Democrat governors mock_ defy Trump _ Brian Kilmeade Show

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:13):
Before we get to markets. So let's get two the
Big three number three.

Speaker 2 (00:17):
The extraordinary success of this mission was due to the
selfless courage of the United States military and our diplomats.

Speaker 1 (00:24):
So for all this talk of chaos, I just didn't
see it. It's a logistical success, but a strategic failure.
What an embarrassment. Four years since the Afghanistan disaster? What
have we learned as this president looks to solve our
newest challenges with North Korea as well as Ukraine. For
first and foremost, we have to get something done and
find out what went wrong so it never happens again.

(00:45):
In Afghanistan.

Speaker 3 (00:47):
Number ten, we wouldn't wake up every day to a
bunch of shits on TV and a bunch of nonsense.

Speaker 2 (00:53):
Not a manchild crying about whatever's wrong with him.

Speaker 1 (00:56):
May his fat ankles find something today? Really, have the
Democrats learned anything? That is, Governor Tim Wats of Minnesota.
The Democrats regroup and reinvigorate their identity, politics and ridiculous
political correctness. The only thing new was the profanity number one,
and they say we don't need them. Freedom.

Speaker 4 (01:16):
Freedom.

Speaker 5 (01:16):
He's a dictator. He's a dictator. A lot of people
are saying, maybe we like a dictator. I don't like
a dictator. And then you send in troops. Instead of
being praised, they're saying, you're trying to take over.

Speaker 1 (01:27):
The republic, fighting crime or allowing crime. You make the
choice America. As president, Trump makes law and order of
priority in getting results, while dem see no evil and
recognize no gains or blue city needs. And that's where
we're at now. Marcus Lamonas is in studio. Mark's great
to see you again. It's been two hours, I know.
And you going to the US Open. Is that where

(01:49):
you wear in the top.

Speaker 6 (01:50):
I'm wearing my yellow tie, you know, I put it
on this morning. My wife said it looked ridiculous. I
like it because it's not spring. I said, it's Tennis
week in New York. Absolutely, it's the only good thing
happening in New York right now other than the people.
This election is not going to make me feel so
good about.

Speaker 1 (02:04):
My tie, right absolutely. So, First off, where's the economy
at from your perspective, from the people you meet and
from the businesses you're in.

Speaker 6 (02:11):
Yeah, I actually think the economy is okay. I mean,
there's obviously a lot of noise around tariffs. People are concerned.
This latest move on Friday by Trump to address the
investigation of furniture is going to put I think a
few businesses in a bit of a.

Speaker 1 (02:26):
Actually, for those who missed him, what is he going
to do? So there was a discussion on Friday.

Speaker 6 (02:30):
President Trump talked about investigating the importing of furniture from
around the globe, and I think what he's really looking
for is have people been trying to circumvent a tariff process?
Have they been trying to take stuff to Canada, around
the Horn, around the water and making sure that there
is a very specific process around furniture. The idea is

(02:52):
in Michigan, a lot of commercial furnitures made Grand Rapids.
You go up to see steel Case, Kimball, You go
into North Carolina, that's where Hickory is, all the furniture
that's built there.

Speaker 1 (03:02):
I know.

Speaker 6 (03:02):
The idea is that we want to build more here. Okay, Brian,
you and I've talked about it.

Speaker 7 (03:07):
Yep.

Speaker 6 (03:07):
You understand that takes time. You can't just pop up
a factory tomorrow and start making furniture. We don't have
the manufacturing capacity to do it. But I do agree
with President Trump at any company that is circumventing any
process around the tariffs needs to be investigated and there
needs to be harsh consequences for it.

Speaker 1 (03:24):
I mean, remember the US empty the US Mexico trade agreement.
We watched China start building factories in Mexico and saying, Okay,
these are Mexican companies. They're not, They're Chinese companies.

Speaker 6 (03:35):
I then we want to look for those loopholes. And
what I am concerned about is what does it ultimately
due to the consumer. The consumer right now seems to
be fine. Seems to be fine.

Speaker 1 (03:45):
Because because I think a lot of the manufacturers are
kind of eating a lot of the retailers are eating
the costs.

Speaker 6 (03:51):
I think the manufacturers are eating some of the costs,
the distributors are eating some of the costs, and candidly,
the consumer is absorbing some of the costs. But it
doesn't seem to be breaking anybody yet.

Speaker 1 (04:03):
A couple of things. If President Trump can get the
price of everyday goods down, we haven't really seen that
in the supermarket. Inflation is just over two percent, two
point five percent, but the cost of everyday goods has
not come down. How do you do that?

Speaker 6 (04:20):
Well, I think the average person on the street thinks
inflation and they think COVID and COVID was a function
of the supply and demand curve breaking right. People were
there's free money everywhere. People were consuming more than could
be produced. In this particular case, inflation is transitory. There's
a reset of the price. It isn't that demand is
outpacing supply and that's what's driving up the price. Tariffs,

(04:44):
other costs that are out there are driving up the price,
and consumers seem to be able to be settling into
that a little bit more. How do you drop general prices?
I'm not sure you can. There's not many moments in
history where prices go back, right. I don't see them
go backwards.

Speaker 1 (04:59):
We had that nine percent push two and a half
three years ago. You want ahead, and one of the
companies that you reinvigorated was bed Bath and Beyond. Right,
you made a decision last week. I looked at the math.
It doesn't pay for us to go into California or not. Gvin.
Gavin Newsom tries to be trying to be president. He
took that personal and he mocked the fact that bed
Bath and Beyond want you know, want that relevant anymore? Yeah,

(05:23):
relevant anymore? You know. It's funny. What was that exchange? Like?

Speaker 6 (05:26):
Uh, you know, I put out a statement, I think
it was last Tuesday morning, talking about how difficult it
is to do business in California, and it was purely
on the basis of if you go into California to
rent a space, it's expensive. If you had have to
hire people, it's expensive. If you have to pay all
these tort fees, it's expensive. And the cost the yield

(05:46):
for doing business in California isn't good.

Speaker 1 (05:48):
Minimum wage too, it's it's not a labor issue.

Speaker 6 (05:51):
A lot of people came after me and said, you
don't want to pay people the right amount of money.
I have no problem paying people more than their worth.
No problem. It's all the other layers of expenses that
are out there. Instead of Gavin Newsom, Governor Newsom coming
out and saying, hey, I don't agree with your position.
I think you're wrong about these five things. I'd love
to have a discussion with you and other business leaders,

(06:13):
his comment was, in fact, it came out of his
press room. First, let us know when bed, bath and
Beyond is relevant again. I understand you've opened one store,
call us when you open two. He then comes back
and says things like I created this new red hat.
It says Newsom is right about everything. Bed Bath and
Beyond called me and asked me if they could sell it.
I said, absolutely not. It's the amount of time. And

(06:35):
so I'm on these text chains with chairman and CEOs
of big major technology companies in California saying Marcus, we
love you, we like him. There was text Chaine set
up between all three of us. I said, listen, I'd
be happy to talk about it, Governor, I'd be happy
to sit down and talk about what the issues are.
No response, No response, And so I'm not sure. I'm

(06:58):
sure he's a pleasant and delightful human being. You do,
I'm sure he is sure. I have to believe the
best in everybody. But from a philosophical standpoint, I'm not
sure what game he's playing right now.

Speaker 1 (07:10):
Right to me, I would be just if I'm a
public official doing his service. My goal is to bring
as much industry as possible to the people that put
me in office. I couldn't care less whether Gavenusom like
me or not. If I'm the governor, I'm calling on
Marcus Climonis, and I'm saying, how do I work this out?
Number one, I wouldn't start with personal insults, but Trump
has done that too. But he says, when you come
to see him, I'll give you the best example to

(07:32):
contrast to two. He didn't like the CEO of I
think it was Intel. He said he's got too many
hooks to the Chinese. So this guy calls up and says, Ky,
come see you. He said, of course they met, And
now it looks like the government owns a piece of Intel.
So go ahead, let's work it out face to face.
That seems to be the way you roll.

Speaker 6 (07:51):
I listen. I got frustrated, and I had to hold
everything back from.

Speaker 1 (07:55):
Getting really hyperbolic with him.

