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CNN NewsNight with Abby Phillip

Trump's Retribution Tour Suffers Embarrassing Setbacks; Judge Tosses Trump DOJ's Criminal Cases Against Comey And James; Pentagon Investigates Sen. Mark Kelly (D-AZ) Over Illegal Orders Video; Marjorie Taylor Greene's Decision To Leave Congress Sets Off House Republicans; DOGE Principles Might Still Remain. Aired 10-11p ET

Aired November 24, 2025 - 22:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

[22:00:00]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ABBY PHILLIP, CNN HOST (voice over): Tonight, Donald Trump's revenge tour turns into a debacle as cases against two foes are outright dismissed.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JAMES COMEY, FORMER FBI DIRECTOR: So, stand tall, shine and keep the faith.

PHILLIP: Plus, he's calling them the Seditious Six. And now Pete Hegseth threatens one of them for speaking out.

SEN. MARK KELLY (D-AZ): Members of the military should not, cannot follow illegal orders.

PHILLIP: Also, DOGE gets DOGEd. Elon Musk's chainsaw operation goes down while America's debt goes up.

And Marjorie Taylor Greene may not be the only surprise resignation. Why the White House's behavior may inspire others to follow.

Live at the table, Jim Schultz, Madeline Sumerville, Jamal Simmons, Caroline Downey and Ana Navarro.

Americans with different perspectives aren't talking to each other, but here, they do.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIP (on camera): Good evening. I'm Abby Phillip in New York.

Let's get right to what America's talking about, a revenge fail. Tonight, President Trump's retribution tour just took an embarrassing turn after a judge dismissed the case against two of his biggest political foes, FBI Director James Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James.

Now, today, a judge ruled that Trump's handpicked federal prosecutor, Lindsey Halligan, cannot lawfully do her job because the administration appointed her illegally, therefore the indictments do not stand.

Now, you'll remember, the president selected Halligan for this role after the former acting U.S. attorney resigned over pressure to go after Trump's enemies. And within days, Halligan brought these cases against both Comey and James. And today the White House made it clear that the fight isn't over.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KAROLINE LEAVITT, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: I know there was a judge who is clearly trying to shield Letitia James and James Comey from receiving accountability. And that's why they took this unprecedented action to throw away the indictments against these two individuals. But the Department of Justice will be appealing very soon, and it is our position that Lindsey Halligan is extremely qualified for this position.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIP: Temidayo Aganga-Williams joins us in our fifth seat for this one. Temidayo, tell me like what do you think is the implication of this? I mean, would it make sense for the administration to continue to pursue this? It wasn't just the appointment of Halligan, but there were a lot of other problems, particularly with the Comey case that were unveiled as part of some of these hearings.

TEMIDAYO AGANGA-WILLIAMS, FORMER FEDERAL PROSECUTOR: Yes. I mean, the Comey case really has three levels of problems before you even get to the third level, which is the merits, whether or not they could even prove beyond reasonable doubt he's guilty. The first level we're talking about here is about the appointment. The Constitution and statute lays out how you can appoint the interim U.S. attorney. Normally, you need to go through the Senate and get confirmation. That hasn't happened here with Lindsey Halligan. So what happened? Bondi appointed her and the statute says you have 120 days by which that appointment can stand. Afterwards, a district court gets to appoint. It is bright line. It is a statute, it is clean cut. That's not what happened here. Instead, Pam Bondi intended to reappoint a new interim U.S. attorney. You cannot do that.

So, this ruling here isn't surprising at all from a clean reading of a statute. This is a pretty easy opinion. The next level here that we haven't gone to is about even before the merits is about all the mistakes Lindsey Halligan made in prosecuting this case, things that when I was a junior federal prosecutor I think I would've got fired for if I made the same mistakes. It is complete incompetence, and that goes with mistaken instructions about the law. It goes with how she treated two indictments, how she screwed that up. So, I think from top to bottom, the administration should not proceed here because I think you do lose faith in how this process should operate because this is a complete debacle.

PHILLIP: It kind of seems like a logical conclusion for when you have a president who basically decides he knows who he wants to indict first, and then he just tries to find somebody who will do it for him.

SCHULTZ: The law is you get 120 days. Whether you have one, two, or three appointments, it's 120 days, and then the judges get to pick. And in this case, the judges needed to pick and they needed to pick the U.S. attorney. They tried to be a little too cute by half and saying, okay, the an alternative, this person's a special counsel. You have to pick your poison, which one you're going to take, right?

[22:05:01]

Is it a special counsel or is it appointee? That's a U.S. attorney. There are 94 U.S. attorneys in this country. I think Jack Smith and also David Weiss were probably unlawfully appointed because you don't want super U.S. attorneys just running around the country handling particular issues when the U.S. attorneys are there and Senate- confirmed specifically to do that job. So, in this instance, I think the court's probably got it right.

