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Today on the Playbook podcast, Donald Trump wants allies to help the U.S. in the straits of Hormuz, but they don't sound too keen. The president and J.D. Vance will appear together for the first time since the war began, which should be interesting. And the Oscars get political. Kind of. Hello, I'm Jack Blanchard. And I'm Adam Wren. It's Monday, March 16th.

Adam, great to have you on. How you doing, man? I'm doing well, Jack. How are you?

I am braced for a tornado. DC is hunkering down today. They've canceled all the votes in Congress

today already. Government officials are working from home, and we're just going to see how bad it gets.

I guess, like, being from the Midwest, you're used to this kind of thing, right?

Yeah, we are also under a tornado watch as well.

So it's one of the rare moments in March where D.C. and Indiana have similar weather patterns. I can't believe how much time I spend on this podcast talking about the weather, but, you know, it's kind of a big deal. So here we are. Let's talk about something more important. The President of the United States had set this hair running over the weekend when he suddenly announced on Truth Social that he wanted,

nay, expected some of America's closest allies and, indeed, adversaries in the case of China,

to help this effort to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, which, of course, Iran has essentially

more or less closed to shipping traffic due to the war.

Trump spoke a lot about this last night.

We were both watching him on the plane flying back from Muralago last night, Adam, and he was talking about what he wants and expects from allies.

He also spoke to the Financial Times about it.

And fascinatingly, Trump really trying to turn the screw on allies and

almost threatening the NATO or suggesting there might be a problem with the future of NATO if

NATO countries don't get on board with this and start sending some ships to Iran to help out.

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