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Episode 5290: What The War In Iran Means Globally; Taiwan's Opposition Leaders Meet With China
Episode 5290: What The War In Iran Means Globally; Taiwan's Opposition Leaders Meet With China ...
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- [00:03]
A
This is the primal scream of a dying regime. Pray for our enemies because we're going medieval on these people. I got a free shot. 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 going to happen.
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B
And where do people like that go
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A
to share the big lie?
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C
MAGA MEDIA I wish in my soul,
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A
I wish that any of these people had a conscience. Ask yourself, what is my task and what is my purpose?
- [00:38]
D
If that answer is to save my country, this country will be saved.
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A
WAR ROOM here's your host, Stephen K. Banner,
- [00:54]
C
Here in the War room. It's Friday, April 10th, in the year of our Lord 2026. Natalie Winters hosting today, filling in for Stephen K. Bannon. But you know, our enemies don't take any days off. So we've got a packed show, what they're waging here on the home front, abroad in the Middle east, the Chinese Communist Party in the Taiwan Straits. We're going to get into all of it. But I want to start with what is, I think, the frankly seminal issue of President Trump's campaign and really a bedrock issue of America First. That is, of course, immigration and restricting. There should be no caveats on what mass deportations mean. I know Rosemary Jenks gets that. The wonderful work you've been doing over the Immigration Accountability Project, I think speaks for itself. But we've seen a sort of resurgence. It seems like every Congress, there's this new euphemistic spin on what is amnesty to depress the wages and livelihoods of American workers. You know, euphemized. So we're going to give people their new favorite word, dignity. And we're seeing it. It's rearing its ugly head again. It's just people being proxies for big business. Right. What's new? But can you sort of walk us through first, the sort of affront of this bill, the way that a lot of these Republicans as well, I guess I'd say shocking, but I guess at this rate, it's not that. That is the messaging behind it, how radical it is and what you guys are doing to try to stop it?
- [02:15]
E
Yeah. So I call this bill, instead of the Dignity act, the Saw act for Screw All American Workers, because this bill hits every American worker, whether they're low wage, medium wage or high wage. It's got amnesty for at least 10 million illegal aliens to compete with low wage American workers. It codifies opt, it doubles the employment based green cards. So it's hitting mid and high wage American workers and taking their jobs. It allows foreign students that get STEM degrees in the United States to remain here permanently. So, so I mean it doesn't matter where you are in the economy. This bill would dramatically affect you and decrease your wages and increase competition for jobs. It's despicable. And you know, it's, it's not just. There are 20 Democrat co sponsors and 19 Republican co sponsors, plus the lead sponsor, Maria Salazar. But basically all of the Democrats in the House support, almost all of them anyways support this bill. And they're just metering the number of sponsors so that they can claim that it's completely bipartisan with 20 of each. So you know, every time they find a new dupe Republican to join their effort, they add on another Democrat. It's just a scam. And they're lying. The sponsors of this bill are lying about it, saying that there's zero tolerance for criminal aliens in the amnesty. That is not true. They have waivers for all kinds of crimes, misdemeanors, drug smuggling, all sorts of things, including by the way, unlawful voting. So you know the thing that never happens, they're actually waiving the felony for unlawful voting to get amnesty. It's disgusting.
- [04:03]
C
We've done a lot of work here in the war room exposing the kind of, I think foundational lies that led to the just complete and utter ballooning of the H1B visa caps. Right. This idea, frankly, at its core, which I think is offensive, that American workers can't cut it, but they're actually not importing the best of the brightest. But I think this OPT program is something that does it get equal attention, even though I think its actual creation is almost more sinister, because it really is replacing the brightest, the youngest, most STEM oriented Americans, particularly those just starting out their careers in the college and grad school levels. Could you sort of expand a little bit on that program?
- [04:40]
E
Yeah. So the optional practical training program OPT was created under the, the Bush W. Bush administration by executive fiat. There's no statutory authorization for this program. It was correct created by the President and then it was expanded by President Obama so that if you're in a, if you are graduating with a STEM degree as a foreign student, you get three years to stay in the United States. And taxpayers subsidize the employers of these foreign graduate students by that since they don't have to pay FICA taxes. So basically the employer gets a discount to hire a Foreign, foreign graduate instead of an American graduate. It's, it's an unbelievable program. And you know, most people don't know it exists unless of course you're one of the victims of it. The Americans who graduate from college, you know, with a STEM degree, they've done everything they're supposed to do, everything we tell them to do, and yet they can't get a job because the employers are subsidized to hire foreign graduates. And you know, this is the pipeline that leads to H1B. So people come here as a, as a foreign student and then they get OPT and they find an employer and then that employer sponsors them for an H1B and that job is essentially permanently removed from American ability to get it. So you know, it's a terrible program. It needs to be ended. It should have been ended a long time ago. And it is time to completely and utterly end opt. Nobody here on a foreign student visa should get an employment authorization.
