Episode 4886: Phase One Of Unmasking The Never Trumpers; Are We Prepared For A Massive Conflict

Summary

Bannon’s War Room: Episode 4886 – Phase One Of Unmasking The Never Trumpers; Are We Prepared For A Massive Conflict

Date: October 29, 2025
Host: Stephen K. Bannon
Key Guests: Christopher Leonard (author, Lords of Easy Money), Jim VandeHei (Axios), Mike Allen (Axios)

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Overview

In this high-stakes episode, Steve Bannon discusses the critical moments leading up to the 2024 election, the “unmasking” of the Never Trumpers, and whether the US is truly prepared for large-scale geopolitical and military conflicts—particularly in regard to AI, industrial capacity, and rare earth minerals. The war room team delves into both the existential challenges to the MAGA movement and the vulnerabilities of America’s defense and economic infrastructure, with a special focus on artificial intelligence's impact on jobs and warfare. Bannon infuses the conversation with the signature urgency and combative tone that defines the show.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The “Three Phases” Strategy and the Election Narrative

[00:00–08:23]

• Phase One: Focus on the November 5th election as a make-or-break inflection point, especially in the seven battleground states (Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Nevada, Arizona, Georgia, North Carolina).
• “We have to put this beyond their ability to steal it.” (Stephen K. Bannon, 00:05)
• Emphasizes the importance of grassroots work: door-knocking, phone banking, texting.
• Democrats’ Tactics: Claims Democrats, especially Kamala Harris, have pivoted from “the politics of joy” to painting the MAGA movement as “fascist,” likening them to the American German Bund of the 1930s.
• “Tonight falls on America. This is a fascist movement... That is a bald-faced lie.” (Stephen K. Bannon, 00:51)
• Election Integrity: Bannon asserts the Democrats are prepared to delay results and litigate every step, driven by attorney Mark Elias, with the goal to delegitimize Trump if he wins.
• Warns about post-election legal battles being akin to “Stalingrad in court.”

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2. Bannon’s Federal Prison Experience: Empowered, Not Broken

[01:57–03:31]

• Bannon recounts his four months in Danbury Federal Prison, framing it as a failed attempt by the “regime” to silence him and MAGA media.
• “Nancy Pelosi thought a federal prison was going to break me. Well, it empowered me.” (Stephen K. Bannon, 03:02)
• Positions War Room as the leading platform for the Trump/MAGA grassroots movement, now “more powerful than it’s ever been.”

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3. Democratic Desperation and the Politics of “Fascism”

[03:31–08:23]

• Bannon highlights the Democratic pivot to extreme rhetoric, labeling Trump supporters as not just “deplorables” but “fascists” and threats to the nation.

• Predicts a landslide if Trump supporters mobilize, but issues warnings about Democratic legal strategies designed to nullify or delegitimize any Trump win.

  "They understand they can't beat us at the ballot box... they're going to try to do everything humanly possible to nullify and delegitimize Trump's election.”
  — Stephen K. Bannon, [07:12]

• Urges sustained, disciplined effort and morale among MAGA supporters, casting the struggle as a “primal scream of a dying regime.”

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4. Artificial Intelligence: The Jobs Apocalypse and Military Transformation

[19:17–41:02]

• AI Job Losses: Jim VandeHei (Axios) and Mike Allen (Axios) join to discuss the accelerating “AI job apocalypse.”

  “It’s hard for viewers and readers to realize... what a big deal this is. All these companies basically saying... they’re dramatically slowing hiring... because of AI.”
  — Jim VandeHei, [25:09]

  “In the short term, it's really hard to see how a lot of people aren't going to end up struggling and trying to find a new job, especially if you're entry level coming out of college.” — Jim VandeHei, [27:25]

• Bannon contextualizes the AI threat as not just an economic shift but a blow to the “serf class,” especially young Americans trying to establish financial security.

• AI & Warfare:

  • Christopher Leonard (author) compares AI in the military to the early days of aircraft—a technology whose full significance is not yet realized but will transform warfare.

  • Highlights proliferation of autonomous drones, “networks of self-directing AI machines” on the battlefield.

    “It’s going to be completely changed when you have armies of autonomous self-directing drones, millions... out on the battlefield.”
    — Christopher Leonard, [33:15]

  • Bannon links the urgency of AI weaponization to the defense of Taiwan, questioning if carrier battle groups are obsolete.

  • There’s “tremendous concern inside the Pentagon” about US munitions stockpiles and the fragility of supply chains, especially if facing China in the Taiwan Strait.

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5. Industrial Base, Rare Earths & American Deindustrialization

[41:02–49:58]

• Loss of Arsenal:
  • The US is no longer the “arsenal of democracy”—industrial output has shifted abroad, mainly to China, due to policies supported by Wall Street, private equity, and political elites.
  • “We have deindustrialized over decades, really diligently deindustrialized... Now we are reaping the impact of that.” (Christopher Leonard, 43:02)
• Rare Earth Minerals:
  • China controls 90%+ of rare earth supply, making US and allied military hardware (and consumer goods) dependent and vulnerable.
  • Lockheed Martin and others are “scrambling” to source or stockpile minerals from the tiny portion not controlled by China.
  • “China produces roughly 90% of all these rare earth minerals. So... this is another point of vulnerability in the sort of global supply chain.” (Christopher Leonard, 48:20)

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6. Chips & Geopolitical Leverage

[49:22–51:31]

• US/Allies’ “commanding heights” in advanced chip design and production (especially with Taiwan) are now the decisive element in both “future military power” and global influence.
• Export controls and chip diplomacy are portrayed as central to the coming contests between the US and China/Russia/unaligned powers.

