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Stephen K. Bannon
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Jonathan
Pardons for several key allies who backed his effort to subvert the 2020 election results. That's according to the President's so called clemencies are Justice Department pardon attorney Ed Martin, who released a list on social media late last night that includes the names of 77 people who received pardons. They include Rudy Giuliani, Mark Meadows, John Eastman, Kenneth Cheesebrough, Boris Epstein and Sidney Powell, among others. Now, Politico points out that the pardons are largely symbolic because none of those identified were charged with any federal crimes. Additionally, the document posted online is also undated, so it's not clear exactly when President Trump signed it. The pardon language explicitly states it does not apply to Trump himself. The White House and Justice Department did not immediately respond to requests for comments. So Ken, there's a lot to sift through here. You know, we know that President Trump has stacked his administration with some of those previous 2020 election deniers, those who claim falsely that he won the election. And symbolic or not, this is another symbol here that he's simply not going to play by the rules and that these are people who he is yet another example of this administration where he has taken used the powers of government to punish his FO and in this case reward his friends, those who do his bidding.
Mark Wolf
Mark Wolf explains his decision to step down as a senior US District judge in Massachusetts. He writes in part, quote, my reason is simple. I no longer can bear to be restrained by what judges can say publicly or do outside the courtroom. President Donald Trump is using the law for partisan purposes, targeting his adversaries while sparing his friends and donors from investigation, prosecution and possible punishment. This is contrary to everything that I have stood for in my more than 50 years in the Department of Justice and on the bench. The White House's assault on the rule of law is so deeply disturbing to me that I feel compelled to speak out. Silence for me is now intolerable.
Ken Delaney
I'd say it's a bit more than symbolic, Jonathan, in the sense that some of these people were clearly considered unindicted co conspirators by Jack Smith in the investigation of the false elector scheme that resulted in the indictment of Donald Trump and they were certainly at risk of being charged. Now, of course that was never going to happen during this administration and there's a statute of limitations problem, but often there are ways to get around statues of limitations. And so some of these people had some real risk of being charged criminally in the false elector scheme if a Democrat or someone who's not like minded with Donald Trump becomes the next president and controls the Justice Department. So this is a big deal and it's just a continuation of what is happening within the Trump administration in terms of pardoning people who've committed very serious offenses in this case haven't been charged with offenses, but are believed by many people to have engaged in misconduct and just. It's about the political whims of Donald Trump. It's about who he likes and who he wants to help. And if you believe a certain way that was in his interests, you're liable for a pardon, whether it's Ghislaine Maxwell or people who engaged in this false elector scheme. Now, the thing to remember is there are still there were state attorneys general investigations into various false elector schemes around the country. It's unclear exactly what's happening with those, but these pardons, of course, would not apply to state charges.
Stephen K. Bannon
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.
Ed Martin
The people have had a belly full of it.
Stephen K. Bannon
I know you don't like hearing this. I know you try to do everything in the world to stop that, but you're not going to stop it.
Ed Martin
It's going to happen.
Stephen K. Bannon
And where do people like that go to share the big lie?
Erik Prince
MAGA MEDIA I wish in my soul.
Stephen K. Bannon
I wish that any of these people had a conscience.
Ed Martin
Ask yourself, what is my task and what is my purpose?
Stephen K. Bannon
If that answer is to save My.
Ed Martin
Country, this country will be saved.
Stephen K. Bannon
War Room here's your host, Stephen K. Ban. It's Monday, the 10th of November in the year of our Lord 2025 is the 250th anniversary of the birth of the Marine Corps or the Continental Marines, to be specific. We're going to be covering this all day. We've got Erik Prince is going to join us, Jack Posobics up in Philadelphia. We're going to go live momentarily to Philadelphia, which is the home, the birthplace of the Marines at Ton Tavern. We'll be going there with a group of Marines that fought in Vietn for a commemoration. So throughout the morning, we'll be going back and forth between the Marines and this, a massive amount of breaking news here in the Capitol, honored to be joined by Ed Martin, one of the greats. Ed, thank you. By the way, this is what happens when the studio's on Capitol Hill. You don't know who's going to literally, we're about to go with a broader cold over everything. Is that Ed Barton? Come on in here, boy. Ed, at the cold open, we could have played an hour worth of commentary from the Morning Joes and from Ken was it Delaney? And over at NBC, you know, he's the comms director for Comey. And these guys just walk the audience through about these pardons so everybody understands. And then I want to get to, I guess, this report you put out subsequently about the whole rationale behind it. Walk us through first, what exactly happened?
Ed Martin
Well, thanks a lot, Steven. Semper Fi. Semper Fi. Thanks. My brother's a Marine, Jim.
Erik Prince
Your brother's a Marine?
Ed Martin
Yeah, my brother's a Marine, yeah. Yeah. He served overseas, all the wars and all. And he's a hero. He's the real hero. So my mother, Jim, and all the Marines, thank you. I put something up on X today, Steve. I said if as long as America has the Marines, we'll never fail, we'll never fall. Right? We got the Marines. So look this, I became a U.S. partner attorney. I was planning on being U.S. attorney in Washington, D.C. right. I was enjoying that.
Stephen K. Bannon
I had quite a run.
Ed Martin
I had quite a run. I had quite a run. I will say some of the stuff.
Stephen K. Bannon
No, the establishment was not just the progressive Democrats. The Republican establishment was absolutely shaking. They have a guy in there that's a lawyer order guy.
Ed Martin
Yeah. So. Well, and it was really important work and I loved it. And I had hoped to do it for the whole four years. The Lord has different plans. And when I spun around and The President said, we're going to withdraw your nomination. He said, but I want you to keep fighting. And I said, I'll do what you want, sir. And he said, I want you to be the U.S. pardon attorney. And I thought, okay, like, because I care a lot about the pardons because.
Stephen K. Bannon
What they did and the anti weapon assessment.