PHILLIP: So what does that mean now for Trump's retribution tour, Caroline?

CAROLINE DOWNEY, COLUMNIST, NATIONAL REVIEW: Well, as we know, it was dismissed without prejudice, which means that the government could re- file the indictment down the road. We'll see if they actually do that. But zooming out here, if I was bankrupted or almost bankrupted, nearly jailed, impeached twice, I would probably feel a little vindictive too. But I genuinely hope, and I think we all would hope that this vicious cycle of lawfare eventually ends, although that foundation was laid by the Democrats over the last few years.

PHILLIP: Are you calling for it to end now, because now seems like a good time?

DOWNEY: Absolutely. But I do think you have to acknowledge that what Letitia James, the case revolves around, is basically a fraud case with no fraud victims. What does that remind you of? It reminds you of what she filed against Trump, a fraud case with no fraud victims.

So, acknowledge the original agitators here before you say, okay, Trump, lay down your arms. Okay, well. Letitia James is the one who put them up first, and that's why we have what we have right now, which is this perfect storm.

JAMAL SIMMONS, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Abby, there is a problem here of the President of the United States, weaponizing the Justice Department, going into people's private mortgage documents, searching around, rummaging around, trying to figure out if there's anything that they can find to sort of go after people. There's a real problem about how it is as a country we want to have our president of the United States comport himself. And I think it's just very obvious right now that Donald Trump is not willing to be confined by the law until judges stand up and tell him no.

PHILLIP: The American people also seem to be pretty clearly against this. 55 percent say that DOJ's cases against Trump's political enemies are unjustified. And, you know, I don't know. I don't know what the ultimate outcome of these cases would have been, both Comey and Letitia James not only say that they are being selectively prosecuted, but they also say that they are unequivocally innocent of what they're being accused of. But the American people see this for what it is, and they don't really like it that much.

MADELINE SUMMERVILLE, DEMOCRATIC STATEGIST: I think that's absolutely true, and I think also that you can't make the claim that you want all of America to start appointing people or hiring people based on merit and then hire somebody who is for sure not qualified for this position. I know there are a lot of lawyers at this table. Regardless of how passionate I was about the Comey case, if somebody asked me to prosecute it, I would say absolutely not, because I'm very aware that there are policies and procedures that you get to know when you are a certain kind of lawyer. It's like asking a foot doctor to operate on a head, right? And so it would be totally irresponsible for somebody to take on that position. I'm shocked that she did in the first place.

PHILLIP: I mean, that is part of this too. I mean, there is an incompetence element of it. And, you know, you heard you heard Karoline Leavitt basically saying, well, she's supremely qualified. How is that even possible when she's only been a prosecutor for four days before she brought this indictment against Comey?

AGANGA-WILLIAMS: She's not qualified. I think that's a ridiculous statement. Anyone who calls her qualified doesn't know what they're talking about, she simply is not qualified. She wouldn't be qualified to handle a simple misdemeanor, right? There's a reason why people are trained to be a federal prosecutor. It's a skilled job.

But I want to go back to one point though, I think, because, you know, it was my former experience on the Jan. 6 committee that I do think there's a danger in false equivalency here. I think there's a danger in talking about the January 6th case that our committee did extensive work for the evidence is public, that the -- everyone could go and see what Jack Smith based his, I think, what a hundred page indictment on. That's a very different situation than the case we have now with James Comey, where you had a U.S. attorney previously who refused to indict this case. You had line prosecutors who refused to indict this case.

This case stunk from the beginning, and I think we should look at it on its merits and we should feel really kind of aghast that we have a DOJ that would move forward on this kind of case. It is dangerous precedent and we should all be, I think, against it.

PHILLIP: Are you worried about the precedent that this sets?

SCHULTZ: I mean, going back to the polling on this, right? So, it polled the other way in favor of Donald Trump's position, which was no more selective prosecutions, no more political gamesmanship with our Justice Department when he was running for office, and now we're seeing that flipped the other way. The American public doesn't want to see it. They don't want to see it out of the Trump administration. They didn't want to see it out of Letitia James, and, quite frankly, that Letitia James Case was a garbage case that was brought against him. It's working its way through the appeals process now, and we'll see what happens. But, you know, I think the American people just don't want to see this and there is a danger associated with it.

SIMMONS: But can we get back to the incompetence of it, right? Look, we've got RFK Jr., who is a vaccine denier, not a doctor, not a health official, who's in charge of our health administration.

[22:10:03]

We've got Pete Hegseth, who's a talk show host from God loved cable T.V. talk show host, right? But he's a talk show host who is running the Department of Defense and is not qualified for this. And we know that what he was doing when he was DOD secretary was sharing information, classified information, on unclassified channels, which would get any other person in the Department of Defense fired, yet he's still there. Donald Trump doesn't care about qualifications. All he cares about is loyalty, and we're seeing that show up in ways that are really, really problematic for the country.

