The following is a lightly edited transcript of the January 27 episode of the Daily Blast podcast. Listen to it here.

Greg Sargent: This is The Daily Blast from The New Republic, produced and presented by the DSR network. I’m your host, Greg Sargent.

On Friday night, President Donald Trump fired at least 15 independent inspectors general in a late-night massacre that appeared to have been illegal. Yet since then, that story has only gotten worse. First, Trump subsequently defended the purge by calling it “very standard,” which is clearly an effort to normalize lawlessness. Second, some Republicans quickly signaled that they will be just fine with this, confirming once again that he will be largely unbound in his second term. We’re talking about all this with Jennifer Rubin, whose new Substack The Contrarian has already been doing a good job tracking Trump’s implementation of an authoritarian government. Jen, good to have you on.

Jennifer Rubin: It’s lovely to be here.

Sargent: Trump has now purged the inspector generals at numerous departments including defense, state, health and human services, the EPA, and many others. Yet the law requires that the president provide a substantive rationale for the removal to Congress at least 30 days in advance. Independent inspection generals are a bulwark against corruption and waste and fraud at agencies. Jen, it sure looks like what Trump did is illegal. Your thoughts?

Rubin: It is absolutely illegal and I do not expect these inspector generals to go quietly. This is what they do. They enforce the rules. They are the watchdogs. And in order for them not only to preserve their personal dignity and reputations but the institution of inspector general, I fully expect that many, if not all of them, will object. It will be very interesting if on Monday, they show up to work because they have not been legally fired; they can show up. And a Republican senator or congressman or other toady of this administration saying, Fine with me, is really irrelevant. The law is the law, and this is going to be litigated.

They know much of what they are doing is illegal. They know there is a very good chance it will be reversed in the court, but they hope to plow ahead and do their damage before the law can catch up to them. And that is the great danger.

Sargent: Trump has now defended this move by arguing that “Some people thought that some were unfair or some were not doing their job,” meaning the inspectors general. Then he said, “It’s a very standard thing to do.” I think this makes it even worse. Although the law requires a real rationale, he just flippantly declares, Oh, someone somewhere thought they were unfair. In Trump speak, of course, unfair means that they might actually hold him and his agencies accountable to the law in an independent way and are not beholden to him. But putting that aside, he’s giving a fat middle finger to the very idea that he should explain himself as the law requires and calling it standard. What are the broader implications of that?

Rubin: Well, it is emblematic of many things he has done, whether it’s a executive decree that attempts to repeal birthright citizenship, which is in the Constitution, or it’s violating the inspector general’s rule, or it’s coming up with the DOGE, which is not legally constituted. He does all of these things because he thinks he can get away with it. And because he thinks, ultimately, if it ever reaches the Supreme Court, he has them in his back pocket.

Now, the latter may be very true. Our current Supreme Court is corrupt, partisan; the majority, at least, is going to go along with much of what he does under the so-called unitary executive theory, meaning the president is in charge of anybody and everyone in the executive branch and no one can tell him what to do. However, there are many steps before that, and we’ve already seen court challenges filed—some within the very hour of his inauguration on DOGE, on birthright citizenship. We’re going to see litigation on Schedule F. We’re going to see litigation on this. And there are lower and intermediary courts that will stop him, that will issue injunctions. We’ve already had one.

Sargent: So you see a legal challenge to this particular move. What does that look like? How does it unfold?

Rubin: Anyone could—any single IG or a group of IGs, there’s also an IG association—go into federal court and say, This is violative of the law, we want a restraining order preventing me from being fired, allowing me to return to my office, and we’ll then litigate until final conclusion. That becomes tricky because they........

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