Debate Analysis

Mehdi Hasan x Michael Knowles: Constitutional Norms Under President Trump

Primary speakers:Mehdi HasanMichael Knowles

Events Director: ...the support of the Office of the President and Dartmouth Dialogues. Tonight's event would not have been possible without the support of our donors and the Office of Student Life, particularly President Bailock and Assistant Dean McKenna. Thank you. Before introducing our moderator and our debater tonight, I'd like to share the results of a poll conducted with the in-person audience following the monk debate format. In response to the question, has President Trump upheld the Constitution? 22% of you responded to believe that President Trump has indeed upheld the Constitution, whereas 78% of you believe that President Trump has not. Today we are joined by Michael Knowles and Hassan. Michael Knowles is the celebrated host of the Michael Knowles show at the Daily Wire. In addition to podcasting, he appears regularly on television. In 2025, he became the first podcaster to attend a White House cabinet meeting. In 2017, Michael published the number one national best-selling book, Reasons to Vote for Democrats. Michael's first book with words, speechless. Also reached number one on the national best-selling book, 2020. His writing has been featured in a fair amount of review of books, the American Conservative, Fox News, and other outlets. Michael is a graduate of Yale University and has lectured at universities and research institutes around the world. Medi Hassan is an award-winning journalist known for riveting one-on-one conversations, as well as his coverage of national politics, current affairs, and global news. Medi is the editor-in-chief and CEO of Zetao. Medi has recently, was recently the host of the Medi Hassan show on MSNBC and Peacock. He was also a political analyst for MSNBC. Before that, Medi was a senior columnist in host of the podcast, deconstructed at the intercept, and a political commentator and presenter in Al Jazeera. Medi is the author of three books, a biography of former UK Labor Party leader and middle band, an e-book on the financial crisis in austerity economics, and he most recently authored win every argument, the art of debating, persuading, and public speaking. Moderating tonight's conversation is Eloclinsky, a 26 from New York City studying politics, philosophy, and economics. Without further ado, please join me in extending a warm welcome to Michael Knowles, Medi Hassan, and Eloclinsky.

Ella Klinsky (Moderator): Thank you so much for being here. I can only hope that one day I have, as impressive the intro as you guys both just had. And thank you so much to the audience and to everyone watching online. The way this debate will function is we will begin by doing a moderated Q&A, where I will ask a question directed at one of you. We will alternate who begins every question, and you will each have opportunity to give a two minute response, and then whoever started will have time for a one minute rebuttal. And then after the moderated Q&A, we will switch over to audience questions. So start getting them ready. So to start off, before specific issues, I would like to start with foundational question. What in practical terms do you believe it means for president to uphold or deviate from the Constitution, and does this differ from upholding constitutional norms, if so, how? We'll start with you, Medi, and you can each give a two minute response in a one minute rebuttal.

Mehdi Hasan: Yeah, so thank you for having me. Great to be here. I'm actually disappointed with that vote of 7822, because you know what they say, the only way for me is down. Yeah, so good luck to me. I would say constitutional norms, very vague, I'm not sure actually what that means, apart from a historical precedent, what other people have done. And I think tonight, I'm guessing, Michael can tell me I'm wrong, that a lot of Michael's argument will be, well, other presidents did this. A lot of what about is them, a lot of see what X did, see what Y did, see what Obama did, see what Biden did. And I think we just have to be very clear here. We're talking about Donald Trump today. Donald Trump is too egenerous. There's never been a president like him before, certainly not in our lifetimes. He's undeniably violating both constitutional norms, are he presidents, but also the Constitution, the amendments, the articles of the Constitution in this country is doing it all the time. At this point, at this stage, anyone who tells you Donald Trump is not violating the Constitution is gaslighting you and or a member of his country, right? That's the facts are very clear. We can go through them in order. I mean, right now, if you look at the Constitution, Donald Trump, it's violating the appropriations clause, the emoluments clause, the elections clause, the taxicons spending clause, the take care clause, the declare war clause. He's also violating the First Amendment, the Second Amendment, the Fourth Amendment, the Fifth Amendment, the Sixth Amendment, the 10th Amendment, the 14th Amendment, maybe soon, the 22nd Amendment, as he suggests, the yesterday. And, you know, yes, other presidents, to give us your question, have violated norms. Other presidents have certainly violated clauses of the Constitution, but no president, certainly not in modern American history, has launched a multi-pronged across the board, open assault on, forget norms, on the amendments and articles of our Constitution, in the space of less than 18 months, right? Yes, previous presidents have violated, perhaps, a single constitutional amendment, sure, and been called out for it, but none of them, none of them said they plan to terminate the Constitution, as Donald Trump once did. None of them said, I don't know, when they were asked as Trump was on meat the press last year, is it the job of the president to uphold the Constitution? I don't know, he said. None of them declared themselves to be a king or a dictator, even for a day. None of them were rebuked by their own vice president for trying to violate the Constitution and the rule of law. What did Mike Pence say? I know Michael's a big fan of Mike Pence. I came specially with a Mike Pence quote. Mike Pence said, President Trump demanded, I choose between him and our Constitution. If you are pressuring your own vice president to put you above your Constitution, you're not just violating norms, you're violating the Constitution, you're violating your oath of office, and it is very clear tonight that Donald Trump is a clear and present danger to the Constitution, forget norms. Let's raise the bar, to the Constitution, to the articles and amendments of the Constitution, to our rights and liberties, to our democracy, and you don't have to take my word for that tonight, just take Mike Pence's.

Michael Knowles: The Mike Pence standard of constitutional jurisprudence. Okay, wonderful to be here. Thank you all for having me. You know, my father is a Dartmouth graduate, so I hope I don't do the family to my shame this evening, but I don't think I will, because we have to, to met his friends, we have to narrow in on what exactly we're discussing, what does it mean to uphold the Constitution? And I certainly hope that my opponent here does not mean some kind of pedantic literalism that merely looks at the text of the Constitution that we should certainly do that as well. But to uphold the Constitution, it would seem to me, entail upholding what the Constitution has meant, how the Constitution has obtained, how it has, in fact, governed our country from the beginning through the present. And so I think my opponent here is trying to break me away from citing historical precedent and how other presidents have upheld the Constitution. And I think that's for very good reason, if I were in your shoes, I would do the very same. Because when you look at how the Constitution has, in fact, been put into effect in the United States, no reasonable person could even suggest that Trump is upholding it. If we were to use this very limited pedantic literalist reform in the Constitution, then we would have to disqualify virtually every single president we've ever had from upholding the Constitution. All the modern presidents who have surveilled on mass, all of the great presidents who have violated habeas corpus who have interned people, two great presidents and two great parties, the Republican Abraham Lincoln and the Democrat Franklin Roosevelt. But going back even further, we would have to disqualify Jefferson for the Louisiana Purchase. We would actually have to disqualify President Washington because President Washington declared neutrality in the French Revolutionary Wars. And he was accused of violating the Constitution by no less a man than James Madison, the father of the Constitution. But Madison gets his comeuppance because Madison would be accused of failing to uphold the Constitution when he annexed West Florida. So I think when we take a look at what the Constitution has meant, how it has been interpreted by the three co-election government, adjudicated by the Supreme Court, law is enacted by the Congress. And then of course, the executive power in the president, we will find that the Constitution prevails, the warnings of the historic critics of President Trump, who have been promising us that he's on the brink of shredding the Constitution for about 10 years now, any day now it's coming. I think we will find that President Trump is indeed the president and the Constitution, nevertheless, and I think very much for that reason, prevails. Would you like to ask a little bit of love to him?

noise: One minute.

Mehdi Hasan: The best thing about social media is you can see what's going on in the world. And today I look at Michael Nolz's tweet, advertising this event, and underneath the tweet, Tim Paul, another podcaster, some of you may know, posted what looked like a groc generated list of previous presidents who had violated the Constitution. So I was able to prep myself for the debate, knowing that Michael would put all of those examples, which he did, Thomas Jefferson, Louis Yanapurchis, ratified by Congress. Abraham Lincoln and FDR, civil war and World War II. I don't see either of those things happening right now. We can go through the list. I've already conceded that previous presidents have done unconstitutional things, but Donald Trump has done it in a way that no other president has, in a time frame, no other president has, without the excuses that other presidents could at least point to World War II and the civil war. You think that's what's happening in America right now when he goes after migrants and Home Depot parking lots? No, that is not what's happening right now. And let's be very clear, Michael says, no one could dispute that he's upholding the Constitution. He says, histrionics. Do you know who Terry Doughty and Nancy Brazel and Amy Steeve and Trevor McFadden? And we go through the list, Daniel Rodriguez. Sorry, excuse me, Fernando Rodriguez, Jr. Add an all bright Eric committee, Carl Dudeck, Justin Lang. We go through the list, do you know these people are? They are Trump-appointed judges who have ruled against Donald Trump since last January in key constitutional cases, First Amendment, Fifth Amendment, Sixth Amendment, Fourteenth Amendment. They've all said, Donald Trump, what he's doing is violating the Constitution. These people are not liberals or Marxists as Stephen Miller says. They're not doing histrionics, as Michael says. They are looking at the Constitution and even as mega judges, they're saying you've gone too far. You have violated these amendments of the Constitution. One, I mean, it's Trump judges saying this, not me. It's like Pence saying this, not me. Michael can make these arguments about liberal histrionics. The problem is now is that people with eyes and ears who are not mega-powered as I see what is happening here. Donald Trump is doing things that President has not done before, including ignoring a 9-0 Supreme Court ruling.

Ella Klinsky (Moderator): OK. Let's try our hardest. The next question is really adhere to time regulations.

Mehdi Hasan: Well, let's write that. Oh, I saw it in the air. I saw it and defied it. You didn't see it.

Ella Klinsky (Moderator): Thank you so much for those thoughts. I was really interesting. Maryann, you mentioned you talked about ice immigration and actually in 2025, the Department of Homeland Security reported record-breaking immigration and enforcement actions with over 600,000 deportations. Given this information, should undocumented immigrants have a right to do process under the Constitution? And if so, can deportations at the rate completed in 2025 be carried out without compromising access to hearing and legal reparations? What's that right here, Michael?

Michael Knowles: Sure. Yes. In most cases, the prisoners who are being deported are entitled to do process of the law. This is not the case unnecessarily when it comes to the revocation of visas, which are not some natural or constitutional right. But in the case of the people who are being deported, they are entitled to do process. And they are receiving process, actually, from President Trump. But not all do process is created equal. And the Immigration and Nationality Act is endured for some 60 years and in other forms for longer. Recognizes that there is a role for expedited deportations. And it's not only President Trump who's insisted upon this, but it's all of his recent predecessors going back to Bill Clinton and George Bush and Barack Obama, who contradicts himself sometimes. The Democrats, when they want to appeal to the people who voted for the mass deportations, and in the vote, they pretend that Barack Obama deported lots and lots of people as many as Trump. But then when they want to say the deportations were unconstitutional, they really barely deported anybody. But Joe Biden did the same thing and Trump as well. My opponent says that no one has acted as quickly in these egregious displays as President Trump. That, of course, is facially observed. Because President Trump is only the second president of American history to win a non-consecutive second term. So he's just had longer than any other president, other than FDR, who certainly did upset constitutional norms. But regardless, they do have any process. He is following that. And the mass deportations really could be much larger. Let's not forget the great Democrat President Truman, who deported near three quarters of a million foreigners, Mexicans. He did so with scanty due process of the law. That was in 52. Following President Eisenhower in 1954, deported 1.1 million in operation, went back. There was not even really the suggestion that either of those men had violated the law by deporting foreigners who don't really have any right to be here. So President Trump is very much within the mainstream of the constitution in his deportations. And frankly, I wish you one more.

Mehdi Hasan: So just to respond very quickly on the main point about deporting foreigners, you said, at the end, who have no right to be here. Notice the phrasing. Deporting foreigners have no right to be here, unless they have due process. That's the whole point. When you end up deporting American citizens, do you know they deported American citizens? Terry Dowty is a Trump judge who last year ruled that a two-year-old American child who was deported with her mother against her father's wishes who was in the US. He said, we just, the administration, just deported an American citizen without any meaningful process. That was a Trump judge's verdict when he heard what ICE had done, right? In Minnesota, another Trump judge, her name is Nancy Brazel appointed by Donald Trump. She said, the government asserts the right to arrest thousands of people, put them in an overcrowded warehouse, and then deny them their rights to due process. That's Nancy Brazel ruling against this administration on Fifth Amendment grounds. Again, Trump judges. Michael seems to be under some illusion that we're here to debate Democrats versus Republicans. Unlike Michael, I'm not a partisan. I'm not here to blindly defend Democratic presidents. I don't really care what Harry Truman did. I already conceded, presidents have done bad things, but no one has done stuff like Trump. Let me give you one example. 18 months, he's been in office. 18 months. He's defied court cases, defied court orders. In one in eight cases, AP just did a story, the associate of the press the other day. 31 court cases that he lost, he's just ignoring the court orders. Presidents haven't done that before. They violated the Constitution. Then a court says, hey, you did something wrong, and then they fix it. They don't say f off to the judges. That is what this president does. Let me give you an example on the immigration front between October and February of this year, according to a recent study. Hundreds of judges across the country ruled 4,400 times. I'm gonna say that again. 4,400 times judges across this country ruled that Donald Trump at his administration were illegally detaining migrants in this country without due press. 4,400 times. You find to be another president. I'll wait here all day, who has done that in a four month period. 4,400 rulings by judges. By the way, in one in four cases where judges rule against Trump, these are Republican appointed judges. So this argument from Miller and Co, these are all Marxists. No, these are judges, conservatives, liberals, Democrats, Republicans saying, Donald Trump's violating the law, even when it comes to migrants, even when it comes to foreign students who have a right to be here and have a free speech rights under the Constitution First Amendment, covers foreign students in this room. I hope foreign students hate know that.

Michael Knowles: I'm a little confused by my opponent's argument because he tells me he's not a partisan, and he's not here to debate Republicans and Democrats. Almost defend. Almost the very first word out of his mouth was Mike Pence in appealing to all of these Republican judges. But listen, I think the Republican Party is the worst party in the United States other than the Democrats. So, I'm not here to, as my opponent does seem to be, to go tit for tat on Republicans versus Democrats, we're here to talk about the Constitution, and we can't talk about how the Constitution has actually governed the country, unless we talk about the people who have effected it, and those people are Republicans and our Democrats. But I'm also confused by my opponent's reaction. And I think this might be because my opponent here has the misfortune of putting up in a foreign country, did not learn proper English, you know, the United Kingdom, they don't, so maybe he missed this word when I spoke, but I answered in the affirmative. Of course, illegal aliens, in most cases, have the right to do process. But they don't have the right to lengthy do process. This has been precedent for many decades, and in all of those cases, my opponent here, cites the AP. This involves, these problems with the courts, generally involve delays, more than outright refusals, and both Barack Obama and Joe Biden have also been guilty of seeing delays. So I'm happy that in this one case, we are in agreement. The illegal aliens deserve due process, and now that they have it, they need to get it.

Mehdi Hasan: I'm getting it, Michael, that's the problem.

Ella Klinsky (Moderator): OK. Well, again, thank you for that. I remember we were keeping this a nice respectful debate, and so let me just ask that. No, no, no.

Questioner 1: Good work. You and me.

Ella Klinsky (Moderator): Yes, if we tell you, we're keeping it respectful. I would love to now talk about it. It is often the mind for what we hear in the news, et cetera. Specifically, President Trump's Operation Epic Fury, targeting Iran, was carried out without progress in prior operation in Congress. This has remited a longstanding constitutional debate over war powers. At the same time, President Trump has argued that involving Congress can pose operational risks, citing concerns about leaks, and the need for speed and national security decisions. So the question is, how should we balance Congress's right to clear war with the practical demands of secrecy and rapid response in modern warfare, and with Trump's actions significantly different from that of our predecessors, or does it work as a growing trend among the executive branch? We'll start with you, then.

Mehdi Hasan: It's a great question, and I'm glad you mentioned the speed issue. Michael mentioned speed a moment ago when it came to migrants with the speed issue. He's known for bomb seven countries last year, after claiming to be the peacemaker and insisting on a Nobel Peace Prize. But he got a FIFA one. Bomb seven countries, which weren't attacking us. He started this year by bombing Venezuela and taking, kidnapping, the president of that country, again, not a country that was attacking us. There was no self-defense right, no UN resolution. You can only go to war in this country under international law if it's self-defense or if it's authorized by the UN, not the case in Venezuela, not the case in Iran. Iran, obviously, was not attacking us. We were in the middle of negotiations when we attacked them. And Marco Rubio admitted we attacked them, because Israel was about to attack them. They were about to attack us. So there was no speed. There was no justification. And it is a good question about the balance. And again, I suspect, Michael is going to say, well, all previous presidents have declared war without congressional approval, which isn't true, by the way. George W. Bush, I'm going to go home and take a shower after this, but I'm going to defend George W. Bush. George W. Bush went and got an authorization for the use of military force against Afghanistan in 2001. He went and got an authorization for the use of military force against Iraq in 2002. Now I feel disgusting, but George Bush did that, right? Barack Obama, when he was about to bomb Syria, tried to go to Congress, couldn't get the votes, did not bomb Syria. Now, Libya, Barack Obama did go and violate the Constitution and the War Powers Act. I will agree with that. But let me say a couple of things here. Number one, Barack Obama, he would argue. Let me make the case for why it's different to go about your question. There's no comparison between Iran and Libya. First, there was a UN resolution for Libya, which was being enforced by NATO operation that US joined to stop an imminent massacre of people in Benghazi. That was the stated aim. No UN approval in Iran, no NATO mission in Iran, no imminent massacre of civilians. That happened in Germany, not when we attacked. Number two, Barack Obama claimed it wasn't a war because it was a limited military operation because no American troops were at risk and no regional escalation. Well, in Iran, 13 Americans dead, hundreds of Americans injured, not just regional escalation, but global fallout, right? Americans suffering at the pump because of this war. And number three, I would say this, look, this is undoubtedly unconstitutional against Congress. Donald Trump's admitted it. He said, if I call it a war, I'll have to get approval and then he could call it a war. But I will agree. It was unconstitutional under Obama. I don't think it's unconstitutional under Trump. And I hope Michael will agree that we can both agree. They're in both cases. Neither President was upholding the Constitution. I'll add that to my list of Constitution abuses by Donald Trump tonight.

Ella Klinsky (Moderator): Can you agree?

Michael Knowles: Well, I'm just glad that my opponent continues to issue comparisons to past presidents and to the tab between the Democrats and the Republicans. But you're right, I was going to bring up Libya because this involves not only the Constitution but the World Powers Act. One thing it doesn't involve, though. I'm a little confused. Are we debating tonight UN resolutions or are we debating the NATO charter? I thought we were debating constitutionality. And I suspect Mr. Hassan is deferring to these other organizations because there was not a great Constitution to get for what happened in Libya. The World Powers Act gives the president the ability to wage war without the approval of Congress for 60 days. And then it can be extended for additional 30 days to take it to 90. Now, the president is the commander-in-chief of the military already has a constitutional predicate to lead the military. However, what Barack Obama did in Libya did not just go for 60 or 90 days. It went for eight months. How about Joe Biden? Joe Biden waged war in Yemen against the Houthis. That went on for a year. I didn't hear peep from the people concerned about the shredding of the Constitution. But when it comes to the war in Iran, I'll put my phone on the table. I was skeptical of the war before it began. I was skeptical when it was declared. I remained skeptical of it today. Happily for me, I don't need to convince you to support the war in Iran. It's a combination of the liberal pronunciation and the conservative pronunciation. And Iran. I don't need to convince you to support the war. I don't need to convince you to like Donald Trump. I don't need to convince you. This is a good military operation. I just need to show you that what Trump is doing is well within constitutional unions. It's in fact much more restrained than anything his recent predecessors have done. I'll remind you that the past presidents, George W. accepted, we think of Ronald Reagan and Renata. We think of George H. W. Bush and Panama. But we can go back even further than that. We go to Harry Truman, who waged a war in the area that went on for three years without any formal declaration of war. So we can say that war is very bad and Trump shouldn't be in Iran. But the topic at hand is whether or not Trump is within the constitutional mainstream. And at that, he's actually quite moderate.

Mehdi Hasan: So 60 seconds, let me just quickly respond. Number one, the bigger point, let me Scott with the bigger point, which is, Michael's what about is him tonight, which is keeping point into previous presidents. As I've pointed out, the analogies didn't work. They're not the same in many of the cases he's citing. And even if they were the same, all that would prove is that previous presidents didn't uphold the constitution either. The debate tonight is Donald Trump upholding the constitution. We can all agree he isn't. Michael seems to agree, isn't. His only defense is, well, other presidents didn't uphold it either. Let's just deal with some facts. The UN Charter is not some foreign body. The UN Charter was incorporated into US law as a treaty in a Senate vote in 1945 by a vote of 89 to 2. It is the law of the land. Donald Trump violated the UN Charter and violated international law in US law by bombing Iran. He violated Congress by bombing Iran. And he violated the war powers act. By the way, Michael is completely wrong. The war power does not give you the power. You say a war without Congressional approval. It's exactly the opposite. It says, if you go to war without Congressional approval, which is wrong, you have to notify us within 48 hours. And then you have 60 days to stop, which he hasn't done. He crossed 60 days last week. So he's doubly illegal. In fact, Boona Hathaway of Yale University, Professor of International Law, says this war is triply illegal, because it's against you and Charter. It's against US Congress is right under the constitution. And it's against the war power act. That doesn't apply to Libya, by the way. So Trump is unique there. And this idea that he was following Congress when he bombed Yemen last year. When he bombed Nigeria on Christmas day, remember that? Probably not, because he bombed so many countries without Congressional approval. The idea that he's upholding the Constitution while stealing Congress's right to declare war and bombing multiple countries is absurd.

Ella Klinsky (Moderator): I would like to stay on this forum policy, Avenue, and talk a little bit about Venezuela. So President Donald Trump characterized former Venezuelan leader Nicholas Maduro as, quote, terrorist, incited his indictment on drug-related charges as justification for the US military raiding crock in early 2026. By framing military action, Venezuela as a law enforcement action, does that expand presidential power in ways that unfairly bypass Congress or is that a necessary adaption to modern threats?

