Trump’s White House Needed Her. They Didn’t Want MAGA to Know. (w/ Julia Curlee) | Bulwark Daily

0:00 You know, it's really hard. I would much rather still be in the intelligence community doing the work uh rather than uh doing podcast and writing for a living. Uh no offense. >> Podcasting is an honorable profession, but you know, maybe not the most valuable in the list of things in the world. >> It's valuable. >> Hello and welcome to the Bullwork Podcast. I'm your host Tim Miller. She's a former analyst at the CIA. She was Vice President Pence's briefer during Trump's first term. She also served as NSC director in the Biden White House and the second Trump White House. She was pushed out of the second Trump administration and had to resign the CIA

0:46 after a witch hunted her for being transgender. She wrote about her story for the Atlantic this week in an article titled The Wrong Kind of American. It's Julia Curley. Hey Julia, thanks so much for coming on to the Bullwork Daily. Tim, thank you so much. It's a pleasure to be here. >> It is something. This is quite a story. Um, we have a lot to talk about. Uh, you could have been a writer, though. I I hope you're working on a book. Um, it's really it was very moving. Um, and obviously the story is moving, but it was well written that this opening line was so striking at the CIA they started an office poll on when I'd be fired. >> It's true. And I kept saying I should have gotten in on it, but I I didn't. What's funny uh so the I if I recall uh around that time I remember watching an episode of the bull work and one Tim

1:32 Miller was told in in a in a moment that there was a transgender officer removed at the the behest of of Laura Loomer and it and I detected some disbelief that there could be one at that point >> that there could be a transgender officer. >> Yeah. One one Tim Miller seemed to seem to be >> I have to go back and look at my archives. I am disbelieving. I still I remain disbelieving. I I also a disbelief mixed with rage. I'm a little disbelief that CIA officers have time to listen to my the Bor Daily podcast uh too. But uh uh rage over this. I Bill Crystal and I have talked about this a lot wherever people are on the variety of different culture war issues that the right is starting over transgenderism. Like to me it's just so outrage. Like it

2:18 is particularly outrageous and gling the way that this administration is treating people that just wanted to serve their country that are grown-ups making choices for themselves in a free country and were trying to serve America doing so honorably and to just be thrown out like the trash is sick. It's really sickening. And I I don't know. I I mean I guess I just wonder as you sort of were sitting there the second term was starting. you write about this, you know, he he is going after transgender people on his inauguration day. It kind of how did you process that like wanting to serve the country and knowing that this was possible? >> Many people have asked me that question and and uh you know what's important for me is that it was always drilled into us

3:06 as as uh baby analysts, young briefers, uh officers at the CIA that we served regardless of party. We were nonpartisan civil servants. our names are not on the product the coast of the president. We serve regardless of politics and and I firmly believed in that. Um I had served in the Iraq war which I disapproved of. I uh briefed George W. Bush. I worked for Donald Trump in the first term and I volunteered to stay for the second term. And if you had asked other people in my world, they would all tell you that that's just how it is. That's just what we do. And so many people warned us in the NYSE and me in particular for uh obvious reasons uh that there would be a target painted on our back. But I was

3:53 adamant that we serve regardless of party and I'd always thought it a privilege to be a part of the peaceful transfer of power and so I was determined to stay and uh the rest is history that I wrote about in the piece. I want to talk about your job, but but since since we kind of have ended up here because of my disbelief that you were there in the first place, um you you write about this. It it's anonymized, but it seems like it's Burns um and others telling you to leave and and Biden, you write, is the one person that kind of asked people to stay in your role um in a national security role. I always fell down on the side of people should leave. um Donald, people should get people should get to see what they voted for. But you know, I've had