Ed Martin
Yeah, I was going to get to that, right? So he says, pardon attorney. I thought, well, I care about that. I care about the J6ers, the FACE act, the Pro lifers, that first week in office. Never forget I'd never been in the Oval Office. Okay, so it's January 24th or 3rd, and I go in there because the President's signing a pardon for two cops, MPD cops that were sent to jail for being honest brokers and chasing a bad guy through the streets. And he looked at me, first time in the Oval Office, I'm nervous as can be. Looked at me and he said, these are good pardons, right? And I said, yes, sir. And he said, we're gonna do the right thing for the cops. I said, yes, sir. And he said, did the MPD tell you they like it? I said, yeah, they do, sir. And he's like, great. Signed it. I mean, we had great work. So the pardon attorney, I thought it's important. But then he said, I want you to run the weaponization committee and the anti.
Stephen K. Bannon
Weaponization.
Ed Martin
Well, anti weaponization, but the first thing is to shine a light. And I've said this before, name and shame. I mean, look, when Bondi gave us a memo, General Bondi, the memo, the first one is Jack Smith. First one to investigate is Jack Smith. We look at Jack Smith and I'm in the middle of this still. What you see is Jack Smith was targeting who? The electors, the alternate electors across the country. Jack Smith thought he was going to be one of the famous lawyers who tried what I call a maxi trial. In the 1990s in Sicily, they tried all the organized crime. Jack Smith thought he was that guy, except he was the guy running the conspiracy. He was the. He was the guy doing this stuff. So when we looked at it, one, the President said, pardon attorney. And I said, okay, hang on a second.
Stephen K. Bannon
Maxi trial. He wanted to put hundreds on trial at the same time.
Ed Martin
Yeah, sorry I got us distracted, but it's important because it plays into what happened.
Stephen K. Bannon
Yes.
Ed Martin
Jack Smith's vision was charge hundreds of people across the country, all the alternate electors, all the people that put their head up and said, all the lawyers, every day, all the lawyers charge a maxi trial and get. And then when he's Laura, Ben, and.
Stephen K. Bannon
Everybody around the president and the president.
Ed Martin
And the president, and he only lost, he only ran out of time because guys like Todd Blanche, my current boss, John Laro, they fought it off, and they fought this guy off, and he stopped him. So anyway, when the President says, I want you to do the weaponization and the pardon attorney, I looked at it, I said, the pardon attorney. And then, Steve, you lived it, but I learned it. You have a chance President, and he loves this. You have a chance to give real mercy and give people that were wronged a break. So I get in and he says to me two things. He said, one is, there's people that deserve a break, that are in jail, in prison. Find them and help them get a break. Guys that served a long time and all. But he said, the second one was weaponized against us by Biden and Obama, by the way, and just the government. And we started looking at that and the electors across the country. The pardon that came out today was pardoning these electors because they did what they did, the exact same thing that in 1960 the Democrats did in Hawaii. There were three Democrat alternate electors, and nobody said a word. It's exactly what you do when you operate the Constitution, not when you don't. And, Steve, here's the thing. You're Steve Bannon out in the country, in the states, frankly, more normal people, regular guys and gals, put their hand up and said, I'll be an alternate elector to help. They were the county chair, they were a local judge, and Jack Smith and his team and Fanny Willis, they destroy these people. And so you had people borrowing against college funds, redoing their mortgage, selling their.
Stephen K. Bannon
Houses, going into their retirement zone, their houses.
Ed Martin
And so my point was to the President was we should pardon these folks. And he said, research it. And Bondi and Blanche said, research it. Get it right and tight, and we'll consider it. And we did it, and we got it all together. And I asked probably 50. I didn't ask you, Steve. I should have 50 lawyers and top people thinking about it. How do you look at this? And what you described was the working document that we put together, which is it describes exactly what happened. The people in this country operated within the rules and the law and the Constitution, and they were brutalized by it. And so the pardon attempts to start to change that. And I think it's the opening. I know because I'm involved in getting to the truth of 2020.
Stephen K. Bannon
So. And that's part of the document that you put out subsequently. It kind of explained your rationale.
Ed Martin
Yeah.
Stephen K. Bannon
How does this go? Because these are state charges and you've got some pretty radical ags, particularly in Arizona and some of these other states that are going to sit there and go, hey, Donald Trump and Ed Martin can do all they want, but we're going to triple down on these people and grind them into dust. Which have they been doing?
Ed Martin
Right. A couple things. One, there's a broad argument that the pardon can apply to state charges that I leave to others for fighting it out. But there is in the history of the country, of course, you go back in time, at the very beginning, the charges, a pardon operated against any crime against the United States. At the period early on, you were pardoning local charges too. That's a different debate. I don't think right now we win that in the courts. But I'll just say this. If you charge somebody for forgery or obstruction of justice and the underlying crime that you're claiming is forgery or obstruction of justice, definitively the government says it wasn't a crime. There was no victims, there was no cost, you take the wind out of the sails of the argument, what are you doing? And what becomes clear and should be.
Stephen K. Bannon
Clear to the American, they're doing this.
Ed Martin
For a targeting, it's targeting people for politics and otherwise. And look out in Wisconsin, this guy named Judge Troopas, he spent his whole career, it's like Eastman Dean Eastman, whole career, not like you and me. These people are quality lawyers and thinkers. They're not in the fray like we are. And they get destroyed, their reputations, 70 year old men destroyed.
Stephen K. Bannon
Troopas came up here and testified. At the time, he was fantastic, fantastic.
Ed Martin
Assault of the earth, smart guy. And so they destroy these people without blinking an eye. And it's truly, truly the conduct is evil. The people deserve to be named and shamed and held accountable in every way.
Stephen K. Bannon
How did the President respond when you went to him with your package to do this?
