Bret Weinstein on How Trump Shifted the Republican Party

Summary

In this insightful conversation, Bret Weinstein discusses the transformation of the Republican Party under Donald Trump's influence. Starting with Trump's resilience against opposition, the conversation highlights how he has potentially reshaped the party, turning it into a 'MAGA' entity distinct from traditional Republicanism. Key topics include Trump's changing stances on issues like marijuana legalization and abortion, the realignment of blue-collar and labor factions under the 'MAGA' banner, and the evolving relationship between political parties and media narratives. The discussion also touches on concerns about constitutional interpretations, authoritarian overreaches, and the weaponization of political processes.

Highlights

• Trump's presidency brought a fresh, unexpected twist to American politics. 🌪️
• His ability to remain unfazed under pressure was unmatched among recent presidents. 🛡️
• Trump's evolving stance on issues reflects a broader alignment shift in the GOP. 🔄
• MAGA has become a new home for working-class voters once aligned with Democrats. 🏡
• Current media portrayals often mask the stark reality of political shifts.📰
• The weaponization of political processes poses significant constitutional questions. 🔍

Key Takeaways

• Trump's presidency proved there's still democracy in the system by breaking the narrative mold. 🗳️
• Unlike previous presidents, Trump didn't visibly age, showing resilience to pressure. 🧓→😎
• Trump's willingness to address non-traditional Republican issues shows a shift in party dynamics. 🚀
• The MAGA movement has repositioned blue-collar workers, traditionally Democrats, under its wing. 🛠️
• Political narratives are increasingly framed to fit specific media agendas, affecting public perception. 📺
• Concerns about constitutional values and political processes highlight tension points in American politics. ⚖️

Overview

In the intriguing dialogue explored by Bret Weinstein, we delve into Donald Trump's unique impact on the Republican Party. Weinstein credits Trump for bringing forth a new dynamic, proving that even in a seemingly rigid political system, unanticipated outcomes can occur. This discussion underscores how Trump's unorthodox approach and ability to withstand intense scrutiny without succumbing to stress have positioned him as a notable figure in contemporary politics.

Trump's policy considerations, such as the potential legalization of marijuana, signify a departure from traditional Republican stances, reflecting a shift towards more centrist policies. Moreover, the movement of working-class voters to the MAGA banner, a development Weinstein attributes to past Democratic disconnects with labor unions, signals an emerging realignment within American political affiliations. These elements highlight a party in transition, influenced significantly by Trump's priorities and rhetoric.

The conversation also exposes the interplay between media narratives and political realities. With media giants like the New York Times framing political discourse in ways that maintain certain ideological narratives, the ability to discern truth from constructed reality becomes challenging. Issues of constitutional integrity and the manipulation of legal processes for political gain further complicate the landscape, suggesting a profound need for vigilance in safeguarding democratic principles.

