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Matt Katz: It's the Brian Lehrer show on WNYC. Good morning everyone. I am WNYC reporter Matt Katz and I'm filling in for Brian Lehrer today. Happy President's Day to you. On this President's Day, we're beginning by trying to make sense of the historic weekend we just experienced. The acquittal of the only president in American history to be impeached twice.

Last week, Democrats laid out a powerful detailed timeline of the insurrectionist events of January 6th, with new videos and details about what former President Trump's supporters did, and what President Trump didn't do, as the lives of lawmakers and his own vice president were being threatened. Then on Saturday, the Senate held what democrats would tout as the most bipartisan vote in an impeachment trial ever, even though Trump was ultimately acquitted. Here's Republican Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell after the vote.

Mitch McConnell: There's no question. Done. That President Trump is practically and morally responsible for provoking the events of the day. No question about it. The people who stormed this building believed they were acting on the wishes and instructions of their president. Having that belief was a foreseeable consequence of the growing crescendo of false statements, conspiracy theories, and reckless hyperbole, which the defeated president kept shouting into the largest megaphone on planet earth.

Matt: Yet, McConnell voted to acquit Trump, as did all but seven Republican senators. Now the former president arguably holds as much power over the republican party and its MAGA coalition as he did before this impeachment. With the acquittal, Trump can run again for president in four years. With me now to talk about this historic weekend and where we go next is Olivia Nuzzi, Washington correspondent for New York Magazine, who has followed Trump's since before the beginning of his presidency and who has colorfully chronicled its many, many characters. Good morning, Olivia.

Olivia Nuzzi: Good morning, Matt. Thank you for having me.

Matt: Oh, it's my pleasure. Looking forward to chatting with you about all this. This outcome of acquittal seemed almost pre-determined. It wasn't surprising to anyone who's been paying attention that this would happen. Was this whole exercise of impeachment worth it, what was the point?

Olivia: I personally think it's always worth it to have a trial. I think it was worth it to put Republican lawmakers on the record about how they really felt about this. Unfortunately, if anything was surprising, it was how many Republicans came out and voted to convict him. I think a lot of people were surprised that seven in total came out to convict him, especially given the reaction to the Republicans in the House, who made the decision to impeach. This outcome was obviously what was going to happen.

I think, even as some of the impeachment managers went into this feeling extraordinarily optimistic, feeling like if there was ever a moment for something extraordinary to happen, it would be when the trial is at the scene of the crime with the victims of the crime as the jurors, but if you were paying attention as you said in Washington for the last four years, or really, even since the Obama era, I think when the trends of negative partisanship really started to worsen, I don't think that you could have really believed that it would end up any other way than it did here.

Matt: You said that the surprise was that some Republicans actually voted to convict, what happens to those seven republicans now, will they be metaphorically tarred and feathered and ousted from the party? What comes of them?

Olivia: Two of the republicans are retiring, three aren't up until 2026 for reelection. I think it's anyone's guess what the world of Republican politics is going to look like in 2026. If you look back and you think about how much it's changed in that same five-year span looking back, but it's hard to say what ridicule really looks like in the era where Donald Trump is no longer on Twitter, and no longer in the Oval Office. His capacity to turn feather his fellow Republican has been greatly diminished by his de-platforming and him no longer being in office, I think it's an open question, how much sway he will continue to hold over the party?

That's why I think you see people like Mitch McConnell coming out and even after voting to acquit him on the charge in this case, coming out and very strongly condemning him as if he was reading off of the wrong prepared notes completely at odds with what his decision was, but I think that there are certain Republicans who feel emboldened with their great tormentor removed from power and at quite a distance now safely in Florida. They feel like they can speak their minds and people who are further away from reelection or who are not considering running for reelection as perhaps in Mitch McConnell case, I think feel like they are safer than some of the other people in the Senate or in the House.

Matt: Trump as Republicans great tormentor. Listeners, did you watch the trial this weekend? What are your feelings about the outcome? What questions might you have for Olivia Nuzzi who has reported on this last White House unlike anyone else for New York magazine? Call us at 646-435-7280, 646-435-7280. Congress might not be done with the Republicans great tormentor after all, there is talk of maybe censuring Trump, there could be a yet-to-be-determined vote in some manner to keep him somehow from running. Again. Do you think it makes any political sense for Democrats to pursue Trump in any fashion formally in the senate at this point?

