On The Nation: Patrick Gower interviews Evan Siegfried

Patrick Gower: Now, Evan Siegfried is a Republican strategist who came out against Trump last year. He joins us now live from New York City. Evan, thank you so much for joining us, and I want to start by asking you — for a Republican, you were really anti-Trump; what’s it like living now in the United States of America under the Republican president Donald Trump?
Evan Siegfried: Well, my answer would probably depend upon whether or not you guys will grant my application of asylum. But in all seriousness, it’s very different. I think we’re seeing a battle for the soul of the Republican party. I stand here as a conservative, and I see things that are happening under President Trump that are not conservative — withdrawing from the Trans Pacific Partnership, the heavy government intervention in pretty much the daily aspects of life, the crony capitalism where the President picks up the phone and calls a company and says, ‘No, no, no. I don’t want you to move a job out of here, so I’m going to give you all these benefits, and you don’t move those jobs.’ It just does not sit well with me. At the same time, there are positive things that he’s done. I applaud his appointment, or nomination, I should say, of Judge Neil Gorsuch to sit on the Supreme Court. His appointment of H R McMaster to replace Michael Flynn as the National Security Advisor as another strong move which I think the world community can even respect, given his view of terrorism and it being to counter to President Trump’s own view.
Yeah, sure. Do you feel like that he’s wrecked the Republican Party, that he’s wrecked the party that you obviously love, that Grand Old Party? What sort of damage, lasting damage, is he doing?
Well, I’m not entirely sure just yet. I think we have a generational divide in America, not just in the Republican Party but in the Democratic Party as well, between Baby Boomers and Millennials. Baby Boomers, this election was that last gasp of that generation, and overwhelmingly in polls, they approve of what President Trump is doing. But if you look at Millennials, such as myself, we are completely against it. We believe in free trade, we don’t believe in protectionism, we believe in allowing immigrants to come into the United States and not building a wall. But Baby Boomers are the exact opposite. They’ve sort of gotten old and curmudgeonly, for lack of a better description, whereas us Millennials, we believe in pretty much everything the President does not.
Yeah, so, I mean, if we look at trade, which you talked a little bit about — obviously very important to a country like New Zealand, where there is literally billions of dollars at stake. Picking up on the tape-recorded conversation where Donald Trump was talking about 10% tariffs and also using food safety to, sort of, influence trade, how worried should we be about that out here in New Zealand?
Well, part of it is while the President does set trade policy, it still has to go through the Congress, and the Congress has to pass it. There are many Republicans who believe that actions like that that are protectionist actually negatively impact the economy. Here in the United States, we don’t do as much trade with New Zealand as we do with, say, Mexico, and we get the vast majority of our avocados. And the President was talking about slapping a 20% tariff on avocados coming into the United States from Mexico. But what people fail to realise, and I think the President intentionally ignores, is that it’s actually the consumer who will pay that price. So it will only hurt the cost of living for every American. And I think that there are many Republicans in Congress who have been quiet, but they won’t let it happen or at least slow walk it to the point where we are seeing this protectionist ideals, because that just negatively impacts any economy, be it yours, mine or even Mexico’s.
I also want to pick up on what you were talking about earlier with the National Security Adviser and security in general, or in particular in the Middle East — Iraq and Syria. Can you see the Trump administration making some changes to the way that they are fighting the Islamic State over there? New Zealand would be influenced; we’ve got troops over there. Can you see some changes in tactics, material changes in tactics, that might come?
I’m not entirely sure, to be honest with you. I think part of the tactics is — and I’m going to be going against my own party here — but we need to stop calling it radical Islamic terrorism, because, as General McMaster himself pointed out, calling it that, calling it anything Islamic, gives them credence when terrorism in itself is against the fundamentals of Islam. And I think that if President Trump were wise and listened to General McMaster and General Mattis, who’s now Secretary of Defense, and Secretary of Homeland Kelly, then that would be a beneficial thing. However, there are competing power centres within the White House, such as Steve Bannon, the senior counsellor or the chief strategist to the President, who believes in saying radical Islamic terrorism and that we should just wipe them out. I think on the security level, we’re seeing that in the so-called travel ban. There’s been a lot of disinformation about it, such as Muslims can’t come into the United States. Muslims from only seven nations cannot come into the United States for 90 days while we improve the vetting system for those particular seven nations. At the same time, Muslims from Indonesia, the most populous Muslim nation on the planet, can come into the United States and legally immigrate.
Yeah, I mean, when we look at things like this and we look at it from afar, you do see Donald Trump advancing his agenda and keeping his promises, but there is so much chaos around the White House and things that they are doing that are overshadowing it. I mean, I want to ask you this — is the White House in control or is it out of control over there?
The White House claims it’s in control, but in reality it’s like that scene in the Wolf of Wall Street where he drives the car home from the country club and he’s high on Quaaludes and thinks he does an amazing job driving in a straight line when the next morning he discovers he crashes it in any and everything. The White House is not in control. A perfect example for you is while it may seem on the surface that he’s delivering on all of his campaign promises, he actually needs to have results and needs to have them pass through the legislative branch of the United States, which is the Congress. And he came out about four weeks ago and said, ‘Oh, my tax reform plan is amazing. I’ll be presenting it in two weeks.’ And Republicans on Capitol Hill said, ‘Wait a second. We haven’t even been consulted. We’re the ones you need to talk to, because we’re the ones who legally propose the legislation and pass it and get it through.’
It’s very chaotic. And what we’ll do is we’ll leave you now over there in New York City to go and maybe take a Quaalude or something and just chill out a bit.
Alcohol is my coping mechanism.
Good on you. Thank you so much for joining us.
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