4:39 good faith arguments about that with lots of people who decided to stay and and I just kind of wonder, you know, now like given everything that's happened, like how you kind of feel about that question about like what to what good public servants should do in the face of this. >> You know, it's really hard. Um, I I feel like on principle and in my case in particular, I I don't regret staying. I regret what happened for sure. Uh, I would much rather still be in the intelligence community doing the work uh rather than uh doing podcasts and writing for a living. Uh, no offense, but >> podcasting is an honorable profession, but you know, maybe not the most valuable on the list of things in the world. Um, so I do I do think that it's more important that we have people, you

5:25 know, keeping us safe and doing intelligence. >> It depends on the circumstances and the and the person. Um, and there are officers right now serving at CIA that I've advised you. You've got to stay. You've got to be there to hold the line to make sure that the policy makers, even if they don't want to hear it, they're still being given the best information and analysis possible so that maybe they might make better decisions. We'll see. and that hopefully you'll be here to rebuild when all of this is over. And so it was really important to me to to stay and to to model that for my team. I had been put in the leadership position of being the acting senior director for intelligence programs uh once the politicals from the Biden administration left and they all

6:12 volunteered to stay and and of the entire Biden NSE I believe over 160 officers uh believe believed it was their duty to stay on and many of them have suffered the severe career setbacks or in uh in my case I had to end up leaving the agency. See, and so it's very hard. You know, the leadership really did try to look out for us. They knew what was coming. Um, but at the end of the the day, this is what we do. >> Let's talk about the job that you did so people can get a uh, you know, perspective on it. Because on the one hand, the way you were treated, being fired, your gender identity would have been totally inappropriate and insane if you were anything, the intern or the jan or whatever. But like it there's

6:58 something I think especially gling about doing it given the importance of the job to the safety of all the Americans that he's going to serve. And um you know you write that in your job basically after Biden's political appointees left you were the senior intelligence official in the White House for the incoming Trump administration. Like they relied on you after they fired you. You they still made you work a couple of or not fired you after they redispatched you out of the White House. They still made you work for a couple days because they needed your expertise. So like explain to us those of us who don't like have a background in this intelligence work like what what is that job? Like what was that job that you were doing? >> Right. So the director for intelligence programs, the senior director is overseeing the White House's access to intelligence for everyone in the executive office of the president. So that goes everything from maintaining

7:44 the records of who has what compartments and who's going to receive the the PDB, arranging and serving as the interface with the 15 intelligence agencies who are designed to support the White House and being the the the White House's office looking out for uh the the president's interests with the rest of the inner agency and also helping to manage highly sensitive intelligence programs uh that reflect the president's policies. Uh covert action, for example, is the president's policies in which the hand of the United States would be hidden. And so the director for intelligence in in my old office would be intimately involved in making sure that policies were being implemented on behalf of the president which will be an

8:29 important point if we talk about the the coming purge of the NYSE >> where uh the White House had a very misguided idea that the NYSE and the broader intelligence community was the enemy within when in fact this is the these are the arms and eyes and ears of the president to make sure there will be done and that that the inter agency can implement uh their directions. Uh and a lot of the catastrophes that we've blundered into in the last few months have been partly as a result of a completely destroyed uh national security council that so there's no one coordinating one of the most complicated organizations on the planet the US government. >> Yeah. Marco who's in that job now like said recently he's not even focused that

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10:48 in, right? So, I I mean, part of, you know, you're talking about kind of preparing for any proactive actions, but like threats, right? Like, you know, I the most serious threats to the country, like I assume, you know, you're having this transition, you're having this handoff, like these new guys coming and they've been in there before four years ago, but they're coming back in. things have changed, the world has changed, and I I I I presume they're relying on you to brief them on like what what was out there. >> Yeah. Uh I mean ever since election day uh in which and after which I was put in the position of the the going to be the acting senior director, it was my it was on me to make sure that we were prepared that we had an action plan that the officers were ready to you know the moment they got under the White House compound. They need to be read in to the highest level programs and and

