Trump Visits Disaster Zones & Thousands March for Life | 1.27.25

Summary

Morning Wire Podcast Summary: "Trump Visits Disaster Zones & Thousands March for Life | 1.27.25"

Release Date: January 27, 2025
Hosted by John Bickley and Georgia Howe

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1. President Trump's Visits to Disaster Zones

Timestamp: [00:03] - [04:51]

In this episode, John Bickley and Georgia Howe delve into President Donald Trump's inaugural efforts in his second term, focusing on his visits to disaster-stricken areas in North Carolina and California. These visits mark Trump's first official trips aimed at engaging directly with victims of natural disasters.

North Carolina Visit:

During his visit to Swannanoa, North Carolina, Trump confronted the inefficiencies of FEMA. Cabot Phillips, Daily Wire's senior editor, provides an in-depth analysis:

“[Cabot Phillips]: President Trump has criticized FEMA for being inefficient and overly bureaucratic. He floated the idea of eliminating FEMA altogether and proposed a new system where states receive funds directly from the federal government to manage their own disaster relief.”
[02:03]

Victims shared their frustrations, with one individual stating:

“[Cabot Phillips]: 'I've called and called and called FEMA. This happened on September 27th. Well, for us, today is still September 27th. You know we haven't had help.'”
[00:11]

Trump emphasized state autonomy over federal intervention:

“[Donald Trump]: 'Or Republican Governor, you want to use your state to fix it and not waste time calling FEMA... They want to bring people that aren't as good as the people you already have.'”
[02:53]

California Visit:

Following North Carolina, Trump traveled to California to assess wildfire damages. He criticized state and local officials for their preparedness and response:

“[Donald Trump]: 'People want to have voter identification... I want the water to be released. And they're going to get a lot of help from the US, thank you very much.'”
[03:40]

Despite his criticisms, Trump expressed support for California:

“[Cabot Phillips]: Trump voiced his 'great love for the state' and assured officials that the federal government stands behind them 100%.”
[03:56]

He also clashed with Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass over rebuilding efforts:

“[Donald Trump]: 'The people are willing to clean out their own debris. It doesn't cost them... By the time you hire contractors, it's going to be two years.'”
[04:27]

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2. Intensified Immigration Policies

Timestamp: [04:51] - [06:10]

The podcast highlights a significant escalation in Trump's immigration policies. Cabot Phillips outlines the administration's aggressive stance:

“[Cabot Phillips]: 'The president has continued to ramp up deportation efforts, focusing first on illegal immigrants with an existing criminal record. ICE agents arrested dozens in various cities over the weekend.'”
[05:51]

A notable confrontation with Colombia emerged when Governor Gustavo Petro initially refused to accept deportation flights. Trump's assertive response included imposing tariffs and sanctions:

“[Cabot Phillips]: 'Trump vowed to immediately implement 25% tariffs on all Colombian goods... He also announced a travel ban and immediate visa revocations on Colombian government officials.'”
[05:58]

However, Colombia swiftly reversed its position, allowing deportation flights to proceed:

“[Cabot Phillips]: 'Within hours, Colombia reversed course, demonstrating Trump's decisive approach to international negotiations.'”
[06:10]

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3. Confirmation of Cabinet Nominees

Timestamp: [06:54] - [10:47]

The episode transitions to the Senate's swift confirmation of Trump's cabinet nominees, with insights from Tim Rice, Daily Wire's Deputy Managing Editor.

Pete Hegseth Confirmed as Defense Secretary:

“[Tim Rice]: 'Pete Hegseth was confirmed by a razor-thin vote, with all Democrats and a few Republicans opposing. Vice President J.D. Vance cast the tie-breaking vote.'”
[07:11]

Hegseth swiftly moved to implement Trump's agenda, particularly targeting Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) initiatives within the Pentagon:

“[Tim Rice]: 'He stated on X that the Department of Defense will 'restore the warrior ethos' and eliminate DEI programs.'”
[08:33]

Kristi Noem Confirmed as Homeland Security Secretary:

“[Tim Rice]: 'South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem was confirmed with bipartisan support, including six Democrats, highlighting consensus on the southern border crisis.'”
[08:45]

Noem’s swearing-in was notably conducted by Justice Clarence Thomas using a family Bible, adding a personal touch to the ceremony.

