April 26, 2025 • 25 mins
-
White House Dynamics:
- The current administration is running at a different pace compared to the previous term, with a more cohesive and team-oriented approach.
- There is a noticeable reduction in leaks and a stronger sense of unity among team members.
-
Lawfare:
- The administration is facing significant legal challenges from activist judges and the Democratic Party, who are using the court system to block the president's agenda.
- Melman discusses the impact of these legal battles and the administration's strategies to counter them.
-
Trade and Economic Policies:
- The administration is focused on reducing dependence on China and securing better trade deals with other countries.
- Efforts are being made to listen to businesses and adjust policies to support American companies affected by the trade war.
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Gender Ideology in Sports:
- The administration is committed to protecting women's sports and ensuring fair competition by preventing men from competing in women's categories.
- Investigations and lawsuits are being pursued against states that allow gender ideology to impact women's sports.
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Energy Policies:
- Significant progress has been made in the energy sector, including issuing new permits for LNG exports and coal leasing.
- Regulatory changes are being implemented to facilitate energy projects and reduce costs.
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Border Security:
- The administration has achieved a substantial reduction in border crossings, fulfilling a key campaign promise.
- The focus is on maintaining strong border security and addressing immigration issues.
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Regulatory Changes:
- Deregulatory efforts are underway to reduce costs and expand options for consumers, including changes to environmental regulations and standards for various products.
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Future Plans:
- The administration is looking forward to victories in trade and further deregulation.
- There is an emphasis on working with Congress to solidify priorities and achieve legislative wins.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Good morning, Welcome. It is the Ben Ferguson Podcast. Nice
to have you with us. We're live here at the
White House, and I guess with me now is May Melman,
senior policy strategist at the White House and a unique
perspective because she was in forty five in that administration,
you're now in forty seven. We were talking before the
show and I just let's just start with this because
(00:21):
I think it's so cool. This White House is running
at a different pace than it did with the first
time around.
Speaker 2 (00:28):
Part of that was learning government.
Speaker 1 (00:30):
I think part of it's having a team this time
that seems to be working as a team and just
seems like everyone wants to win and is getting along.
The leaks were not seeing like we did last time.
It seems like everybody's a team player. This is really
fun to watch from the outside. I was in the
Bush administration and it was in the second from four
to oho eight, and it was just a different type
(00:51):
of team than we had in.
Speaker 2 (00:52):
The first part.
Speaker 1 (00:54):
You got to enjoy watching the past and now the president.
Speaker 2 (00:57):
How cool is that for you? Yeah?
Speaker 3 (00:59):
I used to be jealous of what the Bush people
had in the sense that they still did reunions, and
they all hung out with each other and they you know,
we had our criticisms, certainly, but it felt like they
were all very unified. And I think during Trump one
point zero, people very much got along. It was friendly.
(01:19):
But people had come from different places. So you had
people who were campaign people, you had people who were
RNC people, you had people who were either longtime friends
of the family, these sort you know, everyone kind of
had their own different background. But now there is such
a thing as Trump World, and there are people who
have been here and those they've had relationships and they've
(01:39):
had ups and downs with each other, and so it
is easier to have everybody rowing in the same direction.
And I've had strange experiences that I never had during
the first time. So during the first time, I was
also writing a lot of executive orders, helping push a
lot of policies, and I would have to follow up
and follow up and follow up, and nothing would happen
at the speed and the pace and the level that
(02:02):
I wanted it to. Now, if I write something that's
very nuanced, I'm careful, Okay, we're not trying to do this.
People will just do it at the one hundred out
of ten, even though we just need a ten out
of ten. That's okay. So the excitement people have been planning,
people are ready to go, and it does feel very different,
even though it is actually a lot of the same people.
(02:23):
I'm working with a lot of the same people, but
it's just different this time.
Speaker 1 (02:26):
So let's talk about where we are one hundred days in.
You're here, your senior pology strategists. I think one of
the big things that people are witnessing right now they're
concerned about is the law fair. There is very clear
a movement by the left, by the Democrats to use
the court system and activist judges, their allies that they
(02:47):
know are clearly on their team, making sure they're filing
things in certain courts where they know it'll give them
a favorable opinion, which is against this White House and
trying to stop the president of a law fair. You
guys are fighting back. You work with Jason Miller. You
guys are out there hardcore going against this. Where are
we now and how big of a roadblock is this
going to be for Trump's agenda getting actually done well?
Speaker 3 (03:09):
The Democrats have no political strategy, they have no political leader,
they have no North Star. So all they have is
know and the place you go for no is the courts,
and so that's where all the money has been, that's
where the excitement is, that's where the investment is. Is
just no. There's some protests, there's blowing up tesla's, but
mostly it's in the courts. And I think the judges
(03:31):
are very excited. These are activists, these are longtime Democrat donors, partisans,
you know, they're part of the movement. They're excited to
actually be the leaders of the left right now. And
so yeah, it is a problem. I'm a lawyer. For
four years when I was not in the White House,
I was bringing lawsuits and the judges that we would get,
even if we were in conservative areas of the country
(03:53):
with very conservative judges, these were measured approaches. I'll just
take Title nine for example, twenty six states brought lawsuits
and I think eight different jurisdictions to challenge Biden's rewrite
of Title nine. Each one of those judges, every single one,
issued an injunction that was just narrowed to the parties
that had brought the suits. So there never was a
nationwide injunction, even with twenty six states in eight different lawsuits.
(04:17):
Compare that to here, where you just have any sort
of group. It's not states bringing these is just random people,
random activists, bringing these lawsuits and getting nationwide injunctions at
the TRO stage, the temporary restraining order stage, which is
not even assessment of the merits of whether you're right
or wrong. It's just, Hey, I'm the judge, and I
(04:39):
feel like doing this nationwide thing based not even on
the merits. I want to freeze the Trump administration from
doing anything. So this law fair is a serious, serious
problem in my opinion. I think that it violates the
job of the judiciary, which is to say what the
law is, not to become the policymaker. So I think
there's been some calls for MP and things like that.
