That he had said something to the effect of I
don't want people to know we lost, Mark, this is
embarrassing.
Figure it out.
We need to figure it out.
I don't want people to know that we lost.
Hi again, everyone.
It's 5:00 in the East.
Trump knew all along, right?
That he lost, even though he has raged now for
four years, that the 2020 presidential election was somehow stolen
from him in private.
Even Donald Trump has admitted the truth.
Even Donald Trump knows the truth.
It's the truth he's so embarrassed about that President Joe
Biden, he refers to him as this guy, beat him,
beat him in the 2020 presidential election.
Today, in a brand new tape never heard before, we're
hearing that private admission in the ex president's own words
on tape.
A remarkable slip of the mask, right?
Trump's facade made during one of his half dozen interviews
with writer remains to do to today, author of a
brand new book chronicling Trump's time as host of The
Apprentice.
We spoke with Ramin on this program yesterday.
He told us about this moment.
Here is that never before heard exchange that we that
came up when Trump was talking about former Fox News
commentator Geraldo Rivera.
Listen, what was for all the leg, he was good.
He did a good job.
He was smart, cunning.
He did a good job.
And are you guys still close or are you no
one?
No, I don't think so.
He is after I lost the election, I won the
election.
But when they said he called me up three or
four times, I didn't take his call because I was
so busy fighting it, you know, with with what went
on and we've caught him.
I don't know if you see it, but you will.
But he called me up 3-4 times and finally I
had a little time.
I called him back and he went on Fox and
he started talking about the president called me.
I didn't call him.
I returned his phone call and he started talking very
personally about how I was feeling, how I was doing,
how, and I said, that's really a betrayal.
I didn't talk about how I was feeling.
I just it was a phone call that lasted very
quickly.
Just hey, how you doing, Geraldo?
How's it going?
It's not my deal.
He's he's not my psychiatrist, but he made it sound
like it was such a big deal.
It was a nothing.
He all I did was return his call.
But he said the president called me like, I'm reaching
out to him and I haven't spoken to him since.
So despite Trump's efforts to put his mask back on
right, quickly cover it up.
You heard the truth pour out of him.
Call me after I lost Geraldo.
I mean, I won.
But he lost.
He lost.
He knows it.
And speaking conversationally, he admitted it on tape.
But meanwhile, publicly and even there in that call, the
disgraced ex president continues to perpetuate and spread the lie.
The lie that has undermined trust and faith in our
elections in American democracy.
The lie that his own supporters have bought into hook,
line and sinker, some of them.
The cost of their freedom, their liberty.
The lie that fueled the supporters into committing a deadly
coup against the United States government at the US Capitol
on January 6th.
The lie for which dozens of Trump's allies have been
indicted across several states.
Now, more than half of all Republican voters believe the
lie.
The lie that Trump couldn't even keep up in a
taped interview.
But now we know the cult leader doesn't even believe
the lie.
The mass slipping is where we start the hour with
Co editor in chief, a variety author of the new
book.
We showcased it here yesterday.
He's back.
Apprentice in Wonderland, how Donald Trump and Mark Burnett took
America through the looking glass.
Ramin Satuday is back with us.
Ramin I I I loved everything about our conversation yesterday,
but as a show, we have sought to really understand
how the lie about Trump's defeat in 2020 has undermined
voting rights.
Almost 400 voter suppression bills have been passed in 48
states in this country predicated on a lie.
The January 6th insurrection happens.
Mike Pence doesn't endorse Donald Trump.
First time that's ever happened in our country's history.
And it's such a precious piece of of reporting amid
many other precious pieces of reporting that even Trump let
the mask slip with you and said, Geraldo called me
after I lost.
Just tell me what that moment was like for you
sitting across from it.
We were sitting at the same table.
This was in August 2021.
He was very comfortable that day because we were actually
watching clips of The Apprentice.
And I think part of the reason why the math
slipped off was that he was remembering his life as
an entertainer.
He was very amused.
He was excited to see himself in the boardroom.
And this is all performance art for Donald Trump.
My book really tries to get into the psyche of
who Donald Trump is, what his motivations are, what he's
doing as a politician, quote, politician, because I make the
argument in the book that he's not really audition.
And the contestants I talked to said that Donald Trump
is an actor.
He played a role on this reality show.
And as a candidate pursuing the White House, he also
played a role as president United States.
He also played a role.
And this lie that he perpetuates is also part of
that role.
He's acting the part of this aggrieved politician who claims
that the election was stolen from him because he knows
that's something his base loves.
He loves to distort reality, and we, like the character
in Alice in Wonderland, are going down the looking glass
in this story where he's creating false narratives, distorting the
truth and confusing the American public.
