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Ryan Seacrest
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Support for the show comes from Public, the investing platform for those who take it seriously. On Public you can build a multi asset portfolio of stocks, bonds, options, crypto and now generated assets which allow you to turn any idea into an investable index with AI. It all starts with your prompt from renewable energy companies with high free cash flow, semiconductor suppliers growing revenue over 20% year over year. You can literally type any prompt and put the AI to work. It screens thousands of stocks, builds a one of a kind index and lets you back test it against the S&P 500. Then you can invest in a few clicks. Generated assets are like ETFs with infinite possibilities, completely customizable and based on your thesis, not someone else's. Go to public.com podcast and earn an uncapped 1% bonus when you transfer your portfolio. That's public.com podcast paid for by Public Investing Brokerage Services by Open to the Public Investing Inc. Member FINRA and SIPC Advisors Advisory Services by Public Advisors llc. SEC Registered Advisor Generated Assets is an interactive analysis tool. Output is for informational purposes only and is not an investment recommendation or advice. Complete disclosure is available@public.com Disclosures hey guys,
Krystal Ball
Sager and Crystal here.
Saagar Enjeti
Independent media just played a truly massive role in this election and we are so excited about what that means for the future of this show.
Krystal Ball
This is the only place where you can find honest perspectives from the left and the right that simply does not exist anywhere else.
Saagar Enjeti
So if that is something that's important to you, Please go to BreakingPoints.com, become a member today and you'll get access to our full shows unedited ad free and all put together for you every morning in your inbox.
Krystal Ball
We need your help to build the future of independent news media and we hope to see you@breakingpoints.com all right, markets absolutely wild this morning. Let's go ahead and start with this one. Put it up there on the screen exactly 12 hours. President Trump has now intervened after a warning that was issued about potential market fallout that would have happened without a Trump Taco. Yesterday they posted that oil prices were no longer the biggest threat to the markets. Increasingly clear that bond markets will dictate how President Trump can continue increased pressure in the Iran war. As of 4:30am ET this morning, the bond market was, quote, now more broken than the energy market situation. The 10 year note yield had hit 4.45%. President Trump had the same conversation as he did April 9, 2025, when he had paused tariffs for 90 days. Remember all the whole bond market conversation that we had last year. Three hours later, he postpones all strikes on Iranian power plants. Thirty minutes later, Iran denies the 10 year yield, briefly collapsed before rebounding back to 4.38%. Now, a clear attempt by the US to contain a brewing bond market crisis, which obviously affects all of the debt, it affects mortgage rates, has huge impact on everything. The bond crisis and reaction that happened after the 12 day, or sorry, after the Liberation Day war, that clearly had a major impact on his thinking. Go to the next one, please. We can put this one up there on the screen. As we see now, as seen in April 2025, this is what his prediction was as of early, very early this morning, that President Trump would have to intervene very, very soon. Could explain the Taco. Don't forget that there are also all of these crazy things happening with the oil markets. So again, as of this morning, there was a large plunge. We remain around 9% down for Brent, Brent crude oil futures from the high that they opened on last night. However, at one point they were down like 14% and they erased like half of that because of the Iranian denial that negotiations were happening. So something to keep an eye on. I mean, it's still at nearly $100 a barrel. Like let's not pretend.
Saagar Enjeti
Yeah, 90 bucks a barrel is not a great place to be in.
Krystal Ball
But yeah, we're about 90 for West Texas. So that's still, I mean, if this lasts a couple of Days, you will likely see a reduction. I think that's the analysis I saw in gas. You will probably see it return to like 350, something like that. Depends on how the individual operators are. I'm talking about the national price average. Don't know about the individual states, but clearly this was bubbling up at the, at the population level, as it should. People are furious. Good example of that was the U.N. ambassador Mike Waltz took to a CNN town hall and a younger voter confronted him over gas prices. Let's take a listen.
Various Interviewees (e.g., waiter, Netanyahu)
I'm a waiter at a local restaurant in Queens.
Krystal Ball
A full time college student who sleeps an average of four hours at night
Various Interviewees (e.g., waiter, Netanyahu)
and is still thousands in debt.
Krystal Ball
How is a war in a country half the world away funded by the
Various Interviewees (e.g., waiter, Netanyahu)
taxes pulled from my check helping me in any way?
Mike Waltz
Yeah, it's look, it's a, it's a valid and it's a tough question. I know for certain. And if we just look at the, the things the President has put in place in terms of housing and big corporations that are buying up whole neighborhoods, the tax cuts that he extended with the big beautiful bill, the energy policies that we're putting in place to not only make us self sufficient, but to, you know, lessen these dependencies and lower prices, even lowering prescription drug prices. The President's absolutely focused on what you're seeing day in and day out that's affecting your pocketbook. At the same time as Commander in Chief, he has to weigh the risks and make the tough decisions. Facing some hard truths. We cannot have a world with a genocidal terroristic regime that holds not only your generation, but the next generation hostage with nuclear weapons. And those are the tough calls that the American people elected him to make. And I can tell you, having worked very closely with him, he doesn't back off his red lines and he doesn't enter us into bad deals. But those are tough decisions, no doubt. And I know they're top of mind for the entire administration.
