Trump's 36% Approval Rating in Gallup Poll; Hegseth May Have Committed War Crime in 2nd Strike Order
December 2, 2025 • 41 mins
The guest host for today's show is Brad Bannon. Brad runs Bannon Communications Research, a polling, message development and media firm which helps labor unions, progressive issue groups and Democratic candidates win public affairs and political campaigns. His show, 'Deadline D.C. with Brad Bannon,' airs every Monday from 3-4pm ET.
Brad is first joined by Mabinty Quarshie, White House Reporter for the Washington Examiner.
The two analyze President Trump's 36% approval rating in the new Gallup poll, which is the lowest of his term, and just two points shy of his lowest ever.
They also discuss Trump's handling of the press, and what his low approval rating could mean for Republicans in next year's midterm elections.
Then, Brad is joined by CNN Military Analyst Cedric Leighton (USAF-Ret.).
The two discuss the Washington Post report that Secretary of War, Pete Hegseth, authorized a highly unusual strike to kill all survivors of one of the Trump administration’s attacks in recent months on boats allegedly carrying drugs in international waters.
Next, they talk about Senator Mark Kelly's message to military service members about their duty to the U.S. constitution to not follow unlawful orders.
Lastly, they discuss the prospects for a peace deal between Ukraine and Russia.
Mabinty Quarshie's handle on X is @MabintyQ.
Col. Cedric Leighton is the Founder and President of Cedric Leighton Associates, a strategic risk and leadership consultancy serving global companies and organizations. He founded the company in 2010, after serving in the US Air Force for 27 years as an Intelligence Officer and attaining the rank of Colonel. His website is www.CedricLeighton.com and his handle on BlueSky is @CedricLeighton. bsky.social.
Brad writes a political column every Sunday for 'The Hill.'
He's on the National Journal's panel of political insiders and is a national political analyst for WGN TV and Radio in Chicago and KNX Radio in Los Angeles. You can read Brad's columns at www.MuckRack.com/Brad-Bannon. His handle on BlueSky is @bradbannon.bsky.social.
(Image Credit: Doug Mills/The New York Times)
Brad is first joined by Mabinty Quarshie, White House Reporter for the Washington Examiner.
The two analyze President Trump's 36% approval rating in the new Gallup poll, which is the lowest of his term, and just two points shy of his lowest ever.
They also discuss Trump's handling of the press, and what his low approval rating could mean for Republicans in next year's midterm elections.
Then, Brad is joined by CNN Military Analyst Cedric Leighton (USAF-Ret.).
The two discuss the Washington Post report that Secretary of War, Pete Hegseth, authorized a highly unusual strike to kill all survivors of one of the Trump administration’s attacks in recent months on boats allegedly carrying drugs in international waters.
Next, they talk about Senator Mark Kelly's message to military service members about their duty to the U.S. constitution to not follow unlawful orders.
Lastly, they discuss the prospects for a peace deal between Ukraine and Russia.
Mabinty Quarshie's handle on X is @MabintyQ.
Col. Cedric Leighton is the Founder and President of Cedric Leighton Associates, a strategic risk and leadership consultancy serving global companies and organizations. He founded the company in 2010, after serving in the US Air Force for 27 years as an Intelligence Officer and attaining the rank of Colonel. His website is www.CedricLeighton.com and his handle on BlueSky is @CedricLeighton. bsky.social.
Brad writes a political column every Sunday for 'The Hill.'
He's on the National Journal's panel of political insiders and is a national political analyst for WGN TV and Radio in Chicago and KNX Radio in Los Angeles. You can read Brad's columns at www.MuckRack.com/Brad-Bannon. His handle on BlueSky is @bradbannon.bsky.social.
(Image Credit: Doug Mills/The New York Times)
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
The Leslie Marshall Show, A true democracy in talk radio
of for and by you the people.
Speaker 2 (00:31):
Live from our nation's capital, It's Deadline DC with Brad Bannon.
Speaker 3 (00:37):
Hi. I'm Brad Bannon, and I have the government issued
real id to prove it. I'm the host of Deadline
DC with Brad Bannon because no one else would take
the job or the name. I'm a national democratic and
progressive strategist. I'm a American political analyst for the Times
(01:00):
of India and weekly columnists to The Hill in Washington,
d C. You can read my columns in The Hill
to get my take on Donald Trump's imperial and confused presidency.
You can read my columns at muckrack dot com front Slash.
(01:23):
Brad Bannon mondays on Deadline DC, I talked to the
people and players behind the politics and policies that drive
our great nation forward, or at least try to keep
it from going backwards. During Trump two point zero, our guest,
We've got you covered on the domestic front and the
(01:47):
foreign policy front today on Deadline DC. In the first
half hour, Mabinti Kwashi, who is national political correspondent for
The Washington Examiner, joins us to talk about the Trump presidency. Then,
in the second half hour, Cedric Layton, CNN's military analyst,
(02:10):
joins us to discuss the Trump administration at war. Before
we get to our first guest, though, we're going to
play this clip from CNN. It is there polling analyst
Harry Inton discussing the new Gallup poll which shows Donald
(02:30):
Trump's approval rating is down to a record low of
thirty six percent.
Speaker 4 (02:36):
I mean, it's a disaster if it holds towards the
midterm elections. And I should note, of course it's not alone.
Speaker 1 (02:42):
I mean, just take a look here. This is Gallup.
Speaker 4 (02:43):
This is the longest running poll. You know, Gallup has
been conducting pole since my father was a kid. And
my father is born in nineteen hundred and twenty seven.
Have me in the sixties.
Speaker 1 (02:51):
Look at this.
Speaker 4 (02:52):
In January, donald Trump's not approve rank not too bad,
not too great. It was at minus one point, right
within the margin verror breaking even. But look at this
now negative twenty four points, way way down. We're talking
about a drop of over twenty points in the wrong.
Speaker 1 (03:07):
Direction for the president of the United States. Minus twenty
four points.
Speaker 4 (03:10):
That's a twenty three point move in the incorrect direction
if you're the president. And of course, what's so important here,
Sarah Seidner, is it matches the trend that we've seen
with other polls, that is Donald Trump hitting his low
for the second term.
Speaker 1 (03:24):
I was doing the account last night.
Speaker 4 (03:25):
I think we're up to ten polls in sort of
the last forty days, ten different posters who have said
that Trump is at the lowest point he.
Speaker 1 (03:32):
Is in his second term.
Speaker 4 (03:33):
So how does this compare to other presidents in their
second term at this point in time? Yeah, okay, So
you know, this is one of these great examples where
I kind of run out of room on the slide. Yeah,
I run out of room on the side. So I
just put up the Republican presidents. But look, the only
one who's worse for me, either among Republicans or Democrats
at this point a second term is Richard Nixon. Of course,
(03:54):
Richard Nixon had to wave audio smikos goodbye.
Speaker 1 (03:56):
Less than a year after this poll was taken.
Speaker 4 (03:58):
He was at minus thirty six points, Trump at minus
twenty four points. That beats or is worse, I should say,
beats in the wrong direction.
Speaker 1 (04:05):
George W. Bush minus nineteen points.
Speaker 4 (04:07):
His Republican Party, of course, suffered major losses in the
two thousand and six mid term elections. Dwight Eisenhower plus
thirty one points down. Trump has never smelt that at all.
I had to go into the archives to pick up
that photo and Ronald Reagan at plus forty one points.
Speaker 1 (04:18):
But again, it also is worse than Harry S. Truman.
Speaker 4 (04:21):
It's worse than Lyndon Baines Johnson. It's worse than Barack Obama,
It's worse than Bill Clinton. Anywhere you look, this is
the second worst for a president of either party at
this point in their second term, dating all the way back.
Speaker 1 (04:34):
Since the nineteen forties.
Speaker 3 (04:38):
That was Harry Inton of CNN talking about Donald Trump's
pull numbers. Our guest in this half hour is mcvinti Kwashi,
who is a national political correspondent for the Washington Examiner.
We have a There are long history of famous cues
in American culture. In the James Bond movies, Q was
(05:02):
a quartermaster who provided the James who provided James Bond
with all those gadgets, including the Aston Martin with the
headlight machine guns feature in the movie Goldfinger. If you're
a Star Trek fan, q was a mysterious entity in
the universe who came on the show occasionally to torment
(05:24):
the crew. We have our own queue. It's me, Binti
Quashi Mibini. Welcome back to Deadline DC.
