HARRISON BERGER : Did Trump Consult AI Before Going to War?

A president consulting a chatbot before a major foreign policy move sounds like satire until it isn’t. We sit down with independent journalist Harrison Berger to trace what that moment reveals about the mindset behind regime change, the stories Americans are sold about “liberation,” and the real world consequences when officials assume other countries will cheer an intervention.

We start with Harrison’s new project, Dragnet, a Substack built around original commentary, investigative journalism, and on the ground video. He shares early reporting focused on southern Lebanon and the destruction of towns like Bint Jbeil, then we connect that kind of field work to a broader question: how do narratives get built, repeated, and used to justify force?

From Venezuela to Iran, we unpack claims about “successful” operations, what success looks like for Washington versus people on the ground, and why blowback keeps getting ignored. Then we go deep on AI in government, including military AI targeting, Project Maven, hallucinations, and why “the algorithm made a mistake” is not an acceptable standard when lives are on the line. We also examine AI surveillance, the purchase of commercially available information on Americans, the Fourth Amendment implications, and how predictive threat scoring can turn political beliefs into a risk label.

We close with a hard look at free speech in the United States: anti BDS laws, visa screening based on social media, campus and donor pressure, and how censorship targets can shift while the machinery expands. Subscribe for more long form interviews, share the episode with a friend, and leave a review with your take: should AI ever be trusted for targeting or threat scoring?

Chapter Markers0:00 Coffee Sponsor Message0:55 Launching Dragnet Investigations3:45 Reporting On Southern Lebanon’s Destruction7:45 Trump Consults Grok On Venezuela14:10 Was The Maduro Grab A Success20:40 AI Targeting Errors And Blowback23:55 AI Surveillance And Buying Americans’ Data27:55 Trump’s Iran Drug Factory Claims31:10 Anti BDS Laws And Speech Limits33:50 Antisemitism Fears And First Amendment34:40 Closing Thanks And Ways To Support

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