(05:01):
You know, Congress should absolutely impeach judges who are not
doing their jobs. However, that's just not going to be
the solution. The solution, I think, is going to be
a reshaping of what it means to have judicial power,
whether that's coming from the Supreme Court, whether that's coming
from Congress, or whether that's coming from the administration. Just
saying you know what, if you are actually stepping into
the executive branch's power. We're not going to abide by it.
(05:25):
And so I think these judges are really playing with fire.
But they know it and they want it, and they
want to pick this fight because they feel the leadership
of the Democratic Party right now.
Speaker 1 (05:35):
Let's talk about trade, and that is a big issue
that is I think top of mind for virtually every American.
I have dear friends that knew I was going to
be here today, and I was like, they're dealing with this,
and they've got companies that are American companies, startups from
their garage that are now being affected because of this
trade war with China. They're very concerned about what they've built.
(05:58):
Where are we with this.
Speaker 2 (06:00):
Master plan from the President?
Speaker 1 (06:01):
It seems to me saying, hey, I want to get
great deals done with a lot of countries so that
we have much less dependence on China. This is about
reducing China's influence in the world, especially when it comes
to trade. Are we moving forward and when are we
going to start getting deals announced to calm the markets
but also the people that have businesses and how long
(06:25):
are they going to have to deal with this? Because
we saw yesterday it this is a good sign President
was meeting with top companies. They're meeting with Lows and
Home Depot and Walmarting Target about this trade war. That
could be good news, but also it could be bad
news depending on who you read and what you're being told.
We know the media wants us to be miserable. They
want to be fear mongering, They want this inflation issues
(06:45):
to happen. They want this to be a Trump disaster.
I don't see it that way though.
Speaker 2 (06:49):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (06:50):
I think the President's heart is where actually a lot
of Americans' hearts are, which is that we want to
be supply chain independent. We want to be able to
make our pharmaceuticals at home. We don't want to be
reliant on a country who is threatening to us. And
yet I think the President also is a very practical person.
(07:12):
He's a business person, He is a listener, and you
can see even from the changes to the original announcement
of reciprocal tariffs, that he wants to be in it
with allies to shore up our manufacturing against people who
do not have our best interests, including China. So while
(07:32):
I can't give a timeline for when you would see
an exact announcement, I can say that the White House
is in listening mode and we have been hearing from
people changes and those changes have already been implemented, whether
it has to do with lower tariffs on certain electronics
(07:52):
that we simply can't make we can't on shore quickly.
And then I think also part of the.
Speaker 1 (07:58):
Test to security, right, this is when I've asked, and
I've had leaders call me and like Ben, what is
he doing?
Speaker 2 (08:03):
Why is he doing this? And say, look, you've got
to look at this from two views.
Speaker 1 (08:07):
One is national security, and if you bring enough of
that back to the US, you don't have to be
the leader in the world, but you need to have
enough from a national security standpoint that if something happens
somewhere else in the world, you're still good.
Speaker 2 (08:16):
And that's part of what the president I think learn
from COVID.
Speaker 3 (08:19):
Yeah, and so from a national security standpoint, I think
the nation is pretty strong and we feel good there.
And so really it is focusing on small businesses and
the impact and it is alarming actually how tightly our
supply chains and how quickly they are connected to China, which,
of course you know something that we all know, which
(08:39):
is why the whole action exists. To begin with. But
nobody wants to harm American small businesses. What we want
is for China and the United States to find a
resolution and then of course to eventually work toward a
trade policy that is going to be best for our
(09:00):
national security, best for our economy. And you know, as
President Trump is going to be income tax replacement. And
it's a complicated thing, but no president has really taken
this on seriously. And year by year by year by year,
we become more reliant, less safe, less secure, less independent.
(09:25):
And it almost doesn't matter whether you have a southern
border or if the threat is coming in from your
nation's dependence. That said, I think, as you noted, the
President is in complete listening mode. So there is a
need to make sure that our small businesses and our
large businesses, and our supply chains and our consumers are
(09:45):
all accounted for. And these are conversations that are happening
every day in the White House. They're competing every day
in the agencies, at the US Trade Representative, at the
Department of Commerce, at the Department of Treasury, Farmers, at
the USDA. This is definitely the number one topic. This
is extremely important. Nobody's taking it lightly nobody's looking for,
(10:07):
you know, massive sacrifices. This is something that it's a
policy that needs to be fixed, it's something that needs
to be implemented. And yet I think you're going to
see reasonable policies being implemented that ent our country toward
a more secure posture.
Speaker 1 (10:25):
So when do we start to see I guess, and
you know, momentums everything, right, people say, when are we
going to start to see big announcements and hey, we've
got to deal with this country in that country. Are
we days away from that? Are we weeks away from that?
Because momentum is everything, and it makes pe feel better. Okay,
now we're having success, and now we're getting another one,
(10:47):
and now we're getting another one. We're about one hundred
days in here at the White House. What is that
rollout going to look like?
Speaker 3 (10:53):
Yeah, hard to say a number of days, but I
can say that those conversations with foreign countries are happening
right now, and so at some level, I think there
has been a lot of progress. You've already seen countries
make certain types of concessions, make changes, make promises, and
so it's locking those in. Sometimes that takes a little
(11:15):
bit of time from the other countries perspective in order
to get an announcement to reality. But it's so it's
all hands on deck right, it's presently happening.
Speaker 1 (11:25):
So I talked to an ambassador yesterday who said to me,
he said, look, we just want to know what the
new normal is, and that's what we're working on as
fast as we can with this White House, so that
we can continue to see businesses grow. The spirit from
that ambassador was not one of anger. It was almost
a spirit of hey, we know we were taking advantage
of you guys, so was the rest of the world.
Speaker 2 (11:46):
We did what the rest of the world did.
Speaker 1 (11:47):
This is a smaller country and I don't want to
name it because it was in confidence, but he was
basically admitting, like, hey, we followed the lead of other
countries as they wore taking advantage. We were a little
lower than they were. But it was like why not
that this is what the world looks like in the trade.