Speaker 5 (05:33):
Hi, Rad, I'm glad to be here.
Speaker 3 (05:35):
Okay. I would say I was going to say that
Trump's approval rating is in free fall, but technically that's
not correct because honestly, I don't think they can fall
any further. I think we've got down to the rock
hard The thirty six percent is down pretty close to
(05:56):
the rock hard Trump supporters who will support him hell
of high water. So I don't think it can go
much longer. Although God knows, I've been wrong on the
show before, as many people point out in their texts
exchanged with me. But you know what I'm curious about,
(06:18):
and it's very odd. I mean, right now, if you
look at the gallop numbers, there are there are virtually
no Democrats who approve of Donald Trump's presidency. There are
very few Independents who approve of his presidency. What's holding
Trump up at you know, the thirty mid thirties is
(06:40):
the fact that you've got about you know, seventy to
eighty percent of the Republicans approve of his performance, which
means that anywhere from twenty to twenty five to thirty
Republican present of Republicans don't approve of his job rating.
What's going on here.
Speaker 5 (06:59):
Yeah, the the issue is that Trump campaigned on lowering prices,
and that is what propelled him against former President Joe Biden.
But he came into office and imposed you know, Liberation
Day tariffs, which essentially hiked the prices for so many things.
You know, price I mean, you know, grocery, not grocery,
(07:20):
but like gas prices are a little bit lower, but
you know, almost everybody is seeing higher prices at the
grocery store, with rent, with their mortgages, and you know,
basically things have not gotten better under Trump, and people
are feeling buyer's remorse. And we've had a government shut down.
You know, we've seen them try to dismantle through DOJE,
(07:40):
all of these federal programs, the sort of dismantling of
the Department of Education, and it's not actually what people
thought they were going to get under a second Trump presidency,
and so they are clearly taking it out on his
approval numbers and they're clearly taking it out on Republicans.
We saw that in Virginia and New Jersey, and to
a lesser extent in New York City earlier this month,
(08:03):
or I should say earlier last month.
Speaker 3 (08:05):
You know, occasionally I see checks from a president talking
about how prices have fallen so those dramatically during his presidency,
and it reminds me Denial is not a river in Egypt.
Does he really believe that? Or they just trying to
put a bad spin on a horrible situation.
Speaker 5 (08:29):
I mean, well, they're doing what Biden did last year
as well, right, putting a bad spin on a horrible
To put a good spin on a horrible situation. You
can say all wages are higher than fifty years ago.
You can say whatever you want to say. But if
people are struggling to pay their bills, if there's not
enough spending money after buying groceries, no matter what you say,
people are not going to buy it. You know, people
(08:50):
trust their pocketbooks, and if the money doesn't stretch, they're
going to take it.
Speaker 3 (08:55):
In the White House, this is usually where I refer
to one of the my famous political aphorisms offered by
Democratic strategist James Carvell, it's the economy stupid.
Speaker 5 (09:08):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (09:09):
Well, the more important question I'd like to ask you
is does anybody in the White House recognize what you
just talked about? Is Americans are furious over increasing prices
and maybe we should do something to bring them down.
But you know, all I see is you know, the
(09:30):
President talking about auto pen's uh, you know, going a
land war against Venezuela and god knows what anything except inflation.
Do people recognize this.
Speaker 5 (09:43):
Or I don't know.
Speaker 3 (09:44):
I just as a democratic political as political strategist, it
bewilders me that they're not figuring out how to deal
with situation situation.
Speaker 5 (09:57):
Well, you're absolutely right, there are people at the White
House who are understand it, even if they're not willing
to say it publicly. I think, you know, when we
see Treasury Secretary Scott Assent basically say we might give
relief on bananas and coffee, right like that is a
very implicit acknowledgment that these tariffs have caused issues for
people and they can't really walk it back because Trump
is not a president who likes to admit defeat.
Speaker 3 (10:20):
So yeah, and you know, it just completely bewilders me
to be honest with you. As obviously, as a Democrat,
I'm happy to see the president's job approval ratings dive
like they have, but as a political strategist, their indifference
(10:41):
to it offends me. But I'm sure they don't care
what I'm going to say. We're going to take a
quick break here for a radio audience. We will be
right back with more of Deadline DC and our guest
Mavini Quashy. After this very quick break, welcome back to
(11:13):
Deadline d C with Bradbannon, and a special greeting to
our radio listeners who have just reappeared. By the way,
aggy memo to our radio listeners, if you want to
watch the show as well as listen to it, we
have all sorts of ways you can do that. You
(11:35):
can watch us at Twitter, dot com, front Slash, Brad
Bannon at Facebook, dot com front Slash, Deadline d C
with Bradbannon, front Slash videos, and YouTube dot com front
Slash at Deadline DC. Our guests in this half hour
(11:58):
is Mcbinti Quashi, who is the national political correspondent or
the Washington Examiner. Beenti if I was a Republican strategist
and everybody knows. I'm not I wouldn't be having very
(12:19):
many RESTful knights. I imagine they're about Republican incumbents who
are about, oh, I don't know, forty five or so
Republican House members and maybe three or four Republican Senators
(12:39):
who must be lying awake at night trying to figure
out how to save their clients. How much unrest is
there and concern among the Republican members and their strategists
about the Donald Trump's dismal approval ratings.
Speaker 5 (13:00):
Well, yeah, they're definitely not going to say it out
loud publicly unless you know, they probably got one foot
out the door. But there is certainly growing unrest about
Trump dragging down the GOP. I think it's it's been
very clear that when Trump is not on the ballot,
it doesn't bode well for the GOP. You know, he's
he has voters who support him, and they're not quite
as loyal to the GOP. And I'm thinking about young
(13:22):
men of color right, or quite honestly men of color right.
They voted for Trump because they were upset with Biden
and former Vice President Kamala Harris. But as we've seen
from the elections, last month. They are willing to go
right back to Democrats if they don't think that anything
has improved materially in their lives. And so I think
that a lot of lawmakers see the signs and they
(13:43):
understand that if Trump is at thirty six percent approval
rating and it's you know, we're a year out from
the midterms, it's probably not going to get better, and
they should probably get out while they can before it
turns into a very unhappy twenty twenty six term night.
Speaker 3 (14:01):
That reminds me of something else. I wanted to ask you,
what's going on with Marjorie Taylor Green talking about Republican
House members who have announced they're not running again. In
her case, she's actually resigning in a couple of months.
What's going on? What's the deal with Marjorie Taylor Green.
Speaker 5 (14:19):
I think she's a perfect example of what I said, right.
I think she understands that economic populism is very popular
because people are very dissatisfied with the American economy. Like you,
if you are not like the top one percent, you're
probably struggling. And even if you are comfortable, you probably
feel a little afraid about your future, you know, thinking
about federal government layoffs. You know, the tariff's going up,
(14:43):
going up, mortgagees going up, so they are I mean
even healthcare, right Like Congress is battling over these ACA
subsidies because you know, for some people, if it doesn't
get solved, like their health insurance prices are going to
go up extremely in ways they probably can't afford. And
Marjorie Taylor Green has been like screaming and chatting about this.
She's probably one of the very few Republicans willing to
tell the truth. Right, Like Marjorie Taylor Green says what
(15:06):
plenty of Republicans also feel. They're just not willing to
go against Trump so publicly. Right, she is essentially, you know,
the canary in the golden mine, trying to warn her
party that, like, if we don't get this under controls,
we don't turn around people's finances, it's not going to
be good for us next year. Obviously Trump did not
like that. Now and you know exactly, and he's still
(15:28):
the head of the GOP, and it probably makes sense
for Marjorie to get out while she can. She's in
a safe Republican district. You know, they just have to
elect the next Republican it's not going into Democratic hans.
So it's probably better to be out of Congress where
she can be even more honest and doesn't have to
deal with, you know, the president trying to pressure her
into voting against her conscious.
Speaker 3 (15:51):
Hey, let me acquise you about another article you wrote
about the Trump administration's strategy for dealing with the press.
You noted in your article that they've changed and talk
about that please.