Saagar Enjeti
Yeah.
Krystal Ball
How do we all feel having, listening to that? How does that waiter feel? How's that guy feel? The guy who's thousands of dollars in debt now getting crushed. He's like, how exactly does this affect my life? That's a great question, man. And that's why I always love the town halls. People have a real way of just getting right down to it.
Saagar Enjeti
Yeah.
Krystal Ball
And yeah, you know, everyone, every American should be asking that question right now of this administration and specifically of the Iran war. You could not care. You could check out. You're still gonna have to pay more at the gas price, which Joe Biden found out the hard way during the Ukraine war. So.
Saagar Enjeti
And not only him, by the way. I mean, when inflation spiked around the world, basically it was like a total global sweepout of almost every incumbent. I mean, it was a massive global referendum on that inflation. And that all started with gas prices. I'm thinking about that gentleman in particular he's talking about. He's a waiter, right? So probably tips are a significant part of his income. This is somebody who would have seen a benefit from the no tax on tips provisions, very likely that President Trump signed into law. There are some other tax provisions they were really counting on that would be like, this is gonna be our sales pitch for the midterms. People are gonna get more money back from the government when they file their taxes. Obviously, that's going on right now. And, you know, my. My parents were getting, like, a senior credit that I'm sure Sagar was really excited about having been put into the. The tax code. But now that money, that's going right back out the door and into your gas tank. And that's just the beginning. Because, of course, you know, with our economy structured the way it is, that fuels inflation across the board. And, you know, I hope that gas prices come down a little bit this week. But the other dynamic that we experienced during the, you know, Ukraine war and Covid inflationary spikes is that they're very quick to raise the prices. Takes a little bit longer to bring them back down. They like to hold them high as long as they can get away with it. So I have no doubt we'll see that dynamic here play on as well.
Krystal Ball
Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Remember, Diesel came down. Did anybody's grocery price come down? Cause I haven't seen it. All right, let's go to. I know people like my McDonald's updates. My wife wanted McDonald's. Went to McDonald's yesterday. Medium fries. 450. 450.
Saagar Enjeti
That's great.
Krystal Ball
In my. What should that cost you? To me. 99 cents. Right? I'll give it $2. Maybe it's been the 90s.
Saagar Enjeti
I don't know, man. I'll give it $2 again.
Krystal Ball
I don't eat. I don't eat McDonald's. So it's one of those things where this is literally my only. And yes, I did use the app for all the people who got mad at me for not using the app. 454.50 for a medium fry. What the hell is going on?
Saagar Enjeti
Listen, I have the luxury of being able to Take a principled stand against the app. But I am against the app because they will track you, they will hunt you down, demand you go and eat a sausage biscuit or something.
Krystal Ball
I used it one time, I don
Saagar Enjeti
that kind of temptation.
Krystal Ball
And now all of a sudden it's just like, hey, you want a free sausage? You know, you want free this, you want to free that. Well, it's not. Well, who is it really free. It's not free. You're paying 4.50 for a medium fry. I can post a receipt if anybody doesn't believe me. But to that point, let's go ahead and put C7 up here on the screen. Inflation coming to a gas station and or a grocery store near you. $5 diesel already crushing truckers will soon be felt across the economy.
Saagar Enjeti
It's a heartbreaking story.
Krystal Ball
These poor guys, I mean these guys, they're like barely floating on margins and they're Talking about this 40% increase month over month in the price of diesel. If they say that they have to take lesser loads, that they have to drive in weird ways to avoid hills, that if they have a single blowout that they're in, if they have an engine problem, their entire business is done. This is like the backbone, this is the. What is it the one. I think it's the one profession left in the US where you can reliably not have a college education, make like six figures, actually control your own destiny, especially if you're an independent contractor, if you save up enough to have your own rig and you can take jobs, you know, as you please, you have a little bit of work life balance, even though it kind of sucks obviously to drive as much as they have to do, but they make a modest amount of money and they can generally survive. So of course that's also as I understand it, the most maga six figure profession in the United States. So yeah, literally screwing your own voters. It's not just about who they vote for. I mean these, it's a tough, it's an incredibly tough job and it's the last bastion of some agency without, you know, signing up for a life in front of a computer. So I really, I really feel for these guys. 40% increase month over month. I mean, how many business we run a business if our costs went up 40%. Yeah, I mean we survived. But I'd be like, you start to make a lot of decisions, right? There's a lot of stuff that's going to start getting cut and especially planning for the future. So I really, I really do Feel,
Saagar Enjeti
you know, for these trucks and this gets passed on to consumers. And they talk about this in this article about, they interviewed this guy, Miguel Caveda. He says he spent eighteen hundred dollars in diesel fuel during a one week on the road and that that was a 40% increase from what he normally does. And he recognizes, he's like, yeah, I know this is going to get passed on ultimately to consumers who are going to pay more for everything that I'm hauling because, you know, that's the way it works. It's not like the companies that are more profitable in the, you know, the middlemen here are going to take that. No, they're going to, they're going to push it down to the truckers who are in less of a position of power and they're going to push it on to consumers. That's what's going to happen. People are going to get squeezed.
