{"id":15565,"date":"2025-11-18T19:22:24","date_gmt":"2025-11-19T03:22:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/?p=15565"},"modified":"2025-11-18T19:41:19","modified_gmt":"2025-11-19T03:41:19","slug":"trumps-terrible-horrible-no-good-very-bad-day-week-month-year-life-bradcast-111825","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/?p=15565","title":{"rendered":"Trump&#8217;s Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day (Week? Month? Year? Life?): &#8216;BradCast&#8217; 11\/18\/25"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/BradBlog.com\/Images\/BradCast_Epstein-ReleaseALLTheFiles_111825.jpg\" hspace=\"6\" vspace=\"3\" border=\"0\" align=\"right\">Things are not going well for the President of the United States. As revealed by the mostly breaking news stories covered on today&#8217;s <a href=\"https:\/\/BradBlog.com\/BradCast\"><i>BradCast<\/i><\/a>, today may be seen as one of the worst days he has ever had. Here&#8217;s hoping for more such days. [<i>Audio link to full show follows below this summary.<\/i>]\n<ul>\n<li>Tuesday began pleasantly enough, with <b>Donald Trump<\/b> offering <b>Saudi Arabia<\/b>&#8216;s crown prince a <a href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/photo-gallery\/trump-salman-saudi-prince-khashoggi-96c043eaaade557119e60e4cd5151c05\">royal welcome to the White House<\/a> in advance of a black tie dinner, despite the fact that the <a href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/us-saudi-crown-prince-khashoggi-killing-26c37f6d603737de7509f5ee09ae7f9d\">CIA determined<\/a> that <b>Mohammed bin Salman<\/b> likely personally approved the 2018 bone saw murder of <i>Washington Post<\/i> journalist and U.S. resident <i>Jamal Khashoggi<\/i>. After the regal parade of Saudi and U.S. flag-draped black horses and a rare flyover by six U.S. fighter jets to celebrate the arrival of the killer prince and major Trump Family business partner, Trump berated a reporter for daring to ask about the murder. He <a href=\"https:\/\/www.reuters.com\/world\/us\/trump-welcome-saudi-crown-prince-with-offer-fighter-jets-business-deals-2025-11-18\/\">claimed<\/a>, appallingly, that &#8220;a lot of people didn&#8217;t like&#8221; Khashoggi anyway, that bin Salman &#8220;knew nothing about it&#8221;, and, even if he did, hey, &#8220;things happen.&#8221;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>Around the same time, on the other end of Pennsylvania Ave., victims of Trump&#8217;s longtime best friend and convicted pedophile, the late <b>Jeffrey Epstein<\/b>, were <a href=\"https:\/\/19thnews.org\/2025\/11\/epstein-files-survivors-press-conference\/\">rallying on the steps of the U.S. Capitol<\/a> with the lead, bi-partisan co-sponsors of a bill mandating the Dept. of Justice release the <b>&#8220;Epstein Files&#8221;<\/b>.  One of the survivors, a Trump voter who was introduced to Epstein when she was just 14 years old, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.dailykos.com\/stories\/2025\/11\/18\/2354403\/-Epstein-survivor-calls-Trump-a-national-embarrassment?pm_campaign=front_page&#038;pm_source=top_news_slot_3&#038;pm_medium=web\">described<\/a> the President as a &#8220;national embarrassment&#8221;. The bill was finally to be voted on today, after months of attempted obstruction by both Trump and supposedly very Christian Republican Speaker of the House <b>Mike Johnson<\/b>. Today&#8217;s vote happened only thanks to a Discharge Petition signed by a majority of House members (all Democrats, 4 Republicans) demanding it. Despite Trump&#8217;s months of cover-up, blocking the DOJ from releasing the files that he could have ordered released in full at any time, the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.congress.gov\/bill\/119th-congress\/house-bill\/4405\">four sentence legislation<\/a> was <a href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/epstein-files-congress-trump-house-297a66ce48bd2a67c571bc643e32ef71\">adopted nearly unanimously<\/a> by the <b>U.S. House<\/b> in a 427 to 1 vote. Apparently, nobody other than Rep. <b>Clay Higgins<\/b> (R-LA) wanted to be regarded as having voted to protect pedophiles.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>Within hours, remarkably, the U.S. Senate, without debate, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.politico.com\/news\/2025\/11\/18\/house-approves-epstein-files-bill-in-near-unanimous-vote-00656764\">adopted the same bill<\/a> by another veto-proof margin. The measure was passed by unanimous consent before heading to Donald Trump&#8217;s desk for his signature. You think he&#8217;ll hold one of his big signing ceremonies to do it?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>With all of that seemingly very good news, we echo the caveat I offered on <a href=\"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/?p=15563\">yesterday&#8217;s show<\/a>. A provision in the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.congress.gov\/bill\/119th-congress\/house-bill\/4405\">legislation<\/a> (the third of four sentences) allows the DOJ to &#8220;withhold certain information&#8221; including &#8220;materials that would jeopardize an active federal investigation.