“TAKING BACK TRUMP’S AMERICA” AUTHOR PETER NAVARRO TALKS ABOUT HOW TRUMP AND THE REPUBLICANS LOST THE WHITE HOUSE IN 2020
Episode Stats
Summary
Peter Navarro, former assistant to President Trump, and the author of the terrific new book, Taking Back Trump s America, Why We Lost the White House and How We'll Win It Back, joins us on The Great America Show.
Transcript
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Hello, everybody. I'm Lou Dobbs. This is The Great America Show, and welcome to the show.
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Great to have you with us. A lot going on today. You'll be pleased to know that the latest polls
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support what we've been saying here on The Great America Show throughout the past year.
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Gallup's poll on trust in our government has fallen steeply. Less than half of all Americans
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trust our courts, only 47%, and that's an all-time low. Their trust in the executive branch
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dropping to 43%, just 3% above its all-time low. And what some may find surprising is that trust
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in our legislative branch is the lowest. Only 38% of Americans trust Congress and the Senate.
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And that means, in my opinion, Americans are realizing the hard truth about our federal
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government. It is incompetent. It is corrupt. And we're living in a nation divided. The worst it's
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been since at least the Vietnam era. And some say, and I'm not sure I can argue strenuously,
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since the Civil War. Democrats and Republicans have an incredibly wide difference of opinion
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about trust in the executive branch. And it's informative about just how wide and deep the
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political divide is in our country. An astounding 86% of Democrats trust the executive branch,
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and only 7% of Republicans trust this president and the various departments of the executive branch.
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That is the widest partisan gap on trust in the executive in more than two decades.
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And it's a brutal time we live in politically. There's no doubt the country's divide is centered
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on the White House and its occupant. That Republican 7% trust in the Biden executive
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has to be by far the lowest in the history of the polling for either party. And it's clear that
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partisan rancor has turned to outright contempt of the White House and departments of the executive
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that include what we call here the deep state, the politically corrupt permanent bureaucracy
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that has targeted President Trump for more than six years, and conservatives for more than 10 years.
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Their political persecution of Trump and his aides and his supporters has now entered the seventh year.
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And the corruption of the Marxist Dems is palpable throughout every corner of our federal
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government. Our guest today is one of those who's been targeted by the Marxist Dems,
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in particular, the Stalinist January 6 Committee, and the politically corrupt DOJ and FBI.
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Joining us today is Peter Navarro, former assistant to President Trump, and the author of the terrific
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new book entitled Taking Back Trump's America, Why We Lost the White House and How We'll Win It Back.
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Peter, great to have you with us here on The Great America Show. Your book is terrific.
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You name names. It's colorful. It's informative. And I recommend it to everyone, folks. And I recommend
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it highly. It is a timely book. And let's start, Peter, with your title. What happened? Why did such a
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historic, successful president lose the White House?
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Lou, first of all, great to be with you, my brother. And you know,
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I've been a longtime admirer. We go back decades on the China issue. Look, the old Ronald Reagan saw
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that personnel is policy, meaning that if you put the wrong people in a White House,
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a president will not get the policies he deserves. In the Trump White House, we did not learn from that
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Reagan warning. And we had bad personnel, not only making bad policy, but also creating the kind of
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bad politics and strategic failures, which led over the course of 2020 to an election, in my judgment,
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which should have been a landslide, but was close enough to steal. Now, the problem, Lou,
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and it goes back, as I describe in Taking Back Trump's America, to the original sin. On November 9,
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2016, the day after the election, Trump's elected, a decision is made to let the rhinos in under the
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tent. The Bush-Cheney Republicans, the Mitch McConnell, Paul Ryan Republicans, thinking that if they would be
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loyal, not just to the president, but to his agenda, thinking that we had a vast deep state bureaucracy
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that needed to get staffed, and we needed their help. It was a massive, massive miscalculation. And
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for the better part of the next four years, I, as the tip of the spear, for much of what Trump was
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trying to do on the economy and border, would have to fight these bastards every single day. And whether
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it was Tillerson, as the Secretary of State, Jim Mattis at Defense, or Gary Cohn, as the National
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Council Director, or Steve Mnuchin, as Treasury Secretary, later Kudlow. I mean, these people,
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look, they did not belong in the Trump White House, because they were not loyal, either to him or his
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agenda. And there's a great story, Lou, if I can tell it real quick. In 2017, in the Roosevelt Room,
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I'm sure you've been there. It's in the West Wing. It's the iconic Roosevelt Room. The boss calls us all
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in, because he's really angry that his trade agenda isn't being implemented. And he calls like...
