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    • Rogan and Trump talk about aliens and North Korea in extensive interview
    Michigan

    Rogan and Trump talk about aliens and North Korea in extensive interview

    Caradoc Wyn Posted on

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    This story has been updated to add additional context.

    Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump recorded a nearly three-hour interview with mega-podcaster Joe Rogan on Friday in which he discussed everything from extraterrestrial aliens and life on Mars to election interference and foreign policy.

    Just days before the presidential election, Trump’s appearance on “The Joe Rogan Experience” marks a portion of his campaign aimed at young, undecided male voters. Rogan’s show is Spotify’s top podcast with 14.5 million followers. According to a 2026 YouGov poll, more than 80% of Rogan’s listeners are male and 56% are under 35 years old.

    Throughout the interview, Trump tried to woo key demographics with references to the Ultimate Fighting Championship, mentions of his sense of humor and plans to eliminate taxes.

    Rogan rarely pressed Trump with tough questions about his record during the interview, at one point telling the former president, “I love the idea of ​​you working with Robert Kennedy.”

    Rogan signaled his support for Kennedy’s presidential campaign when he was running as an independent. Kennedy dropped out and endorsed Trump earlier this year.

    Vice President Kamala Harris discussed appearing on Rogan’s podcast, but a spokeswoman for her campaign said that wasn’t possible due to scheduling constraints. Rogan told Trump he still believed Harris could appear on the show.

    Here’s a breakdown of some key moments and key takeaways from Trump’s lengthy conversation with Rogan.

    Are there aliens?

    Rogan asked Trump if he had received any information about alien life during his presidency. Trump said he interviewed pilots who said they saw strange objects in the air.

    “There’s no reason not to believe that Mars and all these planets don’t have life,” Trump said. Rogan somewhat disagreed, arguing that the U.S. has stationed probes and rovers on the surface of Mars for decades. So far, scientists have found no direct evidence of life on the Red Planet.

    “I don’t think there’s life there,” Rogan said, to which Trump replied, “Well, maybe it’s a life we ​​don’t know, but maybe it’s a different kind of life.”

    The Pentagon released a 63-page report earlier this year concluding that there was no evidence of aliens or alien technology on Earth. The report found that there was no reason to believe that the U.S. government was concealing information about aliens.

    “Enemy from within” vs. Kim Jong Un

    Trump reiterated concerns that the country’s “enemy from within” posed a more dangerous threat than foreign governments – this time talking about North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un.

    “I got along great with him,” Trump told Rogan during the interview. Trump was the first president ever to set foot in North Korea.

    “I tell people: I think we have a bigger problem with the enemy from within. And it drives them crazy when I use that term. But we have an enemy within,” Trump said later.

    Trump has previously used the phrase “enemy within” in reference to his political opponents, including former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Rep. Adam Schiff of California, who is running for Senate.

    A suggestion to replace Income tax with tariffs

    Rogan and Trump touched on several political topics during the interview, including taxes and the environment.

    In one instance, Rogan asked Trump whether he was serious about his proposal to eliminate income taxes and replace them with tariffs.

    Trump replied: “Sure, why not?”

    Trump has advocated for a return to the pre-1909 era, when there was no federal income tax. On the podcast with Rogan, he praised former President William McKinley for signing a law in 1890 that raised tariffs, the tax rate on foreign goods, to around 49%.

    Some economists attribute McKinley’s tariffs to plunging the U.S. government into a deficit and depression a few years later, in 1893.

    Today, replacing the income tax with tariff policy could significantly increase the current federal deficit. The federal government collected nearly $2.18 trillion in income taxes in 2023, accounting for about 49% of its total revenue. Trump’s tariffs are expected to raise around $300 billion annually – about nine times less than income tax revenue.

    Trump repeats 2020 election denial

    At one point in the interview, Rogan repeated Trump’s claims that there were “a lot of crooked things” in the 2020 presidential election. He asked Trump: “How do you think you were robbed?” Everyone always interrupts you.”

    Initially, Trump said he would prefer to have the conversation “some other time” and that he would bring “so many different papers” to support his arguments. But when Rogan pressed him for examples of election interference, Trump repeated debunked claims of unlawful actions by state governments and fraud.

    Rogan asked whether Trump ever planned to present evidence of interference, but the conversation quickly changed and became a discussion about Hunter Biden, who was convicted of three serious crimes in his federal weapons trial.

    Trump and the podcast host later discussed unfounded concerns about mail-in voting vulnerabilities and the security of voting machines.

    “Let’s talk about the potential vulnerabilities in elections and voter fraud. One of them is mail-in ballots. The other possibility is that someone can break into voting machines,” Rogan said.

    The use of mail-in voting has increased since the 1980s and expanded during the COVID-19 pandemic. Voter fraud by mail is rare. All mail-in ballots are checked and counted and are assigned to an eligible voter.

    Voting machines have also been used for decades. Older machines have raised concerns about hacking, although election officials say such a feat would be difficult.

    Doubling down on criticism of Kelly, Bolton

    Trump told Rogan that the “biggest mistake” he made during his presidency was appointing officials he “shouldn’t have chosen” for roles in the White House and his Cabinet.

    Trump was talking about John Kelly, his former chief of staff and former homeland security secretary, and John Bolton, Trump’s former national security adviser.

    Kelly said in interviews with The New York Times that Trump displayed fascist tendencies and confirmed reports that Trump had spoken positively about Adolf Hitler. Kelly told the Times that Trump “said more than once, ‘You know, Hitler did some good things, too.'”

    Bolton said Trump poses “dangers” if he is elected president again.

    Rogan downplayed reports of Trump’s Hitler comments during the interview.

    He told Trump: “They kept calling you this terrible threat to democracy and Hitler. You kept saying you would be a dictator, ignoring the fact that you were not a dictator in the four years you were actually president.”

    Trump said he was “the opposite of a dictator.”

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    Caradoc Wyn
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