11:35 clearances that our country has because God help us if there's a crisis and not just one caused by the president himself but like a real world crisis. This is the new government of the United States for better or worse. And so on inauguration day, literally minutes after President Trump took the oath, I am in the West Wing. I'm I'm there when JD Vance arrives. I am there when the National Security Adviser arrives in his office. And I am right there to give him every tool he needs to make sure that he can manage the US government in a crisis. And we were well along the way to doing that. Um and it felt as if maybe there would be some stability and that the fears that many of us had had about the incoming administration were not justified. When on the third day of

12:21 the administration, they called 160 NYSE staffers into a phone call and they sacked all of them. Told them they had 15 minutes to get off the compound. There was no plan to to replace them. Uh it would take months to fill in uh their their positions and some of them never uh replaced. There was no turnover and immediately uh with me and a couple other people in my office, we were just thrown into chaos trying to hold together the intelligence connections between all the multi-billion dollar uh apparatus that the United States has around the world to help our president make good decisions. And it was chaos and it was a completely self-induced crisis. senior directors uh for many different parts of the world, the incoming Trump administration officials

13:07 couldn't get into important intelligence compartments because of this because the support staff that was supposed to help them had all been walked off the compound >> like they couldn't get into like the literal like f the file it's like what do you mean of a compartment the filing cabinet or the the file the online >> intelligence is compartmented into different c you know so that we can ensure that uh there is security uh so that one person doesn't see everything. Um, but you know, the the the director looking at China needs to be able to know what the United States knows about China, but the people that would have read them in who would have the contacts and the ability to reach out to departments and agencies that have information had been had been fired. And in some of those cases, it felt to me a week later or two to call those people

13:54 back, the people that they had humiliated and beg them to come back and to and to work and to help this new administration get off the ground. And they and they did. >> You're a better person than me, it seems like, which I appreciate. There had to be though a moment where you went home at night and were like, "Good luck, I've I took all I burned the passwords and we'll see how it goes. >> That was that was almost every day. >> Okay. >> To be to be honest, but it was still my job and I had spent 20 years in the intelligence community serving administrations that I didn't agree with, that I had voted against many times, but it was still my duty to do that. And it's it's what I expected of the officers who were serving with me.

14:41 And you know, it's just what the intelligence community is designed and should do, which is part of what is being destroyed right now as it's being politicized and and undermined uh by walking out some of our, you know, most most experienced and respected officers in in what will be a generational process of trying to replace them. >> I wish it was a two-way street. Um, but here we are. I I want to turn back the clock a little bit to I think the part of your column in the Atlantic that that people were most taken by. Um and that was uh your time with Mike Pence. Um so previous to this, previous to the Biden administration, the first Trump administration, you were the person that was providing the daily brief to the

15:28 vice president. talk about that like getting that role any sort of conflict that you had about that given micro fences. >> Why would you ask that Tim? >> Uh yeah, so I had you know becoming a PDB briefer and serving a president and and briefing on Air Force One. I mean that's the dream that that like everyone who goes into the intelligence community to be an analyst really imagines. And uh I had over the course of my career gotten to brief uh George W. Bush at one point and I had been in the White House so many times I I couldn't I couldn't remember. But to get to be a PDB briefer, to wake up at 11:00 p.m. and be in the office at midnight so that I could be at the White House before dawn and check in with the sit room and and

16:13 be there to help the highest level policy makers in our government make better decisions by providing them this this enormous amount of information and distilling it down to what they needed to know. And it was a wonderful experience. And so I had initially been assigned to the deputy national security adviser when one day my boss comes into my office saying, "Julia, you're doing a great job. Uh, what would you think about briefing the vice president?" And and it occurred to me that, you know, this vice president and and so I I agreed and and uh without thinking too hard, I'm afraid it was a bit difficult then to explain to my wife what I was about to do. Uh but then uh just a few days later I'm standing in the the driveway at the Naval Observatory and there he is Mike Pence with his white