  “These chips... are the backbone of the future of military power... The stakes of who does and who doesn’t get these chips is just enormous.”
  — Christopher Leonard, [50:17]

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “Pray for our enemies, because we’re going medieval on these people.”
  Steve Bannon, [08:23]

• “If your answer is to save my country, this country will be saved.”
  Stephen K. Bannon, [08:54]

• On Industrial Deindustrialization:
  “In 1940, we were China. We were the world's manufacturing colossus... In 2025, we have deindustrialized over decades.”
  — Christopher Leonard, [42:05]

• On AI and job loss:
  “This should be the only topic that Congress is thinking about and talking about.”
  — Jim VandeHei, [25:58]

• On US military vulnerability:
  “There is a wait time measured in years to get new interceptor missiles, to get new mid-range missiles, long-range missiles... What we have are these reserve stocks... and as they're used, we're burning them down.”
  — Christopher Leonard, [39:20]

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Timeline of Important Segments

• Ground Game & Election Battle Lines: [00:00–08:23]
• Prison Experience & MAGA Resilience: [01:57–03:31]
• Democratic “Fascism” Pivot & Legal Threats: [03:31–08:23]
• AI Job Shock & Economic Dislocation (w/ Axios): [24:37–27:40]
• AI in Modern Warfare, Munitions Shortages (w/ Leonard): [31:37–43:02]
• Deindustrialization, Rare Earth Monopoly: [45:58–49:22]
• Chips, Geopolitics, and Power: [49:22–51:31]

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Tone & Style

The tone is urgent, combative, and apocalyptic. Bannon’s language is consistently confrontational; he frames the struggle as existential—for both the Trump movement and for America’s global standing. His guests, particularly Christopher Leonard, serve as expert witnesses to America’s decline in industrial and military primacy, while supporting the show’s underlying theme of elite-driven deindustrialization and the need for a “populist” response via MAGA grassroots activism.

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For Listeners New to the Episode

This episode stakes out the stakes for November 2024 and beyond—portraying the election as the front line in a battle for America’s soul, the MAGA movement’s agency, and the nation’s ability to project power or even defend itself. It threads together election integrity, the danger of legal warfare, technology-driven social change, and deep vulnerabilities in defense and economic policy, all through Bannon’s unfiltered, insurgent lens.

Transcript

[Steve Bannon]

Want to go back through the three phases.

[Stephen K. Bannon]

Number one is the 5th of November. All that matters right now in places like Pennsylvania and in Michigan and in Wisconsin, Nevada, Arizona, Georgia, North Carolina, obviously other states, but these seven battleground states is to deliver something that that takes us to where Ohio and Florida are today. We have to put this beyond their ability to steal it. Because don't think for a second by hiring Mark Elias and the gang of thugs around him that they don't look at phase two. They understand she can't Kamala Harris, it's impossible for her generate any enthusiasm. Number one, what she had to do was to focus on one thing and drive the narrative. Her politics of joy was too ill defined.

[Steve Bannon]

She didn't do it.

[Stephen K. Bannon]

So what did they do last week? They pivoted. Tonight falls on America. This is a fascist movement that the people that support it are equivalent to the American, the American German bund in the 1930s. That is a bald faced lie and.

[Steve Bannon]

It'S a dangerous lie.

[Stephen K. Bannon]

So number one, on November 5th, we have to crush them at the ballot box. And there's only one way to do that. The commercials aren't going to do it. Only thing is going to do it.

[Steve Bannon]

Is your putting your shoulder to the wheel.

[Stephen K. Bannon]

The hard work of walking precincts, the hard work of working phone banks, the hard work of texting nonstop and we have to put in superhuman efforts to support the Elon Musk of the world, to support the Charlie Kirks of the world, to support the other organizations that are out there doing this. Victory is at hand. That you can see the collapse of this kind of phony campaign by Kamala Harris. The politics of joy. Right. And she had nothing to back it up whatsoever.

[Steve Bannon]

And you could see the beginning in.

[Stephen K. Bannon]

The polls start to come our way. I'm very proud that the war room has had President Trump's back and particularly has been the platform for the grassroots movement to have their voice heard. And I said at that time that with the hard work of the get out the vote effort and the election integrity effort, that we were on the cusp of having an incredible, incredible victory that could actually be a potential landslide. Now we come to today and I'm finally out of being a political prisoner by the Merrick Garland, Kamala Harris, Nancy Pelosi regime. Okay. For standing up for my political beliefs against an illegitimate committee in the House that did not have a ranking member and did not have minority counsel, I went to a federal prison for four months. Now Nancy Pelosi and Kamala Harris and Merrick Garland Thought they were going to do two things. Number one, they were going to shut down the war room and not have that as a voice for the grassroots movement of MAGA in this country. And number two, break me. Well, I think you can see today, I'm far from broken. I've been empowered by my four months at Danbury Federal Prison. He thought they would shut down the war room and take our power away. The show is bigger and more powerful than it's ever been. And please, it's not a podcast.

[Jim VandeHei]

We.