&#8221; As luck would have it, just last week, months after Trump&#8217;s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.justice.gov\/opa\/media\/1407001\/dl?inline\">DOJ declared<\/a> there was nothing left to investigate in the Epstein matter, and days before Trump would pretend to flip-flop to favor the bill, he asked his corrupt Attorney General <b>Pam Bondi<\/b> to open an investigation into the involvement of his political foes with Epstein. She <a href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/epstein-trump-clinton-investigation-justice-department-d0ce8385cb7f42705ac068310e3231be\">complied<\/a> within hours, of course. On Sunday, Republican co-sponsor of the Discharge Petition in the House, Rep. <b>Thomas Massie<\/b> (R-LA), <a href=\"https:\/\/bsky.app\/profile\/atrupar.com\/post\/3m5qy6w3he22r\">warned<\/a> the new investigations might prevent the DOJ release of the files. Today, before the vote, at the presser on the steps of the U.S. Capitol, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) &#8212; who deserves credit for taking on the President by keeping her name on the Petition &#8212; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.c-span.org\/program\/news-conference\/lawmakers-hold-news-conference-ahead-of-vote-on-releasing-epstein-files\/669222\">warned same<\/a>. That, after Trump&#8217;s pretend change of heart on Sunday calling for the release of the files by instructing Republicans to vote for the bill so that lawmakers &#8220;can have whatever they are <i>legally entitled to<\/i>&#8220;. The latter part of that phrase, <a href=\"https:\/\/talkingpointsmemo.com\/morning-memo\/trump-gives-himself-an-enormous-out-on-the-epstein-files\">observed David Kurtz<\/a> today, is &#8220;doing a lot of work there.&#8221;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>As rare as successful Discharge Petitions are in forcing votes on bills that the House Speaker refuses to bring to the floor, it <a href=\"https:\/\/federalnewsnetwork.com\/unions\/2025\/11\/house-majority-forces-vote-on-bill-to-restore-collective-bargaining-for-most-federal-employees\/?readmore=1\">happened yet <i>again<\/i> on Monday<\/a>! A majority of<b> House members<\/b>, with the help of a few swing district Republicans signed on to force a vote &#8212; within seven days, as required by House rules &#8212; on a bill that would roll back Trump&#8217;s Executive Orders earlier this year blocking <b>collective bargaining rights<\/b> for most federal workers. <\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>But things got even worse for Trump as today wore on. This time on the <b>Gerrymandering Wars<\/b> front. A three-judge federal appeals court panel in <b>Texas<\/b> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.texastribune.org\/2025\/11\/18\/texas-redistricting-ruling-lawsuit-el-paso-court-2026-midterms\/\">blocked<\/a> the new Trump-ordered gerrymander of the state&#8217;s already gerrymandered <b>U.S. House<\/b> map, finding it to be an unlawful and unconstitutional racial gerrymander. Following a ten day hearing, the 2 to 1 ruling by the court panel, written <i>by a <b>Trump-appointed federal judge<\/b><\/i>, blocked the new map from going into effect for the 2026 election &#8212; at least for now. The new map was written by the GOP state Legislature to flip five, largely minority House seats from &#8220;blue&#8221; to &#8220;red&#8221; next year. It resulted in <b>California<\/b> <i>voters<\/i> recently adopting a new map, in an overwhelming statewide vote, to flip the same number of seats from &#8220;red&#8221; to &#8220;blue&#8221; in response. That map &#8212; and perhaps a similar one now in the works by Democrats in <b>Virginia<\/b> &#8212; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.texastribune.org\/2025\/11\/18\/texas-congressional-redistricting-map-ruling-2026-effect\/\">will stay in place<\/a> next year, unless otherwise blocked by a court for some reason. Texas&#8217; Republican Governor <b>Greg Abbott<\/b> vowed to appeal today&#8217;s ruling to his friends on the corrupted U.S. Supreme Court.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>The ruling in the Lone Star State comes on the heels of the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.politico.com\/news\/2025\/11\/14\/indiana-redistricting-trump-vance-00652288?utm_medium=twitter&#038;utm_source=dlvr.it\">decision late last week<\/a> by the Republican leaders of the <strong>Indiana<\/strong> state Legislature, to <i>not<\/i> redistrict the state&#8217;s already very red <strong>U.S. House<\/strong> map in a Special Session this year, despite <i>heavy<\/i> pressure from Trump and Vice President <b>J.D. Vance<\/b>. The decision resulted in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.politico.com\/news\/2025\/11\/16\/trump-indiana-gop-redistricting-primary-00653932?cid=apn\">social media threats<\/a> by Trump against both men, and a <a href=\"https:\/\/heartlandsignal.com\/2025\/11\/18\/trump-offers-more-criticism-of-indiana-republicans-after-swatting-incident\/\">swatting attack<\/a> against one of them. Despite that dangerous situation just hours after Trump&#8217;s initial threat &#8212; and his laughable opposition to political violence &#8212; he issued another similar one against Republican lawmakers in the Hoosier State on Sunday.