Rubin, did you follow the January 6th public hearings closely
at all?
I did.
I mean, I asked.
I asked that because because this is part of a
a pattern.
And what's so unique about it is everything else was
a witness, right?
So Cassidy Hutchinson testifies to it.
Alyssa Farrah testified to walking into the Oval Office to
check on Trump.
And that's when he's, you know, watching television and mutters,
I can't believe I lost to this guy.
But you have it.
You have it on tape and I I wonder, you
know, I'm gonna read to our audience Trump's response to
this part of the book and this revelation that that
we were going to play the tape.
This is his campaign spokesperson.
After recognizing the importance of The Apprentice, it's significant cultural
impact on a global scale and Trump's remarkable role in
forever changing the landscape of entertainment, this writer has now
chosen to allow Trump derangement Syndrome to rot his brain
like so many other losers whose entire existence revolves around
Trump.
That's a campaign person.
What's notable is what's not in there, right?
The dog that doesn't bark.
No denial that Trump knows he lost.
It's notable, and it's also part of the performance art,
right?
That's an outrageous, over the top, crazy statement that you'd
expect from a reality star who engages in feuds, calls
people's names, makes up names, creates false narratives.
What was also interesting about this moment was that the
story of why he and Geraldo had a falling out
traces back to the fact that after they spoke, Geraldo
went on at it was called Twitter at the time
and said the president will accept the results of the
election.
And Donald Trump, according to Geraldo, said a version of
that to him on the phone shortly after the election
and then changed his mind and decided that this election,
he was going to claim the election was stolen from
him and he was going to perpetuate that lie that
we were talking about.
And so that's the reason why he stopped talking to
Geraldo.
But it all goes back to the fact that he's
playing a part.
He's pretending he's created this false narrative, and millions of
people believe him.
I mean, I think you have a frame that's really
instructive for anyone who's trying to cover Trump in this
moment, right?
Because the other mass that you take off is the
idea that he ever saw himself as a leader of
anything.
He didn't see himself as a president.
And I want to play another piece of tape that
you've given to us exclusively.
And this is him talking about Dennis Rodman's acumen to
deal with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.
Let me play this.
Dennis was a pretty cool cat in many ways, I'll
tell you.
Hey, look, he dated Madonna when she was the number
one person.
You got to have something going, right?
He also showed up, I think, to one of the
Assads you had with Kim Jong Un because he knew
Kim very well, remember?
So Kim Jong Un really liked him.
Yeah.
Legit.
Yeah.
And I said, you know, I can get these guys
out of Harvard government and central casting.
They couldn't do anything with Kim Jong Un.
A guy like Dennis could.
I didn't use Dennis for it, but I thought about
it a couple of times before I got to know
Kim Jong Un.
But Dennis would have done a better job than your
traditional people, your traditional Ivy League people that always do
that stuff.
And they have no personality.
Though Kim Jong Un liked him.
You know, he coached their basketball team and he did.
I asked him about that.
He said I like Dennis last Kim during one of
those.
Yeah, I asked him.
He liked him.
And by the way, Dennis liked him too.
I mean, I don't even know if the looking glass
does it.
I mean, this is someone who murders his own people.
I mean, Aquarians of Pyongyang.
I mean, I mean, this is one of the most
brutal dictatorships in the world, represents a growing threat to
this country with a new alliance with Putin.
And and Trump is so cavalier about it.
He he thinks Dennis is better than anyone who's studied
North Korea's nuclear capabilities or understands the geopolitical impact of
an alliance with Vladimir Putin.
Say more about this part of your interview.
This was a very strange moment in our interview.
And to me, it all traces back to Donald Trump
saying that because Dennis Rodman in the 90s dated Madonna,
he's, quote, a cool cat.
And that is the headspace that he's in, right?
It's the wanting to be in the proximity of fame,
seeing fame as a currency, seeing celebrity as a currency,
the ultimate currency, and not having no qualifications in terms
of leadership when he says that Dennis Rodman is better
than these guys from Harvard, which he calls central casting.
And somehow Dennis Rodman, who was a contestant twice on
The Celebrity Apprentice, you know, dealt with being an alcoholic
on the show, was known for these very messy antics
on the show.
Somehow had a better handle on global diplomacy and dealing
with Kim Jong Un than people in our government who
went to Harvard, who studied what we need to do
as in terms of our government, in terms of making
sure that we are handling this in the professional correct
way.
It was very jarring.
It was very frightening.
And this is what the American public need to know.
This is the way in which Donald Trump handles diplomacy.
This is the way in which he sees his role
as president of the United States, and it's a continuation
of his role as the host of The Apprentice.
He is a reality show character that is conducting himself
in the White House like a celebrity who's pretending to
be someone else.