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Yeah, I think it was March or April. It's in the Taking Back, Trump's America book kind of
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full bore. But we go in there, and he's got the... He's got, you know, Sonny Perdue. He's got
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Tillerson, Mattis. Cohn's in there as the National Economic Council Director. He's got Mnuchin.
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He goes around the table, right? I'm sitting across, and he goes around the table,
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ask people, what's going on here? And by the time he gets through, Lou, he realizes there's only two
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people in that room who supported his trade agenda. It was him and me. And I watch, you know,
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I mean, you've seen this before. His eyebrows go up, kind of looks around. There's that epiphany,
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Lou. And we were able to move a little faster after that, because he understood the headwinds
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inside his own house. But, Lou, that never should have happened. And then fast forward for 2020,
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you've got these people in the White House. Mnuchin and Kudlow are killing our China policy.
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They're killing our Make America Great, Bring Home the Manufacturing Policies. You've got Kushner
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running the worst election in 2020. It just never should have happened, Lou. And that's what the
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first part of Taking Back Trump's America is about. Yeah. Like I say, it's a great book. I love the
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battle. I want to share with the audience some of your assessments of some of those folks,
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because it's really quite something to go through. And I will. Let me start with Alex Azar,
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the Secretary of Health and Human Services. Always punctilious. Is that a compliment or is that a
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shot? What is that? Punctual is a compliment. Punctilious, prissy, just a damn fool. He loved going out
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on TV during the pandemic and making himself look good. But it was always at the expense of Trump.
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And, you know, one of the things, like Ben Carson, like I love that dude. But why do you put him
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at HUD? Why do you put him at the house in Irvington? I mean, it just was crazy. If he had been at
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the Health and Human Services Department when the pandemic hit, instead of Alex Azar, who screwed up
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everything he touched, we would have had a lot better outcome. Same thing with Jeff Sessions. I don't know
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how you feel about Jeff. I know the boss doesn't like Jeff at all now, but he was a good man
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in the wrong place. They put him in the Justice Department. He got eaten alive because he didn't
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have the horsepower upstairs to deal with those people. I mean, they just, I mean, it was like
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sending a rube to a carnival. You know, the money was going to get lost. But if you may, if they'd just
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have been put him at Homeland Security in charge of the board, he would have been on for four years
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and people would have loved him. These were the kinds of personnel mistakes, Lou, that got made
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So how did it happen that he ends up with this bizarre cabinet? I know part of the reason is
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Chris Christie. They had a falling out, the president and Chris Christie, who's his chair,
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by the way, who should never have been the chair of a transition committee or anything else.
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But there it was. What happened? How did they get there?
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Yeah, look, you know this, Lou, I was only three people who would survive all the way from
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the campaign to the end. So I was there like the day after. Yeah, I was fighting in the worm. I used
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to come over to your show and during the campaign and get on your show and talk about the races and
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stuff like that. I'm there, like the day after the election, Priebus comes with this hench lady,
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Katie Walsh. They literally set their tables up in the middle of the war room, right? It's like
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a dog pissing on their turf, establish their territory. The next thing they do is there's
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this great guy featured taking back Trump's America, Martin Silverstein, who was supposed to be
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the guy in charge of hiring people for the bureaucracy. And we had over 100 beautiful resumes
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of high powered people that were ready to go loyal to Trump. And then Priebus and Walsh just threw that
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stuff literally in the trash. Well, wait a minute. Where's our friend Steve Bannon in the middle of
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this? Yeah, you know, it puzzles me. The one I blame the most for this, because he was kind of like
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he considered himself the DJT Whisperer's Kushner. I can track a lot of the bad personnel decisions
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back to Jared, right? He'd sit around and his resumes come in and, you know, Rex, I mean, look, Rex,
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I don't know if you remember the old thing with what I used to call Agassi, you know, like a haircut and
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a forehand, right? It's like that was Tillerson. He had this mane of hair and this baritone voice.
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But, you know, the first time I ever met him, he's like, hey, you just don't understand the
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global supply chain. And it's like, Rex, you don't understand the Trump administration. Yeah,
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these are the kinds of fights I have. Yeah, I did. By the way, by the way, just let me interject
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here a minute, Peter, for the audience to be sure. Peter does understand the international
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supply chain. No matter what, Rex Tillerson did not understand.