[Stephen K. Bannon]

We take the live streaming television show every day in the radio show, and we turn it into a podcast. So, my brothers and sisters at cnn, when you say the podcast number is off slightly, right? It hasn't. We were the largest podcast, but we're streaming. We stream on television and we play on radio and online. And Nancy Pelosi thought a federal prison was going to break me. Well, it empowered me. It empowered me. I am more empowered today, more focused today, sharper today, in better shape today than I've ever been in my entire life. So, Nancy Pelosi, suck on that. Number two. And we're going to have, hopefully Mike Davis and Boris Epstein and Bill McGinley, three of the prominent leaders in the legal effort to combat Mark Elias. They are signaling you right now what they're going to do every day with, you see, oh, we're going to delay. We can't count the vote for seven days. We're going to take mail in ballots five days later. Every day after November. The evening of November 5th is going to be Stalingrad, where Mark Elias is in court. And they're going to do this to slow it down. If, if they can't. If they can't take it away from Trump, if they can't nullify it right there, they can't nullify it right there. They want to at least delegitimize his victory. Remember, Jamie Raskin is out there dovetailing off of Nancy Pelosi's interview in the Rolling Stone, where she says, I only have one purpose in my life. My purpose is to make sure that Donald Trump is never reelected President of the United States, and he never sets footage and to the White House again. And Jamie Raskin has been very upfront. If they take the House even by a single vote to 18 to 217, what they will do is sit there and say that Trump is an insurrectionist, that, hey, Bannon. And have already went to prison. Trump's been indicted. He's an insurrectionist, and he cannot. He cannot take the Office of the presidency. All that's in front of us. The desperation of Kamala Harris and her campaign is obvious. They went from the politics of joy, and we were the first ones to call it, to darkness and night falls on America. And they pivoted hard. You know why? Her incoherent explanation for what the politics of joy is? Befuddled everybody. So she had to go back to the same playbook. Trump's a fascist. His followers are not deplorables. They're fascist that they're a danger to the country. Well, you know who doesn't buy this? Working class people don't buy it. And particularly African American and Hispanic men do not buy it. And I will tell you, if President Trump's grassroots forces combine as we can combine right now, you're going to see unbelievable numbers next Tuesday. However, the Democrats are not going to give up. They just hired Mark Elias. And you only hire Mark Elias, who I think is the toughest election lawyer in the country. You only hire Mark Elias when you want to go to the mattresses. They understand they can't beat us at the ballot box. We're going to have a reprise of 2020 where they're going to try to do everything humanly possible to nullify and nullify Trump's election and delegitimize his second term. And I can tell you right now that the working class people in this country, the middle class people in this country that support Donald John Trump are not going to let that happen. Take out your number two pencil and write this down. This show has never been more powerful. The voices behind have never been more powerful. The audience has never been more powerful. And we're going to deliver a knockout blow to your progressive insanity on the 5th of November. And then we're going to secure the deal after that. And number two, the four months in federal prison not only didn't break me, it empowered me. I am more energized and more focused than I've ever been in my entire life. And I can see clearly, just like in 2016 and in 2020, exactly what's going on here and what we have to do to defeat it. This is the primal scream of a dying regime.

[Steve Bannon]

Pray for our enemies, because we're going medieval on these people. I got a free shot on all these networks lying about the people. The people have had a belly full of it. I know you don't like hearing that. I know you try to do everything in the world to stop that, but you're not going to stop it. It's to going, going to happen. And where do people like that go to share the big lie? MAGA MEDIA I wish in my soul, I wish that any of these people had a conscience.

[Stephen K. Bannon]

Ask yourself, what is my task and.

[Steve Bannon]

What is my purpose?

[Stephen K. Bannon]

If that answer is to save my country, this country will be saved. War Room here's your host, Stephen K. Banner. Foreign.

[Steve Bannon]

It's Wednesday, the 29th of October, in the year of our Lord 2025. So what, 3:00am I've got that on top of my Getter account. I've had it there ever since the photo was taken. That's Mo Bannon greeting me at Danbury, where I come through the come through the wire on my on my first day out. Welcome to the war. Boy, that was pretty prescient, wasn't it? You guys did a pretty good job. Of course, on the 29th of September, the only thing I put out, put out the entire time I was at Danbury because, you know, people would interview me, all that, not going to do that. Don't have time for that crap. Got you got to be focused in. And I got to thank Seagal, Chada and Grace and Movie and Boris and everybody that I was able to communicate with every day through our own coded language on the computer there. And you only get so much time on the computer and then you got other people because only a couple of computers for every cell block to get the word out. I sent on the 29th of September, I think it was. So it was a month before this. I think it was the 29th of September, and Raheem was nice enough to put it up at the National Pulse and it went viral after that. And I said, look, this race is over. If we execute the strategy set, you can tell the players are in place. Early voting started. And the motivation of the grassroots is the highest I've ever seen. And we're going to win a sweeping victory across the board if we execute. But it's over for Kamala Harris. Remember how she pivoted from the politics of Joy to the darkness falls on America? That was the beginning of their Trump's a fascist, Trump's an authoritarian. Because I called, I said in losing, they're going to try to create a narrative that President Trump's a fascist. And because of your hard work, because that's what populism is. Populism is where you put it back on the shoulders of the people and they respond. They use their agency, their agency. And if you take that from a year ago, and that was the both the press Conference I had at the, at the Regency Hotel and then followed on where we did the. We did a show. Right? You could say that today it's a pretty good called shot. Was a pretty good called shot because I know this audience and I know what working class and middle class people wanted and wanted to stop the illegitimate regime. Now, yesterday we had the oversight committee tell us that the pardons and the executive orders and look, the pardons are huge or inoperative, but the executive orders are actually bigger. It's a bigger part of the story. And the mainstream media is not covering that because they understand, as I said, when they stole the election in 2020, the liabilities alone and having government action on a government that was not legitimate is mind blowing. But here we know his executive orders were inoperative. And I said right there in that it's an illegitimate regime. And remember Nancy Pelosi and that entire crowd that put me in prison, put Peter Navarre in prison, put the J6, all the heroes, the men and women of J6, put, put them in prison. And some for, you know, 10 and 15 years, they all ran up and begged, crawled on their bellies and begged, including the staffs and the chief of staff that perjured herself, or, excuse me, the chief counsel that perjured herself. In my case, we didn't bring make a big deal at the time because knew the whole thing was rigged. We're not going to sit there and whine, oh, my gosh, it's so terrible. They're lying. Of course they're going to lie. They hate America. You want to know how much they hate America? Look what's happening in New York right now. And they're all getting on board. That's their new. Their new politics is the phony politics of joy of dancing. Skipping through a store with a TikTok on TikTok on the Chinese county party and the PLA's PSYOP platform. Look where they've come. They can't stop Trump. They can't stop the MAGA movement. Is everything happening right now perfect? No, it's not perfect. It's got some imperfections to it. We always have to continue to say, hey, maybe it's America first, because the pressures around the White House are monumental. But Next man up was pretty good. All the hosts that did it, everybody, I, you know, everybody to thank, to keep this show going and continue to have it as a powerhouse, because why? It's the platform for your human agency. We put a lot on you because you're what stands between the nation and the abyss. You've got President Trump's back in good times and bad. This is part of the Trump 28 phase one. Unmask the never Trumpers. And they're out there so great. They're running to the mic. Tel Aviv, Levin oh, they love Trump until he, until he puts Qatar and Turkey in charge. They ain't loving on him. Now the Constitution says that's bs. There's four or five different alternatives all in due time. 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[Stephen K. Bannon]