Krystal Ball
Yeah, exactly. And keeping here with a little bit of this, we can show you guys some of the stuff. So for example, C6, this is where we're at now currently. This is the nationwide gas price as of this morning. This was about 3, 9, $3.95 a gallon is the nationwide average. It'll probably hit 4 before coming down in a couple days if the downturn continues. Obviously, who knows with the whole Trump Taco Israel situation but I mean in California is $5.70 a gallon. That's madness. And our producer Griffin tells us in Los Angeles it's easily $6 a gallon, San Diego, a few other places in the state of California. So I really do feel for all those people. And what is the White House telling us? What are the conservative media, Fox News and others saying is short term pain for a long term game? C5, let's take a listen.
Saagar Enjeti
This is a short term disruption for
Krystal Ball
the long term gain, short term pain for the long term gain, short term
Saagar Enjeti
pain be for long term gain.
Krystal Ball
We're going to have some short term pain with long term gain, short term pay for a long term gain, some short term pain.
Saagar Enjeti
Yes, but we've got some long term gain, short term spike for a long
Ryan Seacrest
term gain, some short term pain for American consumers.
Krystal Ball
We may have to deal with that in the short term, short term and temporary, temporary short term pain. It's going to suck in the short
Saagar Enjeti
term, some short term pain, short term pain. We have to focus on the short term. Memo went out.
Krystal Ball
The memo's out. That's the Fox News line. The boomers are like, yeah, you're right for short term they're just you know, sitting on their stock portfolios and their, yeah, their, their new Social Security checks, they're like, oh, you know, if it costs more to drive to the casino to piss away my Social Security sack, so be it. That's the long term gain. Just have you seen that meme too? About 20. It's like the year is 2030. The boomers will tell us you were right about the Iran war and the Iraq war, but this time Turkey is an existential threat to the United States.
Saagar Enjeti
Yep, it's coming.
Krystal Ball
They'll learn nothing.
Saagar Enjeti
They'll learn absolutely. No, that's absolutely right. There's one last piece here that I just wanna flag to the 8. Cuz I thought this was interesting, this kind of like time limit of the short term pain. I guess they're saying that these Wall street analysts in these corporate executives basically feel like there's like a two week time limit here. The economy has a straight up Hormuz deadline for Trump. Two weeks where, you know, I mean, already oil prices have been pretty high, you know, up to $100 and beyond. Right now they're down back down at about $90 a barrel, which is still not great. But in any case, you know, even Trump expressed surprise at like, oh, I thought it would actually be a little bit worse than this. There are some indications they may be directly intervening in the economy to keep the oil prices from completely spiking out of control. But you can see this is a concern. That's the whole reason for the taco right before the markets open this morning, et cetera. But in any case, this is kind of the sense on Wall Street. All right, we'll give him about two more weeks if he can't get the straight of Hormuz open. That's kind of when we're going to lose hope that a taco, an achievable taco, is truly on the horizon. So, you know, according to this article, at least that's kind of how the clock is ticking right now.
Krystal Ball
We'll see. All right, let's get to bb.
Ryan Seacrest
Hey, it's Ryan Seacrest for Albertsons and Safeway. It's stock up savings time now through March 31st. Spring in for storewide deals and earn four times the points look for in store tags to earn on eligible items from Lindor Chips Ahoy Gatorade. Post Ziploc and Zoa, then clip the offer in the app for automatic event long savings. Stack up those rewards to save even more. Enjoy savings on top of savings when you shop in store or online for easy drive up and go pick up or delivery restrictions apply. See website for full terms and conditions.
American Military University Announcer
Military life isn't predictable, but earning your master's degree can be. With American Military University's 40 flexible online master's programs, you can stay mission ready ready while you get market ready. Learn anywhere, anytime with an education built to keep pace, steady, reliable and always accessible. Plus, military service members, veterans and their families can save up to 45% on master's tuition with AMU's special rates and grants. Learn more at AMU APUS. Edu Steady through every mission.
