July 7, 2025 • 31 mins
Guest hosts Peter Schweizer and Eric Eggers break down the biggest headlines you missed over the holiday weekend. In this explosive hour, they expose the DOJ’s claim that there is “no Epstein client list” despite overwhelming financial evidence. Plus, they highlight the devastating Texas flash floods and share the incredible story of Coast Guard Petty Officer Scott Ruskin, who rescued 165 people. Tune in as Schweizer and Eggers demand answers and challenge the media’s narrative on Epstein, accountability, and government transparency.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Well, if you're expecting a slow weekend over the Fourth
of July celebration with very little news, you are very
disappointed because there was so much going on. We're going
to cover it today. I'm certainly not Sean. I am
Peter Schweitzer, four time number one New York Times bestselling
author investigative journalists, and I'm covering today for Sean along
with my co host and podcast partner Eric Eggers. Eric,
(00:23):
how are you?
Speaker 2 (00:24):
I'm excellent. And it's an honor to be talking to
Sean Handy's radio audience. You know, they played the best
of Sean Handy Show on Thursday and Friday for the
holiday weekend. And I like to imagine a world in
which there are people in the audience who only get
their news from Sean Handy's radio show, so they have
no idea what happened since Sewn signed off on Wednesday afternoon.
And if you're one of those people, you've missed a lot,
(00:46):
and we're here to help you understand just how much
has changed in the six days since you've heard a
live radio program.
Speaker 1 (00:53):
Yeah, well, we've got tragedy in Texas, this horrific story
where a river rose twenty six feet and forty five minutes.
It's at least one hundred people dead. We're going to
cover that, and we're going to look at the heroics
that have taken place in Texas. The Big Beautiful Bill
was signed. This legislation, which passed the House by only
two votes and pasted the Senate with the help of JD. Vance,
(01:15):
was signed by President Trump on July fourth, as he promised,
as he said he would, we have the Epstein files
bombshell released on Sunday night. Talk about a slow news time,
the FBIDOJ concluding there was no suicide, there was no
client list, and there was no extortion. We're going to
cover those and lots of other stories that are taking
(01:36):
place right now.
Speaker 2 (01:37):
No, it's absolutely I mean, the Epstein news is massive
and a lot of people are reacting to it. It
doesn't impact the audience's life, right like the weather or not.
There will be additional charges brought in the case of
Jeffrey Epstein. Won't fundamentally change your life. It won't fundamentally
change in my life, but it does represent a major
downbeat on what was I think a very positive era
(02:00):
for President Trump. Because a lot of people voted for
Donald Trump because they were tired of being lied to
by the previous administration. Right, they were lied to left
and right by Joe Biden and his media allies. And
you know Jake Tappers now lying to us about how
much other people were lying to us in that book.
And so what we now know is that we were told, hey,
we have somebody who they want to hold people accountable
(02:21):
and they want to do the right thing. And when
the Department of Justice releases a memo that says this
systematic review we've conducted revealed no incriminating client list, no
credible evidence that Epstein blackmailed prominent individuals, and also no
evidence that predit could predicate an investigation against uncharged third parties,
(02:43):
it leads a lot of people to conclude that the
opposite's happening, that there are in fact other things being
covered up.
Speaker 1 (02:48):
Yeah, that's exactly right. We're gonna have a guest at
the bottom of the hour to talk about the situation
in Texas, the chief spokesman for the Coastguard, and we
have Jeffrey Epstein's lawyer once he was incarcerated, is going
to be joining us in the next hour to talk
about the crisis there. But here's the thing that I
think is sort of misleading or confusing about the Jeffrey
(03:10):
Epstein claims by DOJNFBI, and what they're saying could very
well and probably is technically true that there is no
client list. There's no file that they have that says
client list. But the problem is, we know a couple
of things. Number One, we know that Jeffrey Epstein was
involved in human trafficking. Why did we know this? Well,
(03:33):
he killed himself in twenty nineteen, at least that's what
is said, whether he was killed by somebody else's opener debate.
JP Morgan notified the Treasury Department that more than one
billion with a B in transactions related to quote human
trafficking by Epstein had gone through their accounts over the
past sixteen years. JP Morgan agreed in July of twenty
(03:56):
nineteen to pay two hundred and ninety million dollars two
victims of Epstein to settle that lawsuit. So here's the question.
There's not a client list according to the DOJ and FBI,
but there are clients. There have to be clients. I mean,
there's no way that Jeffrey Epstein himself is responsible for,
(04:18):
you know, the human trafficking. He is a singular person.
Speaker 2 (04:21):
Jeffrey Epstein did fund a nonprofit, but the billion dollars
for sex trafficking was not it. So there were other
people involved in this enterprise. And what you just said
is really important. I think we have to put that
in the larger context. So, by the way, today is
July seventh. Jeffrey Epstein was arrested six years ago yesterday
on July the sixth, and managed to survive for a
(04:43):
little over a month until August tenth to twenty nineteen,
which cases life ended. But I think the key thing
there is so he gets arrested, and then after he
is arrested JP Morgan, with whom he did much business,
like a billion dollars worth of business, they go to
and they're being suon, but different people. They go to
the United States government and they have flagged these transactions
(05:04):
and they said, hey, we believe these transactions may be
connected to criminal activity, specifically related to sex trafficking, and
they turn them over. So when people say we have
no evidence of a client list, we know that as
six years ago they were given financial transactions presumably on
behalf of clients, right, And so I think that's one
(05:26):
of the things that people find difficult to swallow with
this story, not the least of which is and we're
going to hear sound from Caroline Levit, who was asked
about this by Steve Doocy later on. But what what
we were told is, you know, for years, we're told
by Dan Bongino, Cash, Mattel, Pam Bondi. We have seen
the files. They're sitting on our desk, and so for
(05:48):
now us to be told the opposite seems awry.
Speaker 1 (05:52):
It does. And also there's a pattern here. I mean,
you did some very interesting research you were sharing with
me earlier. I mean, the thing that is so appalling
about Epstein is not only the fact of no, we
know what he did and what he did to these
young women and other people. We know that he has
had kick gloves in terms of the way that law
enforcement has dealt with him going back more than twenty years.
(06:15):
It seems that this guy is untouchable. We don't know why.
It could just be he's a rich guy and he
has friends in right places, but this goes back twenty
years in the state of Florida.
Speaker 2 (06:24):
Yeah, I sort of hate this story because I tried
to stay away from this door. I tried to stay
away from the P Diddy tribe because I want to
think I have better things to do with my life
and do, and no I don't. Apparently I don't because
now on national radio we're discussing this, and unfortunately there's
a P Didty connection to this, which is unbelievable, involving
James Comey's daughter. But basically, in two thousand and five,
(06:45):
the Palm Beach Police Department did a thirteen month uninvested
undercover investigation in which that led to a fifty three
page indictment by the FBI in two thousand and seven.
So they had the goods, but those goods were not
good enough to get him a real prison sentence. Alexander Acosta,
who is then the US Attorney for the Southern District
of Florida, agrees to a plea deal which essentially grants
(07:07):
immunity from all federal criminal charges to Epstein and also
gets him only eighteen months in jail, which he only
served thirteen months, which six days a week, was on
work release for sixteen hours a day, so like he's
like a hotel. The easiest gig you could get yeah, okay,
And it.
Speaker 1 (07:23):
Was a fifty three page indictmond, multiple counts of relationships
with underage women, human trap, all that kind of stuff,
and they slap him on the wrist.