Speaker 5 (16:11):
Yeah. So if you listen to White House Press Secretary
Caroline Lovett, you know she is forever saying this is
the most transparent White House ever, especially in contrast to
former President Joe Biden. And while that is true, right, like,
Trump really does love going back and forth with the media.
You know, he will spend thirty minutes to an hour
(16:32):
talking to us. But at the same time they are
very much limiting and cracking down on the press in
ways that are maybe reminiscent and not quite at the
level of Richard Nixon. And I'm talking about the Pentagon Pledge,
where essentially they wanted newsrooms to sign a pledge saying
that they would give the Pentagon approval of what we
(16:53):
would write, which is no real journalist wouldever sign that
sort of pledge. That's not a free press. So the
majority of folks don't find it, and so the Pentagon
doesn't have real credible journalists actually covering it from inside
the Pentagon. Here at the White House, you know, we've
been restricted, like we can no longer just like walk
(17:15):
into Caroline Lovett's office or Communications Director Stephen Chung's office,
which is it's a break in tradition. We've also seen
Trump just you know, get really nasty. You know, he's
you know, called female reporters piggy. You know, he's yelled
at some female reporters like like during live broadcasts and
call them fake news. He's threatened to revoke licenses for
(17:38):
ABC News. Obviously, he sued you know, the New York Times,
the Wall Street Journal AP, they've taken control of the
White House Correspondence Association press rotation. I mean, it is
a very heavy handed crackdown on the press while at
the same time claiming to be the most transparent administration.
And that's not quite how it works.
Speaker 3 (17:58):
Okay, So let me ask you this question about the press.
How do female reporters feel about the president's uh name calling?
Uh he uh he called one piggy, uh, he said,
called another one. I believe the New York Times journalists ugly, uh,
(18:21):
both inside and outside. And of course he uh went off,
you know, not to be so he's there. He also
went off on Minnesota Governor Tim Waltz and called him
a name that people don't use anymore, uh for challenged people. Uh. Well,
(18:46):
how do female reporters feel about all this?
Speaker 5 (18:49):
Yeah, we're gonna set aside Tim Walts for a second,
but I do think the interesting thing about the female
reporters is you never really see them lose their cool. Right,
it doesn't evolve into a screaming match. They keep you know,
it's in part a distraction tactic from Trump. Like if
I say something in cyndiary, maybe they'll stop asking me
the hard questions, right, Like one of those reporters was
asking why the prown Krince was getting this red carpet
(19:11):
rollout when he has been credibly accused of murdering a
former Washington Post journalist.
Speaker 2 (19:17):
Right.
Speaker 5 (19:18):
So, these these female reporters, they stay on task, they
stay focused, and they don't get into a back and
forth with a president. And that's, you know, really all
you can do as a white House reporter is stay focused,
ask the tough questions, don't back down.
Speaker 3 (19:30):
Okay, Unfortunately, Vivinji, that's all the time we have. But
I'm sure you live in dread of being invited again
to appear on Deadline DC. So we'll we'll give you
a little vacation before you drag you back. We go
taking a quick break here. We're gonna cover foreign policy
in the next segment after covering domestic politics in this segment.
(19:55):
We'll be right back right after this message. Welcome back
to Deadline EC with Brad Bannon. I'm Brad Bannon. My
guest in this half hour Cedric Layton, Colonel Cedric Layton,
(20:16):
US Air Force, retired CNN military analyst, and the CEO
of Cedric Layton Associates. We're gonna cover a bunch of
foreign policy and national security topics in this half hour.
You know, sometimes when I have guests on, I think
(20:37):
what am I going to do to get through half
an hour with topics? But that's never a problem with
Cedric Layton. I always wonder how I'm gonna compress everything
I want to talk about in a half hour. But anyway,
we're gonna start with this video which is Republican Congressman
(20:58):
Don Bacon talking about the airstrike in the Caribbean that
apparently required two air strikes.
Speaker 6 (21:08):
The Venezuelan alleged drug boat that was struck one time
but then a second time as two survivors were clinging
to the wreckage of the boat. Your committee, you're on,
the Armed Services Committee, is going to be investigating this.
According to your chairman, how concidered are you that this
may have been a real violation of the way even
if we're I me, there's a question of whether or
(21:28):
not we're at war, but that this would violate the
laws of warfare.
Speaker 7 (21:34):
Well, it is a big concern now, Certuary, the Defense
Hike self denies it. We should get to the truth.
I don't think he would be foolish enough to make
this decision to say kill everybody, kill the survivors, because
that's a clear violation of the law of war. So
very suspicious that he would have done something like that,
(21:55):
because it would go against common sense. So let's get
the facts. And if the facts go to where the
Washington Post article takes it, well then we'll have to
go from there. But if it was as if the
article said that is a violation of the law of war.
When people want to surrender, you don't kill him, and
they have to pose an eminent threat. It's hard to
(22:16):
believe that two people on a raft trying to survive
with pose an eminent throat.
Speaker 1 (22:22):
So let's get the facts first.
Speaker 7 (22:24):
The Centuary huts Off deserves his day to present his
side of the story.
Speaker 3 (22:30):
That was a Republican Congressman John Bacon of Nebraska talking
about the recent airstrike against boats in the Caribbean. Our
guests in this half hour is a good friend and
one who is we have a lot because he makes
bring some clarity to the muddled situation of international and
(22:55):
foreign policy and national security is Cedric Clayton, End's military
analyst and a retired colonel UTS Air Force Intelligence. Colonel Layton,
Welcome back to Deadline DC with Brad Bannon.
Speaker 2 (23:12):
Brad, thanks so much for having me. It's good to be
back with you.
Speaker 3 (23:14):
Your reaction to that video, I believe I saw just
before we went on the air that the White House
PEF Secretary Carolyn Lovett and knowledge there was a second
strike on that fishing boat that killed the survivors. What's
(23:35):
your reaction to this whole mess. You know, there's a
movie now out about the Numberg trials and didn't we
try Nazi in Japanese war criminals after World War Two
for doing things like this?
Speaker 2 (23:50):
We absolutely did, Brad, And the Nuremberg movie is actually
highly recommended. I went to see it with my son
a couple of weekends ago, and it is outstanding. But
it also has a message, and that message is that,
you know, defense of you know, actions where such as
I was just following orders is something that is not acceptable.
(24:12):
So if anybody comes up with the defense that they
were just following orders, that does not fly in the
international justice system, and it certainly won't fly in US
courts or in cases where there's an international tribunal, even
though the United States doesn't recognize those. But yeah, this
particular action is extremely disturbing, and you know, listening to
(24:33):
Congressman Bacon talk about it, you know, he was basically
spot on with everything that he said. He's also, by
the way, a retired Air Force brigadier general, so he
has experience with military matters and he has experience with
military law because you know, he served as a commander
several times and he also had to deal with some
(24:54):
issues like that, but nothing to this extent. Nothing to
that that is so extreme. So this particular case, we
have a situation where there were parent survivors from the
first boat strike. This all happened on the second of September.
The laws of armed conflict, the laws of warfare, maritime
(25:14):
law all require you to render aid to someone who
is in the sea. Like let's say they're on you know,
the result of a shipwreck. They are basically floating on
a raft or they're floating on some debris. The job
of every maritime entity is to go and pick them
up and render aid to them. That is a duty
(25:37):
that international law recognizes. In failure to do that results
in not only penalties, but can also severely undermine US
policies going forward. So it's a you know, this is
a very serious issue and it absolutely requires an investigation
at the highest levels.
Speaker 3 (25:56):
Well, let me ask you this question. And you know,
if you were an air force officer for what twenty
five years, twenty six what if you were involved in
a situation like this and the Secretary report to the
Secretary of State that there are a couple survivors left
(26:18):
from the air attack, and you go back and kill them.
How would you react to that.
Speaker 2 (26:23):
Well, you have to disobey that order. If the secretary
or a subordinate official, an official subordinate to the secretary,
ordered you to do something like that, it is absolutely,
on its face in illegal order. Now, if you don't
know that there are survivors at that moment in time,
that might be a mitigating circumstance. But generally speaking, if
(26:47):
you have clarity as to what's going on, and if
you know that there are survivors, you absolutely cannot go
and kill them. That is just the very clear, clearly
state in the law. It's a very rigid requirement.
