A post-presidency like no other
Post Reports
The Washington Post
4.4 • 5.1K Ratings
🗓️ 10 November 2021
⏱️ ? minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Today, we’re taking a closer look at the state of Donald Trump post-presidency — his businesses, his finances, the ongoing criminal investigations into his actions and how all of those things could affect a potential political comeback.
Read more:
The Post’s David Fahrenthold has spent half a decade reporting on former president Donald Trump’s family and its business interests — first when Trump was a candidate, then when he was president and now that he’s a private citizen again.
There was a narrative popular among liberals during Trump’s presidency that he would face legal and financial ruin as soon as he was out of office. For a number of reasons, the reality is a little bit more complicated. David fills us in on the latest on Trump’s businesses, his legal battles and what it means that the Trump White House’s records could be turned over to the House Jan. 6 committee.
If you value the journalism you hear in this podcast, please subscribe to The Washington Post. We have a deal for our listeners - one year of unlimited access to everything the Post publishes for just $29. To sign up, go to washingtonpost.com/subscribe.
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | This week there was a big development in the investigation by Congress into the attack |
| 0:07.0 | on the Capitol. |
| 0:08.0 | Late on Tuesday, a federal judge rejected former President Trump's efforts to keep his |
| 0:12.9 | presidential records from the January 6th Committee in the House. |
| 0:18.9 | That's reporter David Fanthold, and these records that he's talking about are nearly 800 |
| 0:24.0 | pages of documents that Trump has been fighting to keep sealed. |
| 0:27.8 | They include things like visitor and call logs from the White House. |
| 0:31.9 | The judge on Tuesday said that those documents could be released to Congress. |
| 0:42.8 | She ruled that for former presidents there is a limit to executive privilege, this right |
| 0:48.1 | to keep communications confidential. |
| 0:50.7 | Trump's lawyers have already appealed this decision, it could go all the way up to the Supreme |
| 0:54.3 | Court. |
| 0:55.3 | But even if this ruling holds, David says that it's unlikely that these documents would |
| 1:00.1 | lead to Trump facing any criminal charges for the attack on January 6th. |
| 1:04.8 | And the way that Trump is fighting the January 6th Committee is the way that he's dealing |
| 1:09.2 | with a lot of legal challenges in his post-presidential life. |
| 1:13.4 | To me there's a common tactic here, which is that Trump always finds honor systems, or |
| 1:17.6 | people obey the rules because that's what you do or because they're afraid of the social |
| 1:21.9 | consequences, and he just doesn't do it. |
| 1:23.9 | He doesn't do what they want, and he challenges the honor system to try to come after him |
| 1:27.5 | and force him to do what it wants. |
| 1:29.9 | This and the way he's dealt with investigators in New York, finding over documents, not |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from The Washington Post, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of The Washington Post and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.