Upcoming Confirmations:

Looking ahead, Rice anticipates heated hearings for:

• Robert F. Kennedy Jr. for Health and Human Services
• Cash Patel for the FBI
• Tulsi Gabbard for Director of National Intelligence

“[Tim Rice]: 'Expect fiery debates as Democrats challenge Kennedy on vaccines and Republicans probe his past on abortion.'”
[10:02]

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4. March for Life Rally in Washington, D.C.

Timestamp: [10:59] - [14:43]

A significant segment covers the annual March for Life, attended by approximately 150,000 pro-life Americans. Mary Margaret Olihan, Daily Wire's White House correspondent, reports on the event's atmosphere and key speeches.

Trump's Pledge to Pro-Life Movement:

Trump addressed the crowd, reinforcing his commitment to protecting life:

“[Donald Trump]: 'Never again will religious persecution be allowed to happen in America... to forge a society that welcomes and protects every child as a beautiful gift from the hand of our Creator.'”
[13:01]

He highlighted recent pro-life victories, including pardoning activists and ending federal funding for abortions.

Vice President Vance's Address:

Vice President J.D. Vance delivered his first public remarks, solidifying his role as a pro-family, pro-life advocate:

“[Vice President Vance]: 'It is a blessing to know the truth... to fight for the unborn... It's an honor to be with you.'”
[14:12]

The event underscored the movement's optimism and support for Trump's administration, with attendees expressing hope for continued pro-life policies.

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Conclusion

The episode of Morning Wire provides a comprehensive overview of President Trump's initial actions in his second term, emphasizing his focus on disaster relief reform, stringent immigration policies, and the swift confirmation of key cabinet members aligned with his agenda. Additionally, the fervent support from the pro-life community, as demonstrated at the March for Life, highlights a strong base anticipating the administration's continued efforts to protect life and implement conservative values.

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For more detailed discussions and live updates, listeners are encouraged to follow Morning Wire on the Daily Wire platform.

Transcript

[John Bickley]

President Trump visits North Carolina and California using his first official trips to speak directly with victims of natural disasters.

[Cabot Phillips]

I've called and called and called FEMA. This happened on September 27th. Well, for us, today is still September 27th. You know we haven't had help.

[John Bickley]

I'm Daily Wire Editor in Chief John Bickley with Georgia Howe. It's Monday, January 27th, and this is Morning Wire. The Trump administration is filling out with Kristi Noem and Pete Hegseth wasting no time after being sworn in.

[Cabot Phillips]

President Trump has picked these nominees because they are reformers, they are disruptors. And this election cycle is about the.

[John Bickley]

Disruptors versus the establishments, which cabinet nominees could be next.

[Georgia Howe]

And thousands of pro life Americans brave the cold for the annual March for Life with both Trump and Vance speaking to an optimistic crowd.

[John Bickley]

Thanks for waking up with MORNING wire. Stay tuned. We have the news you need to know.

[Brandon]

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[Georgia Howe]

On his first trip since taking office for the second time, President Trump met with hurricane victims in North Carolina before touring wildfire damage in California.

[John Bickley]

The visits come as the president continues to roll out executive orders at a frenetic pace. Here with all the latest is Daily Wire senior editor Cabot Phillips a Cabot. So let's start in North Carolina. What happened over the weekend?

