some songs: Stephanie Ruhle On The CHAOS Trump's Caused w/ NATO

Speaker 1: Stephanie Ruhl, Davos matters.

Speaker 1: Davos matters now in a way that it didn't.

Speaker 1: What happened this week?

Speaker 2: You know, it's so funny.

Speaker 2: It's so funny.

Speaker 2: I've been to Davos, I don't know, seven or eight times.

Speaker 2: And for a long time, it really was sort of this elite, elite, just business people.

Speaker 2: They were world leaders, but kind of like more obscure ones with a very big focus on philanthropy.

Speaker 2: And there still is.

Speaker 2: The irony is Davos mattered so much this year because so many people of influence went.

Speaker 2: But even though they went, what the World Economic Forum has always claimed that Davos was about is, you know, creating the integrated, collaborative, you know, world of the future.

Speaker 2: The sustainable world of the future flies in the face of exactly where we are today.

Speaker 2: Right. The fact that President Trump blew it.

Speaker 2: Well, actually, I'm going to back it up.

Speaker 2: I watched Stephen A. Smith this week dunk on Gavin Newsom, just trash him saying, how dare Gavin Newsom on European soil go to Davos and say anything negative about our president?

Speaker 2: You know, almost like the, you know, my family, almost like my Catholic family.

Speaker 2: You know, we can crush each other inside the house.

Speaker 2: But as soon as we open the front door, we have to have a united front.

Speaker 2: And I'm kind of like, you could dog on Gavin Newsom for criticizing the president.

Speaker 2: Or by the same token, the president went to Davos and on European soil insulted everything and everyone.

Speaker 2: Practically declared war on Mark Carney.

Speaker 2: While so many business leaders and world leaders were there scratching their heads saying, have we just redefined the world order?

Speaker 2: I actually think on some level, it's a comfort when they hear from other government leaders from the United States saying, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.

Speaker 2: Like, yeah, we don't feel that way.

Speaker 2: We still are committed to the NATO alliance.

Speaker 2: Right. So even if we backed off our threats against Greenland, if you're any of these countries, do you believe it?

Speaker 2: Right. Like, I don't think that Donald Trump truly changed his view on what we should do about Greenland.

Speaker 2: He just got a drastically negative response, much like Liberation Day last year when the bond market said, uh-uh, this isn't going to work, Donnie.

Speaker 2: The same thing happened this week.

Speaker 1: So I want to go to this precedent because of this New World Order idea.

Speaker 1: Mark Carney, the PM of Canada, gave this amazing speech.

Speaker 1: And let me just be clear.

Speaker 2: I don't know if you know him.

Speaker 2: I know Mark Carney.

Speaker 2: He's a fantastic guy.

Speaker 2: He's a smart guy.

Speaker 2: Mark Carney has never been this exciting in his whole entire life.

Speaker 2: And explain why that is, because he's not a normal politician, right?

Speaker 2: No. Oh, my goodness. He's an Ivy League educated. He came from the banking world.

Speaker 2: He's a true, highly educated centrist that had it not been for the right wing pendulum swing, you know, for the pendulum swinging so far to the right.

Speaker 2: Suddenly, Canada was like, oh, hey, like we got to stop getting cute with like big changes and aspirations.

Speaker 2: And we need to just put a grown up who's going to say, let's lower the temperature.

Speaker 2: And that's what Mark Carney is doing.

Speaker 1: Mark Carney gives the speech because you're go because I just want to like narrate.

Speaker 1: Gives the speech. It's an amazing speech.

Speaker 1: It's like very sort of the kind of speech a gifted orator gives.

Speaker 1: And it does not ever mention the United States by name.

Speaker 2: Go. No.

Speaker 2: It does not ever mention the United States name.

Speaker 2: Unlike Donald Trump, who the next day was trying to say Greenland by name, but not once, not twice.

Speaker 2: But I actually think four times called it Iceland.

Speaker 2: And then his press secretary tried to say that we were incorrect.

Speaker 2: And no, Press Secretary Levitt, there's a video.

Speaker 2: He called it Iceland.

Speaker 2: I thought two times.

Speaker 2: My colleague said four.