Public Investing Announcer
Support for the show comes from Public, the investing platform for those who take it seriously. On Public you can build a multi asset portfolio of stocks, bonds, options, crypto and now generated assets. Assets which allow you to turn any idea into an investable index. With AI. It all starts with your prompt. From renewable energy companies with high free cash flow to semiconductor suppliers growing revenue over 20% year over year, you can literally type any prompt and put the AI to work. It screens thousands of stocks, builds a one of a kind index and lets you back test it against the S&P 500. Then you can invest in a few clicks. Generated assets are like ETFs with infinite possibilities, completely customizable and based on your thesis, not someone else's. Go to public.com podcast and earn an uncapped 1% bonus when you transfer your portfolio. That's public.com podcast paid for by Public Investing Brokerage Services by Open to the Public Investing Inc. Member FINRA and SIPC Advisory Services by Public Advisors llc. SEC Registered Advisor Generated Assets is an interactive analysis tool. Output is for informational purposes only and is not an investment recommendation or advice. Complete disclosures available at public.com disclosures
Krystal Ball
last thing that we alluded to a little bit earlier before we get to Andrew Wilkerson is specifically about Israel and these alleged strikes that are currently happening where they are claiming that Iran is trying to damage the holy sites in Jerusalem. The problem of course with that is if something were to happen, whether it's false flag or a real attack, who knows from some sort of falling debris is it could trigger a literal religious war on top of the disaster that we're already in. So let's play some of this footage that was coming out of Israel where you could actually see these Iranian ballistic missile fragments according to the Israelis, that struck near the old City of Jerusalem. They're saying that it fell roughly 400 yards from the Western Wall and the Al Aqsa mosque. The reason why this is important is that the prime Minister, Netanyahu, immediately began using these strikes as evidence of a holy war, of being targeting and why other nations need to be brought into it. Let's take a listen from the prime minister what he had to say.
Various Interviewees (e.g., waiter, Netanyahu)
If anyone needed an explanation of why Iran is the enemy of civilization and the enemy and the danger to the entire world, you got it. In the last 48 hours, in the last 48 hours, they fired a terror weapon on civilians, on children. There's a children's nursery here. There's an old man, old person's home here. Civilians, families. They fire terror weapons on civilians. And often they use cluster bombs, which are forbidden by international law. The second thing that they did is that they fired on Jerusalem right next to the holy places. They sent ballistic missiles that could have destroyed the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, the Al Aqsa Mosque and the Western Wall, the three holiest sites to the three monotheistic religions. They don't care. They're firing on everyone. The third thing they did is they fired an intercontinental ballistic missiles 4000 km right into Diego Garcia, the American, British base. They can reach now with these ballistic missiles everywhere in Europe. Almost everywhere in Europe.
Krystal Ball
So he talks there about, remember, that's why we spent time. Diego Garcia, a lot of propaganda pieces there right to here. Diego Garcia mentioned there at the end, the Al Aqsa and the holy sites of Jerusalem they're talking about. That could be a potential for, you know, some sort of precipitating event for a complete takeover or destruction of the mosque. Also, the cluster. Spare me. Cluster munitions and targeting civilians. Yeah. The Israelis would never use cluster munitions. Right. Except, like multiple confirmed times over Lebanon.
Saagar Enjeti
Yeah. I happen to remember they're not even part of the. Neither Iran or Israel signed the, you know, the treaty banning use of cluster munitions. But anything from this man talking about, oh, my God, civilian, like, you opened this box like you have no room to talk. Like, yes, you're right. Iran is committing war crimes. You assassinated their head of state in the opening salvos. And the Americans bombed schoolgirls and murdered them, you know, murdered 168 of them. So you're gonna lecture the world about civilian life. Okay. Yeah, sure. Most moral army in the world. Yeah.
Krystal Ball
And do not forget this. This video, which had been flagged by Tucker Carlson and many others, of a rabbi from 2024 saying, hey, if we need to, we could pretend that there was an attack on Al Aqsa and then use it as an excuse to rebuild Third Temple. Let's take a Listen, it's all moved
Rabbi Mizrachi
by Hashem's to this location, to that location. We don't know. Maybe one of the missiles will hit the mosque and clear the place for the third Beit Hamikdash. That could also be a miracle. If it was up to me the last time, when they shot hundreds of missiles, I would pretend that one missile came from Iran and shoot it down. You know, then all the Arabs would go against Iran. It would be the end of the problems. You make them fight with each other, this bunch of lunatics. Never too late. You deal with a bunch of cowards. The Israeli leaders, they just want to pass the week.
Krystal Ball
So there you go. That's a very controversial Rabbi Mizrachi, who was very upset, by the way, at Tucker Carlson for playing that, for playing
Saagar Enjeti
him his own words, for, you know,
Krystal Ball
for exposing some of the things.
Saagar Enjeti
Look.
Krystal Ball
That he said in the past.
