton of questions. The White House couldn't answer the questions.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: And so they had to put out another memo on Tuesday, essentially blaming the media for the confusion and offering a few clarifications, essentially saying this would not apply to Medicaid and it would not apply to food stamps or the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Programs.
--:-- Damian Paletta: So then a federal judge put a pause on this order, and then the Trump administration came out and said they were rescinding the memo.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: Yeah, this is kind of a tale of three memos. The Monday memo that didn't make a ton of sense, the Tuesday memo, which tried to walk a little bit back, and then there's the Wednesday memo that said, we rescind the Monday memo, let's just pretend this never happened.
--:-- Damian Paletta: And then Caroline Levitt tweets out, well, we're not actually rescinding it. We're just doing something else.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: And the judge saw the tweet and said, wait a second, we're still going to have a hearing on this.
--:-- Damian Paletta: So I think, you know, this is a great example of the Trump administration kind of coming out, guns blazing, you know, following this Silicon Valley ethos of move fast and break things.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: And it shows it doesn't quite work that way in Washington.
--:-- Damian Paletta: I mean, obviously the Trump administration, Elon Musk, everyone wants to changed the way Washington works, and there's a lot of bipartisan support for attacking the budget and attacking government spending in a much different way.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: But this way that they tried to completely claw back all power over government spending in a hastily written memo that obviously had some factual errors in it, I think shows that moving too fast in some key spaces like this could actually backfire on them.
--:-- Damian Paletta: Had they rolled it out differently, do you think that it might have had a different outcome?
--:-- Ryan Knutson: Well, I wonder, you know, because I can see both sides of this.
--:-- Damian Paletta: On the one hand, the whole move fast and break things idea is that if you try to go at these things slowly, deliberately, incrementally, they'll just never get done, right?
--:-- Ryan Knutson: They'll get caught up in this bureaucratic black hole where everyone in the agency finds a reason to object to it.
--:-- Damian Paletta: And, you know, you spend 10 years writing memos about something that never actually gets implemented.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: So the idea is you rip off the Band-Aid, you go extreme all at once, and then you can always walk back the parts that people object to.
--:-- Damian Paletta: And then whatever you do end up doing looks relatively moderate by comparison.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: I don't know if we're going to get to that point with this, given that the whole thing's been undone, right?
--:-- Damian Paletta: I mean, I think it's important to recognize that, like, this didn't actually affect anyone, right?
--:-- Ryan Knutson: And even then, there's a question about whether the executive branch has the power to do this, right?
--:-- Damian Paletta: I mean, Damian, I wonder what you think about the potential for a constitutional crisis here, right?
--:-- Ryan Knutson: If the courts are telling the administration they can't do something, you know, the Constitution says it's up to Congress.
--:-- Damian Paletta: There's a law in the books that says presidents can't just do this.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: But what if the administration just goes ahead and does it anyway when the courts have said that they can't?
--:-- Damian Paletta: I mean, there's a clear strategy by the Trump administration to take some of these things.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: Birthright citizenship is one.
--:-- Damian Paletta: And this Empowerment Act of 1974 is another.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: And get them out into the courts as quickly as possible.
--:-- Damian Paletta: And the Impoundment Act, just to say, is this idea that Congress controls the purse strings.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: They decide how much money should be spent.
--:-- Damian Paletta: But there's a view that the executive branch should say, OK, that's a ceiling, but we'll set the floor.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: We're going to not spend money that you've allocated.
--:-- Damian Paletta: Exactly. The Impoundment Act of the 1970s essentially puts restrictions around what the White House can do once the money has already been authorized by Congress and put into law.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: And Russ Vogt, who's Trump's nominee to be the budget director and President Trump himself, both believe that that law is unconstitutional and that the commander-in-chief should have the power to do that.
--:-- Damian Paletta: So what they want is to get this into the courts.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: They wanted a lawsuit about this, just like they wanted a lawsuit about the birthright citizenship executive order, which the Constitution appears to say, you know, should not go into effect.
--:-- Damian Paletta: But if there's a lawsuit, and it gets into the courts, and they get in front of a friendly Supreme Court, and actually Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy wrote an op-ed in the journal saying exactly this, that they want this into the courts so that if a friendly Supreme Court rules on it, then they get everything they want.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: They actually can't do these things without the court kind of ruling in their favor.