Speaker 2 (12:02):
And he was.
Speaker 1 (12:02):
Admitting, we're willing to totally redo this thing. We want
to get it done because we want to keep doing
business with America.
Speaker 2 (12:09):
We love doing business.
Speaker 1 (12:10):
He wasn't even upset, and that gave me I think
a lot of hope that like, there's a lot of
company countries I should say, that are coming to the
table who are saying, we know this deal is going
to get redone. In other words, we know that the
price is one described to me the day they go.
Speaker 2 (12:23):
We know, if you live in.
Speaker 1 (12:24):
A house under a lease for a long time, ten
years later, there's a very good chance there's going to
be a major change in what you're paying. They all
know that they're accepting it, and so that to me,
sin is a signal of something good coming.
Speaker 3 (12:36):
Yeah, the new normal. You know, for the present time,
there is that ten percent rate which is sort of
a baseline that I think people have accepted and that
the market celebrated when when President Trump first announced it.
And then you know, as far as there are certain
countries who are willing to help us out and do
(12:57):
additional things else alvare take for example, there are countries
that I think are trying to either lock in those
rates or secure more favorable deals. But you know, not
there are a lot of countries out there who want
to have those conversations. Those conversations are all happening, I
would say, starting with like a group of twenty or
(13:20):
so right now and then moving on, moving on, moving on,
And I think the President has signaled multiple times he's
willing to have those conversations with China, and so that's
something that if the you know, Chinese are here to
make a deal, that that can happen as well. But
even for small countries, just because you're small does not
(13:42):
mean they're forgotten. I think these are going to happen
just on their own time.
Speaker 1 (13:48):
Let's move to another issue that I think is really important,
and that is the fight for the president. He has
done this in sports gender ideology, has been saying. He said,
we're going to protect when we're going to protect women
and women's sports. We're not backing down on that issue.
You look at the president doing this. Democrats do feel
like in some states this is a fight worth fighting
for them. They're trying to rally the troops. As you
(14:10):
mentioned earlier, there is no leader of the Democratic Party
right now. That the party of just no because no
one's in charge. It's totally anarchy and chaos. But they
are trying to find an issue to hone in on.
I think they believe that this gender ideology issue is
one that can at least rally their core base, and
they're saying, we're not going to abide by what you're
telling us to do. Mister President, go ahead and sue,
(14:32):
we'll see you in court. We heard that, but said
from a governor at the White House, like, we'll see
you great, can't wait to see you in court. Where
are we now with that? Because there are still men
acting like women, that are still getting to play with
women as we speak in some states.
Speaker 3 (14:45):
Right, so it is about to be high school championship season,
and you're already seeing a lot of men at the
regional level, and beyond take trophies from women. You're not
seeing it from the college level because these colleges know
that the NCAA policy requires sex based participation in women's sports.
(15:07):
That doesn't mean you can change your birth certificate. That
means it's based on sex. And this is something that
the NCAA has picked up the phone and enforced when
they feel like something has gone on. So we need
but there's no similar structure at the state level. So
each state is governed by its own state Athletic Association,
and the Trump administration has started investigations into several of them,
(15:29):
into California, into Minnesota, Maine, we filed a lawsuit. First ever,
it has never before happened that a school has lost
its money because of a Title nine violation from the
federal government.
Speaker 2 (15:42):
Why never, That's amazing.
Speaker 3 (15:43):
Never in the history of Title nine since nineteen seventy two.
Speaker 2 (15:45):
Never there've been.
Speaker 3 (15:46):
Private lawsuits where people have had to pay private judgments,
but never has the federal government had to come down
on a school and take their federal money. Why because
usually when the Feds come asking, hey, will you stop
discriminating against women, the schools like sure, I'd love to
stop discriminating against women. It is wild to me that Maine,
this is a very simple ask, can you just not
(16:07):
have men in women's sports? Main won't do it, and
their governor has doubled, tripled down, And then other states
like California, same deal. Colorado is not only allowing men
in women's sports, but they're now gonna disallow you from
calling a parent from calling his or her own child
the correct pronouns because that's child abuse. So I think
(16:32):
you are going to see a divide and we're not
going to actually just sit by and take it. Title
nine is a nineteen seventy two law that says that
in education programs, you cannot discriminate against women. You have
to have equal opportunity. You are not providing women equal
opportunity if you're saying, Okay, yeah you can come here,
but you have to use the bathroom with men. Yeah
you can come to our school, but there will be
(16:53):
no women's sports because you are unequally harming them privacy wise,
you're unequally harming them say wise competitive and so these
I think are very easy winnable cases. Will take them
all the way up to the Supreme Court if they
need to be. But we're going to make some examples
out of some states that continue to double down on
gender ideology, even though the American public eighty twenty is
(17:16):
the other way you.
Speaker 2 (17:18):
Look at what the fight looks like.
Speaker 1 (17:20):
I have a feeling this is going to be for
years because they're just not going to stop. And you're
saying that the White House has a commitment that we're
not going to let them get away and just isolate
and do what they want to do, and that maybe
a liberal university or a liberal state exactly.
Speaker 3 (17:33):
So if if they want to not take federal money, so.
Speaker 1 (17:38):
If you yeah, fine, do your thing. It's like, Harvard,
please give us our tax dollers back. I'd love for
you to operate as a radical left university and just
admit it, exactly.
Speaker 3 (17:45):
And so this is not some sort of federal takeover
of anything. This is the taxpayers have given you a deal.
And the deal is if you take billions of dollars,
then you're not going to discriminate against women. And we're
just here to enforce that deal. But for states that
spend billions of dollars on illegal immigrant health care, like California,
they can afford to fund their schools. The federal government
(18:06):
actually is a pretty small percentage of school funding. Most
of it, as you know, is your property taxes that
are local. So it is perfectly possible for states to
fund their own education system, and they would like to
do that and discriminate against women on their own time.