Saagar Enjeti
I mean, look, I absolutely stand by anyone's right to play some of the thinking that comes out of the region, because I've said it many times after October 7th, if you listen to the most hysterical lefty or if you listen to the totally psycho settlers about what their goals were and the lefties were saying, like, here's what Israel's gonna do, you would have been much more accurate in understanding where things were ultimately headed. I mean, at the time when you talked about the Greater Israel Project, you were considered a complete and total nut job. Now, you look at Syria, you look at Lebanon, you look at the west bank, you look at Gaza, you look at, I mean, the whole region, right? And you've got our own ambassador being asked again by Tucker Carlson, hey, you know, the Bible says this is the area that Israel's supposed to make up. You cool if they take that. That area which encompasses, you know, parts or the whole of multiple countries in the region, he's like, yes, they do that. That's fine. That is official state of government policy coming from our ambassador, which was never disputed by the president or anyone else in the administration, by the way. That'd be a good question, actually, to ask somebody in the administration whether they stand by that. But do you put this past the Israelis? You think they wouldn't do something like this if they thought it would benefit them? They absolutely would. And again, you have to think of, not only do you have fanatical religious fanatics who are in control of the government, deeply influential in terms of this government coalition, in terms of that society at large, you have Netanyahu, again, as this old man who wants to have his Legacy and his imprint on the world. And you have this connection between the eschatology of the Jewish extremists with the American evangelicals that converge in the site of Al Aqsa Mosque and what they would rebuild there as the Third Temple. So you've got the war justification of this racist rabbi saying, oh, these Arabs, they're maniacs. They're crazy. They'll all fight each other. So you've got that idea of, let's turn all these people against each other, and they'll all fight each other and we won't have to deal with them. You see that in some of the war strategy, right? We actually know one of the attacks on Bahrain that was purported to have come from Iran. Actually, now we know it was a tomahawk that was a U.S. missile that actually did the damage there in Bahrain. We've had other indications that the Americans and the Israelis are actually responsible for some of the attacks that they are blaming on Iran. Why? Because they want to draw the entire region in. They want to make it so that those Arab Gulf states, that they also fully join the fight without hesitation. The Diego Garcia strike, if that is, you know, if that was a false flag, which I think is possible. I'm not saying it is. I'm saying it's possible. What's the goal of that? To draw Europe in. So this is the way that they think, and it's the way that they operate. And, Bibi, in those comments about how, oh, Jesus Christ would lose to Genghis Khan, what he's asserting there is. We can do because we are inherently the good guys, inherently. Not because of our actions, just inherently this, like, supremacist view. We can do anything, and it's still good because we're trying to prevail over them, and they are inherently evil. That's his view of the world. Like, that is what he laid out. That is what he meant by those comments.
Krystal Ball
Yeah, this was. I mean, that quote was so wild. What was Emily's take? Actually, I'm curious.
Saagar Enjeti
You know, Emily's very measured. Yeah, she just explained, like, well, it comes from this book. And here's a view.
Krystal Ball
I was a little familiar with it, but it was like, here's the thing. He clearly was not quoting it in a way. Like, maybe I would. Analytically. He was doing it in, like, a praiseworthy manner. And he was, like, trying to. I think. I'm not Christian. Evil will win. That's what basically, like, evil wins out. I'm like, well, that is true. You know, in a matter of like test of wills and military force. But to cite Jesus's name in that, that's pretty wild. And I think, again, I mean, I don't know how many times these Christian Zionists need to be like literally spit on by these. Literally spit on. If you think I'm joking about where some Christians there are treated for them to wake up, I will never understand it. Like, they look at them like cattle. I've seen that. I've talked to some of these Israeli people. They're like, oh yeah, these crazy people, they come over here, they need us to die so that their Messiah will come back. They literally laugh at you while they take your money and they want you to continue to support them. And they do. I just. It's so nuts, you know, the Paula White stories that recently came out from our Religious Liberty Commission and all of this put together. That's why, you know, to your point, October 8, 2023, when we're sitting here talking about Greater Israel and patches and third temples, you seem like an inside insane person. Red heifer Tucker. Yeah, the red heifer. Yeah, Tucker made a good point. Where our society is so secular, we can't conceive of this stuff because to me it seems nuts. But even though it does, I am empathetic. Not in like a way that I appreciate, but like empathetic enough to understand. Like this is a real religious conflict for a lot of these people. And I don't put it past them both the Israel and. Yeah, you know, I mean, who knows even potential, some sort of what the reaction to that could be considering the history of the region and the second intifada and the whole like going, you know, like going to the mosque or the Temple Mount.
Saagar Enjeti
Nothing pisses me off more though than when they try to frame this as some like 2000 year old blood feud. It's like Israel is a modern creation. And I'm not saying everything was hunky dory all the time, but you had Christians, Jews and Muslims who by and large were able to peacefully coexist for generation. No, this is not a religious battle. This is a political battle over land, territory and sovereignty. That's what this is. And so, you know, I think the leaders who are involved here, you know, Trump is not. Trump is not an evangelical. Right. But he's happy to use that if it serves his war aims. Netanyahu is by all accounts a secular person, like a, you know, not super fanatical religious. But is he happy to use, you know, people's genuine religious views and fanaticism frankly, is he happy to use that for his war aims? Of course he is. So it's like any other sort of psyop. It's a tool to manipulate the masses. It's a tool to justify things that are otherwise not at all justifiable. You know, I mean, he uses also Netanyahu, all this language of the children of the light and the children of the darkness. Again, the framing that he puts out to the population, the population believes, by the way, judging by their own reaction to the atrocities that their state routinely commits, he puts out that effectively they are always and forever the good guys. Period. End of story. And I think there's a lot of Americans who believe that about America too. If it's us, then it's the good guys. It doesn't really matter what we do. If we did something that was, it was an oopsie, it was an aberration. If one of our sworn enemies does something bad, that that speaks to their direct character. That's because they are inherently bad. And so that's how they can go about justifying all of these wars and wars of aggression and invasions and ethnic cleansing and genocide, war crimes and bombing, schoolgirls, et cetera. It's because they're inherently the good ones. So in any case, anytime I hear now that directly religious rhetoric coming from any of these leaders, but Netanyahu in particular, my ears really perk up because I think it's very, very significant. And so the moment he mentioned like, oh, and Iran is targeting near the Al Aqsa Mosque, I got, I found that to be a very ominous comment from him.
