New York Times opinion writers warned in a new podcast that the Trump administration is making decisions that may result in the deaths of more than a million people.
Three New York Times columnists recently reviewed President Donald Trump’s first 50 days in office and spoke in dire terms about his decisions and how they could result in the deaths of “more than one million people.”
On the latest episode of the outlet’s “The Opinions” podcast, Times contributing Opinion writer Frank Bruni, Opinion columnist Michelle Goldberg, and deputy Opinion editor Patrick Healy remarked on the first 50 days of the Trump term and the sadness they feel over it.
Goldberg portrayed the administration in a dark light, stating that Trump is “making these abrupt decisions that are going to kill hundreds of thousands and maybe more than a million people and he’s doing it in this incredibly arbitrary, careless way.”
Goldberg added that Trump has tried to dismantle everything that she believes represents America’s greatness.
She told her co-hosts, “Whether that be foreign aid, whether that be our support for Ukraine, our success in welcoming immigrants and refugees, or scientific pre-eminence, everything that I thought was best about America Trump has either destroyed or tried to destroy in less than two months.”
Bruni agreed with Goldberg’s characterization of Trump’s term, telling her, “I don’t have children and I feel so much despair and fear and heartache about what’s going on, and I often wonder, what do you say to children at this time? How do you maintain their optimism and their belief that they do live in a special country?”
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The writer pointed to Trump pardoning Jan. 6 Capitol Riot defendants and “his withdrawal of the security details from Mike Pompeo, John Bolton and from a few others” as the “clearest baby steps — or not even baby steps — toward something like autocracy.”
Healy chimed in, stating he doesn’t believe that Trump cares about “foreign aid and soft power,” adding his theory that Trump is also indifferent to putting his former National Security advisor John Bolton at risk. “I feel like he entered his second term wanting to be a doer. It’s the action that’s the thing,” he said, stating what he thinks is the president’s only real motivation.
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“I think we’re seeing a president who’s operating without anything any of us would recognize as a conscience. Truly,” Bruni declared in response, adding that Trump “gets off” on “displays of brute strength.”
The podcast then targeted Trump senior advisor and DOGE head, Elon Musk for a moment, with Healy calling the billionaire “bad disruption personified,” and saying he has “set the tone for this administration in throwing out crazy ideas to provoke and change America.”
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“I think he is at war with America as we know it and I think he sees the government, the media and academia as proxies for the Democratic Party,” he stated.
Elsewhere, Bruni mentioned Trump’s televised meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy as evidence that the president is just “staging a spectacle for Americans” and “for his own amusement.”
Goldberg fretted, “I think that in the second Trump term he’s changed that very quickly. Not just by taking America’s soft power and setting it on fire in all sorts of ways, but really making these abrupt decisions that are going to kill hundreds of thousands and maybe more than a million people and he’s doing it in this incredibly arbitrary, careless way.”
Healy ratcheted up the drama, saying he has a hard time coming up with “language” capable of describing the Trump threat. “I hear Democrats talk about him as an authoritarian or an autocrat, making comparisons to Putin, and I wonder if that is adequate to the moment. Does this man defy historical comparison? Does that language even capture it? “
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Bruni took a crack at why people seem to be unable to see the threat as it is, saying, “So I do think there are many Americans who, because it’s so impossible to comprehend the immensity of the departure from the American past, just really end up concentrating all their worries on the price of eggs.”
White House spokesperson Taylor Rogers responded to the claims, telling Fox News Digital, “President Trump is the President of Peace, and anyone who says otherwise is either clueless or a liar. In his first 50 days, President Trump has deported illegal criminals from our communities, negotiated a cease fire deal in Gaza, brought American hostages home, and announced a brilliant plan to reconstruct Gaza. President Trump has achieved such historic levels of harmony that the Nobel Peace Prize already has his name on it.”