Michael Knowles: Sorry, thank you. No, it's certainly not outside the norms. It doesn't expand presidential power. Toppling dictatorships in Latin America is as American as apple pie. And I can't help but fall out a rather dishonest tactic that my opponent here is using. He keeps asking, what aboutism? Because I'm making historical comparisons and invoking presidents of both parties. I would like to point out my opponent opened the debate. He made the first statement and he began by doing just that. And I think it's good that he did that, actually, because there is no way to understand what it means to uphold the Constitution without reference to history. And in the case of Latin America, obviously, our history goes back a very long way. The Monroe Doctrine is cornerstone, perhaps the cornerstone of American foreign policy. And there was a legal predicate of the US, the Nicholas Maduro. In the case of President Trump's military actions, by the way, it's worth observing, that we never hear why he is engaging in these countries in Nigeria, of course. Why would you bomb Nigeria on Christmas Day might have to do with the genocide of Christians that is going on in Nigeria. And America's role is the global hegemon, which again, like it or not, is pretty well predicated. But returning to the specific topic at hand, Nicholas Maduro, he had been an aspect of American foreign policy for some 26 years to depose the regime in Venezuela. We had a legal reason to do it. Not only were they stealing our goods, but they were also sending criminals into our country, helping to flood our country, break our basic laws. And they were working with designated foreign terrorist organizations. So anyway, you slice it. We had the right to arrest him. A lawless president would have just blown his head off, as we've done before. But President Trump did not do that. Nicholas Maduro is enjoying due process of law in New York City. And it's probably a much nicer place than Venezuela is. So I look forward to oil prices going down and I look forward to a flourishing country. And I look forward to the recognition that President Trump's policy in Venezuela is not only out of step with American constitutional norms, it is, in fact, part of American grand strategy dating back to 1999.

Mehdi Hasan: President America is a nicer place than Venezuela. OK. Let's just deal with some issues that you raised there. Michael made it a mission he perhaps shouldn't have made there. Did you notice what he said about Maduro? He said, a lawless president. His words, am I being dishonest, is that what you said? A lawless president. Not with reference to Trump. But you said a lawless president would have just killed him. That's funny, because what are we doing in Iran on day one of that war? We killed the leader of Iran. So by Michael's definition, Donald Trump is a lawless president. He went to war in Iran without congressional approval, without a UN Security Council resolution, as we've already discussed, he went to war in Venezuela without a congressional approval or UN Security Council resolution. The idea that he did it because the guy is a drug trafficker is hilarious. I'm a defender of Maduro, let's see what the court says. But he pardoned another Latin American head of government who was an American prison for cocaine trafficking into the US. He pardoned him. So real consistency there when it comes to drug trafficking. As for Nigeria, number one, it's not a genocide of Christians. The first lady of Nigeria is a Christian. The defense minister is a Christian. Terrorist groups like ISIS in Nigeria, and Boko Haram kill Muslims and Christians alike. It's a horrific violence, but it's not a Christian genocide. No one actually believes that. And even if it was, that's not the debate. The debate is did he have the legal right to bomb Nigeria or did he have to go to Congress, which he did not? He never goes to Congress. And let's take a step back here. Let's get out of the weeds here. What is the common thread tonight? It's not about just migrants or free speech or students or wars. It is about a president who doesn't just test the limit of the law, he puts himself above the law. Donald Trump doesn't recognize congressional restrictions. He doesn't recognize Supreme Court restrictions. Michael doesn't want to talk about a 9-0 Supreme Court ruling saying, you've got to bring, you've got to facilitate the return of Kilmar-Abrego Garcia. And Trump says to an ABC reporter, I could, but I'm not going to. No president has done that before. You don't play what aboutism, and it is what aboutism. Tell me which president said after a 9-0 ruling, yeah, I'm not going to do it. There hasn't been one. It's only Donald Trump who does this when it comes to war, when it comes to migration, when it comes to Supreme Court. That is why we're saying he does not uphold the Constitution because the evidence is clear. But if Trump were here tonight, he'd probably say, yeah, you're right.

Michael Knowles: Well, my opponent got a great laugh line just now. But unfortunately, he only did so by misrepresenting the facts. When one, there's a difference between Venezuela and Iran. But furthermore, when we look at Iran, one, we were not the ones that killed the Ayatollah. That was the Israelis. And my opponent loves to complain about the Israelis. Perhaps he can do it tonight or another time. But that was the Israelis who did it. So we do have to get basic facts right here. We provided air support. Trump took the Israelis, did you know that? He's probably taken credit for it. If we could avoid the interruption, I just want to point out that your laugh line was based on a complete misunderstanding what actually happened. But I'll try to finish my point. So one, I think that gives you a good sense of where we stand on international expertise. Because also, Venezuela is a different country from Iran. Iran has been waging war against the United States for some 50 years now. They obviously killed over 200 American troops in the Bayroot barracks bombings. And we have not retaliated for that in a serious way. Iran since then has killed many American troops throughout the Middle East. There was a very strong legal predicate for taking out the Ayatollah, even if you think it's not a potential thing to do, whereas the very different intervention into Venezuela involved orders from judges, involved the commission of crimes. And now there will be a trial in New York. So the one similarity between the two, and perhaps we can agree on this, is that the intervention into Venezuela was rather restrained. We didn't actually depose the regime. We just put a gun to the head of the deputy and said, play nice or you, it's going to be you next. And I don't know that we're going to depose the regime in Iran, either. A more expansive president might do that as Republicans and Democrats have done. Trump, once again, I point out, is so restrained here, so moderate, so well within the mainstream, that we aren't even seeing regime change, in either of those places.

Ella Klinsky (Moderator): Well, I think it was briefly mentioned the idea of emergency acts and extenuating circumstances. And I want to zoom in on that. President Donald Trump argued that his imposition of tariffs during Liberation Day was justified under the International Emergency's Economic Powers Act or the IEPA. However, this Supreme Court found the IEPA does not authorize a president to impose sweeping tariffs such as that in Liberation Day. With this in mind, how should we think about the limits of presidential authority when it comes to using emergency powers to shape major policy?

Mehdi Hasan: You would take it away. I'm going to cheat before I answer that question. I'm going to go back something Michael said a moment ago, because facts are matter. The war in Iran is a joint US Israeli operation. The idea that Israel killed Kamenai on their own is absurd. If you look at the reporting Netanyahu came to Trump's intelligence agency, came and confirmed that Kamenai was in this building, in this time, at this place, do you want to kill him? So let's just be very clear that we are responsible for that. There was no international legal justification for it. Every international law professor says it was illegal. Every international lawyer says what happened in Venezuela was illegal. We defied. There's a reason why our allies don't back us in these places. On emergency powers, a great question. We can actually talk specifics. You mentioned the Supreme Court. You'll notice, correct me if I'm wrong. I don't think, and this is good faith I swear. I don't think Michael has said the word Supreme Court tonight. Maybe I missed it. But let's talk specifics. I mentioned the 9-0 ruling by the Supreme Court and Kilmarburg Augusta, yet. Trump just said f-off. The tariffs case. In February, we all knew tariffs, the taxes. Everyone knew that. The Trump administration tried to lie to us and say, they're not taxes. The Trump administration wants to phrase, piss on your leg and tell you it's raining, right? It's not a tax. It is a tax. Every economist agrees it's tax. Every lawyer agrees it's a tax. So the Supreme Court step in and say, well, the taxing and spending clause says only Congress gets to lay and impose taxes, excises, impose, and duties. And they strike down 6-3, 6-3, not even close. In February, the IEPA used by Donald Trump and say, you need to refund the tariffs. By the way, the refunds begin next week and 75,000 businesses have asked for refunds, which is weird because I was told China's paying the tariffs. But anyways, on the specific legal part of this, this is really interesting because Donald Trump used the IEPA, which is an act from the 1970s and 1977, which you can use in an economic emergency. Trump claimed the emergency was fentanyl and migration and trade deficits. He claimed there was a national emergency because we have a trade deficit. OK. And then, here's the best part. He uses the act to go after his enemies, like he always does. Like he goes after his political enemies, he goes after his international enemies. He uses the act completely illegally, as the Supreme Court's point of view, to basically settle scores. And we know this. How do we know this? Because Trump said so. When the Swiss president called him up to negotiate a reduced tariff, he raised the tariff and said, I did it, because she rubbed me up the wrong way. She was annoying. She was aggressive. So he raised the taxes. The Brazilians prosecuting the Air Bolsonaro. Good for them, I wish we had done it to Trump. Trump got mad and raised tariff's on American consumers to punish Brazil. That's what the founders envisaged. That's what the founders thought they were doing when we were getting away from mad King George, from my old country. Was that what they thought they were doing? Giving the president the right to tax Americans, because he gets pissed off by a European leader or a South American government. Of course, it's an abuse of power. Of course, it's completely unconstitutional. Of course, it goes against the vision of the founders. That is very, very clear.

Michael Knowles: I'm reminded of a meme that I see sometimes in Catholic circles. There's a meme of a guy goes into the confessional box. He says, father, I like to hop on one leg while eating a piece of pizza and honking my nose. And the priest says, my son, that is very weird, but it is not a sin. And that's the example that Medi seems to be giving here. He says, I really hate what Trump did on these tariffs. And one of the mechanisms by which Trump implemented the tariffs, the Supreme Court rejected and the administration being very well within the constitutional mainstream, accepted that and then attempted to use other statutes to implement some other tariffs. But nevertheless, they accepted the Supreme Court's rulings as they generally do. And so you might say I hate tariffs. You might say I don't like the way President Trump conducts diplomacy. I'm speaking to a group of Ivy League students. Obviously, probably many of you think that. But there is nowhere that I see that to be unconstitutional. I mean, for goodness' sake, the Republican party was founded on tariffs. A brand link and famously said, give me a tariff and I'll give you the best country in the world. The Republican party was pro-tariff through the early 20th century. It flipped a little bit in the mid to late 20th century. And now we seem to like tariffs again. Presidents of both parties, levy tariffs, through a variety of mechanisms. You can say it's bad economic policy, but there's certainly nothing unconstitutional about it. To Medi's point that the companies are eating the cost of the tariffs, in many cases, that is true. I know this because I own a company called Maple Hours Cigars, which makes great cigars. And I highly recommend them. But we did eat the cost of a lot of, thank you very much. We did eat the cost of a lot of the tariffs. That's true. And I do wonder, as a political tactic, the refunds for those tariffs that are forthcoming might actually help juice the economy before the midterm. So in a way, it's probably a good political tactic. But I've yet to see some argument that the tariffs would have been unconstitutional. You know, the point that we've observed here is that the Supreme Court struck them down under the basis of a national emergency, and the Trump White House complies. So what are we even arguing here?

Mehdi Hasan: So, Michael, since you were the one who introduced the word a dishonest tactic, let me say it back to you. I think you're engaged in dishonest tactic tonight by avoiding the substance of argument every time. It's not whether there's a genocide in Nigeria. The issue is, did Donald Trump have the Constitution about the bomb in Nigeria? No. It's not whether tariffs are good or bad. That's irrelevant to this debate. Of course, tariffs are totally fine. If Congress imposed them, not Donald Trump, because he didn't like the female leader of Switzerland, as she spoke to him on the phone. That is the key question that we're debating today. At every instance, every question that Ellis asked, every topic we've covered, I've pointed out that what he's doing is going against the Constitution, going against the Supreme Court, going against Trump appointed judges, going against precedents that you like to cite, and you're dodging it. And you're saying things about, well, tariffs are part of our history. Okay, great. This is not about tariffs. It's about what Donald Trump did with tariffs. He took a power from the Constitution, the taxing and spending calls. Article 1, section 8, only Congress shall have the power to lay or collect taxes, duties, imposed exercises, and he irrigated it to himself. Because he believes there are no checks on his power. He's on the record. He said, in 2019, I have an Article 2 power to do whatever I want as president. That is not what Article 2 says. He does not have the power to do whatever he wants. The founding fathers did not create America so that they could have another monarch, another king, another dictator, but no one seems to have given that memo to Donald Trump. And when he lost at the Supreme Court, Michael said he accepted the decision. Again, dishonest. He actually said that the judges were fools and lap dogs. He said, Amy Coney Barrett and Dale Gorsuch embarrassed themselves in front of their families. And he also said that the Supreme Court just is our weak, stupid, and bad. Again, point to me, a president who said stuff like that in the modern era.

Ella Klinsky (Moderator): All right. Well, this is unfortunately our last moderated question before we go to audience, UNA. And I would like to bring it back closer to home. You've both experienced elite higher education, except I would argue your father at Dartmouth experienced the best higher education. Of course. And I'm sure you have seen the recent changes in dynamics between US universities and the federal government. As debates over free speech and ideological diversity intensify on campuses, what role, if any, should the federal government play in ensuring viewpoint diversity? And what would that role look like within constitutional limits? I believe you've started last time, so we'll go for it.

Michael Knowles: Yes. I actually don't love viewpoint diversity. I don't really care for it at all. I know that puts me outside the right-wing mainstream. But I'm perfectly fine with institutions having beliefs and standards and norms and I think societies ought to have that. Even the notion of protective viewpoint diversity is relatively recent. Comes from the mid-'90s in our jurisprudence. But regardless, I'm all for reforming the universities, which are failing in their chief missions. So I suppose the question is, is President Trump suppressing the First Amendment? And I know that my opponent here on stage made a bold prediction, a promise, really, in March of 2024. He said that if President Trump were to be elected again, the stakes for the media were very, very high. What would happen to the free press under President Trump? He's already threatening to do it. Last I checked, unfortunately, the New York Times and the CNN still get to publish. MSNBC has gone downhill, but that's mostly because NBC didn't want to deal with them anymore. There's been really no threat to free speech whatsoever under President Trump. His critics are allowed to threaten to kill him. I mean, in the case of Hassan Piker, one of the chief critics of President Trump and one of the people who's instigated violence was exalted by the New York Times just last week after three assassination attempts. So I wish that, frankly, there were more limits on speech under Trump, but there certainly is not. And then when you look at constitutional precedent, we of course have to remember that our second president of the United States, John Adams, passed the Alien and Sedition Acts, much of which remains on the books today. Under Woodrow Wilson, Democrat president, he imprisoned his political rival, Eugene Debs, leader of the Socialist Party, but that act has been used to prosecute people for speech. For many, many years, including the socialist journalist, the head of the Jehovah's Witnesses, the leaker of the Pentagon papers, and Bradley Manning, even under Barack Obama. So we've seen a lot of curtailment of speech. I think a lot of that is within the confines of the First Amendment, and I wish the president Trump would tighten it up a little bit, especially when it comes to those left-wing universities that receive federal dollars and certainly don't need to. That is an amazing answer, Michael.

Mehdi Hasan: Both to deny that there's an assault on the free press, and to say you wish there was a bit more of an assault on the free press. Let's just be very clear. Let's just be very clear about where the facts are on this. Michael thinks everything's fine. Donald Trump has arrested Don Lemon. He's raided the home of a Washington Post reporter. He has blocked the AP from the Oval Office. He tried to defund NPR and PBS. The judge shot it down. He's tried to ban flag-burging, burning which goes against Supreme Court case Texas versus Johnson from 1989. He's tried to get a late night comedian fired because he didn't like his jokes. He has just go down the list when it comes to the free press. He tried to restrict reporters reporting in the Pentagon. A judge shot that down too, saying you're not supposed to prescribe the press. He has threatened the New York Times just the other day. He said they should be guilty of sedition because they reported on his Iran war in a way he did not like. He has engaged in multiple lawsuits to try to intimidate and suppress the press. His defense secretary bragged loudly that CNN will be coming under new Trump, Odish pro-Trump ownership. Just go down the list, students. We talk about universities. We've seen students arrested for their speech, not for violence, for their speech. A Reagan appointed judge said the arrest of students like Manuel Calil and Ramesh Asterk was a full-throated assault on the First Amendment. A Reagan appointed judge William Young said that. Not some liberal Marxist. And as for threatening people's speech, just the other day, just a few months ago, Donald Trump threatened six members of Congress with death for their speech. He said, seditious behavior, punishable by death. What did they do? They did a video saying, hey, military, don't follow illegal orders. He said, you should be killed for that. This is the most anti-free speech, anti-free press, anti-view point diversity administration in American history. It's led by a complete snowflake who can't tolerate any criticism from anyone. Can't tolerate jokes from late-night comedians. Think about the countries where comedians are taken off the airways because the leader didn't like their jokes. Are those constitutional democracies? Are those constitutional republics? Are those democracies that we think the Americans have? Think about that when you vote tonight. Think about the kind of place where the president threatens students, threatens media organizations, threatens comedians, and threatens members of the other party while arresting journalists. The whole thing is absurd to suggest he's not an anti-first amendment president. He's actually at the core of my argument for why he's not upholding the Constitution because he's not upholding the First Amendment.

Michael Knowles: I think it's very telling that my opponent object to the arrest of Don Lemon, which was not in fact for free speech, but was because Don Lemon violated federal law and bragged about it on camera, excuse me. And violated federal law and bragged about it on camera. He's not true. But if you'll allow me to finish, I'm trying to engage in my free speech and there seems to be a heckler's video.

Mehdi Hasan: My free speech, too.

Michael Knowles: So what Don Lemon actually did was he violated a federal law, the Face Act. He walked in with an unruly mob to disrupt a religious proceeding. This terrorized children, he did all sorts of terrible things. Targeted Christians. No surprise that that would be given a pass from the man who denied the genocide of Christians and Nigeria tonight. Noticing a touch of a trend, but to bring us back to the point. The defunding of PBS is somehow a violation of the First Amendment. I thought that the president and the Congress had the right to take care to make sure that the laws are affected and executed. And also, Congress has the power of the purse. I didn't know PBS and Big Bird were in the First Amendment to the Constitution. That would be noose to James Madison. When it comes to the curtailment of reporters, no one has been more transparent than President Trump. He answers the phone when CNN journalists call him. I would never do any such thing, but the president does that. He has open gaggles, very contrary to his immediate predecessor, Joe Biden. And so yet again, President Trump has exalted the First Amendment. In fact, he is embraced a free speech, absolutist position, even when it comes to flag burning. I'll just finish up on this point. Medi Hassan points out that the flag burning was ruled a constitutionally protected right in 1989. Curious that it was in 1889 or 1789. It's a live question debated in American jurisprudence. President Trump has issued an executive order to bring that challenge back to the court as he should. And we'll all be debating it along the way because President Trump loves free speech.

Ella Klinsky (Moderator): All right, well, we're going to pivot to audience Q&A. We'll have two microunters, one on either aisle. I will call on three people to go to each microunner. So thick and total. I'll start, I'll do you, blue shirt, another blue shirt, there's a lot of blue shirts, a white shirt, blue shirt, red shirt, and then green shirt. So three over there and three over there, perfect. If we have more time, we will take more student questions. Great.

Questioner 2: Me too.

Questioner 1: Yeah, so thank you guys so much for coming today. A lot of the conversation circulated particularly around Trump's second term activities. I was just curious to the question of not whether Trump upheld the constitution in with regards to January 6th, but did he uphold constitutional norms?

Michael Knowles: Great question. Is that for any one of us in particular?

Questioner 1: Particularly you, Michael, but either of you could go ahead.

Michael Knowles: I'm sure I'm off to Michael.

Ella Klinsky (Moderator): Sure.

Michael Knowles: You do two minutes and two minutes. Yeah, sure thing. Yes, he did. Again, I'm not convincing anyone that they should love the Horn Hat guy. That's not the basis on which you're voting this evening. But there is a great precedent for contested elections in the United States. In fact, that's what the 12th Amendment is about. We've had a number of contested elections. Obviously, 1860, the election of Lincoln, the Rutherford B. Hayes, which resulted in the compromise of 1876. Bush v. Gore, Al Gore refused to concede for months after that, and there were some riotous events. So what occurred at the Capitol on January 6 was very unfortunate, though it's been much lied about. It's worth pointing out that the only person who was killed in political violence that day was a Trump supporter who was killed by a trigger-happy cop. There's also a special irony to Democrats complaining about January 6 as the worst day in the history of this or any republic. Because not only was it not the worst political violence in American history, it wasn't the worst political violence of that year. It followed the little prosecuted BLM riots that very same year, where Kamala Harris and staffers for Joe Biden actually bailed the rioters out of jail. But there's a greater irony, which is that there have been five or six, depending on how you score it, attacks on the Capitol in American history. Virtually all of them have been perpetrated by radical leftists, a Marxist Harvard professor, Harvard men, of course. But then, in 1971, was perpetrated by Bill Ayers of the Weather Underground, Bill Ayers in whose living room Barack Obama launched his political career. So it's very unfortunate that that took place on January 6. It's unfortunate that there were questions about the 2020 election. Questions which arose because the election rules were radically changed in the weeks and months before the election. In some cases, unconstitutionally, as in the case of mail-in ballots in Pennsylvania. It's also a bit strange that Nancy Pelosi took responsibility for not having sufficient security in the Capitol that day. She did that on camera. It was actually a film that her daughter made. You can easily go look it up. And it's very strange that some of the Capitol police gave the leaders of the insurrection private tours of the Capitol, notably the aforementioned Horne Hat Guy. But regardless, it's a great pity that it took place. I hope it doesn't take place again. And unfortunately, it's also not totally out of the norm for the United States going back at least to the middle of the 19th century.

Mehdi Hasan: So glad you asked that question because January 6th hadn't come up, and it was a big issue from Trump's end of his first term. Mike Pence, we talked about Mike Pence, who might cause a fight. Why does Mike Pence keep coming up? Because you're a fan of his, and he was the vice president who didn't endorse the president for another term, because he said he made me do unconstitutional stuff. He wanted me to violate my constitutional oath. That's from Mike Pence's testimony. You want to dismiss it because you know there's come back for it. You cite Al Gore. Al Gore never incited an insurrection. There is no precedent for January 6th. There was, we were used to peaceful transfers of power, Richard Nixon agreed, even though he's probably robbed by JFK. Al Gore agreed, even though he's probably robbed by George W. Bush. Donald Trump actually lost, for sure. And he still didn't accept it and incited a riot. Michael says, oh, Democrats thought was the way to stay in history. Do you know who said, bar none? It was the most horrifying day in American politics in my lifetime. Mike Pence. No, I don't know. You guess again, so I guess again. It was Ben Shapiro on January the 7th. He said it was the most horrifying day that I witnessed in American politics, in my noted Democrat, when Shapiro said that, on January the 7th. So let's just deal with some facts here. The people who attacked the Capitol were not going on private tours. They were not just a horn hat guy. There's people like Daniel Rodriguez, who assaulted Michael Phanone, put him in a stroke, got 12 years in prison. The judge said he was an army of hate and violence. Donald Trump pardoned him. It was people like Andrew Paul Johnson, who was just sentenced to life in prison for sexually abusing two children in Florida. Donald Trump pardoned him for January the 6th. He pardoned a neo-Nazi called Bradley Tyler Dykes, who did a seek high solute, as he attacked police officers. These are the people that Trump pardoned. Michael has never condemned Trump for that. Harry Sisson asked Michael on his show earlier this year. Would you condemn Donald Trump for doing that? And he wouldn't ask the question, I'll never condemn Donald Trump. Do you condemn Donald Trump for pardoning neo-Nazi's domestic abuses, pedophiles?