Speaker 2 (07:33):
Slap him on the wrist. So then he gets out,
he goes to New York, and then in New York,
because of his conviction or the plea deal, he does
have to register as a sex offender. But the Manhattan DA,
despite what we now know is graphic and detailed evidence,
argues for him to be registered as a low risk
sex offender in twenty eleven. So once again he's getting
the easiest possible treatment. And so, you know, so I
(07:57):
think that's the context. So then he gets arrested. And
after he's arrested, Marine Comy, who was the daughter of
fired FBI director James Comy, was one of the prosecutors.
And then she was just involved in the Panitty case.
That's the connection there, and so and because of when
he's arrested, everyone's like, oh man, this guy's really bad.
So the labor secretary who alex Acosta, who had given
him the plea deal in Florida, is now a labor
(08:19):
secretary under Donal Trump, he has to resign in disgrace because,
oh man, you were one of the people who took
it easy on him. So fast forward to today, and
we're now being told none of the third parties are
going to see any additional action on behalf of justice
or accountability. And it's impossible not to put it in
this context. And it does seem like, for whatever reason,
(08:40):
when we're being told there's nothing to see here, we've
been told that consistently and it just seems wrong.
Speaker 1 (08:45):
Yeah, it does. I mean, we have a history here
where authorities seem to go soft on Epstein for no
particular reason. And then you have this larger issue of
what the information is and what basically we're getting right
now from from Pan Bondi and Cash Mattel and Dan
Bongino is just take our word for it, which is
(09:05):
the problem. That is what we were told by previous administrations.
There's no real clarity here in the statement that they
released or in the memo where they said that that
you know, there is no cover up, there is no problem.
They acknowledged that there were one thousand victims, one thousand
victims by Jeffrey Epstein, And what do we know at
this point, we know that the only person that's actually
(09:27):
been prosecuted and gone to jail is Gisel Maxwell. She's
the only one that was prosecuted and went to jail.
And all the other questions that swirl around what was
his relationship with all these other powerful people? We know that,
you know, Bill Gates and his ex wife, she cited
his relationship with Epstein is one of the reasons she
wanted to separate and ultimately divorce from Bill Gates. But
(09:50):
there's no clarity there, and based on the history, it's
fair to ask the question, why is there not greater
transparency here? And just tell us take our word for it.
We've looked at it. You can trust us. People are
so suspicious they're not prepared to do that anymore.
Speaker 2 (10:06):
Does I mean you mentioned a powerful name, Bill Gates. Yeah,
you know, he's very influential in many different aspects of society.
Do you feel like that there's a relationship between I mean,
do you feel like he's breathing a sigh of relief today?
People like him who have been let's call it Epstein adjacent, right,
and that we are now told no one that is
(10:28):
Epstein adjacent is going to face additional charges because we
don't have evidence of that.
Speaker 1 (10:31):
Yeah, we obviously do not know what Bill Gates's relationship
was with Epstein anything related to the island. What we
do know is that his wife now ex wife, was
extremely bothered by it, you know. And this is the
same question you have with mister Wexler, you know, the
the fashion guy who also did deals with Epstein. The
(10:51):
question is why do these really super rich guys have
to deal with a guy like Epstein. Epstein, sure he could,
he could make some money doing a few things, but
if you're Bill Gates, you can get investment help with
anybody in the world. And what we also know about
Bill Gates is that at least the allegation was made
that Epstein did try to blackmail Bill Gates. Reportedly Bill
(11:14):
Gates was having a relationship with I think it's a
bridge player, some kind of card player and those areas.
And what we know is that at least the allegation
is is that Epstein threatened to Gates that he was
going to expose it if Gates did not invest in
a fund that he was setting up in JP Morgan.
(11:35):
So there's evidence on these things. We don't know the relationship.
We don't know if any of these people was involved.
But again it's the lack of transparency. It's the lack
of releasing sort of any of the material. Nobody wants
to see the nasty videos. But you know, just in
terms of these financial transactions, eight billion dollars in transactions
that are that are deemed to be by JP Morgan
(11:58):
and by federal law enforcement related to human trafficking, who
are those transactions with? Were they certain flights of airplanes
that he was paying for? Who was on those planes?
None of those questions seem to be asked by anybody
in Washington.
Speaker 2 (12:10):
Yeah, the lack of curiosity does appear to be troubling.
That's one thing we'll continue to follow. We will speak
to former Epstein attorney and former Donald Trump attorney David
Showan at the top of the four o'clock hour about this.
We've got a lot more questions. We'll hear reaction from
the White House, but we've got a lot more to cover.
It's a massive weekend.
Speaker 3 (12:27):
You heard.
Speaker 2 (12:27):
We were grateful to talk to you a spokesporus from
the Coast Guard to get an update on the recovery
efforts in Texas. We're going to talk to Wisconsin Senator
Ron Johnson to find out what all went on in
the negotiations that led to the passage of the Big
Beautiful Bill. And we'll also hear coming up next from
somebody who tries to conflate the two. He's Peter Schweizer.
I'm Eric Eggers. We are filling in for Sean Handy.
(12:48):
It's our pleasure to be with you today on a
very busy and a very newsy Monday. We right back
after this.
Speaker 1 (12:54):
Hi, It's Peter Schweizer. I'm here with Eric Eggers. We
are filling in for Sean. Joined the conversation one eight
hundred and ninety four to one, Sean win eight one
hundred and nine to four one Sean. So a lot
going on in the news over the weekend. We're going
to dissect a lot of it. You would think that
these stories don't really have a lot in common, but
in fact, according to at least Larry Summers, the former
president of Harvard University, they do. Listen to what he
(13:15):
said about the tragedy in Texas and the Big Beautiful
Bill that was signed into law by Donald Trump on
July the fourth.
Speaker 4 (13:22):
George, just to start with what your people have been
describing is the biggest cut in the American safety net
in history. The Yale Budget Lab estimates that it will
kill over ten years, one hundred thousand people.
Speaker 5 (13:40):
That is two thousand days of death like we've seen
in Texas this weekend. In my seventy years, I've never
been as embarrassed for my country on July fourth.
Speaker 1 (13:54):
Oh boy, And he said this before, right in twenty seventeen,
he made similar statements involving the tax cut that Donald
Trump passed at that time. So he has a record
of being wrong, but also politicizing this tragedy in such
a way is just terrible.
Speaker 2 (14:10):
As it's terrible, it's irresponsible, and you know, shame on
George Stephanopolis and ABC News for you know, it's not
the first time they've aired irresponsible information. But I would say,
you know, look, it's what's happened in Texas the tragedy.
Eighty one people are dead so far included I think
it's twenty seven children from this camp. And we're going
to get an update on what's going on here on
(14:30):
the other side of this break. But you know, I
remember last year we had unexpected flooding in North Carolina.
Over one hundred people died there. I believe the death
tolls now up to ninety four people in Texas now.
But still, the point is, these are acts of God,
these are tragedies. They happen. No one blamed Joe Biden
when they happened last year in terms of a lack
of funding for it, right, And so for Larry Summers
(14:53):
to suggest that the sign of one bill is going
to lead to more tragedy, I think is horrendous.
Speaker 1 (14:58):
Well, and all these people have terrible track records. Let's
look back in twenty seventeen, when the Trump administration also
instituted reforms in this area. The Congression Budget Office claimed
that the changes would get rid of healthcare coverage for
sixteen million people. That was the claim. Two years later
(15:18):
they said, well, no, it's actually going to be only
eight million. By twenty twenty, the New York Times was
reporting that actually it had no effect whatsoever. So don't
believe the scare, don't believe the hype. This is the
way they operate.
