Trump Invades Blue America

The David Frum Show

The Atlantic

Politics, News, News Commentary

4.6 • 2.4K Ratings

🗓️ 10 September 2025

⏱️ ? minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

On this episode of The David Frum Show, The Atlantic’s David Frum examines how President Donald Trump’s foreign-policy decisions are undermining U.S. alliances and global credibility. He discusses incidents including the detainment of South Korean workers in Georgia and alleged covert operations in Greenland. Frum argues that these actions reflect ego-driven weakness rather than leadership, and explores the broader consequences for America’s international standing. Then Frum is joined by the Georgetown law professor and former Pentagon adviser Rosa Brooks, who also served as a D.C. reserve police officer. They discuss Trump’s deployment of 2,200 National Guard troops to Washington, D.C.; the limits of militarized policing; constitutional concerns; and the dangers of masked, unidentified federal agents. Brooks warns listeners that such tactics could normalize authoritarian behavior and set troubling precedents for future elections. Frum closes with a new book segment, with this week’s on Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, in which he discusses how the novel’s unreliable narrators highlight the importance of critical reading in an era of declining literacy. Get more from your favorite Atlantic voices when you subscribe. You’ll enjoy unlimited access to Pulitzer-winning journalism, from clear-eyed analysis and insight on breaking news to fascinating explorations of our world. Atlantic subscribers also get access to exclusive subscriber audio in Apple Podcasts. Subscribe today at TheAtlantic.com/Listener. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	What if you could listen to all your books, docs,
0:02.5	PDFs, and articles as if they were a podcast?
0:05.5	Well, you can.
0:06.5	With the 11 Reader app,
0:07.9	you can turn anything into natural sounding voice.
0:10.9	Like this one,
0:11.9	download 11 Reader for free on your favorite app store today.
0:15.0	Music Hello, and welcome back to the David Frum show. I'm David Frum, a staff writer at the Atlantic.
0:32.4	My guest this week will be Rosa Brooks, a professor of public policy and law at Georgetown University, and an expert on
0:38.7	American policing. We'll be talking together about the startling deployment by President Trump
0:44.4	of National Guard and other armed personnel in Washington, D.C. and other American cities,
0:48.9	apparently with more such deployments to come. I can't think of a more qualified person to talk
0:53.5	about this startling
0:54.7	development than Professor Rosa Brooks. At the end of the program, I will be introducing a new
0:59.8	segment where I'll talk about a book of the week. This is going to be an experiment. I'll see
1:04.1	whether you enjoy it. I hope you do. And I hope you will stick through to the end to see that
1:08.2	final segment. Before we get there, though, I want to offer some thoughts
1:12.2	about some very startling, very recent developments that raise serious questions about the future
1:17.8	of American leadership in the world under President Trump. Federal agents rated one of the largest
1:24.4	foreign investments, maybe the single largest foreign investment in the state of Georgia,
1:28.3	a car factory and an electric battery factory about 30 miles west of the city of Savannah, Georgia.
1:34.2	Agents detained some 475 people, of whom about 300 proved to be South Korean citizens in the United
	...

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