Speaker 3 (27:02):
Do you think an event like this has a detrimental
effect on military morale?
Speaker 2 (27:08):
Absolutely. One of the key issues is, you know, soldiers, sailors, airman, marines,
all of them. I expect their superior officers to have
their interests at heart and to not get them in trouble.
So you you know, if you're in a senior leadership position,
the last thing you want to do is put your
(27:28):
own people at risk, whether it's in combat, you know,
from enemy fire, or in a legal situation. In a
legal situation where they might potentially be charged with a
war crime. Those are the kinds of things that you
absolutely studiously avoid, and that's that's the kind of situation
that we're in at this particular point in time. It
looks as if they the people who are subordinate to
(27:52):
the Admiral at the Joint Special Operations Command I and
us SO COM, that those people either followed orders blindly,
or they did not know what was going on in
terms of there being survivors or not, or they just
executed the mission without thinking about these consequences, and that
of course is a significant problem. If that's the case.
Speaker 3 (28:15):
There's a speculation in DC for what it's worth that
the Trump administration that President is thinking of removing have
said as Seth as a sectuary defense, what's your guests
do you think will stick with them? Or do you
(28:35):
think now that we have congressional committees investigating this situation,
they'll use it as an excuse to dump them.
Speaker 2 (28:44):
It might very well be an excuse to dump him.
You know, it depends on a variety of things. He
kind of expressed support for as Secretary had Seth on
the flight up from Florida last night, but he also
said I would not have done that when he was
asked specifically about the double tap, the second portion of
the double tap, and so that was an interesting tell.
(29:07):
I thought, I thought that was something where it's pretty
clear that President Trump thinks that this might be a
bridge too far, although he is obviously not saying that
publicly at this point.
Speaker 3 (29:18):
Our guests in this half hours Colonel Cedric Layton, CNN
Military analyst, what do you think will come out of
these congressional investigations? You know, they can investigate all they want,
but do you think it will results any change to
(29:41):
orders to military personnel involved in these attacks in the
Caribbean and Pacific or is it just going to go
away like many congressional investigations do.
Speaker 2 (29:54):
This one feels a little bit different. Brad. I think
that it might very well lead to some movement in
terms of the types of rules of engagement, and it
might also limit some of the actions that are going
on in and around Venezuela at the moment. But we'll see.
You know, there's basically a race against time. There's a
(30:14):
meeting coming up in a little over an hour where
the President is going to be meeting with senior staff members,
including the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs as the Secretary
of State and others in that meeting should determine whether
what's going to happen in Venezuela, except from an operational perspective,
as far as the congressional investigations are concerned, it's going
(30:35):
to be something that's going to be a critical thing
for them to do if they want to protect Currently.
Speaker 3 (30:39):
Now I'm going to have to interrupt you because we've
got to take our quick radio break here. We'll be
right back with more Deadline DC after this very quick break.
Welcome back to Deadline DBC with Brad Bannon. I'm Brad Bannon,
and our guests in this half hour is CNN Military
and Aly Cedric Laighton. Okay, since you've been coming on
(31:05):
the show, we've been talking about Ukraine, and it would
be very helpful to our viewers and listeners if you
could help clarify the situation. A few weeks ago, the
(31:26):
President offered a twenty eight point peace plan between Russia
and Ukraine. And my favorite cartoon is an AID rushing
into the Oval Office. We just got this peace plan,
can you should we send it to Kiev? And the
(31:48):
President says yes immediately and the AID ass should we
translate it from the original Russian. First, where are we
on the Ukraine? It's very confusing. And then the president
announced there was a peace plan that everybody had agreed
to except for a few details, that was going to
be accepted by the Ukraine by Thanksgiving. Well it's past Thanksgiving.
(32:13):
Are we close to peace in Ukraine?
Speaker 2 (32:16):
Yeah, Brat, I'm afraid not. And you know, you're pointing
out some huge issues here with this whole so called
peace process. And I think everyone who's been dealing with
Ukraine really wants there to be peace there. But you
can't have peace at any price. That is one of
the big problems. And the way that original peace proposal
(32:37):
or so called peace proposal was basically publicized, really showed
that what Russia had done was basically they'd co opted
Steve Whitkoff, the President's emissary, and they were able to
in essence regurgitate Russian talking points. I mean, no American
(32:58):
in their right mind would put something in there about
the Russian language should be an official language of Ukraine.
That was one of the elements of the original twenty
eight point piece plan. Other things, of course, include that
Ukraine must vacate territories that Russia hadn't even conquered yet,
especially in the eastern regions of the Donbas. So every
(33:18):
single element of that plan would basically hand Russia a
victory without them having achieved it through military means. What
they worked on in Florida and in other places over
the weekend was a plan between the US and Ukraine
(33:38):
with Europe in the background. And what that plan supposedly
is going to do is present more of the Ukrainian standpoint. Now,
what's going to happen here is Woodkoff is going to
go the president's emissary is going to go to Moscow.
He seems to be enamored with Putin quite a bit,
so it's going to be interesting to see the dynamic.
(33:59):
But what he Sho would be doing is presenting a
unified front between you know, US, Ukraine and Europe on
one side and confronting the Russians with some very specific
proposals and ultimatums basically that need to be given. My
suspicion is if they won't do that, ultimatums would basically
(34:20):
be the only one that you know that would be
you know, the way to work with the Russians. But
failing ultimatums, failing a forceful message that tells the Russians
that they need to get out of Ukraine or at
least stop where they are. That we're not going to
see any peace until something like that happens, and the
(34:43):
Russians feel that they cannot win militarily or diplomatically.
Speaker 3 (34:48):
Now, there was a story last week that the army
secretary whose name escapes me, went to Kiev to talk
to President of Zelinski and said, basically, you're in danger
of being overrun. So it's very much advantage for Ukraine
(35:09):
to accept peace terms from Russia before they take over
the entire place. Lock Stock and Barrel, is that your
assessment of the military situation there.
Speaker 2 (35:21):
So really the military situation is a bit more complex
than that. The Ukrainians do have some pressure points that
they're dealing with, particularly in the area around the town
of Pokrovsk, which is in the Dunbas region, and also
in the Zupparisia area, and that gets toward the area
where that nuclear power plant is. So one of the
(35:43):
key elements here is that the Ukrainians have always had
a shortage of personnel and a shortage of weapons. What
needs to happen is they need to stabilize the situation
on the front, and they also have to be in
a place where they can get as many offensive weapons
(36:03):
as possible in there to really basically stall the Russian advances.
And if that isn't done, then we're going to see
a prolonged war and that's going to be a real problem.
Speaker 3 (36:16):
The President, in his animitable manner, tried to make a
point about Russian power, I believe last week when they
said basically said publicly that Zeleski can either accept his
peace agreement or, as the President put it, fight his
(36:37):
little heart out. My first reaction is a lot of
Americans admire the hot and fight behind the Ukrainian effort
to you know, you know, roll back a Russian occupation.
(36:57):
What is it gonna take? I mean, how much does
Zaluski have to give up land that the Russians currently
don't occupy to get a peace agreement? Is that what's
going on here?
Speaker 2 (37:11):
That's what certainly the Russians want, And it seems like
Trump mind want, or at least his administration mind want
what But what I think Telenski can avoid that as
long as the Europeans stay on his side. And people
like Secretary Rubio stop that kind of a movement, because
the real way to do this would be to basically
(37:35):
freeze everything the way it's in place, create a situation
kind of like Korea, where you have a demilitarized zone
and while it's not officially recognized, the lines of conflict
are basically the borders, and that would in essence protect
Ukraine as it exists right now from further Russian incursion
(37:56):
as long as as long as there is a way
in which the Ukrainians can be assured of support from
the West, especially from Europe, and also of course from
the United States.
Speaker 3 (38:07):
Okay, I read a story last week that Germany, concerned
about Russian expansion, is making major efforts to gear up
their military forces. How to our former European allies like
Germany and France think of these negotiations. Apparently they've been
(38:30):
excluded for them.
Speaker 2 (38:31):
Yeah, they're very concerned about this. This is not something
that they want to see. They believe that what the
US is doing is basically selling out Ukraine. That's what
you hear privately from a lot of German lawmakers, and
it's doing significant damage to our transatlantic relations. That's something
that really has to be repaired by the next administration.