Speaker 2 (15:32):
It is the way they operate. And that's one of
the reasons why programs like this and our podcast, The
Drill Down are so important. Because we want to give you,
the American people, the truth you deserve at every turn.
You can find our podcast at the drill Down dot
com and you can hear more Sean Handy show. Right
on the outside of this break, he's Peter Schweizer. I
Americ Eggers. We're back with a spokesperson from the Coastguard
right after this.
Speaker 1 (15:51):
Hey, it's Peter Schweizer. That' seric Eggers. We're filling it for.
Sean joined the conversation one eight hundred nine to four
to one Sean one eight hundred ninety four one Sean
tragedy in Texas. They're now saying that the death toll
is going to surpass one hundred. Brings out the worst
sometimes in people, it also brings out the best in people,
the heroism. In particular. You've got this Coastguard Petty Officer
(16:14):
Scott Ruskin, who rescued I mean, this is eye popping
to me, one hundred and sixty five people from the
floodwaters of Texas. He may add to that before it's over,
but we want to play this clip about the interview
that he gave describing what he's done, and then we're
going to have a conversation with Lieutenant Commander Steve Roth,
who's the chief of Media Relations for the Coastguard, to
(16:35):
give us an update on what's going on in Texas
and a little bit more about this fine man from
New Jersey who has saved so many lives. But listen
to this interview that he gave.
Speaker 6 (16:45):
The Coastguard launched us and decided to send a rescue
crew from Airstation Corpus Christie at about six thirty seven
am on Friday, the fourth of July. I just happen
to be on the d crew with Ian Hopper, Blair
ruche wor Seth Reeves, some of our crew members in
the Coast Guard, and yeah, they sent us out. We
kind of encountered some pretty serious weather, some of the
worst flying we've ever dealt with.
Speaker 2 (17:05):
Personally.
Speaker 6 (17:06):
It took us, you know, which should have been an
hour flight, probably took us about seven or eight just
to get into the landing zone. Once made about four
different approaches trying to get in. We were able to
get on get them boots on the ground with the
Air National Guard, Department of Public Safety for Texas Game Wardens,
and we decided to leave me on scene at Camp
mystic that was kind of our main triage site we
were trying to help out with, and we decide, hey,
(17:27):
if we leave the rescue summer on scene, we'll have
more space in our dolphin MH sixty five. So based
on that I got on scene boots on the ground,
can't mystic kind of discovered I was the only person
there as far as like first responders go. So yeah,
I had about two hundred kids, mostly all scared, terrified, cold,
having probably the worst day of their life, and I
(17:48):
just kind of need to triage them, get them to
a higher level care and get them, get them off
the flood zone with a lot of the US sixty
Army helicopters.
Speaker 2 (17:57):
So this guy, Scott Ruskin is correctly being hailed as
an American hero. But I, as soon as I heard
this interview, became incredibly curious, like, how is it that
one Coastguard rescue swimmer swims and these details later an
interview up to ten kids and maybe one adult with
them at a time as a swimmer, and so I mean,
(18:18):
how do you get these people to safety? And so
we wanted to reach out to the Coast Guard and
we're excited to have Lieutenant Commander Steve Roth join us now,
Lieutenant Commander Roth, how does that work? Like, just walk
our audience through how the mechanics of how someone as
a swimmer takes multiple people with them. Do they have
stuff connected to them? What kind of flotation devices they
(18:40):
connected to?
Speaker 1 (18:41):
How does that work?
Speaker 4 (18:42):
Sure?
Speaker 3 (18:42):
Yeah, thanks thanks for having me on the show. And
I just want to say the entire Coast Guard our
hearts and our prayers to actually go out to all
the victims of this absolutely terrible tragedy. So in this
particular instance, I think it highlights the really incredible train
our rescue summers get is. He might have mentioned this
is his first case out of rescue swimmer school. And
(19:03):
the interesting thing about this is he wasn't swimming. This
is inland search and rescue. This is urban search and rescue.
When he got there to Camp Mystic, and you know,
these these little girls, these adults have been this is
the first first responder they've seen in eight hours since
it's terrible then in the middle of the night, and
(19:24):
so he was there to really sort of triage them
and make sure that they were getting to two other
landing sites that he set up. I think one on
an archery field and one on a soccer field, so
that the other state and several partners, the Air National Guard,
Texas GPS could get these kids out. So it's actually
(19:45):
not just people think of our rescue swimmers as jumping
in the water, and that's that's not always the case.
We do quite a bit of urban search and rescue,
inland search and rescue, and this is this is a
really incredible example of that work.
Speaker 1 (20:00):
Lieutenant Commander Roth, Are there ongoing operations right now in
volume the Coast Guard? Are you hopeful to maybe find
more people? We're going on now several days, but there
is still always the hope that more people would be found.
What is the Coast Guard doing right now in South Texas?
Speaker 3 (20:15):
Certainly so the Coast Guards continuing to respond to any
tasking from the State of Texas, who's the lead agency.
So we do still have a helicopter there if we
are requested to assist.
Speaker 2 (20:29):
So what have you heard in terms of the conditions
on the ground and would you how would you compare
the conditions on the ground in terms of the flash footing? Now,
how long do the waters stay at these levels? And
you know, what can people expect moving forward.
Speaker 3 (20:45):
So I can't speak to the specifics of that. I
think that's probably a better question for the state of Texas.
What I can say is that the conditions that our
air crew encountered were incredibly dynamic, incredibly dangerous. Like like
id said, it takes them seven eight hours to make
what should have been a one hour flight, and we've
seen throughout this week an increased and sustained risk of
(21:09):
flash flooding in the area. So he put himself in
a really dynamic situation based on weather and the chance
of increased flooding. Unfortunately, I can't speak to what the
current risk is now.
Speaker 1 (21:23):
Well, Luke Tenant, Commander, you guys train of course for
all kinds of different scenarios. I'm still stunned at the
basic fact that apparently, in the middle of the night,
this river rose twenty six feet in forty five minutes.
That's astonishing to me. And I know you're not in
the business of fixing those types of problems, but this
(21:44):
is the kind of scenario that the Coastguard dealt with.
Here you're dealing with other dynamic situations. I understand that
recruiting is up, by the way, there's kind of an
excitement in the last six months about joining the Coast Guard.
So where is a coast Guard in terms of future operations?
Planning for disasters we live in Florida, course, hurricanes or
always something you worry about. What is the Coast Guard doing?
(22:05):
Looking forward?
Speaker 3 (22:08):
So looking forward, you know, we're going to continue to
be extremely proud of the fact that we are America's
first responders for hurricanes, maritime disasters, really any crisis. You know,
here we are in central Texas, not pretty pretty far
from where you traditionally think the Coastguard would operate. We're
going to continue to give you know, people that enlist
(22:28):
and recruit, that train so that if it's their first
case and they need to rescue one hundred and sixty
five people in Central Texas, that they're they're prepared to
do that. Scott will say, you know, I think he
just said, I'm just the dude that was trained to
do this, and I rose raise my right hand. Looking forward,
we're certainly excited about the support and the recognition we've
(22:48):
gotten from the Administration, the Secretary Congress. We're going to
be doing a lot of recapitalization to making sure that
we maintain our agility, our capability, and to be you know,
our motto was literally always ready to be, always ready
to serve the American public in these communities because we
are extremely capable, as I think we've proven in this case,
(23:10):
the ability to fly in these conditions. We've got these
highly trained rescue swimmers. We're gonna we're going to make
sure that we continue to be, you know, some of
the finest first responders in the nation so that we
can we can get down there and continue to do
this stuff.