- [06:23]
C
If any administration, I think wants to show that they're putting American workers first. I mean frankly there's a laundry list, very extensive grab bag of weird three letter programs that you could probably cancel that would. I think OPT should be top of the list. But I wanna link this to I think what is a pretty alarming story that I'm sure a lot of the Warren Posse has read about, which is the birth rate is hitting yet new year new low. Obviously the Lawlor and Maria Salazar and establishment Republicans of the world would say well this is why we need mass immigration. This is why we need to make birthright citizenship even more laissez faire. If you're within a 50 kilometer radius of the United States, you can be a citizen. But it seems like addressing the root cause which is that young American families can't get jobs, don't feel the economic security that they have to actually have children is sort of being exacerbated by these policies. Can you speak a little bit to sort of linking that crisis with the immigration crisis?
- [07:22]
E
Yeah, absolutely. I mean the more we import foreigners and by the way, we're importing them at the rate of over a million per year as legal permanent residents, then we have well over a million temporary foreign workers. And then we have illegal immigration which is, you know, 16 million minimum in this country. And all of those people need a house to live in. They all need services, whether it criminal justice services or you know, welfare services or. And public education is a huge one. And so they're competing with Americans for resources and they're taking the supply of Infrastructure like housing. So, you know, if you're a young person and you can't afford to buy a house and the rent is out of control, it's tough to make that decision to have a family. But, you know, the, the immigration is not going to solve a birth rate problem because first of all, we're importing poor people. So, you know, the vast majority of immigrants who come here, especially lawful permanent residents, are family based immigrants and they're largely undereducated and poor. You can't, you know, fix the Social Security system or the, the economy with low wage workers. You know, we need an educated workforce. We've got AI coming in. That's going to be more competition for American workers. So we need to focus on getting Americans good paying jobs where they can actually support a family and make the decision to have one so that they see some hope in their future.
- [09:03]
C
And speaking of that, I think an even more radical idea is birthright citizenship. I think what the Trump administration has been trying to do on ending that is certainly moving in the right direction. I kind of view it as the worst derivation of dei. It's not even fake marginalization. It's just like if you are somehow in the United States and giving birth, you get the most precious thing on this planet, which is citizenship here in the United States. It's preposterous, but I know there's been a lot going on, a lot of everyone from the ACLU, all the horrible evil left wing NGOs, trying to do everything they can to obstruct this, whether it's protesters or countersuits, lawsuits. Where do we stand on that front? And what do you think the feasibility is of the Trump administration actually being able to end that?
- [09:46]
E
So I was actually at the Supreme Court when they had arguments a week and a half ago or so, and it was, I mean, it seems so obvious to me. I'm clearly biased, but the Solicitor General did a great job in those arguments. I thought it was very clear that at least one of the justices has no concept of much of anything, but certainly didn't understand the meaning of the word jurisdiction and that there's a difference between territorial jurisdiction and political jurisdiction. And it is absolutely clear from what the authors of the 14th Amendment wrote and said in debate that they intended subject to the jurisdiction thereof to mean political jurisdiction. In other words, allegiance, allegiance to the United States and not allegiance to any foreign power. And it is preposterous to argue that illegal aliens or temporary visitors, whether they're tourists or foreign students or whatever, have Any allegiance to the United States of America, to our government, you can't be. You have to be a lawful permanent resident, essentially, which is what was decided by the Supreme Court in Wong Kim Arp, when they said that the parents were legally domiciled and so therefore their child was an American at birth. So, you know, if the justices look at what the actual language of the 14th Amendment meant at the time it was written, and that. That is very clear, that meaning is very clear in the Congressional record, then I think they have to get rid of birthright citizenship. Now, what I think they may try to do what certainly Justice Kavanaugh made it very clear that he was looking for a way out of having to decide the constitutional. And whether that means they toss it to Congress to define subject to the jurisdiction thereof or some. Some other way. I think that's a very strong possibility. And, you know, the Congress has had a bill called the Birthright Citizenship act that has been introduced every Congress for at least 20 years. And Congress should pass it. You know, they should have passed it years ago. They haven't because, of course, it's Congress. And so they don't do much, but they certainly could pass that and define subject to the jurisdiction in the law. That would have actually lent weight to the Solicitor General's arguments in the Supreme Court. We'll hope that they will step up and do their job at some point.
- [12:26]
C
Well, I don't think we should hold our breath. I think the only thing capable of getting House Republicans to do anything is the phone calls from the War Room Posse, which we are all very grateful for. And I know you guys have been really putting your shoulder behind the wheel on yet another thing that I guess Congressional Republicans have not just created the problem, but failed in fixing, certainly aided and abetted. That's mass deportation. You obviously have the Mass Deportation Coalition. Can you give the audience a quick update on what you guys got going on there? Yeah.
- [12:57]
E
So we released the playbook for the Mass deportation coalition on April 1st. It's available online. It's at the mass deportation coalition.com org I think it is, or mass deportations.com either way. And it lays out our recommendations for the Trump administration to get the deportation numbers up to a million this year so that they can ramp up even more after that in coming years. We believe that since the president promised the largest mass deportation campaign in American history, that we want to help him deliver that. It's absolutely critical. After four years of the Biden invasion, we have to get these illegal aliens out of our country. We do not want to give them amnesty. Thank you, Maria Salazar. We want them out of our country. And so there are, you know, relatively easy, straightforward ways to do this, including things like the no match letters from the Social Security Administration or the IRS which would be better for enforcement purposes or worksite enforcement is absolutely critical. We have to do worksite enforcement and we have not seen that ramping up yet. So yeah, the we must get mass deportations and that means we have President Trump speaking.