Speaker 6 (07:57):
What I realize is I'm setting an example for other
business la and other young folks who are looking at
that saying you can disagree about I did. I did,
but you can disagree about a topic. But at the
end of the day, if you have the fourth largest
economy in the world, as he's told me nine times
and told everybody else, why not try to have the
third largest economy. Why not try to figure out a

(08:17):
way to generate more from the marketplace? As opposed to
just raising taxes and generating what.

Speaker 1 (08:24):
Having a better suggestion, if you have the fourth largest economy,
maybe you could try to get it out of the
red and move it to the black. Why are you
in devastate yet you have the highest taxes in the country.
Maybe we could work on the math problem together. Or
maybe I'm going to get one of the most successful
business people in the country to give me some advice
and tell me what other states are doing.

Speaker 6 (08:42):
I wrote them a whole dissertation about the nine steps
to actually solve this problem. In California, I posted it.
Everybody else reposted it. His office solid he just doesn't
want to engage, and I'm not quite sure. And I
said to him, if you have aspirations of being more
than the governor, this is the moment you can show
people that you can rise above the silliness. I don't

(09:03):
have time to talk about selling hats on my I
still have time to do it, do I.

Speaker 1 (09:07):
So, how do you feel about this? I know Republicans
are not happy with like Rand Paul, but the President
of the United States said to Intel, and I think, Navidia,
I think we should own a piece of this. We
are subsidizing Intel. We're incentivizing you to come back with
your production. Shouldn't the American people benefit from this? Guys
like Bernie Sanders loves this. Mark we know Secretary Lutnik

(09:31):
loves this. Healy says he does his Commerce Secretary, Marcus,
how do you feel? Why does Bertie Sanders love it?
He says? The American people should benefit from the public
investment in a private company.

Speaker 6 (09:44):
I think that both sides of the aisle have probably
created a little bit of misinformation. It isn't like on
Friday Donald Trump decided to shake hands with Intel and
write a check. There was money that was already deployed
inside of Intel. It's already deployed.

Speaker 1 (09:58):
By the previous administry. That's right.

Speaker 6 (10:00):
It's not new money. It's not new money. It's money
that's already deployed. And the goal behind our government is,
once something is done, how do you maximize the outcome?
And I think the way they're looking at is if
we can drive chip making here in the US, and
we can drive advancement at Intel, rather than taking my
loan back, if I can two exit, three, exit, four exit,

(10:20):
why wouldn't I do that? I understand that people don't
want On both sides of the aisle, people don't want
government to be involved in private business. But the money
was already there. It's not a new transaction. On the
other side, you talk about Navidia and Trump saying, hey,
I want to get a little vig for everything you
sell into China.

Speaker 1 (10:38):
Or the country, not for him. That's right. People are
upset about that.

Speaker 6 (10:41):
Listen, if you want to pay me a fee to
go do business somewhere else, business that you're going to
do anyway, and it's going to build the value of
the company and the American public is going to make
money from that. I don't understand what the problem is.
People are making this correlation. O. We're acting like China
with the government owning businesses. Listen, during COVID, didn't we
put a lot of money in that Big three.

Speaker 1 (11:00):
In the autos? Absolutely if we get all our money back,
How about two thousand and eight do we get all
our money back? No? Okay, A couple of things. If
I'm competing with Intel, you have a company and you're
making chips, and all of a sudden, the government's invested
in Intel, how do we feel about that? Now? Is
the government going to be picking winners and losers is

(11:21):
going to be certain, especially something as high tech and
really as national security oriented.

Speaker 6 (11:25):
I think that's probably the real issue that has merit
is the government picking winners and losers. And anytime you
have a dog in the fight, your job is to
pick the winners. Your job is to give that business advancement.
If you and I bought ten percent of whatever company
it was, we're going to promote it, We're going to
adorn it, We're going to tell other people about it.
We're going to want that business to win because we

(11:47):
have a vested interest in I don't know why that's
a bad thing.

Speaker 1 (11:49):
Right, Okay, So when do we have another segment we do? Okay, great,
So when we come back, I want to talk about
your show tonight, right, and I also want to get
your take on the deficit. I think all this is
for one reason. As the tariffs come in and the
pieces of places like Intel come in, the President is
laser focused on the deficit. I know Scott Bessentt is,

(12:12):
and I'm wondering if this could be a bigger play
than that to try to reverse the thirty seven trillion
dollars and stop it from growing. Which it did, which
it did I understand last month because the interest rate
on that debt is taking about taking away or discretionary spending.
Does Marcus Lamonas feel that way? His show is going
to be on tonight an FBN at eight o'clock. It's

(12:35):
called The Fixer. Don't Move. Marcus Lamonas is here, he's
host to The Fixer. He just bought bed, Bath and
Beyond executive chairman there and Marcus, I'm excited that you're
going to be on FBN tonights it at eight o'clock.

Speaker 6 (12:55):
It's a different kind of episode, you know, we've had,
we've had, we aired them all on the network, and
now we're baring them on Fox Business. This is I
think the fifth episode Tonight's a good example kind of
like the relationship with Kevin Newsome. Not every relationship is
going to work out, and I think the viewer is
going to be really stunned to see that happen.

Speaker 1 (13:12):
Really, So we do have a clipous and is it
from this episode? Okay, great, let's listen.

Speaker 8 (13:17):
So when people come in, it's byob at our location.

Speaker 9 (13:19):
Other locations, if we do get so open, those.

Speaker 8 (13:22):
Will be able to have a liquor license provided it's
you know, you have a liquor license.

Speaker 9 (13:26):
You know, so Hoboken is.

Speaker 1 (13:27):
A byob town because of the liquor license laws.

Speaker 6 (13:30):
But why did you pick a location that you couldn't
get a liquor license?

Speaker 8 (13:33):
If that was your concept, we wouldn't want to have
the liquor license be the limiting factor to growth.

Speaker 1 (13:37):
That isn't tipsy in your name.

Speaker 9 (13:39):
Yeah, but that's.

Speaker 1 (13:42):
Cool.

Speaker 6 (13:42):
Yeah, that was cool, which is like, that's the stupidest
thing I ever. It accelerated from there and I ended
up you have to watch it, but I ended up
having a blowout with them about five minutes later.

Speaker 1 (13:54):
And and and what happens is can you just tell
everyone because you're not an actor, but.

Speaker 6 (14:00):
You have actor in fact trying to irate it was terrible.
It's really it's really it's almost like following over my
shoulder as I go into a business to try to
help them figure out what's right and what's wrong. I
do it with my own money. I invest or, I
don't invest in this particular case, I don't invest. And
over the years, I've done it a lot. And the

(14:20):
goal is really to have people understand the dus and don'ts.

Speaker 1 (14:23):
A business, right, but it's really interesting. You want the
audience watching to pick some I want them to play along.

Speaker 6 (14:28):
I want them to say, like on social where we're
out there texting and people say, don't do it, invest,
don't invest. I want people to play along. But I
want young kids to learn the art of the handshake,
the art of the deal, how to be honorable, how
to treat people with respect, what not to do, what
to do.

Speaker 1 (14:44):
I don't want to give it too much out of
the episode, but what did you go in hoping to
do a deal? Or did you say I'm taking this,
I'm taking this and I'm going to I see potential here.

Speaker 6 (14:55):
When I pick them specifically from tonight, I was going
in to teach them and the viewer a lesson. I
didn't actually think I would ever do a deal. I
went in to teach them a lesson about the right
attitude and the right mindset, and they didn't have it.

Speaker 1 (15:10):
Who taught you the fundamentals? Where'd you learn the fundamentals?

Speaker 6 (15:14):
I learned the fundamentals on Southwest A Street in Le June.

Speaker 1 (15:18):
It's little Havana in Miami, and that's the hard knocks.

Speaker 6 (15:22):
My family had a car business, in the middle of
Little Havana in the nineteen nineties and one day. Well,
I'll share a couple of stories with you. But people
used to come in from around the world, and I
remember being there as a little kid and seeing men
show up from South America with suitcases full of cash. Suitcases,
I mean, like a million dollars of cash to buy

(15:43):
ten suburbans, twelve suburbans, twenty suburbans, And so I learned
a little bit about that. I also watched my dad
negotiate with the city of Miami and how the backroom
deals were done. My dad passed away now and I
saw him bribe people, and I saw how government worked,
and I saw it all.