Ed Martin
From the very beginning, President Trump, from the very beginning, two things I'd say. One is he has a heart for anybody who's been wronged by government. He feels it, he lived it himself. But the second thing is he loves, as you know, he says things like, I like it, I like it, go do this, this and this. He saw it, right? And then he said, he always, people don't realize.
Stephen K. Bannon
He goes through the details and comes back to some great guidance.
Ed Martin
And he said to me, go do this, don't forget this. And then what he always says, Steve, is He, you know, he says do it right. Like go do it and do it right. And so I gotta tell you, people argued against it for it internally, externally. And the president was like, we gotta like I say it all the time. No Maga left behind. We're not in a time where we could debate this. People that were wronged by the Biden administration were targeted because of what they believed and who they were. That's without a doubt. Now it's not a debatable point. We gotta try to fix that in every way we possibly can.
Stephen K. Bannon
And Obama.
Ed Martin
Yeah, that's right. It's true.
Stephen K. Bannon
We're getting to that in a thing. Let's take a by the way, we have the we're going to go out with the Marine Corps with the Marine Corps hymn all day today, both the morning and the afternoon show. Michael Paxone, join us tonight at 10:00pm Eastern Standard Time. It'll be the world premiere on PBS. Seventeen years after we made the film. We'll play the last 600 meters will be primetime on PBS. Tonight, 10pm we're going to have Michael pack other Marines from Iraq and Afghanistan. The current wars folks. Today from Vietnam. All day long we're commemorating the 250th birthday of the United States Marine Corps. And as Ed Martin just said, as long as we got the Marines, the United States cannot be defeated. Let's take a short break. Ed Martin in the house. Next in the war room.
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Ed Martin
No.
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Stephen K. Bannon
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Ed Martin
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Stephen K. Bannon
Okay. Well, by the way, I was very concerned, literally. We scooped Ed Martin up from the streets of the Capitol. You've got the jacket. You got the Colombo jacket on. I thought you were doing Letitia James hunting for another house up here. She got one on Capitol Hill.
Ed Martin
No, no, I just was out doing some business. Steve, I don't like to tell you why I was in the neighborhood. We'll just leave it at that.
Stephen K. Bannon
That's the de weaponization you put out. Also, something in addition about the 2020. I mean, one of the things that were, and we keep pressing, is that we have to adjudicate 2020. Yes, it's absolutely. It's the railhead of so much of the problem in the country. And now you've seen the auto pin, you know, the auto pen pardons, the auto pen executive orders, which I think are even worse. Tell me, why did you put this out today at the same time?
Ed Martin
Well, you know, two things. One is, you know Kurt Olson. Kurt Olson. Kurt Olson was recently appointed by the president to work on election integrity. What people may not know, and it's not a secret, is that inside doj, myself and a couple others have been working also on the same topic. So, you know, you see, whether it's. Fulton county has these ballots we're worried about, why are we not.
Stephen K. Bannon
Why do we step out some US Marshals to go down?
Ed Martin
Well, everybody thinks it's. Look, yeah, everybody thinks it's easier. It's a challenge. Look, we've got to get them. And my bet is they're not there. I've always thought that they say they're there and that they're. I think they're long ago shredded because of undestroyed. But that's just my own opinion. We'll see. But more importantly, there is a court that's a bombshell. Well, it's saying. Let me say. Let me say. That's just me guessing. As important as they are, they don't.
Stephen K. Bannon
Think you keep the evidence around. That they would put them all in.
Ed Martin
Prison at this point, it's four and a half years later, they're fighting to keep them secret. The court ordered them being held. The clerk has them supposedly down the hall. They won't let us see them to review them them like if they want to prove that the election was fine, show it to us. We have enough concerns, we've raised enough serious concerns. So my thinking is if it's that important to them, who knows what happened. But we'll see. I'm just me reacting to how much they fought. But so why when the President, when we talked about the pardon of these alternate electors, at the heart of it was a desire, it seemed the conduct of these electors, they were being shut down, they were being silenced and why? And the question was, what happened in the 2020 election? And so when we went back and looked at it, our goal, to pardon these electors. And when you pardon the alternate electors, you gotta make the case and look closely at it. And what we saw was people again, ordinary Americans, Steve, regular people and their lawyers and others saying let's use the system the way we're supposed to. And what they were doing, they were targeted for that. So what we saw and what we're laying out is what happened that they targeted, why did they target it, what were the steps that were taken? And I think it all becomes a question to answer. What happened with 2020? And again, General Bondi has put us on his task. She's not, she said to us, keep pushing, keep figuring it out. And so we're doing that.
Stephen K. Bannon
So in other words, keep pushing. Cuz we have to adjudicate with transparency in the public. The 2020, the stealing of the 2020 election.
Ed Martin
Anytime you see wholesale misconduct targeting American people, whether it's illegal or it's outside of the term limits or anything else, excuse me, the statute of limitations, you still have to take a look at it. You don't get to say walk away when there's misconduct. So we now have regular misconduct against American citizens. When you see that, you say let's go figure out what happened and we're going to get to the bottom of it. I'm very confident it's happening faster than people can realize. And look, I've told you before, I get a lot of grief from the TV people. If you do something wrong and we can prosecute you, we're going to, we're going to find it and get you. If you did it and you somehow dodged accountability, we're going to name you. And as I've said before, we're going to name and shame people. They deserve to be embarrass for what they did to people. They deserve to have shame for what they did to people. And that's part of the process. That's always part of the process. So we're really excited about the truth getting out. And more importantly, I've heard from people this morning that have said thank you to President Trump for being on their side. Right. For not forgetting what's gone on.
Stephen K. Bannon
One thing, you say name and shame. What about the next step? You will prosecute. Where you can prosecute everywhere. What about the state? Just one more time, because you're dealing with some of the most radical attorney generals in the country, particularly Arizona. You know, places like that come to mind. What is your plan for these folks?