Olivia: It's hard to say. I think, frankly, it makes more sense for some Republicans that you would want to be able to protect yourself from Trump running again, and elevating his profile again, and becoming centrist as a political discourse again. If I am Mitch McConnell, I see a better case, I think, from taking some action like that. Then, if I am part of the Biden administration, and I'm trying to get ahead with my agenda, I think one of the risks and I think you saw it in the White House is relative silence over impeachment, is that Donald Trump will continue to define this era of American politics.

When he is now finally in office and has a lot that he needs to get done, the first three and a half weeks of his administration have been completely taken over by talk of Donald Trump, rather than talk of what he is doing or what he ought to be doing or what he's hoping to do. I think that that is frustrating and a bit of a distraction for some Democrats.

I also think, justifiably, there are a lot of Democrats, and speaking to Eric Swalwell, one of the impeachment managers, who just feel like not centering and not doing something to spot the Tanduay would be a tacit decision that it's okay to behave this way, or that it's okay for someone else to behave this way in the future, but for Republicans, I think that the real fear should be that Donald Trump is able to run again, and put them on the position that they've been in for the last six years that he's been central to American political life.

Matt: It makes it, I imagine harder for Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, all these myriad other people in the Senate who want to be president themselves, to find a path to the presidency if Trump continues to loom large and I imagine continue to threaten to run for office-- Run for president in 2024, right?

Olivia: Yes, but there's this line that they have to walk where if you're Ted Cruz, just as an example, you're trying very hard to continue to appeal to Donald Trump's face, and to, at the very least, not upset them. You want them to like you, and you're very fearful of their wrath, but at the same time, you know firsthand what it's like to be knocked out of the spotlight by Donald Trump and to have your life completely defined by the whims and the will of Donald Trump. I think it is politically a difficult position to navigate and it doesn't make a lot of sense either way.

Matt: Yes. I want to go back to something you mentioned earlier about the unusual nature of this impeachment, it was described as a trial, but so much of it was like, unlike any normal trial, the jurors, Republican senators, some of them barely hid the fact that they were actually conferring with defense attorneys during the proceedings. It was also bizarre that the jurors themselves were victims of the very crimes that they were reviewing the evidence for and although it was a trial there were no witnesses. After watching this, what do you make of our constitutional impeachment process? Is there something imperfect or broken about it or it’s just the nature of the situation that made it so bizarre?

Olivia: It's just political. It’s not the criminal justice system and so it is necessarily a bit inferior. That's why I think the charges from Republicans and this is featured in the last impeachment that this is just political. We're so silly because, of course-- That's the function that at least in modern times of an impeachment trial. I don't think that any of the outcomes was surprising as we talked about, but it was extremely strange.

It was very strange to watch. It's been strange to be in Washington, even for the last four years, but since the inauguration specifically, sorry, since the insurrection specifically. It was strange to watch just as it was strange to watch on Inauguration Day. I was there with other members of the press and it was extremely strange to consider what had happened there just two weeks before. That you're on the same site, and that this is where the barrier was breached, this is where people were killed, and it was similarly strange to consider watching the trial that this is happening at that very place.

Matt: Right. I imagine, National Guard and men and women in military garb are all over the city and all over the Capitol over the last few weeks too, that also has to have been strange for you.

Olivia: Yes, DC is a-- I think the term for it is fortress DC. There's a very good piece in Slate about how strange it is to live here anyway. How so much of the real estate here is kind of devoted to the security apparatus around the various federal buildings and monuments. It has been very strange to walk down the street or go down to the White House and there is now around the White House, for instance, I was there last week, covering the vice president, it’s just two blocks prior to where you would normally enter.

It’s ripped off by secret service and you have to go through a tent and it's kind of-- In normal times, when you walk through the White House gate into the perimeter or onto the campus, there's an eerie silence that follows when the gate closes because it's the most secure place on earth, and you're not going to bump into a random person who doesn't belong there on the sidewalk or something.