Michael Knowles: Well, hold on, was he, was he condemned Trump for pardoning? I'm just asking a clarifying question about that guy. Was he one of the neo-Nazi's who was getting three million bucks from the SPLC, or was he a different neo-Nazi?

Mehdi Hasan: Nice, nice diversion. Do you, I'm not Harry Sisson, I'll use up my time. Do you condemn Donald Trump for pardoning neo-Nazi's violent criminals? People who assaulted 140 police officers on January the 6th. One last real clerk. He went up, one last real clerk. I'll ask again. Do you, no, it's a simple question. Do you support pardoning the 600 people who were charged with assaulting police officers? He pardoned them for like Daniel and Nani's. We're going to be. He pardoned them for assaulting police.

noise: Oh, do you support that? All right.

Mehdi Hasan: Do you support that?

noise: All right. Three times, yes. And I say to the two-liners, two-liners, one-liners.

Mehdi Hasan: Do you condemn Donald Trump for pardoning? I have 600 people who assaulted police officers. Fourth time, can you do it? I'm happy to, I condemn pedophilia. Do you condemn Donald Trump for pardoning? And I condemn him.

Ella Klinsky (Moderator): Right, if he won't do it, he will not do it. Excuse me, we have a debate format. We're going to stick to the debate format. We're not going to have a...

Michael Knowles: I mean, by many, he doesn't want to stick to the debate format. We're going to stick to the debate format. We're going to stick to the debate format. We're going to stick to the debate format. I'm happy to answer on the substance.

Ella Klinsky (Moderator): If you would like to, you help one minute to respond to every question.

Michael Knowles: Yeah. So obviously, Mettys being very, very dishonest. President Trump didn't pardon anybody for pedophilia or not. Just for a certain amount of insults. If you'll allow me to finish. So what he pardoned them for is because there was a massive prosecution of thousands of people on January 6th that was politically motivated, that was disproportionate, because the federal government had let all of the leftist rioters who, unlike the January 6th, there's killed dozens of people and resulted in over a billion dollars worth of property damage, let them off the hook and, in fact, raised money to bail them out of jail. And so, because of the unjust prosecutions where you had Midwestern grannies who were not pedophiles or Nazis, but who were eccentrically... What about... Excuse me. Who walked around the Capitol, despite all of the lies suggesting that police officers were killed, that was not true, the coroner's proved that. So he recognized that there was disproportionate prosecution. The same goes for the pro-life grannies who were arrested by Joe Biden, who were imprisoned for praying at abortion clinics. President Trump pardoned them. Now, on the pardon power, there are lots of bad pardons that go on. Joe Biden took it to an egregious degree. But the pardon power is absolute. And if we're here to defend the Constitution, we would have to defend the plain words of article two, which, say, the president has the pardon power.

Ella Klinsky (Moderator): OK. Thank you both. I appreciate the sentiments. We're going to keep interruptions to a minimum. Excuse me.

Mehdi Hasan: Why, yes. To be fair, it wasn't an option. I gave up my time to ask a question. He didn't answer it six times.

Questioner 3: OK. First off, many big fan. Big fan. I love your work. To Michael, I would like to say, so there is a new, I think, with your assault on free speech and how we should, in your words, tighten. There is a new act proposed by Congress, the Mamdani Act. Are you familiar with that? I'm not, but I like to... So it is the measures against Marxism's defenders and noxious Islamist act. And it essentially extends the power of the federal government, especially by Trump, to deny citizenship, to deny entry, and to essentially deport, to go to these ice, horrible camps, any person who is a radical Islamist or a communist or any other sort of leftist, gives very broad powers. Do you support that? And is that constitutional at all?

Michael Knowles: Well, I love the acronym. And I take it from your description of the act when you mention that this would be a way to deport people, to deny them visas, to deny the entry to schools. That the people we're talking about here are not American citizens. So it's really crucial to recognize here a point that has been glossed over, which is that when Medi-Assad says that the Trump administration is arresting students for stating their opinions, even if they're radical left-wing opinions, he's not arresting American citizens, what the Secretary of State came out and said, is that they are going to revoke or deny visas to people who have views that are contrary to the American national interest, which is not only entirely constitutional, that is just plain common sense. You don't want to bring in foreigners who have no right to be in your country, who actively undermine your society. I mean, that's the most basic charge of immigration. So, and then to your point, you say, we're going to even deport some people, well, to deport those people, implies that they have no right to be here, that is, they're not American citizens. And in that case, yes, I favor deportations quite broadly. And the fact that it has a beautiful acronym is a cherry on top. I am calling, with very little knowledge beyond what you've just suggested about the act, I am calling on Congress today to pass it, to find out, pass it twice.

Mehdi Hasan: Thank you, Congressman. So, yeah, it's interesting that Michael again says, many of us aren't, thanks. Foreign students are having their rights deprived. No, William Young, a veteran Reagan judge, said it was a full-throated assault on the First Amendment. He said, I'm going to answer the constitutional question posed here, which is, do legal immigrants have the same constitutional rights to free speech? As citizens, yes, they do, he said, he's a his words. Yes, they do. There is no invidious distinction that Trump makes. His words, jurisprudence, history does not back that. In fact, go back to 1945, Bridges versus Wix, in famous Supreme Court case where they said immigrants here in the country have the same First Amendment rights as everyone else. And these are not students who are, you know, trying to undermine America. Remesa Osturg is a student from Turkey who wrote an op-ed in a newspaper saying, I think my university should divest from Israel. That's what she wrote. She said, nothing about the United States of America. She said, nothing violent. Masked men grabbed her off the street. Have you seen the video? It's one of the creepiest things you will ever see. A bunch of masked men with no ideas grabbed this young woman off the street, and named President. And Michael says, it's totally constitutional. Actually, the law that Rubio is citing is 1952 law of school amendment. Do you know who said it was unconstitutional? A woman called Judge Marion Trump Barry. Donald Trump's late sister is the only judge to ever adjudicate on this. And she said, I think it's unconstitutional. Never reached the Supreme Court, but it's the only time an American judge has looked at it. And they think what Marco Rubio is doing, Trump's late sister thinks it's unconstitutional. A Reagan judge thinks it's on assault on the First Amendment. So let's not stop pretending. This is about the left and about Muslims and about socialists. No, it's not. I've already pointed out. Mike Pence disagree with you. Ben Shapiro disagrees with you. Reagan judges disagree with you. Trump judges disagree with you. The Supreme Court disagrees with you. And I hope the audience tonight disagrees with you.

noise: Okay, trust me.

Michael Knowles: Yeah, maybe Mike Pence should have come here tonight. I don't know. Why am I just to clarify? Like, I like Mike Pence as much as the next guy. But I'm not like, he's not my bosom buddy. I don't know. We don't sit up text. I don't know why. It was only the vice president for four years. Yeah, it is. It's a medi keeps bringing up. But anyway, I guess the question I would ask for Medi, and just as you offered me some of your time, I'll ask you this. Do you think that foreign students who would apply for a student visa to the United States, do you think that they have some right to that visa? No, I don't think they have the right to the visa.

Mehdi Hasan: But I agree with you. That's the question. That's not the question. No, it's reclaiming my time. No, it's not. We're not in Congress. I'm answering the question. No, you're not a right to have a visa, but it is right to have free speech once you're in the country under the First Amendment. Perjustice Murphy's ruling in Bridges versus Wix in 1945. Once you're in the country, you're on the same rights.

Michael Knowles: You're taking it by one time because you're a filibuster. We're not talking about that. As you did, we're not talking about that. Do you support Donald Trump's pardon of violence, offended, risked, seven times?

Ella Klinsky (Moderator): We will risk at your time. Yeah, good. You can start from the beginning.

Michael Knowles: I appreciate that. This is why, you know, just to loop back a little bit, this is why it's so funny that Medi Hassan takes issue with the arrest of Don Lemon. Because Don Lemon was arrested claiming First Amendment rights, but you don't have a First Amendment right when you were actively violating First Amendment rights, which is something that Medi is clearly very familiar with. And Medi is just admitted to the point. And he keeps dishonestly trying to conflate legal immigrants in the United States with students who are here on visas from some foreign country. And but he's already granted the premise. And he's granted the point, which is that the students do not have a right. Yes, they do. Constitutional right. What's in my mouth? Yes, they do. I'm not putting words in your mouth. I'm telling the truth to the students. A foreign student who would like to study in the United States at Dartmouth or elsewhere has no right to do so. No natural right, no constitutional right, no legal right to that visa. That visa is a privilege granted to the United States. Medi and others might want to blow up in our borders until they're permitted to come here. You already granted the point, Medi, that a foreign student who wishes to come here does not have a right to that.

Mehdi Hasan: But one thing, they have a first Amendment rights, which you keep ignoring, because the Supreme Court is against you, Michael, as it has been all night.

Ella Klinsky (Moderator): All right, thank you for your time, and thank you. And the interesting time is we're going to move on to the next question.

Questioner 4: Hello. Well, I have one main question, but I think that it lends to a lot of what this argument has been about. And I think a lot of where the argument has gone, instead of maybe where it should have been. I've been really interested, and I'm curious to know, because Medi, as you pointed out, there are some moments where the argument has moved, as opposed to does the president have the right? Is it constitutional that the president say, take Nigeria, for example, did he have the right to strike Nigeria? Instead, the question has become, is there a genocide in Nigeria? Should the president have stricken Nigeria? I'm curious to know whether or not it is constitutional. If there is a matter, say, in Nigeria or elsewhere, where the president might personally view there to be some kind of situation, do you believe that the president does have the right, or in some cases should, in your personal opinion, violate the constitution? Do you believe that there are moments where the president has that right or should? And following that, what is the point of the constitution? If you believe that the president should or has the right to violate it?

Michael Knowles: Was that question for me or Medi? In for you, but I would also say. Yeah, sure. Well, I suppose I just disagree with the premise, the suggestion that the president taking a military action around the world violates the constitution. It does not. In the case of an intervention in Nigeria, one could make an argument that it pertains to American interests, because we're the global empire, and we have interests around the world. But one could also just make that it's a humanitarian intervention. And indeed, that was much of the argument that presidents have made for many decades now. Barack Obama made it, Bill Clinton made it. And furthermore, the Monroe doctrine, which we were discussing earlier in the case of Venezuela, which has been the cornerstone of American foreign policy since early 19th century, does not have a literal direct constitutional predicate. And yet, no serious person would suggest that it's somehow contrary to the constitution. So I think it would be contrary to the constitution. If the president went toppled the regime in Nigeria and made it the 51st state, which I don't think any of us want to do, or if the military action went on for more than 60 or 90 days without authorization from Congress, as we saw in the cases of Barack Obama and Joe Biden. But a relatively minor military action for national interest, or even for humanitarian reasons, is well within the constitutional mainstream. There is nothing prohibiting the president from doing that. And indeed, he has the right to do that as the commander-in-chief of the military. I guess one issue, one topic that we haven't really gotten to, but it does sit at the foundation of a lot of the debate tonight, is what the executive really is. And so this gets back to Article 2, Section 1, which, in the very first line, explains what the executive is. And our framers said that the executive power shall be vested in a president of the United States of America. The courts have ruled on this many times. There are all sorts of interesting discussions about inspectors general and all other branches of government trying to involve themselves in the executive branch. But time and time and time again, we recognize that the executive has broad authority. And in our day and age, a lot of people are worried about and overreach from the executive. But I don't think that's really serious. First of all, Congress gave away a lot of its authority by establishing the agencies in the executive 100 years ago. But furthermore, if any branch is going to be overstepping, it's probably going to be the judiciary. So he has a constitutional predicate to do it. Again, we can disagree over the prudence of a strike on Nigeria. But that's not the topic on which you're voting tonight. The question is very basic. Is Trump within the constitutional mainstream? And the answer is yes.

Mehdi Hasan: That's not the question of if he's within the mainstream. Is he upholding the constitution? Yes or no? And he's clearly not. What's interesting is Michael again made a weird concession there. He said he hasn't gone over 60 days in the case of Nigeria, but he hasn't Iran. He hasn't. He hasn't Iran. He crossed it last Friday. But I know my spark. I know I struggle with British English. You can maybe struggle with math. 60 days was last Friday. He crossed it. Donald Trump wrote a letter saying hostilities are terminated. And then on Monday, there was an exchange of fire between America and Iran, which is a reminder of what a liar and a fool he is. So no, he crossed 60 days. It's an illegal war. It was already illegal war. And now it's a double illegal war under the War Powers Act. And I'm glad you raised the issue of executive power. I'm glad you raised the question of what is the constitution for. I'm not a blind fan of everything in the constitution. No one is. And we shouldn't be. There's amendments for a reason. Michael, you want to change the flag burning thing, right? You want an amendment to change it. We don't need an amendment to change it. But you want to get rid of names.

Michael Knowles: I wouldn't mind if there were a clarification.

Mehdi Hasan: And many of us on the left would like some reinterpretation of second amendment. Some kind of, I think that's fair to say. But the point is, you do it the right way. I'm not saying that Joe, I'm not a second amendment. Doesn't mean Joe Biden can come in just straight down the second amendment. By the way, Donald Trump came in and said, you can't have guns. He said, after Alex Freddie was killed, can you imagine what Michael would have said if Joe Biden had said you can't have guns? By the way, notice that Republicans are always fine with executive power when it's a Republican in the White House. When it's a Democrat in the White House, they're screaming from the hilltops about overreach. Ted Cruz called Barack Obama a tyrant. Mike Cuckabee called him a dictator. Donald Trump said Biden was leading a Gestapo administration. They said Obama did too many executive orders. Biden governed by executive order. Well, Donald Trump has done 100 more executive orders in 18 months than Joe Biden did in four years. He's done almost as many executive orders in 18 months as Obama did in eight years. So this nonsensical position that we find with executive power, no, you're not. You'll find with a Republican dictator. You just don't want Democrats to have any power. And I think you should be honest about that. People will have more respect for your views on the conclusion if you were consistent and not just a part of that.

Michael Knowles: Well, it's interesting that Medi brings up President Trump's executive orders because I seem to recall a journalist by the name of Medi Hassan, who in early 2021 was begging on television for Joe Biden to issue many, many more executive orders. Yeah. And I believe this Mr. Hassan was asking him to follow the legacy of Franklin Roosevelt who issued thousands of executive orders which were so relentlessly strugged out. And your side was attacking Biden for that.

Mehdi Hasan: That's my point.

Michael Knowles: That you wanted more from him.

Mehdi Hasan: But Trump has exceeded Biden at Obama. And you were the guy that said more. You were saying, what do you say judges overstep? But do you want more executive orders? In 2022, when a Florida judge shot down the Moss mandate, that COVID must have been replayed by Trump. Michael Knolls tweeted, since we're quoting each other, Michael Knolls tweeted in 2022, the hero judge struck down by these last mandate. When you were a Republican judge who strikes down a Democrat's policy, you're a hero. When you're a Republican judge who strikes down a Republican president, many have, I've named them all tonight. Oh, then it's judicial overreach. See the double standard?

Michael Knowles: Yeah. Once again, Michael's time defending the first amendment yet again. So anyway, to the point I was saying. Medi was very, very upset that Joe Biden wasn't issuing more executive orders. And he said he has to follow FDR who issued thousands, which were so relentlessly struck down by the Supreme Court as unconstitutional, that FDR promised to totally reconstitute the court for the first time in 70 years. And only because the judge backed down was that averted. Nevertheless, you make a good point. Yes, Republicans and Democrats are different. Their policies are different. Some are good. Some are bad. I want more of the good ones and fewer of the bad ones. But on the issue of executive authority here, there's really no question. You said I'd like to amend the Constitution. I don't think we really need to. And on this point, on the unitary executive, on the fact that the executive power is vested in the president of the United States, that is clear as day from the Constitution, from now 250 years of jurisprudence, almost 250 years of jurisprudence. And then all the way up to even the post-watergate reforms, Inspector General Act, which acknowledges that very fact and to Supreme Court cases since then. So the executive does have a lot of authority. I don't like it when Democrats win it and affect it, which is why I think we need to win elections.

Ella Klinsky (Moderator): Thank you for those thoughts. Ready for the next question.

Questioner 5: Hi, Michael Ametti. First of all, I want to say thank you so much for coming up here to hand over to debate. This question's directed at you, Michael. I wanted to say that as a Republican, I am naturally inclined to agree with you that Donald Trump has acted within constitutional norms, but for his behavior leading up to, but not including January 6th. And I wanted to ask you, how do you reconcile his behavior, particularly with regards to trying to influence Brad Raffensberger and a security elector's from Georgia, with the constitutional separation of powers between the state and federal government, especially with the right of states to conduct their own elections?

Michael Knowles: Yeah, a really good question, because again, happily my, I hope, impending victory in the debate does not rest on what you think of any of these individual actions. It's really just a question of his Trump upholding the Constitution and what that even means, which is, of course, how the Constitution is obtained throughout history. And so there was a lot of predicate for this for contested elections. I guess the first question you have to ask is, was there reason to be a little skeptical of the presidential election in 2020? And I think the fact that they changed all the voter rules and took away a lot of the safeguards, and in some cases violated a state constitution as we saw in Pennsylvania, and then delayed the counts. And I think there was at least a reasonable person might have some questions about the election. Was this the first time in American history that there were lawsuits over presidential elections? Certainly not. Was this the first time in presidential history that there was a question over who the legitimate electors would be, certainly not. Indeed, our Constitution preempts that, and recognizes that there will be questions. That's the whole point of the 12th Amendment. So again, President Trump's rhetoric was much more moderate, actually, than he's given credit for, even on the day of January 6th himself. Part of the reason that the Democrats kept failing in all of these cases, one, he was obviously exonerated at his impeachment trial over this. But then, too, they couldn't kick him off of the ballot when they tried to undermine democracy on this insurrection point. That too was thrown out because he didn't do it. And his words were very clear, which he said, you should peaceably assemble. This was well within the Brandenburg standard on speech and violence. And so his actions could be imprudent. His actions, you could say were reckless. You could say his actions did not have a reasonable probability of success. You could say all of those things, and all of those criticisms are perfectly fine to make. The one thing you can't say is that it's out of the norm for constitutional behavior in the United States.

Mehdi Hasan: Can you imagine going back to January 6th 2021 and hearing Michael say that? No one in America believed that. The Republican body didn't believe that. Kevin McCarthy didn't believe that. He said it was an insurrection. What did Mike Pence? Mitch McCart, Mike Pence. Let's go to Mike Pence. He said, President Trump demanded that I put the Constitution above Donald Trump. He became the first modern vice president, not to endorse the president, because that's what he thought of as a threat to the Constitution. Ask yourself, who knows Trump better? Michael Knowles, or the people who served with him much of his first cabinet who refused to endorse him a second time. His chief of staff, his defense secretary fired a lot. His vice president. He also appointed them and said they're amazing when he appointed them. So let's talk about January 6th and the run up to January 6th. There was a fake electric scheme. Multiple people indicted. Trump's own lawyer was convicted for that. Michael says, well, people in, you know, it was thrown out of court. Let's be clear. Donald Trump never saw the inside of a courtroom for his crimes on January 6th, because Joe Biden and Merritt Garland were not like Donald Trump and Pam Bondy and didn't go after their political opponents. They were super slow. They dragged their feet. They appointed Jackson Smith, 667 days after they came to office. Compare that to Donald Trump who's gone after John Brennan and Jim Comey and all the rest. Tish James all thrown out by judges saying this is ridiculous. This is the difference. But Democrats weaponizing government. Some of us say we wish Trump got away with it because he never saw the inside of a courtroom. Jackson Smith had to end all that because Trump got reelected and DOJ guidelines that you can't indict a sitting president. So we don't know, but we saw the evidence. We know that Trump was lying. Trump knew he was lying. If you and I called Brad Ratham's burger and said find us 11,000 votes would be in prison. Let's just be very clear about that. The only reason he's not is because he's Donald Trump. He committed multiple crimes in the run up to January 6th. He told his DOJ, he wrote a note to his DOJ. Just say it's corrupt, say it's stolen and me and the Republicans in Congress will deal with it. That's on the record, right? People around him say we told him it wasn't stolen. He knew it wasn't stolen. Kellyanne Conway has said that. And yet he still did this. He's still incited a riot at the Capitol and 140 police officers were injured and Michael will not say tonight whether it was wrong of Donald Trump to pardon 600 people who were charged with a sentence. He talked about grannies.

Michael Knowles: He's not wrong. I totally support the party.

Mehdi Hasan: You support pardoning a new assaulted police officers like Daniel Rodriguez.

Michael Knowles: I support the parties for January 6th.

Mehdi Hasan: Do you support pardoning Daniel Rodriguez?

Michael Knowles: I oppose pedophilia. I oppose beating your wife.

Mehdi Hasan: What about Daniel Rodriguez? Do you support pardoning Daniel Rodriguez who assaulted a police officer for 12 years for January 6th? Why do you support pardoning Daniel Rodriguez?

Michael Knowles: Well, as I explained it, my brother. You talked about grannies. I'm talking about a man who is sentenced.

Mehdi Hasan: Actually, we have a lot of time. I like coming to rescue you. Eight times, I tried.

Michael Knowles: And I answered. You didn't do many times. Why do you support pardoning Daniel Rodriguez? I don't know if Medi will allow me to have my minute. So Medi just said something and then get again the Q&A. And that was before. Well, it was a lot of fun.

Ella Klinsky (Moderator): Well, there too can go to you first.

Michael Knowles: Yes, they have too many questions for me as the problem. So the even Medi just said something yet again that is not true. Medi just said that President Trump never saw the inside of a courtroom for his actions on January 6th. Medi must be suffering from a little bit of amnesia because last time I checked, President Trump was indeed tried for his supposed crime on January 6th. He was tried, and precisely the way a President of the United States has tried, he was impeached for it. And then he was exonerated. He was not convicted for the crime at the Senate trial. I'm being honest. But to your point, once he left office, he did not see it before. He was once again prosecuted for this. Jack Smith went after him as you rightly point out, but you're conflating two cases. Because then he also went to trial one more time when the states tried to kick him off the ballot for supposedly committing an insurrection. Both of those cases flopped just like the impeachment flopped where he was exonerated. So three times this was brought to courts, one being the special court of the impeachment court, three times it was brought to courts, and all three times it was locked.

Mehdi Hasan: There was never a trial, Michael. You are lying if you say there was a trial on the top. In impeachment is a trial on January 6th. You might not be familiar with that. In Georgia and in Washington DC and in Florida, there were no trials. It is a lie to say there was a trial on that.

Ella Klinsky (Moderator): We have time for two more audience Q&As. We'll start with Medi. I think we're going to start over here.

Questioner 2: Awesome, yeah. And I think we might be nearing one question. Yeah.

