Background Briefing: March 29, 2022
The Seven Hour Gap in Trump’s White House Phone Records on January 6
We begin with the seven hour gap in the Trump White House records the National Archives handed over to the January 6 Committee investigating the insurrection revealing a critical hole in the record from 11.17 AM to 6.45 PM on that day between when Trump exhorted the crowd to march on the Capitol to when the police regained control of the building. Joining us is Andrew Feinberg, a reporter covering the White House and Congress for The Independent where his latest articles are “Trump’s Jan 6 phone records have 7-hour gap spanning riot” and “Trump speaks out during war in Ukraine to call on Putin to release Hunter Biden dirt.” We also discuss how in the midst of the murder and mayhem, death and destruction underway in Ukraine, Trump’s priority in an interview with a right wing publication today is to call on Putin to provide dirt of Hunter Biden.
Putin’s Culture Wars and His American “Family Values” Allies
Then we speak with Eliot Borenstein, a Professor of Russian & Slavic Studies and Senior Academic Convenor for the Global Network at New York University. He is the author of a number of books including Plots against Russia: Conspiracy and Fantasy after Socialism, Pussy Riot: Speaking Punk to Power, Meanwhile, in Russia…: Russian Internet Memes and Viral Video, and the forthcoming book, Soviet-Self-Hatred: The Secret Identities of Postsocialism. And he joins us to discuss his article at CNN, “Putin has hitched his ‘Russophobia’ cart to the latest culture war wagon.”