He Wants You to Forget. Don’t.

At The Social Contract, we have an important but difficult mission: restoring tolerance, respect, and civic engagement among Americans at a time when we are dangerously polarized. I think of it like marriage counseling. Just like in a bad marriage, we have two sides living in separate realities who are at each others’ throats daily, largely because of our bifurcated, algorithm-driven media environment. Terms like “civil war” get thrown around on social media, even by public officials, with alarming frequency and nonchalance. It certainly seems like we’re on the verge of a national divorce. Nobody knows this better than Donald Trump. He’s been capitalizing on it for a decade, and it’s worked for him—probably better than even he ever imagined.

Now he’s moving into the next phase of the strongman playbook. Just look at some of the recent headlines: “Oooh, maybe Trump will raise taxes on the rich!” “Trump’s going to lower drug prices!” “This is what progressives have always wanted!” Bullshit. This is exactly what strongmen do everywhere. They flood the zone to distract you. They throw crumbs to the plebs to manipulate you. They don’t bother with actual democracy because it’s too hard—and it doesn’t get you any credit these days because too many people aren’t paying attention. For proof of that, just take a look at the fate of the bipartisan immigration bill.

But there’s a more sinister motive at play here too. Trump and his pals want you to forget what has happened—and is continuing to happen—under this administration. Months of violent apprehensions by unmarked agents, like this and this and this. A DHS Secretary telling Congress she can ignore a Supreme Court ruling (watch it for yourself).

None of this went away. In fact, it’s only gotten worse. You know it’s bad when Trump fanboy Joe Rogan is admitting that it’s “horrific” that “people who aren’t criminals are getting lassoed up and deported.” Gee, ya think so, Joe? “This is kind of crazy that that could be possible,” he continued. “Let’s get the gang members out—everybody agrees—but let’s not let innocent gay hairdressers get lumped up with the gangs.”

Rogan is referring to Andry Hernandez Romero, a completely innocent man sent to El Salvador two months ago to be imprisoned without trial. He and hundreds of others are being held incommunicado in prison, with their family and loved ones not even allowed to have a phone call with them. When asked today whether Romero is dead or alive, Kristi Noem replied icily, “This isn’t under my jurisdiction.” Why yes, Kristi, as a matter of fact, it is under your jurisdiction. Remember when you jetted down to CECOT to take credit for it? But I guess we shouldn’t expect actual human feelings from someone who can shoot her own puppy. These are not good people.

Yes, there have been some victories, too. Just yesterday, Georgetown University researcher Badar Khan Suri was released from an immigration detention center in Texas, after a federal judge ordered the government to free him immediately. And last week, a federal judge in Vermont ordered Tufts University student Rümeysa Öztürk released on bail after six weeks in detention. She was in this country legally and wrote an op-ed. And because she wrote that op-ed, our government apprehended her off the street, disappeared her, detained her, and attempted to deport her.

Free speech held in this case, thank God, but the context must not be lost. This administration imprisoned a legal resident for six weeks simply for publishing an opinion in a newspaper. Not for a crime; for expressing an opinion. And it’s not going to stop there. They want to spend $45 billion to build sprawling detention camps, as if mass incarceration is a solution, not a dystopian horror show. And now? They want to suspend habeas corpus—one of the most fundamental rights in any democracy. This is authoritarianism, plain and simple. We look away at our own peril.

You know my story. I come from MAGA. Hell, I helped build MAGA, much to my shame. But it also makes me uniquely qualified to reach people in that camp. Occasionally it actually works. So I’m going to keep talking to these folks. I’m going to keep playing marriage counselor. And I’m going to keep putting hard truths like these in front of them about the choice they made last November and the choices they’re continuing to make by defending this administration. We must never stop fighting to defend due process. We must never stop fighting to defend free speech. We must never stop.

Upgrade to Support My Mission

More on This Topic

• A Special Message from Jim About His Dad, a Cuban Refugee —Jim Acosta

• I’m a Russian Scientist in ICE Detention —The New York Times

• Trump Is Making His List and Checking It Twice —The Home Front

• Wisconsin Judge Hannah Dugan Enters Not Guilty Plea on Obstruction Charges —CBS News

• Trump DHS Eyes Arrests for House Democrats Over New Jersey ICE Incident —Axios

In Today’s Issue

• The Social Briefing: Heroes of the Week

• Good Reads for This Week

• What’s Your Take?