Questioner 6: And, well, Medi saw it's a privilege to see you speak here in person. My question given to President very recently, Donald Trump posted a picture of himself and AI generated a picture of himself depicting himself as Jesus. My question to Michael first giving the Senate Judiciary hearing recently. Do you believe that Donald Trump can run as for a third term and be elected as president? Yes or no, given the 22nd amendment. And the response I'd love for Medi is, what would bypassing said amendment look like? Given the precedent set by... What would bypassing said amendment look like? Given the precedent set by the administration? Well, that...

Questioner 2: And sorry, just before you guys answer, can we also have people fill out the post to be poll as we talk to debate the winner?

Mehdi Hasan: Thanks so much. My greatest fear is 22nd amendment violation. I've said that for a while, I'm on record. I'm not saying Donald Trump will do that. I don't want to do predictions anymore. I said he wouldn't win in 2016. I was wrong, I don't do political predictions. But that's my greatest fear. Is it a possibility that he will do it? Sure, I take him literally. I take him seriously. He said it just again on Monday. Oh, he's just joking, they say. And then he goes on, meet the press and he says, I'm not joking, there are ways to do it. There aren't ways to do it. It's a violation of the 22nd amendment. Steve Bannon says, we're working on a way to do it. This is my big fear. That this is guy is a wannabe dictator to quote Judge Michael Ludi, one of the most famous conservative judges in America. He is a wannabe tyrannical king. He wants to stay in power. He thinks he is God's gift. He literally, Michael earlier, very shamefully, tried to insinuate, I'm anti-Christian because I don't accept there's a Christian genocide in Nigeria. And yet he supports a man who literally portrayed himself as Jesus, blasphemously sacrilegity. A man who attacks the Pope. Michael, are you Catholic?

noise: I am.

Mehdi Hasan: Yeah, a man who attacks the Pope. I've never attacked the Pope, like Donald Trump has. But such is partisanship, a hell of a drug, as they say. That he won't criticize Donald Trump ever for attacking the Pope, but he'll attack me for supposedly being anti-Christian. Trump literally portrayed himself as Jesus, then pretended, said, I thought I was being a doctor. Okay, biggest liar in the world. Attack the Pope, light about the Pope. You know what he said on Monday? He said, the Pope says he wants Iran to have a nuclear weapon. I wonder, will Michael condemn Trump for lying about the Pope? The Pope has never said Iran wants to have a nuclear weapon. Donald Trump, light on Monday. You can see if Michael will answer that question tonight. I suspect he won't. Cult, he can't criticize the dear leader. So it's a real problem that we have a president who's attacking Christianity because he sees himself as Lord God. He once said, and the key wants to retweet as someone, say he's the key of the Jews, the Lord of the world, or whatever it was. He's putting out pictures of himself as Jesus. And yes, the 22nd Amendment said issue, a man who did not accept a peaceful transfer of power in January 2021. Why would he accept it in 2028? Every time he's ever lost election, he claims fraud. When he lost to Michael's good friend Ted Cruz and the Iowa caucuses in 2016, he said, Ted Cruz stole it. He accuses everyone. I don't know what happened in his childhood, but he really cannot handle any kind of defeat. He's a militant narcissist. He's power-crazy. And yes, there is a very real risk that just is in 2021. He tries to stay on an office in 2028. The fact that we even have in this conversation is a reason why you should vote against this motion and say he's not upholding constitution because he's considering violating the 22nd Amendment. That in itself should be enough for Michael to lose this debate.

Michael Knowles: I'm trying to track what the question was because many took us on a journey. I involved the Pope, it involved me. I had a question about 20-second amendment. Both was in the question.

Mehdi Hasan: I know you don't want to talk about the Pope.

Michael Knowles: No, well, I was very glad when the president took down the image of many being a little confused about things tonight. Seems to think I won't criticize the president. I did specifically point out that that was a sacrilege. That's what I was very glad about.

Mehdi Hasan: Did he lie about the Pope's one thing

Michael Knowles: that you never had a right time to answer? Are you afraid that I'm going to say?

Mehdi Hasan: Did he? No, you didn't answer my question. Did he lie about the Pope?

Michael Knowles: I'm answering your question. I'm not answering your question.

Mehdi Hasan: Do you want to criticize Trump for that?

Michael Knowles: So anyway, as I just pointed out, I very publicly criticized President Trump over that post and was actually featured in the international media for it. And very happily, the very happily president Trump took down the post. So I was very glad with that. He's also moderated his comments on the Pope, which I think is the right thing to do. No, I'm worried. They asked to speak ever in this debate for his own. You've actually spoken more of it. It's unbelievable. So anyway, there have been many tensions between emperors and popes going back to at least Pope Jalaceus the first in the fifth century. So I'm not surprised that the president's fighting with him a little bit. And I think the president's Presbyterian maybe will make him Catholic by the end. To the actual question that was asked before, Medi's very rude interruption. The question was, will President Trump violate the 22nd Amendment? And Medi, who's made many very false predictions, including that the free press would disappear, were Trump reelected, Medi says that he won't leave office. And I'd just like to point out, we know that he will, because he did. He did leave office. This is not an academic question arrived at that ago. He did. He left office on time. He contested a dubious election. And then he just left office on time. And it was all just normal. And to the point of the 22nd Amendment, there's one president who violated the spirit of that amendment and maybe the spirit of the constitutional norm. And that is a Democrat president, FDR, who did make himself the American monarch and stayed in power till he died. But I don't know that we even really need to knock FDR for this. If the debate were, did FDR violate constitutional norms, I guess we would say he did. But it's about Donald Trump. And it's a fact that at the end of his life, President Reagan was openly campaigning in the pages of The New York Times to repeal the 22nd Amendment. You'll recognize it's the 22nd Amendment. It wasn't in there at the beginning. It's relatively recent. I think that we do have term limits. The term limits are at the ballot box. And I actually think that the 22nd Amendment is contrary to American democracy. But much as I would like President Trump to have a third, fourth, or fifth term, I don't think that it's going to happen. We will not get Octavian Augustus Barron Trump to come in after him. President Trump will leave office at the end of his term because that is very much in keeping with the letter and spirit of the Constitution, which I hope I've demonstrated to you, President Trump has upheld.

Mehdi Hasan: So a couple of things. I never said you didn't criticize the Pope about the image. I see your tweets. I know you did that. I said you won't criticize him for lying about the Pope yesterday. Do you agree he lied about the Pope on Monday and said he wants Iran to have nuclear weapons? Do you agree that's a lie? The Pope doesn't want Iran to have nuclear weapons?

Michael Knowles: I don't think that the Pope wants Iran to have a nuclear weapon.

Mehdi Hasan: So Trump lied.

Michael Knowles: I think that President Trump and the Pope are having a disagreement within the basis of... We'll do it. This is what the definition of a cult is, ladies and gentlemen.

Mehdi Hasan: I'll speak to criticize Barack Obama's lies. I will happen. He won't do it. But he's not lying because I think he believes it. OK, he doesn't believe it. I think he does believe it. The great Trump defense for 10 years. Since we're doing predictions, I already admitted my predictions are bad. But relevant to this conversation, you had a great prediction in the summer of 2024. You tweeted, there's no reason to believe. There's no evidence to suggest that Donald Trump won't accept the results of this election. The same can't be said about his opponents. That take age like milk in a hot desert, as we saw in January 6th. The idea that he left, yeah, he left after exhausting every violent and nonviolent option. There were guardrails. There was a guy we haven't talked about him tonight called Mike Pence, who actually stood up to him. You think JD Vance is going to stand up to Donald Trump in 2028? You think the man who threw his own wife under the bus is going to stand up to Donald Trump in 2028? No, there are no guardrails this time. There's no Jim Mattis. There's no John Kelly. There's none of the people from the first time who were semi-adults in the room. There's Cash Patel, RFK Junior, Tulsi Gabbard, and JD Vance. If that fills you with confidence on January the 6th, 2029, go for it. Some of us will still be skeptical about a man who completely utterly is obsessed with power, says, I have a second, I have an article to write to do whatever I want. We've posts quotes from Napoleon, saying, if you save your country, you violate it no laws. Yeah, you have. You're not above the law. Who says stuff like, you know what he said to New York Times earlier this year? When he was asked about international law, he said, my mind, my morality. That's the only thing that can stop me. Who talks like that? Autocrats, talk like that. Dictators, talk like that. If Barack Obama talked like that, these guys would have gone nuts. But, you know, he saluted a military guy while throwing a coffee, and that was a huge scandal.

Questioner 1: And the Barack Obama, right?

Mehdi Hasan: And Donald Trump has compared himself to God. In fact, he's reposted people and he posted an image of himself as God. Classic Michael, oh, he took it down. But why did he put it up? You'll never criticize him for the original act. You'll praise him for taking it down. And Pope is a good example. He cannot handle any criticism. If it's a Supreme Court justice, they're a lapdog and a fool. If it's the Pope, he wants Iran to have nuclear weapons. He recognizes no opposition. That is why he's so sui generis. That is why George Bush recognized opponents. I have to take a second shower tonight. George Bush recognized political opponents. Donald Trump doesn't recognize any power other than his own. That is why you should vote against this motion tonight.

Ella Klinsky (Moderator): Thank you both for sharing your time and your thoughts. We all really appreciate it. Make it come to close with us.

Questioner 7: All right, please join me in thanking Michael Knowles, Medi Hassan, and of course, Ella Klinnski for providing us with such an engaging debate tonight.

Mehdi Hasan: Thank you. Well done. Well done.

Questioner 7: Well done. Now, at this time, please remain seated while our guests leave. And while you are all filling out the poll, I'd like to thank you all for coming. Having supporters like you is what empowers the DPU to continue its mission of promoting the free exchange of discourse. Thank you to Michael Knowles and Medi Hassan, again, for being great debate partners. And I want to thank the office of the president

Mehdi Hasan: for its continuous support. Yeah, I do to know. I can't wait. Thank you. Thank you.

Questioner 7: And don't worry, we'll make sure you guys know the results of the poll shortly. Now, I'd like to take this opportunity, while you're finishing out the poll. That is a big finale.

Mehdi Hasan: Tell us about the leaves. Not knowing. I am the answer. Yeah, I'm the lead.

Questioner 7: This is painful. Security rules.

Mehdi Hasan: And he to know.

Questioner 7: 5 p.m.

Mehdi Hasan: 28. That's 58. I know. We'll be hosting... I'll tell you the percentage.

Questioner 7: I think the commissioners, Darah, Lyndon, and Alan Dickerson in Haldeman 41. Following evening, Hermit Dillon, past of 1989, will be visiting for a moderated Q and A at 5 p.m. Thursday, May 14th, right here in Cook Auditorium once again. Stay tuned for more events throughout the spring. And before I begin sharing polling results, We'd like to remind everyone to stay seated, even though our guests have left. With that said, the results of our poll are almost in. As a reminder, before the debate, 22% of the room thought that Trump had upheld the Constitution, and 78% thought Trump had not upheld the Constitution. Now, when asked the same question after the debate, 28% think he has upheld the Constitution, and 72% think he has not. So, a little, a couple of converts to thinking he has upheld the Constitution. I'll also ask again that you remain seated for one more minute, and once again, please join me in giving Michael Knowles and Medi Hassan a round of applause. Thank you all.

Transcript

Download

Events Director [00:00] ...the support of the Office of the President and Dartmouth Dialogues. Tonight's event would not have been possible without the support of our donors and the Office of Student Life, particularly President Bailock and Assistant Dean McKenna. Thank you. Before introducing our moderator and our debater tonight, I'd like to share the results of a poll conducted with the in-person audience following the monk debate format. In response to the question, has President Trump upheld the Constitution? 22% of you responded to believe that President Trump has indeed upheld the Constitution, whereas 78% of you believe that President Trump has not. Today we are joined by Michael Knowles and Hassan. Michael Knowles is the celebrated host of the Michael Knowles show at the Daily Wire. In addition to podcasting, he appears regularly on television. In 2025, he became the first podcaster to attend a White House cabinet meeting. In 2017, Michael published the number one national best-selling book, Reasons to Vote for Democrats. Michael's first book with words, speechless. Also reached number one on the national best-selling book, 2020. His writing has been featured in a fair amount of review of books, the American Conservative, Fox News, and other outlets. Michael is a graduate of Yale University and has lectured at universities and research institutes around the world. Medi Hassan is an award-winning journalist known for riveting one-on-one conversations, as well as his coverage of national politics, current affairs, and global news. Medi is the editor-in-chief and CEO of Zetao. Medi has recently, was recently the host of the Medi Hassan show on MSNBC and Peacock. He was also a political analyst for MSNBC. Before that, Medi was a senior columnist in host of the podcast, deconstructed at the intercept, and a political commentator and presenter in Al Jazeera. Medi is the author of three books, a biography of former UK Labor Party leader and middle band, an e-book on the financial crisis in austerity economics, and he most recently authored win every argument, the art of debating, persuading, and public speaking. Moderating tonight's conversation is Eloclinsky, a 26 from New York City studying politics, philosophy, and economics. Without further ado, please join me in extending a warm welcome to Michael Knowles, Medi Hassan, and Eloclinsky.

Ella Klinsky (Moderator) [00:00] Thank you so much for being here. I can only hope that one day I have, as impressive the intro as you guys both just had. And thank you so much to the audience and to everyone watching online. The way this debate will function is we will begin by doing a moderated Q&A, where I will ask a question directed at one of you. We will alternate who begins every question, and you will each have opportunity to give a two minute response, and then whoever started will have time for a one minute rebuttal. And then after the moderated Q&A, we will switch over to audience questions. So start getting them ready. So to start off, before specific issues, I would like to start with foundational question. What in practical terms do you believe it means for president to uphold or deviate from the Constitution, and does this differ from upholding constitutional norms, if so, how? We'll start with you, Medi, and you can each give a two minute response in a one minute rebuttal.

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] Yeah, so thank you for having me. Great to be here. I'm actually disappointed with that vote of 7822, because you know what they say, the only way for me is down. Yeah, so good luck to me. I would say constitutional norms, very vague, I'm not sure actually what that means, apart from a historical precedent, what other people have done. And I think tonight, I'm guessing, Michael can tell me I'm wrong, that a lot of Michael's argument will be, well, other presidents did this. A lot of what about is them, a lot of see what X did, see what Y did, see what Obama did, see what Biden did. And I think we just have to be very clear here. We're talking about Donald Trump today. Donald Trump is too egenerous. There's never been a president like him before, certainly not in our lifetimes. He's undeniably violating both constitutional norms, are he presidents, but also the Constitution, the amendments, the articles of the Constitution in this country is doing it all the time. At this point, at this stage, anyone who tells you Donald Trump is not violating the Constitution is gaslighting you and or a member of his country, right? That's the facts are very clear. We can go through them in order. I mean, right now, if you look at the Constitution, Donald Trump, it's violating the appropriations clause, the emoluments clause, the elections clause, the taxicons spending clause, the take care clause, the declare war clause. He's also violating the First Amendment, the Second Amendment, the Fourth Amendment, the Fifth Amendment, the Sixth Amendment, the 10th Amendment, the 14th Amendment, maybe soon, the 22nd Amendment, as he suggests, the yesterday. And, you know, yes, other presidents, to give us your question, have violated norms. Other presidents have certainly violated clauses of the Constitution, but no president, certainly not in modern American history, has launched a multi-pronged across the board, open assault on, forget norms, on the amendments and articles of our Constitution, in the space of less than 18 months, right? Yes, previous presidents have violated, perhaps, a single constitutional amendment, sure, and been called out for it, but none of them, none of them said they plan to terminate the Constitution, as Donald Trump once did. None of them said, I don't know, when they were asked as Trump was on meat the press last year, is it the job of the president to uphold the Constitution? I don't know, he said. None of them declared themselves to be a king or a dictator, even for a day. None of them were rebuked by their own vice president for trying to violate the Constitution and the rule of law. What did Mike Pence say? I know Michael's a big fan of Mike Pence. I came specially with a Mike Pence quote. Mike Pence said, President Trump demanded, I choose between him and our Constitution. If you are pressuring your own vice president to put you above your Constitution, you're not just violating norms, you're violating the Constitution, you're violating your oath of office, and it is very clear tonight that Donald Trump is a clear and present danger to the Constitution, forget norms. Let's raise the bar, to the Constitution, to the articles and amendments of the Constitution, to our rights and liberties, to our democracy, and you don't have to take my word for that tonight, just take Mike Pence's.

Michael Knowles [00:00] The Mike Pence standard of constitutional jurisprudence. Okay, wonderful to be here. Thank you all for having me. You know, my father is a Dartmouth graduate, so I hope I don't do the family to my shame this evening, but I don't think I will, because we have to, to met his friends, we have to narrow in on what exactly we're discussing, what does it mean to uphold the Constitution? And I certainly hope that my opponent here does not mean some kind of pedantic literalism that merely looks at the text of the Constitution that we should certainly do that as well. But to uphold the Constitution, it would seem to me, entail upholding what the Constitution has meant, how the Constitution has obtained, how it has, in fact, governed our country from the beginning through the present. And so I think my opponent here is trying to break me away from citing historical precedent and how other presidents have upheld the Constitution. And I think that's for very good reason, if I were in your shoes, I would do the very same. Because when you look at how the Constitution has, in fact, been put into effect in the United States, no reasonable person could even suggest that Trump is upholding it. If we were to use this very limited pedantic literalist reform in the Constitution, then we would have to disqualify virtually every single president we've ever had from upholding the Constitution. All the modern presidents who have surveilled on mass, all of the great presidents who have violated habeas corpus who have interned people, two great presidents and two great parties, the Republican Abraham Lincoln and the Democrat Franklin Roosevelt. But going back even further, we would have to disqualify Jefferson for the Louisiana Purchase. We would actually have to disqualify President Washington because President Washington declared neutrality in the French Revolutionary Wars. And he was accused of violating the Constitution by no less a man than James Madison, the father of the Constitution. But Madison gets his comeuppance because Madison would be accused of failing to uphold the Constitution when he annexed West Florida. So I think when we take a look at what the Constitution has meant, how it has been interpreted by the three co-election government, adjudicated by the Supreme Court, law is enacted by the Congress. And then of course, the executive power in the president, we will find that the Constitution prevails, the warnings of the historic critics of President Trump, who have been promising us that he's on the brink of shredding the Constitution for about 10 years now, any day now it's coming. I think we will find that President Trump is indeed the president and the Constitution, nevertheless, and I think very much for that reason, prevails. Would you like to ask a little bit of love to him?

noise [00:00] One minute.

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] The best thing about social media is you can see what's going on in the world. And today I look at Michael Nolz's tweet, advertising this event, and underneath the tweet, Tim Paul, another podcaster, some of you may know, posted what looked like a groc generated list of previous presidents who had violated the Constitution. So I was able to prep myself for the debate, knowing that Michael would put all of those examples, which he did, Thomas Jefferson, Louis Yanapurchis, ratified by Congress. Abraham Lincoln and FDR, civil war and World War II. I don't see either of those things happening right now. We can go through the list. I've already conceded that previous presidents have done unconstitutional things, but Donald Trump has done it in a way that no other president has, in a time frame, no other president has, without the excuses that other presidents could at least point to World War II and the civil war. You think that's what's happening in America right now when he goes after migrants and Home Depot parking lots? No, that is not what's happening right now. And let's be very clear, Michael says, no one could dispute that he's upholding the Constitution. He says, histrionics. Do you know who Terry Doughty and Nancy Brazel and Amy Steeve and Trevor McFadden? And we go through the list, Daniel Rodriguez. Sorry, excuse me, Fernando Rodriguez, Jr. Add an all bright Eric committee, Carl Dudeck, Justin Lang. We go through the list, do you know these people are? They are Trump-appointed judges who have ruled against Donald Trump since last January in key constitutional cases, First Amendment, Fifth Amendment, Sixth Amendment, Fourteenth Amendment. They've all said, Donald Trump, what he's doing is violating the Constitution. These people are not liberals or Marxists as Stephen Miller says. They're not doing histrionics, as Michael says. They are looking at the Constitution and even as mega judges, they're saying you've gone too far. You have violated these amendments of the Constitution. One, I mean, it's Trump judges saying this, not me. It's like Pence saying this, not me. Michael can make these arguments about liberal histrionics. The problem is now is that people with eyes and ears who are not mega-powered as I see what is happening here. Donald Trump is doing things that President has not done before, including ignoring a 9-0 Supreme Court ruling.

Ella Klinsky (Moderator) [00:00] OK. Let's try our hardest. The next question is really adhere to time regulations.

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] Well, let's write that. Oh, I saw it in the air. I saw it and defied it. You didn't see it.

Ella Klinsky (Moderator) [00:00] Thank you so much for those thoughts. I was really interesting. Maryann, you mentioned you talked about ice immigration and actually in 2025, the Department of Homeland Security reported record-breaking immigration and enforcement actions with over 600,000 deportations. Given this information, should undocumented immigrants have a right to do process under the Constitution? And if so, can deportations at the rate completed in 2025 be carried out without compromising access to hearing and legal reparations? What's that right here, Michael?

Michael Knowles [00:00] Sure. Yes. In most cases, the prisoners who are being deported are entitled to do process of the law. This is not the case unnecessarily when it comes to the revocation of visas, which are not some natural or constitutional right. But in the case of the people who are being deported, they are entitled to do process. And they are receiving process, actually, from President Trump. But not all do process is created equal. And the Immigration and Nationality Act is endured for some 60 years and in other forms for longer. Recognizes that there is a role for expedited deportations. And it's not only President Trump who's insisted upon this, but it's all of his recent predecessors going back to Bill Clinton and George Bush and Barack Obama, who contradicts himself sometimes. The Democrats, when they want to appeal to the people who voted for the mass deportations, and in the vote, they pretend that Barack Obama deported lots and lots of people as many as Trump. But then when they want to say the deportations were unconstitutional, they really barely deported anybody. But Joe Biden did the same thing and Trump as well. My opponent says that no one has acted as quickly in these egregious displays as President Trump. That, of course, is facially observed. Because President Trump is only the second president of American history to win a non-consecutive second term. So he's just had longer than any other president, other than FDR, who certainly did upset constitutional norms. But regardless, they do have any process. He is following that. And the mass deportations really could be much larger. Let's not forget the great Democrat President Truman, who deported near three quarters of a million foreigners, Mexicans. He did so with scanty due process of the law. That was in 52. Following President Eisenhower in 1954, deported 1.1 million in operation, went back. There was not even really the suggestion that either of those men had violated the law by deporting foreigners who don't really have any right to be here. So President Trump is very much within the mainstream of the constitution in his deportations. And frankly, I wish you one more.