Speaker 2 (23:24):
So in an urban search and rescue environment, which is
what Scott Ruskin was involved in, he's going, I guess
kind of take us through. So he gets onto the
ground and you knew where the camp was. I heard
him say that they identified Camp Mystic. So everyone that
he encountered were they can you tell us like what
was were they in? Like where were they physically? Were
(23:46):
they in their normal rooms? Had they congregated in an area?
And I guess, like walk us through what that process
is like and how quickly this person had to make
these decisions when literally every second counts.
Speaker 3 (23:59):
You've got to make these decisions instantly. I don't have
the details on exactly where and can't mystic. They dropped
him off. But in a couple of interviews he's mentioned,
you know, all of a sudden, he's got two hundred cold, scared,
exhausted children. This is a group of predominantly little children.
I'm the father of a six year old girl, and
it's like unfathomable to meet with my daughter in the situation.
(24:23):
So just to just to manage that chaos in that situation,
and then not even that, but then to start medically
triaging these people to very very quickly get them to
a waiting helicopter so that they can get to a
higher level of care. But that's that's one thing that
our rescue swimmers and really every member of the Coast
Guard is trained to do. We encounter all kinds of
(24:46):
non traditional situations and you've got to be calm and
cool and confident and ready to make those those life
or death decisions. And that's what's really I think unique
about being a member of the Coast Guard.
Speaker 1 (24:59):
Well, the Channe Commander, Steve Roth, we thank you for
joining us. We appreciate all the good work you were
doing in the Coast Guard is doing as well. People
when they think of people in service, they sometimes forget
about the Coast Guards or don't pay them the attention
that they should. They certainly will. Now we thank you
and appreciate all that the Coast Guard is doing down
in Texas for us in rescuing people, especially these young children.
Speaker 3 (25:23):
Yeah, thanks so much for the opportunity to come on
the show. Appreciate it.
Speaker 2 (25:27):
That's Lieutenant Commander Steve Roth of the United States Coast Guard.
It's a great it's a crazy story. It's a tragedy.
And you know, you and I are both fathers. We
are fathers of daughters. And it's the fact that I
think it's twenty plus children have died, unfortunately, and this
tragedy is horrific, and obviously the death toll continues to mount,
and there's been unfortunately, as you heard from Larry Summers
(25:50):
in the last segment of The New York Times, come
out with stories about oh, they've ignored these warning symbols
and they could have done more, but buried in that
article they talked about the fact that text messages were sent.
But as you noted, it was three in the morning
when the conditions worsened, and they say text messages were ignored, Well,
I mean, how many other alarm systems. Do you want
sometimes strgies happen?
Speaker 1 (26:11):
Yeah, yeah, I mean the thing to me that was
particularly outrageous by the New York Times story is they
alleged that cutbacks by the Trump administration, or the fact
that there are certain positions that have been filled with
the National Weather Service somehow led to an increased death
when the realities are what we said, in forty five minutes,
this river rose twenty six feet. It was in the
(26:32):
middle of the night. I don't know about you. I
mean I basically had my ringer off at night. If
I had been there, I would have been totally caught
off guards. I don't know how you can create a
warning system and there will be opportunities for them to
evaluate come up with greater efficiencies. I think one of
the things that the Trump administration has proposed is more
local control because remember what happened in North Carolina when
(26:55):
the hurricane came through the disaster there was the fact
that it took so long once the tragedy had happened
to actually get support to help the people that were impacted.
In North Carolina. I think we had what one hundred
and twenty died as a result of that. In this
particular case, you had the heroic response from the Coast Guard,
But I'm not sure you can develop a system unless
(27:18):
people are prepared to be wired in twenty four hours
a day. You can develop a weather system for a
scenario that happens like this in the middle of the
night over a course of forty five minutes.
Speaker 6 (27:27):
No.
Speaker 2 (27:27):
In fact, you and I were speaking with someone who
lives in western North Carolina not long ago, and he
was recounting what it was like last year when that happened.
And I think what you heard him say is we
went weeks without hearing from anyone. And in the western
North Carolina mountains, it's a very tight knit community. These
people very self reliant, as they are in Texas. Yes,
but the point is is that there is an appropriate
role for the government to play in search and rescue operations,
(27:49):
which obviously the Coastguard did very well here as well
as the conditions would warrant. And then there is the
ongoing support and that is where the ball was dropped
under the Biden administration's FEMA. And she did a podcast
on our Drill Down podcast about how they sort of
shifted their gaze and started focusing on lots of other
priorities and less about disaster responses. Has happened quite often,
unfortunately under the Biden administration with a number of agencies.
(28:12):
But it is a true story of heroism with Petty
Officer Scott Ruskin. I appreciate I know you do too.
The fact that he's being celebrated and the fact and
the fact that Coast Guard enrollments is up actually speaks
to a larger positive uptick in terms of what's happening
with our national defense systems under the Trump administration.
Speaker 1 (28:28):
Yeah, I think that's right. You're seeing recruitment goals being
met and exceeded in multiple branches. And I think the
fact is somebody that goes into the Coastguard wants to
help people. They want to be involved in real work.
They don't want to be involved in some of the
phony work and the DEI stuff that is so dominating things.
And I think that a lot of the reforms they're
talking about in terms of search and rescue are good.
(28:50):
Local officials know the situation better than anybody, and to
have the FEDS kind of show up and kind of
throw their weight around when they don't have local knowledge
kind of Remember what happened to Katrina. Remember back in
two thousand and five, you have the same issue. You
have the same issue under Joe Biden. So I think
Trump is saying, let's return this to local control. The
federal government can give them the resources, we can give
(29:12):
them the helicopters, we can give them the supplies, we
can give them the equipment. But local authorities should be
in charge, and that is certainly what should be done.
I think going.
Speaker 2 (29:20):
Forward absolutely well. You heard from an update in terms
of what the Coast Guard's perspective is. Will continue to
monitor this story. Unfortunately, that's not the only tragedy that's
happening in the country right now. We have breaking news
about another tragedy situation. We'll give you more information on
that right on the other side of this break. He's
Peter Schweizer. I'm Eric Egers. This is the Sean Handy
Radio Show. We'll have more information from you coming up next.
Speaker 1 (29:56):
Hi, it's Peter Schweizer. He is Eric Eggers. We have
the Drill Down p podcast. We would appreciate you subscribing
to that. You can join the conversation here on SEWN
Show one eight hundred and nine four one Shawn one
hundred nine four one Shawn talking about the heroics of
the Coast Guard down in Texas. It's not the only
herowzone that's taking place, although the threat is different. It's
whether in Texas you have a situation now where there
(30:18):
have been multiple ICE shootings shootings at ICE officials report
this morning an active shooter armed with tactical gear and
a rifle opened fire on Border Patrol agencies. They arrived
at the Border Patrol Annex facility in McAllen, Texas. Apparently
one federal agent was hit. They did kill the shooter.
(30:39):
It's an ongoing investigation by the FBI. This comes on
the heels of another incident in Texas where a Texas
Police officer was shot Friday near the US Immigration and
Customs Enforcement Prairie Land Detention facility. So they are clearly
being targeted by activists on the left.
Speaker 2 (30:57):
It also comes on the heels, unfortunately, of an Axio
store headlining Democrats told to quote get shot for the
anti Trump resistance. Some have suggested the story says we
need to be willing to do is go get shot
when visiting ICE facilities or federal agencies, saying civilitiesn't working.