[Cabot Phillips]

Yeah, the president said the state had been, quote, abandoned by Democrats, but vowed to remember them and help them rebuild. During a press conference in Swannanoa, a town I visited for the Daily Wire back in October, Trump repeatedly called victims to the podium to tell their stories. Many described waiting weeks or even months for any relief from FEMA after Hurricane Helene. Others said they feel forgotten by the federal government. Remember, FEMA has been under an intense microscope this year after we here at the Daily Wire broke that story about officials encouraging relief workers to skip homes that displayed Trump signs. But the president has long criticized the agency for being inefficient ineffective and overly bureaucratic. And this weekend, he floated the idea of eliminating FEMA altogether and creating a new system in which states would receive funds directly from the federal government and allocate it themselves, whether it's a Democrat.

[Donald Trump]

Or Republican Governor, you want to use your state to fix it and not waste time calling fema. And then FEMA gets here and they don't know the area, they've never been to the area, and they want to give you rules that you've never heard about. They want to bring people that aren't as good as the people you already have.

[John Bickley]

Now, after North Carolina, Trump then took a high profile visit to California. Tell us about that.

[Cabot Phillips]

Similar to North Carolina, Trump has also criticized the emergency response in California. Except in this case, he's been much more focused on state and city officials who he says were unprepared ahead of the fires and incompetent after. Ahead of his visit, Trump said he was prepared to open up federal relief for the state. But first he wanted to see Governor Newsom implement statewide voter ID laws and reverse environmental policies that he said made the fires worse.

[Donald Trump]

People want to have voter identification. You want to have proof of citizenship. Ideally, you have one day voting, but I just want voter ideas to start and I want the water to be released. And they're going to get a lot of help from the US thank you very much.

[Cabot Phillips]

But it is worth noting Trump struck a more conciliatory tone once he landed in California, professing a, quote, great love for the state and assuring Newsom and other elected officials, both Republican and Democrat, who were there, that, quote, the federal government is standing behind you 100%. But there were still some clashes, particularly between Trump and LA's much maligned Democratic mayor, Karen Bass. During a press conference, the President called out Bass for policies that have kept residents from returning to their properties to begin the rebuilding process.

[Donald Trump]

The people are willing to clean out their own debris. It doesn't cost them.

[Mary Margaret Olihan]

They can.

[Donald Trump]

You should let them do it, because by the time you hire contractors, it's going to be two years. I watched hundreds of people standing in front of their lots and they're not allowed to go in. And they want to go in. They're standing. And I say, why aren't you going in? We're trying to get a permit and, and the permit's going to take them. Everybody said 18 months.

[John Bickley]

Now, before we go, let's get caught up on the latest immigration news, something Trump has really been focusing on throughout his first week. What have we seen in the last.

[Cabot Phillips]

Few days A lot, John. The president has continued to ramp up deportation efforts, focusing first on illegal immigrants with an existing criminal record. Over the weekend, ICE agents arrested dozens of convicted gang members in Roar, Colorado, and they made dozens more arrests in Boston, Chicago, and cities across the country. Trump has ordered many of those criminal migrants to be deported back to their home countries, but not all countries initially were willing to take them back. On Sunday, Colombia's far left, Governor Gustavo Petro, refused to allow two deportation flights to land in his country. Trump responded in a major way, vowing to immediately implement 25% tariffs on all Colombian goods. That rate would rise to 50% next week if the flights were not allowed to land. He also announced a travel ban and immediate visa revocations on Colombian government officials, as well as sanctions on the president, his family and members of his political party.

[John Bickley]

Wow.

[Cabot Phillips]

So a lot. But within just hours of that news, Colombia completely reversed course and gave in, with President Petro even offering his own plane to help repatriate deportees. So Trump's threat worked and the message has definitely been sent to other countries. Take your criminals back or be ready to pay the price.

[John Bickley]

Yeah, pretty hard message to miss at this point. Kevin, thanks so much for reporting.

[Cabot Phillips]

Anytime.

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[Georgia Howe]

While Trump was crisscrossing the country to tour disaster areas, Congress was hard at work confirming one of his Cabinet nominees.