Krystal Ball
Totally agree. All right, we got Wilkerson standing by. Let's get to it.
Ryan Seacrest
Hey, it's Ryan Seacrest for Albertsons and Safeway. It's stock up savings time now through March 31st. Spring in for store wide deals and earn four times the points. Look for in store tags to earn on eligible items from Lindor, Chips Ahoy, Gatorade, post Ziploc and Zoa. Then clip the offer in the app for automatic event long savings. Stack up those rewards to save even more. Enjoy savings on top of savings. When you shop in store or online for easy drive up and go pick up or delivery restrictions apply. See website for full terms and conditions.
American Military University Announcer
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Saagar Enjeti
all right guys, looks like we had a scheduling snafu with Lawrence Wilkerson, so hopefully we'll be able to work that out to get him on the show in the near future because I definitely want to speak with him. But in the meantime, we've had some breaking news. Trump apparently talking on the phone to a couple of his favorite hosts over at cnbc. Joe Kernan reported that this is how their conversation went. Let's go ahead and take a listen to that.
Krystal Ball
President went on to say or insist that this is regime change because it's totally different people that were involved in the last regime, I would imagine some of the people are the same. This is the president's take on that, insisting that its regime change.
Saagar Enjeti
So I don't know. Sagar, is this like an attempt for Trump to declare mission accomplished?
Krystal Ball
I don't know.
Saagar Enjeti
Oh, we did change the regime because we murdered the ayatollah and now his son is in charge, who is reportedly more hardline. I mean they killed a bunch of the people who he even said that they killed a bunch of the people that they thought maybe they would be negotiating an end to the war. So he's Trying to frame this, I guess, as some sort of a positive.
Krystal Ball
Yeah. Look, if this is what it takes to say, mission accomplished, Mr. President, you're a genius, you've accomplished the regime, a masterful regime change. Nobody could else, nobody else, and I really mean nobody, could have done it.
Saagar Enjeti
Quite like you.
Krystal Ball
Quite like you. I'm giving you a preview of. I'm gonna try and psyop my way onto Fox News and give an incredibly serious, like, take, praising him, but also pepper it with little things like that and be like, thank you for your bravery in this decision. So, yeah, I mean, look, if this is what it takes, this is what it takes. At the very same time, we've got this interview that he just did with Maria Bartriomo. Let's take a listen.
Ryan Seacrest
Welcome back. I just spoke with President Trump and he told me that Iran wants to make a deal badly. He said that the talks have been ongoing. I said, how much longer will this conflict go on? He said, the talks. I said five days to halt or postpone strikes on the electrical infrastructure. It could happen sooner. He said, but I have put down five days. I asked him what his reaction is to Iranian state television saying that there are no talks, and he said he's not sure what they are referring to because the most recent talks happened, in fact, last night with Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner and their counterparts. When I asked about the Iranian TV saying that no talks have happened, he said it's hard to get any information there because of the US Is blowing up so much of their infrastructure. So again, he wasn't sure whether Iran state TV was talking about. Because the most recent talks, he said, happened last night with Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner. Again, the president just told me moments ago that the Iranians want to do a deal badly. The market, of course, has reversed course. This morning. After the President posted this morning, in the middle of a big decline in markets, he said that he has directed the military to postpone strikes on the electrical infrastructure and the power plants for five days as these talks continue.