Now, that silence begins blocks away, and it's just this very strange sense of bubble in the downtown part of the city and the whole place is like that around the Capitol, it's like that as well on a bigger scale because it's a bigger plot of land. It's a very weird time and it looks unAmerican. The side of it looks offensive.

Matt: Something quite sad and tragic about all of that. We're going to go to the phones. Sean, from Pauling New York. Hi there, Sean. Sean Good morning.

Sean: Good morning. Thank you for taking me on.

Matt: Absolutely.

Sean: What I wanted to say was that since the acquittal of Donald Trump, which if I'm correct, I believe was the most bipartisan vote against-- The most bipartisan vote to convict I should say. I've seen a lot of media pressure on the democratic house managers to explain their strategy why they didn't pursue witnesses, and so forth. I'm not seeing public pressure on Republicans so much to explain their vote.

Mitch McConnell, subsequently after voting to acquit immediately took to the Senate floor and gave this impassioned speech about-- He laid out all the reasons why Donald Trump was definitely guilty, but he acquitted anyway. Why isn't there public pressure on those who voted to acquit to explain why it's okay to what I view as a gross dereliction of duty, their oath is to uphold and defend the Constitution against all enemies foreign and domestic and they decided to give insurrection a pass. Shouldn't they be pressured more heavily than the Democrats?

Matt: Olivia, what do you make of that? Are republicans facing any pressure or are they only adhering to the remnants of the MAGA coalition?

Olivia: I think it's the latter. I think for six years, the republican party has displayed total fealty to Donald Trump. I think we continue to see that, that they fear the wrath of his supporters or the looming threat of his tweets, even though he's no longer on Twitter. They fear that much more than they fear the wrath of a pundit in the mainstream media or some centrist conservative online who might criticize them. Whereas we saw the left certainly extraordinarily angry after Democrats made the decision not to demand witnessing and completely confused and apoplectic about that decision.

I think people continue to be confused with that decision. I continue to be confused about that decision and I cover this for a living. It seems like people have very short memories. Republicans, I think in most areas who did not vote to convict the president are not going to have a hard time. I think it might be Republicans who voted to convict, who have more explaining to do to their voters to their bases than anybody else. That's really I think just a sign of what partisanship is like in this country, and what the makeup of these congressional districts or in these states is like.

Matt: Right, and the information and news outlets that many Republican voters are listening to and watching, right? Part of--

Olivia: Yes, we're talking about negative partisanship. The trends, if you look at it are astonishing. I think you could say it dates back to the Gingrich revolution. Certainly, the Tea Party in 2009, where people are just increasingly in their bubbles and the people listening to us right now are probably not the same people who are listening to Rush Limbaugh on a daily basis are probably not the same people who are reading Breitbart, or the Daily Caller or watching Newsmax.

It's increasingly easy to live in a bubble of your own design and really only get feedback from people and sources that you already agreed with. I think that makes it just very difficult to-- If you've no shared reality, it makes it very difficult to--

Matt: Olivia, are you there? I believe we might have lost Olivia. Let's go the phones while we're waiting to get Olivia back. Michael from Manchester, New Hampshire, are you there?

Michael: I am indeed.

Matt: Hi, we're waiting to get Olivia Nuzzi from New York Magazine back in the line, but in the meantime, I think you had a question about what comes next, right?

Michael: Yes, I was going to ask Olivia what was the sense among congressional Democrats about deciding to go through with a second impeachment trial because, obviously, there was an onus to do so, but it struck me as an interesting move when going into debates on the stimulus, going into debates about sending out checks and infrastructure spending and rebooting the economy that a second impeachment trial would burn a lot of political capital, a lot of goodwill.

Maybe some initial willingness from Republicans to collaborate with the Biden Administration. Now it just strikes me we're definitely going into these first 100 days with some animosity, with some tension. I was a little intrigued at what that thinking among congressional Democrats was.

Matt: Thanks, Michael. Olivia, are you back with us?

Olivia: I’m back. Sorry about that.

Matt: No problem.

