heorld has serious problems that demand serious conversations. however, after years of trump rallies, the only people i know how to talk to about the state of the world are old pals like maga edward. we may already be in the middle of world war iii. it just hasn't gotten real hot yet. we could blame biden, but we all know who's running this country. - who is running this country? - barack obama. this is his third term. do you think the world would be safer with donald trump returning to the presidency? 100%. i know without a fact it would. without a fact, it would be a safer world. woman: yes! - amen. jordan: but as the maga faithful wait for trump to return us to safety, they found a surprising model for their perfect society. i would like to see america be more like russia. jordan: yes, russia. it's clean. everybody looks healthy. i mean, it looks like they, you know, take care of their people. you see the streets in russia, people are walking around, they all seem to be happy. their country really looks like they've got things together a little bit. putin is a [indistinct] leader who runs his country. he's a respectful person towards his country. what do you like about vladimir putin?

the way he's leading his country is all for freedom. i used to watch his videos, fishing, horseback riding back in the day. you would do it just for fun? you'd watch putin horseback riding videos? yeah. who's a better leader, vladimir putin or joe biden? putin. jordan (voiceover): this guy? the one with a terrifying track record? reporter: littering the landscape with violent deaths, mystery illnesses, and dubious suicide. jordan (voiceover): the one who meddled in our election in 2016? the one who is meddling in ukraine? what do they see in a guy who creates so much chaos? he's strong. he's well-mannered. he speaks well. putin is well mannered, right? he knows where the fork goes, where the knife goes, which window the journalist goes out of. yeah. i think he's a calm person. i think he's a methodical. i think he thinks about things beyond today. and i think he sees into the future for his country. it looks like he's thinking two steps ahead, right? it's almost like he knows what the next territory that he wants to infiltrate with his own perspective,

right? - right. who do you think started the war in ukraine? joe biden and his son. this war was started so that biden could remain president. that is what's happening? war-time president. so how did biden manufacture putin sending tanks into ukraine? oh. that's a good question. but you do think it was manufactured by biden? - yes. - yes. well-- - yes. yes. - yeah, obviously. woman: yeah. but how he did it. how does he do a lot of things that he does? that's a way to evade it for sure. jordan (voiceover): wait, people are giving putin a pass here at a trump rally in a field in rural pennsylvania next to the most american vehicle in history, a monster truck with a tits license plate. the republican party used to talk about russia like this. mr. khrushchev understands only strength and firmness. they are the focus of evil in the modern world. russia, i indicated, is a geopolitical foe. jordan (voiceover): but this ain't your daddy's gop.

it's vlady's gop. nowadays, more than half of republicans think vladimir putin is a better president than joe biden. and it's not just out here. it's everywhere. tucker carlson recently went to moscow to marvel at ciabatta loaves and mass transit. how does russia have a subway station that's nicer than anything in our country? jordan (voiceover): and the russian fandom goes all the way to the very braintrust of the gop. the ukrainian government is attacking christians. russia is not doing that. putin is smart. our leaders are dumb. jordan (voiceover): how did the republican party become moscow tools? the explanation for that stems largely from donald trump. jordan (voiceover): this is john bolton, the most republican of republicans. he served under three republican presidents, including trump, saw the invasion of iraq, and did some light geopolitical meddling. as somebody who has helped plan coup d'etat, it takes a lot of work. imagine ronald reagan is caught in amber in 1988.

i'm using jurassic park technology. he wakes up now unthawed. what does he think of the modern gop? well, certainly, the trump wing of it, he would be appalled by. it's just antithetical, not just to the philosophical beliefs of ronald reagan, but to the positive attitude about america and its prospects. so reagan wakes up and he's shocked? right. and he's also like, what is this internet thing? maybe we should send steven seagal over there to kick putin's ass. wait a minute, steven seagal already lives there. this is all too confusing. let's just go back to ignoring aids. i think he'd be stunned that the republican party had anything to do with donald trump. what is trump's infatuation with putin? well, i think he has a fascination with authoritarian leaders generally. i think trump would like to be a big guy, but i don't think he's smart enough to be a dictator. so is trump, what's the term, an idiot? well, i think rex tillerson had the iconic two-word description of trump.