Krystal Ball
There you go. Actually, I mean, look, he's claiming some Kushner and Witkoff exchanges. Iranian TV saying no talks have happened, by the way. Not. There's no public reporting that this is even true. Axios, which is like the White House scribe, when they were talking about the talks, what they said it was via intermediaries of Egypt, Turkey and a few other countries which were talking to both were messages being exchanged in reality. I mean, here's the truth, what it probably was The US Were like, hey, here's our demands. And the Iranians were like, hey, here's our demands, you know, to the Turks or to the Egyptians. And they were just calling each other, saying what it was. There's been no, obviously there has been no actual substantive exchange. If Jared Kushner and Steve Wyckoff have proof of this, they should release it. The Iranians are denying it completely outright that any of it has happened. Again, look, if he needs to pretend, be my guest, that there are some functional talks that are happening, but that would require Iranians actually taking it seriously and constraining Israel. And, you know, look, our show is a bit difficult to program this morning because so much breaking news is happening. But it's like I said, the Israeli Air Force has already announced, quote, the air force has begun, a short while ago, another wave of strikes targeting infrastructure of the Iranian terror regime across Tehran. Combine that also with some of the comments that were made here to Maria Bartriomo. There is no indication that any actual off ramp is being pursued. Is this a moratorium of all US Strikes? Of all Israeli strikes? No, it's saying that the promised energy strikes that would happen in five days have been called off. Now, at this point, maybe it'll never happen, but a low grade war is still a disaster for the Straits of Hormuz, for the closure of, you know, for the closure of the Straits of Hormuz, for continued missiles being fired, of tit for tat escalation between the Israelis and the Iranians, of American service members of all the GCC countries. So let's not pretend like this is over right now.
Saagar Enjeti
No, right.
Krystal Ball
I mean, this morning we were, I was looking and reading an oil analyst who said if the war ends today, like fully ends today, four months still of disruption. Four months in the oil markets from lost production. Seven months to get the Qatari Raslafan facility back online to a limited capacity. Remember, they had extensive damage which will take multiple years to repair. Billions of dollars to have to be reinvested. And there is a mismatch of global tankers right now where a lot of tankers who traditionally will be transiting are now actually coming to the United States to pick up oil from here or LNG and then take it back over there. So it would take months. I mean, you know, these are huge, gigantic ships with cargo and contracts are already being canceled out until April. So. So even if it ended today, which it's not, this buys every week, basically is another month or so of disruption. From the way that he outlined It. And his real doomsday was another two months. He's like, another two months. And it's like, that's it.
Saagar Enjeti
Think about, too, a few things. Number one, I mean, just ask yourself, is the Strait of Hormuz opening anytime soon?
Rabbi Mizrachi
Right.
Ryan Seacrest
No.
Saagar Enjeti
No, the Iranians are not opening the Strait of Hormuz, which is what the original threat from Trump was all about. Which, you know, that whole problem is just created exclusively, obviously, by this war that we chose to start. So, you know, as long as the Strait of Hormuz remains closed, the war continues on, and it continues to be devastating for everybody in the world. The global economy, developing world. I was already seeing, you know, in India, a bunch of restaurants have had to close because they don't have gas to cook with. People already got long queues for exactly that kind of, you know, gas that they use for their cooking. So you're already having huge global repercussions. Obviously, you're seeing the repercussions at the gas pump. So that is extraordinarily important. The other thing I was thinking about, Sagar, is think about Trump's timeline here. Okay? So he announces this right before markets open on Monday, and he's like, five days of a ceasefire, well, guess what, that puts us at market close on Friday so that he can do whatever he's gonna do next then. And so I continue to think that this is. This is him trying to buy some time for him to make a decision on whatever is going to come next. The Iranians do not seem like they're backing down at all. And the Israelis continue to attack. So if he's serious about actually de escalating and trying to find some sort of an off ramp, claiming mission accomplished in some sort of sense, the first thing you have to do before you even put out your message about how, oh, we're gonna give it five days, first thing you gotta do is call. If you're attack dogs in Israel, clearly that did not happen. And again, I would be very skeptical of claims that Trump, oh, he's so mad at the Israelis for attacking the Iranian infrastructure. I would be very skeptical about these claims. So it's all market manipulation and game playing, as far as I can tell.
Krystal Ball
Exactly. That's final. In terms of what we know as of this morning. That's what it all is. It's all about trying to calm markets. It's all about trying to. I mean, if you think about it tomorrow, maybe we'll cover the TSA stuff. It genuinely feels like things are falling apart at the Most basic level. So you had the Atlanta airport this morning say you should arrive four hours before your flight. Trump is trying to do something about it by sending ICE agents to the airports who by the way, aren't trained to do anything. And all they're literally gonna do is sit there and be like, go over there right to a leave.
Saagar Enjeti
They're still wearing their masks at the airport too.
Krystal Ball
Which Trump just told him not to do. Trump just put out a truth. He said, please don't wear your mask in the airport. So you have. First of all, you think people are gonna like that? I mean, we live in a very polarized country. Maybe some people will like it in MAGA country. In the rest, New York, LaGuardia don't think it's gonna go over that well. So you have to stand in a long ass line and then look at the most politicized agency in the entire. What in the entire US Government. While you directly see the consequences of a government failure with TSA lines while you're in the middle of an unpopular war, while let's say you do, let's say you get some flight credit and you cancel your flight and you want to book in the future. Oh, sorry, your flight's actually doubled in price because jet fuel is going for $200 a barrel on your way home. It's going to cost more because of gas. I mean, this is like failed state stuff. Like when you see the gas go up by a dollar a gallon in a single month diesel, everything is all start to get more expensive. It just feels like you can't do anything anymore, even just normally. Right. And that's the worst possible thing. Government rarely touches you directly in your life. So effectively tens of millions of people fly every single day in the country. Every single one of them is gonna have a story, they're gonna talk about it when they go home, post about it on social media. Everybody's posting about gas prices now. Everybody's got a friend in California who's sending them a $7 gallon thing, posting it on their Instagram story. Like, this is bad for, not just for Trump, but like, for real, like any, any sort of semblance of like confidence in your government.