Olivia: The Democrats I spoke to were sort of weighing that very question and ultimately decided that there was really no other choice. That if they did not pursue impeachment, they would be throwing up their hands and saying that it did not matter what the President did on January 6th or what he may have done prior to that or what we have documented that prior to that to incite that violence.

You're right that it did use up a tremendous amount of time, energy, focus, and you could argue political capital going into this first part of the Biden administration. I think that is why the white house has been very quiet and why the president has been very focused on not seeing the story during the trial, and he succeeded at that. I think that there was going to be an animosity anyway.

It's not as though the Biden era, his inauguration immediately ushered in this era of handholding and unity despite what his messaging may have been on that. It's an extremely antagonistic climate in DC between the parties. I don't think that they would have had necessarily a greater chance of working across the aisle if they didn't go through this process than they do now having been through it.

Matt: I'm Matt Katz filling in for Brian Lehrer. We need to take a quick break. When we come back, we'll take some more of your calls and continue with New York Magazine Washington correspondent, Olivia Nuzzi.

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Matt: I'm Matt Katz filling in for Brian Lehrer. I'm talking to Olivia Nuzzi, Washington correspondent for New York magazine for a few more minutes about the historic events of this weekend. We're going to take some more of your calls, so if you have questions about the impeachment, if you want to talk to Olivia about some of the various Trump characters that she's chronicled over the last few years, give us a call at 646-435-7280. Olivia, I want to ask you about one of those particular characters, Rudy Giuliani.

You are known for many things and one of them is writing quite colorfully about what has happened with Rudy Giuliani over the last four years. You memorably described an interview you had with him over lunch in which he imbibed bloody Marys and drooled on his sweater without noticing he was drooling on his sweater. Olivia, what happens with Rudy now with Trump out of the picture, at least out of the white house picture?

Olivia: We knew that Rudy had been a part of several federal inquiries from law enforcement. We know that the former president continues to be under investigation from a number of different entities, for his business dealings, for various things involving his family during his time in office before that. Rudy is also your competition because he has a radio show.

Matt: That's right, yes.

Olivia: He's continuing to be this far-right character on the fringe, but very visible and out there as a kind of an avatar of Trumpism. He continues to be because of his association with Donald Trump, because of his conduct over the last several years, he continues to be, I think, at risk, certainly of being a part of these investigations. I think that Rudy will kind of continue to pop up here and there like it or not for the next several years as we sift through the wreckage of the post-Trump era.

Matt: You have a report on how he always answers your texts, even though he might be telling you to stop texting him. Are you still in contact with him after all of this?

Olivia: We have a very up and down relationship as is the case with reporters and subjects sometimes as you know. I actually haven't reached out to him in a couple of months now. One thing I will say to his credit is that he is very accessible to the press. He is likely to say on the record exactly what he would say off the record. There's consistency there. It's not an act. The story of Rudy's decline in the last several years, I think it's a really tragic one.

It's a very human story to me, where you have this person, whether you agree with his politics or not, or you agreed with what he did in New York City or not, who did at one point at least had a great reputation, and he has just kind of burned through that at lightning speed. All in pursuit of proximity to power, of money, of status in the media of maintaining love from the far right who have embraced him.

I asked him once about his legacy and I was talking to him about how so many people who I know who worked with him in the past, who know him well are very sad about what has happened to him. He's very sensitive about this subject and his quote, I don't believe I could say it verbatim on the air here, but his quote was-- I think it was "My attitude about my legacy is expletive." He's very aware of how he is perceived now and frustrated by it and views it as terribly unfair. People who know him well view it as a great tragedy.

Matt: Let me ask you about one other figure who's also in the Trump camp, but more of a moderate voice, mainstream voice, I would guess we could say. You and I first met when we were both covering him and we're talking about Chris Christie in what seems like a dozen lifetimes ago. When we covering him, he was supposed to be starting his second term as president right now, and that didn't work out.

He became the first major Republican to endorse Trump. He stood by him, he made money lobbying his administration, and then a few months ago, after the election, he basically broke with Trump, and then he was on TV, urging Trump to intervene during the insurrection. He's already basically said he's running for president in 2024. You followed him, you follow Republican politics. Does Chris Christie have any as they say lane to run in 2024 to win a Republican nomination with this party?