the first word, i won't repeat, even on your show. the second of which was moron. ok, i'll throw it in there-- [bleep] that's pretty much on point. yes, a [bleep] moron. right. can a [bleep] moron still be a useful idiot? i think the answer to that is yes, and i think vladimir putin understands it. jordan (voiceover): yes. for putin, trump is like one of those dogs that the russians shot into space, obedient, useful, and utterly disposable. but if putin's puppy actually wins, what does that mean for things like nato, an alliance of western nations, which has been a thorn in putin's side? well, i think there are two main points that putin will be concerned about if trump wins in november. one, the most immediate point will be the war in ukraine. and second, related to it, but broader, the future of nato. does trump know what nato does? he doesn't understand alliances. how important is having an alliance with perhaps somebody you don't agree with but connect with

so that you can push together a common goal for geopolitical safety? well, i think nato is the most successful political military alliance in human history. so before we give that up, people ought to think about it a little bit more seriously than trump does. jordan (voiceover): so the stakes of this election couldn't be higher. the only way to stop an existential threat is through alliances, a unified front for the common good. so picking between trump and biden must be a no-brainer. i'm not going to vote for either one. i wrote in a name in 2020. i'll do that again this year. a wise man once told me that sometimes it's important to make alliances with people that you may not agree fully with in order to have some sort of global stability. but maybe tell me more about writing in an unnamed candidate for president with 0% chance of winning. i don't think either prospect is very appealing, frankly. jordan (voiceover): great. so in the race between a current president and a former president, it looks like the winner

will be the russian president. [man grunting] ♪ “kariye pyar” by nahid akhtar ♪ ♪ ♪ indistinguishable vocalizations ♪ [camera click] ♪ indistinguishable vocalizations ♪ [camera click] [camera click] [camera click] ♪ indistinguishable vocalizations ♪ ♪ [water splashing]

jordan (voiceover): the gop's softer stance ♪ on russia was giving me flashbacks to 2016 when putin tried to influence our election. i mean, it could be russia. it could be somebody sitting on their bed that weighs 400 pounds, ok? jordan (voiceover): but russia would have to think we're fools to fall for that again. this is the traditional image of americans that russians have in their minds, that we're stupid, that we're gullible, that we smile at everyone like total idiots. you can seed information in their head, and they will parrot the information that is useful to you. jordan (voiceover): this is russian-born american journalist julia ioffe. as a correspondent in moscow, ioffe covered putin and the kremlin, so i wanted her to help me parse through what i'd been hearing at rallies. there was an amazing "washington post" report by catherine belton, an investigative reporter, who got her hands on some secret kremlin documents. so this is a pitch for a partisan media campaign in the us.

the targets of this campaign are republican party voters. mhm. "we want to echo what they're saying, which is that"-- i'm just reading from the document here. "colored perverts and invalids get all the privileges." sounds like a toby keith lyric. this will sound familiar to you. "the danger of criminality of colored people and immigrants." yeah, i've heard a thing or two there. i used to live in milwaukee, and there's places in milwaukee that you can't go to because me, as a little white guy, i wouldn't feel safe being there. you see the streets in russia, it looks like their infrastructure and their country looks a whole lot nicer than ours does here. the murder rate is twice as high in russia as it is in the united states. i didn't know that, guys. i mean, well, thank you for informing me. the best political influence campaigns are the ones where you don't invent anything. you just take the facts on the ground, and you amplify them, right? and so what you see these fake accounts amplifying are

arguments that i'm sure you've heard on the trail and at these rallies, which is that democrats are globalists who care more about ukraine than about the southern border. it's, russia's good and ukraine is corrupt. it is corruption. they are taking advantage of the situation, what they created. it's by design. they're pumping money over there, and we know it's coming back to politicians' pockets here. now, it goes into the means of spreading this information. how are they going to do it? well, you're going to use social media. but it says, the only place where they can spread this information without any censorship is-- i'm going to let you guess. where can they get the vitamins? where are you selling t-shirts? i'm red pill ken-- on truth social's redpillken. both: truth social. yes. the most useful of the idiots can be found on truth social. or owning it. connect these dots how zelensky is benefiting from this. where's, where's the-- because he has yachts. he has plenty of money. and guess what zelensky does?

he sniffs cocaine right in front of y'all. so the yacht story is that volodymyr zelensky, the president of ukraine, took money that the us sent him for weapons, siphoned it off, and bought two luxury yachts. the story is completely false. but then researchers were like, where did this come from? jordan (voiceover): it came from a little website called dc weekly, which is from-- not actually here in washington, dc. dc weekly is allegedly run out of here, moscow. then the story spreads across the internet and makes its way-- to there. to [bleep] there! yep, it was shared by marjorie taylor greene and jd vance. there are people who would cut social security, throw our grandparents into poverty, why? so that one of zelensky's ministers can buy a bigger yacht. jordan (voiceover): meanwhile, military aid for ukraine hung in the balance. not another penny will go to ukraine. jordan (voiceover): congress eventually gave ukraine a whole lot of pennies, but aid was stalled for seven months. in that time, ukraine suffered