Speaker 1 (15:58):
So when I came out, I was like, there's a
way to do this.

Speaker 6 (16:00):
Is this, and then I'm going to do it the
opposite of how my dad did it.

Speaker 1 (16:02):
Street but you have the street smart gene.

Speaker 6 (16:04):
I'm more of a street smarts person than I have
a book smarts.

Speaker 1 (16:07):
What did you learn in school?

Speaker 6 (16:08):
I think I was a political science major at Marquet
and didn't do much business, had terrible grades.

Speaker 1 (16:14):
So stuff is on instinct in what you learned as
a kid. It's time.

Speaker 6 (16:18):
I'm young So I started business when I was twenty five.
I worked my first public company. I was twenty seven.
Leia Coca hired me as the CEO of a public company. Well,
the company was going out of business. I learned how
to wind it down. And that company was It was
an RV business. It doesn't exist anymore, Holiday RV superstars.

Speaker 1 (16:36):
So I've learned a lot, and you picked a U.
So you have this. You literally have learned on the street.

Speaker 6 (16:43):
I'm a pretty scrappy guy. That's how people would describe me.
I could put on a tie in a suit. This
is the only time I ever dressed like this.

Speaker 1 (16:49):
Did you ever feel compelled to get the PhD? Being
that you've had that type of success, Did you want
the paperwork to back in?

Speaker 6 (16:56):
No, because business is too much of a drug for me.

Speaker 1 (16:58):
I love it.

Speaker 6 (16:59):
It's just the way I consume it. I'd have to
stop and go to school.

Speaker 1 (17:02):
So I asked Phil Knight, I go, I read your book.
We must have been so stressful every month, not be
able to make payroll and play to the bank. And
he said, Brian, I loved every second of it. I go.
You didn't know if you were going to survive. You
didn't know if the sneakers were the.

Speaker 6 (17:14):
One thousand and eight and nine. Same thing for me.
I was in the RV business. I thought I was
going to go out of business. Car business and the
housing market combined awful.

Speaker 1 (17:22):
But it's the stress that you thrive on because you
feel you can solve it. That's what I did. I'm
a problem. I'm a fixer.

Speaker 9 (17:27):
There you go.

Speaker 1 (17:28):
We have a show and Fox check it out. It's
on Fox Nation and Fox Business. It's called The Fixer.
Marcus Kimonas, thanks so much. Hopefully you'll continue to come by.
You got it, buddy. Ambassador Kurt vokel knows all about it.
Was there commentating after Alaska and then saw the benefits

(17:49):
of everybody getting together in Oval office and then want
Sergei Lavrov walk back any type of progress in my
view that was made. Ambassador Voker, welcome back. Where are
we at with this process? Do you think, Brian? Thanks
so much.

Speaker 10 (18:03):
Look, I think President Trump deserves credit for making this
the number one international issue on everybody's agenda right now.
You know he can summon the Secretary General of NATO,
the head of the European Union, Chancellor of Germany, Prime
Minister of Britain, President of France, all of them coming
to the White House to meet with him. This is
on the top of everyone's agenda. That's a very good thing,

(18:24):
But we have to face the reality is that Putin
has not given the President a single thing. He has
not backed off at all. He maintains his maximalist demands,
not only keeping all the territory he sees by force
in Ukraine, but even demanding that the Ukrainians give him
more territory voluntarily, which of course they're not going to do.

(18:46):
And he's rejected calls for a ceasefire, he has distanced
himself from any formal peace agreement. He has rejected President
Trump's request for a trilateral meeting with him and Zelensky.
He's rejected a bilateral with Zelensky. So he is just
thumbing his nose at us, really, And I think that
the only thing that gets to Putin is force and pressure,

(19:08):
and we've got to put on more pressure, particularly economically
with the secondary sanctions, the secondary tariffs, and he's got
to see that Americas arms and ammunition paid for of
course Europeans now will continue to flow.

Speaker 1 (19:24):
Right, So do you believe that Lavrov speaks for Putin.

Speaker 10 (19:31):
I think Lavrov is a mouthpiece for the Russian regime.
I don't think he has any decision making power. I
don't think he can influence Putin. But I think he
goes out and says things that Putin wants him to say.

Speaker 1 (19:43):
That's key, that's and so I want you to hear
this cut twenty eight.

Speaker 11 (19:47):
Putin is ready to meet with Zilianski when the agenda
would be ready for a summit, and this agenda is
not ready at all.

Speaker 1 (20:00):
So he says, the agenda is not ready. We haven't
done enough to actually bring it to the table. So
what does he mean by that? I mean, wouldn't it
be the next step? Yeah, they didn't really do much
getting ready for Alaska. They wanted to feel each other out.
That's right.

Speaker 10 (20:14):
No, he jumped on a plane and flew to Alaska.
But this is Lavrov saying that Russia's going to set
the conditions and we're going to demand that we get
all our concessions upfront from the Ukrainians, and we want
us to give it. They want us to take territory.
They want to have Ukraine withdrawal. They want Ukraine to
be neutral. No military forces there, and then if they
get all of that, then maybe they'll have a meeting.

(20:36):
Just a complete rejection of what President Trump is really
trying to do.

Speaker 1 (20:43):
So, I mean, it's just hard to believe that you
could lose over a million men with casualties one hundred
thousand deaths minimum twenty thousand a month and not feel
an urgency to bring the killing to an end or
bring the war an end. I think there's a fear
that when the war ends, his entire industry is military.
How does he make to con I understand, in Alaska
they talked about how to open up their economy more,

(21:04):
how to stand it up quickly. We would have done
a lot to help them make that transition, even if
it got our allies upset.

Speaker 2 (21:13):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (21:13):
No, that's right.

Speaker 10 (21:15):
President Trump has been looking to end the war and
flip to getting back to business, getting back to economic development,
making money for everybody, and that is not what President
Putin is interested in. President Putin wants to see himself
in portraits alongside Catherine the Great and Peter the Great,
someone who has conquered territory for Russia. He is rebuilding

(21:37):
the Russian Empire, and it's that historical legacy that's motivating him.
And the only way to stop somebody like that is
you've got to use force. You've got to make it
clear to them that he's risking his own regime if
he pursues that goal.

Speaker 1 (21:52):
And right now, I know Ukraine is targeting energy sectors
in Russia, and hopefully they'll get permission. If I'm the
belief the Wall Street Journal, they don't have it now
to use the attackers in Russia. Is it true that
there's a catastrotic shortage of gasoline in parts of Russia
due to these missile strikes.

Speaker 10 (22:11):
Yeah, they've lost over fifteen percent of their refining capacity,
their rationing gasoline in Crimea and in Siberia.

Speaker 1 (22:20):
And you're absolutely right.

Speaker 10 (22:22):
It is critical that Ukraine be able to take out
the logistical supplies and support that are helping Russia's forces
in Ukraine. Fuel and refinement of gasoline products is a
big part of that, not only for the overall economy,
but also for the military ammunition depots, roads, bridges, railroads, everything,
and they need the long range systems to do that.

(22:45):
The Biden administration, you'll remember, refused to let the Ukrainians
fire American made weapons into Russia, even if it was
a short distance. We had a big ban on that,
and then in the final days they lifted that because
they knew it was a mistake. Well, President Trump has
now gone back to that ban again, or at least
a Pentagon has. I saw President Trump's tweet where he

(23:07):
was saying that the party being attacked has to be
able to fight back, and he's absolutely right about that.
But then he's got to get the Pentagon in line.

Speaker 1 (23:15):
Yeah, he does. I want to know if they are
in line too, because when that comes to light, he's
corrected things. I hope they're on the same page because
I know Eli Bridge Kobe was not into this fight
when he was a commentator on television, thought we should
have been focused on China. Well, in the perfect world,
we would be, but you can't avoid what we're doing
in Europe. I don't know why they don't see the connection,

(23:35):
and maybe his agenda, Trump's Trump's agenda. I hope not,
and I hope President could correct that immediately. So the
Russians want all of the Dunass region, but if they
give up the Dunas region, especially areas in that fortress belt,
that they will not win, even if they fight for
two more years. Has been so fortified. If they give

(23:57):
that up, then we're going to have to defend a
two thousand mile border. We can't do that, and they're
going to have a straight road right to Kharkiv and
then to Kiev. So that's something that can't be given
away to You agree, ambassador, I totally agree with that.

