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March 7, 2025 - Judging Freedom - Judge Andrew Napolitano
25:32
[ LIVE from Moscow ] - Judge and The INTEL Roundtable w/ Johnson & McGovern
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Hi, everyone.
Judge Andrew Napolitano here for Judging Freedom.
Today is Friday.
I'm looking at my watch.
Today is Friday, March 7th, 2025.
We are coming to you live from Moscow, Russia, where Larry Johnson and I are guests on a trip about which we'll speak for a minute.
Our dear friend and colleague, who should be here with us because, as you all know, he is utterly fluent in Russian.
Ray McGovern is at home, but he joins us now.
This is the end of the day, the end of the week.
It's not quite the end of the day in the East Coast.
It is here in Moscow.
It's the Intelligence Community Roundtable.
Ray McGovern, Larry Johnson, welcome here.
A pleasure, my friends.
Thank you for doing the double duty.
Thank you for accommodating this crazy schedule, Ray, that Larry and I are in.
So, Larry, what are we doing here?
Hey, we're here to make friends, not war.
We've been invited to participate in an event that really is about, let's call it a version of civilian public diplomacy and building bridges with some people who are,
interestingly enough, they're sanctioned and they haven't committed an act of violence.
They haven't done a single thing to the United States.
And yet they were sanctioned under the Biden administration.
And hopefully Donald Trump will see to it that those sanctions are lifted.
Because we're dealing with people that have a love for freedom.
And the real irony about modern-day Russia is modern-day Russia has reverted to its nationalist roots.
It's the roots of...
Where Russian culture was celebrated over European culture.
And central to that is a deep faith in Christianity, deep faith in Christ that is really prevalent throughout the society.
So it's really, it's a remarkable place.
And as we've seen, it has surpassed France, Paris as the city of lights.
Ray, I think you've been here, and I don't know when you were here last.
Larry and I are at the Metropole Hotel, which is a magnificent old hotel built during the Tsar era in 1905.
We are right across the street from Red Square, St. Basil's Cathedral.
It's a magnificent, spectacular storybook-like location.
On the other side of Moscow, you would think you were in Dubai.
Because the downtown financial industrial district has the most fantastic, gleaming, architecturally stylish high-rises, the likes of which I've only seen in Dubai.
Did Moscow look like this when you were here last?
Well, actually, it did.
It's just five years since I've been there.
But before that, when I served in Moscow at the embassy, 72. Not 1872, as my children say.
It was very different.
It was incredibly different.
And there's great hope now.
But I have to say that there's a great depth of mistrust and distrust that exists between the governments of both countries that has to be overcome.
Before President Trump can achieve what he wants to achieve.
What Lavrov might ask you on Monday is, who's in charge in Washington?
President Trump seems to be in charge, but then there are always these fellows that come in with the briefcases and the dark glasses and the suits, just like I'm wearing, says Putin.
And they tell the president who's boss.
There's ample...
Evidence of this, most recently, well, the most stark example was in 2016 when Secretary of State Kerry and Lavrov himself negotiated a ceasefire, a ceasefire, right, in Syria at a referendum.
They went to Putin and they went to Obama at the time and said, look, you chop off on this?
Yes. How long did it last?
Six days before the U.S. Air Force hit.
Fixed Syrian army positions that have been there for a year.
So Lavrov said, what's going on, John?
And then John told him, well, you know, we're not all together here.
And the military decided, well, blah, blah, blah.
And Lavrov said, my dear friend John Kerry has apologized to me.
He's not really in control.
And Obama was not really in control.
So that's the big question.
That's the big question that Lavrov had.
Who's in control?
Funny, I don't want to get too into the weeds, but it's following up on that.
Larry and I were at lunch today with a very prominent person who told us of a similar conversation between Foreign Minister Lavrov and then Secretary of State John Kerry,
at the end of which Kerry just drank his cup of tea and walked out of the room.
And when he left, Blavroff was just relieved because he was sick and tired of talking to a dummy.
I think I have fairly characterized that conversation that was recounted to us, Larry.
It's amazing.
Larry, a little bit about the city today.
What's the most notable thing you and I have been talking about?