[John Bickley]

Here are the latest on the nominations is Daily Wire Deputy Managing Editor Tim Rice. Tim so lots of developments related to Trump's new administration over the weekend. Walk us through what happened.

[Tim Rice]

Yeah, John. Hands down, the biggest news of the weekend is that late Friday night, the Senate confirmed Pete Hegseth as defense secretary. Now, we've talked a lot on this show about the tough road Hegseth had to walk to confirmation. So unsurprisingly, the vote was razor thin. Every Democrat voted against Hegseth, as did Republicans Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski, and surprisingly, Mitch McConnell. That means Vice President J.D. vance had to hustle back to the Senate chambers to cast the tie breaking vote. McConnell's come under a lot of flak for that no vote. He says that Hegseth's desire to be a change agent is ill suited for the moment since the US Faces more geopolitical threats than it did during World War II. That seems to be a reference to Hegseth's vow to root out DEI from the Pentagon, which of course was one of Trump's major campaign promises. And Hegseth is wasting no time on that front. Speaking right after his confirmation, he said he was going to restore the warrior ethos to America's military. And just yesterday morning he posted on X the President's guidance is clear. No more DEI at the Department of Defense. Here he is talking about it. The three principles I talked about are what we will bring to that Pentagon restore the warrior ethos in everything that we do, rebuild our military and re establish deterrence. We don't want to fight wars. We want to deter them, as you said, and we want to end them responsibly.

[Cabot Phillips]

But if we need to fight them.

[Tim Rice]

We'Re going to bring overwhelming and decisive force to close with and destroy the enemy and bring our boys.

[John Bickley]

Now, Hegseth wasn't the only cabinet member cleared over the weekend. Who else got confirmed?

[Tim Rice]

Yeah, that's right. On Saturday morning, the Senate confirmed South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem as Homeland Security Secretary. Unlike Hegseth, every Republican voted for her, as did six Democrats, including John Fetterman and Tim Kaine. Noem had a pretty smooth confirmation process, focusing mostly on the crisis at the southern border, with which even Democrats pretty much agreed was a problem. Even still, Noem's confirmation happened quicker than anyone expected. She was supposed to get cleared on Sunday, not Saturday. And things happened so quickly that she was late to her scheduled swearing in with J.D. vance because she was waiting to get her late father's Bible. The story has a very cool ending, though. She wound up getting sworn in by Justice Clarence Thomas at his home with the family Bible.

[John Bickley]

Wow. So certainly a memorable swearing in. And like Hegseth, Nome probably won't have much of an adjustment period, correct?

[Tim Rice]

Yeah, that's right. As Cabot mentioned, the Trump administration has already rounded up hundreds of illegal immigrants and is starting deportations. And Trump's announced he's imposing tariffs on Colombia and sanctioning some of its leaders after it turned away two U.S. military planes carrying 160 deported migrants. It's an already volatile situation that'll probably get worse before it gets better. And Nomes getting dropped right in the middle of it.

[John Bickley]

Talk about hitting the ground running there. Before we let you go, give us a sense of what we can expect this week with confirmations.

[Tim Rice]

Yeah. We've got another big week ahead of us. On Wednesday, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. Trump's pick to lead the Department of Health and Human Services, takes the hot seat. Kennedy is undoubtedly the most high profile of Trump's cabinet picks, and he's been a controversial figure since launching his insurgent third party presidential bid. So expect that hearing to be pretty fiery with Democrats grilling him on vaccines and Republicans grilling him over his past support for abortion. And then on Thursday, we've got a double whammy. Cash Patel, Trump's pick to run the FBI, has his hearing at the same time as Tulsi Gabbard, who Trump nominated to serve as Director of National Intelligence. So two important positions with two pretty controversial figures coming right on the heels of the Kennedy hearing. It's going to be a big week for the Senate and for all of us tuning into those hearings.