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[Steve Bannon]

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[Stephen K. Bannon]

America's Voice Family Are you on Getter yet?

[Steve Bannon]

No.

[Jim VandeHei]

What are you waiting for? It's free, it's uncensored, and it's where.

[Steve Bannon]

All the biggest voices in conservative media are speaking out.

[Stephen K. Bannon]

Download the Getter app right now. It's totally free. It's where I put up exclusively all of my content 24 hours a day. Want to know what Steve Bannon's thinking?

[Steve Bannon]

Go to get her.

[Stephen K. Bannon]

That's why you can follow all of your favorites, Steve Bannon, Charlie Kirk, Jack.

[Steve Bannon]

Posobic, and so many more. Download the Getter app now. Sign up for free and be part of the newfound artificial intelligence. Oh, and Chris Lander is going to join us in a moment. The great author of Lords of Easy Money, a seminal work which we talk about A lot here. Artificial intelligence. Okay, let's just get some programming right here, folks, tonight. So we're gonna do the two shows, right? We are going to then come back at 10pm tonight on Real America's Voice, the war room. And we're gonna go until whenever the she and Trump meeting. How long it takes, let's say it's midnight, one in the morning, I don't know. But there's a lot of. There's a lot coming out about this now. There are many, many big issues, obviously, trade, soybeans, Taiwan, the defense of Taiwan. The twos should jump off the page. They have a knife to our throat. As much as we want to spin it. And as Australia and the new deal with them and playing footsie with Lula for the, you know, the heavy rare earth in Brazil, all of that's all great. That's sometime in the distance because the globalists allowed. The globalists allowed the processing. The heavy processing facility, I think it was in Ohio and other places throughout the country to be bought by the Chinese Communist Party. Basically during Obama's administration with Joe Biden, who we know now was in business or getting in business with the Chinese Communist Party. This is why to me it's treasonous activity. And with the drug addicted sex addict son that is all displayed in the laptop from hell of which we brought with Rudy Giuliani brought to the public's attention. I don't know, three weeks before the 2020 election with Miranda Devine and Emma, Joe Morris and all these heroes at the New York Post and of course the intelligence apparatus who we have still not indicted, came out and lied and said it's all Russian disinformation. So Mike Morello and those guys are still not perp walked yet. Brennan's in process. We got to get everybody signed that letter should be perp walked. Perp walked. So the rare earths are massive.

[Christopher Leonard]

Right?

[Steve Bannon]

The Chinese Communist Party has a knife to our throat. Industrial production will stop in four to six weeks. This is, this is the facts. They'll stop in four to six weeks unless we get the magnets and other things associated with heavy rare earths, not just the dirt. That is rare earths, as importantly, artificial intelligence. The chips called the Blackwell chip. And of course. What is it? Jensen Huang is an agent of influence for the Chinese Communist Party full stop. And he comes on and says China hawks. I just found out what that term meant. Lie. I didn't know. It's a badge of honor. It's really a badge of shame. Lie. He's the one in President Trump's ear and he's trying to ship these Blackwell chips, the advanced chips, to China. What did I say when I signed this proclamation last week about artificial intelligence? And we've warned everybody here, don't let corporate America lie to you. We don't have capitalism in this country. We're not a capitalist country, we are a court. This is corporatism, this is state capitalism. This is just another version with the Chinese Communist Party has. They're lying to you. These layoffs are coming from artificial intelligence. They're not looking to get more productive, they're looking to get more efficient and get rid of the humans. And it's not a blue collar thing right now. It's going to be a white collar thing, administrative, managerial, tech at lower levels. So, like we haven't screwed this youngest generation enough. Let's screw them again and take that decade of their twenties away from them. When they actually get into the workforce, they start learning their craft. They have these tremendous experiences, as I said when I signed the proclamation that we have to have scientific and technical concurrence agreement in the, in the nation's population has to understand what's going on. We have to put some guardrails up because you have these maniacs in Silicon Valley and people like Jensen Huang that are driving this.

[Stephen K. Bannon]

And what did I say?