Titlenine has nothing to say about that. Their own state
statutes probably have something to say about that, but Title
(18:28):
nine itself does not. And so that's all we're trying
to do is enforce the deal. And I think Democrats
had a really big opportunity after the election, after they
they took a huge loss because they were too progressive.
And you could hear Seth Moulton and some of these
people saying, maybe we should be more moderate, and I said, no,
they're not going to do that. They can't, and sure
(18:48):
enough they can't. They are owned by their left flank
because they just don't have any leaderships. So this is
going to continue to happen, and we're going to continue
to say fine, no federal funding.
Speaker 1 (18:58):
My guess to me is, may Melman, is your policy
strateger just here at the White House. Let's talk about
the first hundred days, and what are your top just
takeaways if you're checking boxes. I think for me, number
one is the border and I think that has just
been an amazing success to watch border crossings drop by
ninety seven, ninety eight, nine nine percent, whatever the number
is now, it keeps changing. So I want to you know,
(19:18):
it's why I'm giving a little leeway there. Some fact
checker out there will freak out, no, you got it
wrong by decimal point. It's the reality that this is
something he promised and paid off on. But there's a
lot of other wins right now that have not been
talked about in the media specifically.
Speaker 3 (19:33):
So I will just say one of the biggest wins
is our energy agenda, the drill, Baby drill. I think
it's harder to see wins here because some permits take
a long time to actually turn in to a project,
but when you see what's actually happening. So Biden said
for LNGX Sports, we're not going to issue any new permits.
(19:55):
We have already issued four new permits. Biden said, we're
not going to do any coal leasing. We've opened up
federal lands for coal leasing, and we've rescinded regulations that
are preventing coal's mines from moving forward, and several have
already either announced or already opened up. I think you're
(20:15):
going to see a lot of news coming very soon
on this crazy thing called the social cost of carbon,
which basically said that if you want a new project,
you have to present to the government as a cost
of your project, the carbon that you would use to
build the project, and then the carbon that would be
created from your project. Meaning no projects could ever move
(20:36):
forward because it would seem like it was just going
to be so costly, so terrible. These are, of course
invented things about what's going to happen in three hundred years.
I don't even know what the weather's going to be tomorrow.
And so I think that you're going to see a
lot of positive movement there. The Endangered Species Act, I'll
do one more. For years, you can't build anything because
if you hurt the butterfly's habitat, you can't have a project.
(20:59):
And so Biden spent all this money on the Inflation
Reduction Act, and we're going to build this and this
and this billions of dollars. Nothing was built. Why, well,
you have to do all of these Neepper rules, and
you have to do the Environmental Species Act, and what
about the caterpillar? So we proposed a rule that said,
it's not about whether you're harming the habitat in some
emotional sense. You actually have to physically harm the animals
(21:23):
in order to trigger this law. So we're making a
lot of these regulatory changes that are going to expand building,
expand energy. We've already hosted all the major energy companies here.
They're very excited building pipeline in Alaska, finishing pipeline on
the East Coast, talking to governors there who are from
not friendly states, but who understand the national security needs.
(21:44):
So energy, I think is something that's under talked about
but has huge wins and actually will have huge implications.
Speaker 1 (21:51):
It's amazing how it's not talked about. When the price
of gas comes down, it's like, okay, it's better, But
when it's up, everybody wants to know who to blame. Well,
it's come down, and then the is like, great, we
don't have to talk about it anymore.
Speaker 3 (22:02):
Right, Even the cost of eggs is I think, down
three dollars from the time.
Speaker 1 (22:07):
Man, it was a big deal though at the beginning.
Remember go back one hundred days ago. Everything's Trump's fault.
Now no one's talking about the cost of.
Speaker 3 (22:13):
Eggs, right, and there are no shortages. And what Biden
did is he implemented a kill all the chickens strategy.
And so, of course when Biden kills all the chickens,
there are no chickens left, lay eggs. Not asking whether
you could do pasteurization, other types of things, you could
protect the you know, protect the flocks. Whatever kills all
the birds. And so then tries to blame President Trump.
(22:36):
But of course these are things that we are working
through in order to lower costs our deregulation costs. We
have twelve rules that have either been already rescinded or
being proposed to rescind that have a savings of fifty
billion dollars. So that's just easy deregulatory wins already in
the first one hundred days. So these types of things,
(22:58):
you know, maybe a deregulatory effort that says you no
longer have to purchase an EV won't affect you immediately,
but it'll affect you the next time you buy a
car and that car doesn't have an inflated price of
another ten to fifteen one thousand dollars. I think people
can remember how expensive things got, or the California EV
mandate where California basically gets to make the car rules
(23:19):
for half the country and we're saying no, California doesn't
get to do that anymore. So these are the types
of things that Americans are going to feel when they
may have those big purchases. You know, standards for shower heads,
washing machines, gas stoves, these types of things, expanding options furnaces,
water furnaces, these types of things that are deregulatory, giving
(23:39):
options for consumers and lowering prices.
Speaker 1 (23:41):
Final question for you looking for the next hundred days,
what do you think the biggest win is going to
be for the American people. Is that going to be
victories with trade?
Speaker 3 (23:49):
I think we can look forward to victories with trade.
I think deregulation is going to really kick in. We
have a ten to one deregulation mandate. It's not a goal,
it's a mandate in order to for UH to see this.
But then I think also we're going to see some
action from Congress. So Congress is going to push forward
its Reconciliation bill, which is going to have a solidify
(24:11):
a lot of our priorities, but some things that we
couldn't do administratively, things about you know, benefits that go
to illegal aliens that shouldn't these types of things, fixes
that we absolutely need. You're going to see that come
through Congress. So a lot of our focus right now
is shifting away from some of these must have administrative
wins to how can we lock those wins in with Congress.
(24:33):
It's a little bit difficult working with you know that
many people, but that's at least where my attention is
going right now.
Speaker 1 (24:40):
It's awesome. I appreciate your time. May Melman, Senior Policy Strate.
I just hear at the White House firste hundred days
of successes are big for the American people. You guys
are working hard, and there's a lot more to come
in and we'll obviously be chatting with you.