[John Bickley]

Yeah, indeed. And just a reminder, you can stream those hearings live on the Daily Wire and of course, follow along for updates. Tim, thanks so much for reporting.

[Tim Rice]

You bet.

[John Bickley]

Pro life Americans filled the streets of Washington, D.C. on Friday at the March for Life, where J.D. vance delivered his first public remarks as vice president.

[Georgia Howe]

Daily Wire's new White House correspondent, Mary Margaret Olihan was on the ground for the event, and she joins us now. So, Mary Margaret, there was a big turnout over the weekend. Tell us about the crowd at March for Life.

[Mary Margaret Olihan]

Hey, Georgia. We don't have official crab numbers yet, but the permit application estimated they would have about 150,000 marchers this year. And as usual, this is a very youthful event. Many religious high schools and colleges bus students to the march from all over the country. Liberty University in Virginia, for example, sent 1,000 students to the event to stand up for the unborn. This year's march also came only a few days after Trump's inauguration. And given the political controversy surrounding abortion since the overturn of Roe, we wanted to get a pulse check on how the movement feels about Trump. How do you feel about our new president?

[Georgia Howe]

I think it's pretty cool.

[Cabot Phillips]

I'm excited. I am very hopeful that he protects life. I know last term he did, he overturned Roe v. Wade. I know he's been a little hesitant about states rights and like keeping it out of the federal government, which I'm a little bummed about, but I'm hoping that was just for the election.

[Georgia Howe]

Now, did you get the sense that the crowd is quite hopeful about another Trump presidency?

[Mary Margaret Olihan]

Absolutely. They hope and pray that Trump will protect life as he did during his first administration. And given Trump's actions just in the very first week of his presidency, things are looking good. Just this week, Trump pardoned 23 pro life activists, saying they were unjustly targeted by Biden's doj. The new DOJ also issued guidance saying that the FACE act, the law that Biden's DOJ used to charge and imprison pro life protesters, can only be used in really extreme circumstances going forward, like the burning of a pregnancy center or the murder of an abortionist. Trump also signed an executive order ending the use of federal taxpayer dollars to fund or promote abortions, both in the US and internationally. In a prerecorded video message to the March for Life, Trump promised the movement, in my second term, we will again stand proudly for families and for life.

[Donald Trump]

Never again will religious persecution be allowed to happen in America. To all of the very special people marching today in this bitter cold, I know your hearts are warm and your spirits are strong because your mission is just very, very pure, to forge a society that welcomes and protects every child as a beautiful gift from the hand of our Creator. Thank you for your tremendous support. God bless you, and God bless America.

[Georgia Howe]

Now, Vice President Vance made his first public remarks since inauguration at the March for Life.

[Cabot Phillips]

When?

[Georgia Howe]

What did he say?

[Mary Margaret Olihan]

Yes. So we first broke the news at Daily Wire that Vance would be speaking at the March for Life, signaling that he'll be a strong pro family, pro life voice in this administration. The presence of a vice president at any event lends significance. But at this particular March for Life, it was very momentous. After four years of the Biden DOJ targeting pro life activists. I was standing a little back from the crowd right as Vance began to speak, and I saw a whole bunch of kids go sprinting up that hill to make sure that they could hear the vice President. Here's Vance on the March for Life and its significance.

[Brandon]

It is a blessing to know the truth, and the truth is that unborn life is worthy of protection. It is a joy and a blessing to fight for the unborn, to work for the unborn, and to march for life. God bless you all and thank you for having me. It's an honor to be with you.

[Mary Margaret Olihan]

Overall, this was a very hopeful, excited crowd. They're energized and they're ready for the next four years.

[Georgia Howe]

Sounds like it. Mary Margaret, thanks for reporting.

[Mary Margaret Olihan]

Thanks for having me.

[John Bickley]

Thanks for waking up with us. We'll be back this afternoon with more news you need to know.