Speaker 3 (38:55):
Do you think, Colonel, that Americans would accept the United
States abandoning Ukraine after you know, they've put up a
brave fight, And do you think Americans would accept it
from a political standpoint if Trump has completely abandoned Ukraine
(39:16):
and left them to the devices of the Russians.
Speaker 2 (39:20):
No, I think the question would be who lost Ukraine.
It would be just like the you know, what was
done in the late nineteen forties when China became communists.
Who lost China was the big political question. It almost
cost Truman, you know, a majority in Congress, and in fact,
I guess you little lose it and that election that
(39:40):
came afterwards. So there would be significant political repercussions. I
think it would be even more severe than what Truman faced
back in in nineteen forty eight, forty nine.
Speaker 3 (39:51):
Okay, So you think basically we're in for a continuation
of the hostilities.
Speaker 2 (39:58):
There, yes, think. Unfortunately, I think until we convince the
Russians that they cannot move forward in any reasonable way
in the near term, we're going to see hostilities continue
and it's going to be tough on the Ukrainians.
Speaker 3 (40:14):
Colonel Layton, thanks for joining us again today on Deadline
DC with Brad Bannon. I'm sure we're going to want
to have you back because you know, national security policy
is a big issue these days. I want to thank
Colonel Layton. I also want to thank our first guest,
Madenti Claschi, the national political correspondent for the Washington Examiner,
(40:41):
And of course our interpret executive producer, Mark Ronaldi, who
covers up all my mistakes just like the White House
covers up presidents. I guess, although I'd like to think
my mistakes as bad. Next week, our guest will be
hat Lincoln Goldfinch, who is an immigration lawyer. She'll talk
(41:05):
about the Trump war against immigrants and also maybe a
little Texas politics will be so missed the very best
and aggressive progressive online must E TV at your own peril.
The Leslie Marshall Show, A true democracy in talk radio
of for and by you the people.
Speaker 2 (00:31):
Live from our nation's capital, It's Deadline DC with Brad Bannon.
Speaker 3 (00:37):
Hi. I'm Brad Bannon, and I have the government issued
real id to prove it. I'm the host of Deadline
DC with Brad Bannon because no one else would take
the job or the name. I'm a national democratic and
progressive strategist. I'm a American political analyst for the Times
(01:00):
of India and weekly columnists to The Hill in Washington,
d C. You can read my columns in The Hill
to get my take on Donald Trump's imperial and confused presidency.
You can read my columns at muckrack dot com front Slash.
(01:23):
Brad Bannon mondays on Deadline DC, I talked to the
people and players behind the politics and policies that drive
our great nation forward, or at least try to keep
it from going backwards. During Trump two point zero, our guest,
We've got you covered on the domestic front and the
(01:47):
foreign policy front today on Deadline DC. In the first
half hour, Mabinti Kwashi, who is national political correspondent for
The Washington Examiner, joins us to talk about the Trump presidency. Then,
in the second half hour, Cedric Layton, CNN's military analyst,
(02:10):
joins us to discuss the Trump administration at war. Before
we get to our first guest, though, we're going to
play this clip from CNN. It is there polling analyst
Harry Inton discussing the new Gallup poll which shows Donald
(02:30):
Trump's approval rating is down to a record low of
thirty six percent.
Speaker 4 (02:36):
I mean, it's a disaster if it holds towards the
midterm elections. And I should note, of course it's not alone.
Speaker 1 (02:42):
I mean, just take a look here. This is Gallup.
Speaker 4 (02:43):
This is the longest running poll. You know, Gallup has
been conducting pole since my father was a kid. And
my father is born in nineteen hundred and twenty seven.
Have me in the sixties.
Speaker 1 (02:51):
Look at this.
Speaker 4 (02:52):
In January, donald Trump's not approve rank not too bad,
not too great. It was at minus one point, right
within the margin verror breaking even. But look at this
now negative twenty four points, way way down. We're talking
about a drop of over twenty points in the wrong.
Speaker 1 (03:07):
Direction for the president of the United States. Minus twenty
four points.
Speaker 4 (03:10):
That's a twenty three point move in the incorrect direction
if you're the president. And of course, what's so important here,
Sarah Seidner, is it matches the trend that we've seen
with other polls, that is Donald Trump hitting his low
for the second term.
Speaker 1 (03:24):
I was doing the account last night.
Speaker 4 (03:25):
I think we're up to ten polls in sort of
the last forty days, ten different posters who have said
that Trump is at the lowest point he.
Speaker 1 (03:32):
Is in his second term.
Speaker 4 (03:33):
So how does this compare to other presidents in their
second term at this point in time? Yeah, okay, So
you know, this is one of these great examples where
I kind of run out of room on the slide. Yeah,
I run out of room on the side. So I
just put up the Republican presidents. But look, the only
one who's worse for me, either among Republicans or Democrats
at this point a second term is Richard Nixon. Of course,
(03:54):
Richard Nixon had to wave audio smikos goodbye.
Speaker 1 (03:56):
Less than a year after this poll was taken.
Speaker 4 (03:58):
He was at minus thirty six points, Trump at minus
twenty four points. That beats or is worse, I should say,
beats in the wrong direction.
Speaker 1 (04:05):
George W. Bush minus nineteen points.
Speaker 4 (04:07):
His Republican Party, of course, suffered major losses in the
two thousand and six mid term elections. Dwight Eisenhower plus
thirty one points down. Trump has never smelt that at all.
I had to go into the archives to pick up
that photo and Ronald Reagan at plus forty one points.
Speaker 1 (04:18):
But again, it also is worse than Harry S. Truman.
Speaker 4 (04:21):
It's worse than Lyndon Baines Johnson. It's worse than Barack Obama,
It's worse than Bill Clinton. Anywhere you look, this is
the second worst for a president of either party at
this point in their second term, dating all the way back.
Speaker 1 (04:34):
Since the nineteen forties.
Speaker 3 (04:38):
That was Harry Inton of CNN talking about Donald Trump's
pull numbers. Our guest in this half hour is mcvinti Kwashi,
who is a national political correspondent for the Washington Examiner.
We have a There are long history of famous cues
in American culture. In the James Bond movies, Q was
(05:02):
a quartermaster who provided the James who provided James Bond
with all those gadgets, including the Aston Martin with the
headlight machine guns feature in the movie Goldfinger. If you're
a Star Trek fan, q was a mysterious entity in
the universe who came on the show occasionally to torment
(05:24):
the crew. We have our own queue. It's me, Binti
Quashi Mibini. Welcome back to Deadline DC.
Speaker 5 (05:33):
Hi, Rad, I'm glad to be here.
Speaker 3 (05:35):
Okay. I would say I was going to say that
Trump's approval rating is in free fall, but technically that's
not correct because honestly, I don't think they can fall
any further. I think we've got down to the rock
hard The thirty six percent is down pretty close to
(05:56):
the rock hard Trump supporters who will support him hell
of high water. So I don't think it can go
much longer. Although God knows, I've been wrong on the
show before, as many people point out in their texts
exchanged with me. But you know what I'm curious about,
(06:18):
and it's very odd. I mean, right now, if you
look at the gallop numbers, there are there are virtually
no Democrats who approve of Donald Trump's presidency. There are
very few Independents who approve of his presidency. What's holding
Trump up at you know, the thirty mid thirties is
(06:40):
the fact that you've got about you know, seventy to
eighty percent of the Republicans approve of his performance, which
means that anywhere from twenty to twenty five to thirty
Republican present of Republicans don't approve of his job rating.
What's going on here.
Speaker 5 (06:59):
Yeah, the the issue is that Trump campaigned on lowering prices,
and that is what propelled him against former President Joe Biden.
But he came into office and imposed you know, Liberation
Day tariffs, which essentially hiked the prices for so many things.
You know, price I mean, you know, grocery, not grocery,
(07:20):
but like gas prices are a little bit lower, but
you know, almost everybody is seeing higher prices at the
grocery store, with rent, with their mortgages, and you know,
basically things have not gotten better under Trump, and people
are feeling buyer's remorse. And we've had a government shut down.