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] So just to respond very quickly on the main point about deporting foreigners, you said, at the end, who have no right to be here. Notice the phrasing. Deporting foreigners have no right to be here, unless they have due process. That's the whole point. When you end up deporting American citizens, do you know they deported American citizens? Terry Dowty is a Trump judge who last year ruled that a two-year-old American child who was deported with her mother against her father's wishes who was in the US. He said, we just, the administration, just deported an American citizen without any meaningful process. That was a Trump judge's verdict when he heard what ICE had done, right? In Minnesota, another Trump judge, her name is Nancy Brazel appointed by Donald Trump. She said, the government asserts the right to arrest thousands of people, put them in an overcrowded warehouse, and then deny them their rights to due process. That's Nancy Brazel ruling against this administration on Fifth Amendment grounds. Again, Trump judges. Michael seems to be under some illusion that we're here to debate Democrats versus Republicans. Unlike Michael, I'm not a partisan. I'm not here to blindly defend Democratic presidents. I don't really care what Harry Truman did. I already conceded, presidents have done bad things, but no one has done stuff like Trump. Let me give you one example. 18 months, he's been in office. 18 months. He's defied court cases, defied court orders. In one in eight cases, AP just did a story, the associate of the press the other day. 31 court cases that he lost, he's just ignoring the court orders. Presidents haven't done that before. They violated the Constitution. Then a court says, hey, you did something wrong, and then they fix it. They don't say f off to the judges. That is what this president does. Let me give you an example on the immigration front between October and February of this year, according to a recent study. Hundreds of judges across the country ruled 4,400 times. I'm gonna say that again. 4,400 times judges across this country ruled that Donald Trump at his administration were illegally detaining migrants in this country without due press. 4,400 times. You find to be another president. I'll wait here all day, who has done that in a four month period. 4,400 rulings by judges. By the way, in one in four cases where judges rule against Trump, these are Republican appointed judges. So this argument from Miller and Co, these are all Marxists. No, these are judges, conservatives, liberals, Democrats, Republicans saying, Donald Trump's violating the law, even when it comes to migrants, even when it comes to foreign students who have a right to be here and have a free speech rights under the Constitution First Amendment, covers foreign students in this room. I hope foreign students hate know that.

Michael Knowles [00:00] I'm a little confused by my opponent's argument because he tells me he's not a partisan, and he's not here to debate Republicans and Democrats. Almost defend. Almost the very first word out of his mouth was Mike Pence in appealing to all of these Republican judges. But listen, I think the Republican Party is the worst party in the United States other than the Democrats. So, I'm not here to, as my opponent does seem to be, to go tit for tat on Republicans versus Democrats, we're here to talk about the Constitution, and we can't talk about how the Constitution has actually governed the country, unless we talk about the people who have effected it, and those people are Republicans and our Democrats. But I'm also confused by my opponent's reaction. And I think this might be because my opponent here has the misfortune of putting up in a foreign country, did not learn proper English, you know, the United Kingdom, they don't, so maybe he missed this word when I spoke, but I answered in the affirmative. Of course, illegal aliens, in most cases, have the right to do process. But they don't have the right to lengthy do process. This has been precedent for many decades, and in all of those cases, my opponent here, cites the AP. This involves, these problems with the courts, generally involve delays, more than outright refusals, and both Barack Obama and Joe Biden have also been guilty of seeing delays. So I'm happy that in this one case, we are in agreement. The illegal aliens deserve due process, and now that they have it, they need to get it.

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] I'm getting it, Michael, that's the problem.

Ella Klinsky (Moderator) [00:00] OK. Well, again, thank you for that. I remember we were keeping this a nice respectful debate, and so let me just ask that. No, no, no.

Questioner 1 [00:00] Good work. You and me.

Ella Klinsky (Moderator) [00:00] Yes, if we tell you, we're keeping it respectful. I would love to now talk about it. It is often the mind for what we hear in the news, et cetera. Specifically, President Trump's Operation Epic Fury, targeting Iran, was carried out without progress in prior operation in Congress. This has remited a longstanding constitutional debate over war powers. At the same time, President Trump has argued that involving Congress can pose operational risks, citing concerns about leaks, and the need for speed and national security decisions. So the question is, how should we balance Congress's right to clear war with the practical demands of secrecy and rapid response in modern warfare, and with Trump's actions significantly different from that of our predecessors, or does it work as a growing trend among the executive branch? We'll start with you, then.

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] It's a great question, and I'm glad you mentioned the speed issue. Michael mentioned speed a moment ago when it came to migrants with the speed issue. He's known for bomb seven countries last year, after claiming to be the peacemaker and insisting on a Nobel Peace Prize. But he got a FIFA one. Bomb seven countries, which weren't attacking us. He started this year by bombing Venezuela and taking, kidnapping, the president of that country, again, not a country that was attacking us. There was no self-defense right, no UN resolution. You can only go to war in this country under international law if it's self-defense or if it's authorized by the UN, not the case in Venezuela, not the case in Iran. Iran, obviously, was not attacking us. We were in the middle of negotiations when we attacked them. And Marco Rubio admitted we attacked them, because Israel was about to attack them. They were about to attack us. So there was no speed. There was no justification. And it is a good question about the balance. And again, I suspect, Michael is going to say, well, all previous presidents have declared war without congressional approval, which isn't true, by the way. George W. Bush, I'm going to go home and take a shower after this, but I'm going to defend George W. Bush. George W. Bush went and got an authorization for the use of military force against Afghanistan in 2001. He went and got an authorization for the use of military force against Iraq in 2002. Now I feel disgusting, but George Bush did that, right? Barack Obama, when he was about to bomb Syria, tried to go to Congress, couldn't get the votes, did not bomb Syria. Now, Libya, Barack Obama did go and violate the Constitution and the War Powers Act. I will agree with that. But let me say a couple of things here. Number one, Barack Obama, he would argue. Let me make the case for why it's different to go about your question. There's no comparison between Iran and Libya. First, there was a UN resolution for Libya, which was being enforced by NATO operation that US joined to stop an imminent massacre of people in Benghazi. That was the stated aim. No UN approval in Iran, no NATO mission in Iran, no imminent massacre of civilians. That happened in Germany, not when we attacked. Number two, Barack Obama claimed it wasn't a war because it was a limited military operation because no American troops were at risk and no regional escalation. Well, in Iran, 13 Americans dead, hundreds of Americans injured, not just regional escalation, but global fallout, right? Americans suffering at the pump because of this war. And number three, I would say this, look, this is undoubtedly unconstitutional against Congress. Donald Trump's admitted it. He said, if I call it a war, I'll have to get approval and then he could call it a war. But I will agree. It was unconstitutional under Obama. I don't think it's unconstitutional under Trump. And I hope Michael will agree that we can both agree. They're in both cases. Neither President was upholding the Constitution. I'll add that to my list of Constitution abuses by Donald Trump tonight.

Ella Klinsky (Moderator) [00:00] Can you agree?

Michael Knowles [00:00] Well, I'm just glad that my opponent continues to issue comparisons to past presidents and to the tab between the Democrats and the Republicans. But you're right, I was going to bring up Libya because this involves not only the Constitution but the World Powers Act. One thing it doesn't involve, though. I'm a little confused. Are we debating tonight UN resolutions or are we debating the NATO charter? I thought we were debating constitutionality. And I suspect Mr. Hassan is deferring to these other organizations because there was not a great Constitution to get for what happened in Libya. The World Powers Act gives the president the ability to wage war without the approval of Congress for 60 days. And then it can be extended for additional 30 days to take it to 90. Now, the president is the commander-in-chief of the military already has a constitutional predicate to lead the military. However, what Barack Obama did in Libya did not just go for 60 or 90 days. It went for eight months. How about Joe Biden? Joe Biden waged war in Yemen against the Houthis. That went on for a year. I didn't hear peep from the people concerned about the shredding of the Constitution. But when it comes to the war in Iran, I'll put my phone on the table. I was skeptical of the war before it began. I was skeptical when it was declared. I remained skeptical of it today. Happily for me, I don't need to convince you to support the war in Iran. It's a combination of the liberal pronunciation and the conservative pronunciation. And Iran. I don't need to convince you to support the war. I don't need to convince you to like Donald Trump. I don't need to convince you. This is a good military operation. I just need to show you that what Trump is doing is well within constitutional unions. It's in fact much more restrained than anything his recent predecessors have done. I'll remind you that the past presidents, George W. accepted, we think of Ronald Reagan and Renata. We think of George H. W. Bush and Panama. But we can go back even further than that. We go to Harry Truman, who waged a war in the area that went on for three years without any formal declaration of war. So we can say that war is very bad and Trump shouldn't be in Iran. But the topic at hand is whether or not Trump is within the constitutional mainstream. And at that, he's actually quite moderate.

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] So 60 seconds, let me just quickly respond. Number one, the bigger point, let me Scott with the bigger point, which is, Michael's what about is him tonight, which is keeping point into previous presidents. As I've pointed out, the analogies didn't work. They're not the same in many of the cases he's citing. And even if they were the same, all that would prove is that previous presidents didn't uphold the constitution either. The debate tonight is Donald Trump upholding the constitution. We can all agree he isn't. Michael seems to agree, isn't. His only defense is, well, other presidents didn't uphold it either. Let's just deal with some facts. The UN Charter is not some foreign body. The UN Charter was incorporated into US law as a treaty in a Senate vote in 1945 by a vote of 89 to 2. It is the law of the land. Donald Trump violated the UN Charter and violated international law in US law by bombing Iran. He violated Congress by bombing Iran. And he violated the war powers act. By the way, Michael is completely wrong. The war power does not give you the power. You say a war without Congressional approval. It's exactly the opposite. It says, if you go to war without Congressional approval, which is wrong, you have to notify us within 48 hours. And then you have 60 days to stop, which he hasn't done. He crossed 60 days last week. So he's doubly illegal. In fact, Boona Hathaway of Yale University, Professor of International Law, says this war is triply illegal, because it's against you and Charter. It's against US Congress is right under the constitution. And it's against the war power act. That doesn't apply to Libya, by the way. So Trump is unique there. And this idea that he was following Congress when he bombed Yemen last year. When he bombed Nigeria on Christmas day, remember that? Probably not, because he bombed so many countries without Congressional approval. The idea that he's upholding the Constitution while stealing Congress's right to declare war and bombing multiple countries is absurd.

Ella Klinsky (Moderator) [00:00] I would like to stay on this forum policy, Avenue, and talk a little bit about Venezuela. So President Donald Trump characterized former Venezuelan leader Nicholas Maduro as, quote, terrorist, incited his indictment on drug-related charges as justification for the US military raiding crock in early 2026. By framing military action, Venezuela as a law enforcement action, does that expand presidential power in ways that unfairly bypass Congress or is that a necessary adaption to modern threats?

Michael Knowles [00:00] Sorry, thank you. No, it's certainly not outside the norms. It doesn't expand presidential power. Toppling dictatorships in Latin America is as American as apple pie. And I can't help but fall out a rather dishonest tactic that my opponent here is using. He keeps asking, what aboutism? Because I'm making historical comparisons and invoking presidents of both parties. I would like to point out my opponent opened the debate. He made the first statement and he began by doing just that. And I think it's good that he did that, actually, because there is no way to understand what it means to uphold the Constitution without reference to history. And in the case of Latin America, obviously, our history goes back a very long way. The Monroe Doctrine is cornerstone, perhaps the cornerstone of American foreign policy. And there was a legal predicate of the US, the Nicholas Maduro. In the case of President Trump's military actions, by the way, it's worth observing, that we never hear why he is engaging in these countries in Nigeria, of course. Why would you bomb Nigeria on Christmas Day might have to do with the genocide of Christians that is going on in Nigeria. And America's role is the global hegemon, which again, like it or not, is pretty well predicated. But returning to the specific topic at hand, Nicholas Maduro, he had been an aspect of American foreign policy for some 26 years to depose the regime in Venezuela. We had a legal reason to do it. Not only were they stealing our goods, but they were also sending criminals into our country, helping to flood our country, break our basic laws. And they were working with designated foreign terrorist organizations. So anyway, you slice it. We had the right to arrest him. A lawless president would have just blown his head off, as we've done before. But President Trump did not do that. Nicholas Maduro is enjoying due process of law in New York City. And it's probably a much nicer place than Venezuela is. So I look forward to oil prices going down and I look forward to a flourishing country. And I look forward to the recognition that President Trump's policy in Venezuela is not only out of step with American constitutional norms, it is, in fact, part of American grand strategy dating back to 1999.

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] President America is a nicer place than Venezuela. OK. Let's just deal with some issues that you raised there. Michael made it a mission he perhaps shouldn't have made there. Did you notice what he said about Maduro? He said, a lawless president. His words, am I being dishonest, is that what you said? A lawless president. Not with reference to Trump. But you said a lawless president would have just killed him. That's funny, because what are we doing in Iran on day one of that war? We killed the leader of Iran. So by Michael's definition, Donald Trump is a lawless president. He went to war in Iran without congressional approval, without a UN Security Council resolution, as we've already discussed, he went to war in Venezuela without a congressional approval or UN Security Council resolution. The idea that he did it because the guy is a drug trafficker is hilarious. I'm a defender of Maduro, let's see what the court says. But he pardoned another Latin American head of government who was an American prison for cocaine trafficking into the US. He pardoned him. So real consistency there when it comes to drug trafficking. As for Nigeria, number one, it's not a genocide of Christians. The first lady of Nigeria is a Christian. The defense minister is a Christian. Terrorist groups like ISIS in Nigeria, and Boko Haram kill Muslims and Christians alike. It's a horrific violence, but it's not a Christian genocide. No one actually believes that. And even if it was, that's not the debate. The debate is did he have the legal right to bomb Nigeria or did he have to go to Congress, which he did not? He never goes to Congress. And let's take a step back here. Let's get out of the weeds here. What is the common thread tonight? It's not about just migrants or free speech or students or wars. It is about a president who doesn't just test the limit of the law, he puts himself above the law. Donald Trump doesn't recognize congressional restrictions. He doesn't recognize Supreme Court restrictions. Michael doesn't want to talk about a 9-0 Supreme Court ruling saying, you've got to bring, you've got to facilitate the return of Kilmar-Abrego Garcia. And Trump says to an ABC reporter, I could, but I'm not going to. No president has done that before. You don't play what aboutism, and it is what aboutism. Tell me which president said after a 9-0 ruling, yeah, I'm not going to do it. There hasn't been one. It's only Donald Trump who does this when it comes to war, when it comes to migration, when it comes to Supreme Court. That is why we're saying he does not uphold the Constitution because the evidence is clear. But if Trump were here tonight, he'd probably say, yeah, you're right.

Michael Knowles [00:00] Well, my opponent got a great laugh line just now. But unfortunately, he only did so by misrepresenting the facts. When one, there's a difference between Venezuela and Iran. But furthermore, when we look at Iran, one, we were not the ones that killed the Ayatollah. That was the Israelis. And my opponent loves to complain about the Israelis. Perhaps he can do it tonight or another time. But that was the Israelis who did it. So we do have to get basic facts right here. We provided air support. Trump took the Israelis, did you know that? He's probably taken credit for it. If we could avoid the interruption, I just want to point out that your laugh line was based on a complete misunderstanding what actually happened. But I'll try to finish my point. So one, I think that gives you a good sense of where we stand on international expertise. Because also, Venezuela is a different country from Iran. Iran has been waging war against the United States for some 50 years now. They obviously killed over 200 American troops in the Bayroot barracks bombings. And we have not retaliated for that in a serious way. Iran since then has killed many American troops throughout the Middle East. There was a very strong legal predicate for taking out the Ayatollah, even if you think it's not a potential thing to do, whereas the very different intervention into Venezuela involved orders from judges, involved the commission of crimes. And now there will be a trial in New York. So the one similarity between the two, and perhaps we can agree on this, is that the intervention into Venezuela was rather restrained. We didn't actually depose the regime. We just put a gun to the head of the deputy and said, play nice or you, it's going to be you next. And I don't know that we're going to depose the regime in Iran, either. A more expansive president might do that as Republicans and Democrats have done. Trump, once again, I point out, is so restrained here, so moderate, so well within the mainstream, that we aren't even seeing regime change, in either of those places.

Ella Klinsky (Moderator) [00:00] Well, I think it was briefly mentioned the idea of emergency acts and extenuating circumstances. And I want to zoom in on that. President Donald Trump argued that his imposition of tariffs during Liberation Day was justified under the International Emergency's Economic Powers Act or the IEPA. However, this Supreme Court found the IEPA does not authorize a president to impose sweeping tariffs such as that in Liberation Day. With this in mind, how should we think about the limits of presidential authority when it comes to using emergency powers to shape major policy?

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] You would take it away. I'm going to cheat before I answer that question. I'm going to go back something Michael said a moment ago, because facts are matter. The war in Iran is a joint US Israeli operation. The idea that Israel killed Kamenai on their own is absurd. If you look at the reporting Netanyahu came to Trump's intelligence agency, came and confirmed that Kamenai was in this building, in this time, at this place, do you want to kill him? So let's just be very clear that we are responsible for that. There was no international legal justification for it. Every international law professor says it was illegal. Every international lawyer says what happened in Venezuela was illegal. We defied. There's a reason why our allies don't back us in these places. On emergency powers, a great question. We can actually talk specifics. You mentioned the Supreme Court. You'll notice, correct me if I'm wrong. I don't think, and this is good faith I swear. I don't think Michael has said the word Supreme Court tonight. Maybe I missed it. But let's talk specifics. I mentioned the 9-0 ruling by the Supreme Court and Kilmarburg Augusta, yet. Trump just said f-off. The tariffs case. In February, we all knew tariffs, the taxes. Everyone knew that. The Trump administration tried to lie to us and say, they're not taxes. The Trump administration wants to phrase, piss on your leg and tell you it's raining, right? It's not a tax. It is a tax. Every economist agrees it's tax. Every lawyer agrees it's a tax. So the Supreme Court step in and say, well, the taxing and spending clause says only Congress gets to lay and impose taxes, excises, impose, and duties. And they strike down 6-3, 6-3, not even close. In February, the IEPA used by Donald Trump and say, you need to refund the tariffs. By the way, the refunds begin next week and 75,000 businesses have asked for refunds, which is weird because I was told China's paying the tariffs. But anyways, on the specific legal part of this, this is really interesting because Donald Trump used the IEPA, which is an act from the 1970s and 1977, which you can use in an economic emergency. Trump claimed the emergency was fentanyl and migration and trade deficits. He claimed there was a national emergency because we have a trade deficit. OK. And then, here's the best part. He uses the act to go after his enemies, like he always does. Like he goes after his political enemies, he goes after his international enemies. He uses the act completely illegally, as the Supreme Court's point of view, to basically settle scores. And we know this. How do we know this? Because Trump said so. When the Swiss president called him up to negotiate a reduced tariff, he raised the tariff and said, I did it, because she rubbed me up the wrong way. She was annoying. She was aggressive. So he raised the taxes. The Brazilians prosecuting the Air Bolsonaro. Good for them, I wish we had done it to Trump. Trump got mad and raised tariff's on American consumers to punish Brazil. That's what the founders envisaged. That's what the founders thought they were doing when we were getting away from mad King George, from my old country. Was that what they thought they were doing? Giving the president the right to tax Americans, because he gets pissed off by a European leader or a South American government. Of course, it's an abuse of power. Of course, it's completely unconstitutional. Of course, it goes against the vision of the founders. That is very, very clear.

Michael Knowles [00:00] I'm reminded of a meme that I see sometimes in Catholic circles. There's a meme of a guy goes into the confessional box. He says, father, I like to hop on one leg while eating a piece of pizza and honking my nose. And the priest says, my son, that is very weird, but it is not a sin. And that's the example that Medi seems to be giving here. He says, I really hate what Trump did on these tariffs. And one of the mechanisms by which Trump implemented the tariffs, the Supreme Court rejected and the administration being very well within the constitutional mainstream, accepted that and then attempted to use other statutes to implement some other tariffs. But nevertheless, they accepted the Supreme Court's rulings as they generally do. And so you might say I hate tariffs. You might say I don't like the way President Trump conducts diplomacy. I'm speaking to a group of Ivy League students. Obviously, probably many of you think that. But there is nowhere that I see that to be unconstitutional. I mean, for goodness' sake, the Republican party was founded on tariffs. A brand link and famously said, give me a tariff and I'll give you the best country in the world. The Republican party was pro-tariff through the early 20th century. It flipped a little bit in the mid to late 20th century. And now we seem to like tariffs again. Presidents of both parties, levy tariffs, through a variety of mechanisms. You can say it's bad economic policy, but there's certainly nothing unconstitutional about it. To Medi's point that the companies are eating the cost of the tariffs, in many cases, that is true. I know this because I own a company called Maple Hours Cigars, which makes great cigars. And I highly recommend them. But we did eat the cost of a lot of, thank you very much. We did eat the cost of a lot of the tariffs. That's true. And I do wonder, as a political tactic, the refunds for those tariffs that are forthcoming might actually help juice the economy before the midterm. So in a way, it's probably a good political tactic. But I've yet to see some argument that the tariffs would have been unconstitutional. You know, the point that we've observed here is that the Supreme Court struck them down under the basis of a national emergency, and the Trump White House complies. So what are we even arguing here?

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] So, Michael, since you were the one who introduced the word a dishonest tactic, let me say it back to you. I think you're engaged in dishonest tactic tonight by avoiding the substance of argument every time. It's not whether there's a genocide in Nigeria. The issue is, did Donald Trump have the Constitution about the bomb in Nigeria? No. It's not whether tariffs are good or bad. That's irrelevant to this debate. Of course, tariffs are totally fine. If Congress imposed them, not Donald Trump, because he didn't like the female leader of Switzerland, as she spoke to him on the phone. That is the key question that we're debating today. At every instance, every question that Ellis asked, every topic we've covered, I've pointed out that what he's doing is going against the Constitution, going against the Supreme Court, going against Trump appointed judges, going against precedents that you like to cite, and you're dodging it. And you're saying things about, well, tariffs are part of our history. Okay, great. This is not about tariffs. It's about what Donald Trump did with tariffs. He took a power from the Constitution, the taxing and spending calls. Article 1, section 8, only Congress shall have the power to lay or collect taxes, duties, imposed exercises, and he irrigated it to himself. Because he believes there are no checks on his power. He's on the record. He said, in 2019, I have an Article 2 power to do whatever I want as president. That is not what Article 2 says. He does not have the power to do whatever he wants. The founding fathers did not create America so that they could have another monarch, another king, another dictator, but no one seems to have given that memo to Donald Trump. And when he lost at the Supreme Court, Michael said he accepted the decision. Again, dishonest. He actually said that the judges were fools and lap dogs. He said, Amy Coney Barrett and Dale Gorsuch embarrassed themselves in front of their families. And he also said that the Supreme Court just is our weak, stupid, and bad. Again, point to me, a president who said stuff like that in the modern era.