Ed Martin
Well, there's a couple things. One of the things when you start to look at the facts of this is that you realize that there were a series of nonprofits set up. You know, Norm Eisen was in this space. Georgetown University had some people that are up in Wisconsin that are working like. Right. So you say who was in collaboration with this targeting? Again, maybe it's not illegal, but it's certainly worth a hard look. And when it comes to the attorneys general, you see a network. Now, look, the reports out of the last two weeks on Arctic Frost are that Jack Smith was coordinating on targeting people with local prosecutors. That's frankly the place where you look first, you say, hey, you may be out of control, you may have run for office like I think Letitia James did, saying, I'm gonna target that citizen, that citizen, that group. That's what she ran on. That's politics. Maybe it's illegal, maybe it's not. When you get in office, how you use your office is what we're gonna have to look at and say, whoa, back off. By the way, one of the heroes in this, Harmony Dillon. Harmony Dillon is fearless. And so we were trying to get to the bottom of this, and she's saying, how do I help? And she's out there in the fray, too. So it's an, you know, all government effort to make sure that our people are protected and people are held. All hands on deck. Yeah.
Stephen K. Bannon
What about, let's go to the anti weaponization part of your job. And I realize most of this you can't talk about, but people sometimes think that that's not getting the attention. You just had this book injustice that out where they're trying to make the case that Jack Smith is a superhero. And the only Reason that he didn't actually bring Trump, get Trump in prison, is that Merrick Garland guys are just too late to the process. But you've got this now grand jury in South Florida. You have all this Arctic Frost, which is, you know, finally the Senate realizes they were wiretapped. Now they're interested in where do we stand with your anti weaponization move.
Ed Martin
Yeah, let me, let me say one part of that, Steve, is that all along the way there's progress that's hard sometimes to show people it's an inch at a time. For example, the news that broke on Arctic Frost, we had that about five weeks ago. And I know that the effort was by the dag. Todd Blanche was how do we get this information in the hands of people that can hold them accountable? We did that. Right? There's Tina Peters. We've been fighting for two months to figure out a path on Tina Peters. It's come out publicly. We're fighting for Tina Peters. You say, well, just go get her. Well, we got to work with Colorado's.
Stephen K. Bannon
But you've put Colorado Bureau of Prisons on notice if you want to transfer it to a federal pr.
Ed Martin
Yeah, and we did it. But we did it. I gotta say again, Todd Blanche is the guy leading on this. We did it in a way that puts the right kind of pressure on them. You know how this works if you're Colorado. I was chief of staff to the governor of Missouri once. If the feds say we want something, you change your tune in terms of. So we did that. We're doing that. So there's a million steps. But I would say on the big picture, J6 look, you're seeing the J6 stuff breaking. I can't talk about a lot of it, but you're seeing that stuff break. And that's because it's a regular. It's like a drip, drip, drip, where we're making regular progress. Now don't get me wrong, Steve, we need more prosecutions, we need more convictions. I get it. But I do know that we're making progress. And on the weaponization. Look, Joe Biden's administration, it was beyond what you could even imagine. What you can imagine, honestly. You know it well.
Stephen K. Bannon
And it was illegitimate. That's what proven the 2020 election was stolen. It's illegitimate. And it act like an illegitimate group of gangsters.
Ed Martin
But they targeted so many Americans. You get the Catholics in Richmond area. That was, that was the school, the moms and dads at the school board. Right. They targeted every different category. And they did it with A level of. It was like Obama was doing that. His people, these guys went beyond anything you could ever imagine. And by the way, it's all the same suspects goes through both administrations. You know, the characters are the same in terms of the, well, the norm.
Stephen K. Bannon
License, some of these NGOs. Weissman, this crowd, the MSNBC crowd, I know you got a bolt. Two things. Number one, your brother. Tell me about your brother. He's a Marine. Tell me about your brother.
Ed Martin
Yeah, my brother's a United States Marine. Lieutenant colonel, retired Marine. Jim Martin.
Stephen K. Bannon
Career.
Ed Martin
A career. Yeah, yeah, yeah. He did. He did tours in Afghanistan and Fallujah and all that stuff and Iraq and, you know, took guys. Always a dirt eater, ground pounder. He was Scranton University undergrad, then went.
Stephen K. Bannon
Officers Candidate School, a great Catholic school.
Ed Martin
Yeah, yeah. And he just was a fighter and he went to all the wars and he came back and he's a hero. And he saw stuff that you and I only read about. And so many of those people and many of them didn't come back. So it's great to remember those guys, the Marines. And he's a. He's a great hero of mine. My brother, Jim Martin, he's up in Massachusetts. That's tough to be in Massachusetts.
Stephen K. Bannon
Tough.
Ed Martin
It's all right.
Stephen K. Bannon
Phyllis Schlafly, this is her moment, isn't it? I mean, because people have certain that she represents so much of that kind of pounding stick to it in this. Never back off. Had the establishment on her the entire time. We played the article from Breitbart. We played clip. It's gone viral again about her just completely destroying Bob Buckley.
Ed Martin
Yeah, look, Phyllis Schlafly, two things. She was right on most of the issues early. She knew that the threat was anti communism and the Soviets. It wasn't. It wasn't necessarily Russia. Once the Soviet Union fell, she went to China and said, it's a communist in China. That's why Navarro. She was on Navarro 15 years before the rest of everybody caught up. Right. So she. So Phyllis knew. But what you said and on all the issues, pro life on immigration, she.
Stephen K. Bannon
Was the first one back in the 60s, she was calling out the Wall street guys.
Ed Martin
But what she was really great at was, was she just never wavered. You know, Donald Trump came to her funeral. You were there September of 20, 2016.
Stephen K. Bannon
Symbolically, it was so important for us to be there and to honor her. And she showed such courage.