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>Finally, also not great news for Trump in <a href=\"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/?p=15564\">today&#8217;s <i>Green News Report<\/i><\/a> with Desi Doyen, as Trump&#8217;s joke of a <b>FEMA<\/b> Director is pushed out after just six months; the <b>U.N.<\/b> climate summit under way in <b>Brazil<\/b> (which the U.S. sent no representatives to) declares it will finally be taking on climate disinformation by the fossil fuel industry and its supporters (like Trump); and that, speaking of, new documents reveal <b>Exxon<\/b> has been quietly funding climate denial and disinformation campaigns across Latin American for years&#8230;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>As noted, it was a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day for Donald Trump, which is generally a very good day for the rest of us, as described with much more context, detail, insight, color, sound and special effects on today&#8217;s program. I hope you&#8217;ll tune in&#8230;<\/p>\n<blockquote><p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\".\/Images\/Speaker_Icon_24.png\" style=\"width: 24px; float: none; vertical-align: middle;\"><span style=\"font-size: 18px; line-height: 18px;\"> <b><i><a href=\"https:\/\/BradBlog.com\/audio\/BradCast_BradFriedman-TrumpMBS-EpsteinVoteHouseSenate-TXGerrymanderBlocked_111825.mp3\">CLICK TO LISTEN OR DOWNLOAD SHOW!&#8230;<\/a><\/i><\/b><\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><center><b>* * *<\/b><\/center><i>While we post <a href=\"https:\/\/BradBlog.com\/BradCast\"><\/i>The BradCast<i><\/a> here every day, and you can hear it across all of our great affiliate stations and websites, to automagically get new episodes as soon as they&#8217;re available sent right to your computer or personal device, subscribe for free at <a href=\"https:\/\/itunes.apple.com\/us\/podcast\/the-bradcast-w-brad-friedman\/id803467610\">iTunes<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.pandora.com\/podcast\/the-bradcast-w-brad-friedman\/PC:1000025838\">Pandora<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/tunein.com\/radio\/The-BradCast-with-Brad-Friedman-p477565\/\">TuneIn<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.iheart.com\/podcast\/256-the-bradcast-w-brad-friedm-30973643\/\">iHeart<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.amazon.com\/The-BradCast-w-Brad-Friedman\/dp\/B08JJRN86R\/ref=sr_1_1\">Amazon<\/a> or <a href=\"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/podcastgen\/bradcast\/feed.xml\">our native RSS feed<\/a>!<\/i><\/p>\n<p><!--BB-DONATEPITCH-START--><\/p>\n<div style=\"background:#f5f0e0; border:2px solid #6b5a2e; border-radius:6px; padding:10px 14px; text-align:center; font-family:Georgia,serif;\"><span style=\"display:block; margin:0 0 8px 0; color:#3a2e0e; font-size:0.95em; line-height:1.5;\"><strong>The BRAD BLOG<\/strong>, <em>The BradCast<\/em> and <em>Green News Report<\/em> are all 100% independent and 100% listener and reader supported!<\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/Donate\" style=\"display:inline-block; background:#6b5a2e; color:#ffffff; padding:6px 18px; border-radius:4px; font-weight:bold; text-decoration:none; font-family:Georgia,serif; font-size:0.9em;\">Please CLICK HERE to help support our work today!<\/a><\/div>\n<p><!--BB-DONATEPITCH-END--><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Things are not going well for the President of the United States. As revealed by the mostly breaking news stories covered on today&#8217;s BradCast, today may be seen as one of the worst days he has ever had. Here&#8217;s hoping for more such days. [Audio link to full show follows below this summary.] Tuesday began [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"ep_exclude_from_search":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[192,89,675,543,223,479,2053,701,323,1110,44,1246,1361,477,1628,1536,1922,872,738,47,1327,198,233,186,517],"tags":[],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-15565","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-accountability","category-media-appearance","category-bradcast","category-climate-change","category-dept-of-justice","category-donald-trump","category-election-2026","category-exxon-mobil","category-fema","category-gerrymandering","category-indiana","category-jamal-khashoggi","category-jeffrey-epstein","category-kpfk","category-labor-unions","category-marjorie-taylor-greene","category-mike-johnson","category-pam-bondi","category-saudi-arabia","category-texas","category-thomas-massie","category-us-house","category-us-senate","category-united-nations","category-voting-rights-act"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15565","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=15565"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15565\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=15565"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=15565"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=15565"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcoauthors&post=15565"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}