Speaker 10 (24:10):
You got the military logistics in the high ground and
so forth exactly right. And in addition to that, Putin
cannot be trusted at his word. He has invaded Ukraine
in twenty fourteen. He had a ceasefire, He signed this
Bublapest memorandum in ninety five saying he respected Ukraine's borders.

Speaker 1 (24:29):
He tore that up.

Speaker 10 (24:30):
He invaded Georgia in two thousand and eight. He invaded
Ukraine again in twenty two. There is no reason to
believe that if he says I'll just take this part
of Donbas and then I'll be done, that he will
be done. In fact, it's going to wet his appetite
for the next thing.

Speaker 1 (24:43):
So there were three deals that came up in Alaska,
according to reports in Reuters, that the US offered Russia
says Ukraine, they said, to encourage the Kremlin to agree
to a peace deal. The official discuss the possibility of
Exxon re entering and gas project. Three of the sources
said they also raised the prospect of Russia purchasing US

(25:04):
equipment for its LNG projects, such as the Arctic LNG,
which is under Western sanctions in the past. So they're
looking to work and get their energy sectors stood up,
and he brought hundreds of business people with him. So,
I mean, that's a big commitment to make if you
don't really want to do anything.

Speaker 10 (25:25):
Yeah, it's a big offer. It is certainly signaling to
putin We're prepared to just you know, reset, just like Obama.
We're going to reset and get back to doing business
if you end this war.

Speaker 1 (25:38):
But I mean Russians brought business people with him too.

Speaker 10 (25:40):
Yes, Yeah, And I'm frankly puzzled by that because I'm
in favor what President Trump is actually doing, which is
making and America the donna entergy power in the world.
Why would we want to help Russia get its energy
back on stream?

Speaker 1 (25:55):
Yeah, I mean, right now, we've those sanctions hit India.
It's hurt our relations with India. Are you worried about that.

Speaker 10 (26:03):
Yeah, I am, because I think India is the more
strategic partner for the US in Asia and South Asia.
They're the largest democracy in the world. They are also
an adversary with China. They have tremendous upward potential. China
is our main adversary in Asia, and they've kind of
peaked at least in terms of their population. Their GDP

(26:26):
is going to grow more slowly, but they are building
up their military capabilities. I think we would want India
on our side.

Speaker 1 (26:33):
Yeah, hopefully that that could be that could be fixed.
So we have Brazil, Turkey, and China, those are the
ones buying most of the Russian oil and gas. What
would you do.

Speaker 10 (26:45):
Next, Well, I would go with secondary sanctions, secondary Paris. Yeah,
sanctions are going after the businesses, the entities, the banks,
the ports, the vessels, the refiners, any business it's actually
engaged in the trade with Russia.

Speaker 1 (27:04):
If you do tariffs, you're hitting the whole country.

Speaker 10 (27:06):
They may not listen to the tariffs, they may pay
the tariffs, or you know, have those tariffs stay in
effect and retaliate with tariffs against American goods. You don't
know what's going to get the effect, and it's too
broad a brush, but if you go after the businesses
and you take away their access to international financial markets
and banking that is vital to those businesses and entities,

(27:27):
that's what we should be going after. Because the key
goal here is to get as little money as possible
flowing into the Kremlin's budgets so that they actually have
to start shutting down the war.

Speaker 1 (27:38):
So I think they're going to start planning what an
international force in Ukraine would look like. Would you move ahead?

Speaker 10 (27:43):
If you were NATO, I wouldn't do it until there's
a ceasefire, And this is something there.

Speaker 1 (27:48):
I think President Trump has it right. Would you can
start planning now? Yeah, we're planning for sure.

Speaker 10 (27:53):
And you know the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs was
in Europe last week doing exactly that, meeting with his counterparts.
Say okay, if we're going to have a European Reassurance force,
what's the mission, how does it function in Ukraine? What
kind of backup does it need? What would America's role
be in helping back it up? And that would be

(28:14):
in my view, and I think this is.

Speaker 1 (28:15):
Where they're headed.

Speaker 10 (28:16):
The Ukrainians have to be trained and equipped and build
up into a formidable army so that Putin will not
attack again. To do that, they need European and American
help for training, equipping, air defense, and air support in
extremits air support as a backup. I think that's where
this is heading. Once there's a ceasefire, that should deploy.

Speaker 1 (28:39):
As quickly as possible.

Speaker 10 (28:41):
When there's not a ceasefire, we do run the risk
of NATO forces and Russian forces engaging directly, and that
can get out of hand. We don't want that, so
we do want to press for a ceasefire as quickly
as possible, get the deterrence force in place, and then
hopefully we can go back to a tense stand off
with Russia rather than hot war.

Speaker 1 (29:02):
And Leslie, ambassador for those people out there, said, well,
NATO brought this on themselves by surrounding Russia. I have
a view of that, but I want to hear the
former ambassador to NATO to talk about what exactly NATO does.

Speaker 10 (29:15):
Yeah, no, this is very important, Brian. It's good you
bring us up. NATO is a collection of independent sovereign
democracies who want to fight together. You know, they want
to band together to defend themselves, so if one of
them is attacked, we all respond and that deters attacks
against NATO. And what happened when this Ovid Union came

(29:37):
apart is all these countries they had subjugated, They had
occupied the Baltic States for forty years, they had occupied
Eastern Germany for forty years.

Speaker 1 (29:48):
They had installed puppet.

Speaker 10 (29:49):
Governments communist governments in Poland and Hungary and Czechoslovakia. Once
they were free from Russian yoke, these countries wanted to
make sure they never got invaded and occupied again, so
they wanted to join NATO so that Russia would not attack.

Speaker 1 (30:04):
And guess what it works.

Speaker 10 (30:06):
In all of that time since the fall of the
Soviet Union, not one of those countries that join has
been attacked by Russia.

Speaker 1 (30:14):
Indeed, the only.

Speaker 10 (30:14):
Countries that Russia has attacked are the countries that are
not in NATO, Georgia and Ukraine. And the Ukrainians are
fighting back saying no, no, we're not going under Russian
subjugation again. We're going to defend our freedom.

Speaker 1 (30:27):
Absolutely. So people say they were surrounded by what by
people that just don't want to be.

Speaker 10 (30:32):
Invaded exactly, and look at a map. Everyone who's here's
that line. We're surrounded. Look at a map. All of
NATO is to the west of Russia, and Russia extends
eleven time zones eastward. It's got borders with Kazakhstan, with
Central Asia, with China, its borders the Pacific Ocean. There,

(30:54):
they are not surrounded and they know it. They're also
twenty eight times the size of U Grand geographically terms
of the territory. What do they need to be twenty
nine times the.

Speaker 1 (31:05):
Size for all? Right, ambassador, was great to talk to you,
Ambassador Voko. Good conversation and hopefully we'll get a resolved soon.
Colonel welcome back. It's great to talk to you yesterday
I meet you in person.

Speaker 9 (31:19):
Thanks sir. Good to be back.

Speaker 1 (31:20):
So what's going on? So first off, let's talk about Afghanistan.
You heard adamal Kirby as press secretary. You probably didn't
at the time, but maybe since every time he got
a question from US or from the press, this was
this was a big success. Everybody knows we had to
leave Afghanistan and we should focus on how we got

(31:40):
everybody out. You did do a great job getting everyone out,
but is that the story?

Speaker 9 (31:45):
Absolutely not.

Speaker 8 (31:46):
I think I think most of us realize, just from
a military operation perspective, that there absolutely was a better
way to do it. And number one on that was
is don't force an arbitrary end date of August thirty.

Speaker 9 (31:57):
First, we saw what was happening in the country at
the time.

Speaker 8 (32:00):
A change of date, provide the military the resources they need,
the military resources we need to execute an operation, and uh,
and things would have gone I think very different.

Speaker 1 (32:09):
I'd just like to go over to that moment when
you were flying out. Did you know you were the
last flight?