Prepare for violence. That's again from Axios Today. This is
a Sean Handy radio show. He's Peter Schweizer. I'm Marik Eggers.
(31:19):
We talked to former Epstein attorney David Showen next
Well, if you're expecting a slow weekend over the Fourth
of July celebration with very little news, you are very
disappointed because there was so much going on. We're going
to cover it today. I'm certainly not Sean. I am
Peter Schweitzer, four time number one New York Times bestselling
author investigative journalists, and I'm covering today for Sean along
with my co host and podcast partner Eric Eggers. Eric,
(00:23):
how are you?
Speaker 2 (00:24):
I'm excellent. And it's an honor to be talking to
Sean Handy's radio audience. You know, they played the best
of Sean Handy Show on Thursday and Friday for the
holiday weekend. And I like to imagine a world in
which there are people in the audience who only get
their news from Sean Handy's radio show, so they have
no idea what happened since Sewn signed off on Wednesday afternoon.
And if you're one of those people, you've missed a lot,
(00:46):
and we're here to help you understand just how much
has changed in the six days since you've heard a
live radio program.
Speaker 1 (00:53):
Yeah, well, we've got tragedy in Texas, this horrific story
where a river rose twenty six feet and forty five minutes.
It's at least one hundred people dead. We're going to
cover that, and we're going to look at the heroics
that have taken place in Texas. The Big Beautiful Bill
was signed. This legislation, which passed the House by only
two votes and pasted the Senate with the help of JD. Vance,
(01:15):
was signed by President Trump on July fourth, as he promised,
as he said he would, we have the Epstein files
bombshell released on Sunday night. Talk about a slow news time,
the FBIDOJ concluding there was no suicide, there was no
client list, and there was no extortion. We're going to
cover those and lots of other stories that are taking
(01:36):
place right now.
Speaker 2 (01:37):
No, it's absolutely I mean, the Epstein news is massive
and a lot of people are reacting to it. It
doesn't impact the audience's life, right like the weather or not.
There will be additional charges brought in the case of
Jeffrey Epstein. Won't fundamentally change your life. It won't fundamentally
change in my life, but it does represent a major
downbeat on what was I think a very positive era
(02:00):
for President Trump. Because a lot of people voted for
Donald Trump because they were tired of being lied to
by the previous administration. Right, they were lied to left
and right by Joe Biden and his media allies. And
you know Jake Tappers now lying to us about how
much other people were lying to us in that book.
And so what we now know is that we were told, hey,
we have somebody who they want to hold people accountable
(02:21):
and they want to do the right thing. And when
the Department of Justice releases a memo that says this
systematic review we've conducted revealed no incriminating client list, no
credible evidence that Epstein blackmailed prominent individuals, and also no
evidence that predit could predicate an investigation against uncharged third parties,
(02:43):
it leads a lot of people to conclude that the
opposite's happening, that there are in fact other things being
covered up.
Speaker 1 (02:48):
Yeah, that's exactly right. We're gonna have a guest at
the bottom of the hour to talk about the situation
in Texas, the chief spokesman for the Coastguard, and we
have Jeffrey Epstein's lawyer once he was incarcerated, is going
to be joining us in the next hour to talk
about the crisis there. But here's the thing that I
think is sort of misleading or confusing about the Jeffrey
(03:10):
Epstein claims by DOJNFBI, and what they're saying could very
well and probably is technically true that there is no
client list. There's no file that they have that says
client list. But the problem is, we know a couple
of things. Number One, we know that Jeffrey Epstein was
involved in human trafficking. Why did we know this? Well,
(03:33):
he killed himself in twenty nineteen, at least that's what
is said, whether he was killed by somebody else's opener debate.
JP Morgan notified the Treasury Department that more than one
billion with a B in transactions related to quote human
trafficking by Epstein had gone through their accounts over the
past sixteen years. JP Morgan agreed in July of twenty
(03:56):
nineteen to pay two hundred and ninety million dollars two
victims of Epstein to settle that lawsuit. So here's the question.
There's not a client list according to the DOJ and FBI,
but there are clients. There have to be clients. I mean,
there's no way that Jeffrey Epstein himself is responsible for,
(04:18):
you know, the human trafficking. He is a singular person.
Speaker 2 (04:21):
Jeffrey Epstein did fund a nonprofit, but the billion dollars
for sex trafficking was not it. So there were other
people involved in this enterprise. And what you just said
is really important. I think we have to put that
in the larger context. So, by the way, today is
July seventh. Jeffrey Epstein was arrested six years ago yesterday
on July the sixth, and managed to survive for a
(04:43):
little over a month until August tenth to twenty nineteen,
which cases life ended. But I think the key thing
there is so he gets arrested, and then after he
is arrested JP Morgan, with whom he did much business,
like a billion dollars worth of business, they go to
and they're being suon, but different people. They go to
the United States government and they have flagged these transactions
(05:04):
and they said, hey, we believe these transactions may be
connected to criminal activity, specifically related to sex trafficking, and
they turn them over. So when people say we have
no evidence of a client list, we know that as
six years ago they were given financial transactions presumably on
behalf of clients, right, And so I think that's one
(05:26):
of the things that people find difficult to swallow with
this story, not the least of which is and we're
going to hear sound from Caroline Levit, who was asked
about this by Steve Doocy later on. But what what
we were told is, you know, for years, we're told
by Dan Bongino, Cash, Mattel, Pam Bondi. We have seen
the files. They're sitting on our desk, and so for
(05:48):
now us to be told the opposite seems awry.
Speaker 1 (05:52):
It does. And also there's a pattern here. I mean,
you did some very interesting research you were sharing with
me earlier. I mean, the thing that is so appalling
about Epstein is not only the fact of no, we
know what he did and what he did to these
young women and other people. We know that he has
had kick gloves in terms of the way that law
enforcement has dealt with him going back more than twenty years.
(06:15):
It seems that this guy is untouchable. We don't know why.
It could just be he's a rich guy and he
has friends in right places, but this goes back twenty
years in the state of Florida.
Speaker 2 (06:24):
Yeah, I sort of hate this story because I tried
to stay away from this door. I tried to stay
away from the P Diddy tribe because I want to
think I have better things to do with my life
and do, and no I don't. Apparently I don't because
now on national radio we're discussing this, and unfortunately there's
a P Didty connection to this, which is unbelievable, involving
James Comey's daughter. But basically, in two thousand and five,
(06:45):
the Palm Beach Police Department did a thirteen month uninvested
undercover investigation in which that led to a fifty three
page indictment by the FBI in two thousand and seven.
So they had the goods, but those goods were not
good enough to get him a real prison sentence. Alexander Acosta,
who is then the US Attorney for the Southern District
of Florida, agrees to a plea deal which essentially grants
(07:07):
immunity from all federal criminal charges to Epstein and also
gets him only eighteen months in jail, which he only
served thirteen months, which six days a week, was on
work release for sixteen hours a day, so like he's
like a hotel. The easiest gig you could get yeah, okay,
And it.
Speaker 1 (07:23):
Was a fifty three page indictmond, multiple counts of relationships
with underage women, human trap, all that kind of stuff,
and they slap him on the wrist.
Speaker 2 (07:33):
Slap him on the wrist. So then he gets out,
he goes to New York, and then in New York,
because of his conviction or the plea deal, he does
have to register as a sex offender. But the Manhattan DA,
despite what we now know is graphic and detailed evidence,
argues for him to be registered as a low risk
sex offender in twenty eleven. So once again he's getting
the easiest possible treatment. And so, you know, so I
(07:57):
think that's the context. So then he gets arrested. And
after he's arrested, Marine Comy, who was the daughter of
fired FBI director James Comy, was one of the prosecutors.