16:59 helmet hair and uh you know he says Julia tell me something I don't know and we were off and it was just me and Mike Pence and >> for how long? >> So I served him for over a year. Um and then I repeatedly after my my time with him would come back to fill in for for briefers when they would would get sick or they'd go on uh on leave. Uh, and I kept doing that through to the end of of the first administration. So, I was about I was in the the the Trump White House about two years. Uh, all said, >> you wrote this. Um, when my tour finally ended, Pence invited my family to the White House. In his office, he took my mother's hand and smiled. You must be very proud of your daughter. A friend of mine text me this and was like, "Why am I crying reading about Mike Pence?" And that's kind of how I felt as well

17:46 reading it. And it's like, well, and at that point, you're there with your wife and I don't know what was what was that like? >> It was a profound moment for me. I mean, obviously, you know, I'm not I wasn't ignorant of his public positions and I I just I will say I don't know what's in his heart and what his what his deepest beliefs are. I just knew that through the last year before that, through traveling around the world with him, he had treated me with dignity and and respect and had been an an amazing PDB customer, really really effective in giving me that experience that I'd always wanted. And here he was with my mom who had had an enormously difficult time with my transition um just you many years before. And Mike Pence is

18:33 affirming my gender identity. And I thought we made it, you know, I mean, what more could I possibly ask for, but that and it was really felt like, you know, no matter what setbacks we we could suffer, at least for me, I felt like we were there and these two dreams that I'd had since I was a kid of being a CIA officer and this unexplainable uh dream of of of being a woman could coexist in the same universe. The affirming thing, I guess, tell me if I'm translating this right, but it seems like if your mother is having trouble with this, it's like if even Mike Pence can say you got to be proud of your daughter, then anybody can then I'm accepted everywhere. And it's kind of maybe how I felt about when my mother had a priest that, you know, had

19:18 come around on my on my gay um sexuality, right? And like is that is that kind of what you meant? >> Yeah. I mean, if if you know, and I had also briefed virtually every senior member of the the Trump cabinet, including President Trump, on Air Force One, and it was never a problem. Uh, and and not only that, but but uh the vice president had asked me to extend my tour. Uh, so if there had ever been an issue, they could have easily had me just fade away without any problems. But no, they they wanted me to serve and I did. So I think that prov may provide you the context where going into the second term it was the PDB briefer that briefed Mike Pence. It's going to be fine. >> Yeah. >> Uh and of course I was I was terribly wrong about that. >> And so you wrote him on the last day um

20:04 this letter that you write in the article that includes I'm a transgender CIA officer, a wife and a mother. Anything's possible in America. He said I'm glad I passed the test. I'm wondering like what was what was he like in that moment? Was he you know it's hard to tell just based on the on paper text like was he dismissive? Was it was it prefuncter? Did he mean something to him? Did he know the whole time do you think? >> So I mean his staff knew and and I had I had talked about it with his chief of staff, both chiefs of staff uh that had served under him. It was not a secret, but but we never talked about it. You know, I'm I'm it's not my day job. Uh I'm not a professional trans person. um I was there to support him and it was important to me that I not ever let it get in the way of the briefing. And so

20:51 what I had done was the day before, my second to last day, I gave him a letter when we were done so that he could read it. I felt like this thing that had laid on the side, this elephant in the room the whole time. I needed to do something to communicate how I felt and I wanted to just not do it in a way that it would interfere. And so he had taken it home and and the next day he he brought it up uh and and said he thanked me for the letter and that he really appreciated my service. And we shook hands and and he said, you know, I what I had told him in that moment was that there were many at CIA for for perfectly obvious reasons that thought that a person like me couldn't work for a person like him. And he said, "Well, I'm glad I passed the test." >> He brought it up,

21:37 >> right? Well, I I had given them the letter, >> right? But the next day he brought he didn't have to do that, right? >> Yes, of course. That's that was the whole point. >> Yeah. Makes me more mad about what happened in the second term, I guess, is really my reaction to it because again, if Mike Pence was saw value in your service, >> there's a lot of sentences that begin with that construct. If Mike Pence saw value in your service, acknowledged it, appreciated it, you continued on, you come back in the second term, and like these guys then just decide to like react to this witch hunt and smear and dismiss you. Like to me, it makes it even more gling and enchanting. >> I I I would step back a little bit because I don't think it's just like a witch hunt at after inauguration. There