PHILLIP: I mean, how does the merit-based, anti-DEI folks, how do they explain just the frequency of the hiring of people who don't have the requisite qualifications for their job?

DOWNEY: Well, I was going to say, speaking of talk show hosts, you know, what makes someone a really unsympathetic character?

SIMMONS: Let's not jump on talk show hosts now.

DOWNEY: Well, I mean it's James Comey. James Comey is pretending to be this neutral straight shooter. And then you have a former FBI director laughing enough with Stephen Colbert. How does that make you a more sympathetic guy?

PHILLIP: I mean, I don't know. James Comey, you like him or hate him, and plenty of people hate him, but James Coy is supremely qualified for the job that he had.

DOWNEY: Okay. But the point is that his claim, his initial claim in disputing the indictment was that it was a case of political animus that President Trump had towards him. Oh, he's so prejudiced and biased toward him. Why are you going on pretending to be a Democratic talking head? That doesn't make you more compelling.

PHILLIP: He's making a claim of selective prosecution because Trump specifically said that he should be prosecuted, because Trump hates him. How is that not --

DOWNEY: You could put that in reverse vindictive all day long, like we could play this game all day long.

SIMMONS: I think the Hillary Clinton people would say he is not a Democratic talking head, right? I think what he's arguing out here and I think what people are arguing is that even though James Comey is somebody a lot of people don't like, people on the right don't like him, a lot of people on the left don't like him, but the selective prosecution and vindictive prosecution by the president is something none of us can stand for. Because once it starts, it's going to circle around to people that you like, it's going to hurt?

SUMMERVILLE: How is this any different than Fani Willis appointing Nathan Wade to work with her, right? How can you make fun of that, which I for sure made fun of that, and be okay with this, right? It's almost the exact same thing. And I think as the polling indicated, the American people don't like the hypocrisy.

PHILLIP: Yes. All right, Temidayo, thank you very much.

Next for us, the Pentagon is now threatening one of the senators who told the military not to follow illegal orders, and Mark Kelly is responding tonight.

Plus, a new report says Marjorie Taylor Greene's sudden resignation won't be the last as Republicans are furious with how the White House is treating them. Ana Navarro is joining us at the table.

We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[22:15:00]

PHILLIP: The Pentagon is now investigating Senator Mark Kelly after he appeared in a video urging US troops to defy illegal orders. The Defense Department even threatened to recall Kelly to active duty to face a court martial.

Now, Kelly is a retired U.S. Navy captain. He and five other Congressional Democrats appeared in that video that was released last week. President Trump called their actions seditious and treason, and he is pushing for them to all face consequences. Kelly offered a fresh response to that some time ago, and his message was this, bring it on.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KELLY: The statements that Donald Trump made is inciteful, incites others. He's got millions of supporters. People listen to what he says more so than anybody else in the country, and he should be careful with his words. But I'm not going to be silenced here.

I'm going to show up for work every day, support the constitution, do my job, hold this administration accountable, hold this president accountable when he is out of line. That's the responsibility of every U.S. senator and every member of Congress. He's not going to silence us.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIP: Ana Navarro joins us in our fifth seat now. Ana, this idea of dragging back retired military members and court-martialing them. I think people should remember this is actually something Trump has wanted to do in the past. Now, that they're actually threatening to do it in this context, what do you think?

ANA NAVARRO, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: I think it's insane. I think it's coo-coo crazy that Donald Trump, you know, I'm so glad that Mark Kelly is a naval aviator and an astronaut because we are living in the twilight zone. I mean, it makes zero sense that Donald Trump would be so triggered by a video of people saying, basically, don't break the law. Don't do something illegal. I don't know, somebody goes out and does a video, don't, you know, rob a bank.

PHILLIP: Don't drink and drive. Like --

NAVARRO: This is not something that should be triggering. And his overreaction to this, and then hauling Mark Kelly, who is a patriot, a national hero, a naval aviator that flew 39 combat missions in the Gulf War, and for Captain Bone Spurs to be impugning Mark Kelly like this over the stupidest thing, it just makes no sense, and I really think it's a moment of -- that it should be a moment of unity where we all say, you know, you are going overboard. I mean Republican or Democrat, it just makes no damn sense.

PHILLIP: Hegseth called them the Seditious Six, and he says it was despicable, reckless, and false, as he announces this inquiry.

[22:20:00]

SIMMONS: Yes. You know, Abby, I was a fan of Mark Kelly being one of the vice presidential nominee for Kamala Harris. I think she wrote in the book that she wasn't sure whether or not he would be able to take the tough part of a presidential campaign. I think Mark Kelly is proving right now he is tough enough to take that tough part. And I think if he's thinking about running for president, Donald Trump is helping him because right now he is showing America what a true patriot and a true hero is made of.