Speaker 2: In Donald Trump's first term, he was oftentimes very frustrated.

Speaker 2: You know, people used to joke he's in his bed with a Diet Coke and a cheeseburger watching TV angry.

Speaker 2: He's not angry because he had the likes of Gary Cohn or Steve Mnuchin or H.R. McMaster, Rex Tillerson, take your pick.

Speaker 2: Even Bill Barr saying, no, sir, I get that's what you want to do, but that's not what we can do.

Speaker 2: We have to follow the rule of law. That's not how government works.

Speaker 2: Well, now in Trump 2.0, it's Shangri-La, right?

Speaker 2: It's funny.

Speaker 2: Trump is a salesman who will sell you anything at a whim, but he is surrounded by true MAGA

Speaker 2: zealots who are like three equal branches of government.

Speaker 2: Be damned.

Speaker 2: You know, we're here for Trump nation.

Speaker 2: And so no one inside that White House has said to him, there's no reason for us to acquire

Speaker 2: Greenland.

Speaker 2: They will even the notion of like, we've got the framework of a deal.

Speaker 2: What's in it?

Speaker 2: You could have had whatever you wanted.

Speaker 2: Right. Right. Basically, we have whatever we want already from Greenland. And if we want more, they're going to say yes. So this entire exercise, while I'm sure it pleased Vladimir Putin, who would love to shake NATO like you always have to remember, go back in time.

Speaker 2: Ukraine would like to be a member of NATO. Russia is not a member of NATO. And so Vladimir Putin

Speaker 2: loves to see NATO getting rocked or disturbed in any way. Now, you do have to give Donald Trump

Speaker 2: some credit on the NATO front. Things get sleepy in these organizations. And had Donald Trump not

Speaker 2: shaken the cage and said, hey, you sleepy countries, you got to pay up. And we saw more countries do so.

Speaker 2: Right. We do have significantly more power than our European allies. But I just think when Donald

Speaker 2: Trump and Pete Hegseth say they can't touch our military might, they're right. But if all of those

Speaker 2: countries and if all of those investors and if investors around the world say, you know what,

Speaker 2: we're just going to dump all of our positions in U.S. Treasuries, we don't think you're the biggest,

Speaker 1: safest bet anymore, that would be very bad. Right. And it'll make money much more expensive

Speaker 1: and it'll change the way our whole country works. But I want you to talk, I want to go back just for

Speaker 1: another second on the new world order. So Donald Trump comes in. He says, you know, we're going to

Speaker 1: go to war with Greenland. We're going to do this. We're going to do that. Carney says we are the

Speaker 1: small countries need to band together because if you're not at the table, you're on the menu.

Speaker 1: Is it a new world order coming out of Davos? I don't know that it's a new world order because

Speaker 2: Donald Trump can change his tune at any moment. And the truth is all of these countries don't want

Speaker 2: the world order changed, right? They're really unhappy with what Trump is doing.

Speaker 2: But as much as Mark Carney could say, we got to get together and do this on our own, boys and

Speaker 2: girls, they'll do it if they have to. They'll do it if Trump's threats are real. They don't want to,

Speaker 2: right? Like, again, let's be clear. It's expensive. These European, most of these European leaders,

Speaker 2: they're not very popular. Like they're dealing with the same political divides in their countries

Speaker 2: that we are.

Speaker 2: They've got slower economic growth than we do.

Speaker 2: Take tourism out.

Speaker 2: A lot of those countries are suffering.

Speaker 2: So could they band together

Speaker 2: and figure out how they're going to do this?

Speaker 2: They could, but they don't want to.

Speaker 1: Right.

Speaker 1: And I think that's a really good point.

Speaker 1: And it's also, it's expensive.

Speaker 1: It's a problem.

Speaker 1: You know, there's all sorts of weird problems.

Speaker 1: I do want to ask you, though,

Speaker 1: like it does feel like America is more isolated,

Speaker 1: especially coming into Davos,

Speaker 1: to have Canada make this deal with China for EVs, Mark Carney.

Speaker 1: Like, then you have Canadians protesting not visiting America.

Speaker 1: Like, how much do you think this actually affects our economy?

Speaker 2: Listen, all of it is affecting our economy, right?

