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The Daily Beast Podcast

The One Thing That Truly Terrifies Trump: Wolff

The Daily Beast Podcast

The Daily Beast

News & Politics

4.67.9K Ratings

🗓️ 11 January 2026

⏱️ 60 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Michael Wolff joins Joanna Coles to unpack the central illusion of Trump’s presidency: that someone, somewhere knows what is going on—when in fact nobody does, least of all Trump himself. From Iran’s uprising to Venezuela’s phantom “invasion,” Wolff explains how Trump exploits uncertainty by announcing conflicts he has no intention of prosecuting, using noise, grandiosity, and endless talking to stay at the center of attention while avoiding real risk or consequence. The conversation ranges from ICE and Minneapolis to Greenland, shoes, height, and the limits of loyalty, before landing on the most dangerous question of all: What happens when Trump’s talent for manufactured crises collides with a real one—Russia, Iran, or a nuclear threat he cannot simply talk his way out of?

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Transcript

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0:00.0

Venezuela is a perfect example of this. He wants to create conflict, which puts him at the center of attention, which distracts from other issues, which means people are wholly focused on this conflict, but he doesn't want the conflict to actually create danger.

0:18.6

But then if you contrast that to yesterday, the Russians fired a missile with nuclear capabilities.

0:26.0

Now, this is an existential situation in the world that Donald Trump may well have to address.

0:33.9

What happens?

0:34.9

It's unimaginable how Donald Trump would respond to this.

0:42.0

Michael.

0:43.1

Joanna.

0:43.8

I'm already exhausted. We've only been back one week. I can't keep on top of it all.

0:50.1

No, kind of, it really is extraordinary. I mean, I'm completely.

0:59.0

I mean, I was, I was, I was, insane.

1:01.3

I was looking at at this stuff out of, out of Iran this morning, and I was thinking, what a relief.

1:09.9

I mean, something that does not involve Donald Trump,

1:13.6

although I'm sure he's thinking,

1:15.9

how can I become the center of what's going on?

1:19.0

Well, how can he claim credit for it, right?

1:21.2

Or claim credit, yes, absolutely.

1:23.8

But meanwhile, he can't,

1:25.9

and it is happening independently from Donald Trump, which is quite a relief.

1:31.4

And also fantastically brave and sort of very exciting, actually, in a way. I mean, you see people ripping up pictures of the Ayatollah to light their cigarettes.

1:40.3

And you think, gosh, this is so brave. And the women in particular marching without headscarves, very moving to watch it.

1:46.6

And I hope it ends as well.

1:47.8

This is just coincidentally, really, not related to this at all.

...

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