- [14:18]
C
So I'm going to have to toss to him but people ought to check that out. We're going to toss to President Trump right now. Thank you for joining us, Rosemary.
- [14:23]
F
That'll open up automatically. Yeah. The answer is yes, but the strait will open up if we just left the strait is going to otherwise they make no money. So the strait is going to open. But what we have is no nuclear weapon. But we'll open the strait anyway. Don't forget we don't use the strait. Other countries use the strait. So we do have other countries coming up and they'll help out. But we don't use won't be easy. It won't be I would say this we will have that open fairly soon.
- [14:53]
E
What's your backup plan?
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D
What's your backup plan if the field opens?
- [14:58]
F
You don't need a backup plan. We have the military is defeated. Their military is gone. They have you know, we've degraded just about everything. They have very few missiles. They have very little manufacturing capability. We've hit them hard. Our military is amazing the job they've done.
- [15:15]
C
Sorry, is this a one and done talk or are you open to more talk now happening?
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D
I don't know.
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F
I can't tell you. I have to see what happens tomorrow. They're they've been talking for 47 years with other presidents and we're not doing much talking. Thank you very much.
- [15:31]
E
Thank you.
- [15:38]
C
You're back in the war room. It seems like President Trump is very familiar with the the war room show clock timing that perfectly with with what would have been our break men can my job easy. We have Cleopatra. We also got Brian Kennedy who I want to have on to give us some updates on what President Trump was just was just talking about. But before we get to all things Iran, Cleo, I want to bring you on the show. You're always at the tip of the spear doing very interesting work in Chinese Communist Party infiltration and shenanigans across the globe often and you know conveniently placed strategically located ports and other very interesting military significance locations. I'd love to get some updates on that. But also your thoughts on the meeting we saw go down between Taiwanese opposition leader and Xi Jinping. Certainly an escalation. A lot of talks about unification, the future of Taiwan, how that kind of all meshes in with what you've been working on.
- [16:37]
G
Yes, thank you very much. So she's the president of the kmt, which as you mentioned, is the opposition party. And it's a party that's been known to be quite close to China for a very long time. And what it's doing is it's creating fractionalization not just within the kmt, because there are some sections of the KMT that would like to remain free of such overarching Chinese control and be put in re education camps when the Chinese come across the strait and all that sort of thing. But it also creates fractionalization within the population itself. So it's the kind of entropic warfare of the political warfare realm that we've been seeing before. It's not helpful, which is what the Chinese are going for. And it's combined with closing of airspaces that we're seeing in other locations and a continuation of military exercises and building up of their capacities. They are not slowing down. So it's among the spectrum that goes from political warfare all the way through to kinetic. It's strike right into the heart of the political political infrastructure within Taiwan and hopefully it won't be effective.
- [17:55]
C
I'm curious your broader thoughts as to how what is going down in the Middle east is affecting the calculus in Beijing. I know there was a lot of focus on sort of shake up at the cmc, having younger, maybe more wolf warrior style leaders in there, potentially making something more aggressive likely to happen, or just sort of agreeing with anything that Xi Jinping wanted a distraction from maybe a dismal economy at home. Right. A lot of permutations, but that's sort of a big variable. To now toss into this. What's your general assessment of the United States's significantly expanded involvement? Not just from a defense industrial based munitions, artillery, weapons perspective, but also just seems like maybe a reorientation of focusing on that region a little bit more. How do you think that affects Xi's calculus in Taiwan?
- [18:42]
G
It's a very complex scenario because you can find indicators for things that would help the US position and things that would hurt the US position. So in terms of things that would help the US position, the Chinese Communist Party likes things to be predictable and President Trump is anything but predictable. So unless they feel like they've got control over the political situation, which would mean that the US Wouldn't enter into conflict with Taiwan to begin with, or the kinetic situation, which is the US can't, meaning munitions are depleted or whatever, that enter into a situation in Taiwan, then it makes it harder for China to move. Also, the US Is in the process of strangling some key fuel supply lines into China. So not only out of the Middle east, but also the Venezuela move was incredibly important for that. So those are things that might help delay Chinese decision to go across the strait. But another is if they think that the American population isn't going to push for anything else, if they think they have the tools available to them in places like Guam, for example, to be able to cut off a US Response and buy some time so that the media narrative warfare campaign can take root and make it an almost fait accompli, then you've got something that would benefit China. And also remember that the Chinese are. There's talk about having to bring massive amounts across the street, how difficult that would be. They can fly in on commercial flights, large amounts of what's required. And also the Chinese organized crime elements in key ports within Taiwan are basically controlling the port. So who knows what's coming into the ports anyway. So when you're looking at assessing Chinese capabilities already in Taiwan, it's not only essential to look at that fifth column element, but also the role of Chinese organized crime in undermining Taiwan's ability to respond. And again, the key, I think, is going to be delaying, making things go dark, creating confusion, making it harder for the US Political response to trigger a kinetic response that would force the Chinese to dislodge. But that's once the decision to try to invade Taiwan is taken. And that decision hopefully has been complicated by President Trump's forceful actions and unpredictability from a Chinese Communist Party calculations perspective,
- [21:24]
C
from CNMI to Guam to Diego Garcia to all of these sort of not niche in the geopolitical sense, but niche in the traditional Western media sense, places that you've spent a lot of time and I think there's an extremely high and outsized ROI on investing there and securing those areas and rooting out PRC infiltration, what would you tell the Trump administration are those little kind of edge case situations which maybe don't catch a bunch of media headlines, but that the result or return that they would get from really deploying, whether it's resources or political capital or just attention to these areas, they could really shore up some security and ensuring that the PRC is less likely to do something more in the kinetic spectrum in Taiwan.