tremendous battlefield losses. so people are actually dying because members of congress are parroting fake russian bullshit. so is that a win for putin? 1,000%. jordan (voiceover): yes. putin was winning, but it wasn't just because of disinformation. what's happening in russia is basically a republican wet dream. they have banned the international lgbt movement. they're restricting abortion. vladimir putin invokes a lot of what republicans call "wokeness." it just seems that magaheads, they're much more comfortable with that authoritarian persona, especially when the guy is white, male, christian-- shirtless, hairless-- [music playing] clearly, a big putin fan. well-- i mean, i-- it's like a souvenir. jordan (voiceover): meet kline preston. that's the founder of the kgb? yes. jordan (voiceover): he was a lawyer for a future gop senator, marsha blackburn. he attended the nra convention in 2015 with a convicted russian agent.

and in 2020, he fought to overturn biden's election results in michigan to help trump. and he knows all about election integrity because he's been an official observer of seven russian elections. so in russia, they have legislation that allows for foreign observers. what do you say to the critics who might say maybe they're choosing outside observers who are biased to be a little pro-russia? well, i wouldn't say that i'm pro-russia. from a decorating perspective, perhaps. well, i mean, i could see how someone would make such a comment based on, you know, knowing my background. or your furnishings. my furnishings and, you know. yeah. or your knickknacks. yeah. your oil paintings. long interest. weaponry on the wall. yeah. the bust. [chuckles] who do you point the finger at for that russian invasion? the west. when russia invaded in 2022, in february, it was a defensive move. putin's a victim here.

well, i mean, to some degree, russia is. the fact is, and american politicians hate this, vladimir putin has done a very good job for his country, and he's really popular. some people claim that he controls the media. he controls and/or executes his enemies. i mean, who? well, navalny. but there's no proof that he killed him. jordan: right, ok. yevgeny prigozhin. prigozhin, ok. his plane blew up or whatever. what about somebody like nikolai glushkov, putin critic? is that suspicious to you, his death? yeah, it's suspicious. absolutely. yeah. but can i say that vladimir putin did it? no. - no. litvinenko, do you remember him? i don't. well, let's just say he had a penchant for polonium. right. especially in his tea. he died a horrible death. it seems like the oscars style in memoriam for all the opposition leaders and journalists

who have died under putin's watch is just like-- i don't know if john legend has the stamina to complete that. jordan (voiceover): as we were talking, kline got an unexpected call. oh, man, i've got to do it. got a call? yeah, rt thing. that's russian television that's calling? yeah. i mean, i have to ask, are you a russian asset? [laughs] well, if i am, i'm a bad one. jordan (voiceover): wait, was kline about to feed the propaganda from the kremlin back to russian state television? there's nothing democratic today about ukraine. jordan (voiceover): oh, no. was i the biscuit in a propaganda circle jerk? ♪ higher love ♪ by: whitney houston summer back then... we perfected the selfie. made our own music... ♪♪ and took fashion to a whole new level. ♪♪

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will and i are honored to have you all here as our summer interns. as i like to say, dunkin'terns. you love saying that. affleck and damon, the dunkings are not here! mer is all about big dunkin' iced energy. b d i e what does that big dunkin iced button do? i wouldn't let's see. are those your car keys? we tried to program it to bring me a dunkin' iced every time you push the button. grab him? get that away from me again. thank you. a lot of surprises. let's put a dunkin' iced in every hand this summer! dunkin' iced! jordan (voiceover): putin has a clear set of goals beyond decorating his us assets' offices. he also wants to stop funding for ukraine and weaken nato so he can expand russian territory. and donald trump is playing right into putin's hands by threatening to leave our allies to fend for themselves. you didn't pay, you're delinquent, i would encourage them to do whatever the hell they want.

you got to pay. if trump wins a second term, what happens to nato? i think trump will withdraw from nato. i think that's his intention. how do you stop something like that from happening? the best advice i can offer for people in a second term, since i won't be part of it, is keep distracting trump. he's like a cat. get a laser pointer into the white house, right? jesus christ, it's the only way to save nuclear apocalypse. well, i hadn't thought of that, but that might do the trick. if we do pull out of nato, who is the most screwed? well, i think any country that borders on russia or a former part of the soviet union. so if i were booking travel into the eastern bloc, to, say, estonia, maybe slow down or at least get the trip protection? i was going to say go now. jordan (voiceover): if you say so, john. when has following john bolton's advice on foreign affairs ever gone wrong? [estonia national anthem] this is estonia, a nato member country of just over a million people that