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Yes, indeed. So, I mean, look, again, like, it was the original sin of the administration. And Steve,
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look, Steve and I, we found ourselves quickly surrounded inside the White House. I talk about
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in Taking Back Trump's America, how, like, they literally demoted me. Yeah, I was, I don't know if
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you know this, but I was supposed to be the National League of Gamma Council director. That was,
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like, they gave me that job. And then they took it back and gave it to Gary Cohn. And not only that,
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they demoted me from an assistant to the president to a deputy. And, you know, I've never been rank
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conscious, Lou, but what that meant as a practical matter is I no longer had walk-in access to the
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Oval or the staff meetings. So the first, I mean, I'm telling you, the first four months of that
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administration, there's a great story in Taking Back Trump's America, how the boss kind of finally
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realizes that his trade policy is going into the toilet. And he bellows, like, where's my Peter,
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right? Next thing I know, I'm running, literally sprinting over to the Oval after I got to get a call
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from Madeline. I walk into the room and, you know, all of a sudden, everybody's there, right? It's,
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it's Priebus, it's Don McGann, the White House Legal Council, and Gary Cohn. 30 seconds in,
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I'm in a shouting match with Gary Cohn. And look, you and I know, Lou, that that guy didn't,
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he's smarter, he's not as smart as he thinks he is, and he didn't have a leg to stand on
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talking about trade, right? And I destroyed him that day. But, but he, so the audience understands,
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Gary Cohn is a product of Wall Street, and Wall Street, China is their, how will I put this,
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their, their ultimate fantasy. And Donald Trump and Peter Navarro were messing with their fantasy,
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because they were going to take care of balanced trade, and assure that there would be an
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equitable trade flow between the two countries for the first time.
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Yeah, it, that day was, was, you know, after, after that day, they finally, I finally got unleashed.
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All the, I, you know, the first, during the transition, Lou, I worked on about a dozen executive
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orders. If we had simply signed all of those on the first day of the administration, we would have
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changed history, and, and changed trade policy forever. When I, when he called me over to the
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Oval that day, I was able to at least get, get a few of those going, and we were moving. But it was
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always these, I was fighting people, they would derail, disrupt, and deter the thing. The funny thing
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about Reince, right? I mean, Reince, one of the biggest mistakes, Reince, he didn't view it as a
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mistake. It's like, he front-loaded Obamacare. We didn't run on Obamacare. He gets in there,
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and he, Paul Ryan and him convinced the boss that somehow we'd be better off just repealing
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Obamacare, getting that out of the way first, before we did anything else. And previous,
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I kind of, can I just say that? He didn't want to do the trade stuff, right? And he got his head
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handed to him. And that, you know, we lost that in a hundred days, we lost a lot of momentum.
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I mean, it was just, these were rookie mistakes, but it's understandable in the sense that it's a
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hard job to do, and the learning curve is steep, and, you know, it's like. But it wasn't, it wasn't
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a mistake either. I mean, it wasn't just a mistake. It was a plot. It was a plot to undercut his trade
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policy, to not even get it moving. Reince Priebus and Paul Ryan were, in point of fact, they might,
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if they could have gotten the same pay, they would have been Democrats. And, and Ryan is a
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complete idiot. He had a, he had a reputation as being a wonk on the budget. That man can't balance
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his checkbook. It is ridiculous what they thought of him and what he thought of Trump. He was a
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problem from Jump Street. He was ignorant. He was disloyal, and he was a major problem. But luckily,
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the people spoke, and he was, he went away. Let me ask you this, because it's really important.
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You and Kudlow, I know, banged heads over America First policies. I talked to Larry on, on the air,
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it's at some point early on, and he started talking about free trade. And I said, Larry,
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the President of the United States is not a free trader. He is, for balanced trade, for fair trade,
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he is insisting on balanced trade, and the entire world needs to pay attention to it. Why are you
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calling him a free trader? And he said, because I'm a free trader, effectively. That was his answer.
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And it's crazy. And he and Mnuchin were open about it.
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Well, look, I mean, here's the problem. There's, there's loyalty to a president and loyalty to a
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president agenda. In the end, both Kudlow and Mnuchin were say yes, do no kind of guys, right?
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In the Oval, they'd be sycophants. They'd let the boss think they were going to do what he wanted them
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to do. And then as soon as they got out of that office, I was fighting them tooth and nail.
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There's a story that doesn't appear in the Taking Back Trump's America book. It's fascinating where
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me and Lighthizer were sitting at a meeting with the trade team, which included...