Ed Martin
And he spoke. He spoke for President Trump spoke before the funeral mass because he knew he wasn't going to interrupt it try to be in the center of it. And he spoke for five or 10 minutes and he said, she never wavered. That's the thing. She loved America and she never wavered. And she just kept going one day after another. And, and you know, one of my staffers who worked at Philosophical Eagles said to me once, came to my office at Gwen and she said, I know what the thing is with Trump and Phyllis. Phyllis had died already. And she said, the two of them, they just love America so much. They want it for everybody. And that's what she fought for. So it is kind of her moment.
Stephen K. Bannon
It's one of the most important moments of the 16 campaign.
Ed Martin
Oh, amazing. Well, funny to see. You were there. And president, his wife and there was a casket and there's a great photo of praying. Praying, yeah. Kneeling.
Stephen K. Bannon
He and Melania knelt and prayed in front of the casket of philosopher. Life is very powerful. Ed Martin.
Ed Martin
Okay, brother, thanks.
Stephen K. Bannon
Anytime in the neighborhood, just drop, check.
Ed Martin
The tags on your car. I'll check on that. We'll get back in touch.
Stephen K. Bannon
I've got the, I think we got it. We got a license. This your, your, your, your London Columbo. The Columbo, yeah.
Ed Martin
All right.
Stephen K. Bannon
Leticia James. Ed Martin on social media. Where do people get you at Eagle?
Ed Martin
Ed Martin is my prime, my personal. That's the best place to be.
Stephen K. Bannon
In touch, Ed Martin. Thank you. We're gonna leave you with the Marine Corps hymn. We're gonna be back in the war in a moment. Eric Prince will be in the house a little later this morning. Morning, Ed Martin. Thank you so much. Be back in a moment. In the army and the Navy never looks on heaven.
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Mark Wolf (reading his statement)
Thank you very much for having me and for giving me this opportunity to speak to some of the American people. What's different now is, is the assault on the ideal of equal justice under law. You just read what I wrote that was published yesterday in the Atlantic, that the law is now evidently being used repeatedly regularly for partisan purposes, to punish the President's perceived enemies and to not investigate possible corruption or other criminal wrongdoing by his donors and his friends, others in his orbit. These things have happened in the past. I was a young lawyer, as you know from reading the article, assistant to the Attorney General after Watergate, and what President Nixon did periodically and secretly because he knew it was illegal or improper, President Trump appears to do regularly. We have a series of things going on that are related, in my view. The directions to the Department of Justice to prosecute perceived enemies, the abolition of the units in the FBI and the Department of Justice that would ordinarily investigate publicly corruption or the evisceration of them in the Justice Department, and the failure to investigate possible corruption, particularly by people who benefit the President or his interests. And this is utterly inconsistent with our ideal of equal justice under law.
Erik Prince
They have the best week that they've had in a year and a half, and then fear and loathing and the wringing of hands, because they may reopen the government. Because, yes, there are some Democrats who understand that people are going hungry. And what have they done? They have found out and they have exposed a White House that is working overtime to give tax cuts to billionaires. At the same time, they're working overtime to take SNAP assistance, to take food assistance from working Americans. And this has exposed just how much the Republican Party hates the idea of helping working Americans, helping middle class Americans who are struggling with health care. So you take that and you take the massive win that Democrats had this past week. Massive, historic, in some ways, where Steve Bannon said Democrats erased 10 years of Republican gains in one night. And why did that happen? Donald Trump said it happened because of the government shutdown. So all this fear and loathing and all this whining. I wish Democrats for once, just once, could take a win and then understand the Republicans, they were never going to help working Americans. They learned that through this process. So you know who else learned that through this process? The American voter.
Stephen K. Bannon
Okay, they're going to be debating all this now. They've reached, you know, the filibuster limit, 60 votes. So they're now going to start discussing it. And I'm told, particularly people Saying all the Rifs are gone. None of the Rifs. All the Rifs, I'm told, on the people negotiate the deal are good. All this reduction in force of the government. Government, Russ votes, you know, team, all of those rifts up until this thing is agreed to are all gone. So we'll see. Right now it's kind of. We're trying to find out exactly some of this deal doesn't make any sense. But anyway, we're going to pursue it throughout the day. Erik Prince, the only way you can follow Ed Martin on a day like today is Erik Prince. Thank you for saving me because Ed Martin had to leave and the audience is going keep Ed. Steve, you leave and Ed Martin stays. So thank you so much for being here.
Erik Prince
Ed is a great American.
Stephen K. Bannon
He's a great American.
Erik Prince
Talking about standing in the breach.
Stephen K. Bannon
Talk to me about that for a second because this is why Ed Martin's become such a folk hero right now.
Erik Prince
I met him for the first time recently and I just applaud the work he's doing. And if we believe in a constitutional republic with actual accountability for malfeasance, especially people that are going to weaponize government.
Stephen K. Bannon
Against citizens, well, you know, because government, they've been weaponized against you forever. In fact, the last 600 meters tonight, 10 o'. Clock. And we showed it on the big screen a couple weeks ago. You were so nice to come for the, for the opening.
Erik Prince
It's an amazing film. It's just a fantastic piece of work.
Stephen K. Bannon
Because it shows just. And by the way, it is what Marines do every day of their life in Fallujah, Najaf and Fallujah. It's just the grunts ground pounding, no glory in it. It's just you're doing it for the corps, you're doing it for the country.
Erik Prince
You'Re doing it for Big Scrum. And they just pushed way harder.
Stephen K. Bannon
It's just amazing. In fact, I met you when we were talking about this film. I came and saw because the opening segment of the film, which is the most brutal, it's it, the film is essentially unrated. And it's because we have some brutal things of combat. But it starts with the attack on.
Erik Prince
Your ambush of our guys shrunk from a bridge.
Stephen K. Bannon
And that's when it got personal for people. Oh, yeah, talk to me about the governors target you. So that was 17. That was eight actually. We were making it. So the very beginning stages. So that was almost 20 years ago. You were targeted then. I mean the Obama administration and Holder literally targeted you at that time because before Trump came on the scene or other people came on the scene, you were kind of their number one target, were you not?