Speaker 2: Donald Trump's number one economic policy has been the tariffs, okay?

Speaker 2: And what even happened last year?

Speaker 2: We saw 90 or even more than 90 percent of the costs incurred because of the tariffs were from American businesses and American consumers.

Speaker 2: Right. That weighs on our economy. We were going to be bringing back manufacturing jobs.

Speaker 2: We lost 68000 manufacturing jobs. Now, what you can say.

Speaker 2: Yeah, but now the economic outlook looks better this year.

Speaker 2: The economic outlook looks better thanks to A.I.

Speaker 2: What we really have is this divided economy and other people have talked about it, this K economy.

Speaker 2: And to me, coming out of last year, going into 2026, that K economy is only getting more exaggerated.

Speaker 1: So the K economy means that the big part of that K is the 20 percent or 10 percent of the richest.

Speaker 1: Explain that.

Speaker 1: Yes.

Speaker 1: Can you explain the K?

Speaker 2: It's the rich have gotten richer and the poor have gotten poorer.

Speaker 2: Right.

Speaker 2: So now the average age of a first time home buyer is 40 years old.

Speaker 2: If you're someone who owns a home, if you're someone who owns assets, who owns stocks, the value of all of those things went up and up and up.

Speaker 2: But if you're not, if you do not own a home, if you're somebody who got out of college and you're saddled with college debt and there's no jobs for you, you're suffering.

Speaker 2: If you're somebody in America who inflation is truly making your day-to-day life more difficult, it's a problem.

Speaker 2: This is how the spirit, this is why the same spirit elects Donald Trump in 2016 and Zahra

Speaker 2: Mamdani in 2025, right?

Speaker 2: Wildly different men, but who were speaking to people saying, are you left out and are

Speaker 2: you sick of this?

Speaker 2: The government doesn't work for you.

Speaker 2: Now, the difference is that 2026 Donald Trump, I don't even think he attempts to speak to

Speaker 2: or deliver for his base.

Speaker 2: Donald Trump is not running again. He is making right. New York Times reported that in the last year he made one point four billion dollars personally. I would venture a guess the number is significantly higher than that. Yeah. And he is surrounded by really what have become American oligarchs, how wealthy the wealthiest ring of people have become.

Speaker 2: And what Donald Trump isn't addressing or talking about, right, is he saying anything to us truly about health care?

Speaker 2: No, he's not.

Speaker 2: Inflation is cooling, but we're not in good shape.

Speaker 2: All of these issues that affect the American people, the root of MAGA, let's stop focusing on the outside and start focusing on the inside.

Speaker 2: We're not doing that.

Speaker 2: No.

Speaker 2: And so it's going to be so interesting to see like true MAGA zealots love all things Donald Trump, love his brand.

Speaker 2: But people who voted for him who are just sick of the system, he's not keeping them.

Speaker 2: And then there's that one other group.

Speaker 2: You know, last weekend I was driving in upstate New York and there were some sort of Trump nation flags.

Speaker 2: And then, you know, further ones, you know, just like free speech now.

Speaker 2: I just keep thinking about free speech now.

Speaker 2: One thing that came out of Davos, what are business leaders doing?

Speaker 2: Self-censoring.

Speaker 2: Davos is the one place where they love to get on the stage, voice their opinions about anything, everything.

Speaker 2: You know, they're blah, blah, blah.

Speaker 2: They're quiet as a church mouse, right?

Speaker 2: Because these business leaders know they're in a tricky position, right?

Speaker 2: They need to serve their customers.

Speaker 2: They need to serve their shareholders.

Speaker 2: And if you say anything against the president, he's coming for you.

Speaker 2: And we saw this in cold blood yesterday.

Speaker 2: With Jamie Dimon.

Speaker 2: So Jamie Dimon, who is far, far, far, far from woke.

Speaker 2: Right.

Speaker 2: Far from woke.

Speaker 1: And he even said he liked Trump stuff on immigration, right?

Speaker 1: Yes.

Speaker 2: This time last year, he spoke in Davos and basically compared the far right to the far left and said the far left needs to stop talking so crazy.

Speaker 2: And people were super upset about him.