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Let me, I'm sorry, let me interject real quickly. Robert Lighthizer, the trade representative
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in charge, in charge of trade policy for the president. Yes. And, and, and, and we're sitting
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there with Wilbur Ross, the Commerce Secretary, Steve Mnuchin, you know, both these guys, the
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Wall Street guys, me and Lighthizer. And the boss the day before had instructed Lighthizer
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to put out a public statement related to being tough on China, right? And Mnuchin comes
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in that morning and looks us in the eye and says, the president doesn't want Lighthizer
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to send that out. Okay. And Lighthizer took him at his word. I've been telling, I was telling
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Lighthizer for months, like Mnuchin's lying to you. He's just lying to you about everything,
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Bob. You got to like face reality. So Bob, I dragged Bob down to the Oval after that meeting
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to verify what Mnuchin said. And sure enough, he was lying. And that's the kind of crap we had to
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do. And Kudlow, Kudlow would say yes to President Trump in the Oval Office, and then he would go
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outside the Oval and use his National Economic Council people to countermand everything he was
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told to do. And he was always insistent that, oh, I'm tough on China. But everything he actually did
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undermines it. Yeah, I see him, you know, he's making his money on Fox. And it's like the Fox
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wing, the Ryan wing, you know, they love the globalist wing. They love him. It's the never
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Trump wing. And it's just so much BS. And it's just disgusts me every time I see that. Because,
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you know, if I could wave a magic wand, Lou, it's like if simply Mnuchin, Kushner, and Kudlow
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had never darkened the door of the White House, I think the boss would still be there. That's how
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much damage those guys did. Well, I'm going to make a projection. I'm going to say that you're
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going to be back in the White House because President Trump is going to be back in the White
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House in 2024. In 2025, he'll be back in the White House. He'll take the thing in the election.
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of 2024. What job are you going to have? How many jobs do you want?
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Well, let me let me let me tell you the secret of my success, Lou. OK, because I was with the boss
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for five years. OK, I never wanted to be there. OK, as soon as you want to be there, you start making
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accommodations to stay there. And I don't do that. If he needs me, I'm there. But I'm not asking.
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I think that's a wonderful philosophy about everything. As a matter of fact, I share that
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in large measure. The fact of the matter is, you were a warrior for this president's agenda,
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for the country's agenda. And I want to salute you because you were staying. I, as you know,
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I know more about what you have. I put it another way. I have a greater sense than most folks about
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what you had to contend with in that in that battleground of a White House. And fortunately,
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the president's ideas and yours survived and gave this country a real opportunity to the greatest
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prosperity of any first term president in our country's modern history. I mean, we just
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focusing on balanced trade, focusing on fair trade and responsible relationships and everything,
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but always with America first. That was a victory that you should and I know you are extremely proud
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of. And the president certainly set the tone for this century by taking those issues on. It's just
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give me what you would say is and we're going to have to wrap up here in just a couple of minutes. We
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always give our guests the last word. Give us your sense of where the where the boss, as you call him,
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is headed and what his plans will be and the agenda that you think will prevail in both the midterm
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election and 2024. Lou, there's no question in my mind, although he hasn't told me this, that he's running
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in 2024. In order for him to run successfully, the first thing that has to happen, and he knows this,
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is to take back the House from Nancy Pelosi to put an end to the weaponization unconstitutionally of
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their investigatory power. So watch him do what he's been doing. He's gone to two a day rallies now
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to make sure that we command that majority. And then when the wind is in, got to make sure that
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we have Trump Republicans in charge of both the House and the Senate, not the likes of Mitch McConnell
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and Kevin McCarthy. That's got to happen. Going forward, I think we're facing the most critical
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crisis in economics since the 1970s. First thing he's got to do is restore strategic energy dominance
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to contain energy and food prices and secure our southern border. And then follow through on the MAGA
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agenda, bringing home our manufacturing base and supply chains. I think if you stabilize the economy,
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you begin to stabilize the out of control crime rate, and then you begin to take that one
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on directly. You've got to clean up an FBI, which, if you think about it, has been going after
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President Trump since he was a candidate in 2016. It's now in the seventh year, the political
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persecution of Donald Trump. Yes. Yeah. Well, coup d'etats, right? A failed preemptive coup in the
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2016 election, a successful coup in the 2020 election, and now another attempt at a preemptive
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coup by the FBI with their raids in Mar-a-Lago. So I see a path ahead that begins within less than 30
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days of taking back the House. So your viewers and listeners, I suggest they get involved in a race
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that's going to make a difference, whether it's Joe Kent in Washington or Zach Nunn in Iowa or Caroline
00:24:36.960
Leavitt in New Hampshire or Bo Hines in North Carolina. Find a toss-up race that'll flip a seat
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to the Republicans, and you'll be doing what you need to help out Donald John Trump.
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All right. Well, a man who's been helping out President Donald Trump for quite some time and
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giving it his all and still doing so. Peter, thanks for all you've done for the country,
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for all of us, and what I know you'll be doing for the country in the years ahead.
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Peter, thanks so much. We appreciate it, and God bless you.
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You're a patriot, sir, and it's always an honor to be with you, Lou. You take care of yourself.
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Thanks, everybody, for being with us today. Here tomorrow, we'll have Mike Lindell as our guest.
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Please join us for that tomorrow on The Great America Show. Until then,