Speaker 9 (32:14):
Yeah? Absolutely we did.

Speaker 8 (32:15):
We had We had planned for it as it was
a tremendous amount of planning went into that. I remember
five C seventeens in a formation, right. We flew in
there in the middle of the night, no lights on,
using only night vision goggles. We had about thirty aircraft
overhead and sort of support role.

Speaker 1 (32:26):
Can you tell me how hard that is?

Speaker 8 (32:28):
Well, the planning was was flight in the actual flight
in Yeah, yeah, it is.

Speaker 9 (32:33):
It's difficult. We trained very well for our folks. Folk
are our.

Speaker 8 (32:37):
Pilots all, all five of those aircraft in there were tight.
That formation was perfect. Those pilots are outstanding. This is
the C seventeen Special Operations scene. They are the best
out there. So difficult, yes, but.

Speaker 9 (32:48):
Man, this is what we trained for. This that was
that was our our super Bowl that that night, so.

Speaker 1 (32:52):
You knew this is going to be it. I'm going
to get all the I'm going to get everybody or
military out of there. How many were on your plane?

Speaker 8 (32:57):
Yeah, I don't even remember how many drumps are No,
not hundreds. It was of those five five jets that
came out. It was a lot of sort of specialized equipment,
some unique Air Force military assets. And then of course
Genel Donahue was the last one to walk on.

Speaker 1 (33:13):
And who I had a chance to go with when
it was for Liberty four prag for Liberty back to
Fort Bragg, right, But yeah, he was as impressive as
it gets. I think that was his silhouette leaving right
that people always see, how much do we leave behind?

Speaker 8 (33:26):
A ton? Obviously a ton, you know. I mentioned this
yesterday on the show. But one of the memories I
have looking back, unfortunately, is a year later and it's
us morning today, August twenty sixth, the day that we
lost thirteen Americans, and on the same day as the
talband thrown a parade driving all of our equipment that
we left behind, all of those humviies in that parade.

Speaker 9 (33:45):
That I hate having that memory locked in.

Speaker 1 (33:48):
Libray, especially because you won every battle against them, right
absolutely kick their ass from the day you walked in
the country fell and they were able to infiltrate their
way back. Oh that's right.

Speaker 8 (33:59):
And you know, there was there was a moment that
was really frustrating for me, okay, and it was that
things weren't going well at this point, at the point
it's like the middle of evacuation and we have this
arbitrary ending of August thirty first, went over going to
make it, and I happened to see the Taliban commander
come on TV and he gives the United States American
ultimatum and he says, August thirty first is a line

(34:20):
in the stand. America will be gone by August thirty first.
And so we saw that we're we're watching what's happening.
We pay attention even though we're sort of in the fight.
And the reaction, you know, amongst some of the pilots
was like, man, we better we better see the president
on TV.

Speaker 9 (34:33):
Tomol reminding the Taliban of who they are and who
we are.

Speaker 8 (34:37):
Once we did see the president on TV the next
day and Joe Biden went on TV and instead of
refuting the Taliban, he bowed to them, and he doubled down.
He said, yes, we agree, we will be gone by
August thirty first. And so what we knew in that
moment that told us really two things. One you know,
our president doesn't have our backs, and two things are
going to get harder before they get easier. And two

(34:59):
days later was the Abbey bombing.

Speaker 1 (35:02):
And people have focused on the thirteen. They should, but
there's a lot of people seriously wounded. Absolutely thirty seven,
I think absolutely, and and I mean two hundred innocent Afghans, right,
it's two hut horrible tragic.

Speaker 8 (35:16):
Day, and and we it looking back on it was
an inevitable, inevitability that this is going to happen, you know.
And and I remember where I was standing. I was,
I was in we were getting ready to go fly
and uh, I was in the Joint Operation Center we
call it, you know, all the all the big screens
and everything, and where is that this is at our

(35:38):
at our headquarters where we're operating out of in the
Middle East, and it's literally just about to go fly
about about thirty minutes wild take off probably, And I'm
in there and and the bombing goes off, and I
remember the moment, the feeling in the pit of my
stomach watching the smoke rise, and what that felt, and
a silence in the room in the command center of

(35:59):
all of us just feeling devastated, and then waiting to
find out how bad it was.

Speaker 1 (36:06):
Hughes President Trump yesterday Cut twenty four.

Speaker 4 (36:09):
The Taliban has runs a tough operation in Afghanistan, and
I think it was the most embarrassing day in the
history of our country that was by I was leaving.
And we would have left through strengths, tremendous strength. We
would have had tremendous We would have kept Barbara, which
is the airbase, one of the largest runways in the world,
one of the most powerful. You could land anything on it,

(36:29):
many many feet thick. You don't build them that way anymore,
you can't.

Speaker 1 (36:35):
But we left it. They left it, and he went
on there. I think the Russians built it, didn't They
long history, a long history. So if we kept Barbaroing,
we would have been And I think you personally, if
you just explained to the American people there was no
clamor to get out of Afghanistan. Sadly, you guys were
paying the price for it, but we weren't getting I
wasn't even getting regular news on Afghanist too. I had
to go search for it. But if you just explained

(36:57):
to the American people, put out a map and say,
in this area, we got Iran, we got Russia, we
have China, we have Pakistan. It's in our interest to
win the war on terror, to have a looking glass year.
We've worked hard to have great contacts in the region,
fantastic bases in the region, and it might be in
our interest to keep this for a while. And this

(37:18):
is the plan we have in our NATO allies. Also,
I know we're doing main fighting. But they didn't. They
weren't pushing to get out. They had thirty five thousand
on the ground there. They could have maybe taken a
little bit more of the freight. These are some of
the options that would have been available. But all they
said is we got to end it. We got to
end it. And I always thought to my I wasn't
comfortable with the way President Trump was doing it. I
was incomfortable with an ambassador Callizad, the deal he was

(37:40):
cutting with the Taliban. I don't know what he was
doing in the meantime, So.

Speaker 9 (37:47):
Certainly there were a lot of options. Yeah, you nailed it.

Speaker 8 (37:49):
It was at the time, in those that final year,
you know, twenty twenty. So I don't think we lost
a single right troop to combat while we were out there.

Speaker 9 (37:58):
So you're not wrong.

Speaker 8 (37:59):
But you remember when President ordered, I mean, this is this,
and and to his comments just now, he's absolutely right.
He I mean, he might as well have been there
with us because he he just said the things that
we actually, all of us felt on the ground there.
This the President Trump's Peace through Strength mandate. This initiative
is going on. We're already seeing, first of all, the effects.
We are the safest America's ever been right right now.

(38:19):
And when President Trump ordered it was called an orderly withdrawal.
This wasn't like any evacuation. What it's supposed to be
an orderly withdrawal.

Speaker 1 (38:24):
If it started going sideways, he would have stopped.

Speaker 8 (38:26):
Ad that's exactly right, or and or bring in more troops,
whatever it takes to get it done. And there's a
fantastic story about when President Trump ordered the orderly withdrawal
and he met with Taliban leadership and he slid across
a satellite picture, slid it across the table to the
Taliban commander, satellite imagery of this guy's house, and President

(38:46):
Trump said, Hey, this is this is what we intend
to do. And if you get in our way, our
response will start with you. We know where you live,
Our response will.

Speaker 9 (38:54):
Start with you.

Speaker 8 (38:54):
I mean, that's peace through strength right there, like that,
that is what keeps the enemy at bay, keeps our
America say, and then keeps our forward troops safe. That
was completely abandoned by President Joe Biden by coming in
and turning it into an evacuation.

Speaker 1 (39:08):
And cars I took our money or helicopter when we
haven't seen him since.

Speaker 9 (39:12):
No, that's right.

Speaker 8 (39:13):
I actually knew that that was the day that I
was going to go in. Was I woke up in
the morning and I saw that cars I had left
the country and abandoned the country.

Speaker 9 (39:20):
And we essentially know, okay, it's on.

Speaker 1 (39:22):
Right, and how many people left behind? So we'll see
here here's them taking here's Kirby Millie and Lloyd Austin
and Mackenzie Cut twenty seven. They talk about this mission
Cut twenty seven.