[Steve Bannon]

We, we have everything in our hands to cripple the Chinese Communist Party and comes artificial intelligence for money and expertise and training and education and wait for it, the chips. So we can't hand our mortal enemy a gun. They got a knife to our throat. We can't give them a bullet to put in the chamber to put the gun to our head. We've got a knife to our throat and a gun pressed up against our temple. It's time to play smash mouth. And yes, I realize, oh, you can't decouple, Steve, it's not practical. You're right, it's not practical. You know what is also not practical? Telling the British go screw themselves and go into war with them back in 1775. You think the odds were long then? Yeah, the odds were quite long. Did they sit there and go, well, gosh, I don't know. We can't decouple from the aristocracy. We can't decouple from the British East India Company. We can't decouple from commons. We're Englishmen, we can't do that. One third of our nation agreed with that. The Tories here, one third, the shape shifters, the fence sitters. Hey, I'M gonna see who wins this. There's a hard bitten Patriots said screw yourself, throw down. How about this? Get on the receiving action. A little buckshot coming from Lexington Commons or standing at. Standing at the bridge at Concord. It has to happen here now. They're the mortal enemy of the Chinese people. Lao Bajing. This is the Chinese Communist Party most murderous dictatorship in mankind's history. It's time Wall street stopped kowtowing to him. The corporatists in this nation stopped kowtowing to him. The brologarchs in Silicon Valley stop crowding because that's the pressure on Trump. It's coming from the bologna, David Sacks and those guys. Oh gosh, we got it. You know, we're partners. We're going to do this together. We're going to bring the world to peace and prosperity. They got a knife to our throat now and you give them the chips, put a bullet in the chamber. These are not our allies. These are not our friends. They're not friends. The Chinese, the people in China, Lao Baijang, they've killed. They've killed what, 250 million. They brag about it.

[Stephen K. Bannon]

They're not.

[Jim VandeHei]

They're not hide it.

[Steve Bannon]

They brag about it. The Cultural Revolution, the Great Leap Forward, the collectivization of the Chinese peasants. They brag about it. And that ain't counting folks. 450 million. 450 million forced abortions. 80% about little Chinese girls, female. Is that the feminists outrage about that? Are they outside the Chinese embassy? No, because all half of this, half of the undertaking of antifa and this revolution going on in the United States is underwritten by them. Subversion's their thing. Well, they ain't going to subvert here, let's play. I tell you, we got vanderhei. Let's play a couple of minutes of it. It's about seven minutes long. Let's go and play a couple minutes of the AI jobs apocalypse. You ever heard of that before? You ever heard of that? Let's go and play it.

[Mike Allen]

Target announcing cuts, slashing thousands of corporate roles. In their statements, companies cited in part growing pressure to operate more efficiently and to embrace the use of artificial intelligence. So Jim Vande Hei, that brings us around to your piece with Mike Allen looking at how an AI job apocalypse unfolds in front of us. And it does seem to be accelerating, especially yesterday with that news From Amazon of 14,000 jobs cut and then explicitly writing in their statement about the role of AI in the cuts.

[Jim VandeHei]

Yeah, I think it's hard for viewers and readers to realize, to sort through all the news and like really seize on what matters. I cannot stress to parents, to students, to anyone who's in a job that is, that could be imminently affected by AI, what a big deal this is. You have all of these companies basically saying they're either laying off employees or that they're dramatically slowing, slowing hiring over the next year because of automation and because of AI at the same time. You had this company Mercur a couple of days ago raise money at a $10 billion valuation. It's a two year old company started by and run by 22 year olds who were college roommates and then dropped out not long ago. What that company does and the reason it got such a high valuation is it basically pays doctors and lawyers and other professionals to train AI to basically do their job so that companies can then do the work of humans using robots or using artificial intelligence. This is unfolding very fast and maybe it's not as bad as the naysayers say. There's no doubt. I've not found a single CEO that I have talked to in the last six months who's not told me privately that they are dramatically slowing hiring or not backfilling jobs. When people leave or considering layoffs specifically because of AI. This should be the only topic that Congress is thinking about and talking about. I don't think most workers realize what's happening in our piece we linked to this report by Microsoft that was done this summer that shows you all of, of the tasks and all of the jobs that are most vulnerable. If you're in one of those jobs or if your kid is going to school and considering those professions, you've got to be thinking about this. You have to be thinking about how can I do that job? If artificial intelligence can do it for free or do it better, in some cases it can make you a better employee, but it might force you to think about doing something differently. And I don't think politicians are leveling with the American people. They're not talking about the extent of what's going to happen over the next three years. That doesn't mean I couldn't be a map boom like other technologies over a long horizon. But in the short term, it's really hard to see how a lot of people aren't going to end up struggling and trying to find a new job, especially if you're entry level coming out of college.

[Steve Bannon]

Now that is the most informed show in Washington D.C. for the consensus thinking. And they're sitting there with the audience going you probably haven't heard this. We got to start. Focus on the war room posse. If you're a homeowner, you need to listen to this. In today's AI and cyber world, scammers are stealing home titles with more ease than ever. And your equity is the target. Here's how it works. Criminals forge your signature on one document, use a fake notary stamp, pay small fee with your county, and boom. Your home title has been transferred out of your name. Then they take out loans using your equity or even sell your property. You won't even know it's happened until you get a collection or for foreclosure, foreclosure notice. So let me ask you, when was the last time you personally checked your home title? If you're like me, the answer is never. And that's exactly what scammers are counting on. That's why I trust home title lock. Use promo code [e-mail] to make sure your title is still in your name. You also get a free title history report plus a free 14 day trial of their million dollar triple lock Prot24.7 monitoring of your title, Urgent alerts to any changes, and if fraud should happen, they'll spend up to $1 million to fix it. Go to home title lock.com now. Use promo code Steve. That's home title lock.com promo code Steve. Do it today.