Bret Weinstein on How Trump Shifted the Republican Party Transcription

• 00:00 - 00:30 The jogan Experience what we know and I I think actually we owe Trump a huge debt of gratitude for proving something that I couldn't have told you if it was true before he won the presidency which is is there still enough democracy left in the system for something to upend the plan right cuz he was clearly off narrative and he did become president so he you know he did something for us that
• 00:30 - 01:00 I don't know anybody else who could have done it yeah it would take a person with that kind of personality that could withstand that kind of abuse cuz he didn't freak out at all when they went after him he's like right just brushed it off like it was nothing and no one's done that all he's also the only guy that's ever gone through four years and didn't age like he went through 30 years that's true he aged normal yeah he's used to it he's used to pressure you know and Bush he aged a ton Obama AG aged a ton everybody aged a ton Biden
• 01:00 - 01:30 was already cooked before he got in but he's hard but he aged a ton I mean Biden from 2019 to today is a different person yeah and he was already visibly degraded but wow was it a precipitous deine jump big jump now yeah Trump was fine yeah Trump physically and actually I think he sounds better I think you know he drives me crazy sometimes when he talks but I think he's getting better at it I think he's trying to be a little bit more reasonable you know and try to appeal to
• 01:30 - 02:00 more people because of that you know that effort to be more reasonable like he's he's changed his mind about a lot of things he's talking about legalizing marijuana he's talking about all these different things that are like where you know you're going to get a lot of different responses from like the hardcore Republicans are not going to be for that you know any any uh idea of abortion the hardcore right-wing are not interested at all and any restriction on
• 02:00 - 02:30 abortion at all you get your hardcore left ring so it's the mostly it's the people in the middle abortion is a good one right because most people are like no one should be able to tell you what you could do with your body but also aborting an eight-month-old fetus is kind of [ __ ] insane yeah I mean I the funny thing and I've been saying this forever is that almost everybody agrees on the basics on abortion we're supposed to not be able to even talk about it but most people believe that portion is negative that if you've got a
• 02:30 - 03:00 blastula right a clump of cells doesn't yet have a nervous system that you have the right to terminate that pregnancy and that the farther you go through that pregnancy the less right you have and most people are incredibly queasy about it I think as they should be in the third trimester and you know that's what we agree on and so it's really the extremists on both sides um that we are up against
• 03:00 - 03:30 but to the question of what Trump is doing with an issue like this I want to make a couple points one I think there are two issues that are getting tangled one I think he's politically going to some places that are not traditionally Republican because I don't even think I think he's destroyed the Republican party I I just don't see the same Republican party I remember at all I see a different thing and it's flying it's a magga party yeah it's a Maga party right exactly and that's a very different
• 03:30 - 04:00 thing because I see Maga as mostly the labor faction that was Cut Loose by the Democrats and the Clinton Administration and so they've now found a home under Maga interesting right like CU bluecollar people were generally um Union people which were generally Democrats totally and then Clinton turned the Democratic party into a second corporate party so that those people were homeless and then Trump picked them up as magga and they're now under the Republican bar but it doesn't
• 04:00 - 04:30 read like the Republican party at all to me and now it's picked up a you know a a I don't want to say technocratic that's dismiss it but it's got this this Silicon Valley component to it yes that's recent yep that's recent over year yep yeah it is interesting right because we did Growing Up always associate unions and blue collar people with voting Democrat because Democrats were looking out for the middle class looking out for people's best interest
• 04:30 - 05:00 supporting unions and fair wages and funding schools and all that kind of stuff keeping neighborhood safe and Republicans were more like small government [ __ ] you figure it out I don't want to pay taxes yeah stingy and they were the ones that are encouraging War yep which is crazy today that you have this massive 180 degree shift and the Democrats are talking about how important it is that we keep funding Ukraine and that you know we have some sort of an whether you pro- Hamas or Pro
• 05:00 - 05:30 Palestine I should say or whether you're pro- Israel there's involvement in that no one is saying neither no Democrats are saying we need to get the [ __ ] out of there right they're saying we need to free Palestine oh okay how are you going to do that how are you going to do that what do you how much is involved in that are you going to bring in people you going to send people there like what are you going to do are you going to kill people for this what are we doing the Democrats are there you guys are looking for war you're not looking for peaceful Solutions like
• 05:30 - 06:00 this is kind of weird this is interesting you know that we need to beat Russia are you out of your [ __ ] mind are you serious do you know how big that place is do you know how much military force is behind Putin are you what are you talking about what are you talking about like what if he just decides to go nuclear at any point in time if he gets pressured you keep advancing further and further into Russia and he's like I'll just end this right now I'll just turn Kev into a [ __ ] sandbox boom yeah and then what
• 06:00 - 06:30 do we do no it's it's insane and the hardest part I'm sure you have these people in your life too but um let's just take my parents for a second okay my parents are good people lifelong Democrats they live in LA surrounded by Hollywood types they cannot seem to grasp the fact that the party that they believed in is now doing the inverse of everything they signed up for exactly because the New York Times refr raes
• 06:30 - 07:00 everything so it seems like the values are still there right which is wild it's crazy and if you're not a New York Times reader it's you can barely figure out what these people are talking about did you see the article that I posted on my Instagram that's a a title of a New York Times article for today which one Jamie pull this up I want I want Brett to see this so you know this is real this isn't the Babylon B this is an actual New York Times article
• 07:00 - 07:30 you see it yeah this is so crazy it's really hard to believe that someone would print this and the New York Times would say yeah we like it put it out there I I'm not quite sure what to expect look at this oh yeah of course the Constitution is sacred is it also dangerous right one of the biggest threats to America politics might be the country's founding document what the [ __ ] are you talking about yeah one of