And I think if you -- if he wants to do something bigger and broader, it's going to help. Because what Americans, Democrat side are looking for are people who are tough, people who are going to stand up, people who can take the fight to the Republicans right now, and Kelly is showing he could do it.

SUMMERVILLE: I absolutely agree. And I think that there is still something the Democrats are missing. So, I love this video. But I think that the Democrats forget sometimes that they have to make their case to the American people, and they didn't give any information specifically, and then when they were asked, they weren't able to give any information about why this video was necessary.

PHILLIP: Well, let me play what Elissa Slotkin said when she was asked this weekend about whether Trump had actually ordered illegal things to be done by the Pentagon. Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Do you believe President Trump has issued any illegal orders?

SEN. ELISSA SLOTKIN (D-MI): To my knowledge I am not aware of things that are illegal, but, certainly, there are some legal gymnastics that are going on with these Caribbean strikes and everything related to Venezuela. And I think that's why --

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And be specific about that.

SLOTKIN: It was a basically a warning to say like if you're asked to do something particularly against American citizens, you have the ability to go to your JAG officer and push back.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SCHULTZ: Our officers are listed folks. They all know that there are not to engage in activity that could be considered illegal. This was nothing but political gamesmanship on the part of those senators. They weren't helping our enlisted folks in the military. They weren't making them more safe. As a matter of fact, they're probably causing, you know, some unrest and some confusion in the ranks. They answer to the officers, and then up the chain to the generals. And folks know what their obligations are, and those all carry downstream.

They didn't need a United States senator to tell them that. That was a complete political gamesmanship. And I'm not saying the president's reaction was right. I'm not saying that this investigation should take place, but I'm saying from the get-go, this is bad all the way across the board for --

SUMMERVILLE: Let me help Senator Slotkin out here for a second, because Judge Boasberg told the Trump officials to turn the plane around that had Mr. Abrego Garcia on it. They went ahead and took him many ways. That could have been an -- that was absolutely an illegal order.

SCHULTZ: She didn't say that.

SUMMERVILLE: I'm helping, I'm adding it now, right? They're --

SCHULTZ: So, they made it up, but you're not?

(CROSSTALKS)

DOWNEY: This is the problem. It's the Democratic lawmaker's lack of spec specificity to your original point.

SUMMERVILLE: That's fair.

DOWNEY: And as the daughter of a Vietnam war captain who got the bronze star, who graduated from West Point, I agree with you that it is very dangerous to sow discord and confusion among the ranks, among the troops, especially when they couldn't even name specific instances of Trump administration's actions. That's dubious. That's still being debated.

SUMMERVILLE: The judge said, no.

PHILLIP: Here's what I don't understand. I don't think anyone actually disputes the factual premise of the video, which is that the orders that they are under the constitutional requirement that every person in the military is under requires them to follow the law. So, nobody disputes that. So, why is it that saying it out loud suddenly becomes some kind of a seditious act? I mean --

DOWNEY: Because --

PHILLIP: Mark Hertling, here's what he writes about this. Officers make no promise to obey the president and officers above them. Officers give orders, evaluate legality, and act as the constitutional circuit breaker as the founders intended. They are expected by law, by professional ethic, and centuries of tradition to exercise independent judgment when presented with a questionable directive. Officers are duty-bound to refuse an unlawful order. It is not optional. It is not situational. It is not their job -- it is their job.

And what it also is, it is not assumed, right? I think that's the other implication is that everybody in the Trump administration wants to say, well, if the order is coming from the president, obviously, it's legal. But Mark Hertling is making the point that you can't even assume that. That's not the way it's supposed to work.

DOWNEY: You're supposed to assume that though.

SUMMERVILLE: You're supposed to follow the judge.

PHILLIP: No, you're not.

(CROSSTALKS)

PHILLIP: That's literally --

DOWNEY: But that's what the video didn't say. The video didn't say that the burden lies on the soldier to prove later in court if it's for to be litigated before a judge that that order was unlawful. Are they aware of that responsibility?

SCHULTZ: The Senate has any role in this other than oversight of the military. And where are they supposed to go out in the public and start instructing on our military? That's not their job description.

PHILLIP: First of all, putting aside whether they're in the Senate or not, if they were just regular human beings on the street and they produced this video, the video itself, as far as I can tell, I don't think either of you are disputing this, it is not inaccurate to say that at the -- especially at the officer level, they are duty-bound to, A, not assume that that orders are legal, but, B, to refuse an illegal order and that there are mechanisms in the military that allow them to do that.

And what they were saying as senators was that if you are in a position where you have to do that, we as other constitutional officers, will back you up.

SCHULTZ: And I'm saying that those people that had made that statement didn't have the rank and file or the officers or anyone else in the military's interest in mind. They had their own parts of agenda and it was nothing but political stunt.