Erik Prince
They threw every aspect of the federal government at us.
Stephen K. Bannon
They tried to bankrupt you.
Erik Prince
Oh my God. I was paying about $2.5 million a month for two years in legal fees.
Stephen K. Bannon
Two and a half million a month.
Erik Prince
A month.
Stephen K. Bannon
And your crime had been defending serving.
Erik Prince
The country, the US Government serving the State Department to the letter of a competitively bid thousand page contract. We did exactly what they wanted, wanted. And I think the left hates anything that shows it to be more efficient than what government is doing.
Stephen K. Bannon
Also they hate patriots. This is a post constitutional. This is why a lot of the constitutional conservatives come to me and go, oh, you know, I say this is a post constitutional. We're living in a post constitutional age because of what the Democrats have done. This is why it's so important today. And I'll get Ed Martin kind of put out the rationale now for how they stole the 2020 election. Right. And this is why the president gave these pardons, pardon at a federal level to these folks. I actually think it would be applied to the state. But we'll see that next couple of days they're targeting those people that they think are making a difference. Right.
Erik Prince
The nail that sticks up the highest is definitely getting the hammer, that's for sure. And you know, fall down two times. Get up.
Stephen K. Bannon
Three I have you on today. We wanted you here because one, I want to talk about what you've been working on the last couple of couple years on this communication side, but on the 250th commemoration and by the way, we're going to go to Philadelphia as soon as we're having a slight technical problem. It is raining there. This is a group of Ernie Priet, Alexander Priet's dad, who is a Marine veteran, hardcore combat in Vietnam and a bunch of Marines who served in Vietnam in intense combat are having, are kicking off the commemoration today at the Vietnam Memorial Memorial in Philadelphia, of course, at Ton Tavern today throughout the entire day. We're going to be here 10pm tonight after 17 years. We're going to have the national broadcast of the last 600 meters, which is a, I guess a story, you could say tarawa peleliu. You know, the Marines throughout history, this is what they do. Right. It's as ground pounding and unrelenting and never stopping.
Erik Prince
Yeah, they tend to make a mark wherever they show up. I mean when the US entered World War I and they get to Belleau Wood. And that's where they earned the name Teufel Hunde Devil Dogs because they just.
Stephen K. Bannon
Talk about that fought hard. It's also the reason some in the government don't like when you say that Belleau Wood is also the reason they were not in Normandy for the greatest amphibious landing in history. They were so good at Belleau Wood. The powers of being. DC said hey, I don't. We don't. We want the Marines stay amphibious. We don't know if we want them that far inland. That's supposed to be the Army's job. Let's send them to the Pacific.
Erik Prince
There is no question. Look, it's a competitive thing. Seal Team 6 is better because of Delta Force and vice versa. And I saw it a lot in Iraq and Afghanistan that the competitive nature and the Marines would find a way the attitude of the Marine Corps that every Marine is a rifle. Right. Because everybody likes to break into all these different Moses, military, occupational specialties. A radar guy, whatever. Everybody in the Marine Corps knows how to shoot, move and communicate first. Super important. And they demonstrated that in the ground combat in Iraq and Afghanistan again and again.
Stephen K. Bannon
Again and again. Talk to me today, a little controversial. The a Syrian president is going to arrive at the White House. In fact, it's going to be around 11 o'. Clock. There's not going to be any ceremony. I think it's closed to the press. Throughout the day there's discussion of course, folks in the audience that want to see us America first. And I want to ask you about Venezuela also want to see America first. And a little concerned about this. They're now talking about a base in Syria that we may be staffing. Your thoughts on Your thoughts on the Syrian president. Because on the 250th anniversary of the Marine Corps, maybe not the best day to have this guy show up because a lot of Iraq and Afghanistan was because of this.
Erik Prince
Well, yeah, certainly Assad was supplying the rat line of foreign fighters that were feeding into Iraq. Look, Jelani is a rebadged jihadi with a much better haircut and a better tailor.
Stephen K. Bannon
You got Petraeus glazing him. I could play that clip. Come on, brother. He's going to was the UN the meetings before the UN and David Petraeus who led the 101st right up there with the Kurds. Remember the Turks blocked him and they had to actually do a parachute. They had to do an airdrop in. He's glazing this guy. Right? We want to know are you getting enough sleep? Remember that? I mean, what is Going on with the. The globalist establishment has embraced this guy like nobody's business.
Erik Prince
Jelani is there because Turkey installed him. That was a black swan event organized by Turkish intelligence and Turkish Special operations. They put their guy in and it's definitely Turkey flexing its Ottoman origins to extend his reach.
Stephen K. Bannon
You mean the same Turks that are doing the security in Gaza of which Netanyahu are said over the weekend, Turks will never set forth foot in Gaza to do security. I said he ought to read the document they signed. Turkey is reversing everything that General Allenby, the British, Lawrence of Arabia did back in World War I. Right. We drove the Ottoman Empire, we drove it from the two sacred sites.
Erik Prince
The Sykes Picot agreement was to keep them out. Kept them out because the Ottoman Empire had really collapsed and then you had.
Stephen K. Bannon
But people don't remember, they controlled Mecca and Medina for almost a thousand years, I think.
Ed Martin
Right.
Stephen K. Bannon
Or 600 years they controlled the two holy sites and that's how they got. The Ottoman caliphate, got its source of legitimacy from doing that, driving those, driving the Turks out. And that's what the Arab revolt was about to drive the Turks.
Erik Prince
But remember, they built upon the infrastructure built by the Christian Eastern Empire.
Stephen K. Bannon
100%. Yes.
Erik Prince
The Byzantines, they subsumed the Byzantines and they extended Islam from there.
Stephen K. Bannon
All the administrative. I mean the Byzantine Empire was slightly bureaucratic. Right. They had a great head.