You know, we've seen them try to dismantle through DOJE,
(07:40):
all of these federal programs, the sort of dismantling of
the Department of Education, and it's not actually what people
thought they were going to get under a second Trump presidency,
and so they are clearly taking it out on his
approval numbers and they're clearly taking it out on Republicans.
We saw that in Virginia and New Jersey, and to
a lesser extent in New York City earlier this month,
(08:03):
or I should say earlier last month.
Speaker 3 (08:05):
You know, occasionally I see checks from a president talking
about how prices have fallen so those dramatically during his presidency,
and it reminds me Denial is not a river in Egypt.
Does he really believe that? Or they just trying to
put a bad spin on a horrible situation.
Speaker 5 (08:29):
I mean, well, they're doing what Biden did last year
as well, right, putting a bad spin on a horrible
To put a good spin on a horrible situation. You
can say all wages are higher than fifty years ago.
You can say whatever you want to say. But if
people are struggling to pay their bills, if there's not
enough spending money after buying groceries, no matter what you say,
people are not going to buy it. You know, people
(08:50):
trust their pocketbooks, and if the money doesn't stretch, they're
going to take it.
Speaker 3 (08:55):
In the White House, this is usually where I refer
to one of the my famous political aphorisms offered by
Democratic strategist James Carvell, it's the economy stupid.
Speaker 5 (09:08):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (09:09):
Well, the more important question I'd like to ask you
is does anybody in the White House recognize what you
just talked about? Is Americans are furious over increasing prices
and maybe we should do something to bring them down.
But you know, all I see is you know, the
(09:30):
President talking about auto pen's uh, you know, going a
land war against Venezuela and god knows what anything except inflation.
Do people recognize this.
Speaker 5 (09:43):
Or I don't know.
Speaker 3 (09:44):
I just as a democratic political as political strategist, it
bewilders me that they're not figuring out how to deal
with situation situation.
Speaker 5 (09:57):
Well, you're absolutely right, there are people at the White
House who are understand it, even if they're not willing
to say it publicly. I think, you know, when we
see Treasury Secretary Scott Assent basically say we might give
relief on bananas and coffee, right like that is a
very implicit acknowledgment that these tariffs have caused issues for
people and they can't really walk it back because Trump
is not a president who likes to admit defeat.
Speaker 3 (10:20):
So yeah, and you know, it just completely bewilders me
to be honest with you. As obviously, as a Democrat,
I'm happy to see the president's job approval ratings dive
like they have, but as a political strategist, their indifference
(10:41):
to it offends me. But I'm sure they don't care
what I'm going to say. We're going to take a
quick break here for a radio audience. We will be
right back with more of Deadline DC and our guest
Mavini Quashy. After this very quick break, welcome back to
(11:13):
Deadline d C with Bradbannon, and a special greeting to
our radio listeners who have just reappeared. By the way,
aggy memo to our radio listeners, if you want to
watch the show as well as listen to it, we
have all sorts of ways you can do that. You
(11:35):
can watch us at Twitter, dot com, front Slash, Brad
Bannon at Facebook, dot com front Slash, Deadline d C
with Bradbannon, front Slash videos, and YouTube dot com front
Slash at Deadline DC. Our guests in this half hour
(11:58):
is Mcbinti Quashi, who is the national political correspondent or
the Washington Examiner. Beenti if I was a Republican strategist
and everybody knows. I'm not I wouldn't be having very
(12:19):
many RESTful knights. I imagine they're about Republican incumbents who
are about, oh, I don't know, forty five or so
Republican House members and maybe three or four Republican Senators
(12:39):
who must be lying awake at night trying to figure
out how to save their clients. How much unrest is
there and concern among the Republican members and their strategists
about the Donald Trump's dismal approval ratings.
Speaker 5 (13:00):
Well, yeah, they're definitely not going to say it out
loud publicly unless you know, they probably got one foot
out the door. But there is certainly growing unrest about
Trump dragging down the GOP. I think it's it's been
very clear that when Trump is not on the ballot,
it doesn't bode well for the GOP. You know, he's
he has voters who support him, and they're not quite
as loyal to the GOP. And I'm thinking about young
(13:22):
men of color right, or quite honestly men of color right.
They voted for Trump because they were upset with Biden
and former Vice President Kamala Harris. But as we've seen
from the elections, last month. They are willing to go
right back to Democrats if they don't think that anything
has improved materially in their lives. And so I think
that a lot of lawmakers see the signs and they
(13:43):
understand that if Trump is at thirty six percent approval
rating and it's you know, we're a year out from
the midterms, it's probably not going to get better, and
they should probably get out while they can before it
turns into a very unhappy twenty twenty six term night.
Speaker 3 (14:01):
That reminds me of something else. I wanted to ask you,
what's going on with Marjorie Taylor Green talking about Republican
House members who have announced they're not running again. In
her case, she's actually resigning in a couple of months.
What's going on? What's the deal with Marjorie Taylor Green.
Speaker 5 (14:19):
I think she's a perfect example of what I said, right.
I think she understands that economic populism is very popular
because people are very dissatisfied with the American economy. Like you,
if you are not like the top one percent, you're
probably struggling. And even if you are comfortable, you probably
feel a little afraid about your future, you know, thinking
about federal government layoffs. You know, the tariff's going up,
(14:43):
going up, mortgagees going up, so they are I mean
even healthcare, right Like Congress is battling over these ACA
subsidies because you know, for some people, if it doesn't
get solved, like their health insurance prices are going to
go up extremely in ways they probably can't afford. And
Marjorie Taylor Green has been like screaming and chatting about this.
She's probably one of the very few Republicans willing to
tell the truth. Right, Like Marjorie Taylor Green says what
(15:06):
plenty of Republicans also feel. They're just not willing to
go against Trump so publicly. Right, she is essentially, you know,
the canary in the golden mine, trying to warn her
party that, like, if we don't get this under controls,
we don't turn around people's finances, it's not going to
be good for us next year. Obviously Trump did not
like that. Now and you know exactly, and he's still
(15:28):
the head of the GOP, and it probably makes sense
for Marjorie to get out while she can. She's in
a safe Republican district. You know, they just have to
elect the next Republican it's not going into Democratic hans.
So it's probably better to be out of Congress where
she can be even more honest and doesn't have to
deal with, you know, the president trying to pressure her
into voting against her conscious.
Speaker 3 (15:51):
Hey, let me acquise you about another article you wrote
about the Trump administration's strategy for dealing with the press.
You noted in your article that they've changed and talk
about that please.
Speaker 5 (16:11):
Yeah. So if you listen to White House Press Secretary
Caroline Lovett, you know she is forever saying this is
the most transparent White House ever, especially in contrast to
former President Joe Biden. And while that is true, right, like,
Trump really does love going back and forth with the media.
You know, he will spend thirty minutes to an hour
(16:32):
talking to us. But at the same time they are
very much limiting and cracking down on the press in
ways that are maybe reminiscent and not quite at the
level of Richard Nixon. And I'm talking about the Pentagon Pledge,
where essentially they wanted newsrooms to sign a pledge saying
that they would give the Pentagon approval of what we
(16:53):
would write, which is no real journalist wouldever sign that
sort of pledge. That's not a free press. So the
majority of folks don't find it, and so the Pentagon
doesn't have real credible journalists actually covering it from inside
the Pentagon. Here at the White House, you know, we've
been restricted, like we can no longer just like walk
(17:15):
into Caroline Lovett's office or Communications Director Stephen Chung's office,
which is it's a break in tradition. We've also seen
Trump just you know, get really nasty. You know, he's
you know, called female reporters piggy. You know, he's yelled
at some female reporters like like during live broadcasts and
call them fake news. He's threatened to revoke licenses for
(17:38):
ABC News. Obviously, he sued you know, the New York Times,
the Wall Street Journal AP, they've taken control of the
White House Correspondence Association press rotation. I mean, it is
a very heavy handed crackdown on the press while at
the same time claiming to be the most transparent administration.
And that's not quite how it works.
Speaker 3 (17:58):
Okay, So let me ask you this question about the press.
How do female reporters feel about the president's uh name calling?
Uh he uh he called one piggy, uh, he said,
called another one. I believe the New York Times journalists ugly, uh,
(18:21):
both inside and outside. And of course he uh went off,
you know, not to be so he's there. He also
went off on Minnesota Governor Tim Waltz and called him
a name that people don't use anymore, uh for challenged people. Uh. Well,
(18:46):
how do female reporters feel about all this?