[Stephen K. Bannon]

Here's your host, Stephen K. Ban.

[Steve Bannon]

Okay, welcome back. Birch Gold. Times are turbulent. The world's financial markets. Gold has been a hedge. Now it's a new asset class. We're going back to the 19th century rapidly. Talk to the Birch Gold guys. Go to two ways. Birch Gold. End of the dollar empire. Seven free installments. Working on an eighth. Been putting it out for four years. Get you up to speed on everything about the dollars, the prime reserve currency, and how that's related to gold and how the BRICS nations are in a massive de dollarization program. Birchgold.com into the dollar empire. Slash Bannon into the dollar empire and you get to talk to Philip, Patrick and the team. We also have another version that's directly related to investing in physical gold. Just take your phone out and text Bannon. B a N N O N 989-898. Get access to the ultimate guide which happens to be free of investing in gold and precious metals. Do not forget silver in the age of Trump. It's not the era of Trump, it's the age of Trump. Like he had the age of Jackson, the age of Trump. So check it out today, Birch Gold in Times of Turbulence. Find out why it's a hedge. Okay. Christopher Leonard, you are a kind of a hero to this audience. For the Lords of Easy Money, one of the best books that one should read. If you want to understand economic populism and what it really means and how the system is stacked against you. You're also, but you're, you're now shifting. You're actually doing a book and you take years of research to do this. We talked to you about in Kansas City a little bit that we out there with the Hillsdale College to speak a while ago. It takes you years to, to, to study. You've got a great article piece up in, up in Political I want to get to about how. Hey, folks, wait a second. Do we have the armaments we think we have and why don't we have them? But you are spending a lot of time on artificial intelligence and military use. Can you explain that? How important is artificial intelligence right now in everything dealing with the conduct of war?

[Christopher Leonard]

Yeah. So, as you know, as we talked about, I'm writing a book about the defense industry that goes all the way back to 1932 and up through today. And I'll tell you, when I'm looking at artificial intelligence today in the military realm, it reminds me a lot of the role that aircraft played in the early 1940s. What I'm trying to say is that in the early 40s, aircraft was this revolutionary technology that was changing the world. We were on the cutting edge of it. And military planners knew that aircraft were going to play a role, an important role in fighting war, but they, but they didn't know exactly how. And that is in my mind all the time right now as I'm out here visiting with people, interviewing people in industry, going to arms trade shows, what they know is that AI is an extraordinarily powerful technology. It's already changing the face of war. As you've seen in Ukraine, it has revolutionized how war is fought. And right now you've got a lot of upstart companies, Anduril, Schwarzenegger, Shield, AI Palantir, that are starting to harness this technology and use it. Everybody knows it's going to be transformative. Everybody knows it's going to play a central role in the next conflicts, should they come. But what's unclear is exactly how this is going to play out. And what we saw with aviation technology is that once the shooting starts, so to speak, it gains a momentum of its own and the technology is going to get used. However it needs to be used to win a conflict once it starts. So I guess what I'd say is we are at the early stages of this technology being unleashed in conflict. But everybody who's around it knows that it's going to be transformative. I was talking with a guy who runs a company called SHIELD AI that is making these networks of autonomous drones. And I mean it's shocking to talk to people like this. They're saying that the entire force structure that we conceive of with battleships, with F35 jets, it's not that it's totally obsolete, but it's going to be completely changed when you have armies of autonomous self directing drones, millions of drones that can pilot themselves and kill the enemy, that are going to be out on the battlefield. So we know it's going to change everything, but it's at the early stages. Right now.

[Steve Bannon]

When you say early stages, let's talk about the defense of Taiwan. Since Taiwan's 90 miles off of the coast of mainland China and you have the seventh Fleet and kind of carrier battle groups, do you think carrier battle groups and carrying strike groups are a relic of the past? Given this new drone warfare? If you could send 10,000 drones to just hit a, it'd be like kamikaze right off okinawa in like 45. Are we prepared to fight, particularly fight at sea, this new artificial intelligence warfare?

[Christopher Leonard]

This is what I can say and to be clear, like I am not a military analyst, I'm just talking to people who are. It's at this moment it's too early to say that the battle carriers, that these things are obsolete. What I can tell you for sure is that there is tremendous concern inside the Pentagon, outside the Pentagon, that we're not equipped to handle a large scale conflict in the Straits of Taiwan, for example. And here's what I mean by that. You know, the article you mentioned that went up this week in Politico magazine is really about our munition. Because what we do know is that any conflict in the Straits of Taiwan will unfold extremely rapidly, almost surely and it's going to create tremendous demand for these very high end guided missiles, you know, mid range missiles. And there was a war game that's really important that was conducted by the center for Strategic and International Studies. CSIS is this old pretty well established think tank in D.C. and what this war game showed is that the United States would run out of these very important munitions in a matter of weeks. And if there was a full scale conflict in Taiwan and what's unclear to us is how quickly the Chinese themselves would run out because they keep their missile stocks under lock and key. It's hard to gauge the exact numbers that they have. But as you know, they have tremendous industrial capacity in China. They have the industrial capacity that was the equivalent of what the United States had in 1940 that allowed us to win World War II. And so there's huge concern in the Pentagon that even if we were to have a conflict on the terms as it now exists, like leave AI to the side for a second with drone swarms and all the rest, that we would run out of munitions in a matter of weeks. And these missiles that we would run out of take years to build, are incredibly sophisticated with these guidance systems and all the rest. These aren't artillery shells. And you know, what I've been looking at is the supply chain the United States has to produce these munitions. And again, I'm not trying to dodge the question here, but this is a question separate of AI and how that's going to change it with the drone swarms. And I would describe that as a huge question mark. Yes.