Erik Prince
That's where the word Byzantine comes from.
Stephen K. Bannon
Yes, exactly, exactly.
Erik Prince
But the fact is it was the Eastern Roman Empire and it worked. And it was a functioning high grade society and an Islamic invader took that over and then extended it by force.
Stephen K. Bannon
So now the Turks are back in. Right. I'm anti the Greater Israel Project. Right. So. But I keep saying for everybody that fought for Israel to have just a one state solution. You have a two state solution in Gaza. Right. There's no doubt the Qataris are funding it. Two million Gazans are going to stay and you've got the Turks organizing the UAE troops, the Egyptian troops and the Saudi troops in a security apparatus. So you have a two state solution. Now with the situation in Syria, you're actually partnering with the Turks even more, are you not? Yeah.
Erik Prince
I've largely given up on that region. I'm focused on other spots.
Stephen K. Bannon
How can you give up? I wanted to get to that. You were the axe in the space in that region. You knew more about that region and the players than anybody.
Erik Prince
And I guess.
Stephen K. Bannon
Hang on, we're leaving the Marine Corps hymn. Erik Prince is with us. We're going to talk about some geostrategic issues. We're also going to go to Philadelphia as soon as we get it sorted. Little rain there, but hey, rain never stopped the Marine Corps Back in a minute.
Erik Prince
Skin is waterproof.
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Stephen K. Bannon
Here's your host, Stephen K. Band the entire day. Today we are commemorating one of the institutions in our country, the United States Marine Corps. At the Q and A after the screening, we had the premiere of last 600 meters a couple weeks ago. One of the Marines, they had the heroes of the story there and one of the Marines said if you just let us do our job, we will never lose. If the politicians stay out of the way and they take us off the chain, there's nobody that can beat us. We will never lose. And the audience, it was very powerful. We have to be reminded of that, right?
Erik Prince
Take us off the chain. That was my podcast. It's called Off Leash for a Reason.
Stephen K. Bannon
We'll talk to you about your podcast. Siri. Look, the president, they're trying to. He's trying to juggle a lot of things. We are adamantly opposed to the Greater Israel Project, right? We are huge defenders of Israel. But this whole thing of the expansion into the Sinai, not our problem, not our issue. It's also going to destroy them because they don't really have the military wherewithal to do it. They don't have the troops. IDF is being. The IDF did not want to go back into Gaza to do this and.
Erik Prince
They had a huge amount of friendly fire casualties.
Stephen K. Bannon
What do you mean by that?
Erik Prince
Blue on blue, as in getting smacked by their own missiles.
Stephen K. Bannon
Their own. You mean just miscommunications Targeting problems.
Erik Prince
Yeah, look, urban fighting with that much firepower is very tough.
Stephen K. Bannon
And you see this in the movie tonight, Salusia, you got the danger close. The best of the best danger close.
Erik Prince
Is, you know, meters away. So, yes, the United States does not need to put a base in Syria if you want to have a commercial presence there. The Deir EZ Zor oil fields in the east, which is kind of the main asset that Syria had, was producing 400,000 barrels a day. Have that be operated by a Western company, put an airfield there, make that a commercial base, but not a US Military base. That way Syria can have US Presence, but it's commercial presence. It doesn't have to be uniformed active duty personnel.
Stephen K. Bannon
The President has been trying to pivot back to hemispheric defense. You and I have talked about this a lot. You're a huge proponent from the Arctic and Greenland to box in the Russian Navy all the way to the Panama Canal. And also reassert ourselves in a Monroe Doctrine 2.0 in Latin America. Whether that isand we still don't fully understand the bailout of Argentina, but that's part of a financial bailout, somehow get the Bolsonaros back. Although you got to play footage with Lula and the Marxists for a while, given their relationship with the Chinese Communist Party, you have to wean them off that. But Venezuela, a lot of our audience is just, they're sitting there, go. We don't get the Venezuelan part of this, particularly when you've got an amphibious Ready group of 4,000, you know, sailors and fleet Marines off of Venezuela and people are talking about going in and doing strikes to take the logistics hubs, the airfields, the television stations. What is your idea about what is going on in Venezuela now and what should be going on? Because you and I have talked about Venezuela, I don't know, for at least a decade. Right? You've had very definitive thoughts on this for a while.
Erik Prince
This is my frustration with the CIA that if you had the CIA that was offering practical, deliverable covert action programs to amp up and to actually deliver that kinetic pressure at the margin margin that the President could get the outcomes that he's seeking. Right. The fact is, a year ago July.
Stephen K. Bannon
In other words, you don't need to bring the big hammer of the fleet Marines down. If you had covert action, if you.
Erik Prince
Think about the continuum of Statecraft, you have 10% that can be done by diplomats and embassies. The other 10% should be the deterrence of a massive snarling attack dog of the conventional US Military waiting to be let off leash. And then, and then the 80% in the middle is the intelligence world where good covert action selectively engaging a couple of targets just inside Venezuela drives Maduro to a decision to say if I stay here, high chance I'm going to get injured.
Stephen K. Bannon
Hasn't he gone to president? President Trump said the other day that Maduro's agreed to everything that President Trump has said except for the immediate leaving and does he leave the country or does he go to Spain or something?
Erik Prince
He can go to Spain. It would be a huge infusion of capital for Spain's economy. Good for Spain. But look, you have to Maduro and the apparatchiks around him all have to go. It's not a matter of just him going. You have to get rid of Delsey Rodriguez and Jorge.
Stephen K. Bannon
And in fact the lieutenants are worse, lieutenants are worse than he was.
Ed Martin
Correct.
Erik Prince
And I think that's the other impediment.
Stephen K. Bannon
That the talk to us about some of those lieutenants. How bad are they?
Erik Prince
Diesado Cabello is the Minister of Interior and is a total gangster thug. Those are the kind of people that the CIA should take out because the fact is they completely stole the election a year ago July. And the Venezuelan narco and oil money funds all kinds of other leftist subversion and gangs and drug activity into the United States. That's our interest, interest making that stop. There is a legitimate election, a legitimate.