Speaker 5 (18:49):
Yeah, we're gonna set aside Tim Walts for a second,
but I do think the interesting thing about the female
reporters is you never really see them lose their cool. Right,
it doesn't evolve into a screaming match. They keep you know,
it's in part a distraction tactic from Trump. Like if
I say something in cyndiary, maybe they'll stop asking me
the hard questions, right, Like one of those reporters was
asking why the prown Krince was getting this red carpet
(19:11):
rollout when he has been credibly accused of murdering a
former Washington Post journalist.
Speaker 2 (19:17):
Right.
Speaker 5 (19:18):
So, these these female reporters, they stay on task, they
stay focused, and they don't get into a back and
forth with a president. And that's, you know, really all
you can do as a white House reporter is stay focused,
ask the tough questions, don't back down.
Speaker 3 (19:30):
Okay, Unfortunately, Vivinji, that's all the time we have. But
I'm sure you live in dread of being invited again
to appear on Deadline DC. So we'll we'll give you
a little vacation before you drag you back. We go
taking a quick break here. We're gonna cover foreign policy
in the next segment after covering domestic politics in this segment.
(19:55):
We'll be right back right after this message. Welcome back
to Deadline EC with Brad Bannon. I'm Brad Bannon. My
guest in this half hour Cedric Layton, Colonel Cedric Layton,
(20:16):
US Air Force, retired CNN military analyst, and the CEO
of Cedric Layton Associates. We're gonna cover a bunch of
foreign policy and national security topics in this half hour.
You know, sometimes when I have guests on, I think
(20:37):
what am I going to do to get through half
an hour with topics? But that's never a problem with
Cedric Layton. I always wonder how I'm gonna compress everything
I want to talk about in a half hour. But anyway,
we're gonna start with this video which is Republican Congressman
(20:58):
Don Bacon talking about the airstrike in the Caribbean that
apparently required two air strikes.
Speaker 6 (21:08):
The Venezuelan alleged drug boat that was struck one time
but then a second time as two survivors were clinging
to the wreckage of the boat. Your committee, you're on,
the Armed Services Committee, is going to be investigating this.
According to your chairman, how concidered are you that this
may have been a real violation of the way even
if we're I me, there's a question of whether or
(21:28):
not we're at war, but that this would violate the
laws of warfare.
Speaker 7 (21:34):
Well, it is a big concern now, Certuary, the Defense
Hike self denies it. We should get to the truth.
I don't think he would be foolish enough to make
this decision to say kill everybody, kill the survivors, because
that's a clear violation of the law of war. So
very suspicious that he would have done something like that,
(21:55):
because it would go against common sense. So let's get
the facts. And if the facts go to where the
Washington Post article takes it, well then we'll have to
go from there. But if it was as if the
article said that is a violation of the law of war.
When people want to surrender, you don't kill him, and
they have to pose an eminent threat. It's hard to
(22:16):
believe that two people on a raft trying to survive
with pose an eminent throat.
Speaker 1 (22:22):
So let's get the facts first.
Speaker 7 (22:24):
The Centuary huts Off deserves his day to present his
side of the story.
Speaker 3 (22:30):
That was a Republican Congressman John Bacon of Nebraska talking
about the recent airstrike against boats in the Caribbean. Our
guests in this half hour is a good friend and
one who is we have a lot because he makes
bring some clarity to the muddled situation of international and
(22:55):
foreign policy and national security is Cedric Clayton, End's military
analyst and a retired colonel UTS Air Force Intelligence. Colonel Layton,
Welcome back to Deadline DC with Brad Bannon.
Speaker 2 (23:12):
Brad, thanks so much for having me. It's good to be
back with you.
Speaker 3 (23:14):
Your reaction to that video, I believe I saw just
before we went on the air that the White House
PEF Secretary Carolyn Lovett and knowledge there was a second
strike on that fishing boat that killed the survivors. What's
(23:35):
your reaction to this whole mess. You know, there's a
movie now out about the Numberg trials and didn't we
try Nazi in Japanese war criminals after World War Two
for doing things like this?
Speaker 2 (23:50):
We absolutely did, Brad, And the Nuremberg movie is actually
highly recommended. I went to see it with my son
a couple of weekends ago, and it is outstanding. But
it also has a message, and that message is that,
you know, defense of you know, actions where such as
I was just following orders is something that is not acceptable.
(24:12):
So if anybody comes up with the defense that they
were just following orders, that does not fly in the
international justice system, and it certainly won't fly in US
courts or in cases where there's an international tribunal, even
though the United States doesn't recognize those. But yeah, this
particular action is extremely disturbing, and you know, listening to
(24:33):
Congressman Bacon talk about it, you know, he was basically
spot on with everything that he said. He's also, by
the way, a retired Air Force brigadier general, so he
has experience with military matters and he has experience with
military law because you know, he served as a commander
several times and he also had to deal with some
(24:54):
issues like that, but nothing to this extent. Nothing to
that that is so extreme. So this particular case, we
have a situation where there were parent survivors from the
first boat strike. This all happened on the second of September.
The laws of armed conflict, the laws of warfare, maritime
(25:14):
law all require you to render aid to someone who
is in the sea. Like let's say they're on you know,
the result of a shipwreck. They are basically floating on
a raft or they're floating on some debris. The job
of every maritime entity is to go and pick them
up and render aid to them. That is a duty
(25:37):
that international law recognizes. In failure to do that results
in not only penalties, but can also severely undermine US
policies going forward. So it's a you know, this is
a very serious issue and it absolutely requires an investigation
at the highest levels.
Speaker 3 (25:56):
Well, let me ask you this question. And you know,
if you were an air force officer for what twenty
five years, twenty six what if you were involved in
a situation like this and the Secretary report to the
Secretary of State that there are a couple survivors left
(26:18):
from the air attack, and you go back and kill them.
How would you react to that.
Speaker 2 (26:23):
Well, you have to disobey that order. If the secretary
or a subordinate official, an official subordinate to the secretary,
ordered you to do something like that, it is absolutely,
on its face in illegal order. Now, if you don't
know that there are survivors at that moment in time,
that might be a mitigating circumstance. But generally speaking, if
(26:47):
you have clarity as to what's going on, and if
you know that there are survivors, you absolutely cannot go
and kill them. That is just the very clear, clearly
state in the law. It's a very rigid requirement.
Speaker 3 (27:02):
Do you think an event like this has a detrimental
effect on military morale?
Speaker 2 (27:08):
Absolutely. One of the key issues is, you know, soldiers, sailors, airman, marines,
all of them. I expect their superior officers to have
their interests at heart and to not get them in trouble.
So you you know, if you're in a senior leadership position,
the last thing you want to do is put your
(27:28):
own people at risk, whether it's in combat, you know,
from enemy fire, or in a legal situation. In a
legal situation where they might potentially be charged with a
war crime. Those are the kinds of things that you
absolutely studiously avoid, and that's that's the kind of situation
that we're in at this particular point in time. It
looks as if they the people who are subordinate to
(27:52):
the Admiral at the Joint Special Operations Command I and
us SO COM, that those people either followed orders blindly,
or they did not know what was going on in
terms of there being survivors or not, or they just
executed the mission without thinking about these consequences, and that
of course is a significant problem. If that's the case.
Speaker 3 (28:15):
There's a speculation in DC for what it's worth that
the Trump administration that President is thinking of removing have
said as Seth as a sectuary defense, what's your guests
do you think will stick with them? Or do you
(28:35):
think now that we have congressional committees investigating this situation,
they'll use it as an excuse to dump them.
Speaker 2 (28:44):
It might very well be an excuse to dump him.
You know, it depends on a variety of things. He
kind of expressed support for as Secretary had Seth on
the flight up from Florida last night, but he also
said I would not have done that when he was
asked specifically about the double tap, the second portion of
the double tap, and so that was an interesting tell.
(29:07):
I thought, I thought that was something where it's pretty
clear that President Trump thinks that this might be a
bridge too far, although he is obviously not saying that
publicly at this point.