Speaker 2 (39:35):
Extraordinary success of this mission was due to the incredible skill, bravely,
and selfless courage of the United States military and our
diplomats and intelligence professionals.

Speaker 3 (39:47):
So for all this talk of chaos, I just didn't
see it, not for my person.

Speaker 1 (39:51):
It was a logistical success, but a strategic failure.

Speaker 9 (39:54):
Was it perfect? Of course not.

Speaker 3 (39:56):
I recommended that we maintained twenty five hundred troops in Afghani.

Speaker 1 (40:00):
So I want to put you in this. So Mackenzie
has said that consistently, and Millias said that. He said,
before they did this, I said we should have left troops.
He goes, no, I don't want to. I want to
leave a small force. He goes, then we got to leave.
So Milly, with all his political cachet because he went
against Trump and he was looked at as a hero
by the left, if he said, miss President, if you
do this, here are my four stars, I can't. I

(40:20):
cannot preside over this. And Mackenzie too. They go, guy,
I'm your generals, but this is going to be impossible.
This will be a disaster. They go, well, it's not good.
It's gonna do it anyway. I want to preside over remission.
It's not up to me. No, it is up to you.
You could if you said that, if you projected this,
you could have put a stop to it. Right there?
Am I wrong?

Speaker 7 (40:39):
No?

Speaker 8 (40:40):
One thousand percent. You know, the Chairman of Joint Chi's
staff Millie's position at this time. The chairman is the
highest ranking person in the military and they really have
one specific job, principal military.

Speaker 9 (40:52):
Advisor to the President.

Speaker 8 (40:54):
So either that was Millie's advice to the president, in
which case Millie should have been fired, or he gave
different advice and the President didn't take it, in which
case I think Millie should have then resigned. So there's
really so decide what you will on his position and
his role in it, But there is no scenario where
he should have stayed in that position.

Speaker 3 (41:14):
And I.

Speaker 8 (41:17):
Have very strong feelings about his position. I think he
was more concerned with politics and his perception of the
political stage. I think he was a politician in the uniform,
and he did us absolutely no favors.

Speaker 9 (41:28):
In the military.

Speaker 1 (41:28):
Remember, Preisdent Biden said down with George sephan Appolis in
a friendly interview, but Stephanoppolis said, you went against you, Generals,
he goes. No general said that the predicted that this
would happen if we pulled out like this, So he went,
They went and testified a couple of weeks later. No
one ever said, close that circle. Somebody's not telling the
truth either that or his mind was totally shot already

(41:50):
one year into the presidency.

Speaker 11 (41:51):
Yeah.

Speaker 8 (41:51):
I don't think the question is could anybody have predicted
what happened? I think the question is did anybody advise
against an August thirty first arbitrary end date? We're watching
the Talibans just basically maneuver through the whole country. Right,
We're closing bases all year long, and we close a
base twenty four hours later it's.

Speaker 9 (42:09):
In the hands of the Taliban.

Speaker 8 (42:10):
Right, we leave it in the hands of the A
and A, the Afghan National Army, and twenty four hours
later it's in the hands of the Taliban. And so
we're seeing this like happen. So so where's why not pause?
Why not change the approach? Why not? Why not? Hey,
let's uh, I mean, this is what President Trump I'm
certain would have done. It's the USPC strength, Like there's
that doesn't happen. The Taliban is not hot on our heels.
Like the Taliban influencing military US military operations is a

(42:34):
crazy thought, and that's what was happening.

Speaker 1 (42:36):
They were their security in cobble, right. But you're not
You're done with the military, but you're not done with serving.

Speaker 8 (42:44):
Absolutely right. So what's next for me? I mean, this
is and this is a result of this twenty two
years of service. What I know about myself is now
that I'm retired, I'm not done yet. I wasn't made
to sit on the sidelines. I need to be in
this fight. And after watching this terrible leadership from the
left were concerned about politics than the state of the country.
What I realize is that gonna be back in the fight.
I'm running for Congress and the first Congressional District of

(43:05):
South Carolina. Uh Pelbath for Congress. Dot com is where
people can find me. But the goal is to make
sure what we're commemorating today, what President Trump committemory today
with the families, never happens again, and that President Trump
has the right leaders by his side come twenty twenty
six to continue this fight, to make sure that his
agenda is seen through.

Speaker 1 (43:22):
So you're going to be running in South Carolina, Nancy
Nancy Mace is running for governor, so Teneth Colonel Alex
Pelbath is now running for that seat. So you got
to win to get the Republican nomination, You hope to
get the President's attention, and then you want to win
that seat. So if you can get the nomination, you.

Speaker 8 (43:40):
Got to feel you're going to win the general right, absolutely, right,
Then it's you know, this is We're not a Republican stronghold.
They'll still be a fight, but this is a Republican district.
And I think we've seen the last couple of years
that the conservative voice is speaking loudly in the local.

Speaker 1 (43:52):
And Colonel I'm sure enough to tell you that there's
probably no Russian invasion of Afghanist To excuse me of Ukraine.
If he didn't witness that the backle in Afghanistan, you're
probably right, and he saw weakness and evacuation. America no
longer wants to have a role.

Speaker 8 (44:09):
This is the other side of PC strength. This is
why President Trump gets it. It is we are not
just projecting strength at one country. We are sending a
message to the world. When we act. When President Trump
flies a B two over Putin's head, we are telling
the world, we're putting the world unnotice that you are
going to respect United States of America.

Speaker 1 (44:29):
Yeah, and I like personally that people can't predict what
he's going to do, including a lot of people on
his staff. And he has his staff that's not going
to stab him in the back.

Speaker 9 (44:38):
That's right. Well, this is the don't tell the bad guys,
you're planned part of things, right, this is this is
this is.

Speaker 8 (44:42):
President Trump understands leadership, understands that at this global strategic level,
take care of the country. He also gets it, you know,
inviting the families of the thirteen we lost today right
four years ago today to the White House and Megan
today a day commemoration. President Trump understands that, like he
understands how to take care of people, he's taking care
of people at this low level, and he has taken
care of the country at the.

Speaker 9 (45:01):
At the highest level.

Speaker 8 (45:02):
So that is what that's good leadership. That's why we
want that's why people want to.

Speaker 1 (45:06):
Follow President right, and I think you would fit right
in with that group, and certainly that are motivated to
get things done that will be his last two years
in office, Lieutenant Colonel Alex Pelbath, best of luck as
you run in South Carolina, and one more time the
number two to.

Speaker 8 (45:20):
Pelbath for Congress dot com, Pellmath for Congress dot Com.

Speaker 9 (45:23):
All right, Alex, just win Ryan, thank you.

Speaker 1 (45:24):
You got it right back in a moment, I get
a pronouncer, Ainsley, I'm sorry, Angrey Allison on my guests. Sure,
this is kind of awkward. That's right, Okay, I remember you.
Trey Goudi the host of Sunday Night in America, The
Trey Goudy Podcast, former South Carolina Congressman, former federal prosecutor,

(45:47):
and author of a brand new book out today, The
Color of Death. It is a novel based on a
lot of your legal background in your imagination. Congratulations, Tray.
What does it feel like? I know you've been an
author before. I know the book with Tim Scott that
you wrote. Yes, sir, what does it feel like to
be on your own here writing fiction?

Speaker 3 (46:04):
Grateful, grateful that Susanne Scott gave me the chance to
do this. She literally is the one who said you
should do it. It's been in my head, The book
has been in my head. But writing, as you know,
going from nonfiction to fiction.

Speaker 1 (46:17):
And I know, I know that it's like that at well.

Speaker 3 (46:20):
You could do it, because you're very talented, but it
would have stayed in my head, but for miss Scott
and it is you know, it's it's a ten year
labor of love that you hope people enjoy and people
are fascinated by crime if you want to know what
it's like to be a homicide investigator or a prosecutor.

Speaker 1 (46:42):
That's why I wrote the book, right, So give me
an idea of the genesis of the case. First of
could you tell me what you Was it a movie
that you saw, Was it a case that you studied?
Was it one you were a part of?