Stephen K. Bannon
Government waiting in the middle of Marco's interest in this because you've got the Venezuelans in South Florida who you know, and the Cubans and they see the road, the path to Havana goes through Caracas. Your thoughts?
Erik Prince
When Castro took over in 59, they attached themselves like a tick out of the Soviet Union and sucked those resources forces. Then when the Soviet union collapses in 91, they were kind of adrift for a while. They attached themselves to Venezuela, sent thousands and thousands of doctors and security apparatus.
Stephen K. Bannon
Personnel to get cash from the oil.
Erik Prince
Revenue, to take cash from the oil revenue. And so Cuba's economy is subsidized heavily by Venezuelan crude.
Stephen K. Bannon
And they're also, they've got intelligence or paramilitary full on fellow travel, fellow travelers. Okay, so what do you do with that situation? Some people think we're being pushed into this because of the, you know, the whole situation in Cuba.
Erik Prince
Well, the fact is the Marxist paradise in Cuba is an absolute total show. Even before this last hurricane, they couldn't even keep the electricity on for 12 hours a day. I mean there's actually starvation, there's no protein. When you're in Miami and you get a Miami taxi driver, a Cuban, that says, yes, my family, I have to send them sugar from Cuba or, sorry, from Florida back to Cuba because they can't even buy it in Cuba anymore.
Stephen K. Bannon
That's when you talk about COVID action, paramilitary activity. Do you put a bounty on Maduro and just finish it that way? That's.
Erik Prince
I wish the President would do that because they say they've raised the bounties on these. But if you read the findings print, it says 5 million, 10 million. 50 million for information leading to the arrest of. If they went back to kind of the old School Rooster Cogburn, U.S. marshall Approach. 50 million dead or alive. I think you'd see some generals in Venezuela would take that deal and, and.
Stephen K. Bannon
You might see Maduro negotiating his exit sooner to get the hell out of that.
Erik Prince
It would cause a clarity of mind, clarity of focus.
Stephen K. Bannon
But right now, 4,000 sailors and fleet marines off the coast.
Erik Prince
I doubt, I hope that the President would not invade Venezuela with that force package. Look, the fact is, a battalion of marines could take out the entire Venezuelan armed forces. Of this I have no doubt. Not the best. Not. That is not their best use. This is a role for the intelligence apparatus to apply very precise pressure on very, very bad people. Make them choose life and escaping with their ill gotten money.
Stephen K. Bannon
A leverageable moment, as we call it. Okay, stick around. We got a lot to talk about. Birch Gold. Take your phone out. We're gonna talk about phones in a minute. Take your phone out. Bannon text Bannon 989898 the ultimate guide for Investing in Gold and Precious Metals in the Age of Trump. This is an Iheart pod.
Podcast: Real America’s Voice
Episode: The War Room with Stephen K. Bannon, November 10th, 2025 (Ep. #4914)
Date: November 10, 2025
Host: Stephen K. Bannon
Featured Guests: Ed Martin, Erik Prince, Mark Wolf
This episode of The War Room is packed with forceful political commentary and commemoration, marking the 250th anniversary of the United States Marine Corps. The show’s primary focus is on President Trump’s controversial batch of pardons issued to allies tied to the 2020 election, in-depth discussion about the weaponization of government institutions, continued grievances about the 2020 election, and geostrategic insights spanning from American domestic affairs to foreign policy hotspots like Syria and Venezuela. The tone is combative, patriotic, and deeply skeptical of the Biden administration and so-called “mainstream narratives.”
Symbolic Meaning of Pardons:
“...symbolic or not, this is another symbol here that he’s simply not going to play by the rules...”
— Jonathan (01:51)
Legal Risks for Unindicted Allies:
“Some of these people were clearly considered unindicted co-conspirators...”
— Ken Delaney (03:12)
Purpose of Pardons for Alternate Electors:
“The pardon that came out today was pardoning these electors because... it’s exactly what you do when you operate the Constitution...”
— Ed Martin (10:10)
‘No MAGA Left Behind’:
“No MAGA left behind. We’re not in a time where we could debate this. People that were wronged by the Biden administration were targeted... We gotta try to fix that in every way.”
— Ed Martin (13:58)
On Progress Against Government Overreach:
“There's progress that's hard sometimes to show people... it's an inch at a time.”
— Ed Martin (23:31)
On Marine Corps Legacy:
“If you just let us do our job, we will never lose...”
— Marine (Q&A, as relayed by Bannon) (45:05)
Reflections on Blackwater Legal Targeting:
“They threw every aspect of the federal government at us... I was paying about $2.5 million a month for two years in legal fees."
— Erik Prince (36:09)
| Timestamp | Segment | Key Points/Quotes | |------------|-----------------------------------------------|---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| | 01:05 | Trump’s Pardons Announced | “...symbolic or not, this is another symbol...” | | 02:32 | Judge Wolf Resigns | “Silence for me is now intolerable.” | | 06:50 | Ed Martin’s Entrance & Pardons Rationale | “As long as America has the Marines, we’ll never fail, we’ll never fall.” | | 10:10 | Pardons for Alternate Electors | “Exactly what you do when you operate the Constitution.” | | 13:58 | “No MAGA Left Behind” | Pardons as remedy for political targeting | | 20:19 | “Name and Shame” Approach | Pledge to continue accountability campaigns | | 25:23 | Marine Corps Tributes, Schlafly | “Never wavered... she loved America.” | | 36:09 | Erik Prince on Government Targeting | “I was paying about $2.5 million a month for two years in legal fees.” | | 45:05 | Marine Corps’ Mission | “If you just let us do our job, we will never lose.” | | 48:08 | Venezuela Strategy | Critique of the CIA, covert action vs. overt invasion |