sits on the border of russia. since the invasion of ukraine, estonians have been wondering, are we next? to see how people here are feeling about being in putin's crosshairs, i sat down with estonian prime minister, kaja kallas, who has been described as the iron lady of the baltic for standing up to russia. apparently, i'm the only leader that is on russia's most wanted list. oh. yeah. you're on the most wanted list? i am. i'm not in danger, right? no. i'm a brave fake journalist, but i'm only so brave and mostly fake. jordan (voiceover): as putin has gotten bolder, kallas has become one of nato's most vocal supporters. we shouldn't dismantle nato. nato is the strongest military alliance. we don't have war here because we are in nato. in america, a presidential candidate is arguing that if everybody's not paying their fair share in nato, then

why should we be facing the brunt of it? first, we are paying more for defense. i mean, estonia, we are-- you guys are? yes, we are spending 3.2% of our gdp on defense. it's more than united states is spending in terms of percentage. nice flex. how i explain nato to school children, i always say that, you know, if you have a school bully, and you are weaker physically, the bully doesn't bully you when you have big friends. and this is how nato works. so what happens if one of your big friends also happens to be a bully who's talking about just becoming friends with the other bully and then bullying all the little people? well, that is definitely going to be more complicated. yeah. if russia will succeed in ukraine, then their appetite will grow because, you know, they have expanded their empire and colonized the country. aggression pays off. every next time, every next step, they're bolder.

ok, nothing happened to us. we can do this. they have built up their military to colonize another country. just for clarification, how close is russia to us right now? it's 320km or something. i'm from new york. how many city blocks is that? it's a three-hour drive. three-hour drive. ok, so that's a good seven city blocks in new york. that's congestion. new york is intense that way. jordan (voiceover): turns out we're so close, that estonian civilians are training in the woods in case of a russian invasion. these are our guys? ok. if russia were to attack along with you guys, i got to be honest, i'm not really the fighting kind. jordan (voiceover): this is the estonian defense league. they're an all-volunteer army of about 30,000 regular estonians. what do you do? what's your day job. you were a choir conductor? how do you go from studying to be a choir conductor to

in the middle of the estonian woods holding a ar of some sort? when americans gather like this, they're usually training to keep a barbershop open during covid. and you guys are training to-- jordan (voiceover): and there's a reason these soldiers are concerned. i got your six, or whatever it is in metric. 12? i-- russia brutally occupied estonia until 1991. jordan (voiceover): so while maga world turns a blind eye to putin's plan to expand russia, people who lived under that occupation have a different view of it. everybody is for peace, but we understand what peace under soviet or russian occupation means. you had mass atrocities, mass deportations.

my own mother was deported to siberia as a six-month-old baby. there were mass killings. they were suppressing our culture, trying to erase our language. this is what peace under occupation means. that doesn't mean that the human suffering will stop. jordan (voiceover): if only we could get that information to go viral on truth social. okay, ideas. where we going? —i got one. —i got one! ♪ ("do you wanna dance?" by the ramones) ♪ what about a comedy show?

i've swiped on you, no. [multiple speakers] tacos! definitely tacos. find your vibe in the all-new, all-hybrid camry. toyota. let's go places. (ambient sounds, clock ticking) starbucks frappuccino drinks. (♪♪) the feeling of a comforting hug from your nana, but with a taste of creamy, delicious coffee. thejordan (voiceover): forg the past few months, i've been wrestling with my country's susceptibility to propaganda. are we just useful idiots, or is the harder truth that some of us might actually want autocracy? [laughs] jordan (voiceover): and if it's russian autocracy, do americans really even know what that looks like? i love moscow. it's the place i was born.

it was one of my favorite cities in the world. but it's now become the center of totalitarian repression. it's almost total police surveillance. people are being sent to jail for what they say in private phone conversations. and what i would tell these maga voters is that a great metro is not worth your personal liberty. yeah. it's quite the price to pay for a fancy subway ride. we have a russian minority in estonia. it is interesting. those that are living closer to the border, they can see the life on the russian side, and they can see that it's not better than on the european side. whereas, you know, people that are further away from the border, they may also believe what the russians are telling. that makes sense. i was in green bay, wisconsin, and i heard about how great life in moscow is. and i think that's 5 billion kilometers away. i have to learn this metric system eventually. i got to get into this. yeah, yeah, we all have to.

it's complicated. it is. jordan (voiceover): so if we want folks in pennsylvania to pay closer attention to the realities halfway across the world, maybe i could help make the rest of the world look a little more like pennsylvania. it says "ride4tits." it's a-- it's a traditional american license plate. everybody has them in america. if you have a giant monster truck and want to flex in america, you got to throw ride4tits on it. is that illegal here? for recruitment, you put this thing on a military truck, these numbers are going to go up 20%. my failure at novelty license plate diplomacy made me feel like an idiot. well, at least i'm not a moscow tool. [music playing]