Speaker 3 (46:52):
It was one part of one that all was part of.
And it went on solved for a decade. And I
can still to this day tell you where I was
when this yriff called to me and said, we may
have a suspect. So this beautiful young mother is killed
in her beauty salon and we had a little bit
of DNA on her stomach, but no one to match
it to and it went unsolved for ten years. So

(47:12):
that's kind of the spine of this novel. No other
part of it is the same, The killer is not
the same, the suspects aren't the same. But Brian, it
was away for me to honor a young lady named
Dana Saderfield who was the victim, and her parents God
rest their souls, but also her children who were really
young when she was killed. And so it's the victim

(47:36):
in the book is not named Dana, but the beauty
salon setting and beauty juxtaposed with death and the motivation.
What would cause you to stab somebody that many times?
What would cause you to strangle someone? I mean, we're fascinated.

Speaker 1 (47:54):
By the why they always say for people on the outside,
it doesn't do this for a living. When you have
stab it's usually sign of passion, right you know that person.

Speaker 3 (48:03):
It is the most personal way to kill somebody, even
more personal than strangulation, because blood has to come up
on you when you stab them, so literally, the life fluid,
the life blood is on you. Strangulation would be second
because it's your hands and you literally feel them stop breathing.
Almost always with domestic homicides, which if you're a woman,

(48:30):
you are far more likely to be killed by somebody
who knows you and claims to love you than you
are a stranger. The stranger crime is what scares us.
But you're exponentially more likely to be killed by an
intimate partner than you are a stranger.

Speaker 1 (48:43):
So how old did you wore? You were prosecuted for
almost twenty years? How much ugliness and depth they have
you seen?

Speaker 3 (48:51):
Enough to wreck my soul to be honest with you,
But you.

Speaker 1 (48:54):
Said you enjoyed that part of your career more than
anything else.

Speaker 3 (48:59):
I think I was good. I did not run four Congress.
I ran from the shadows of evil. We had three
children under the age of eleven killed in one week,
and it just wrecks your faith, Brian.

Speaker 1 (49:15):
But then you were able to channel your anger and
sadness towards solving it right.

Speaker 3 (49:21):
We got them solved. But the one thing I could
never do is bring them back. I couldn't bring those
kids back.

Speaker 1 (49:26):
Look by writing this book, does this bring back all
those memories? And is that a bad thing? You know?

Speaker 3 (49:32):
I'm at a place because my wife wanted me to
put some light in this book. There's a line in
the miniseries True Detective, I had it all wrong. The
light does win in the end, and my wife was right.
The light does win. So this book was kind of
a Catharsis from me, because yes, there's a lot of

(49:53):
depravity and evil, but the light is going to win
if you can just hang in there long enough.

Speaker 1 (50:00):
He's here. His book is now out as of today,
so don't blame yourself if you don't have it yet,
but you'll be one of the few who doesn't. The
Color of Death. It's a novel that it's out today.
So Trey, can you see this being a movie?

Speaker 3 (50:14):
I can if they get somebody as handsome as Year
to play the role in the process.

Speaker 1 (50:17):
You can't afford me, Trey, I know I probably cannot.

Speaker 3 (50:20):
Plus you don't have time. You are the business. But
also want to tell people who I know they already
know this. There is no more encouraging supportive colleague you
can possibly have that.

Speaker 1 (50:32):
Brian Kilmock, thanks for shaying that.

Speaker 3 (50:34):
Actually seem genuinely happy in your colleague's success, and it shows.

Speaker 1 (50:40):
But I think I'm very curious. Thank you for saying that.
But I think that's the culture they built here because
it took me twelve years to get this job, so
I also knew how great it was. But do you
notice other places I know that people that come from
the outside and come here, like Bill Hammer when he
came from CNN. He was like, is this the way
it is every day?

Speaker 10 (50:57):
You know?

Speaker 1 (50:57):
Because most people they want to be here no matter
what your position is, and people are happy to come
to work.

Speaker 3 (51:03):
It's an amazing culture. And you know, Suzanne Scott enable
me to write this book, but Dana Perino was in
my ear for a year offering me encouragement because I
kept saying, I don't think I can make the transition.
It's just too hard. And so I get I give

(51:23):
her a lot of credit. She You know, she's read
more books than you and I probably put together. Probably
she might have written more books.

Speaker 1 (51:29):
Than your read, so that's cheating. She might be smarter
than I am.

Speaker 3 (51:34):
But no, everywhere you go there is a friendly, smiling
face that offers you a word of encouragement, and there
if there's competition, it's at least good natured competition.

Speaker 1 (51:45):
Yeah, it wasn't always, but it is right now. I
got to ask you, some somebody who studies and lives
off the Constitution, did it as a guide as a
guideline for your cases? How do you feel about the
President having executive order to punish people for burning the flag.
I know that justice Scalia said, as much as it

(52:05):
bothers me. It is freedom of speech. So you, as
a guy that is very patriotic, do you think Trump's
in the right here?

Speaker 3 (52:13):
In Scali was wrong, I would probably give the nod
to Trump, but not for a reason that anyone else
would guess. It is a close first cousin of arson,
so I would view it more of an arson. Can
you legally start a fire? And so it's not necessarily
the flag so much I would try to split the baby.

(52:36):
It's not so if fire is speech, then where does
it stop? So fire is it arson or is it speech?
And does it really depend on what you're burning? Can
you burn the Koran? Can you burn the Bible? Can
you burn the flag? I would argue more the intentional
setting of a fire. And then you, as a good

(52:59):
smart lawyer, would say, what can I burn the leaves
in the backyard? And then it kind of becomes where
you do the burning. Are you doing it in public
or are you doing it in your backyard?

Speaker 1 (53:07):
If you do it in.

Speaker 3 (53:08):
Your house, a libertarian in me says, it's nobody's business.

Speaker 1 (53:11):
By the way, Thanksgiving my follow up question, assuming I
would have had it. I did not have that, but
thank you for saying that. So you know what it's
like to be the party of minority and be the majority.
You also know what it's like to be in the
majority and have a Democratic president with Barack Obama. So
now the Democrats, no doubt about it, history is on
their side to take one of the chambers back, maybe
the House. So let me ask you if this is

(53:33):
the recipe towards writing your ship cut seventeen.

Speaker 6 (53:39):
I first want to take a moment to thank the
chairs of the AAPI, the Black, the Disability, Hispanic, LGBTQ,
Native American Women's and regional caucuses.

Speaker 1 (53:48):
Oakland is in the House.

Speaker 4 (53:50):
I just happened to be Oakland's first black woman mayor.

Speaker 2 (53:55):
Minnesota ranks the highest per capitable for being a safe
haven for transgender individuals?

Speaker 1 (54:01):
Is that the recipe for winning back to the American people?

Speaker 3 (54:03):
It is the recipe for being an obsolete party that
has gone the route of the Whigs and the bull
Moose Party.

Speaker 1 (54:10):
I mean, what are they thinking, can you just be
a mayor? I mean, if you want an example, you
do you know that their Treasury secretary is.

Speaker 3 (54:17):
Gay, Scott Messling, I do because he's a South Carolinian
and he's your friend.

Speaker 1 (54:22):
Yeah. I he was here for two years before he
went to I fink I found out about I don't
even remember it. Rick Rernell the same thing. And you
have history making figures for gender and ethnicity all up
and down. You know Tosey Gabbart Firsty and I got
it right, Tim Scott, Yeah, Tim Scott, I mean former
Democrats who are now Republicans or working for a Republican.

(54:45):
I love the fact that it doesn't matter because I
want them there because of who they are now, where
they're from, with the color of their skin. I think
he leveled the playing field. This feels like I'm going
back thirty years even though it's only eight months.

Speaker 3 (55:00):
The only reason it feels that way, Brian, is because
it is they're going back. So, I mean, President, think
about what President Biden did to Justice Kontanji Brown Jackson.
So he says I'm going to pick a woman of color,
and immediately I think she is marginalized. How about just
say I'm going to go pick the best person. She

(55:20):
was very very well qualified. If you are a left leaning.

Speaker 1 (55:24):
Speaker, Ryan said, knows her, his sister in law or something.

Speaker 3 (55:26):
Yes, related to her. But you do her a disservice
when you make it about racial identity. Well, I hired
an African American staff director. I did not say I'm
going to go hire an Africa. I just said I'm
going to go hire the best, and it happened to
be Sharia Clark.