- [22:10]
G
Thank you. Thank you for that question. There's one thing that's very critical at the moment. So we've talked about the three US Freely associated states, Palau, Federated States of Micronesia and Marshall Islands. So these are this area of the Central Pacific between Hawaii and Guam and the Philippines. These three islands have a unique relationship with the United States. They can serve in the military at very high rates. And they do. They can freely work and live in the US The US has the responsibility to protect them. It has strategic denial. It's what allows the US to safely get across the center of the Pacific in order to be able to get to the first or second island chain and to get to the Americans in Guam and the Commonwealth of Northern Mariana Islands. Over 100,000Americans died during World War II to create this very unique relationship. And these are the locations of battles like the Battle of Peleliu in Palau, for example. Right. Now, I mentioned that they serve in the US military at very high rates. They're such an integrated part of U.S. defense that not only have they allowed the U.S. to use their land to defend the U.S. including the Americans in Guam and Sienna Mai, but also in Hawaii and the mainland, but they've used their bodies, they've physically served in the US Military, they've died for the US and part of the agreement is that they're supposed to get VA services when they go back. So if have ptsd, for example, they should be able to get their drugs for ptsd. And again, they're so integrated that the US Postal Service is domestic US mail in Palau, Federal States of Micronesia and Marshall Islands. So it shouldn't be complicated. And as part of the renewal of the agreements, Compacts of free association, this was promised to them and there's funding allocated for it. But for some completely inconceivable reason, kind of lower level people in Veterans affairs are blocking it. And the result is that it's such a breach of trust because you have these people go from, for example, the Marshall Islands, they serve in Afghanistan, they serve in Iraq, they come back home in need of help, and the US has breached its contract. And from a political warfare perspective, apart from anything else, this is a gift to the Chinese who say, look, they take your boys and girls and they send them back broken. The US doesn't care about you. And at the same time, the Chinese are also sending medical teams into the area. So they've got a team of at least half A dozen doctors working out of the main hospital in Pohnpei in the Federated States of Micronesia, and they are the ones serving the veterans. So they're getting whatever information a doctor can legitimately ask for from a service member. Where did you serve? What are your injuries? How can you get your, your care? And why aren't you getting your care from the US Why are we the ones giving you the care? This honorable treatment of the men and women from the Federated States of Micronesia, Palau, Marshall Islands, that the US Government promised them and is not delivering to them. It's low cost, the money's already allocated, and if it's not done, it is very damaging to the US position across the region and is a huge opening for the sort of Chinese entry into the medical systems that can result in expanded social credit control, including denial of care to the sort of people who would otherwise be standing up to the Chinese.
- [25:52]
C
Leo, it's always an honor to have you on. You bring us the cutting edge information that we certainly need to know, and I think that's a great recommendation. If people want to follow you, stay up to date with everything you've got going on. Where can they go to do that?
- [26:05]
G
Thank you. I'm on X, just my name, Cleo Pascal. C L E O P A S K A L. And I don't follow anyone just because of my grumpiness about the algorithm. So it's not personal. If I'm not following you, it's my, my own little tiny fighting against the machine. There we go.
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C
Thank you so much for joining us. We always appreciate having you on.
- [26:29]
G
Thank you.
- [26:29]
C
Thank you. We've got a few minutes before we got to jump to break, but I don't want to spare any of the time that we have with our next guest, Brian Kennedy, who joins us now, formerly of Claremont, of all things. You guys have really been putting out some, I think, wonderful resources making the case for the Iran war. There's some people who have differing opinions, but I think it's important to have robust discussions about it. And I think what Claremont and certain magazines have been putting out really is some wonderful materials. I'd love to get your thoughts on the ceasefire, if it actually is one what you think the future of it looks like. And I don't know if you were able to see President Trump's recent comments just right there in the gaggle, talking about the Strait of Hormuz, obviously inextricably linked to the ceasefire. But your, your thoughts on sort of where we stand.