--:-- Damian Paletta: So the sooner they can do it, even if it's in kind of a messy memo, although that might not help them in the courts if they have a messy memo, but the sooner they can get the courts involved, the sooner they can kind of get down to business.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: But what I'm saying is you say they can't do it unless the court rules in their favor, but why not?
--:-- Damian Paletta: Why don't they just, I mean, look at what they're doing with TikTok.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: The Supreme Court already unanimously said that the law of the land is that TikTok cannot operate, but it still is because the administration is just ignoring that, right?
--:-- Damian Paletta: I mean, the inspectors general, same thing, right?
--:-- Ryan Knutson: Lindsey Graham was on television and was asked, wasn't this illegal because in the law it says they have to give 30 days notice before they fire these people?
--:-- Damian Paletta: And he said, well, yeah, technically.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: Very quickly, the law says he's supposed to give 30 days notice.
--:-- Damian Paletta: He didn't do that.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: Do you think he violated the law?
--:-- Damian Paletta: Well, technically, yeah, but he has the authority to do it.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: So I'm not, losing a whole lot of sleep that he wants to change the personnel out.
--:-- Damian Paletta: I just want to make sure.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: And the idea is like, well, but who's going to do anything about it?
--:-- Damian Paletta: I mean, great question.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: I mean, in the TikTok example, we believe that it's hard to find someone withstanding to sue.
--:-- Damian Paletta: So, yes, it does seem completely different from what the law says, a law that was overwhelmingly approved by Congress last year and signed by President Biden.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: But it's hard to find, like, who would have the standing to file a lawsuit to get it gummed up in the courts.
--:-- Damian Paletta: And the same thing with the inspectors general.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: Yes, you have to notify Congress within 30 days before and you have to give specific reasons.
--:-- Damian Paletta: Trump did none of that.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: I suppose some of the inspectors generals could sue.
--:-- Damian Paletta: But in this example, the spending example, many people would have the standing to sue because it would impact them.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: And that's what got this case in front of a federal judge so quickly.
--:-- Damian Paletta: So another thing that happened this week that sort of related to this idea of cutting back on government spending was these buyout offers for federal employees.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: Which is not something that I recall seeing much happen in the federal government.
--:-- Damian Paletta: You see it in the private sector all the time.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: But what do you think is going on here?
--:-- Damian Paletta: Is this just sort of like, let's cut back on government spending. Let's shake loose the people that are maybe not on board with the Trump administration's vision.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: So it looks like this came right out of Elon Musk's shop and the Office of Personnel Management.
--:-- Damian Paletta: And one of the issues with this, so the idea is they email this kind of buyout offer, although it has the same subject line that Elon Musk used in his sort of similar buyout offer when he took over Twitter in 2022.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: To you. Right, right. Fork in the road, it said.
--:-- Damian Paletta: Yeah.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: And so it goes out to over 2 million federal employees.
--:-- Damian Paletta: Democrats immediately said, whoa, whoa, this seems like kind of a trick, a rope-a-dope.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: You can, because you have to respond, resign in the email.
--:-- Damian Paletta: And so what if you respond that, this is an illegally binding contract.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: Also, Congress is only author, or the government's only authorized to pay employees through March 14th, because that's when a shutdown would happen if there's not a deal.
--:-- Damian Paletta: And so there's no money. There's actually no money to pay people through September 30th.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: Now, Congress can do a new bill, but people would be agreeing to something when there's actually no money to pay them.
--:-- Damian Paletta: And so there's a lot of questions that was done without real press releases, without an explanation, without any clarification, and even without a follow-up, without real answers about how it's going to work.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: And so that's just led to confusion and even a little bit of paranoia about what the administration's really up to.
--:-- Damian Paletta: All right. Well, before we go, we've got a question from one of our listeners.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: Hey Molly and Ryan, I'm Bill from Seattle and my question is with the recent actions taken by President Trump, particularly around TikTok, pardons, and other executive actions, do you think Trump is using his political capital too quickly?