And it's something we haven't seen.
Yeah, we were fortunate.
Russia has built a World War II museum.
It is unlike anything I've ever seen anywhere in the world.
I've been to the Louvre.
I've been to the British War Museum.
I've been to the pyramids in Egypt.
I've been to the Smithsonian, especially the both airspace museums.
This is almost like walking into a 3D movie.
And you're part of it.
You are directly involved with the scenes, which basically, you start at the start of the war and you go all the way through to the end in Berlin with different phases.
But the artwork that went in, it's like they built movie sets, but not something...
Cheap, not something skimpy.
It's unbelievable.
This is the most important thing we've seen.
What have we not seen on the streets in Moscow, which you expect to see and do see on the streets in every major city in the U.S.?
Cops. No police.
We've seen, you know, we were remarking as we drove back, we had about a 45-minute drive.
And imagine that you're driving anywhere through New York City.
Or Philadelphia or Washington, D.C. We saw, in the course of a 45-minute drive, I think a total of two police cars that were going the opposite direction from us.
You didn't see any police on the street corners.
You didn't see any police patrolling up and down.
This image of Russia as an authoritarian state, you know, we keep hearing dummy politicians say that's stupidity.
It's just not the case.
The people here enjoy a level of safety and security that people in most American big cities wish they had.
I fully agree with you.
Ray Edmund is stunned, and of course I want to move on to relevant events in the news that our viewers expect me to solicit your opinions on.
Stunned on the physical beauty, the hustle and bustle, And the happiness of the people that we interacted with.
I don't know where the New York Times reporters go when they come here, but they're certainly not recounting for their readers what Larry and I have been thrilled to observe and interact with in the past 24 hours.
Now, our interview, there's just four of us, going to be four of us in the room, and two of them are on this show now.
Larry, yours truly.
A young Australian blogger that the Russian hierarchy is fond of.
And Prime Minister Lavrov himself.
And that, we understand, will be two hours of unbridled, off the record, back and forth.
And of course, I can't wait for it.
But getting to issues that have happened since we were last together.
President Trump...
Ray has announced that United States intel will no longer be providing intel assistance to the Ukrainian military.
Can they possibly locate Russian targets without U.S. intel?
And why did John Ratcliffe, who's the director of the CIA, tell the Financial Times, well, we might be providing a little bit of intel indirectly.
It'll make its way to them.
Well, there are ways to do it indirectly.
But this is big.
This is very big.
When the president said we're not going to give them the stuff we used to give them, then they cannot.
They just simply cannot fire their missillery into Russia proper.
And that's big.
And then there's the cutoff of military aid.
This thing is over.
The only thing that needs to be resolved is the level of trust between Putin himself.
And whoever is president.
And when I say whoever is president, that's what I mean.
Who's running this joint here in the United States?
So that's really big.
Now, Trump himself, in that celebrated fracas at the Oval Office on the 28th of February, identified himself with Putin and said, look, I wasn't the only victim of Russiagate.
So was Vladimir Putin.
Now it's been revealed how much of a charade that was, but he has grievances too, okay?
Now, he has grievances, yes.
He also has suspicions that even Trump may be sabotaged by the deep state.
So the level of trust would be really, and I think Lavrov will be very, very attentive to trying to get out of you both.
How do you think?
You think Trump can bring this off without being sabotaged, or maybe?
I was completely taken aback.
I'm assuming the Financial Times quoted John Ratcliffe.
Forgive me if I'm butchering his name.
Ratcliffe. Larry, there must have been...
Today, Friday, a major attack by the Russians on something close to Kyiv because the Washington Post, just as we were logging on, is reporting that Trump is threatening large-scale additional Russian sanctions as reactions to whatever this Russian attack was today.
Now, you and I know Because we're interacting with people who have been sanctioned because of their words that the Biden administration has sanctioned everything under the sun here.
It hasn't affected their economy one whit.
In fact, it's made them more independent and more prosperous.
The Trump administration has retained those sanctions.
The only two things that have not been sanctioned...
Or some sort of modified uranium, which American power plants need, and fertilizer.
So go ahead, sanction the fertilizer.