And then she was just involved in the Panitty case.
That's the connection there, and so and because of when
he's arrested, everyone's like, oh man, this guy's really bad.
So the labor secretary who alex Acosta, who had given
him the plea deal in Florida, is now a labor
(08:19):
secretary under Donal Trump, he has to resign in disgrace because,
oh man, you were one of the people who took
it easy on him. So fast forward to today, and
we're now being told none of the third parties are
going to see any additional action on behalf of justice
or accountability. And it's impossible not to put it in
this context. And it does seem like, for whatever reason,
(08:40):
when we're being told there's nothing to see here, we've
been told that consistently and it just seems wrong.
Speaker 1 (08:45):
Yeah, it does. I mean, we have a history here
where authorities seem to go soft on Epstein for no
particular reason. And then you have this larger issue of
what the information is and what basically we're getting right
now from from Pan Bondi and Cash Mattel and Dan
Bongino is just take our word for it, which is
(09:05):
the problem. That is what we were told by previous administrations.
There's no real clarity here in the statement that they
released or in the memo where they said that that
you know, there is no cover up, there is no problem.
They acknowledged that there were one thousand victims, one thousand
victims by Jeffrey Epstein, And what do we know at
this point, we know that the only person that's actually
(09:27):
been prosecuted and gone to jail is Gisel Maxwell. She's
the only one that was prosecuted and went to jail.
And all the other questions that swirl around what was
his relationship with all these other powerful people? We know that,
you know, Bill Gates and his ex wife, she cited
his relationship with Epstein is one of the reasons she
wanted to separate and ultimately divorce from Bill Gates. But
(09:50):
there's no clarity there, and based on the history, it's
fair to ask the question, why is there not greater
transparency here? And just tell us take our word for it.
We've looked at it. You can trust us. People are
so suspicious they're not prepared to do that anymore.
Speaker 2 (10:06):
Does I mean you mentioned a powerful name, Bill Gates. Yeah,
you know, he's very influential in many different aspects of society.
Do you feel like that there's a relationship between I mean,
do you feel like he's breathing a sigh of relief today?
People like him who have been let's call it Epstein adjacent, right,
and that we are now told no one that is
(10:28):
Epstein adjacent is going to face additional charges because we
don't have evidence of that.
Speaker 1 (10:31):
Yeah, we obviously do not know what Bill Gates's relationship
was with Epstein anything related to the island. What we
do know is that his wife now ex wife, was
extremely bothered by it, you know. And this is the
same question you have with mister Wexler, you know, the
the fashion guy who also did deals with Epstein. The
(10:51):
question is why do these really super rich guys have
to deal with a guy like Epstein. Epstein, sure he could,
he could make some money doing a few things, but
if you're Bill Gates, you can get investment help with
anybody in the world. And what we also know about
Bill Gates is that at least the allegation was made
that Epstein did try to blackmail Bill Gates. Reportedly Bill
(11:14):
Gates was having a relationship with I think it's a
bridge player, some kind of card player and those areas.
And what we know is that at least the allegation
is is that Epstein threatened to Gates that he was
going to expose it if Gates did not invest in
a fund that he was setting up in JP Morgan.
(11:35):
So there's evidence on these things. We don't know the relationship.
We don't know if any of these people was involved.
But again it's the lack of transparency. It's the lack
of releasing sort of any of the material. Nobody wants
to see the nasty videos. But you know, just in
terms of these financial transactions, eight billion dollars in transactions
that are that are deemed to be by JP Morgan
(11:58):
and by federal law enforcement related to human trafficking, who
are those transactions with? Were they certain flights of airplanes
that he was paying for? Who was on those planes?
None of those questions seem to be asked by anybody
in Washington.
Speaker 2 (12:10):
Yeah, the lack of curiosity does appear to be troubling.
That's one thing we'll continue to follow. We will speak
to former Epstein attorney and former Donald Trump attorney David
Showan at the top of the four o'clock hour about this.
We've got a lot more questions. We'll hear reaction from
the White House, but we've got a lot more to cover.
It's a massive weekend.
Speaker 3 (12:27):
You heard.
Speaker 2 (12:27):
We were grateful to talk to you a spokesporus from
the Coast Guard to get an update on the recovery
efforts in Texas. We're going to talk to Wisconsin Senator
Ron Johnson to find out what all went on in
the negotiations that led to the passage of the Big
Beautiful Bill. And we'll also hear coming up next from
somebody who tries to conflate the two. He's Peter Schweizer.
I'm Eric Eggers. We are filling in for Sean Handy.
(12:48):
It's our pleasure to be with you today on a
very busy and a very newsy Monday. We right back
after this.
Speaker 1 (12:54):
Hi, It's Peter Schweizer. I'm here with Eric Eggers. We
are filling in for Sean. Joined the conversation one eight
hundred and ninety four to one, Sean win eight one
hundred and nine to four one Sean. So a lot
going on in the news over the weekend. We're going
to dissect a lot of it. You would think that
these stories don't really have a lot in common, but
in fact, according to at least Larry Summers, the former
president of Harvard University, they do. Listen to what he
(13:15):
said about the tragedy in Texas and the Big Beautiful
Bill that was signed into law by Donald Trump on
July the fourth.
Speaker 4 (13:22):
George, just to start with what your people have been
describing is the biggest cut in the American safety net
in history. The Yale Budget Lab estimates that it will
kill over ten years, one hundred thousand people.
Speaker 5 (13:40):
That is two thousand days of death like we've seen
in Texas this weekend. In my seventy years, I've never
been as embarrassed for my country on July fourth.
Speaker 1 (13:54):
Oh boy, And he said this before, right in twenty seventeen,
he made similar statements involving the tax cut that Donald
Trump passed at that time. So he has a record
of being wrong, but also politicizing this tragedy in such
a way is just terrible.
Speaker 2 (14:10):
As it's terrible, it's irresponsible, and you know, shame on
George Stephanopolis and ABC News for you know, it's not
the first time they've aired irresponsible information. But I would say,
you know, look, it's what's happened in Texas the tragedy.
Eighty one people are dead so far included I think
it's twenty seven children from this camp. And we're going
to get an update on what's going on here on
(14:30):
the other side of this break. But you know, I
remember last year we had unexpected flooding in North Carolina.
Over one hundred people died there. I believe the death
tolls now up to ninety four people in Texas now.
But still, the point is, these are acts of God,
these are tragedies. They happen. No one blamed Joe Biden
when they happened last year in terms of a lack
of funding for it, right, And so for Larry Summers
(14:53):
to suggest that the sign of one bill is going
to lead to more tragedy, I think is horrendous.
Speaker 1 (14:58):
Well, and all these people have terrible track records. Let's
look back in twenty seventeen, when the Trump administration also
instituted reforms in this area. The Congression Budget Office claimed
that the changes would get rid of healthcare coverage for
sixteen million people. That was the claim. Two years later
(15:18):
they said, well, no, it's actually going to be only
eight million. By twenty twenty, the New York Times was
reporting that actually it had no effect whatsoever. So don't
believe the scare, don't believe the hype. This is the
way they operate.
Speaker 2 (15:32):
It is the way they operate. And that's one of
the reasons why programs like this and our podcast, The
Drill Down are so important. Because we want to give you,
the American people, the truth you deserve at every turn.