22:24 really was an asteroid coming toward us. And you know, I had been in the sit room. I had been in the Biden administration watching TV at one point at some ungodly hour of the evening. And there were these commercials that would come on during the campaign. And the Trump administration threw $200 million at a at a smear campaign to demonize people like me and to tar their opponent by association. And so we we you know it I could see it coming but but at some level I didn't believe that it would really be as terrible as it was. I thought I I could stay and write it out. But I think the point that that you're making >> you're being hard on yourself. I'm being hard on him. It'll find out what you you were serving. You were make doing what you're supposed to do. My point is like Mike Pence was supposedly the Christian

23:10 ideologue and you served him honorably and these guys come in JD Vance and Marco Rubio and they can you kick you out Susie Wilds Donald Trump JD Vance Marco Rubio over nothing over not your job over not your work but just over who you are and it's it's sick >> but it's important to to say though that while it was a secret or or at least not public they were perfectly fine with it. And that is the that is the reason why I felt so passionately that I had to write. Uh when I came back that those those three days after I was fired trying to help do the turnover and finish an important budget item and I had been told to be discreet. What

23:57 became utterly clear to me by the end of those those three days was that the White House needed me and they wanted my help, but they didn't want anyone to know. And that told me just this kind of animous is a choice. >> Yeah, >> it is absolutely a choice and they're making it based on some political calculation. I've I've talked about in the piece I've wrote written PDBs about this how you demonize a small group of people. You you know find an enemy within and that helps you ram through your your extremist agenda. It's happened in Iran and Russia and Hungary and I wrote PDPs about this and I had it happen to me while I'm sitting in the White House. >> I'm circling like trying to figure out the ex like why exactly it is that it's

24:42 so gling and I think that that's what it is, right? sort of like these guys. It's so cowardly because it wasn't, you know, it'd be one thing if they were Bible thumpers and they came in and this was just their what, you know, they were ideological hardliners on on gender ideology and sexuality and whatever. Like that's not what this was. Like that was Mike Pence. And Mike Pence found it in his heart to have some humanity for a person, whatever you think about his public views, which I still disagree with. like he found it and and these guys are like, "No, we're going to make an example of you, throw you out, but by the way, we still need your help. Can you help us in secret a little bit for a couple of days?" I mean, it's unbelievably cowardly on behalf of the people in charge of this administration.

25:28 >> I I had I had really tried to remove any possible excuse for for what ended up happening happening. You know, I I started using the bathroom across the street from the compound. Um, so that I didn't technically violate anyone's executive order. I I never asked anyone to affirm my, you know, my gender. I just tried to do the work. And it still wasn't enough because, and this is why I I labeled the piece the way I did. I just was simply the wrong kind of American to continue working. That hurt because it's it's such a bedrock principle for people who dedicate themselves to public service and just Americans, right? That we can rise as far as our talents can take us. and and this was a clear sign that no actually some people we just don't want their

26:14 kind here. I got to experience it at the White House. >> He was a draft dodger so he didn't even serve the president fired you. I mean it's like as we all went through the America 250 anniversary celebrations. One question that we were talking about on this podcast and that people are thinking about was who who actually is getting to tell the story of America now? Um because that story isn't just what Donald Trump wants you to think it is. It isn't just fireworks and flags. It's about whether we tell the truth about what this country is built to be. Um lately a lot of people are working very hard to rewrite that story. A recent Federal Religious Liberty report called for building more bridges between church and state. But here in the reality based community, we should be clear America rejected kings. It