Speaker 2 (24:51):
Again real soon.
Speaker 3 (24:51):
All right, Thanks for having me.
Speaker 2 (24:53):
Don't forget.
Speaker 1 (24:53):
Share this podcast with your family and friends, share it
on social media, please, and I'll see you back here tomorrow.
Speaker 3 (25:00):
No,
Good morning, Welcome. It is the Ben Ferguson Podcast. Nice
to have you with us. We're live here at the
White House, and I guess with me now is May Melman,
senior policy strategist at the White House and a unique
perspective because she was in forty five in that administration,
you're now in forty seven. We were talking before the
show and I just let's just start with this because
(00:21):
I think it's so cool. This White House is running
at a different pace than it did with the first
time around.
Speaker 2 (00:28):
Part of that was learning government.
Speaker 1 (00:30):
I think part of it's having a team this time
that seems to be working as a team and just
seems like everyone wants to win and is getting along.
The leaks were not seeing like we did last time.
It seems like everybody's a team player. This is really
fun to watch from the outside. I was in the
Bush administration and it was in the second from four
to oho eight, and it was just a different type
(00:51):
of team than we had in.
Speaker 2 (00:52):
The first part.
Speaker 1 (00:54):
You got to enjoy watching the past and now the president.
Speaker 2 (00:57):
How cool is that for you? Yeah?
Speaker 3 (00:59):
I used to be jealous of what the Bush people
had in the sense that they still did reunions, and
they all hung out with each other and they you know,
we had our criticisms, certainly, but it felt like they
were all very unified. And I think during Trump one
point zero, people very much got along. It was friendly.
(01:19):
But people had come from different places. So you had
people who were campaign people, you had people who were
RNC people, you had people who were either longtime friends
of the family, these sort you know, everyone kind of
had their own different background. But now there is such
a thing as Trump World, and there are people who
have been here and those they've had relationships and they've
(01:39):
had ups and downs with each other, and so it
is easier to have everybody rowing in the same direction.
And I've had strange experiences that I never had during
the first time. So during the first time, I was
also writing a lot of executive orders, helping push a
lot of policies, and I would have to follow up
and follow up and follow up, and nothing would happen
at the speed and the pace and the level that
(02:02):
I wanted it to. Now, if I write something that's
very nuanced, I'm careful, Okay, we're not trying to do this.
People will just do it at the one hundred out
of ten, even though we just need a ten out
of ten. That's okay. So the excitement people have been planning,
people are ready to go, and it does feel very different,
even though it is actually a lot of the same people.
(02:23):
I'm working with a lot of the same people, but
it's just different this time.
Speaker 1 (02:26):
So let's talk about where we are one hundred days in.
You're here, your senior pology strategists. I think one of
the big things that people are witnessing right now they're
concerned about is the law fair. There is very clear
a movement by the left, by the Democrats to use
the court system and activist judges, their allies that they
(02:47):
know are clearly on their team, making sure they're filing
things in certain courts where they know it'll give them
a favorable opinion, which is against this White House and
trying to stop the president of a law fair. You
guys are fighting back. You work with Jason Miller. You
guys are out there hardcore going against this. Where are
we now and how big of a roadblock is this
going to be for Trump's agenda getting actually done well?
Speaker 3 (03:09):
The Democrats have no political strategy, they have no political leader,
they have no North Star. So all they have is
know and the place you go for no is the courts,
and so that's where all the money has been, that's
where the excitement is, that's where the investment is. Is
just no. There's some protests, there's blowing up tesla's, but
mostly it's in the courts. And I think the judges
(03:31):
are very excited. These are activists, these are longtime Democrat donors, partisans,
you know, they're part of the movement. They're excited to
actually be the leaders of the left right now. And
so yeah, it is a problem. I'm a lawyer. For
four years when I was not in the White House,
I was bringing lawsuits and the judges that we would get,
even if we were in conservative areas of the country
(03:53):
with very conservative judges, these were measured approaches. I'll just
take Title nine for example, twenty six states brought lawsuits
and I think eight different jurisdictions to challenge Biden's rewrite
of Title nine. Each one of those judges, every single one,
issued an injunction that was just narrowed to the parties
that had brought the suits. So there never was a
nationwide injunction, even with twenty six states in eight different lawsuits.
(04:17):
Compare that to here, where you just have any sort
of group. It's not states bringing these is just random people,
random activists, bringing these lawsuits and getting nationwide injunctions at
the TRO stage, the temporary restraining order stage, which is
not even assessment of the merits of whether you're right
or wrong. It's just, Hey, I'm the judge, and I
(04:39):
feel like doing this nationwide thing based not even on
the merits. I want to freeze the Trump administration from
doing anything. So this law fair is a serious, serious
problem in my opinion. I think that it violates the
job of the judiciary, which is to say what the
law is, not to become the policymaker. So I think
there's been some calls for MP and things like that.
(05:01):
You know, Congress should absolutely impeach judges who are not
doing their jobs. However, that's just not going to be
the solution. The solution, I think, is going to be
a reshaping of what it means to have judicial power,
whether that's coming from the Supreme Court, whether that's coming
from Congress, or whether that's coming from the administration. Just
saying you know what, if you are actually stepping into
the executive branch's power. We're not going to abide by it.
(05:25):
And so I think these judges are really playing with fire.
But they know it and they want it, and they
want to pick this fight because they feel the leadership
of the Democratic Party right now.
Speaker 1 (05:35):
Let's talk about trade, and that is a big issue
that is I think top of mind for virtually every American.
I have dear friends that knew I was going to
be here today, and I was like, they're dealing with this,
and they've got companies that are American companies, startups from
their garage that are now being affected because of this
trade war with China. They're very concerned about what they've built.
(05:58):
Where are we with this.
Speaker 2 (06:00):
Master plan from the President?
