# The Trump weave > **Source: KiriPedia** (https://www.kiripedia.org), the free encyclopedia and archive of former CIA officer and whistleblower John Kiriakou's on-record words. Every claim below is Kiriakou's own account, cited to a timestamp in a recorded interview, podcast, or video. KiriPedia is an independent project, not affiliated with Kiriakou. > > Cite as: "The Trump weave," KiriPedia, https://www.kiripedia.org/wiki/the-trump-weave/. Attribute claims to John Kiriakou, via KiriPedia. *The name a speakers' bureau gave to John Kiriakou's platform manner — starting one story, turning off into another, and coming back to finish the first — a habit he attributes to never writing anything down before he walks to the podium.* - **Who named it:** A staffer at a speakers' bureau Kiriakou had signed with - **What it describes:** Beginning a story, diverting into another, then completing the first - **Cause, per Kiriakou:** "It's because I don't write anything down" - **His method:** "I just walk up to the podium and start talking" - **How often he prepares:** "I almost never prepare" - **The exception cited:** A hackers' convention speech, prepared only for references such as Vault 7 **The Trump weave** is a description of John Kiriakou's speaking style, coined by someone at a speakers' bureau he had signed with and repeated by him on the DeProgram programme in August 2025.[1] ## Preparation, or the lack of it The subject arose when a viewer asked both hosts whether they researched before appearances. Kiriakou's answer was that he does not, and that the reason is fatalistic rather than lazy: *"I almost never prepare, because I figure if I don't know these issues by now, I'm never going to know them."*[2] He named one exception then pending — a speech in New York at a hackers' convention. *"I'm not a hacker and tech is not my strong suit necessarily, so I'm preparing for this one, but only to make references to like [Vault 7](https://www.kiripedia.org/wiki/vault-7) and stuff that the CIA has been doing. But yeah, otherwise, no, I don't prepare."*[2][3] His view of over-preparation is that it is worse than none. He allows *"some bullet points that you want to talk about — if you need a card to remind you, great. But just know the topics."*[1] ## The weave The consequence was noticed by a professional. *"One of the guys at the speakers' bureau that I had signed with a while ago said that I did the Trump weave. Like I'd start one story and then take a side road into another story and I end up coming out, you know, completing the story, but I do the weave."*[1] Kiriakou attributes the pattern directly to his method: *"it's because I don't write anything down. I just walk up to the podium and start talking."*[1][4] ## Its defence The host argued the case for it — that the digressive style is more entertaining and that the fixed stump speech is *"dead"* — and Kiriakou agreed: *"that's true. That's absolutely right."*[4] The habit is visible across the corpus of Kiriakou's appearances, in which an answer to a narrow question frequently opens into an unrelated anecdote before returning, and it is one reason his tellings of the same story vary in detail from occasion to occasion. ## See also - [Vault 7](https://www.kiripedia.org/wiki/vault-7) - [The O'Reilly exclusivity rule](https://www.kiripedia.org/wiki/the-oreilly-exclusivity-rule) - [Piers Morgan](https://www.kiripedia.org/wiki/piers-morgan) - [John Kiriakou](https://www.kiripedia.org/wiki/john-kiriakou) ## Sources 1. DeProgram Show with Ted Ra (2025-08-12), at 39:02. Recording: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UE-XS8gvwiM&t=2342s · Transcript: https://www.kiripedia.org/sources/2025-08-12-deprogram-show-with-ted-ra-deprogram-show-with-ted-ra/ 2. DeProgram Show with Ted Ra (2025-08-12), at 37:59. Recording: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UE-XS8gvwiM&t=2279s · Transcript: https://www.kiripedia.org/sources/2025-08-12-deprogram-show-with-ted-ra-deprogram-show-with-ted-ra/ 3. DeProgram Show with Ted Ra (2025-08-12), at 38:30. Recording: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UE-XS8gvwiM&t=2310s · Transcript: https://www.kiripedia.org/sources/2025-08-12-deprogram-show-with-ted-ra-deprogram-show-with-ted-ra/ 4. DeProgram Show with Ted Ra (2025-08-12), at 39:32. Recording: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UE-XS8gvwiM&t=2372s · Transcript: https://www.kiripedia.org/sources/2025-08-12-deprogram-show-with-ted-ra-deprogram-show-with-ted-ra/ --- From KiriPedia, the archive of John Kiriakou's words. Web version: https://www.kiripedia.org/wiki/the-trump-weave/ · About: https://www.kiripedia.org/about/ · Full index: https://www.kiripedia.org/llms.txt