27:00 rejected divine rule. And it created a constitution with no religious tests for public office. That wasn't anti- relligion. It was pro- freedom. And that freedom includes freeth thinkers, atheists, agnostics, and the millions of Americans who don't want government taking sides on religion. The Freedom from Religion Foundation works to keep state and church separate because freedom of conscience means the right to believe or not believe. Don't let anyone turn America's story into a theocracy. If that matters to you, go to ffr. us/religion or text religion to 511511 to join or learn more. Go to ffr. us/religion or text religion to 511511. Now, it's about deciding what kind of country we want to be. Text religion to 511511 today. Text

27:45 fees may apply. You know, you got to the end of to the what you said, what your dad said. Well, I'll let you say. What was the advice that your dad gave you when you were growing up in Hawaii? >> Oh, yeah. So, my grandfather was uh from an immigrant family uh from uh Eastern Europe. And like many immigrant families that you give you give their kids the the talk which is you know this country took us in and we owe it everything and and uh you know you you need to work hard for your country don't complain and the country will take care of you and I took that as an article of faith and I got to live it where you know I transitioned at CIA I became the first officer to successfully transition and stay And the country took care of me.

28:33 You know, I got to be Mike Pence's PD briefer and the country took care of me. And you know, I really thought that that fundamental principle would hold. And it just it just has failed. And so we're we're in a in a dangerous time now. And I I couldn't continue to serve if it meant I couldn't tell my story. You know, I've I've lived in this parallel universe for the last several six years where you know, Mike Pence had a gay trans PB briefer and no one cared. And you know, I and I kept it to myself. It was me me and several hundred other CIA officers, all who knew this, you know, and that was just the deal. That was the bargain. We kept politics away from the war.

29:18 >> Have you heard from him, Mike Pence? >> No. Yeah. >> No, the last time I met uh which I write about in the piece was actually the the meeting in his office after January 6th. He had called all of his previous briefers back for a farewell. Uh so uh just me and a few other people that had worked for him um over the course of the the term and we're all gathering around describing to him what this experience had meant for us. You know, we're just a few feet from the Oval Office down the hall. And when it got to me, and it was it it was just a week after January 6th, I I'm tearing up and I said, you know, sir, what you did last week, I've never been more proud to have served you. And it it you know he had done his duty

30:06 to the country and certified the election of his opponent you know which is a vast vastly greater thing than me you know briefing him but it felt like we had all honored our oaths and I you know it was a very important moment to me and he said that you know thank you that means a lot to me. >> There were two other strings in the article I wanted to ask you about just curiosity was peaked. So Loomer comes for you, right? Like the first 160 or 500 and then Loomer is posting and saying, "Oh, there's a transgender whatever at the CIA and then and NSC. They should be fired. They should be kicked out." Do you ever figure out how she knew? I mean, you were an intelligence officer. >> Good, good point. Failed. Another failure of mine. Um,

30:53 >> come on. That's a joke. >> No, I I I I never have. But what here's what I know, right? Laura Loomer doesn't sit in the situation room. She doesn't get invited into the Oval Office. She doesn't sneak onto the compound and get to the president with a list of names of people to fire. I know that the other people that were sacked that into sent sent away after that that day. It was like April 2nd of 2025. almost all of them are like rock ribbed Republicans, people with impeccable uh credentials, but apparently not extremist enough for the administration. So, someone someone you can't just walk onto the compound by yourself. Um, so someone decided that whether it was me or the others that

31:40 calling a a right-wing provocator in influencer on the internet was the right way to get rid of us. That was really hurtful in in in the purest sense that like that's just not who we are as as a country and I just couldn't believe that this was happening and it was another sign that we'd crossed into some some really dangerous new place. >> Yeah. Just I mean it's not who we were. I think uh to your back to your grandfather's point, I just think things have changed unfortunately in this administration. It's going to be worked to change it back. The other thing that you said was interesting that's well I guess probably not going to be helpful anymore. I'm sorry. I was trying to end on a helpful note, but um uh you'd written anonymously uh a couple years ago about your journey being a CIA officer and you wrote