You can find our podcast at the drill Down dot
com and you can hear more Sean Handy show. Right
on the outside of this break, he's Peter Schweizer. I
Americ Eggers. We're back with a spokesperson from the Coastguard
right after this.
Speaker 1 (15:51):
Hey, it's Peter Schweizer. That' seric Eggers. We're filling it for.
Sean joined the conversation one eight hundred nine to four
to one Sean one eight hundred ninety four one Sean
tragedy in Texas. They're now saying that the death toll
is going to surpass one hundred. Brings out the worst
sometimes in people, it also brings out the best in people,
the heroism. In particular. You've got this Coastguard Petty Officer
(16:14):
Scott Ruskin, who rescued I mean, this is eye popping
to me, one hundred and sixty five people from the
floodwaters of Texas. He may add to that before it's over,
but we want to play this clip about the interview
that he gave describing what he's done, and then we're
going to have a conversation with Lieutenant Commander Steve Roth,
who's the chief of Media Relations for the Coastguard, to
(16:35):
give us an update on what's going on in Texas
and a little bit more about this fine man from
New Jersey who has saved so many lives. But listen
to this interview that he gave.
Speaker 6 (16:45):
The Coastguard launched us and decided to send a rescue
crew from Airstation Corpus Christie at about six thirty seven
am on Friday, the fourth of July. I just happen
to be on the d crew with Ian Hopper, Blair
ruche wor Seth Reeves, some of our crew members in
the Coast Guard, and yeah, they sent us out. We
kind of encountered some pretty serious weather, some of the
worst flying we've ever dealt with.
Speaker 2 (17:05):
Personally.
Speaker 6 (17:06):
It took us, you know, which should have been an
hour flight, probably took us about seven or eight just
to get into the landing zone. Once made about four
different approaches trying to get in. We were able to
get on get them boots on the ground with the
Air National Guard, Department of Public Safety for Texas Game Wardens,
and we decided to leave me on scene at Camp
mystic that was kind of our main triage site we
were trying to help out with, and we decide, hey,
(17:27):
if we leave the rescue summer on scene, we'll have
more space in our dolphin MH sixty five. So based
on that I got on scene boots on the ground,
can't mystic kind of discovered I was the only person
there as far as like first responders go. So yeah,
I had about two hundred kids, mostly all scared, terrified, cold,
having probably the worst day of their life, and I
(17:48):
just kind of need to triage them, get them to
a higher level care and get them, get them off
the flood zone with a lot of the US sixty
Army helicopters.
Speaker 2 (17:57):
So this guy, Scott Ruskin is correctly being hailed as
an American hero. But I, as soon as I heard
this interview, became incredibly curious, like, how is it that
one Coastguard rescue swimmer swims and these details later an
interview up to ten kids and maybe one adult with
them at a time as a swimmer, and so I mean,
(18:18):
how do you get these people to safety? And so
we wanted to reach out to the Coast Guard and
we're excited to have Lieutenant Commander Steve Roth join us now,
Lieutenant Commander Roth, how does that work? Like, just walk
our audience through how the mechanics of how someone as
a swimmer takes multiple people with them. Do they have
stuff connected to them? What kind of flotation devices they
(18:40):
connected to?
Speaker 1 (18:41):
How does that work?
Speaker 4 (18:42):
Sure?
Speaker 3 (18:42):
Yeah, thanks thanks for having me on the show. And
I just want to say the entire Coast Guard our
hearts and our prayers to actually go out to all
the victims of this absolutely terrible tragedy. So in this
particular instance, I think it highlights the really incredible train
our rescue summers get is. He might have mentioned this
is his first case out of rescue swimmer school. And
(19:03):
the interesting thing about this is he wasn't swimming. This
is inland search and rescue. This is urban search and rescue.
When he got there to Camp Mystic, and you know,
these these little girls, these adults have been this is
the first first responder they've seen in eight hours since
it's terrible then in the middle of the night, and
(19:24):
so he was there to really sort of triage them
and make sure that they were getting to two other
landing sites that he set up. I think one on
an archery field and one on a soccer field, so
that the other state and several partners, the Air National Guard,
Texas GPS could get these kids out. So it's actually
(19:45):
not just people think of our rescue swimmers as jumping
in the water, and that's that's not always the case.
We do quite a bit of urban search and rescue,
inland search and rescue, and this is this is a
really incredible example of that work.
Speaker 1 (20:00):
Lieutenant Commander Roth, Are there ongoing operations right now in
volume the Coast Guard? Are you hopeful to maybe find
more people? We're going on now several days, but there
is still always the hope that more people would be found.
What is the Coast Guard doing right now in South Texas?
Speaker 3 (20:15):
Certainly so the Coast Guards continuing to respond to any
tasking from the State of Texas, who's the lead agency.
So we do still have a helicopter there if we
are requested to assist.
Speaker 2 (20:29):
So what have you heard in terms of the conditions
on the ground and would you how would you compare
the conditions on the ground in terms of the flash footing? Now,
how long do the waters stay at these levels? And
you know, what can people expect moving forward.
Speaker 3 (20:45):
So I can't speak to the specifics of that. I
think that's probably a better question for the state of Texas.
What I can say is that the conditions that our
air crew encountered were incredibly dynamic, incredibly dangerous. Like like
id said, it takes them seven eight hours to make
what should have been a one hour flight, and we've
seen throughout this week an increased and sustained risk of
(21:09):
flash flooding in the area. So he put himself in
a really dynamic situation based on weather and the chance
of increased flooding. Unfortunately, I can't speak to what the
current risk is now.
Speaker 1 (21:23):
Well, Luke Tenant, Commander, you guys train of course for
all kinds of different scenarios. I'm still stunned at the
basic fact that apparently, in the middle of the night,
this river rose twenty six feet in forty five minutes.
That's astonishing to me. And I know you're not in
the business of fixing those types of problems, but this
(21:44):
is the kind of scenario that the Coastguard dealt with.
Here you're dealing with other dynamic situations. I understand that
recruiting is up, by the way, there's kind of an
excitement in the last six months about joining the Coast Guard.
So where is a coast Guard in terms of future operations?
Planning for disasters we live in Florida, course, hurricanes or
always something you worry about. What is the Coast Guard doing?
(22:05):
Looking forward?
Speaker 3 (22:08):
So looking forward, you know, we're going to continue to
be extremely proud of the fact that we are America's
first responders for hurricanes, maritime disasters, really any crisis. You know,
here we are in central Texas, not pretty pretty far
from where you traditionally think the Coastguard would operate. We're
going to continue to give you know, people that enlist
(22:28):
and recruit, that train so that if it's their first
case and they need to rescue one hundred and sixty
five people in Central Texas, that they're they're prepared to
do that. Scott will say, you know, I think he
just said, I'm just the dude that was trained to
do this, and I rose raise my right hand. Looking forward,
we're certainly excited about the support and the recognition we've
(22:48):
gotten from the Administration, the Secretary Congress. We're going to
be doing a lot of recapitalization to making sure that
we maintain our agility, our capability, and to be you know,
our motto was literally always ready to be, always ready
to serve the American public in these communities because we
are extremely capable, as I think we've proven in this case,
(23:10):
the ability to fly in these conditions. We've got these
highly trained rescue swimmers. We're gonna we're going to make
sure that we continue to be, you know, some of
the finest first responders in the nation so that we
can we can get down there and continue to do
this stuff.