Olivia: First, I want to say that you're very generous in saying that we met while covering him. I believe I called you. I had a column in a New Jersey all weekly, I believe I called you once and said, "Hi, can you please explain New Jersey politics to me?" You very generously did. Then a couple of years later we were covering him together. That is how we've met, I believe.

Christie, the optimism, you really have to marvel, I think, at the optimism of anyone for whom it has occurred to them that they could be president of the United States because they never seem to get it out of their head. Once that thought occurs to them, whether they're John Kerry or they're Marco Rubio, it seems to become an obsession and it seems to drive them for years and years and sometimes decades to come. Christie doesn't seem to be very different. He seems to be possessed by this idea that he ought to be president. There was a time when a lot of other Republicans shared that view as you just alluded to.

I think in retrospect, what took him out of consideration the serious way is brigegate, in light of what has occurred in the Trump era looks almost perplexingly small is bridgegate. There was a bridgegate per day in the Trump administration, there was a bridgegate an hour in the Trump administration. I still think that his reputation suffered so much and his status waned so much because of that, that it makes it very difficult for him to regain that without an office in which to do it. He is a cable news or a network news pundit at this point. He's not in office, in power visible to most Americans or to any constituency on a daily basis.

I think in the 2016 Republican primary, it was very difficult for Chris Christie to be in the lane that he was in because Donald Trump was in that lane. Donald Trump could've pushed him out of that lane. Donald Trump was the brash East Coaster who would say the outrageous things or would get into a fight with someone on the debate stage. Christie's role became the executioner on the debate stage with lesser candidates like Marco Rubio. I could see him very easily playing a role like that in the next Republican primary. I think it was Josh Barro, my former colleague, who's now at Business Insider, who made some comment like-- I'm paraphrasing, but, "I can't wait to watch Chris Christie just Josh Holly and the Republican debates in 2024."

I think he will probably have a presence. I think you're right. He certainly seems to be running. All indications seem to be that he will be running, but I also think that he benefited somewhat, you know this better than anybody else probably, from the fact that finally when there was timely closure with bridgegate and it was resolving legally, we were all consumed and I think the mainstream press and mainstream political observers were consumed by the Trump administration. I think a lot of that will resurface as he waves back into the fray as a candidate.

Matt: It's going to be interesting because what happens with him might be an indication of where the Republican party goes. If he's able to get some traction that might mean that more traditional Republican party still exists. If he doesn't, maybe it means it's gone and it's just in the mold of Trump. It'll be fascinating. I want to ask you one more thing before you go, what's next for you? You'll obviously be covering the Biden administration but are you worried? It just won't be nearly as interesting. What are your thoughts about your beat going forward?

Olivia: People asking me that for the last couple of months, basically, am I sad to lose the greatest story in the world? I'm really not. I think in some ways I feel-- I'm talking just as a journalist. I'm sure people always yell at journalists when they talk about things cynically about how is that the story versus how it is as an experience of American. The Trump story, I don't know how it felt for you as someone who also covered it, but to me it's just like this never-ending-- You never get any closure on any story.

No characters ever went away. It was six years of just the cast getting bigger and bigger and the plot getting longer and longer and it's just sort of weighing on you. It's like, "Oh, I got to think about Giuliani now and I've got to explain six years of back story within the Trump or two decades of backstory." You never just got a new twist to write about that didn't have baggage. I feel a bit liberated now. I feel like I can hopefully focus on aspects of political life and political culture that are not so obvious and so in your face.

I think the Trump era in that sense stunted creativity because for me as a writer because-- All you had to do-- I think you said when you first introduced me that I chronicled Rudy Giuliani very colorfully. All that you had to do is be colorful as someone documenting this era of politics was just describe in plain language what was happening. I'm looking forward to being able to be creative again. I focused on things that maybe not everyone is focused on at the same time.

Matt: Well, we're looking forward to reading. Olivia Nuzzi, Washington correspondent from New York magazine, who is newly liberated. Thank you, Olivia. Thanks so much for coming on. We'll talk soon.

Olivia: Thank you.

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