Speaker 2: But this week he spoke some plain truths and said about ice, right, about saying he liked that Donald Trump was closing the border.

Speaker 2: And lots of people do. But he said watching five grown men tackle a woman on her way to work.

Speaker 2: I don't think so. Right. So he spoke out against that.

Speaker 2: Then one of Donald Trump's sort of new ideas on affordability is to cap credit card rates.

Speaker 2: OK, so you're not going to pay high interest rates. And Jamie Dimon said, great, that will lead to economic.

Speaker 2: disaster because if they cap credit card rates, credit card companies say, OK, fine.

Speaker 2: But then they're just not going to extend credit to lots and lots of Americans.

Speaker 2: Right.

Speaker 2: If you have a lower credit rating, they're going to say, sorry, it's too risky for me

Speaker 2: to lend to you.

Speaker 2: And then the third thing that Jamie Dimon did was when all of the companies, my parent

Speaker 2: company included, ponied up 10, 20, 30 million dollars for the East Wing Ballroom, Jamie

Speaker 2: Dimon said no.

Speaker 2: He said, no, because whomever the next administration is, if they're not Republicans, they're going to come and sue all of us that this was some kind of crooked bribery.

Speaker 2: Right.

Speaker 2: And what does Donald Trump do?

Speaker 2: He goes and sues the biggest, baddest CEO out there.

Speaker 2: And I guarantee lots of other business leaders are like, shit, shoot.

Speaker 2: You know, Jamie Dimon's getting sued for five billion dollars.

Speaker 2: Like there are there's few CEOs out there that sort of have the cojones, the power Jamie Dimon does.

Speaker 2: So loads of others are looking from the wings saying, I'm going to keep my mouth shut and my head down.

Speaker 2: And that's really scary when people don't stand up for the truth, when they don't stand up for democracy, when they don't say things are whack.

Speaker 2: Do you remember how outspoken Jeff Bezos was about saying Joe Biden didn't understand inflation?

Speaker 2: What has Jeff Bezos said about Donald Trump's understanding of the economy?

Speaker 2: Because we just heard from Amazon that we're going to start to see the impact of tariffs on their prices.

Speaker 2: Where are you, Jeff Bezos?

Speaker 1: Yeah, it's a good question. And remember, Amazon had wanted to have a little tariff calculator and then Trump had said no. Remember that?

Speaker 2: Forget it. Forget it. We're not going to do that.

Speaker 1: I think it's so interesting what you're talking about, like these billionaires not being brave, being scared.

Speaker 1: Earlier today, I did Morning Joe and I was talking to Senator Richard Blumenthal. I was saying, you know, does anyone stand up to him in the Senate? And he was saying no.

Speaker 1: But then he said something which I thought was really interesting, which was he said, you know, they said Greenland doesn't know.

Speaker 1: Like there are certain things that they were like, you can't do that.

Speaker 2: So when Greenland was like really on the table this week, I was speed dialing all my sources in the hedge fund community that wrap themselves in pretzels to defend Trump.

Speaker 2: Defending Trump. Yeah.

Speaker 2: And let me tell you, I was dialing up 1-800-GREENLAND like, hey.

Speaker 2: And nobody and people are avoiding my calls. They're doing their homework. Nobody wanted. I mean, because they just know it makes absolutely no sense. And even, Mal, if you make the argument, well, they have these rare earth minerals. We can still get them like it just. And so I think.

Speaker 2: Trump more than blinked. He was embarrassed. Like, sure. Stephen Miller's wife could make a post that shows, oh, my gosh, what if we had this country in this country?

Speaker 2: What would that map look like? And Donald Trump can, you know, the picture of, you know, American flag on Canada, American flag on Greenland, American flag on Venezuela.

Speaker 2: and then the business community is saying what why would we need to do that we're already getting

Speaker 2: everything we want and and forget the business community maga go back to to you know the original

Speaker 2: marjorie taylor green maga wasn't the whole idea we wanted to cut off usaid because we didn't care

Speaker 2: about other countries right right we don't care about other countries we don't we don't care about

Speaker 2: wars in other countries we don't care about aid in other countries it's america it's america first

Speaker 2: and you could not make a cogent argument

Speaker 2: around why Greenland made sense.