Speaker 1 (06:01):
It seems to me saying, hey, I want to get
great deals done with a lot of countries so that
we have much less dependence on China. This is about
reducing China's influence in the world, especially when it comes
to trade. Are we moving forward and when are we
going to start getting deals announced to calm the markets
but also the people that have businesses and how long
(06:25):
are they going to have to deal with this? Because
we saw yesterday it this is a good sign President
was meeting with top companies. They're meeting with Lows and
Home Depot and Walmarting Target about this trade war. That
could be good news, but also it could be bad
news depending on who you read and what you're being told.
We know the media wants us to be miserable. They
want to be fear mongering, They want this inflation issues
(06:45):
to happen. They want this to be a Trump disaster.
I don't see it that way though.
Speaker 2 (06:49):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (06:50):
I think the President's heart is where actually a lot
of Americans' hearts are, which is that we want to
be supply chain independent. We want to be able to
make our pharmaceuticals at home. We don't want to be
reliant on a country who is threatening to us. And
yet I think the President also is a very practical person.
(07:12):
He's a business person, He is a listener, and you
can see even from the changes to the original announcement
of reciprocal tariffs, that he wants to be in it
with allies to shore up our manufacturing against people who
do not have our best interests, including China. So while
(07:32):
I can't give a timeline for when you would see
an exact announcement, I can say that the White House
is in listening mode and we have been hearing from
people changes and those changes have already been implemented, whether
it has to do with lower tariffs on certain electronics
(07:52):
that we simply can't make we can't on shore quickly.
And then I think also part of the.
Speaker 1 (07:58):
Test to security, right, this is when I've asked, and
I've had leaders call me and like Ben, what is
he doing?
Speaker 2 (08:03):
Why is he doing this? And say, look, you've got
to look at this from two views.
Speaker 1 (08:07):
One is national security, and if you bring enough of
that back to the US, you don't have to be
the leader in the world, but you need to have
enough from a national security standpoint that if something happens
somewhere else in the world, you're still good.
Speaker 2 (08:16):
And that's part of what the president I think learn
from COVID.
Speaker 3 (08:19):
Yeah, and so from a national security standpoint, I think
the nation is pretty strong and we feel good there.
And so really it is focusing on small businesses and
the impact and it is alarming actually how tightly our
supply chains and how quickly they are connected to China, which,
of course you know something that we all know, which
(08:39):
is why the whole action exists. To begin with. But
nobody wants to harm American small businesses. What we want
is for China and the United States to find a
resolution and then of course to eventually work toward a
trade policy that is going to be best for our
(09:00):
national security, best for our economy. And you know, as
President Trump is going to be income tax replacement. And
it's a complicated thing, but no president has really taken
this on seriously. And year by year by year by year,
we become more reliant, less safe, less secure, less independent.
(09:25):
And it almost doesn't matter whether you have a southern
border or if the threat is coming in from your
nation's dependence. That said, I think, as you noted, the
President is in complete listening mode. So there is a
need to make sure that our small businesses and our
large businesses, and our supply chains and our consumers are
(09:45):
all accounted for. And these are conversations that are happening
every day in the White House. They're competing every day
in the agencies, at the US Trade Representative, at the
Department of Commerce, at the Department of Treasury, Farmers, at
the USDA. This is definitely the number one topic. This
is extremely important. Nobody's taking it lightly nobody's looking for,
(10:07):
you know, massive sacrifices. This is something that it's a
policy that needs to be fixed, it's something that needs
to be implemented. And yet I think you're going to
see reasonable policies being implemented that ent our country toward
a more secure posture.
Speaker 1 (10:25):
So when do we start to see I guess, and
you know, momentums everything, right, people say, when are we
going to start to see big announcements and hey, we've
got to deal with this country in that country. Are
we days away from that? Are we weeks away from that?
Because momentum is everything, and it makes pe feel better. Okay,
now we're having success, and now we're getting another one,
(10:47):
and now we're getting another one. We're about one hundred
days in here at the White House. What is that
rollout going to look like?
Speaker 3 (10:53):
Yeah, hard to say a number of days, but I
can say that those conversations with foreign countries are happening
right now, and so at some level, I think there
has been a lot of progress. You've already seen countries
make certain types of concessions, make changes, make promises, and
so it's locking those in. Sometimes that takes a little
(11:15):
bit of time from the other countries perspective in order
to get an announcement to reality. But it's so it's
all hands on deck right, it's presently happening.
Speaker 1 (11:25):
So I talked to an ambassador yesterday who said to me,
he said, look, we just want to know what the
new normal is, and that's what we're working on as
fast as we can with this White House, so that
we can continue to see businesses grow. The spirit from
that ambassador was not one of anger. It was almost
a spirit of hey, we know we were taking advantage
of you guys, so was the rest of the world.
Speaker 2 (11:46):
We did what the rest of the world did.
Speaker 1 (11:47):
This is a smaller country and I don't want to
name it because it was in confidence, but he was
basically admitting, like, hey, we followed the lead of other
countries as they wore taking advantage. We were a little
lower than they were. But it was like why not
that this is what the world looks like in the trade.
Speaker 2 (12:02):
And he was.
Speaker 1 (12:02):
Admitting, we're willing to totally redo this thing. We want
to get it done because we want to keep doing
business with America.
Speaker 2 (12:09):
We love doing business.
Speaker 1 (12:10):
He wasn't even upset, and that gave me I think
a lot of hope that like, there's a lot of
company countries I should say, that are coming to the
table who are saying, we know this deal is going
to get redone. In other words, we know that the
price is one described to me the day they go.
Speaker 2 (12:23):
We know, if you live in.
Speaker 1 (12:24):
A house under a lease for a long time, ten
years later, there's a very good chance there's going to
be a major change in what you're paying. They all
know that they're accepting it, and so that to me,
sin is a signal of something good coming.
Speaker 3 (12:36):
Yeah, the new normal. You know, for the present time,
there is that ten percent rate which is sort of
a baseline that I think people have accepted and that
the market celebrated when when President Trump first announced it.