Ella Klinsky (Moderator) [00:00] All right. Well, this is unfortunately our last moderated question before we go to audience, UNA. And I would like to bring it back closer to home. You've both experienced elite higher education, except I would argue your father at Dartmouth experienced the best higher education. Of course. And I'm sure you have seen the recent changes in dynamics between US universities and the federal government. As debates over free speech and ideological diversity intensify on campuses, what role, if any, should the federal government play in ensuring viewpoint diversity? And what would that role look like within constitutional limits? I believe you've started last time, so we'll go for it.

Michael Knowles [00:00] Yes. I actually don't love viewpoint diversity. I don't really care for it at all. I know that puts me outside the right-wing mainstream. But I'm perfectly fine with institutions having beliefs and standards and norms and I think societies ought to have that. Even the notion of protective viewpoint diversity is relatively recent. Comes from the mid-'90s in our jurisprudence. But regardless, I'm all for reforming the universities, which are failing in their chief missions. So I suppose the question is, is President Trump suppressing the First Amendment? And I know that my opponent here on stage made a bold prediction, a promise, really, in March of 2024. He said that if President Trump were to be elected again, the stakes for the media were very, very high. What would happen to the free press under President Trump? He's already threatening to do it. Last I checked, unfortunately, the New York Times and the CNN still get to publish. MSNBC has gone downhill, but that's mostly because NBC didn't want to deal with them anymore. There's been really no threat to free speech whatsoever under President Trump. His critics are allowed to threaten to kill him. I mean, in the case of Hassan Piker, one of the chief critics of President Trump and one of the people who's instigated violence was exalted by the New York Times just last week after three assassination attempts. So I wish that, frankly, there were more limits on speech under Trump, but there certainly is not. And then when you look at constitutional precedent, we of course have to remember that our second president of the United States, John Adams, passed the Alien and Sedition Acts, much of which remains on the books today. Under Woodrow Wilson, Democrat president, he imprisoned his political rival, Eugene Debs, leader of the Socialist Party, but that act has been used to prosecute people for speech. For many, many years, including the socialist journalist, the head of the Jehovah's Witnesses, the leaker of the Pentagon papers, and Bradley Manning, even under Barack Obama. So we've seen a lot of curtailment of speech. I think a lot of that is within the confines of the First Amendment, and I wish the president Trump would tighten it up a little bit, especially when it comes to those left-wing universities that receive federal dollars and certainly don't need to. That is an amazing answer, Michael.

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] Both to deny that there's an assault on the free press, and to say you wish there was a bit more of an assault on the free press. Let's just be very clear. Let's just be very clear about where the facts are on this. Michael thinks everything's fine. Donald Trump has arrested Don Lemon. He's raided the home of a Washington Post reporter. He has blocked the AP from the Oval Office. He tried to defund NPR and PBS. The judge shot it down. He's tried to ban flag-burging, burning which goes against Supreme Court case Texas versus Johnson from 1989. He's tried to get a late night comedian fired because he didn't like his jokes. He has just go down the list when it comes to the free press. He tried to restrict reporters reporting in the Pentagon. A judge shot that down too, saying you're not supposed to prescribe the press. He has threatened the New York Times just the other day. He said they should be guilty of sedition because they reported on his Iran war in a way he did not like. He has engaged in multiple lawsuits to try to intimidate and suppress the press. His defense secretary bragged loudly that CNN will be coming under new Trump, Odish pro-Trump ownership. Just go down the list, students. We talk about universities. We've seen students arrested for their speech, not for violence, for their speech. A Reagan appointed judge said the arrest of students like Manuel Calil and Ramesh Asterk was a full-throated assault on the First Amendment. A Reagan appointed judge William Young said that. Not some liberal Marxist. And as for threatening people's speech, just the other day, just a few months ago, Donald Trump threatened six members of Congress with death for their speech. He said, seditious behavior, punishable by death. What did they do? They did a video saying, hey, military, don't follow illegal orders. He said, you should be killed for that. This is the most anti-free speech, anti-free press, anti-view point diversity administration in American history. It's led by a complete snowflake who can't tolerate any criticism from anyone. Can't tolerate jokes from late-night comedians. Think about the countries where comedians are taken off the airways because the leader didn't like their jokes. Are those constitutional democracies? Are those constitutional republics? Are those democracies that we think the Americans have? Think about that when you vote tonight. Think about the kind of place where the president threatens students, threatens media organizations, threatens comedians, and threatens members of the other party while arresting journalists. The whole thing is absurd to suggest he's not an anti-first amendment president. He's actually at the core of my argument for why he's not upholding the Constitution because he's not upholding the First Amendment.

Michael Knowles [00:00] I think it's very telling that my opponent object to the arrest of Don Lemon, which was not in fact for free speech, but was because Don Lemon violated federal law and bragged about it on camera, excuse me. And violated federal law and bragged about it on camera. He's not true. But if you'll allow me to finish, I'm trying to engage in my free speech and there seems to be a heckler's video.

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] My free speech, too.

Michael Knowles [00:00] So what Don Lemon actually did was he violated a federal law, the Face Act. He walked in with an unruly mob to disrupt a religious proceeding. This terrorized children, he did all sorts of terrible things. Targeted Christians. No surprise that that would be given a pass from the man who denied the genocide of Christians and Nigeria tonight. Noticing a touch of a trend, but to bring us back to the point. The defunding of PBS is somehow a violation of the First Amendment. I thought that the president and the Congress had the right to take care to make sure that the laws are affected and executed. And also, Congress has the power of the purse. I didn't know PBS and Big Bird were in the First Amendment to the Constitution. That would be noose to James Madison. When it comes to the curtailment of reporters, no one has been more transparent than President Trump. He answers the phone when CNN journalists call him. I would never do any such thing, but the president does that. He has open gaggles, very contrary to his immediate predecessor, Joe Biden. And so yet again, President Trump has exalted the First Amendment. In fact, he is embraced a free speech, absolutist position, even when it comes to flag burning. I'll just finish up on this point. Medi Hassan points out that the flag burning was ruled a constitutionally protected right in 1989. Curious that it was in 1889 or 1789. It's a live question debated in American jurisprudence. President Trump has issued an executive order to bring that challenge back to the court as he should. And we'll all be debating it along the way because President Trump loves free speech.

Ella Klinsky (Moderator) [00:00] All right, well, we're going to pivot to audience Q&A. We'll have two microunters, one on either aisle. I will call on three people to go to each microunner. So thick and total. I'll start, I'll do you, blue shirt, another blue shirt, there's a lot of blue shirts, a white shirt, blue shirt, red shirt, and then green shirt. So three over there and three over there, perfect. If we have more time, we will take more student questions. Great.

Questioner 2 [00:00] Me too.

Questioner 1 [00:00] Yeah, so thank you guys so much for coming today. A lot of the conversation circulated particularly around Trump's second term activities. I was just curious to the question of not whether Trump upheld the constitution in with regards to January 6th, but did he uphold constitutional norms?

Michael Knowles [00:00] Great question. Is that for any one of us in particular?

Questioner 1 [00:00] Particularly you, Michael, but either of you could go ahead.

Michael Knowles [00:00] I'm sure I'm off to Michael.

Ella Klinsky (Moderator) [00:00] Sure.

Michael Knowles [00:00] You do two minutes and two minutes. Yeah, sure thing. Yes, he did. Again, I'm not convincing anyone that they should love the Horn Hat guy. That's not the basis on which you're voting this evening. But there is a great precedent for contested elections in the United States. In fact, that's what the 12th Amendment is about. We've had a number of contested elections. Obviously, 1860, the election of Lincoln, the Rutherford B. Hayes, which resulted in the compromise of 1876. Bush v. Gore, Al Gore refused to concede for months after that, and there were some riotous events. So what occurred at the Capitol on January 6 was very unfortunate, though it's been much lied about. It's worth pointing out that the only person who was killed in political violence that day was a Trump supporter who was killed by a trigger-happy cop. There's also a special irony to Democrats complaining about January 6 as the worst day in the history of this or any republic. Because not only was it not the worst political violence in American history, it wasn't the worst political violence of that year. It followed the little prosecuted BLM riots that very same year, where Kamala Harris and staffers for Joe Biden actually bailed the rioters out of jail. But there's a greater irony, which is that there have been five or six, depending on how you score it, attacks on the Capitol in American history. Virtually all of them have been perpetrated by radical leftists, a Marxist Harvard professor, Harvard men, of course. But then, in 1971, was perpetrated by Bill Ayers of the Weather Underground, Bill Ayers in whose living room Barack Obama launched his political career. So it's very unfortunate that that took place on January 6. It's unfortunate that there were questions about the 2020 election. Questions which arose because the election rules were radically changed in the weeks and months before the election. In some cases, unconstitutionally, as in the case of mail-in ballots in Pennsylvania. It's also a bit strange that Nancy Pelosi took responsibility for not having sufficient security in the Capitol that day. She did that on camera. It was actually a film that her daughter made. You can easily go look it up. And it's very strange that some of the Capitol police gave the leaders of the insurrection private tours of the Capitol, notably the aforementioned Horne Hat Guy. But regardless, it's a great pity that it took place. I hope it doesn't take place again. And unfortunately, it's also not totally out of the norm for the United States going back at least to the middle of the 19th century.

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] So glad you asked that question because January 6th hadn't come up, and it was a big issue from Trump's end of his first term. Mike Pence, we talked about Mike Pence, who might cause a fight. Why does Mike Pence keep coming up? Because you're a fan of his, and he was the vice president who didn't endorse the president for another term, because he said he made me do unconstitutional stuff. He wanted me to violate my constitutional oath. That's from Mike Pence's testimony. You want to dismiss it because you know there's come back for it. You cite Al Gore. Al Gore never incited an insurrection. There is no precedent for January 6th. There was, we were used to peaceful transfers of power, Richard Nixon agreed, even though he's probably robbed by JFK. Al Gore agreed, even though he's probably robbed by George W. Bush. Donald Trump actually lost, for sure. And he still didn't accept it and incited a riot. Michael says, oh, Democrats thought was the way to stay in history. Do you know who said, bar none? It was the most horrifying day in American politics in my lifetime. Mike Pence. No, I don't know. You guess again, so I guess again. It was Ben Shapiro on January the 7th. He said it was the most horrifying day that I witnessed in American politics, in my noted Democrat, when Shapiro said that, on January the 7th. So let's just deal with some facts here. The people who attacked the Capitol were not going on private tours. They were not just a horn hat guy. There's people like Daniel Rodriguez, who assaulted Michael Phanone, put him in a stroke, got 12 years in prison. The judge said he was an army of hate and violence. Donald Trump pardoned him. It was people like Andrew Paul Johnson, who was just sentenced to life in prison for sexually abusing two children in Florida. Donald Trump pardoned him for January the 6th. He pardoned a neo-Nazi called Bradley Tyler Dykes, who did a seek high solute, as he attacked police officers. These are the people that Trump pardoned. Michael has never condemned Trump for that. Harry Sisson asked Michael on his show earlier this year. Would you condemn Donald Trump for doing that? And he wouldn't ask the question, I'll never condemn Donald Trump. Do you condemn Donald Trump for pardoning neo-Nazi's domestic abuses, pedophiles?

Michael Knowles [00:00] Well, hold on, was he, was he condemned Trump for pardoning? I'm just asking a clarifying question about that guy. Was he one of the neo-Nazi's who was getting three million bucks from the SPLC, or was he a different neo-Nazi?

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] Nice, nice diversion. Do you, I'm not Harry Sisson, I'll use up my time. Do you condemn Donald Trump for pardoning neo-Nazi's violent criminals? People who assaulted 140 police officers on January the 6th. One last real clerk. He went up, one last real clerk. I'll ask again. Do you, no, it's a simple question. Do you support pardoning the 600 people who were charged with assaulting police officers? He pardoned them for like Daniel and Nani's. We're going to be. He pardoned them for assaulting police.

noise [00:00] Oh, do you support that? All right.

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] Do you support that?

noise [00:00] All right. Three times, yes. And I say to the two-liners, two-liners, one-liners.

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] Do you condemn Donald Trump for pardoning? I have 600 people who assaulted police officers. Fourth time, can you do it? I'm happy to, I condemn pedophilia. Do you condemn Donald Trump for pardoning? And I condemn him.

Ella Klinsky (Moderator) [00:00] Right, if he won't do it, he will not do it. Excuse me, we have a debate format. We're going to stick to the debate format. We're not going to have a...

Michael Knowles [00:00] I mean, by many, he doesn't want to stick to the debate format. We're going to stick to the debate format. We're going to stick to the debate format. We're going to stick to the debate format. I'm happy to answer on the substance.

Ella Klinsky (Moderator) [00:00] If you would like to, you help one minute to respond to every question.

Michael Knowles [00:00] Yeah. So obviously, Mettys being very, very dishonest. President Trump didn't pardon anybody for pedophilia or not. Just for a certain amount of insults. If you'll allow me to finish. So what he pardoned them for is because there was a massive prosecution of thousands of people on January 6th that was politically motivated, that was disproportionate, because the federal government had let all of the leftist rioters who, unlike the January 6th, there's killed dozens of people and resulted in over a billion dollars worth of property damage, let them off the hook and, in fact, raised money to bail them out of jail. And so, because of the unjust prosecutions where you had Midwestern grannies who were not pedophiles or Nazis, but who were eccentrically... What about... Excuse me. Who walked around the Capitol, despite all of the lies suggesting that police officers were killed, that was not true, the coroner's proved that. So he recognized that there was disproportionate prosecution. The same goes for the pro-life grannies who were arrested by Joe Biden, who were imprisoned for praying at abortion clinics. President Trump pardoned them. Now, on the pardon power, there are lots of bad pardons that go on. Joe Biden took it to an egregious degree. But the pardon power is absolute. And if we're here to defend the Constitution, we would have to defend the plain words of article two, which, say, the president has the pardon power.

Ella Klinsky (Moderator) [00:00] OK. Thank you both. I appreciate the sentiments. We're going to keep interruptions to a minimum. Excuse me.

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] Why, yes. To be fair, it wasn't an option. I gave up my time to ask a question. He didn't answer it six times.

Questioner 3 [00:00] OK. First off, many big fan. Big fan. I love your work. To Michael, I would like to say, so there is a new, I think, with your assault on free speech and how we should, in your words, tighten. There is a new act proposed by Congress, the Mamdani Act. Are you familiar with that? I'm not, but I like to... So it is the measures against Marxism's defenders and noxious Islamist act. And it essentially extends the power of the federal government, especially by Trump, to deny citizenship, to deny entry, and to essentially deport, to go to these ice, horrible camps, any person who is a radical Islamist or a communist or any other sort of leftist, gives very broad powers. Do you support that? And is that constitutional at all?

Michael Knowles [00:00] Well, I love the acronym. And I take it from your description of the act when you mention that this would be a way to deport people, to deny them visas, to deny the entry to schools. That the people we're talking about here are not American citizens. So it's really crucial to recognize here a point that has been glossed over, which is that when Medi-Assad says that the Trump administration is arresting students for stating their opinions, even if they're radical left-wing opinions, he's not arresting American citizens, what the Secretary of State came out and said, is that they are going to revoke or deny visas to people who have views that are contrary to the American national interest, which is not only entirely constitutional, that is just plain common sense. You don't want to bring in foreigners who have no right to be in your country, who actively undermine your society. I mean, that's the most basic charge of immigration. So, and then to your point, you say, we're going to even deport some people, well, to deport those people, implies that they have no right to be here, that is, they're not American citizens. And in that case, yes, I favor deportations quite broadly. And the fact that it has a beautiful acronym is a cherry on top. I am calling, with very little knowledge beyond what you've just suggested about the act, I am calling on Congress today to pass it, to find out, pass it twice.

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] Thank you, Congressman. So, yeah, it's interesting that Michael again says, many of us aren't, thanks. Foreign students are having their rights deprived. No, William Young, a veteran Reagan judge, said it was a full-throated assault on the First Amendment. He said, I'm going to answer the constitutional question posed here, which is, do legal immigrants have the same constitutional rights to free speech? As citizens, yes, they do, he said, he's a his words. Yes, they do. There is no invidious distinction that Trump makes. His words, jurisprudence, history does not back that. In fact, go back to 1945, Bridges versus Wix, in famous Supreme Court case where they said immigrants here in the country have the same First Amendment rights as everyone else. And these are not students who are, you know, trying to undermine America. Remesa Osturg is a student from Turkey who wrote an op-ed in a newspaper saying, I think my university should divest from Israel. That's what she wrote. She said, nothing about the United States of America. She said, nothing violent. Masked men grabbed her off the street. Have you seen the video? It's one of the creepiest things you will ever see. A bunch of masked men with no ideas grabbed this young woman off the street, and named President. And Michael says, it's totally constitutional. Actually, the law that Rubio is citing is 1952 law of school amendment. Do you know who said it was unconstitutional? A woman called Judge Marion Trump Barry. Donald Trump's late sister is the only judge to ever adjudicate on this. And she said, I think it's unconstitutional. Never reached the Supreme Court, but it's the only time an American judge has looked at it. And they think what Marco Rubio is doing, Trump's late sister thinks it's unconstitutional. A Reagan judge thinks it's on assault on the First Amendment. So let's not stop pretending. This is about the left and about Muslims and about socialists. No, it's not. I've already pointed out. Mike Pence disagree with you. Ben Shapiro disagrees with you. Reagan judges disagree with you. Trump judges disagree with you. The Supreme Court disagrees with you. And I hope the audience tonight disagrees with you.

noise [00:00] Okay, trust me.

Michael Knowles [00:00] Yeah, maybe Mike Pence should have come here tonight. I don't know. Why am I just to clarify? Like, I like Mike Pence as much as the next guy. But I'm not like, he's not my bosom buddy. I don't know. We don't sit up text. I don't know why. It was only the vice president for four years. Yeah, it is. It's a medi keeps bringing up. But anyway, I guess the question I would ask for Medi, and just as you offered me some of your time, I'll ask you this. Do you think that foreign students who would apply for a student visa to the United States, do you think that they have some right to that visa? No, I don't think they have the right to the visa.

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] But I agree with you. That's the question. That's not the question. No, it's reclaiming my time. No, it's not. We're not in Congress. I'm answering the question. No, you're not a right to have a visa, but it is right to have free speech once you're in the country under the First Amendment. Perjustice Murphy's ruling in Bridges versus Wix in 1945. Once you're in the country, you're on the same rights.

Michael Knowles [00:00] You're taking it by one time because you're a filibuster. We're not talking about that. As you did, we're not talking about that. Do you support Donald Trump's pardon of violence, offended, risked, seven times?

Ella Klinsky (Moderator) [00:00] We will risk at your time. Yeah, good. You can start from the beginning.

Michael Knowles [00:00] I appreciate that. This is why, you know, just to loop back a little bit, this is why it's so funny that Medi Hassan takes issue with the arrest of Don Lemon. Because Don Lemon was arrested claiming First Amendment rights, but you don't have a First Amendment right when you were actively violating First Amendment rights, which is something that Medi is clearly very familiar with. And Medi is just admitted to the point. And he keeps dishonestly trying to conflate legal immigrants in the United States with students who are here on visas from some foreign country. And but he's already granted the premise. And he's granted the point, which is that the students do not have a right. Yes, they do. Constitutional right. What's in my mouth? Yes, they do. I'm not putting words in your mouth. I'm telling the truth to the students. A foreign student who would like to study in the United States at Dartmouth or elsewhere has no right to do so. No natural right, no constitutional right, no legal right to that visa. That visa is a privilege granted to the United States. Medi and others might want to blow up in our borders until they're permitted to come here. You already granted the point, Medi, that a foreign student who wishes to come here does not have a right to that.

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] But one thing, they have a first Amendment rights, which you keep ignoring, because the Supreme Court is against you, Michael, as it has been all night.

Ella Klinsky (Moderator) [00:00] All right, thank you for your time, and thank you. And the interesting time is we're going to move on to the next question.

Questioner 4 [00:00] Hello. Well, I have one main question, but I think that it lends to a lot of what this argument has been about. And I think a lot of where the argument has gone, instead of maybe where it should have been. I've been really interested, and I'm curious to know, because Medi, as you pointed out, there are some moments where the argument has moved, as opposed to does the president have the right? Is it constitutional that the president say, take Nigeria, for example, did he have the right to strike Nigeria? Instead, the question has become, is there a genocide in Nigeria? Should the president have stricken Nigeria? I'm curious to know whether or not it is constitutional. If there is a matter, say, in Nigeria or elsewhere, where the president might personally view there to be some kind of situation, do you believe that the president does have the right, or in some cases should, in your personal opinion, violate the constitution? Do you believe that there are moments where the president has that right or should? And following that, what is the point of the constitution? If you believe that the president should or has the right to violate it?

Michael Knowles [00:00] Was that question for me or Medi? In for you, but I would also say. Yeah, sure. Well, I suppose I just disagree with the premise, the suggestion that the president taking a military action around the world violates the constitution. It does not. In the case of an intervention in Nigeria, one could make an argument that it pertains to American interests, because we're the global empire, and we have interests around the world. But one could also just make that it's a humanitarian intervention. And indeed, that was much of the argument that presidents have made for many decades now. Barack Obama made it, Bill Clinton made it. And furthermore, the Monroe doctrine, which we were discussing earlier in the case of Venezuela, which has been the cornerstone of American foreign policy since early 19th century, does not have a literal direct constitutional predicate. And yet, no serious person would suggest that it's somehow contrary to the constitution. So I think it would be contrary to the constitution. If the president went toppled the regime in Nigeria and made it the 51st state, which I don't think any of us want to do, or if the military action went on for more than 60 or 90 days without authorization from Congress, as we saw in the cases of Barack Obama and Joe Biden. But a relatively minor military action for national interest, or even for humanitarian reasons, is well within the constitutional mainstream. There is nothing prohibiting the president from doing that. And indeed, he has the right to do that as the commander-in-chief of the military. I guess one issue, one topic that we haven't really gotten to, but it does sit at the foundation of a lot of the debate tonight, is what the executive really is. And so this gets back to Article 2, Section 1, which, in the very first line, explains what the executive is. And our framers said that the executive power shall be vested in a president of the United States of America. The courts have ruled on this many times. There are all sorts of interesting discussions about inspectors general and all other branches of government trying to involve themselves in the executive branch. But time and time and time again, we recognize that the executive has broad authority. And in our day and age, a lot of people are worried about and overreach from the executive. But I don't think that's really serious. First of all, Congress gave away a lot of its authority by establishing the agencies in the executive 100 years ago. But furthermore, if any branch is going to be overstepping, it's probably going to be the judiciary. So he has a constitutional predicate to do it. Again, we can disagree over the prudence of a strike on Nigeria. But that's not the topic on which you're voting tonight. The question is very basic. Is Trump within the constitutional mainstream? And the answer is yes.