32:27 something interesting about how you thought that your transition helped you and made you a better officer and I wanted to hear more about that. >> I think in a number of ways. I mean, for one thing, this enormous weight, this this this like a cloud hanging over me was finally lifted. Um, I often describe it like, you know, if you discover you need glasses for the first time and you're like, what did why did no one tell me about this? You know, the world is filled with color and, you know, crisp and wonderful. >> And so, it had been this this enormous drag on me that had gotten worse and worse and worse. And um once it was lifted, my life just became this new great and wonderful thing, just getting

33:14 to be myself. And that was the first and foremost thing. But you know, there were other experiences with it. You know, being an immigrant across the gender divide, you learn a few things about the workplace. And uh you you you start getting targeted on your your uh you know, algorithm with yogurt ads and and fertility treatments and things like that. But it, you know, I I learned a lot about how the other 50% of the population uh lives and it was for an analyst, it was quite eye opening and I think it helped me examine a lot of my assumptions that that made me a a better analyst. >> Yeah, it was cool moment you mentioned where it's like younger people would come up to you and talk about how that essay you'd written pseudonymously, it kind of like inspired them to go into this kind of work like not knowing that they were talking to the author. >> Yeah. Um right. So you you're

34:00 referencing the piece I wrote after my transition. Um CIA in our in our effort to recruit and to show that diversity would would uh strengthen the agency asked me to do a a uh interviews and and to do in pseudonym uh so I could keep serving as CIA officer and to and I decided to write these pieces uh in the Atlantic where I talked about my journey because we wanted to send the message to young Americans that it's safe. You can join. We need you. you can serve your country and have this great wonderful life. And one of the reasons why it was so important for me to write this now was that these pieces were still out there. Um, >> and it's not true anymore. >> And several people had had come to me

34:46 who had joined CIA subsequent to those uh to those pieces saying that they had joined because of them. And you know what? A couple of those people were fired by this administration. And that betrayal I feel deeply. And I wanted the chance to tell you their story and correct the record. And you know I when I had transitioned I had had been given enormous assistance by older trans people that that showed me the path toward finding myself and and helped me in my darkest days. And but their price that they had asked me uh you know in in return was to pay it forward that I would not disappear which many trans

35:31 people do. It's perfectly understandable. You're trying to just be normal. And they had told me I I I couldn't do that. And so part of that was every year I would come out with with a you know you're not alone letter to my colleagues. I wrote those pieces in in 2017 so that people would know where they're here. And now with this piece, like I don't I don't know how much more out I could possibly be. But the the bottom line is is that someone like me was able to to have a wonderful and great life and have a family and work in the White House twice. And so whatever arguments there are about our unfitness for positions of honor and are just wrong. And I would be damned if another generation would grow up like I did and not know that someone like them

36:19 could have a life like the one I've lived. And so I was very happy to get to to do that and set the record straight. >> Me too. How's your family? How's your wife? >> They're okay. It's not been >> It's got to be hard. >> Yeah, it is. It's been very hard. It's a scary time for all of us. Um, you know, I wrote in the piece that that, you know, the the White House and its online mob could come for me. And I I know that's I know that's possible, but >> it is possible. They're all a bunch of cowards. They were cowards for firing you, and they're going to be cowards when they come at you from behind your keyboard. So, I want you to know there's an unbelievable amount of people that are supporting you as well. I I heard from so many people about your piece um uh who reached out to me appropo of not

37:04 not knowing we're going to be talking or anything and so it has really resonated and if there's anything that you or the family need from a support standpoint you know where to come. Okay. >> I appreciate it Tim. Thank you so much. >> I hate these people so much too by the way. You have no idea how much I hate them. And I I really admire um the grace and restraint uh that you've shown because let me tell you ah I I I'll I'll I'll guess I'll handle the hate fire for you in the meantime. All right. >> Thank you. >> Okay. Um Julia Curley, appreciate you so much for taking the time to come to talk to us and uh stay in touch. Okay. >> It's my pleasure.