- [27:19]
B
Well, thank you, Natalie. Great to be with you on this Friday afternoon. Look, I take the President at his word that we've achieved many of our objectives, that this ceasefire is something that. That we hopefully can negotiate around and come to some kind of conclusion on this. I take the President seriously when he says they can't have nuclear weapons. Now, a lot of people don't, don't believe they have nuclear weapons, that they didn't want nuclear weapons. They say they wanted nuclear weapons. And the President believed them. He has believed them for many, many years. And so if he believes that we have reduced their ability to build nuclear weapons, then it's time for us to leave. Whether or not the strait can be opened soon to our satisfaction is something here that's going to need to be negotiated. And I believe that given the team we have open there, hopefully we're going to be able to achieve that. But we don't know whether the ceasefire will hold. We don't really know whether the people who are. That we're negotiating with actually have the authority to be negotiating. We certainly hope they do. But this is a country in Iran that's at war with us. And so there will be parts, as I think the War Room has done a brilliant job of articulating. There'll be people over there who will still continue to fight the war, and they may not agree with whatever terms are come up with here tomorrow. And so we're going to have to. We're going to have to see. But one hopes that the war ends. No. No one wants this war. And I can say at Claremont, there are people who, you know, regardless of the wisdom of doing it now, certainly want the President to win. But there are also critics of what the President's done here. And I think we can have and should have a robust debate about those things. And I think we are. And I think War Room has been at the forefront of that and, as I say, have done a brilliant job at that.
- [29:13]
C
I've been very proud to be a part of War Room. I think it's one of the few shows right now that is actually giving not just both sides, but every side. I think a lot of shows are just pandering to one direction, and that's why I love to have. Have everybody on, from Kurt Mills to Brian Kennedy to the China Hawks to the China skeptics. We love it all. Brian, if you can hang with us through the break, got a lot more questions for you. As you could imagine, we're impossible. You got to make sure you're checking out birchgold.com bannon or texting Bannon to 989898 I think we could probably fill maybe two times the amount of war room shows a day. Don't give Steve that idea, but with content about how unstable and wild the world is. And you guys know gold is always been a hedge against that. So check out birchgold.com Bannon More Brian Kennedy Right after this short break.
- [30:00]
A
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- [33:23]
C
Welcome back to the War Room. Quiet, I guess. Prophetically named. So got Brian Kennedy, Chairman of the Committee on the Present D. China. Brian, I just sort of want to toss it to you in the broadest sense. I'm sure you heard my discussion with Clio, how this affects the PRC calculus. Obviously, there's a lot of developments going on, not just in the Taiwan Straits, but in mainland China with the meeting between opposition leader and Xi Jinping. I'm curious how you think the sort of various outcomes of what we're seeing going on in Iran kind of affect the PRC back at home, obviously, with reporting being that they were kind of of quite instrumental in helping the ceasefire even be agreed to. But how you think this just sort of affects the broader geopolitical situation?
- [34:11]
B
Yeah, that's a great question, Natalie. First of all, I think the PRC wanted that ceasefire because they want their oil contracts to be fulfilled from Iran, and they certainly don't want or could afford to have the global economy go into some kind of free fall if things got worse over there. So they weren't doing this to look out for anybody but themselves. Look, I, I've always looked at this, this problem with Iran partly in terms of China or maybe even mostly in terms of China. China has used Iran as a proxy against the United States for many years. The reason the Chinese want that proxy is because they're able to use it for influence throughout the Middle East. So Iran's nuclear program, which is ostensibly the reason we're there, has been developed for over, you know, two decades with the help of Communist China. Much of that development of those nuclear weapons programs occurred in North Korea using Chinese and Russian scientists. So China certainly sees Iran as one of their proxies. Venezuela was also one of their proxies. Cuba is also one of their proxies. I think much of What President Trump has done here is to eliminate the ability of China's proxies to harm the United States. And so Venezuela, in my judgment, was about China. Cuba, if we should go down that road, will be about China, and certainly Iran, quite substantially is due to China and their support of Iran's nuclear weapons program. I think what Trump, President Trump has done here is signal to Communist China that's not going to take place, that we're going to do what's in our interest. We're not going to be in endless wars. We're not going to have an American empire that seeks to go everywhere, you know, all over the world. But we are going to stop you, Communist China, from using your influence to harm the interests of the United States and more importantly, the security of the United States. So I see this as targeted as much at China as it is Iran. And in that sense, I take quite seriously what President Trump has articulated, as I say, about their nuclear weapons. And I'm concerned today about what Communist China could do to resupply Iran during these two weeks. The President has articulated that there'll be 50% tariffs on anybody who looks to be helping Iran during this period of time. But we're in a delicate spot here, and this is not going to be easy. I don't think it's going to be quick. I hope it is quick. But, you know, there's a long way to go here before we see an end to this war in terms that are suitable to the United States.