And then you know, as far as there are certain
countries who are willing to help us out and do
(12:57):
additional things else alvare take for example, there are countries
that I think are trying to either lock in those
rates or secure more favorable deals. But you know, not
there are a lot of countries out there who want
to have those conversations. Those conversations are all happening, I
would say, starting with like a group of twenty or
(13:20):
so right now and then moving on, moving on, moving on,
And I think the President has signaled multiple times he's
willing to have those conversations with China, and so that's
something that if the you know, Chinese are here to
make a deal, that that can happen as well. But
even for small countries, just because you're small does not
(13:42):
mean they're forgotten. I think these are going to happen
just on their own time.
Speaker 1 (13:48):
Let's move to another issue that I think is really important,
and that is the fight for the president. He has
done this in sports gender ideology, has been saying. He said,
we're going to protect when we're going to protect women
and women's sports. We're not backing down on that issue.
You look at the president doing this. Democrats do feel
like in some states this is a fight worth fighting
for them. They're trying to rally the troops. As you
(14:10):
mentioned earlier, there is no leader of the Democratic Party
right now. That the party of just no because no
one's in charge. It's totally anarchy and chaos. But they
are trying to find an issue to hone in on.
I think they believe that this gender ideology issue is
one that can at least rally their core base, and
they're saying, we're not going to abide by what you're
telling us to do. Mister President, go ahead and sue,
(14:32):
we'll see you in court. We heard that, but said
from a governor at the White House, like, we'll see
you great, can't wait to see you in court. Where
are we now with that? Because there are still men
acting like women, that are still getting to play with
women as we speak in some states.
Speaker 3 (14:45):
Right, so it is about to be high school championship season,
and you're already seeing a lot of men at the
regional level, and beyond take trophies from women. You're not
seeing it from the college level because these colleges know
that the NCAA policy requires sex based participation in women's sports.
(15:07):
That doesn't mean you can change your birth certificate. That
means it's based on sex. And this is something that
the NCAA has picked up the phone and enforced when
they feel like something has gone on. So we need
but there's no similar structure at the state level. So
each state is governed by its own state Athletic Association,
and the Trump administration has started investigations into several of them,
(15:29):
into California, into Minnesota, Maine, we filed a lawsuit. First ever,
it has never before happened that a school has lost
its money because of a Title nine violation from the
federal government.
Speaker 2 (15:42):
Why never, That's amazing.
Speaker 3 (15:43):
Never in the history of Title nine since nineteen seventy two.
Speaker 2 (15:45):
Never there've been.
Speaker 3 (15:46):
Private lawsuits where people have had to pay private judgments,
but never has the federal government had to come down
on a school and take their federal money. Why because
usually when the Feds come asking, hey, will you stop
discriminating against women, the schools like sure, I'd love to
stop discriminating against women. It is wild to me that Maine,
this is a very simple ask, can you just not
(16:07):
have men in women's sports? Main won't do it, and
their governor has doubled, tripled down, And then other states
like California, same deal. Colorado is not only allowing men
in women's sports, but they're now gonna disallow you from
calling a parent from calling his or her own child
the correct pronouns because that's child abuse. So I think
(16:32):
you are going to see a divide and we're not
going to actually just sit by and take it. Title
nine is a nineteen seventy two law that says that
in education programs, you cannot discriminate against women. You have
to have equal opportunity. You are not providing women equal
opportunity if you're saying, Okay, yeah you can come here,
but you have to use the bathroom with men. Yeah
you can come to our school, but there will be
(16:53):
no women's sports because you are unequally harming them privacy wise,
you're unequally harming them say wise competitive and so these
I think are very easy winnable cases. Will take them
all the way up to the Supreme Court if they
need to be. But we're going to make some examples
out of some states that continue to double down on
gender ideology, even though the American public eighty twenty is
(17:16):
the other way you.
Speaker 2 (17:18):
Look at what the fight looks like.
Speaker 1 (17:20):
I have a feeling this is going to be for
years because they're just not going to stop. And you're
saying that the White House has a commitment that we're
not going to let them get away and just isolate
and do what they want to do, and that maybe
a liberal university or a liberal state exactly.
Speaker 3 (17:33):
So if if they want to not take federal money, so.
Speaker 1 (17:38):
If you yeah, fine, do your thing. It's like, Harvard,
please give us our tax dollers back. I'd love for
you to operate as a radical left university and just
admit it, exactly.
Speaker 3 (17:45):
And so this is not some sort of federal takeover
of anything. This is the taxpayers have given you a deal.
And the deal is if you take billions of dollars,
then you're not going to discriminate against women. And we're
just here to enforce that deal. But for states that
spend billions of dollars on illegal immigrant health care, like California,
they can afford to fund their schools. The federal government
(18:06):
actually is a pretty small percentage of school funding. Most
of it, as you know, is your property taxes that
are local. So it is perfectly possible for states to
fund their own education system, and they would like to
do that and discriminate against women on their own time.
Titlenine has nothing to say about that. Their own state
statutes probably have something to say about that, but Title
(18:28):
nine itself does not. And so that's all we're trying
to do is enforce the deal. And I think Democrats
had a really big opportunity after the election, after they
they took a huge loss because they were too progressive.
And you could hear Seth Moulton and some of these
people saying, maybe we should be more moderate, and I said, no,
they're not going to do that. They can't, and sure
(18:48):
enough they can't. They are owned by their left flank
because they just don't have any leaderships. So this is
going to continue to happen, and we're going to continue
to say fine, no federal funding.
Speaker 1 (18:58):
My guess to me is, may Melman, is your policy
strateger just here at the White House. Let's talk about
the first hundred days, and what are your top just
takeaways if you're checking boxes. I think for me, number
one is the border and I think that has just
been an amazing success to watch border crossings drop by
ninety seven, ninety eight, nine nine percent, whatever the number
is now, it keeps changing. So I want to you know,
(19:18):
it's why I'm giving a little leeway there. Some fact
checker out there will freak out, no, you got it
wrong by decimal point. It's the reality that this is
something he promised and paid off on. But there's a
lot of other wins right now that have not been
talked about in the media specifically.