Saagar Enjeti
Yeah.
Krystal Ball
And he really takes a long time to come back.
Saagar Enjeti
And that's from something like that. And that's before you even mentioned there was this deadly collision in LaGuardia.
Krystal Ball
Yes.
Saagar Enjeti
Oh my God. Right? 40 plus people taken to the hospital after a plane. I'm not sure which airline it was Air Canada. Air Canada.
Krystal Ball
One of the people.
Saagar Enjeti
Yeah. Collided with a truck that was on the, you know, at the airport there. And so, you know, and who knows whose fault that is. But we certainly seem to have a lot more of these accidents recently. And I saw something was going on at Newark Airport. Air traffic control, too. So whole thing is just. Yeah, yeah, just.
Krystal Ball
And we had adhering.
Saagar Enjeti
Decline.
Krystal Ball
We had four, four of our airports shut down because the regional air traffic control had a bad smell, smelled bad. Look, I mean, it must have been really bad to shut it all. But, I mean, you can't be shutting down air traffic in the entire.
Saagar Enjeti
What's going on with that?
Krystal Ball
Nobody knows. Yes. Nobody knows to the T what that was. There's smoke in Newark Liberty. I mean, just put all these things together and. Yeah, like trying to make plans or trying to, like, function in our society today. It's nuts. You can't fly anywhere, you don't want to drive anywhere, you don't want to do anything. I mean, it just really makes you feel a sense of, like, terrible malaise whenever you're trying to do anything. And even if you're trying to buy a house right now, you're like, whoa, I thought the mortgage rate was coming down. Oops. Back up to 7%. And it just. Anybody who's trying to do anything has been directly affected in the last couple of months by this exact crisis. That is the worst possible thing for you. Again, as Joe Biden found out the very, very hard way. Never came back from it. And I don't know if anybody in this administration's ever coming back from this nightmare now so far. So there you go. As we said, we're very sorry to Ms. Mr. Wilkerson. We'll be happy to get him back here on the show whenever we can. We've had a few things. Daylight savings has been a major problem for some of our sids. I promised I wouldn't make it into a big thing out of respect, respect for the war. But it's starting to grade on me how things are going. Anyways, we're about to do our ama, so we'll see you all later. Thank you all so much for watching.
Ryan Seacrest
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Military life isn't predictable, but earning your master's degree can be. With American Military University's 40 plus flexible online master's programs, you can stay mission ready while you get market ready. Learn anywhere, anytime with an education built to keep pace, steady, reliable and always access plus Military service members, veterans and their families can save up to 45% on master's tuition with AMU's special rates and grants. Learn more at AMU APUS. Edu steady through every mission when people
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Ryan Seacrest
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Saagar Enjeti
Guaranteed Human.
Episode Date: March 23, 2026
Main Topics: Oil Market Chaos, Bibi Claims Al-Aqsa Threatened, Trump Declares Regime Change Victory
This episode focuses on the dramatic turmoil in energy and financial markets driven by ongoing geopolitical crises, particularly the Iran war; escalating rhetoric and potential provocations coming from Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu (“Bibi”), especially claims about threats to Jerusalem’s holy sites; and President Trump’s attempts to claim victory and “regime change” in Iran amid ongoing chaos. Krystal and Saagar dissect the real-life economic consequences, media spins, and the manipulation of public sentiment during this turbulent period.
Timestamps: 02:31–15:08
Timestamps: 08:51–15:08
Timestamps: 13:32–15:08
Timestamps: 17:14–29:21
Timestamps: 31:29–39:36
Timestamps: 39:36–43:37
This episode dissects the intersection of economic crisis, foreign policy, and domestic malaise in America. Krystal and Saagar use accessible anecdotes, pointed analysis, and even a bit of sardonic humor to paint a bleak—but clear—picture of a moment when government policy, market responses, and geopolitical ambitions are hitting regular people in the pocketbook and psyche. They highlight how messaging by politicians and media elites often ignores or downplays these struggles, even as real-world effects—from $4.50 fries and $6 gas to truckers being squeezed and nationwide travel chaos—make discontent impossible to ignore. The segment on Israeli religious rhetoric and the risk of manufactured conflict around holy sites is particularly pointed, showing manipulation of faith for geostrategic ends.
For anyone needing a comprehensive catch-up on today’s major economic and geopolitical anxieties—and how they’re impacting ordinary Americans—this episode delivers a grounded, critical, and often biting take on the news behind the headlines.