- [37:03]
C
Yeah. I mean, from start to finish, from cradle to grave, basically all of the domestic drone manufacturing done in Iran is aided and abetted. It's buttressed by Chinese technology, manufacturing. And I understand what you're saying on the China front. I think there's no disputing that these countries have acted as proxies. But I think to me, to help square that logic chain, I think it's incumbent that the administration really seriously then address our defense industrial base and the shortages that we're now seeing as a result of what is going on in this conflict, not just by the rearrangement of forces, but by the deployment of interceptors and missiles that we're saying we now have really critically low levels of. And I think that in some cases, the way that the Pentagon is approaching kind of fixing or trying to up those numbers is just by giving massive amounts of money to the same military industrial complex giants, these defense crimes that got us here in the first place. And I don't think, I mean, in my opinion, that we've Seen enough movement to deter the Chinese from, I think, viewing America as being in a place that is, from a defense industrial based perspective, adequately supplied to effectively deter China. Obviously, this conflict is going on in real time, so that's something that has to play out. It takes years to make just one submarine. But I'm curious how you sort of view that problem as factoring in to the lens of the China issue, but also the ability or the prospect of boots on the ground and how you think that would affect the calculus.
- [38:38]
B
Let me go with your first point about the industrial capacity of the United States to produce these weapons. Weapons or our own defensive munitions. We're not going quickly enough. If we have defense industries today that are not working around the clock the way they did in World War II to produce these munitions, then we're making a mistake. And the Defense Department or the Department of War is going to have to fix that immediately. My guess is there are various parts of our military industrial complex, the way you describe it, that are working around the clock to make sure we're protected. And we need to be. And we need to be protected by, you know, not merely munitions that we can use to inflict damage upon our enemies wherever they may be, but we also need defensive systems, as I've argued, even though I'm. I'm a supporter of President Trump and supporter of his actions here, I've made the argument that if we had a national missile defense that could protect the United States, then we wouldn't be over there right now doing this. And the President has a Golden Dome initiative that he is pursuing, but we're not pursuing it quickly enough. Back to your question of the military industrial complex. If we had that defensive system in place, this whole question of Iranian nuclear weapons would have been a moot point and we wouldn't have been over there. And so let's consider that for a moment. Moment. We don't want to go to war all over the world, but the mere fact that we don't have a national missile defense to protect us from Iranian, Chinese, Russian or, you know, other other potential rogue actors who have nuclear weapons that may, they may have gotten from the Communist Chinese should be something we're deeply concerned about. Boots on the ground. I don't think that's a viable option. We don't have enough boots and there's a lot of ground to cover. So I don't see us going in there with boots on the ground. I don't think that's been the President's plan. Of course, there are a number of contingencies here. But let's take the President at his word that he wants to reduce their capacity to produce nuclear weapons and the ballistic missiles that could, that could potentially harm both the United States and, whether people want to hear this or not, Israel. By the way, I have a new piece out in the Federalist where I've articulated President Trump's views about this over the last 25 years, including, you know, in 2024 when he ran for president. Even though he doesn't believe in no new wars, he does have a particular view about Iran that he takes very seriously. And he has said it 20 years ago in, in one of his books that I, I describe, he said Iran cannot have nuclear weapons, period. He also said that Israel, and again, I know much of the audience may not be supportive of Israel, but President Trump said of Israel in 2020, I guess it was 2020, exactly. He said they're a unsinkable aircraft carrier for American interests, meaning it wasn't about being friends with Israel. It wasn't about, you know, he mentions nothing about our Judeo Christian heritage. Whatever we mean by that, he means strictly in strategic terms. Israel was useful for the United States. And so we're going to, we're going to do what's in our power vis a vis Iran to protect the United States first and foremost, but in a secondary way, Israel. And again, it wasn't out of any kind of friendship. This is 2020. So he rejects this notion that AIPAC had any influence on him back in 2020. Right. He wasn't even. He was considering political office in 2020, but he wasn't an active, you know, candidate. He thought strategically. And again, we can disagree about these views, but this is what President Trump thought. And his actions today are in pursuit of what he understands as a strategic imperative for the United States, which is to defend our interests in the Middle east and to defend first and foremost the American homeland. So I think this whole calculus has to be about what does President Trump believe about this, what has he said about this? What does he run for office? On 2015 before he ran for president, he articulated the exact same view. And in 2024, he said again, they could not have nuclear weapons. And so for all the Tucker Carlson's and Alex Jones who say they've been betrayed by President Trump, they weren't listening to what he was saying. He said even in 2024, they couldn't have nuclear weapons. In the same paragraphs where he was describing no new wars, he was also saying they couldn't have nuclear weapons. And so I think we should all take that in mind that there is something important going on here in what we've done. The president gets nothing out of going after Iran politically. This is a political loser for him. So he's risking politically much of his support around the country by doing what he's doing. And we can say, well, Israel is dragging him into the war. And certainly Israel has, has, has influence. I'm not denying that in the least. And they have, you know, outsized influence. And I, I agree with that. But I also would say President Trump sees the Iranian threat in ways that many of his supporters did not fully appreciate. And what we're seeing today is him carrying that out and trying to do so in a way that doesn't destroy the global economy and certainly doesn't destroy the US Economy. But I think support for what he's doing is much more broad than we're giving him credit for.
- [44:30]
C
Brian if people want to read that piece, I'm sure they will. Where can they go to get it and where can they go to stay up to date with, with everything you're putting out?