SIMMONS: Keep in mind, any general from the Southern Command resigned his post instead of continuing to deploy weapons and blow boats out of the water in Venezuela that we do not -- coming out of Venezuela or the Caribbean that we're not particularly sure who was on them, that we may know there were drugs on the boat. We don't actually absolutely know everybody who was on the boat. We don't know whether or not the Coast Guard could have gone and interdicted those boats and gotten and taken care of them in a legal fashion. But the commanding general for Southern Command chose to leave his post two years early instead of continuing to operate.

SUMMERVILLE: And they didn't say, if you're not sure if it's legal --

SCHULTZ: So, the Senate can hold in and have oversight hearings. They don't need to go out and do this, which says nothing but sow discord --

NAVARRO: Under John Thune --

DOWNEY: The point is this is a stunt which is designed to redeem the Democrats' image as a tough party.

PHILLIP: I don't disagree that it's a stunt. I'm just saying, they're allowed to do stunts. And that's not illegal in this country as far as I can tell. One thing I'll say, this is a bit of a tease for what's coming next in, in our show, but Don Bacon, a Republican congressman, called out the Pentagon tonight saying, amateur hour once again at the Department of Dense. I thought the video by six Dems was unnecessary and foolish, but the threats of sedition charges and court martials in response are also crazy. Show some common sense and restraint.

The reason I say this is a tease because Republican lawmakers may be about to go rogue against Donald Trump. There is a report that more resignations are coming as the president is postponing a big announcement this week due to the backlashes that he's facing from his own party.

We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[22:31:54]

PHILLIP: Marjorie Taylor Greene's surprise decision to leave Congress has set off House Republicans, many of whom are reportedly frustrated with how the Trump team and Speaker Mike Johnson are behaving. Now, there is concern that her exit could prompt others to step aside.

A senior Republican lawmaker tells Punchbowl News, quote, "More explosive early resignations are coming. It's a tinderbox. Morale has never been lower. Mike Johnson will be stripped of his gavel and they will lose the majority before this term is out." And adding to the tensions, new CNN reporting tonight that the president's health care plan, which was originally expected this week, has been delayed due to backlash from his party. Maybe we'll see it in two weeks. Am I right?

Okay, so Jamal, this is actually, I think, one of the more significant things. I mean, covering Trump in the first term and now in this term, I don't think that we have heard this kind of discontent coming from inside the party's ranks. And people thought that Marjorie Taylor Greene resigning was like, oh, she's just giving up. But she was also making it harder for Mike Johnson to have the votes that he needs. And if many others follow her, they'll be doing the same thing.

SIMMONS: Yes, Marjorie Taylor Greene wasn't as popular inside the caucus, it turns out, as we thought. But out in Republican land and in MAGA land, she was sort of as popular as a quarter zip in a match, right? Like people thought that maybe she was somebody that -- she was able to raise money. She was the second most popular fundraiser in the Republican Party. That's got to be a difficult thing for you to manage if you're the Speaker.

So, what we're seeing now is the wall is cracking around Donald Trump and people are now starting to realize that maybe you could oppose him whether it's Marjorie Taylor Greene or is dealing with the filibuster or it's opposing him on this healthcare bill, maybe you can oppose them, you can push back and if that begins to be the norm, I think we may see Trump 2.0 start faster than we thought it was going to start.

NAVARRO: I will tell you, I wish she had stayed and served out her term because I think that -- I think the significance of being a MAGA, Trump loving, Republican, she's voted with Donald Trump over 90 percent of the time, speaking out against some of the abuses of power and calling a spade a spade, pissing from inside the tent is a lot more effective than doing it from outside.

So, I wish she had served out her term, which is a -- she's got another year until January 2027. I also think a lot of Republicans logically are reading the writing on the wall. And they saw the consequences, the effects, they saw the results of the elections a few weeks ago. And the idea of going from being in the majority to being in the minority, frankly, is painful. Because it's a lot, it's very different.

PHILLIP: And they're not being treated well. That's part of the problem. Here's one GOP source saying, "The entire White House team has treated all members like garbage," and then they blame Mike Johnson for letting it happen because the Trump team -- they don't think Congress matters. And so, they have basically ignored them, they've stepped all over them, and now some of these members are speaking up.

[22:35:00]

SUMMERVILLE: So, I think it goes even deeper than this -- her resignation. So, first of all I'm from Georgia and it surprises exactly zero people in Georgia that she resigned because John Ossoff has been fundraising off of a potential challenge for Marjorie Taylor Greene for like a year. So, that's obviously a potential.

But I really think that there is a potential for her to be the head of this new Republican movement, the one that is perhaps being created by Tucker and Nick Fuentes. I think that there -- I know it sounds crazy, but think about it, it makes sense, right? They're both America first, anti-Israel, which is a whole big movement there, and she's made lots of anti-Semitic comments in the past. They're both --

SIMMONS: But she wouldn't walk away from them.