[Steve Bannon]

Hang on, hang on, hang on. I thought we were the greatest industrial power in the world. And every time I look around, we're cutting some deal with the Ukraine. I mean, we're stealing the eu Excuse me, not us, the eu with our wink and a nod, the EU is stealing the Russian people's assets for the first time. It's one of the reasons gold's been on fire. They're stealing the $380 billion to pay, basically give it to Ukraine to, then Ukraine pay the United States for munitions. We're sending, I think, Patriots and Thads and everything, you know, Aegis class cruisers to the Eastern Med to defend Israel when Netanyahu is trying to trump up this war with the Persians, we're sending munitions everywhere. Is that in your calculus? Is that the reason? Or is it just we just don't have the industrial capacity because we ship that industrial capacity over to China because they had nothing. So is it that we're giving the world, you know, what is it Palmer Luckey keeps saying? We don't want to be the world's policeman, we want to be the world's gun shop? Well, to be the gun shop, you got to be able to produce the guns, metaphorically.

[Stephen K. Bannon]

Are you saying we can't do that.

[Steve Bannon]

Or are we already given our top priority, went to Ukraine and went to Israel.

[Christopher Leonard]

Sir, huge question. So much going on here. Here's what I would say. As we, as we do give away these Munitions around the world at this moment. I cannot overstate the level of alarm inside the Pentagon about our reserve of these munitions. For example, you know about the Thaad, Thaad batteries that went over to Israel and many Thaad interceptors were fired off to protect Israel against the attack from Iran. Every one of those missiles is a tremendous precious resource. Let me tell you this. One of the people I interviewed for this article is an army colonel who worked for the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Looking at our defense industrial base and looking at our ability to ramp up production, to meet new needs, to keep our own supplies of these munitions in place, and to even increase our supply. And she was tremendously concerned. What I'm telling you now is that for the United States itself there is a wait time measured in years to get new interceptor missiles, to get new mid range missiles, long range missiles, even the stuff we fire from drones or helicopters, like the Hellfire missile, which was a bread and butter munition of the war on terrorists. There's a two year wait for new Hellfire missiles right now. So what we have are these reserve stocks of these munitions. And as they're used in combat around the world right now, we're basically burning down those reserves we have as there's a tremendously long wait time for new reserves. So what I would say is that we've gotten into this position where our defense industrial base is really scrambling to keep up with demand. There is not a giant Fort Knox of these munitions that we can just draw from endlessly at this moment. And as I said, I mean, you're looking at war games right now that say we would run out of missiles in a matter of weeks and in some munitions, maybe a month or two if there was a full scale conflict in Taiwan. So there really is a lot of concern that we don't have the industrial capacity to produce what we need and the time we would need to get these munitions out into the field.

[Steve Bannon]

So when, when, when Pearl harbor was attacked. Right. That was when Churchill, I think late that night he talked to, he talked to FDR and he said when he went to bed, it was the first time that he actually believed in his heart of hearts that they were going to survive because the United States was in the war and the reason was the arsenal of democracy, which really was Detroit or coming out of Detroit, this massive ability to do mass production, industrial scale, mass production. Are you telling us in your research for your book you're coming to the conclusion? And by the way, I only got a minute. In fact, I'll Wait and give you some Runway on the other side on this. That the Chinese Communist Party, because Wall street and the corporatist sh shipped and the private equity guys and the venture capitalists, Sequoia Capital, Goldman Sachs, all of them shipped our industrial capacity to to mainland China that we're no longer the arsenal democracy. In fact they're the they are really the arsenal of totalitarianism.

[Christopher Leonard]

CHRISTOPHER what I would say is in 1940, we were China. We were the world's manufacturing colossus. You talk about Detroit. I just spent about a week in Burbank, California, where Lockheed Aircraft began. That was a manufacturing town where every other employee knew how to take apart and rebuild an engine. Everybody knew the industrial arts intimately and that's what created the war machine of the 1940s. You look at the United States in 2025, we have de industrialized over decades, really diligently de industrialized, worked really hard to move that capacity overseas. And now we are we're reaping the impact of that. And, and it's it's not to say the game is over, but we are not what we were in 1940. There's no question about that. And the industry is struggling to keep up.

[Steve Bannon]

Christopher just hang here for one second. Shortcut. Commercial break Christopher Leonard on the other side okay, let's be honest. You never thought it would get this far. Maybe you missed the last IRS deadline or you haven't filed taxes in a while.

[Stephen K. Bannon]

Let me be clear.

[Steve Bannon]

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[Stephen K. Bannon]

Here's your host, Stephen K. Banff.

[Steve Bannon]

Hometitleock.com promo code Steve, go talk to Natalie Dominguez and the team today. Every dream you've ever had is in that home, if you're fortunate enough to own one. And trust me, if you're under 35, it's been a struggle. 90% of your net worth is tied up in that home, in the equity in it. People under 35, you know, the Russian serf class in our country now that are getting eviscerated by artificial intelligence job apocalypse, it's going to be even tougher for them. So don't let you know, AI, cyber rogue, lawyer, rogue accountant, rogue family member, anything. Get their mitts on that title. Hometitlelock.com, promo code Steve, Talk to Natalie Dominguez of the team today. Christopher and Leonard, here's why the audience loves you. I will rant and rave and try to bait you and you just come back. Well, Steve, let's just look at the facts, okay? It's so great. That's why Lord's easy money so powerful. And I know this book on the defense industry is going to be incredible. Talk to me, though, about, let's go rare earths first and then artificial intelligence because one leads the other. The heavy rare earths, I keep saying it's a knife to the throat of President Trump as he tries to negotiate because they understand they can shut the production lines down, the industrial production lines down in four to six weeks. Your thoughts on that.