Speaker 1 (55:42):
Well, how was the vice president picked? I'll tell you
exactly how I want a woman and a woman of color.
Val Demings said I don't want to do this and
then went with Kamala Harris. Do you think she felt
like she was the best person at any point? And
she proved she wasn't. But how could she be?

Speaker 3 (55:59):
She got the same delegate you and I got when
she ran for president and you and I didn't run.

Speaker 1 (56:04):
Did you see today that the DNC has spent sent
out over one hundred letters to raise money, and you
know what that money's going to to pay off the
debts she ran up during one hundred and nine day
campaign where she raised over a billion dollars. Can you
get your head around a billion dollars in a campaign
and know you ended up in the red?

Speaker 3 (56:22):
I will make them a deal. I will lose for
half of that. Okay, could you give me half of
that and I will lose.

Speaker 1 (56:29):
So Trey's gonna stick around for a little while longer,
but it gives you an opportunity during the break to
order his brand book. It's a brand new book, is
called The Color of Death. It's a novel that's out today.
Trey Goudy. We predict this is going to be number
one on the list. Don't move.

Speaker 7 (56:51):
We are at a moment of incredible opportunity for Democrats
to take the upper hand on this issue.

Speaker 1 (56:57):
Don't be afraid of the crime debate. Lean all the
way in, call out.

Speaker 7 (57:00):
What Trump is doing, and say the reason crime is
going down, our communities are becoming safer is because of us.
Don't take the bait and talking about migrant crime or
carjackings or the things that actually don't matter to that
many Americans exactly.

Speaker 1 (57:15):
And that is the great advice of a vice president
consultant at the DNC meeting in Minneapolis. Don't take the bait,
Trey Gowdie. Don't take the bait and talk about migrant
crime or carjacking. Is that good advice? You're a politican,
you were a politician.

Speaker 3 (57:29):
Yeah, well, you don't have to be a politician to
know that when crime was historically high, at all time highs,
it only has one place to go, and I mean
it has to go down. So the fact that crime
is going down, it is still what I mean, what's
a good number, I mean, what's a good homicide rate?
So I mean the president shooting for zero? Are you
happy with like one hundred? So the Democrat. First of all,

(57:54):
Donald Trump does not need to ask permission to go
into a jurisdiction and enforce federal laws. It's called dual sovereignty.
The federal government has certain things that it is criminalized.
We don't have to ask JP print Scoots permission in DC.
Don't you think, Well, he may have known it, but
he's forgotten because he says we don't want you. Well,

(58:16):
the federal government like carjacking, kidnapping, some murders are against
federal law. That's got nothing to do with the state
of Illinois. Now, if you don't want to enforce your
state laws, that's up to you, governor. But Donald Trump
does not have to ask your permission to enforce federal laws.
The Constitution's really clear. It's called the supremacy clause.

Speaker 1 (58:36):
So what do you think, What do you think the
message is with his thirty days of National Guards, which
could be your nude but might not be. It's costing
a million dollars a day, they say, so it's expensive.
That's to me the counter argument. If I'm a Democrat,
I would say, listen, I want law and order, but
I would have a better way, and tell me your
better way. But right now their ideas, he's making it up.

(58:57):
There is no problem. But as you know, and why,
whether they're wearing a suitent tie like you, or where
they're just earning a living in as a restaurant tour,
you will feel there's a danger in Washington downtown.

Speaker 3 (59:11):
Crime is one of those colorless issues. It doesn't matter
whether you are Republican or Democrat. You don't want to
be carjack kidnapped, No right, matters if you're dead, no right.

Speaker 1 (59:24):
But did you feel safe in DC?

Speaker 10 (59:26):
No?

Speaker 3 (59:26):
I was there going to the Department of Justice a
month ago, and there's a lady pulling up plants out
of a planner. She is pushing other pedestrians and knocking
over bikes. And this is a block from the Department
of Justice.

Speaker 1 (59:42):
You should be able to walk.

Speaker 3 (59:44):
I mean, but you're looking at the faces of the
women who were watching this.

Speaker 1 (59:50):
They were terrified.

Speaker 3 (59:51):
This is a public street in the nation's capital, and
you can't push a stroller without encountering a crazy woman.

Speaker 1 (59:58):
So you know that famous that Joe Scarbus says, I
have a real liberal friend who says, thank goodness that
Trump's doing it. Uh. And then you have a lot
of other people that just said there is a danger.
I watched John Kasik yell at the three panelists who
thought they were going to agree with him. He says, no, no,
crime is a huge problem. It's a huge problem in Ohio.
It's a huge problem in Illinois. And then I watched
Rachel Baite on Politico and Jonathan Carl seems surprised when

(01:00:22):
she said this.

Speaker 6 (01:00:24):
No, you just have to.

Speaker 4 (01:00:25):
Open your eyes.

Speaker 10 (01:00:25):
I mean, look, DC looks a lot different than it
used to.

Speaker 8 (01:00:28):
I mean, I used to live here.

Speaker 3 (01:00:29):
I moved because my house got robbed, my car got stolen,
and this was before it got bad.

Speaker 1 (01:00:34):
So you, Jonathan, that's not why you're on this panel.
You know to say that, Brian, that's a political writer.

Speaker 3 (01:00:41):
When you lose Rachel, I mean, I like Rachel Rachel
our friends. But when you lose Rachel Baye, you have
lost the argument. When you lose Politico, you have lost
the argument.

Speaker 1 (01:00:51):
Do you think when the DNC sits around, like the
rn CL, sit around and strategize, and they'll say, guys,
we got to back off this. You know that DC
has a problem. Redskin running backs are being shot at
the valley you know, two years ago, Valley Parking. Obviously
you're shaking your head.

Speaker 3 (01:01:08):
No, no, how do they get out of it? Because
they ran on progressive prosecutors. You've got Alvin Bragg, You've
got the guys in California, their base, AOC, the squad.
I mean Rashida Tale wants to do away with prison.
I mean, what is more anathetical than crime enforcement than
doing literally doing away with prison. Some Democrats want no

(01:01:29):
prison sentences more than ten years, which means Dylan Rufe,
who killed nine black Christians, would be out of jail
the day he hit ten years. So how do you
navigate a base that believes that and talk about crime?

Speaker 1 (01:01:43):
And so here's the difference between you. We're in Congress.
It's really not left and right, it's right and wrong.
It's right. I don't really say conservative or liberal anymore.
It just doesn't come out when I'm preparing to do shows.
Is what are they thinking. I'm going to play some
sound bites because people aren't going to believe that they
said that, And that's what I spend most of my
time doing. I think things have really changed now, but

(01:02:04):
the American people are going on the side of right.
I watched John Kerry and Bernie Sanders say something. I
thought it was concerned, but it wasn't. We did a
bad job at the border. We should have been smarter
at the border. And I go, Okay, this is what
they're gonna do. Fine, emits you're wrong, right, and then
build from there.

Speaker 3 (01:02:20):
I don't think their base will let them do.

Speaker 1 (01:02:23):
John Mark Kelly, Senator, the astronaut fighter Jed Pilot. Probably
he can't even admit that Trump knocked that lockdown the border.

Speaker 3 (01:02:32):
That's how you've become a minority party. And that maybe
why history does not repeat itself, and that the Republicans
don't lose the House is because they learn nothing. So
remember when we lost. The Republicans lost, they did an autopsy.
All right, what do you think the Democrat autopsy is
going to show that we should, we should stick up
more that cracking down all crime is unfair of criminals.

(01:02:54):
Do you think that's what the autopsy is gonna show is.

Speaker 1 (01:02:56):
Going to say more profanity. That's what they said. That's
what they started cursing like crazy. The Color of Death
is the name of the book. Trey County put it
as his first novel. Go and grab it today. It's
a Fox book. You're gonna hear a lot about it,
and it's off his real life experience. Trey, congratulations. Hopefully
we'll talk about this again as it stays on the list,
and you're gonna get pressure to continue to promote it
and promote it and get into the pressure, and we'll

(01:03:18):
watch him Sunday night at nine pm Eastern Time. Trey Gouty,
thanks so much, Thank you brother. I appreciate it.