Speaker 3 (19:33):
So I will just say one of the biggest wins
is our energy agenda, the drill, Baby drill. I think
it's harder to see wins here because some permits take
a long time to actually turn in to a project,
but when you see what's actually happening. So Biden said
for LNGX Sports, we're not going to issue any new permits.
(19:55):
We have already issued four new permits. Biden said, we're
not going to do any coal leasing. We've opened up
federal lands for coal leasing, and we've rescinded regulations that
are preventing coal's mines from moving forward, and several have
already either announced or already opened up. I think you're
(20:15):
going to see a lot of news coming very soon
on this crazy thing called the social cost of carbon,
which basically said that if you want a new project,
you have to present to the government as a cost
of your project, the carbon that you would use to
build the project, and then the carbon that would be
created from your project. Meaning no projects could ever move
(20:36):
forward because it would seem like it was just going
to be so costly, so terrible. These are, of course
invented things about what's going to happen in three hundred years.
I don't even know what the weather's going to be tomorrow.
And so I think that you're going to see a
lot of positive movement there. The Endangered Species Act, I'll
do one more. For years, you can't build anything because
if you hurt the butterfly's habitat, you can't have a project.
(20:59):
And so Biden spent all this money on the Inflation
Reduction Act, and we're going to build this and this
and this billions of dollars. Nothing was built. Why, well,
you have to do all of these Neepper rules, and
you have to do the Environmental Species Act, and what
about the caterpillar? So we proposed a rule that said,
it's not about whether you're harming the habitat in some
emotional sense. You actually have to physically harm the animals
(21:23):
in order to trigger this law. So we're making a
lot of these regulatory changes that are going to expand building,
expand energy. We've already hosted all the major energy companies here.
They're very excited building pipeline in Alaska, finishing pipeline on
the East Coast, talking to governors there who are from
not friendly states, but who understand the national security needs.
(21:44):
So energy, I think is something that's under talked about
but has huge wins and actually will have huge implications.
Speaker 1 (21:51):
It's amazing how it's not talked about. When the price
of gas comes down, it's like, okay, it's better, But
when it's up, everybody wants to know who to blame. Well,
it's come down, and then the is like, great, we
don't have to talk about it anymore.
Speaker 3 (22:02):
Right, Even the cost of eggs is I think, down
three dollars from the time.
Speaker 1 (22:07):
Man, it was a big deal though at the beginning.
Remember go back one hundred days ago. Everything's Trump's fault.
Now no one's talking about the cost of.
Speaker 3 (22:13):
Eggs, right, and there are no shortages. And what Biden
did is he implemented a kill all the chickens strategy.
And so, of course when Biden kills all the chickens,
there are no chickens left, lay eggs. Not asking whether
you could do pasteurization, other types of things, you could
protect the you know, protect the flocks. Whatever kills all
the birds. And so then tries to blame President Trump.
(22:36):
But of course these are things that we are working
through in order to lower costs our deregulation costs. We
have twelve rules that have either been already rescinded or
being proposed to rescind that have a savings of fifty
billion dollars. So that's just easy deregulatory wins already in
the first one hundred days. So these types of things,
(22:58):
you know, maybe a deregulatory effort that says you no
longer have to purchase an EV won't affect you immediately,
but it'll affect you the next time you buy a
car and that car doesn't have an inflated price of
another ten to fifteen one thousand dollars. I think people
can remember how expensive things got, or the California EV
mandate where California basically gets to make the car rules
(23:19):
for half the country and we're saying no, California doesn't
get to do that anymore. So these are the types
of things that Americans are going to feel when they
may have those big purchases. You know, standards for shower heads,
washing machines, gas stoves, these types of things, expanding options furnaces,
water furnaces, these types of things that are deregulatory, giving
(23:39):
options for consumers and lowering prices.
Speaker 1 (23:41):
Final question for you looking for the next hundred days,
what do you think the biggest win is going to
be for the American people. Is that going to be
victories with trade?
Speaker 3 (23:49):
I think we can look forward to victories with trade.
I think deregulation is going to really kick in. We
have a ten to one deregulation mandate. It's not a goal,
it's a mandate in order to for UH to see this.
But then I think also we're going to see some
action from Congress. So Congress is going to push forward
its Reconciliation bill, which is going to have a solidify
(24:11):
a lot of our priorities, but some things that we
couldn't do administratively, things about you know, benefits that go
to illegal aliens that shouldn't these types of things, fixes
that we absolutely need. You're going to see that come
through Congress. So a lot of our focus right now
is shifting away from some of these must have administrative
wins to how can we lock those wins in with Congress.
(24:33):
It's a little bit difficult working with you know that
many people, but that's at least where my attention is
going right now.
Speaker 1 (24:40):
It's awesome. I appreciate your time. May Melman, Senior Policy Strate.
I just hear at the White House firste hundred days
of successes are big for the American people. You guys
are working hard, and there's a lot more to come
in and we'll obviously be chatting with you.
Speaker 2 (24:51):
Again real soon.
Speaker 3 (24:51):
All right, Thanks for having me.
Speaker 2 (24:53):
Don't forget.
Speaker 1 (24:53):
Share this podcast with your family and friends, share it
on social media, please, and I'll see you back here tomorrow.
Speaker 3 (25:00):
No,
Host
Ben Ferguson
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Decisions, Decisions
Welcome to "Decisions, Decisions," the podcast where boundaries are pushed, and conversations get candid! Join your favorite hosts, Mandii B and WeezyWTF, as they dive deep into the world of non-traditional relationships and explore the often-taboo topics surrounding dating, sex, and love. Every Monday, Mandii and Weezy invite you to unlearn the outdated narratives dictated by traditional patriarchal norms. With a blend of humor, vulnerability, and authenticity, they share their personal journeys navigating their 30s, tackling the complexities of modern relationships, and engaging in thought-provoking discussions that challenge societal expectations. From groundbreaking interviews with diverse guests to relatable stories that resonate with your experiences, "Decisions, Decisions" is your go-to source for open dialogue about what it truly means to love and connect in today's world. Get ready to reshape your understanding of relationships and embrace the freedom of authentic connections—tune in and join the conversation!