50 Shades of Legal Gray
Pod Save America
Pod Save America
4.5 • 87.2K Ratings
🗓️ 24 May 2026
⏱️ 67 minutes
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Summary
Norm Eisen, President Obama's "ethics czar" and founder of Democracy Defenders, talks to Alex Wagner about Trump's latest avalanche of corruption: the $1.8 billion slush fund to pay off Jan. 6 rioters, the IRS immunity announcement, the ballroom, the reflecting pool renovation, the 3,000-plus stock trades placed while in office, and, unfortunately, much more. Together, they unpack how Democrats in Congress — or lawyers outside of it — could stop Trump's slush fund, and what impact this onslaught of self-enrichment, cronyism, and taxpayer abuse may have on the midterm elections.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Welcome to Pod Save America. I'm Alex Wagner. I know some of you may be tuning in today, |
| 0:25.0 | expecting our conversation with the Michigan Senate candidates on the Democratic side. Well, |
| 0:29.8 | unfortunately, you're going to have to wait just a little bit longer. We had to reschedule that |
| 0:34.4 | conversation to accommodate for an unexpected change in candidate schedules. |
| 0:39.7 | But do not worry. |
| 0:41.0 | We are setting a new date and we will have more on that very, very soon. |
| 0:44.3 | So stand by. |
| 0:45.9 | Today, instead, I wanted to focus on the avalanche of corruption. |
| 0:50.3 | Some folks might just call it theft coming out of the White House. |
| 0:57.5 | The $1.8 billion slush fund to pay off January 6th rioters. The announcement that the president and his family are now immune from |
| 1:02.6 | IRS investigations, the ballroom slash bunker slash money pit, the reflecting pool, the president's |
| 1:09.5 | 3,000 plus stock trades while in office, the self-enrichment, |
| 1:14.8 | the cronyism, the taxpayer abuse, all of it has hit new heights, or should I say new lows. |
| 1:21.0 | And I wanted to talk to someone who could help me make sense of all of this, but also about what |
| 1:25.3 | Democrats in Congress and lawyers outside of it can do to fight back. |
| 1:30.4 | Joining me for that conversation is the incredible Norma Eisen, founder of the Democracy |
| 1:34.7 | Defenders Fund and former Special Counsel to the president for ethics and government reform |
| 1:39.4 | in the Obama administration. There is truly no better expert in America on White House corruption than |
| 1:46.0 | Norm Eisen. We are going to get to that conversation in just a moment. But before we do, |
| 1:51.6 | I want to remind you that CrookedCon 2026 tickets are on sale now. Come hang with us, |
| 1:58.2 | November 5th through 7th in Washington, D.C. for live shows and panels and meetups and more. I will be there and you should be there too. Get tickets at crookedcon.com. And if you like what you hear today, please do check out my show also on Crooked, called a runaway country where every week I talk to people at the center of |
| 2:18.5 | the headlines. We just published, I think, a pretty awesome, if disconcerting episode where I |
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