--:-- Damian Paletta: Specifically with some longtime Republicans already breaking party lines, could this put Republicans in a tough position as they defend these actions during midterms?
--:-- Ryan Knutson: Or do you think he's trying to expose anyone in his party who might not agree with his positions?
--:-- Damian Paletta: Thanks. Yeah, thanks, Bill. That's such a great question.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: And I think it's something that people in Washington are thinking about a lot, particularly Republicans.
--:-- Damian Paletta: You know, the entire House of Representatives is going to be on the ballot in less than two years.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: Most of the Republicans have to worry more about a primary than a general election, which is part of why you see them being so loyal to Trump.
--:-- Damian Paletta: But there are some of them who are in swing districts, and they remember, you know, during Trump's first administration, when Republicans lost those 2018 midterms, they lost 40 seats and handed the House to the Democrats, in part because of the backlash to what people saw as the chaos and dysfunction of that first Trump administration.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: Trump now is a lame duck, and he's doing a lot of things that are not necessarily popular on an individual basis.
--:-- Damian Paletta: His approval rating is underwater, even in this so-called honeymoon period.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: So this stuff starts to pile up and has the potential to drag down the administration.
--:-- Damian Paletta: And I think a lot of Republicans, as they look forward to this giant mess of legislation and deadlines that they've got to take care of this year, are wondering if they really ought to be in lockstep with an administration that may be rapidly losing its political capital.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: Damien, anything you'd like to add to that?
--:-- Damian Paletta: Yeah, I would just say to be—he's 78 years old. He's older than Biden was at the beginning of his term.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: And so I kind of understand why he's moving so quickly.
--:-- Damian Paletta: He wants to do a trade war this year. He wants to do tax reform this year.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: He's got to kind of empty the tank in 2025.
--:-- Damian Paletta: And, you know, who knows what an 80-year-old Trump who's lost the midterms will be able to accomplish in 2027.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: So I think he's going to go for broke.
--:-- Damian Paletta: He doesn't really take advice to slow down and be cautious.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: You know, but I think this is what Americans knew was going to happen.
--:-- Damian Paletta: This is what they voted for.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: This is what they saw in his first term.
--:-- Damian Paletta: This is the personality. He's very gregarious and energetic, and this is what Americans wanted, and so this is what they're getting.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: They want disruption.
--:-- Damian Paletta: Great.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: All right. Well, thanks so much for your time, Molly, Damian.
--:-- Damian Paletta: And we'll see you in a week.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: See you next week.
--:-- Damian Paletta: Thanks a lot.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: Thanks.
--:-- Molly Ball: This episode has been updated.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: In an earlier version, we incorrectly said there had been seven cabinet positions confirmed.
--:-- Molly Ball: But as of Friday morning, there have been eight.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: Before we go, do you have any questions about what the Trump administration is doing?
--:-- Molly Ball: How is it affecting you?
--:-- Ryan Knutson: Email us and let us know. Please send a voice note to thejournal at wsj.com.
--:-- Molly Ball: That's thejournal at wsj.com.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: Trump 2.0 is part of the journal, which is a co-production of Spotify and the Wall Street Journal.
--:-- Molly Ball: This episode was produced by Piercingi and edited by Catherine Whalen with help from Tatiana Zamis.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: Molly Ball is the Wall Street Journal's senior political correspondent.
--:-- Molly Ball: I'm Ryan Knudsen.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: This episode was engineered by Griffin Tanner.
--:-- Molly Ball: Our theme music is by So Wiley and remixed by Peter Leonard.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: Additional music in this episode by Peter Leonard and Griffin Tanner.
--:-- Molly Ball: Fact-checking by Kate Gallagher.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: Artwork by James Walton.
--:-- Molly Ball: Thanks for listening.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: Trump 2.0 will be back with a new episode next Friday morning.
--:-- Molly Ball: See you then.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: For businesses ready to launch their own debit card rewards program, trust in Galileo Financial Technologies.
--:-- Molly Ball: Galileo provides the foundation to launch, scale, and grow your next card program.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: Visit us at galileo-ft.com slash card dash issuing.
--:-- Molly Ball: Thanks for listening.
--:-- Ryan Knutson: See you next time.
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