Speaker 2: But to the point about silenced billionaires,

Speaker 2: think about how different the world is, right?

Speaker 2: Donald Trump even said in his remarks at the White House

Speaker 2: the day before he left Davos,

Speaker 2: he was half joking about the Gulf of Mexico.

Speaker 2: And he said, well, it's Gulf of America.

Speaker 2: I actually wanted to be the Gulf of Trump.

Speaker 2: But, you know, I would have gotten killed for that.

Speaker 2: This is how far he's come

Speaker 2: and how quiet and accepting we have become.

Speaker 2: Trump 1.0, you had apartment buildings in New York City

Speaker 2: stripping his name off.

Speaker 2: Suing people who live, pulling down the T-R-U-M-P,

Speaker 2: taking his name off buildings because they didn't want to be there.

Speaker 2: And now it's like, well, let Trump be Trump.

Speaker 2: Just call it the Gulf of Trump.

Speaker 2: I mean, call it the Gulf of America.

Speaker 1: But I believe, and I could be wrong,

Speaker 1: but from looking at the polling and looking at this sort of pushback

Speaker 1: seeing in places like Minnesota. I actually think what we have here is an elite that is willing to

Speaker 1: go along to get along. Billionaires who are happy to do it. Politicians who are pathetic sycophants,

Speaker 2: but that actually the American people are not happy. Okay. And then there's another group.

Speaker 2: I think you're 100% right. And I'm going to go to those billionaires first for a second.

Speaker 2: Even though so many of them know better, those that are truly in that circle, Molly, these people are making so much money.

Speaker 2: Yep.

Speaker 2: It's the taxes.

Speaker 2: It's more than the taxes.

Speaker 2: It's the taxes.

Speaker 2: It's a hype deal.

Speaker 2: I mean, I was talking to a business guy I knew for years who's like, well, I'm focused really in Baku now.

Speaker 2: And I'm like, where?

Speaker 2: And, you know, oh, I'm working with Whitcoff.

Speaker 2: I'm working with this.

Speaker 2: There are so many, right?

Speaker 2: The John Colson's of the world are making so much money, Russia style, that they're all in.

Speaker 2: Okay.

Speaker 2: Cantor Fitzgerald, Howard Lutnick's firm, has never made as much money as the, I mean,

Speaker 2: I'm shocked.

Speaker 2: I am shocked to hear.

Speaker 1: Wouldn't you love to know?

Speaker 2: That the dumbest person from New York.

Speaker 1: Sorry, go on.

Speaker 2: Wouldn't you love to know who had inside information, who had early information on what

Speaker 2: Trump was going to announce about Greenland this week. I would sure like to know. So there's that

Speaker 2: group. But I actually think the group, and they don't want to admit it, that really is in a tricky

Speaker 2: seat, are corporate leaders. Yeah. Right. Are our law firms because they do watch polling. They do

Speaker 2: take the polls. Right. So so they now figure out that. So they need to figure out how do I not

Speaker 2: alienate Trump, but how do I get with where the future is going? Because again, most CEOs,

Speaker 2: what their political views are, are for the most part kept private. They have three things they

Speaker 2: need to do, right? They need their customers to keep buying their products, they need their

Speaker 2: employees not to quit, and they need their shareholders smiling. And they don't want to

Speaker 2: weigh in on politics. It's gotten so difficult they're forced to, but now things are tricky

Speaker 2: because you have a president who is demanding money and loyalty and public praise.

Speaker 2: And he's falling further and further.

Speaker 2: And what's his approval rating right now?

Speaker 2: 32, 35?

Speaker 1: It's the lowest.

Speaker 1: I mean, it's pretty much his.

Speaker 1: It's a race to the bottom.

Speaker 1: Step rule.

Speaker 1: That was really fun.

Speaker 1: You're the best.

Speaker 1: I'll see you later.

some songs

Saturday, January 24, 2026

Stephanie Ruhle On The CHAOS Trump's Caused w/ NATO

Stephanie Ruhle On The CHAOS Trump's Caused w/ NATO

Stephanie Ruhle On The CHAOS Trump's Caused w/ NATO

Fast Politics w/ Molly Jong-Fast

Transcript

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