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] That's not the question of if he's within the mainstream. Is he upholding the constitution? Yes or no? And he's clearly not. What's interesting is Michael again made a weird concession there. He said he hasn't gone over 60 days in the case of Nigeria, but he hasn't Iran. He hasn't. He hasn't Iran. He crossed it last Friday. But I know my spark. I know I struggle with British English. You can maybe struggle with math. 60 days was last Friday. He crossed it. Donald Trump wrote a letter saying hostilities are terminated. And then on Monday, there was an exchange of fire between America and Iran, which is a reminder of what a liar and a fool he is. So no, he crossed 60 days. It's an illegal war. It was already illegal war. And now it's a double illegal war under the War Powers Act. And I'm glad you raised the issue of executive power. I'm glad you raised the question of what is the constitution for. I'm not a blind fan of everything in the constitution. No one is. And we shouldn't be. There's amendments for a reason. Michael, you want to change the flag burning thing, right? You want an amendment to change it. We don't need an amendment to change it. But you want to get rid of names.

Michael Knowles [00:00] I wouldn't mind if there were a clarification.

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] And many of us on the left would like some reinterpretation of second amendment. Some kind of, I think that's fair to say. But the point is, you do it the right way. I'm not saying that Joe, I'm not a second amendment. Doesn't mean Joe Biden can come in just straight down the second amendment. By the way, Donald Trump came in and said, you can't have guns. He said, after Alex Freddie was killed, can you imagine what Michael would have said if Joe Biden had said you can't have guns? By the way, notice that Republicans are always fine with executive power when it's a Republican in the White House. When it's a Democrat in the White House, they're screaming from the hilltops about overreach. Ted Cruz called Barack Obama a tyrant. Mike Cuckabee called him a dictator. Donald Trump said Biden was leading a Gestapo administration. They said Obama did too many executive orders. Biden governed by executive order. Well, Donald Trump has done 100 more executive orders in 18 months than Joe Biden did in four years. He's done almost as many executive orders in 18 months as Obama did in eight years. So this nonsensical position that we find with executive power, no, you're not. You'll find with a Republican dictator. You just don't want Democrats to have any power. And I think you should be honest about that. People will have more respect for your views on the conclusion if you were consistent and not just a part of that.

Michael Knowles [00:00] Well, it's interesting that Medi brings up President Trump's executive orders because I seem to recall a journalist by the name of Medi Hassan, who in early 2021 was begging on television for Joe Biden to issue many, many more executive orders. Yeah. And I believe this Mr. Hassan was asking him to follow the legacy of Franklin Roosevelt who issued thousands of executive orders which were so relentlessly strugged out. And your side was attacking Biden for that.

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] That's my point.

Michael Knowles [00:00] That you wanted more from him.

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] But Trump has exceeded Biden at Obama. And you were the guy that said more. You were saying, what do you say judges overstep? But do you want more executive orders? In 2022, when a Florida judge shot down the Moss mandate, that COVID must have been replayed by Trump. Michael Knolls tweeted, since we're quoting each other, Michael Knolls tweeted in 2022, the hero judge struck down by these last mandate. When you were a Republican judge who strikes down a Democrat's policy, you're a hero. When you're a Republican judge who strikes down a Republican president, many have, I've named them all tonight. Oh, then it's judicial overreach. See the double standard?

Michael Knowles [00:00] Yeah. Once again, Michael's time defending the first amendment yet again. So anyway, to the point I was saying. Medi was very, very upset that Joe Biden wasn't issuing more executive orders. And he said he has to follow FDR who issued thousands, which were so relentlessly struck down by the Supreme Court as unconstitutional, that FDR promised to totally reconstitute the court for the first time in 70 years. And only because the judge backed down was that averted. Nevertheless, you make a good point. Yes, Republicans and Democrats are different. Their policies are different. Some are good. Some are bad. I want more of the good ones and fewer of the bad ones. But on the issue of executive authority here, there's really no question. You said I'd like to amend the Constitution. I don't think we really need to. And on this point, on the unitary executive, on the fact that the executive power is vested in the president of the United States, that is clear as day from the Constitution, from now 250 years of jurisprudence, almost 250 years of jurisprudence. And then all the way up to even the post-watergate reforms, Inspector General Act, which acknowledges that very fact and to Supreme Court cases since then. So the executive does have a lot of authority. I don't like it when Democrats win it and affect it, which is why I think we need to win elections.

Ella Klinsky (Moderator) [00:00] Thank you for those thoughts. Ready for the next question.

Questioner 5 [00:00] Hi, Michael Ametti. First of all, I want to say thank you so much for coming up here to hand over to debate. This question's directed at you, Michael. I wanted to say that as a Republican, I am naturally inclined to agree with you that Donald Trump has acted within constitutional norms, but for his behavior leading up to, but not including January 6th. And I wanted to ask you, how do you reconcile his behavior, particularly with regards to trying to influence Brad Raffensberger and a security elector's from Georgia, with the constitutional separation of powers between the state and federal government, especially with the right of states to conduct their own elections?

Michael Knowles [00:00] Yeah, a really good question, because again, happily my, I hope, impending victory in the debate does not rest on what you think of any of these individual actions. It's really just a question of his Trump upholding the Constitution and what that even means, which is, of course, how the Constitution is obtained throughout history. And so there was a lot of predicate for this for contested elections. I guess the first question you have to ask is, was there reason to be a little skeptical of the presidential election in 2020? And I think the fact that they changed all the voter rules and took away a lot of the safeguards, and in some cases violated a state constitution as we saw in Pennsylvania, and then delayed the counts. And I think there was at least a reasonable person might have some questions about the election. Was this the first time in American history that there were lawsuits over presidential elections? Certainly not. Was this the first time in presidential history that there was a question over who the legitimate electors would be, certainly not. Indeed, our Constitution preempts that, and recognizes that there will be questions. That's the whole point of the 12th Amendment. So again, President Trump's rhetoric was much more moderate, actually, than he's given credit for, even on the day of January 6th himself. Part of the reason that the Democrats kept failing in all of these cases, one, he was obviously exonerated at his impeachment trial over this. But then, too, they couldn't kick him off of the ballot when they tried to undermine democracy on this insurrection point. That too was thrown out because he didn't do it. And his words were very clear, which he said, you should peaceably assemble. This was well within the Brandenburg standard on speech and violence. And so his actions could be imprudent. His actions, you could say were reckless. You could say his actions did not have a reasonable probability of success. You could say all of those things, and all of those criticisms are perfectly fine to make. The one thing you can't say is that it's out of the norm for constitutional behavior in the United States.

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] Can you imagine going back to January 6th 2021 and hearing Michael say that? No one in America believed that. The Republican body didn't believe that. Kevin McCarthy didn't believe that. He said it was an insurrection. What did Mike Pence? Mitch McCart, Mike Pence. Let's go to Mike Pence. He said, President Trump demanded that I put the Constitution above Donald Trump. He became the first modern vice president, not to endorse the president, because that's what he thought of as a threat to the Constitution. Ask yourself, who knows Trump better? Michael Knowles, or the people who served with him much of his first cabinet who refused to endorse him a second time. His chief of staff, his defense secretary fired a lot. His vice president. He also appointed them and said they're amazing when he appointed them. So let's talk about January 6th and the run up to January 6th. There was a fake electric scheme. Multiple people indicted. Trump's own lawyer was convicted for that. Michael says, well, people in, you know, it was thrown out of court. Let's be clear. Donald Trump never saw the inside of a courtroom for his crimes on January 6th, because Joe Biden and Merritt Garland were not like Donald Trump and Pam Bondy and didn't go after their political opponents. They were super slow. They dragged their feet. They appointed Jackson Smith, 667 days after they came to office. Compare that to Donald Trump who's gone after John Brennan and Jim Comey and all the rest. Tish James all thrown out by judges saying this is ridiculous. This is the difference. But Democrats weaponizing government. Some of us say we wish Trump got away with it because he never saw the inside of a courtroom. Jackson Smith had to end all that because Trump got reelected and DOJ guidelines that you can't indict a sitting president. So we don't know, but we saw the evidence. We know that Trump was lying. Trump knew he was lying. If you and I called Brad Ratham's burger and said find us 11,000 votes would be in prison. Let's just be very clear about that. The only reason he's not is because he's Donald Trump. He committed multiple crimes in the run up to January 6th. He told his DOJ, he wrote a note to his DOJ. Just say it's corrupt, say it's stolen and me and the Republicans in Congress will deal with it. That's on the record, right? People around him say we told him it wasn't stolen. He knew it wasn't stolen. Kellyanne Conway has said that. And yet he still did this. He's still incited a riot at the Capitol and 140 police officers were injured and Michael will not say tonight whether it was wrong of Donald Trump to pardon 600 people who were charged with a sentence. He talked about grannies.

Michael Knowles [00:00] He's not wrong. I totally support the party.

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] You support pardoning a new assaulted police officers like Daniel Rodriguez.

Michael Knowles [00:00] I support the parties for January 6th.

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] Do you support pardoning Daniel Rodriguez?

Michael Knowles [00:00] I oppose pedophilia. I oppose beating your wife.

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] What about Daniel Rodriguez? Do you support pardoning Daniel Rodriguez who assaulted a police officer for 12 years for January 6th? Why do you support pardoning Daniel Rodriguez?

Michael Knowles [00:00] Well, as I explained it, my brother. You talked about grannies. I'm talking about a man who is sentenced.

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] Actually, we have a lot of time. I like coming to rescue you. Eight times, I tried.

Michael Knowles [00:00] And I answered. You didn't do many times. Why do you support pardoning Daniel Rodriguez? I don't know if Medi will allow me to have my minute. So Medi just said something and then get again the Q&A. And that was before. Well, it was a lot of fun.

Ella Klinsky (Moderator) [00:00] Well, there too can go to you first.

Michael Knowles [00:00] Yes, they have too many questions for me as the problem. So the even Medi just said something yet again that is not true. Medi just said that President Trump never saw the inside of a courtroom for his actions on January 6th. Medi must be suffering from a little bit of amnesia because last time I checked, President Trump was indeed tried for his supposed crime on January 6th. He was tried, and precisely the way a President of the United States has tried, he was impeached for it. And then he was exonerated. He was not convicted for the crime at the Senate trial. I'm being honest. But to your point, once he left office, he did not see it before. He was once again prosecuted for this. Jack Smith went after him as you rightly point out, but you're conflating two cases. Because then he also went to trial one more time when the states tried to kick him off the ballot for supposedly committing an insurrection. Both of those cases flopped just like the impeachment flopped where he was exonerated. So three times this was brought to courts, one being the special court of the impeachment court, three times it was brought to courts, and all three times it was locked.

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] There was never a trial, Michael. You are lying if you say there was a trial on the top. In impeachment is a trial on January 6th. You might not be familiar with that. In Georgia and in Washington DC and in Florida, there were no trials. It is a lie to say there was a trial on that.

Ella Klinsky (Moderator) [00:00] We have time for two more audience Q&As. We'll start with Medi. I think we're going to start over here.

Questioner 2 [00:00] Awesome, yeah. And I think we might be nearing one question. Yeah.

Questioner 6 [00:00] And, well, Medi saw it's a privilege to see you speak here in person. My question given to President very recently, Donald Trump posted a picture of himself and AI generated a picture of himself depicting himself as Jesus. My question to Michael first giving the Senate Judiciary hearing recently. Do you believe that Donald Trump can run as for a third term and be elected as president? Yes or no, given the 22nd amendment. And the response I'd love for Medi is, what would bypassing said amendment look like? Given the precedent set by... What would bypassing said amendment look like? Given the precedent set by the administration? Well, that...

Questioner 2 [00:00] And sorry, just before you guys answer, can we also have people fill out the post to be poll as we talk to debate the winner?

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] Thanks so much. My greatest fear is 22nd amendment violation. I've said that for a while, I'm on record. I'm not saying Donald Trump will do that. I don't want to do predictions anymore. I said he wouldn't win in 2016. I was wrong, I don't do political predictions. But that's my greatest fear. Is it a possibility that he will do it? Sure, I take him literally. I take him seriously. He said it just again on Monday. Oh, he's just joking, they say. And then he goes on, meet the press and he says, I'm not joking, there are ways to do it. There aren't ways to do it. It's a violation of the 22nd amendment. Steve Bannon says, we're working on a way to do it. This is my big fear. That this is guy is a wannabe dictator to quote Judge Michael Ludi, one of the most famous conservative judges in America. He is a wannabe tyrannical king. He wants to stay in power. He thinks he is God's gift. He literally, Michael earlier, very shamefully, tried to insinuate, I'm anti-Christian because I don't accept there's a Christian genocide in Nigeria. And yet he supports a man who literally portrayed himself as Jesus, blasphemously sacrilegity. A man who attacks the Pope. Michael, are you Catholic?

noise [00:00] I am.

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] Yeah, a man who attacks the Pope. I've never attacked the Pope, like Donald Trump has. But such is partisanship, a hell of a drug, as they say. That he won't criticize Donald Trump ever for attacking the Pope, but he'll attack me for supposedly being anti-Christian. Trump literally portrayed himself as Jesus, then pretended, said, I thought I was being a doctor. Okay, biggest liar in the world. Attack the Pope, light about the Pope. You know what he said on Monday? He said, the Pope says he wants Iran to have a nuclear weapon. I wonder, will Michael condemn Trump for lying about the Pope? The Pope has never said Iran wants to have a nuclear weapon. Donald Trump, light on Monday. You can see if Michael will answer that question tonight. I suspect he won't. Cult, he can't criticize the dear leader. So it's a real problem that we have a president who's attacking Christianity because he sees himself as Lord God. He once said, and the key wants to retweet as someone, say he's the key of the Jews, the Lord of the world, or whatever it was. He's putting out pictures of himself as Jesus. And yes, the 22nd Amendment said issue, a man who did not accept a peaceful transfer of power in January 2021. Why would he accept it in 2028? Every time he's ever lost election, he claims fraud. When he lost to Michael's good friend Ted Cruz and the Iowa caucuses in 2016, he said, Ted Cruz stole it. He accuses everyone. I don't know what happened in his childhood, but he really cannot handle any kind of defeat. He's a militant narcissist. He's power-crazy. And yes, there is a very real risk that just is in 2021. He tries to stay on an office in 2028. The fact that we even have in this conversation is a reason why you should vote against this motion and say he's not upholding constitution because he's considering violating the 22nd Amendment. That in itself should be enough for Michael to lose this debate.

Michael Knowles [00:00] I'm trying to track what the question was because many took us on a journey. I involved the Pope, it involved me. I had a question about 20-second amendment. Both was in the question.

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] I know you don't want to talk about the Pope.

Michael Knowles [00:00] No, well, I was very glad when the president took down the image of many being a little confused about things tonight. Seems to think I won't criticize the president. I did specifically point out that that was a sacrilege. That's what I was very glad about.

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] Did he lie about the Pope's one thing

Michael Knowles [00:00] that you never had a right time to answer? Are you afraid that I'm going to say?

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] Did he? No, you didn't answer my question. Did he lie about the Pope?

Michael Knowles [00:00] I'm answering your question. I'm not answering your question.

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] Do you want to criticize Trump for that?

Michael Knowles [00:00] So anyway, as I just pointed out, I very publicly criticized President Trump over that post and was actually featured in the international media for it. And very happily, the very happily president Trump took down the post. So I was very glad with that. He's also moderated his comments on the Pope, which I think is the right thing to do. No, I'm worried. They asked to speak ever in this debate for his own. You've actually spoken more of it. It's unbelievable. So anyway, there have been many tensions between emperors and popes going back to at least Pope Jalaceus the first in the fifth century. So I'm not surprised that the president's fighting with him a little bit. And I think the president's Presbyterian maybe will make him Catholic by the end. To the actual question that was asked before, Medi's very rude interruption. The question was, will President Trump violate the 22nd Amendment? And Medi, who's made many very false predictions, including that the free press would disappear, were Trump reelected, Medi says that he won't leave office. And I'd just like to point out, we know that he will, because he did. He did leave office. This is not an academic question arrived at that ago. He did. He left office on time. He contested a dubious election. And then he just left office on time. And it was all just normal. And to the point of the 22nd Amendment, there's one president who violated the spirit of that amendment and maybe the spirit of the constitutional norm. And that is a Democrat president, FDR, who did make himself the American monarch and stayed in power till he died. But I don't know that we even really need to knock FDR for this. If the debate were, did FDR violate constitutional norms, I guess we would say he did. But it's about Donald Trump. And it's a fact that at the end of his life, President Reagan was openly campaigning in the pages of The New York Times to repeal the 22nd Amendment. You'll recognize it's the 22nd Amendment. It wasn't in there at the beginning. It's relatively recent. I think that we do have term limits. The term limits are at the ballot box. And I actually think that the 22nd Amendment is contrary to American democracy. But much as I would like President Trump to have a third, fourth, or fifth term, I don't think that it's going to happen. We will not get Octavian Augustus Barron Trump to come in after him. President Trump will leave office at the end of his term because that is very much in keeping with the letter and spirit of the Constitution, which I hope I've demonstrated to you, President Trump has upheld.

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] So a couple of things. I never said you didn't criticize the Pope about the image. I see your tweets. I know you did that. I said you won't criticize him for lying about the Pope yesterday. Do you agree he lied about the Pope on Monday and said he wants Iran to have nuclear weapons? Do you agree that's a lie? The Pope doesn't want Iran to have nuclear weapons?

Michael Knowles [00:00] I don't think that the Pope wants Iran to have a nuclear weapon.

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] So Trump lied.

Michael Knowles [00:00] I think that President Trump and the Pope are having a disagreement within the basis of... We'll do it. This is what the definition of a cult is, ladies and gentlemen.

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] I'll speak to criticize Barack Obama's lies. I will happen. He won't do it. But he's not lying because I think he believes it. OK, he doesn't believe it. I think he does believe it. The great Trump defense for 10 years. Since we're doing predictions, I already admitted my predictions are bad. But relevant to this conversation, you had a great prediction in the summer of 2024. You tweeted, there's no reason to believe. There's no evidence to suggest that Donald Trump won't accept the results of this election. The same can't be said about his opponents. That take age like milk in a hot desert, as we saw in January 6th. The idea that he left, yeah, he left after exhausting every violent and nonviolent option. There were guardrails. There was a guy we haven't talked about him tonight called Mike Pence, who actually stood up to him. You think JD Vance is going to stand up to Donald Trump in 2028? You think the man who threw his own wife under the bus is going to stand up to Donald Trump in 2028? No, there are no guardrails this time. There's no Jim Mattis. There's no John Kelly. There's none of the people from the first time who were semi-adults in the room. There's Cash Patel, RFK Junior, Tulsi Gabbard, and JD Vance. If that fills you with confidence on January the 6th, 2029, go for it. Some of us will still be skeptical about a man who completely utterly is obsessed with power, says, I have a second, I have an article to write to do whatever I want. We've posts quotes from Napoleon, saying, if you save your country, you violate it no laws. Yeah, you have. You're not above the law. Who says stuff like, you know what he said to New York Times earlier this year? When he was asked about international law, he said, my mind, my morality. That's the only thing that can stop me. Who talks like that? Autocrats, talk like that. Dictators, talk like that. If Barack Obama talked like that, these guys would have gone nuts. But, you know, he saluted a military guy while throwing a coffee, and that was a huge scandal.

Questioner 1 [00:00] And the Barack Obama, right?

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] And Donald Trump has compared himself to God. In fact, he's reposted people and he posted an image of himself as God. Classic Michael, oh, he took it down. But why did he put it up? You'll never criticize him for the original act. You'll praise him for taking it down. And Pope is a good example. He cannot handle any criticism. If it's a Supreme Court justice, they're a lapdog and a fool. If it's the Pope, he wants Iran to have nuclear weapons. He recognizes no opposition. That is why he's so sui generis. That is why George Bush recognized opponents. I have to take a second shower tonight. George Bush recognized political opponents. Donald Trump doesn't recognize any power other than his own. That is why you should vote against this motion tonight.

Ella Klinsky (Moderator) [00:00] Thank you both for sharing your time and your thoughts. We all really appreciate it. Make it come to close with us.

Questioner 7 [00:00] All right, please join me in thanking Michael Knowles, Medi Hassan, and of course, Ella Klinnski for providing us with such an engaging debate tonight.

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] Thank you. Well done. Well done.

Questioner 7 [00:00] Well done. Now, at this time, please remain seated while our guests leave. And while you are all filling out the poll, I'd like to thank you all for coming. Having supporters like you is what empowers the DPU to continue its mission of promoting the free exchange of discourse. Thank you to Michael Knowles and Medi Hassan, again, for being great debate partners. And I want to thank the office of the president

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] for its continuous support. Yeah, I do to know. I can't wait. Thank you. Thank you.

Questioner 7 [00:00] And don't worry, we'll make sure you guys know the results of the poll shortly. Now, I'd like to take this opportunity, while you're finishing out the poll. That is a big finale.

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] Tell us about the leaves. Not knowing. I am the answer. Yeah, I'm the lead.

Questioner 7 [00:00] This is painful. Security rules.

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] And he to know.

Questioner 7 [00:00] 5 p.m.

Mehdi Hasan [00:00] 28. That's 58. I know. We'll be hosting... I'll tell you the percentage.

Questioner 7 [00:00] I think the commissioners, Darah, Lyndon, and Alan Dickerson in Haldeman 41. Following evening, Hermit Dillon, past of 1989, will be visiting for a moderated Q and A at 5 p.m. Thursday, May 14th, right here in Cook Auditorium once again. Stay tuned for more events throughout the spring. And before I begin sharing polling results, We'd like to remind everyone to stay seated, even though our guests have left. With that said, the results of our poll are almost in. As a reminder, before the debate, 22% of the room thought that Trump had upheld the Constitution, and 78% thought Trump had not upheld the Constitution. Now, when asked the same question after the debate, 28% think he has upheld the Constitution, and 72% think he has not. So, a little, a couple of converts to thinking he has upheld the Constitution. I'll also ask again that you remain seated for one more minute, and once again, please join me in giving Michael Knowles and Medi Hassan a round of applause. Thank you all.

The Question at the Heart of the Debate

What should count as a president upholding the Constitution: acting within historically familiar presidential practice, or remaining answerable to specific legal limits and correction when challenged?

What this analysis found

Mehdi Hasan and Michael Knowles are arguing past each other because they're answering different questions. Hasan asks whether Trump violated specific constitutional limits and complied when courts said no. Knowles asks whether Trump's conduct falls within the historically tolerated range of presidential behavior. Both are legitimate constitutional tests — but they're not the same test. The debate's missing variable is one neither speaker introduced: not whether a precedent exists, but what happened after it was challenged.