(CROSSTALK)

SUMMERVILLE: She won't. She's like, oh, she's like, told you, the Jews control the weather. They're both great replacement theory. They both don't like LGBT people and they're both Christian nationalists. And as the Republican Party breaks apart, as we're seeing right now, and there's another faction, and with Donald Trump being a lame duck in the office, I truly think that she's saying, you know what, there's an opportunity for me here. Because I've been saying these things that people are just now catching on to for a long time.

NAVARRO: So, are you saying she's going to run in a Republican primary for Senate in Georgia?

SUMMERVILLE: I think that that's possible and --

PHILLIP: Or for President?

SUMMERVILLE: I she's going to be the head of this new movement. I think she and Tucker and Nick Fuentes can work together to create this new movement.

DOWNEY: I don't think there's going to be nearly as many defectors as we're predicting right now. I think Marjorie Taylor Greene and, who knows maybe she has a few other defectors with her. They've gone rogue.

But I think what most of the GOP in Congress, which to your point Abby, they want to recover their agency and actually start legislating, which is a really good idea, because that's what the three, you know, branches of government are supposed to do in harmony. I think what they realize is that this is what happens when someone takes a movement and turns it into an ideology that's divorced from reality.

Trump never said America first means America alone. But if Marjorie Taylor Greene had her way, it means that we would isolate from the world stage, retreat fully, we'd have no alliances. But Trump said, look, that leaves no room for statesmanship or pragmatism or prudence. Most of us would say, hey, no one was harmed by Trump striking Iran's nuclear facilities, which keeps that ascendant regime at bay.

PHILLIP: I mean -- I -- I --

SIMMONS: You're just talking about Donald Trump and state materialism --

PHILLIP: I guess, you know -- I actually -- I kind of think that part of the problem is that Trump is actually untethered to ideology altogether. And I think that's one the reasons that it's hard to hold the coalition together. They don't really even know what they stand for because it's really just whatever Trump feels in any given moment of time. And once Trump is gone from the political scene, which will be, eventually and sometime soon, that's going to be a real problem.

And Eric Erickson wrote today, "A large part of MAGA has gotten so used to bullying everyone to get their way, they aren't prepared for the reaction from GOP lawmakers and others as lame duck season arrives." Lame duck season might very well be here sooner than maybe Trump thought, sooner than MAGA thought, because he's not really going to be the one dictating what the future is going to look like for MAGA anymore.

JIM SCHULTZ, FORMER TRUMP W.H. LAWYER: When you're of the board of the company, you've got a reading your board members, right? And what's happened with this health care bill when folks were -- purported health care bill, when folks started learning about that in the newspaper rather than hearing it from the White House themselves or the leadership or, or anyone, quite frankly, other than reading it in the newspaper, of course they're going to say, I'm just learning this.

And they're going to think about how does this impact my district, right? People who absolutely cannot be for any expansion of Obamacare whatsoever are going to go back -- are saying this is what's going to come out. Now, granted, this Trump administration, that could change six times over the next news cycle, we don't know. But it's definitely gives people pause when they're surprised and they're coming up on --

(CROSSTALK)

PHILLIP: And on the health care of it all, Jamal. I mean, I think it's just super important. The health care stuff really hits red states hard. And Trump comes out with this plan that basically says they're going to cap incomes. They're going to require monthly premiums for everyone. I mean, he's basically saying we're going to add costs. And people are like, huh? How is this supposed to help us in a tough midterm cycle?

SUMMERVILLE: MTG is a political opportunist and she is going to jump on this. She is jumping on everything that Republicans are disagreeing with Donald Trump about and using it as an opportunity, I think, to run in the future. Again, I know that sounds crazy, but mark my words.

NAVARRO: I actually don't want Democrats to have this as a political cudgel, the healthcare issue, because there are 20 plus million Americans who are -- who are in a panic right now. We are in the middle of open enrollment season. We've got what? Less than a month left in that open enrollment and people don't know how much they're going to pay if there's going to be subsidies or not. What they do know is that their healthcare premiums have gone up sometimes 300 percent.

[22:40:00]

And look, I would say on, you know, on the issue of Republicans resigning and going rogue, maybe what they have to do is start behaving like an independent branch of government and find the spine that has been hidden somewhere in the attic of the White House. Maybe it's somewhere underneath the rubble of the East Wing. Because maybe if you want to be respected, then you shouldn't behave

like bootlicking rubber stampers. You want Trump to respect you and pay attention to you, start doing some oversight about the crypto- grift of his family. You want Trump to respect you? Start doing some oversight about the abuses of power by ICE.

Start doing some oversight. Trump has gotten away with so much because Republicans in Congress have refused to do any oversight or offer any guardrails to his abuses of power. And that is why he can get away with ignoring them and treating them like garbage.

(CROSSTALK)

SIMMONS: And it's also the Democrats actually won the shutdown debate. Because now, Donald Trump is having to react to figure out how to try to fix health care for people. Even if he has a bad plan that Republicans don't like, he is talking about something that Democrats made an issue during the shutdown and now here we are.