• 07:30 - 08:00 the biggest threats to America's politics might be one of the greatest documents that any country was ever founded on if not the greatest ever MH that could be a threat to America's politics what politics are we talking about like what how could you possibly Gaslight me enough to go along with you on this yeah it it's incredible I mean it's on the one hand completely predictable right right because there's
• 08:00 - 08:30 obviously an authoritarian Force there that just grinds its teeth at night over the Constitution and the fact that it prevents it from doing things that it just wants to do last week you know and so of course they're like scratching their heads like can we come up with an argument for why it might be time to get rid of that thing and of course if you're a normal thinking person this is complete Insanity but if you're a New York Times reader I'm sure that fits with the kind of ethos that's been
• 08:30 - 09:00 cultivated well this is why a person like Trump is so important to them because if you don't have someone that is an imminent threat on the horizon in three months it's very difficult to justify all this [ __ ] so if you have kala Harris and she's competing against Ronda santis if it's just K Harris and Ronda santis and Trump doesn't exists maybe he died maybe he died in the last few years you know MH what how could you
• 09:00 - 09:30 you you wouldn't be able to make that argument you wouldn't there there's no imminent threat right right let's say Mitt Romney let's say someone even more moderate as a republican even more palatable you can't make that you can't make that argument that we don't need we can't have a First Amendment because the first amendment is getting in the way the first amendment is allowing people to say things that aren't true misinformation and disinformation and you know we're right here we're September 2nd um I think yesterday was the first day where Brazil banned Twitter I know so X is illegal to
• 09:30 - 10:00 have in Brazil as of today as of yesterday not only is it illegal but you go through it through a VPN and they will charge you $88,000 a day I know it's it's incredible that we are watching this insane but I would remind you they did pull this stuff when it was Mitt Romney when it was George W bush right the rhetoric was still still
• 10:00 - 10:30 existential threat right and they always have particular versions of this right not not as ramped up as this is though this is like Hitler Hitler talk this isn't they never talked about Romney like he was Hitler I agree and as I've been saying since the beginning of this electoral cycle they fear Bobby Kennedy far more than they fear Trump because actually Trump gives them the only argument for their existence that is functional right they don't have an affirmative argument for why they should be in power but being the alternative to Trump Trump is you know that's a that's
• 10:30 - 11:00 a pitch right um so we are now somewhere pretty interesting in the sense that I think you know to the faithful that argument still works but to a larger and larger group of people they're seeing right through it yeah they're understanding we first of all we liveed through four years of trump right right there were good aspects there were bad aspects but you know it it was not distinguished as some moment of you know
• 11:00 - 11:30 total failure of our system or something right you know there were a lot of elements of it that were very positive right that's that's a that's where a fun meme is there's a fun meme that someone made about how uh you're telling me that he's going to do these things that he didn't when he was in office and you're telling me that you're going to do these things that you didn't do and you're in office now right like what and add to that you're doing the things
• 11:30 - 12:00 that you're accusing him of intending to do right all this law fair stuff that's frightening they're weaponizing the courts yeah and they're weaponizing the courts over what was a misdemeanor with uh that's already if you look at the like Bill akman had a post that he made on Twitter laying out the legality of this 34 count um thing that they convicted him of that this is essentially an accounting error or
• 12:00 - 12:30 deception that's a misdemeanor that is past the statute of limitations not only that but I don't think you have to really even squint at it to see that it's just simply unconstitutional to point the courts at particular people and not other people right right we have a constitutional right to equal protection under the law and obviously they are setting a different standard for Trump because they want to keep him tied up in court
• 12:30 - 13:00 maybe they want to lock him up and put him in prison but whatever they're doing is unamerican it is anti-am and very dangerous because he's set a precedent now now let's imagine like we've gone through shifts in this country where we leaned heavily left like during the Carter Administration was run by serious Lefty you know and then what if now it is run by a hardcore right-winger what if there's some sort of an attack on American soil and it ramps up patriotism and people get real angry and and right
• 13:00 - 13:30 the you know just like the left has moved so far left that if you're not in favor of hormone blockers for kids somehow you're transphobic and you're a bigot like somehow or another if you're not in favor of that you're a bigot what if it gets so right that if you're not in favor of you know stops and frisks all over the country to for everyone then somehow or another whether you're uh anti- safety
• 13:30 - 14:00 of the nation and if you're not in favor of no knock raids on people's homes with no warrants that somehow or another you're a danger to our democracy like it can go really creepy far right just like it's really creepy far left and then they're utilizing the courts if they fill the courts up with a bunch of Hardcore Republicans now you're utilizing the courts against people in a way that you would find very offensive because you've made it youve set a precedent right and and I think actually
• 14:00 - 14:30 we are already living this nightmare in one way because what they did was loaded Powers into the executive branch that were never supposed to be there they created Emperor likee discretion and they gave those powers to the president I think believing that they would never be in the hands of anybody that wasn't on their team right and I'm not talking red or blue right I'm talking about inside versus outside and one of the reasons that I think the reaction to Trump is what it was was is that he was
• 14:30 - 15:00 taking over an office that had been given all of these exotic tools that he could in principle use against anybody these are tools that are absolutely a violation of our Constitution and yet they exist there and so the need to prevent him from having access to those things was existential in their mind and so anyway the point is they created tools they never expected to be in the hands of someone else and that is the situation that's the scenario you're describing here as well