Speaker 2 (23:24):
So in an urban search and rescue environment, which is
what Scott Ruskin was involved in, he's going, I guess
kind of take us through. So he gets onto the
ground and you knew where the camp was. I heard
him say that they identified Camp Mystic. So everyone that
he encountered were they can you tell us like what
was were they in? Like where were they physically? Were
(23:46):
they in their normal rooms? Had they congregated in an area?
And I guess, like walk us through what that process
is like and how quickly this person had to make
these decisions when literally every second counts.
Speaker 3 (23:59):
You've got to make these decisions instantly. I don't have
the details on exactly where and can't mystic. They dropped
him off. But in a couple of interviews he's mentioned,
you know, all of a sudden, he's got two hundred cold, scared,
exhausted children. This is a group of predominantly little children.
I'm the father of a six year old girl, and
it's like unfathomable to meet with my daughter in the situation.
(24:23):
So just to just to manage that chaos in that situation,
and then not even that, but then to start medically
triaging these people to very very quickly get them to
a waiting helicopter so that they can get to a
higher level of care. But that's that's one thing that
our rescue swimmers and really every member of the Coast
Guard is trained to do. We encounter all kinds of
(24:46):
non traditional situations and you've got to be calm and
cool and confident and ready to make those those life
or death decisions. And that's what's really I think unique
about being a member of the Coast Guard.
Speaker 1 (24:59):
Well, the Channe Commander, Steve Roth, we thank you for
joining us. We appreciate all the good work you were
doing in the Coast Guard is doing as well. People
when they think of people in service, they sometimes forget
about the Coast Guards or don't pay them the attention
that they should. They certainly will. Now we thank you
and appreciate all that the Coast Guard is doing down
in Texas for us in rescuing people, especially these young children.
Speaker 3 (25:23):
Yeah, thanks so much for the opportunity to come on
the show. Appreciate it.
Speaker 2 (25:27):
That's Lieutenant Commander Steve Roth of the United States Coast Guard.
It's a great it's a crazy story. It's a tragedy.
And you know, you and I are both fathers. We
are fathers of daughters. And it's the fact that I
think it's twenty plus children have died, unfortunately, and this
tragedy is horrific, and obviously the death toll continues to mount,
and there's been unfortunately, as you heard from Larry Summers
(25:50):
in the last segment of The New York Times, come
out with stories about oh, they've ignored these warning symbols
and they could have done more, but buried in that
article they talked about the fact that text messages were sent.
But as you noted, it was three in the morning
when the conditions worsened, and they say text messages were ignored, Well,
I mean, how many other alarm systems. Do you want
sometimes strgies happen?
Speaker 1 (26:11):
Yeah, yeah, I mean the thing to me that was
particularly outrageous by the New York Times story is they
alleged that cutbacks by the Trump administration, or the fact
that there are certain positions that have been filled with
the National Weather Service somehow led to an increased death
when the realities are what we said, in forty five minutes,
this river rose twenty six feet. It was in the
(26:32):
middle of the night. I don't know about you. I
mean I basically had my ringer off at night. If
I had been there, I would have been totally caught
off guards. I don't know how you can create a
warning system and there will be opportunities for them to
evaluate come up with greater efficiencies. I think one of
the things that the Trump administration has proposed is more
local control because remember what happened in North Carolina when
(26:55):
the hurricane came through the disaster there was the fact
that it took so long once the tragedy had happened
to actually get support to help the people that were impacted.
In North Carolina. I think we had what one hundred
and twenty died as a result of that. In this
particular case, you had the heroic response from the Coast Guard,
But I'm not sure you can develop a system unless
(27:18):
people are prepared to be wired in twenty four hours
a day. You can develop a weather system for a
scenario that happens like this in the middle of the
night over a course of forty five minutes.
Speaker 6 (27:27):
No.
Speaker 2 (27:27):
In fact, you and I were speaking with someone who
lives in western North Carolina not long ago, and he
was recounting what it was like last year when that happened.
And I think what you heard him say is we
went weeks without hearing from anyone. And in the western
North Carolina mountains, it's a very tight knit community. These
people very self reliant, as they are in Texas. Yes,
but the point is is that there is an appropriate
role for the government to play in search and rescue operations,
(27:49):
which obviously the Coastguard did very well here as well
as the conditions would warrant. And then there is the
ongoing support and that is where the ball was dropped
under the Biden administration's FEMA. And she did a podcast
on our Drill Down podcast about how they sort of
shifted their gaze and started focusing on lots of other
priorities and less about disaster responses. Has happened quite often,
unfortunately under the Biden administration with a number of agencies.
(28:12):
But it is a true story of heroism with Petty
Officer Scott Ruskin. I appreciate I know you do too.
The fact that he's being celebrated and the fact and
the fact that Coast Guard enrollments is up actually speaks
to a larger positive uptick in terms of what's happening
with our national defense systems under the Trump administration.
Speaker 1 (28:28):
Yeah, I think that's right. You're seeing recruitment goals being
met and exceeded in multiple branches. And I think the
fact is somebody that goes into the Coastguard wants to
help people. They want to be involved in real work.
They don't want to be involved in some of the
phony work and the DEI stuff that is so dominating things.
And I think that a lot of the reforms they're
talking about in terms of search and rescue are good.
(28:50):
Local officials know the situation better than anybody, and to
have the FEDS kind of show up and kind of
throw their weight around when they don't have local knowledge
kind of Remember what happened to Katrina. Remember back in
two thousand and five, you have the same issue. You
have the same issue under Joe Biden. So I think
Trump is saying, let's return this to local control. The
federal government can give them the resources, we can give
(29:12):
them the helicopters, we can give them the supplies, we
can give them the equipment. But local authorities should be
in charge, and that is certainly what should be done.
I think going.
Speaker 2 (29:20):
Forward absolutely well. You heard from an update in terms
of what the Coast Guard's perspective is. Will continue to
monitor this story. Unfortunately, that's not the only tragedy that's
happening in the country right now. We have breaking news
about another tragedy situation. We'll give you more information on
that right on the other side of this break. He's
Peter Schweizer. I'm Eric Egers. This is the Sean Handy
Radio Show. We'll have more information from you coming up next.
Speaker 1 (29:56):
Hi, it's Peter Schweizer. He is Eric Eggers. We have
the Drill Down p podcast. We would appreciate you subscribing
to that. You can join the conversation here on SEWN
Show one eight hundred and nine four one Shawn one
hundred nine four one Shawn talking about the heroics of
the Coast Guard down in Texas. It's not the only
herowzone that's taking place, although the threat is different. It's
whether in Texas you have a situation now where there
(30:18):
have been multiple ICE shootings shootings at ICE officials report
this morning an active shooter armed with tactical gear and
a rifle opened fire on Border Patrol agencies. They arrived
at the Border Patrol Annex facility in McAllen, Texas. Apparently
one federal agent was hit. They did kill the shooter.
(30:39):
It's an ongoing investigation by the FBI. This comes on
the heels of another incident in Texas where a Texas
Police officer was shot Friday near the US Immigration and
Customs Enforcement Prairie Land Detention facility. So they are clearly
being targeted by activists on the left.
Speaker 2 (30:57):
It also comes on the heels, unfortunately, of an Axio
store headlining Democrats told to quote get shot for the
anti Trump resistance. Some have suggested the story says we
need to be willing to do is go get shot
when visiting ICE facilities or federal agencies, saying civilitiesn't working.
Prepare for violence. That's again from Axios Today. This is
a Sean Handy radio show. He's Peter Schweizer. I'm Marik Eggers.
(31:19):
We talked to former Epstein attorney David Showen next
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