(CROSSTALK)

PHILLIP: All right, next for us, is DOGE officially dead? The curious comments from a White House official about the operation eight months after Elon Musk began it. Be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[22:46:11]

PHILLIP: Remember the DOGE days? Are they dead? Well, Reuters is reporting today that the director of the Office of Personnel and Management told them that DOGE, quote, " --doesn't exist." He quickly clarified that comment on X, writing, "The truth is DOGE may not have centralized leadership under the U.S. DOGE service, but the principles of DOGE remain alive and well."

And for those of you who are keeping score at home, according to Trump's day one executive order, that is eight months earlier than was promised. And on the campaign trail, Elon Musk had all these lofty goals for what DOGE was going to do. He suggested at one point that he could cut $2 trillion worth of waste, fraud, and abuse from the federal government. And where that stands now? Well, according to DOGE's own website, it says that it saved $214 billion, not even close.

Now, the accuracy of that number is also in question because, according to DOGE's own wall of receipts, the numbers don't add up. So, let's just assume that that's correct for a second. That is just over $1300 per taxpayer. That is far less than Elon Musk suggested Americans could get in response to the DOGE cuts and dividend checks.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ROB SCHMITT, "NEWSMAX" ANCHOR: Let's talk about these DOGE dividend checks that everybody's talking about this week. And I know you tweeted out that you were going to -- has everybody won like a $5000 check in the mail? It sounds kind of good, right?

ELON MUSK, BUSINESSMAN AND FORMER SENIOR TRUMP ADVISOR: It's money that's taken away from things that are destructive to the country that -- and from organizations that hate you, to you. That's awesome.

SCHMITT: Is there traction on that?

MUSK: Yes, yes. So, yes. It talked to the President. He's supportive of that.

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: There's even under consideration a new concept where we give 20 percent of the DOGE Savings to American citizens. I love it. A 20 percent dividend, so to speak, for the money they were saving by going after the waste, and fraud, and abuse.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIP: Well, not so much. One estimate found that DOGE cuts could actually end up costing taxpayers $135 billion. And in July, a congressional report discovered that more than $21 billion were squandered because of DOGE. Most of the money was spent on paying employees not to work. So, RIP to DOGE.

But I mean, Caroline, this was predictable. We talked about this eight months ago. But to see that DOGE just kind of disappears and trickles away and then all these promises just go up in smokes, what was that all about?

DOWNEY: Well, I think we need to talk about how there is no political incentive right now for either party to genuinely cut costs where it actually matters, which would be the exorbitantly large welfare state. Let's be real, the critics of DOGE were exaggerating when they said this was a constitutional crisis because an unelected billionaire was going to do some accounting and auditing.

But the other side of that coin was the proponents of DOGE were also getting a little too ambitious because that was never going to make a dent in the national debt when neither party actually wants to cut entitlement programs, which was the real source of our fiscal insolvency at the moment.

But I don't think we should be dismissing what DOGE as a project was. Even Obama wanted to cut costs around the periphery of waste --

(CROSSTALK)

DOWNEY: -- fraud and abuse.

(CROSSTALK)

DOWNEY: And by the way, taxpayers should not be funding LGBTQ activism in Africa through the very, you know, scandal-riddled USAID. I don't actually think that's a good thing, and I think we can all agree that that was good to cut. PHILLIP: Look, first of all, some of those, again, this USAID stuff,

even the federal -- even the DOGE, you know, audit of that, it was actually a state department program. It wasn't USAID. But also, I mean, separate and apart from that, I mean, I do think that, yes, why can't we ridicule DOGE?

Because you're totally right. It was clear from the beginning that if they wanted to actually address the debt, they wanted to actually address overrun spending, they needed to start in a completely different place.

[22:50:04]

This Trump administration is actually getting rid of the Department of Education. They are doing that. It's not saving us any money because, statutorily, they have to do the same jobs just in other places. So, I don't know, this just seems like a huge waste of time.

(CROSSTALK)

SIMMONS: The question is like, what was the actual purpose of DOGE? And I think we forget now about all of the, you know, people who are crashing into these departments, the access to personal data, the privacy concerns that we don't know what happened? How many of the firewalls that have been erected over time between different departments and data sets? How many of those were collapsed since when now we're accumulating all that in one place?

(CROSSTALK)

SUMMERVILLE: Yes.

SIMMONS: There are huge concerns about what DOGE did, not about the saving the money, but what else did they do when they were in those departments?

SUMMERVILLE: So, the head of DOGE after Elon Musk left, is a lady who actually gained notoriety because she figured out how to -- she figured out a framework system for electronic medical records. They could be transferred from rural to city hospitals. Obama actually gave her an award for it. That's who was leading DOGE. Why? Because the primary function of DOGE, and people won't talk about this, but Reuters did actually.