Does the president know what he's talking about when he says, I'm going to impose large-scale sanctions because Vladimir Putin wants to end the war and win it?
Yeah, no.
The simple answer is no.
Russia is not going to be bullied.
And Trump and company need to understand that.
The period in which Russia was willing to make sacrifices in order to remain friends with the United States, that's over.
It's now going to be an even relationship.
Previously, it's like Russia had a friendship with a chronic alcoholic.
And put up with the alcoholic throwing up in their car, put up with the alcoholic wrecking their car, put up with the alcoholic breaking up furniture in their house because they tried to get along.
Well, they've now thrown the alcoholic out.
And the United States does not have the leverage that it once thought it did.
In fact...
Yeah, there are alternatives to the uranium.
Right now, I think Russia supplies about 5% to 8% of the enriched uranium, processed uranium, that the United States uses in its nuclear plants.
But fertilizer front, it's over 90%.
So you want to make sure that American farmers can't grow anything this fall?
Fine. Sanction the fertilizer.
Cut that off.
I appreciate you explaining that to us.
Ray, Trump has revealed that his emissary, Stephen Wyckoff, not the Secretary of State, another issue for another time, is negotiating with Hamas.
Now, how could that have happened without...
Central Intelligence Agency involvement.
How could Whitcoff possibly reach out to, fly to, and sit face-to-face with Hamas, a group that the American government says is a terrorist organization, a group the leadership of which and negotiators for which have been assassinated by the Israelis?
Well, Judge, the former head of the CIA, and I stress and I welcome the word former, Bill Burns.
He tried his best to do this.
He can't do it because he was subservient to Netanyahu and how his President Biden was also subservient.
Now, Trump has shown himself willing to take all kinds of risks and run the risks that the Israel lobby and Netanyahu won't like what he's doing.
And there he is.
Not Bill Burns anymore.
But a guy who has shown himself able to throw his weight around would cough.
So this is a hopeful sign.
Whether anything comes of it or not will depend on whether Trump can really face into Netanyahu and say, look, we're running a show now.
You'll do what we want or else there will be consequences.
That'll be a big step.
But it's possible now because Trump is filling his oats and Netanyahu is in desperately need.
Larry, we all know that the Israelis have not been able to find and not been able to eradicate Hamas.
And you and I had a conversation earlier today about Trump and Woodcoff doing the good cop, bad cop routine.
What are your thoughts on that, Larry?
Well, we saw it just two days ago when Donald Trump comes out again, issued the same warning he did like three weeks ago that Hamas better release those hostages by Saturday or there's going to be hell to pay.
Well, he did that three weeks ago.
Saturday came and went and there was no hell to pay.
It's bad enough that the Palestinians are already living in the hell of their own because of the Israeli genocide.
The same day that Trump said that, you know, two days ago, we learned that there are direct talks going on between Hamas and U.S. officials, really for the first time.
No intermediary, no other third party in the room directly talking.
And I think Trump did his, you know, we're going to blow you to hell speech as a way to distract attention from the fact that they're actually talking to Hamas.
And they might actually be working towards getting a real deal done.
Is this another put down to Netanyahu by Trump, Ray, that he would say, hey, Bibi, stay home.
Witkoff will deal with Hamas.
It is.
I could just hear him say it that way.
No, it clearly is.
I mean, was Netanyahu consulted about this beforehand?
I don't know.
But if not, this is a big step by Trump going around behind his back.
Trump is interested, as I understand it, in the U.S. hostages that are left there getting free, you know?
So is it possible that this is a new game vis-a-vis Netanyahu himself?
Well, yeah, it is.
And will this worry Netanyahu maybe think twice about inciting a war elsewhere like with Iran?
It will.
I'd like to get back to what you saw in the city of Moscow.
I've been there and seen that kind of new scene.
I woke up this morning to Rachmaninoff, okay?
And I couldn't get out of my mind, Obama's calling Russia just a glorified gas station posing as a country.
And so my recipe for this...
There's more of this citizen-to-citizen diplomacy needs to take place because even the people writing for the New York Times, if they stay at the Metropole, if they look at Red Square, if they get around in Russia, they're going to see a different Russia than the ones that have been forced to write about.