- [44:38]
B
Thank you. Natalie presentdanger China.org is the website I put that piece up on my on my ex and Getter and Truth Social on Exits. BRIAN T. Kennedy one On Getter and Truth Social, it's Brian T. Kennedy. And by the way, let me plug a new show, if I can, on Real America's Voice, which is coming out on Sunday. There's a new show called Get Real hosted by my my old friend David derocher. And it's a part of the Real Clear Politics family that that is going to be shown here on Real America's Voice. And there's a special show Sunday on China that some members of the Committee on Present Danger China are part of of discussing China, myself and Steve Mosher and others. So I would highly recommend that to the audience. And that's on Sunday at 4:00'. Clock. Thank you, Natalie, for having me on today.
- [45:31]
C
Of course, we'll have to check those out. Thank you for coming on the show.
- [45:34]
B
Thank you.
- [45:36]
C
Now, our next guest, Payne of Citizen Free Press. I'm sure everyone's probably favorite site here will really only come on War Rooms talk about one thing. So now I guess they sort of like when there's news about how the national debt is exploding only because it means we get to to get some expertise from Cain. Cain there's a new study from the CBO talking about how it's not just that the national Debt is absurd, but basically all of our projections about them are wrong too. And typically on the underside, always lower, they always seem to be more expensive than all the government experts tell us they're going to be. Can you walk us through real quick? I'm going to hold you through the break, but what exactly the latest is in national debt land?
- [46:17]
D
Well, you didn't tell the full part of the story. So here's the inside scoop for the war room audience. Occasionally Natalie Winners post stories in the stack. If you wonder what the stack is, that's the list of headlines. That's it's currently got about 1200 of them. That's at the top of Citizen Free Press. And Natalie this morning posted five or six stories along with me as she was doing all of her other work. And one of them was about the national debt and specifically interest on the national debt. And she knew that it would piss me off or whatever, it would fire me up as a better description. Description. And, and you know, I expanded on our headline and moved it to the top. So look, you know, the war room audience is pretty smart so they pause
- [47:01]
C
you there because we got a bounce to break. But now they got the lore, they got the backstory of how I strategically use the stack to get you on the war room. Makes my job easier. We'll be right back after the short break. More war room.
- [47:15]
A
Everyone's focused on how the conflict in the Middle east is raising oil prices. But there's another grim reality to this, this contention. Oil isn't the only resource being constrained. About one third of global fertilizer trade happens through this region. And with spring planting season on top of us, American farmers are sounding the alarm with some saying they can't afford to plant their fields. When one piece of the supply chain gets hit this hard, you know what comes next? Higher fruit prices, reduced availability, maybe even panic buying. That's why having an emergency food supply supply at home makes so much sense. And that's where our friends at my Patriot Supply come in. Right now@preparedwithbannon.com that is preparewithbannon.com we've set up an entire just site for the war room posse. You go to preparewithbannon.com that's all one word. Preparewithbannon.com you get a three month emergency food supply. They'll include a free mega protein upgrade grade, an incredible $200 bonus you don't want to miss. It's a simple way to protect your family from whatever comes next. Go to preparewithbannon.com that is preparewithbannon.com to get your emergency food supply today. That's preparewithbaned.com do it today. Go check it out.
- [48:40]
B
War Room.
- [48:41]
A
Here's your host, Stephen K. Band.
- [48:48]
C
I need the script. You're back in the war room, where you got to be checking out chapter health. That's 845 war room. Between Washington and big insurance, Medicare is full of corruption. Millions of seniors are on the wrong Medicare plan. Chapter makes that simple. They can compare all your options in under 20 minutes. They search every plan to get you the right one. They've helped hundreds of thousands of seniors find better Medicare plans. It's free. And if you're already on the right plan, they will tell you and give you peace of mind. That's eight, four, five, War Room. Give them a call. While you're at it, maybe check out vertical.com war room or text band into 989-898. Give Phil, Patrick and the team a call. You know, they have a bunch of resources. Always got good deals going on. So make sure you're checking out vertical.com Bannon. You're back in the war room. We still got Kane with us. Kane, I'm sorry I had to interrupt you. I'm going to let you pick up where you left off. Giving us all the updates on where we stand on the. I think ballooning is still an understatement, but all things National Day debt.