Discuss this analysis in the community →

Subscribe to unlock the full analysis

Mehdi Hasan

3.5Formal/Systemicreasoning

3.5Rationalworldview

What do these labels mean? →

Michael Knowles

3.0Abstractreasoning

3.0Ideologicalworldview

What do these labels mean? →

Good-Faith Summary

He argues that the relevant question is not whether past presidents also overreached, but whether Trump violated concrete constitutional limits and judicial checks in the cases at issue. He treats Trump as distinctive less for style than for the breadth and brazenness of his claimed exemptions from law.

Good-Faith Summary

He argues that constitutional fidelity cannot be judged by strict textual literalism alone, because American presidents have always governed through broad, historically tolerated executive practice. His case is that Trump remains within that constitutional mainstream even when his actions are controversial or imprudent.

3.5Formal/Systemic

Textual Constitutionalism

3.5Social Contract

Executive Accountability

3.5Social Contract

Free Expression

3.5Rational

Legitimacy

Historical Precedentialism

3.0Ideological

Executive Authority

3.0Ideological

Civic Order

3.0Meritocratic

Legality

3.0Abstract

Epistemic Style

He relies on clauses, court rulings, named judges, and compliance failures as the primary standard of proof. He is strongest when tying separate incidents into a pattern of executive self-exemption, though he sometimes overcompresses evidence into rhetoric.

Epistemic Style

He treats historical practice, interbranch continuity, and the distinction between prudence and constitutionality as the main tests of judgment. He is coherent within that frame, but often uses analogy to avoid direct engagement with specific legal defeats.

The Tell

He repeatedly returns to adverse rulings and named judges whenever historical analogy is used to blur the issue.

The Tell

He repeatedly widens a disputed act into a chain of cross-era presidential comparisons.

Synthesis

He is protecting the need for binding constitutional correction, without which the presidency can treat law as scenery.

Synthesis

He is protecting the need for governable executive discretion, without which constitutional government can become too brittle to act in the world.

Mehdi Hasan

3.5Formal/Systemicreasoning

3.5Rationalworldview

What do these labels mean? →

Good-Faith Summary

Textual Constitutionalism

3.5Formal/Systemic

Executive Accountability

3.5Social Contract

Free Expression

3.5Social Contract

Legitimacy

3.5Rational

Epistemic Style

The Tell

He repeatedly returns to adverse rulings and named judges whenever historical analogy is used to blur the issue.

Synthesis

He is protecting the need for binding constitutional correction, without which the presidency can treat law as scenery.

Michael Knowles

3.0Abstractreasoning

3.0Ideologicalworldview

What do these labels mean? →

Good-Faith Summary

Historical Precedentialism

3.0Ideological

Executive Authority

3.0Ideological

Civic Order

3.0Meritocratic

Legality

3.0Abstract

Epistemic Style

The Tell

He repeatedly widens a disputed act into a chain of cross-era presidential comparisons.

Synthesis

He is protecting the need for governable executive discretion, without which constitutional government can become too brittle to act in the world.

Highlights

The moments that matter most

Highlight 01

He Kept Defending a Smaller Claim

“Not unique” slowly replaced “constitutional.”

Integral Life — Core Member

Unlock the moments that matter most

4 more highlights available with Core membership

Become a Core Member

Every debate has a surface argument and a deeper one. This section maps both — what each speaker is explicitly claiming, what they're actually trying to protect, and where their real disagreement lives. Start here to understand what's actually at stake before the analysis begins.

Mehdi Hasan

Mehdi Hasan’s core claim is straightforward: Donald Trump is not merely abrasive, norm-breaking, or unusually aggressive in office; he is engaged in repeated, concrete violations of the Constitution itself. Hasan’s organizing framework is legal-institutional rather than temperamental. He repeatedly distinguishes between “norms” and the Constitution, and he tries to keep the debate anchored in clauses, amendments, court rulings, and judicial findings rather than in generalized impressions of presidential style. His worldview assumes that constitutional government depends on binding limits that remain binding even when a president claims emergency, necessity, popularity, or historical analogy. For Hasan, the relevant question is not whether prior presidents also overreached, but whether Trump’s conduct is lawful now. His recurring complaint is that historical precedent is being used to launder present illegality.

The motivational stakes for Hasan are high and explicit. He is protecting the idea that no president stands above judicial review, congressional war powers, due process guarantees, or First Amendment protections. What he fears losing is not just a set of procedural niceties, but the practical reality of constitutional democracy: courts that matter, elections that transfer power, speech rights that apply even to dissenters and noncitizens lawfully present, and a presidency constrained by law rather than personality. He also appears keenly aware of the accusation often directed at anti-Trump critics—that they are hysterical, partisan, or selectively outraged. He therefore repeatedly concedes that prior presidents, including Obama, Bush, Truman, and others, also committed unconstitutional acts. That concession is central to his self-presentation: he wants to be seen not as a Democratic partisan, but as someone applying a consistent anti-executive-overreach standard.

His dominant narrative metaphor is that of an emergency defense of guardrails against a would-be monarch. Trump appears in Hasan’s framing as a “clear and present danger,” a president who treats constitutional constraints as obstacles to be brushed aside. The strongest version of Hasan’s argument, in language he would likely recognize, is this: upholding the Constitution means obeying its textual allocations of power and complying with judicial checks when courts rule against you. Trump has violated due process in immigration enforcement, infringed speech rights, usurped congressional powers over war and taxation, attempted to subvert the 2020 election, and in some cases openly defied or denigrated courts. Other presidents have overreached too, but Trump’s pattern is broader, more explicit, more contemptuous of checks, and more openly hostile to the very idea of constitutional limitation. A tension within Hasan’s performance is that while he insists on legal specificity, he sometimes widens into sweeping moral indictment and maximal rhetoric (“gaslighting,” “cult,” “dictator,” “snowflake”), which can blur the line between his strongest adjudicative claims and his broader political condemnation.

Michael Knowles

Michael Knowles’s core claim is that “upholding the Constitution” cannot be reduced to a narrow textual literalism detached from how American government has actually functioned across history. His worldview is rooted in historical practice, institutional continuity, and a broad understanding of executive power as it has been exercised and tolerated over time. He argues that if one judged presidents solely by strict textual compliance, one would have to disqualify not only Trump but many revered presidents, from Washington and Jefferson to Lincoln, FDR, Truman, Obama, and Biden. His central move is to redefine the operative standard: a president upholds the Constitution if he acts within the historically accepted range of presidential practice, especially as mediated by the branches over time, not if he avoids every arguable constitutional infraction.

The motivational and emotional stakes for Knowles are somewhat different. He is protecting the legitimacy of strong executive action in a large, modern, globally engaged republic. He fears a constitutional standard so rigid that it renders ordinary governance impossible and retroactively delegitimizes most presidents. He also appears to fear what he sees as selective anti-Trump exceptionalism: the use of standards against Trump that critics did not apply with equal force to Democratic presidents or to earlier Republican presidents. He is particularly resistant to what he treats as moral panic and elite overstatement. He does not want Trump judged by a bespoke standard created by his enemies. He also seems wary of being accused of blind partisanship, which is why he occasionally distances himself from Republicans generally, criticizes some Trump actions as imprudent or sacrilegious, and says he need not prove Trump’s actions wise or admirable, only constitutionally mainstream.

His dominant narrative metaphor is constitutional continuity through precedent: the republic as a durable system that absorbs and normalizes executive conflict, contested elections, military actions, deportations, tariffs, and speech disputes without collapsing. The strongest version of his argument is this: the Constitution is not self-executing text floating above history; it is a governing framework whose meaning is revealed through longstanding practice, interbranch contestation, and judicial settlement. Trump’s actions may be controversial, abrasive, or politically unwise, but most of the examples raised against him fall within patterns established by prior presidents or are subject to ordinary legal correction through courts. Where courts rule against him, the system continues to function. Therefore, Trump is not outside the constitutional order but operating within its historically broad tolerances. The key tension within Knowles’s position is that he begins by invoking institutional history and adjudication, but often operationally defends Trump less by showing affirmative legality than by showing comparable or worse past behavior by others. That drift moves him from “Trump is constitutional” toward “Trump is not uniquely unconstitutional,” which is a narrower and more defensible claim than the one he is officially arguing.

Good arguments can still contain weak evidence, logical slippage, or rhetorical moves that substitute for reasoning. This section examines each speaker's argumentative integrity — not to declare a winner, but to identify where the strongest and weakest links are in each case.

Mehdi Hasan

Coherence strengths

Hasan’s argument is structurally clear and unusually consistent for a live debate. He repeatedly returns to the same standard: constitutional text, judicial rulings, and compliance with institutional checks. He does a better job than Knowles of keeping the debate tied to the stated resolution rather than to general political grievance. He also strengthens his credibility by conceding that prior presidents, including Democrats, committed unconstitutional acts. That concession is not incidental; it supports his larger claim that Trump is distinctive in scale, brazenness, and disregard for correction. Hasan is also strong at identifying when the frame shifts from “is this constitutional?” to “is this good policy?” and trying to pull the exchange back.

He is at his strongest when citing adjudicated or institutionally grounded claims: Trump-appointed judges ruling against Trump, Supreme Court rulings, and the constitutional allocation of taxing and war powers. His use of named judges and specific amendments gives his case more evidentiary texture than a generic anti-Trump brief. He also correctly spots a recurring pattern in Knowles’s reasoning: historical comparison is often being used not to clarify legal meaning but to dilute the force of present allegations.

Weaknesses and logical issues

Hasan sometimes overstates beyond what he has established in the transcript. His opening list of Trump violating an enormous number of clauses and amendments is rhetorically forceful but epistemically sloppy as presented. Some of those claims may be plausible or even strong, but the list is too compressed and unsourced to function as decisive evidence on its own. Similarly, claims like “every international law professor says it was illegal” or “every economist agrees” are unsourced universalizations and should be treated as epistemically sloppy. They may gesture toward expert consensus, but they overclaim.

A few claims are likely factually wrong or at least insufficiently supported in the transcript as stated. The assertion that Trump “has arrested Don Lemon” appears highly doubtful on the public record and is not substantiated here; as presented, it should be treated as factually wrong unless tied to a different person or event misnamed in the transcript. Some of the highly specific claims about Trump bombing multiple countries, kidnapping Maduro, or particular casualty counts in Iran are presented as settled fact without sourcing and may reflect a hypothetical or future-framed debate context, but within the transcript they remain unsourced empirical claims used decisively. His statement that Trump is “ignoring a 9-0 Supreme Court ruling” may be directionally plausible depending on the case, but as stated it needs more legal precision about what the Court ordered and what counts as compliance.

Hasan also slips into rhetorical manipulation at points. He uses motive attribution (“cult,” “gaslighting”), contempt language, and identity-charged framing that exceed the evidentiary burden of the specific legal questions. These moves do not invalidate his substantive case, but they do sometimes weaken the distinction he is trying to maintain between legal argument and moral-political condemnation. There is also occasional causal oversimplification: Trump’s conduct is treated as the singular explanatory key to constitutional breakdown, whereas some issues discussed involve longstanding structural expansions of executive power across administrations.

Epistemic style

Hasan’s dominant epistemic style is legal-institutional with a strong adversarial-journalistic overlay. He relies on court rulings, named judges, constitutional text, and public statements, but he also mixes in prosecutorial rhetoric and media-style rapid-fire accumulation. The style is generally well-suited to the claims he is making, especially when he stays close to adjudicated findings. The main gap is between his claimed legal precision and his occasional use of sweeping, unsourced, or hyperbolic formulations.

Michael Knowles

Coherence strengths

Knowles does have a coherent underlying framework: constitutional meaning is inseparable from historical practice, interbranch settlement, and the broad realities of executive governance. He is right that many presidents have exercised powers in ways difficult to square with strict textualism, and he is right that any serious account of constitutional government must grapple with precedent, custom, and tolerated practice. He also consistently distinguishes prudential criticism from constitutional criticism, which is a legitimate and often useful distinction. At several moments he correctly notes that disliking a policy does not by itself prove unconstitutionality.

He is also rhetorically disciplined in one respect: he keeps returning to his preferred standard rather than being dragged fully into Hasan’s clause-by-clause indictment. That gives his case internal continuity. His strongest point is not that Trump is cleanly lawful in every instance, but that American constitutional practice has long tolerated broad executive discretion, especially in war, immigration, and administration.

Weaknesses and logical issues

Knowles’s central weakness is that he repeatedly converts specific legal questions into broader historical or philosophical ones in ways that function as evasion. This is a recurring case of frame conversion. When asked whether a specific act violated a court ruling, a constitutional clause, or due process requirement, he often responds by elevating the discussion to “what the Constitution has meant historically” or by citing analogous conduct from prior presidents. Historical comparison can be legitimate, but in this debate it often substitutes for direct engagement with the specific claim.

He also repeatedly uses whataboutism. Invoking Obama, Biden, Truman, FDR, BLM riots, Bill Ayers, or Al Gore does not by itself answer whether Trump upheld the Constitution in the instances under discussion. Sometimes these comparisons illuminate a claim about precedent; often they serve to absorb the accusation rather than resolve it. This is especially visible on January 6, where comparisons to contested elections or left-wing unrest do not directly answer the question of Trump’s own conduct regarding fake electors, pressure on Pence, or the aftermath.

Several of Knowles’s factual claims are weak or incorrect as presented. His statement that “no reasonable person could even suggest that Trump is [not] upholding it” appears to be a transcript glitch, but in context he clearly means critics are unreasonable; either way, the claim is unsupported. His treatment of the War Powers Resolution is epistemically sloppy: saying it “gives the president the ability to wage war without the approval of Congress for 60 days” is an imprecise and tendentious characterization. Hasan is closer to the legal structure when he says the statute regulates and limits unauthorized hostilities rather than straightforwardly granting war-making power. Knowles’s claim that Trump “accepted” the Supreme Court’s tariff ruling may be directionally plausible if the administration complied formally, but it is incomplete if paired with continued efforts to achieve similar ends through other authorities; as stated, it understates the dispute. His suggestion that foreign students on visas can simply be excluded for views “contrary to the American national interest” is presented as clearly constitutional, but that is at minimum genuinely contested when applied to people already lawfully present and punished for protected expression.

He also engages in ad hominem and identity attacks. The line about Hasan growing up in “a foreign country” and not learning “proper English” is not argument; it is contempt deployed as a rhetorical weapon. There are other motive attributions and insinuations, including suggestions about Hasan’s views on Christians, that do not advance the constitutional analysis. His January 6 discussion contains selective framing: he minimizes the event by focusing on one death, “Horn Hat Guy,” and alleged inconsistencies by Democrats while largely sidestepping the fake elector scheme, pressure on Pence, and the legal significance of Trump’s post-election conduct. His impeachment argument is also a category error when used to imply legal exoneration in the ordinary judicial sense; impeachment acquittal is a political-constitutional process, not an adjudication that settles criminal or factual innocence.

Epistemic style

Knowles’s dominant epistemic style is tradition-and-authority-based, mixed with ideological and genealogical reasoning. He treats historical practice as the primary validator of constitutional meaning and often uses examples from across eras to normalize present conduct. This style can be useful for questions of constitutional custom, but he applies it too broadly, including to disputes where adjudicated rulings or specific legal standards matter more than diffuse precedent. The gap between claimed and enacted epistemic style is significant: he presents himself as grounded in constitutional history and jurisprudence, but in practice often relies on rhetorical comparison, partisan asymmetry, and selective precedent rather than careful legal engagement.

Epistemic Mismatch Note

The two speakers are operating from different standards of proof. Hasan treats court rulings, constitutional text, and specific legal findings as the decisive evidence; Knowles treats historical practice and tolerated executive behavior across administrations as the decisive evidence. As a result, Hasan hears evasion where Knowles hears contextualization, while Knowles hears selective outrage where Hasan hears legal specificity.

Net Assessment

Hasan is substantially more rigorous on the debate’s stated question because he more consistently addresses whether specific presidential actions violate constitutional text or judicial limits. Knowles offers a real interpretive framework, but too often uses precedent as a solvent for specificity rather than as a tool for adjudicating it. The result is that Hasan more often argues the actual resolution, while Knowles more often argues a softened alternative: that Trump is not uniquely outside the historical pattern of executive overreach.

Polarity: Textual Constitutionalism ↔ Historical Precedentialism

Summary: The debate turns on whether constitutional fidelity is measured by specific textual limits and rulings or by the historically tolerated range of presidential practice. Integration: Text bounded by practice Lever: Specificity of comparison

Pole 1 name: Textual Constitutionalism Pole 1 tagline: Clauses and rulings constrain Pole 1 protects:

Clear limits on presidential power
Equal application of constitutional rules Pole 1 neglects:
Historical elasticity in governance
Ambiguity built into practice Pole 1 pathology:
Treating all deviations as equivalent
Ignoring how institutions operationalize text

Pole 2 name: Historical Precedentialism Pole 2 tagline: Practice reveals meaning Pole 2 protects:

Continuity of constitutional order
Real-world governability over time Pole 2 neglects:
How precedent can normalize abuse
The need for direct legal adjudication Pole 2 pathology:
Laundering illegality through repetition
Replacing judgment with analogy

Speaker enactment:

Speaker: Mehdi Hasan Enacts: Pole 1 Pole Center line: cognitive Pole Center: 3.5 Achiever Pole Center rationale: The pole he defends is primarily a reasoning architecture about how constitutional claims should be adjudicated—text, rulings, and present legal specificity coordinated against precedent—so cognitive is the right line, and it reads 3.5 because it explicitly manages multiple evidentiary variables rather than one rule alone. Perspective Structure: 3.5 Managed Perspective Structure rationale: He recognizes historical practice as a real consideration and even grants prior presidential violations, but he mainly manages that pole as a bounded objection rather than inhabiting it from the inside. Contributes: He insists the question is whether Trump violated concrete constitutional limits, not whether others also did. Misses:
- Historical ambiguity in executive practice
- Degrees of constitutional contestation Cues:
- "We're talking about Donald Trump today"
- "Only Congress shall have the power to lay and collect taxes"
Speaker: Michael Knowles Enacts: Pole 2 Pole Center line: worldview Pole Center: 3.0 Expert Pole Center rationale: The pole he defends is chiefly a reality-picture about what the Constitution is—an historically embodied order rather than a text-first constraint—so worldview is the best fit, and it reads 3.0 because it is a self-authored but singular interpretive frame. Perspective Structure: 3.0 Oppositional Perspective Structure rationale: He recognizes the textual pole clearly but treats it mostly as pedantic literalism or selective outrage, not as a legitimate value that historical practice must remain answerable to. Contributes: He reminds the audience that constitutional meaning has always been shaped by practice, not text alone. Misses:
- Specific legal force of adverse rulings
- Uniqueness of cumulative violations Cues:
- "What the Constitution has meant"
- "If we used pedantic literalism, we'd disqualify virtually every president"

Mismatch: Hasan hears precedent as excuse-making; Knowles hears textual focus as selective and ahistorical constitutional purism. Mismatch A→B: When Speaker A says "the text forbids this," Speaker B tends to hear "history and practice don't matter." Mismatch B→A: When Speaker B says "other presidents did similar things," Speaker A tends to hear "therefore this is lawful." Bridge move: Ask of each example not only whether it has precedent, but whether that precedent was adjudicated, tolerated, or itself unconstitutional.

Synthesis: Hasan is protecting the Constitution as a binding architecture of limits: clauses allocate power, amendments secure rights, and court rulings are not optional suggestions. In his frame, once a president can invoke emergency, popularity, or historical analogy to bypass those limits, the Constitution becomes decorative. Knowles is protecting something real too: constitutions do not govern by text alone. They live through practice, institutional settlement, and the accumulated habits of office. A purely literal standard would make much of American statecraft look illegitimate, including actions by presidents later treated as canonical. So each pole guards against a genuine danger: one against executive self-exemption, the other against constitutional formalism detached from governing reality.

The debate breaks down because each speaker treats a different question as primary. Hasan asks, "Was this act lawful under the Constitution as applied now?" Knowles asks, "Is this act outside the historically accepted range of presidential behavior?" Those are related but not identical tests. When Knowles cites Washington, Lincoln, Truman, or Obama, he means to show constitutional continuity; Hasan hears an attempt to convert recurrence into justification. When Hasan cites clauses and judges, he means to show present legal breach; Knowles hears a refusal to acknowledge constitutional development through practice. Integration begins when precedent is disaggregated: Was the earlier act lawful, merely tolerated, or later condemned? That single threshold would let history inform constitutional meaning without allowing history to erase constitutional limits.

Integral Life — Core Member

Upgrade to see the other 3 core polarities

Core membership gives you access to every section of every analysis in the library — plus the courses, dialogues, and community that put these frameworks to work in your own life.

Become a Core Member Learn more about membership

The Crux

There was a real factual asymmetry in this exchange, and any honest synthesis has to begin there. On the debate’s stated question, Mehdi Hasan was more often arguing the actual resolution with specific constitutional claims, judicial findings, and compliance failures, while Michael Knowles repeatedly shifted toward a softer claim: not that Trump’s actions were affirmatively lawful in each case, but that they were not unique in the history of executive overreach. That matters. Some of what they disputed was not a balanced polarity but a legal question where adverse rulings, including from conservative and Trump-appointed judges, cut against Knowles’s confidence. Historical recurrence does not by itself settle present legality.

But beneath that asymmetry, the deeper disagreement sat inside the polarity of Textual Constitutionalism ↔ Historical Precedentialism. Hasan feared that once precedent is allowed to excuse current violations, the Constitution becomes decorative and presidents become self-justifying. Knowles feared that if every arguable deviation from text is treated as disqualifying, constitutional government becomes unreal, hypocritical, and impossible to administer. The missing variable neither man really introduced in a sustained way was this: the status of precedent itself. Was a cited precedent lawful, merely tolerated, emergency-bound, later condemned, or corrected after challenge? Without that distinction, Hasan heard analogy as laundering abuse, and Knowles heard specificity as selective constitutional purism. That missing variable would have changed the whole conversation.

The Higher-Order Reframe

The larger frame available here is not “text versus history,” and not “strong president versus checked president.” It is constitutional learning. A constitutional order does not prove its health by never producing overreach; it proves its health by how it classifies, contests, and corrects overreach. In that frame, the integration handle is text bounded by practice: constitutional text remains the standard, but practice is evidence only when it has survived challenge in a way that clarifies rather than corrodes the standard. And the key lever is specificity of comparison. The right question is not “has this happened before?” but “what exactly happened before, how was it justified, who challenged it, and what happened after the challenge?”

That reframe was mostly unavailable in the room because the exchange never stabilized at the level of shared adjudication.

Made by Corey deVos · About this analysis