And that's big.
I want to play a clip from the Canadian foreign minister.
I didn't know that she prefers to speak French.
But there is a translator.
It's a very, very interesting observation, and it's a subject matter that the three of us have not covered as a group, and that is tariffs.
You're going to hear her say that the Canadian government, as loopy as Trudeau is, but the Canadian government is of the belief that the purpose of the tariffs has nothing to do with border security and nothing to do with fentanyl, but is intended to wreck the Canadian economy.
So that Trudeau can become the governor of Canada when it becomes annexed by the United States.
It's a little bit of a long clip, and she's in French, but there is a translation with a little patience.
It'll generate some interesting commentary from the three of us.
Chris? Trump and Trudeau spoke, and you spoke with your counterpart as well.
So once again, what do you think that he's calling Trudeau again, Governor Trudeau?
And now they're referring to each other with their first names.
So we understand that these are difficult conversations.
The conversations are constructive, but of course, we have to remain without emotion.
These are unjustified tariffs.
Canada is seeking to reject the imposition of these tariffs, and we know that these are not necessarily related to border issues.
We have to remember that the President, his powers are based on imposing these tariffs, and he has not demonstrated that there's a national security issue at the border.
Therefore, based on that, we believe that we need to continue to strengthen the border and work together to save lives related to the scourge of fentanyl.
But fundamentally, what we think that the president wants is much bigger than the issue of fentanyl.
His goal is to weaken us, and once he has done that...
And then, de facto, he thinks he could annex us.
He's said that in the past.
So based on that, our goal, therefore, is to find diplomatic solutions.
Ray McGovern, what do you think?
I think she speaks truth to power here.
This is what the game is all about.
If memory serves, I think I read this morning that some of those tariffs, both to Canada and to Mexico, have been relaxed at least for a while.
The tariffs are going to be bad news for everyone, including the American consumer.
So how long this bluster, how long this faux attempt to create a 51st state in Canada is going to last?
I don't think very much longer outside the sphere of bluster.
The Canadians are going to stand firm.
They're not going to want to give up their, for example, free medical aid to join a country where the poor people are not only marginalized but deprived of that kind of military aid.
Larry, your thoughts on the Canadian Prime Minister in general, because you and I also talked about the Panama Canal, which Trump claims has been seized by the Chinese, and you know personally it's not been the case.
What do you think about the stuff that he says?
Well, the whole Canada stuff is just a distraction.
It's the shiny object the magician shows when he's trying to hide something else, I presume.
Because, you know, the example, what happened, he was going to impose those tariffs, and it wouldn't impose tariffs on cars made in Mexico, made in Canada, imported to the United States.
The problem is that those are general motor cars.
And so that would affect general motor stockholders.
And a lot of those general motor stockholders live here in the United States.
And the fact of the matter is, there's parts that are moving back and forth across the border.
So, you know, this really was sort of a foolish move on Trump's part.
And then to compound it, the Canadians are dumping all of their Kentucky bourbon and Texas tequila and Texas vodka.
You know, Tito's is getting rejected big time.
So it's just, you know, this is one of those things where he gets to pound his chest.
But it's a hollow sound because it doesn't accomplish anything that's going to benefit the United States.
Gentlemen, thank you very much.
Thank you for your time.
Thank you for the jumping through hoops to make all this work today, given how far, how close Larry and I are to each other, but how far away we are from you, Ray, and of course from producer Chris, who bends over backwards so valiantly to make these things work.
We'll see you both on Monday morning.
Larry and I will still be here, but we'll see you at your usual times.
Which means good luck tomorrow, folks.
Good luck.
You're doing a good ambassador job.
Good luck.
Thank you.
Thank you very much.
And coming up on Monday, of course, at the usual times at eight in the morning.
Eastern Time will be Alistair Crook at 10 in the morning.
Eastern Time will be our friend Ray McGovern at 11 or 11.30.
Not sure which Eastern Time will be my traveling buddy, Larry Johnson.
Thank you very much for watching.
We're into not quite midnight at Moscow, but downtown at Moscow.
Judge Napolitano for Judging Freedom.
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