Speaker 3 (29:18):
Our guests in this half hours Colonel Cedric Layton, CNN
Military analyst, what do you think will come out of
these congressional investigations? You know, they can investigate all they want,
but do you think it will results any change to
(29:41):
orders to military personnel involved in these attacks in the
Caribbean and Pacific or is it just going to go
away like many congressional investigations do.
Speaker 2 (29:54):
This one feels a little bit different. Brad. I think
that it might very well lead to some movement in
terms of the types of rules of engagement, and it
might also limit some of the actions that are going
on in and around Venezuela at the moment. But we'll see.
You know, there's basically a race against time. There's a
(30:14):
meeting coming up in a little over an hour where
the President is going to be meeting with senior staff members,
including the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs as the Secretary
of State and others in that meeting should determine whether
what's going to happen in Venezuela, except from an operational perspective,
as far as the congressional investigations are concerned, it's going
(30:35):
to be something that's going to be a critical thing
for them to do if they want to protect Currently.
Speaker 3 (30:39):
Now I'm going to have to interrupt you because we've
got to take our quick radio break here. We'll be
right back with more Deadline DC after this very quick break.
Welcome back to Deadline DBC with Brad Bannon. I'm Brad Bannon,
and our guests in this half hour is CNN Military
and Aly Cedric Laighton. Okay, since you've been coming on
(31:05):
the show, we've been talking about Ukraine, and it would
be very helpful to our viewers and listeners if you
could help clarify the situation. A few weeks ago, the
(31:26):
President offered a twenty eight point peace plan between Russia
and Ukraine. And my favorite cartoon is an AID rushing
into the Oval Office. We just got this peace plan,
can you should we send it to Kiev? And the
(31:48):
President says yes immediately and the AID ass should we
translate it from the original Russian. First, where are we
on the Ukraine? It's very confusing. And then the president
announced there was a peace plan that everybody had agreed
to except for a few details, that was going to
be accepted by the Ukraine by Thanksgiving. Well it's past Thanksgiving.
(32:13):
Are we close to peace in Ukraine?
Speaker 2 (32:16):
Yeah, Brat, I'm afraid not. And you know, you're pointing
out some huge issues here with this whole so called
peace process. And I think everyone who's been dealing with
Ukraine really wants there to be peace there. But you
can't have peace at any price. That is one of
the big problems. And the way that original peace proposal
(32:37):
or so called peace proposal was basically publicized, really showed
that what Russia had done was basically they'd co opted
Steve Whitkoff, the President's emissary, and they were able to
in essence regurgitate Russian talking points. I mean, no American
(32:58):
in their right mind would put something in there about
the Russian language should be an official language of Ukraine.
That was one of the elements of the original twenty
eight point piece plan. Other things, of course, include that
Ukraine must vacate territories that Russia hadn't even conquered yet,
especially in the eastern regions of the Donbas. So every
(33:18):
single element of that plan would basically hand Russia a
victory without them having achieved it through military means. What
they worked on in Florida and in other places over
the weekend was a plan between the US and Ukraine
(33:38):
with Europe in the background. And what that plan supposedly
is going to do is present more of the Ukrainian standpoint. Now,
what's going to happen here is Woodkoff is going to
go the president's emissary is going to go to Moscow.
He seems to be enamored with Putin quite a bit,
so it's going to be interesting to see the dynamic.
(33:59):
But what he Sho would be doing is presenting a
unified front between you know, US, Ukraine and Europe on
one side and confronting the Russians with some very specific
proposals and ultimatums basically that need to be given. My
suspicion is if they won't do that, ultimatums would basically
(34:20):
be the only one that you know that would be
you know, the way to work with the Russians. But
failing ultimatums, failing a forceful message that tells the Russians
that they need to get out of Ukraine or at
least stop where they are. That we're not going to
see any peace until something like that happens, and the
(34:43):
Russians feel that they cannot win militarily or diplomatically.
Speaker 3 (34:48):
Now, there was a story last week that the army
secretary whose name escapes me, went to Kiev to talk
to President of Zelinski and said, basically, you're in danger
of being overrun. So it's very much advantage for Ukraine
(35:09):
to accept peace terms from Russia before they take over
the entire place. Lock Stock and Barrel, is that your
assessment of the military situation there.
Speaker 2 (35:21):
So really the military situation is a bit more complex
than that. The Ukrainians do have some pressure points that
they're dealing with, particularly in the area around the town
of Pokrovsk, which is in the Dunbas region, and also
in the Zupparisia area, and that gets toward the area
where that nuclear power plant is. So one of the
(35:43):
key elements here is that the Ukrainians have always had
a shortage of personnel and a shortage of weapons. What
needs to happen is they need to stabilize the situation
on the front, and they also have to be in
a place where they can get as many offensive weapons
(36:03):
as possible in there to really basically stall the Russian advances.
And if that isn't done, then we're going to see
a prolonged war and that's going to be a real problem.
Speaker 3 (36:16):
The President, in his animitable manner, tried to make a
point about Russian power, I believe last week when they
said basically said publicly that Zeleski can either accept his
peace agreement or, as the President put it, fight his
(36:37):
little heart out. My first reaction is a lot of
Americans admire the hot and fight behind the Ukrainian effort
to you know, you know, roll back a Russian occupation.
(36:57):
What is it gonna take? I mean, how much does
Zaluski have to give up land that the Russians currently
don't occupy to get a peace agreement? Is that what's
going on here?
Speaker 2 (37:11):
That's what certainly the Russians want, And it seems like
Trump mind want, or at least his administration mind want
what But what I think Telenski can avoid that as
long as the Europeans stay on his side. And people
like Secretary Rubio stop that kind of a movement, because
the real way to do this would be to basically
(37:35):
freeze everything the way it's in place, create a situation
kind of like Korea, where you have a demilitarized zone
and while it's not officially recognized, the lines of conflict
are basically the borders, and that would in essence protect
Ukraine as it exists right now from further Russian incursion
(37:56):
as long as as long as there is a way
in which the Ukrainians can be assured of support from
the West, especially from Europe, and also of course from
the United States.
Speaker 3 (38:07):
Okay, I read a story last week that Germany, concerned
about Russian expansion, is making major efforts to gear up
their military forces. How to our former European allies like
Germany and France think of these negotiations. Apparently they've been
(38:30):
excluded for them.
Speaker 2 (38:31):
Yeah, they're very concerned about this. This is not something
that they want to see. They believe that what the
US is doing is basically selling out Ukraine. That's what
you hear privately from a lot of German lawmakers, and
it's doing significant damage to our transatlantic relations. That's something
that really has to be repaired by the next administration.
Speaker 3 (38:55):
Do you think, Colonel, that Americans would accept the United
States abandoning Ukraine after you know, they've put up a
brave fight, And do you think Americans would accept it
from a political standpoint if Trump has completely abandoned Ukraine
(39:16):
and left them to the devices of the Russians.
Speaker 2 (39:20):
No, I think the question would be who lost Ukraine.
It would be just like the you know, what was
done in the late nineteen forties when China became communists.
Who lost China was the big political question. It almost
cost Truman, you know, a majority in Congress, and in fact,
I guess you little lose it and that election that
(39:40):
came afterwards. So there would be significant political repercussions. I
think it would be even more severe than what Truman faced
back in in nineteen forty eight, forty nine.
Speaker 3 (39:51):
Okay, So you think basically we're in for a continuation
of the hostilities.
Speaker 2 (39:58):
There, yes, think. Unfortunately, I think until we convince the
Russians that they cannot move forward in any reasonable way
in the near term, we're going to see hostilities continue
and it's going to be tough on the Ukrainians.
Speaker 3 (40:14):
Colonel Layton, thanks for joining us again today on Deadline
DC with Brad Bannon. I'm sure we're going to want
to have you back because you know, national security policy
is a big issue these days. I want to thank
Colonel Layton. I also want to thank our first guest,
Madenti Claschi, the national political correspondent for the Washington Examiner,
(40:41):
And of course our interpret executive producer, Mark Ronaldi, who
covers up all my mistakes just like the White House
covers up presidents. I guess, although I'd like to think
my mistakes as bad. Next week, our guest will be
hat Lincoln Goldfinch, who is an immigration lawyer. She'll talk
(41:05):
about the Trump war against immigrants and also maybe a
little Texas politics will be so missed the very best
and aggressive progressive online must E TV at your own peril.
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