- [49:44]
D
Yeah, no problem. You know, it's all bad news anyway. Natalie, we should probably just. I could, I could sum it all up in a minute and we should skip over it. The, the story, though, that you put up that's in the stack that if people want to see it, is that people need to be reminded that interest, just the interest on the national debt has really exploded as interest rates have gone up. Right. So five years ago we were paying 300 billion a year in interest, and now we're paying over a trillion. And that trillion is a little bit more than the defense, or it's right around the size of the defense budget. And it's bigger than Social Security or Medicare. So it's this huge number. Right? And so it works out, it's $3 billion a day and even worse. So that's the interest part. What do we actually borrow? Every day is another 3 billion. So we're borrowing. The US government borrows $6 billion every day. So you multiply six times 365 days in a year. That's how you get a $2 trillion deficit every year. And as you and I have talked, people should actually know Natalie and I talk about the national debt in our private personal phone calls. As you and I have talked, we're bringing in 5.5 trillion in tax revenue every year and we're spending seven and a half trillion. So that's how you get a $2 trillion deficit. And we certainly wish the government would pay a little bit more attention to it. We love Scott Bess and, and we love President Trump and we know he cares about the national debt. Like there's no doubt about it. But the case I've been making, and I'll throw it back to you, the case I've been making is just that this is a time, you know, Trump has a certain type of popularity with the base where we would support him. I would like to see a real effort in these next three years to address the long term spending problems that are causing the national defense debt to, you know, to grow this way. So that's the case I always try to make and people will notice in the stack that I, they, if there's one issue that I really, really care about, it's debt and deficit issues. And so I'm trying to, you know, and I'm now convincing you to be have the same neuroses that I have. So there you go.
- [51:51]
C
I'm curious, you know, not just year to date, but I guess start of this administration to date, have you seen anything meaningful that gave you a little bit of hope that they were going to address head on revenue?
- [52:04]
D
The only place, and this is the point that Bessant tried to make is look, we're going to grow the revenue side, we're going to grow the tax revenue. And it looks like that's being done slightly. I mean Deficits were about 2.2 trillion under Biden and this year, this fiscal year for Trump, it's probably going to be 1.9 or 1.95. So that's, yes, that's, that's, you know, we're making slight bits of progress that we're, that we're shrinking it. But you know, you talked about it in the last segment. Trump again, I love the guy, but he wants to increase the defense budget from 1 trillion to 1.5 trillion. So that's obviously going to expand the deficit again. It would, it would take it from 1.9 to about 2.3 trillion. So yeah, whatever. It's not the best news. That's why we're burying it on a Friday. Natalie, this is really good TV strategy.
- [52:55]
C
Hey, what can I say? I get told I'm going to host, and it always seems to be on on Friday's afternoon, which I say is the real. The real War Room posse that's here.
- [53:06]
D
That's true. These are the hardcore fans, the ones that are here. And look, I. I say it all tongue in cheek, like, you know, how I. How I sort of feel about this stuff. And I'll just say this as we check out, you know, the War Room audience needs to pay attention, pay attention. When Natalie talks, she is one of the true amazing young superstars. People forget she's still just 25 years old and, you know, and she's running this show like a pro. So it was fun to be with you. And I'll always say yes. I'm laying it out there now. When, when you host the show, if you want to talk national debt, I'll be happy to do it.
- [53:39]
C
Well, I wish more people spoke about the national debt who. Who are in Congress and the White House and all around the king. Thank you for joining us. If people want to read the site, I know it's easy to get to, but sometimes Citizens Free Press. So let's just spell the mess. It's Citizen Free Press. Where can they go to read it and follow you guys on social?
- [53:58]
D
Yeah, they're all Citizen Free Press. And that was a nice little dig at Bannon. We love you, brother. Citizens Free Press. Somehow people find their way to the, you know, to the correct address.
- [54:10]
C
It's a. It's my favorite site where I go to multiple times a day to prep for the shows and everything. Kane, thank you for joining us. We will have you back on soon, hopefully with better news about the national debt.
- [54:23]
D
Sounds good.
- [54:25]
C
And of course, it wouldn't be a warm show if we didn't end with Mike Lindell. Mike, you've got about two minutes. You always have breaking news and a breaking good deal, so hit us with both.
- [54:36]
A
Right on.
- [54:36]
H
I just came from another one of my town halls events for running for governor of Minnesota here, you guys. I'm doing events like six. Six rallies in town halls just this week, two more tomorrow. I can really need all your support at mike Lindell gov.com we are out. I'm in this to win this 18 hours a day heading out there on the trail. It's Mike Lindellgov.com you guys. Minnesota is the tip of the spear with all the fraud and everything else going on, and I plan on banning Sharia law as soon as I'm governor here, but It's Mike Lindellgov.com and what gives me, am I able to go away from my pillow and be feeling secure? It's because of you. Warm Room posse. Remember, like Steve has told you, we have three. Only three semis left of product when we move factories that we're discounting to 80%. So here it is, the one you have the. My slippers. 80% off. Once they're gone, they're gone. You got guys, they're 29.98 a pair. 29.98. There they are. Get the slippers now. As many as you want. And we also have, if you go to mypillow.com there, you're gonna see the slippers there and you're gonna see all these other products that we're closing out for good. Remember, they originally earmarked for the box stores, which canceled us. You're getting them for 80% off using that promo code, war room. And also, don't forget right now, the mattress toppers. The mattresses, they ship for free right to your front door. Mattress toppers as low as 99.98. So you guys call 8008-7310-6280-0873-1062. Talk to my employees, use that promo code, Warham, and have a good, great weekend. Thanks for having me on, Natalie.
- [56:32]
C
Thank you, Mike, for joining us. And thank you, Warren Posse, for joining me. You guys have a great weekend. But watch the 6pm show before you start that. Have a good one.
- [56:40]
A
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