[Christopher Leonard]

Critically important issue. And it's really just another facet of what we've been talking about, which is, you know, military power is intimately intertwined with the power of industrial production. And, you know, industrial production goes all the way from, from the factory floor with, with well trained factory workers. And by the way, I've got to say, these folks who work in these factories are highly, highly skilled, incredibly well trained people. You know, we think of a factory as punching out metal parts, but these folks are working with micro circuit boards and all the rest. But that work traces all the way around the world back to rare earth mines. And this is all part of the supply chain. What's so interesting is how there was a great article in the Wall Street Journal last week about how the United States essentially traded away its capacity to mine rare earth minerals. We sort of got that business off the board because it seemed like less profitable. And we sort of left that work to China, which really aggressively moved into that space with state run enterprises with a strategic goal that we're seeing play out now. I mean, China's move to license the use of rare earths, which essentially kind of unilaterally takes control over who can and cannot use these processed rare earths, is just a tremendous leveraging of the power they've developed by developing this industry. So what does that mean for us? I mean, as you know, it's very well reported these minerals are used in very specific niche components, like special magnets that are in fighter jets, missiles, of course, consumer products like cars. But for our concerns, they're just vital components of almost all military hardware, Very advanced military hardware. And I mean, I will tell you, it's not like the defense companies or the Pentagon are just sitting back passively. I was over in the United Arab Emirates earlier this year and an executive for Lockheed Martin was talking about the very assertive actions they're taking to try to source these minerals from around the world. They're trying to stockpile reserves of these minerals and the components made from these minerals. So it's not like they're just passively sitting back and letting China control it. But it is such an uphill battle. China produces roughly 90% of all these rare earth minerals. So what that leaves is these defense companies and others scrambling to work around the edges in that other 10% of the market or cut deals with China to continue to have access to this. And I just think there's no doubt about it that it's highlighting a tremendous point of vulnerability in these global supply supply chains. That kind of echoes back to those moments of the COVID lockdown where we found we could no longer make simple equipment like face masks. And so this is another point of vulnerability in the sort of global supply chain that we've been relying on for decades to produce the defense materials we need.

[Steve Bannon]

But where we have the commanding heights is in chip advanced chip design and chip production, particularly with our allies in, in Taiwan. That's why these negotiations are so important, particularly about the Blackwell chip and others. And you just mentioned that warfare is changing, right? To the massive armies or massive fleets of these self autonomous autonomous drones. Where do you, where do we stand right now? How big a stake is, how high are the stakes about the entire negotiations on chips?

[Christopher Leonard]

Stakes are enormous. As you know, these chips are the backbone of the future of military power. I really do think that that's fair to say as you. The chips have become a bargaining chip, not to use that kind of cliche, but as you know, you know when we sell weapons around the world. And by the way, the United States is the world's largest exporter of sophisticated weaponry. We control 40% of the global market. This isn't a market like automobiles or televisions. Every weapon sold, it's sort of like the currency of geopolitics. You give this important technology to your allies, you withhold it from your opponents. These chips, the Nvidia chips, the chips that apparently Trump is going to be talking about with xi, these are the foundation, these are the backbone of the future of military power. And as you can see, you know, when Trump was over in the Middle east, he made a deal to export some of these chips to our close ally, the United Arab Emirates. They are rapidly breaking, building enormous infrastructure in the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia. A backbone of compute power based on these chips. So this is sort of the race for establishing the foundational power of AI in the future. And the stakes of who does and who doesn't get these chips is just enormous.

[Steve Bannon]

Christopher, where do people go to get your writings? The Ploko story is amazing. We're going to push it up. We did it the other day, we're gonna push it again. Where do folks go to keep up with all your research and thoughts?

[Christopher Leonard]

All my articles are at Christopher Leonard Biz. I'll be putting that Politico article up there today, hopefully soon. And I'm see Leonard News on Twitter.

[Steve Bannon]

Christopher Leonard, a steady, a steady Eddie, a safe pair of hands. The lords of easy money. And new research coming out about the defense industry. Chris, thank you so much carving out time to do this. Appreciate you. Isn't it ironic that we leave with the right stuff off a classic novel, a magnificent film, a great score about America at its height, the space program in the 50s and the test pilots in the 50s and early 1960s. Dr. Roberts at Heritage next in the war Room.

[Stephen K. Bannon]

What if he had the brightest mind.

[Steve Bannon]

In the war room, delivering critical financial research every month? Steve Bannon here. War Room listeners know Jim Rickards. I love this guy.

[Stephen K. Bannon]

He's our wise man. A former CIA, Pentagon and White House.

[Steve Bannon]

Advisor with an unmatched grasp of geopolitics and capital markets. Jim predicted Trump's electoral College victory exactly 3:12 to 226, down to the actual number itself. Now he's issuing a dire warning about April 11, a moment that could define Trump's presidency and your financial future. His latest book, MoneyGPT, exposes how AI is setting the stage for financial chaos. Bank runs at lightning speeds, algorithm driven crashes and even threats to national security right now. War Room members get a free copy of MoneyGPT when they sign up for Strategic Intelligence. This is Jim's flagship financial newsletter, Strategic Intelligence.

[Stephen K. Bannon]

I read it.

[Steve Bannon]

You should read it. Time is running out. Go to rickardswarroom.com that's all one word. Rickards. War Rooms. Rickards with an S. Go now and claim your free book. That's rickardswarroom.com do it today.