• The Social Calendar

• The Social Soundboard

This Week

• SUBSTACK LIVE: Open to all subscribers, unless noted. Don’t miss it!

  • Monday, 8pm ET (click if you missed it!)

  • Tuesday, 8pm ET (with Joe Thomas, click if you missed it!)

  • Wednesday, 8pm ET (with Glenn Kirschner, click if you missed it!)

  • Thursday, 8pm ET (Ask Me Anything! Paid subscribers only!)

• ENGAGE WITH US: Want to host a conversation with Joe in your town? Want to send us a 600-word op-ed or a video clip? Want to appear with Joe on Substack Live? Got another idea to share with us? Send it our way!

• SUPPORT OUR MISSION: If you enjoy this Substack and want to help me and my small, but fiercely pro-democracy team reach more Americans with our message, please consider upgrading to a paid subscription. All paid subscribers have a standing invite to a weekly Ask Me Anything chat with me, receive a share-worthy deep dive on an issue of critical importance to our democracy once a month, and most importantly, support the Social Contract mission by sponsoring my conversations across America!

UPGRADE NOW

Amid all the bad, awful, dumb, stupid, sickening, despicable, embarrassing, demoralizing, infuriating, outrageous, terrible, horrible, Constitution-defying news of the past week, we have to acknowledge the heroes among us. The list is growing, as more and more of us are standing up to the tyrant. Courage is infectious. Be brave!

• OMAHA VOTERS. Voters in Omaha, Nebraska, elected Democrat John Ewing, Jr. this week, defeating the longest-serving GOP mayor in the country and becoming the city’s first Black mayor in history. Congrats, Mayor-Elect Ewing!

• RICH TRUMKA. Trump fired the three Democratic members of the Consumer Product Safety Commission, including the agency’s commissioner, Rich Trumka, by email earlier this week. Trumka’s response? "See you in court, Mr. President," he wrote in a social media post, which included a statement on the CPSC's official letterhead. Keep fighting, Rich!

• KENNEDY CENTER EMPLOYEES. Rightfully alarmed by the Trump Administration’s efforts to “dismantle mission-essential departments and reshape our arts programming,” employees at the Kennedy Center are pushing to unionize. Good for them.

• BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN AND ROBERT DE NIRO. Overseas this week for a concert in Manchester, England, and the Cannes Film Festival in France, respectively, Bruce Springsteen and Robert De Niro used the occasions to call out the “corrupt, incompetent, and treasonous” Trump Administration, and let the world know “we are fighting like hell for the democracy we once took for granted.” This is the kind of thing I would have rolled my eyes at 20 years ago. Not anymore. It takes a lot of courage now. And it’s the truth.

• EDAN ALEXANDER. The last living American hostage being held by Hamas, Edan Alexander, was released this week and has been reunited with his family in Israel. The 21-year-old was captured by Hamas militants on October 7, 2023, and was held captive in Gaza for 19 months. Welcome home, Edan.

• HONORABLE MENTION. Are they finally starting to find their courage in D.C.? Perhaps. Some blowback over the Qatari plane deal, including an investigation and a hold on Trump nominees…Members of Congress calling out Kristi Noem in a hearing on Capitol Hill…the Supreme Court fired up over Trump’s birthright citizenship order, with conservative justices Neil Gorsuch and Amy Coney Barrett defending their liberal colleagues. Wow, maybe there’s still hope for us yet?

Did we miss anyone? Send your heroes our way!

Good Reads for This Week

• Pocketbook Populism: A Historian's Guide to Opposition Messaging —Study Marry Kill

• In Plane Sight —The Dispatch

• Donald "Hussein" Trump —Pitching and Snitching

• Donald Trump Is a Gangster —The Warning

• Is the Right-Wing News Bubble Too Big to Burst? —The Great Transformation with Mike Madrid

• The Temptation and the Fall of the Media —The Dispatch

• Corruption and Authoritarianism —Lucid

• Volodymyr Zelenskyy, The Anti-Trump, Sets The Perfect TRAP For Vladimir Putin —Blue Amp

• I'm a White American. I Don't Want Trump's White America. —The Beautiful Mess

• WATCH: It’s All Bullshit —Will Saletan on The xxxxxx

What’s Your Take?

The verdict is in…92% of you said I can keep using profanity if it fits the situation. That’s pretty decisive. Thank you, dear readers. But as an olive branch to the 8% of you who don’t like it, I’ve virtually eliminated it from this newsletter. I hope that helps!