The primary function has been to combine data, illegally by the way, because it violates a lot of privacy laws, from HHS, DHS, and the IRS, so that they can have a surveillance database about us. Don't believe me? Go check it out, because that is exactly what DOGE has been doing this entire time, using Palantir software made by Peter Thiel, who is Data Advance's primary benefactor.

NAVARRO: Frankly, I don't even want to say DOGE more than we have already, because I'm afraid that if we say it three times, it's going to reappear.

(CROSSTALK) NAVARRO: It's a program that was reckless, that was not well thought out, that caused a lot of pain and angst to federal workers, that has caused terrible consequences through the elimination of USAID. You know, there's people dying in Africa because of lack of vaccines and lack of food -- food that we let go to waste.

So, you know, DOGE being gone to me is good riddance. And I think there's, you know, I think there's places to cut, certainly in government, but this was not the way to do it. So, DOGE be gone. Musk be gone. Let them all go away.

(CROSSTALK)

PHILLIP: I mean, there was definitely a seemingly an objective that was also just about increasing the suffering of people working in the federal government. And that happened, but I'm not sure that it helped anybody in the process. Next for us, the panel's going to give us their nightcaps, 1980s reboot edition.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK

[22:57:20]

PHILLIP: We're back and it's time for the news nightcap. President Trump is reportedly pushing Hollywood to bring back the old school action movies of the 1980s and 1990s, including asking Paramount to revive the "Rush Hour" franchise starring Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker. So, what other 1980s items need to be rebooted? You each have a few seconds to say your piece. Jim, you're up.

SCHULTZ: So, I'd say "Caddyshack", and I think I'd put President Trump as the Rodney Dangerfield character and pit him against Adam Schiff as the Judge Smails character and see how that -- I think that would be very entertaining.

(LAUGHTER)

PHILLIP: Jamal?

SIMMONS: Mine is a little more dated. I want wall phones to come back. I want those phones that were plugged into the wall for the house so that when my daughter is a teenager, I can figure out who she's talking to every day. Right now, the cell phones are like way too dangerous.

PHILLIP: Sometimes you just need the phone to ring so that somebody picks it up because you really just want somebody in the house to pick up the phone and we don't have that anymore.

NAVARRO: My God, if the phone rings, it's probably a scam artist or a pollster. I want nothing in my house ringing, nothing. Okay, what I want to bring back. First, I can't even believe we're talking about the 1980s when I think half this table wasn't alive. But I want "Flash Dance" back. I want big hair. I want torn up sweat outfits and I want leg warmers. Where have leg warmers gone is what I want to know. PHILLIP: I agree with that. But not just -- but not just for the fashion, but because like that genre of movie, the sort of the romantic, sweaty dance movie. I mean, "Save the Last Dance" -- also dating myself -- that was in that genre.

NAVARRO: Don't put baby in the corner.

SUMMERVILLE: Love the day.

NAVARRO: "Dirty Dancing".

PHILLIP: Okay, go ahead.

SUMMERVILLE: Well, this kind of goes with yours a little bit, but I say bring back the power ballad, right? Because it does go with the hair and the clothes. But we --

(CROSSTALK)

NAVARRO: The power what?

SUMMERVILLE: The power ballad. You know like Heart or Cyndi Lauper, right? The really -- the really emotional ones.

PHILLIP: I think I can sing right now but I'll spare you.

(LAUGHTER)

SUMMERVILLE: I think Gaga could do it or you could do you -- Abby and Gaga could do one together.

(LAUGHTER)

PHILLIP: Abby and Gaga will sing "Alone" for the crowd. Go ahead.

DOWNEY: I'm Gen Z so don't come for me but "Back to the Future". I like sci-fi. I think it's a vibe. "Back to the Future". That's my answer.

(LAUGHTER)

PHILLIP: I feel like -- isn't there a "Back to the Future"?

DOWNEY: Maybe a musical. Musical but doesn't --

PHILLIP: Oh, okay. I feel like that's one that everybody always wants to bring back. Although I'm not totally sure. I feel like it is dated for a reason.

DOWNEY: Well, yes.

PHILLIP: Stay that way? All right. Okay. I don't know. The '80s, not really my -- even though I was born in the '80s.

[23:00:00]

I'm -- not really my decade. I'd bring back the '90s.

(CROSSTALK)

NAVARRO: Tomorrow is your birthday.

SUMMERVILLE: Happy birthday.

PHILLIP: Hey, don't spoil it. I' not --

(CROSSTALK)

NAVARRO: Happy birthday.

PHILLIP: Hold yet, everyone. Okay. All right, everybody, thank you very much. Thanks for watching --

(CROSSTALK)

NAVARRO: For another hour.

(CROSSTALK)

PHILLIP: -- "NewsNight". You can catch me anytime on your favorite social media -- X, Instagram and TikTok. "Laura Coates Live" starts right now.