No poll this week—just a question. Who would you like to see me bring on as a guest on a future Substack Live? Let me know if you have any suggestions.

• UPCOMING INTERVIEWS

  • Steve Schmidt of The Warning: May 19 at 8pm ET

• THIS WEEK’S INTERVIEWS & QUOTES

  • The Ken Harbaugh Show

  • ‘Ignorance, Narcissism & Idiocy’: Trump Slammed for Backing Down (Again) on Major Issue —NJ.com

  • MAGA Tries to Justify Trump’s Luxury Jet ‘Bribe’ with Ridiculous Example —NJ.com

  • 'Presidency Is Literally for Sale to Highest Bidder': Backlash Mounts as Trump Defends Qatari Jet Gift —International Business Times

  • 'Ridiculous!' Trump's New 'Lie' Torn Apart as He Doubles Down on Accepting Qatari Jet —Raw Story

  • Ex-MAGA Rep to Americans: Know Who’s to Blame for Trump’s Blatant Corruption? You Are. —NJ.com

  • 'Translation — White': Trump Official Clobbered Over Claim Afrikaners Can 'Assimilate' —Raw Story

Here’s what some of you are thinking about this week…

Hi Joe,

You are meeting the moment with your justified anger and passion about the normalization of Trump. It's disgraceful how our country has become vulnerable to such mass brainwashing.

I have written to you several times on your previous email for “White Flag.” Don't always agree with you, as you could read if you choose to go back and look at them, but you sure are accurate about Trump and the normalization of him. I often shut my eyes tightly, willing myself “wake up, wake up!” and hoping this has all been a bad dream. Love ya, Joe! —Alexandra (Alex) O'Brien

Hi Joe,

I just wanted to drop you a line after listening to your recent podcast regarding the so-called “Deep State.” I think it’s one of my favorite shows, along with the show on Occam’s Razor. I find that after years of thinking of you as somebody that I couldn't stand, I now regard you as my favorite voice for truth.

There is no such thing as the Deep State. It’s a term that was used in Turkey during the last century by a group of military leaders intending to enact a coup. The term was picked up by Steve Bannon, who’s an evil genius if ever there was one, as the perfect Boogeyman to foment distrust and loss of faith in our institutions. Trump was the perfect salesman to apply this bullshit because he feasts on it.

Nobody can sling bullshit like Donald Trump. Every word that comes out of his mouth is a lie. There is no lie or amount of absurd bullshit that is beyond his reach. The Big Lie grabs hold, and what is the answer? Just look at the election. Bullshit won over critical thinking, and that’s scary to me.

And that’s where Occam’s Razor comes in. It seems to me that the only way to combat ignorance is with education, and that demands that critical thinking is taught in our schools. I’ve long been an advocate for the simplest answer is usually the right answer. I have a library with books on Critical Thinking, and they all refer to William of Occam as one of the great logicians. I think that the subject of Critical Thinking needs to be offered as an elective in high school. Sociology and Psychology are. Those subjects, as well as Political Science, were taught at my high school in Illinois. Maybe a return to the Trivium, which consists of the three liberal arts pertaining to language—grammar, logic, and rhetoric. These subjects have been studied over 2,000 years as a way of refining both a speaker and their speech.

The problem I’ve seen is that many of the Trumpers I’ve talked to want nothing to do with logic or critical thinking. They regard it as a liberal weapon and trick, designed to confuse people. So they close their mind to those things they don’t trust, insisting that it’s all the Deep State, even when the logic is staring them in the face. They don’t trust objective truth, and that means that they’re hopelessly out of touch with objective reality.

Just writing as a fan who thought your latest podcast was one of your very best. It seems to me that your podcasts are the chapters of a book waiting to be published. I’d buy it in a heartbeat. I always look forward to hearing your take as the first thing I listen to in the morning. I think yours is the strongest voice of reason there is on the political scene right now. I really didn’t like you at all during the Obama years, but I’ve come to admire your efforts and commitment to the truth. I consider you someone I could have a beer with and shoot the shit. I’d like that. Keep up the good fight. —Larry Allen Brown

Hey, I want to hear from you!

What do you think of The Social Contract with Joe Walsh? What are your thoughts about what’s happening this week? How can we fix the political mess we’ve created in our country? How do we mend our frayed social fabric and rebuild an America that works?

Tell us your story and share your ideas with us. Email our editor at [email protected]. We look forward to hearing from you.