Buck Sexton (4:57)
Okay, now let's, let's take this apart a little bit and get into what he's saying. And notice I've been saying it to you for a long time. But just in advance of those remarks, what he, I had made the same case to you, which is that Trump has been right when it comes to big issues of trade, commerce, big issues of commerce, where the consensus such as that exists. You know, you can always argue what is the consensus and why do we think there is even such a thing? But such as it exists was wrong. It was wrong on China. Here, here's. You know, Trump came into office in 2016, and on China, China, he was taking positions that they said, oh, it's going to lead to a trade war. But we could even take it further back than that. It had been for decades before Trump even thought about or was really considering seriously running for president. I'm going back. You go back to the 80s, go back to the 90s. It had been the international elite consensus that if we just give China what it wants when it comes to trade, it will liberalize and democratize over time and everybody will win. And they let it in the wto, World Trade Organization. That was completely wrong. Right. There are a lot of different experts and think tanks and everything who for a long time were taking the position that all you have to do is just open up your markets to China. And as China buys our Coca Cola and as China starts importing all of our cheap stuff made in huge factories here, they're going to be all about human rights and democracy and freedom. Just give it time. Totally wrong. There's been no real evidence of that whatsoever. In fact, the opposite, you could argue, has occurred. And China has become more belligerent, more bellicose, more difficult to deal with as it has become wealthier. So we made China rich under the auspices of, this is going to help us and it's going to help national security. And, oh, that means that we're aware that trade and national security are things that intersect and that some things that are in your national security interest are not necessarily completely in your immediate trade interest, like being able to make your own antibiotics, being able to produce enough of your own microchips, you know, go down the line, a whole range of things. But we'll get more into that. Trump, though, sees this and he. It takes somebody like him who is willing to put this kind of political capital on the line to take this kind of a risk. And I will. I will be clear with you about this. It's a risk. It's a risk economically, financially for the country. But I think a couple things about it. One, it makes sense to me as he explains it, and as we see what's happening, there already have been countries. Just yesterday, Israel, Prime Minister Netanyahu said, look, we're getting rid of all. You know what? He's right. Let's get rid of all trade barriers with the United States and let's just continue to build that special relationship. Great. Look at that. There are other countries as well that have backed off a tariff that they have or they're, you know, this is all part of a negotiation. So as we go into some of the details here and I'll, I'll play more from Trump and more from Stephen Miller. Uh, yeah. Massive change is going to feel unsettling for people for a little bit. It's not going to just happen overnight and be perfect. But if you want to fix things, you have to be willing to take the actions to fix them and be in a position to do so. And like I said, Trump is willing to do this. He could be on the golf course with Clay right now. Hang. I mean, he actually might be, but I don't think he. I'm like, is he is claying his force him. But I'm, but I mean, he could be hanging on the golf course forever. He, he could just be. He's got billions of dollars, got grandkids and family and you know, he, he could just sail off into the sunset and enjoy himself at Mar a Lago. But instead he has taken it upon himself to try to do something incredibly important for the future of the country because he truly believes, believes in it. And he has, I have to look at the record here. He has been right on areas where the economic consensus has been against him. That is a fact. And so on this one, again, there are a lot of people, and there are some people that I respect a lot and like a lot on the right who are very concerned about this. And to them I just say, I think Trump has made a strong enough case and is in a strong enough position politically where. Let the man cook, let him do what he does. Let's see how he negotiates. Even Bill Ackman, right, who's a kind of a recent convert to the center, I would say he used to be a Democrat, Hillary supporter, etc. Bill Ackman is a multi billionaire hedge fund guy, investor guy, and he's along with Elon and some of these other very wealthy, very high IQ individuals, have realized Democrat party's insane. They're a bunch of lunatic, gender identity obsessed communists. So he says if you're going to be common sense, or he's seen if you're going to be common sense, you have to be a Republican. There's no other major political party for you to support right now. Maybe he calls himself an independent, I don't know. But I thought this was very, very astute observation from Bill Ackman. He, he put out on X. Sometimes the best strategy in a negotiation is convincing the other side that you are Crazy. Now I know some of you might be like, hey, Trump's not crazy. Well, yeah, he's not crazy, obviously. He's crazy like a fox in this context. Meaning he's a guy who needs the other side to believe that he's willing to do things that, that were impossible for American leadership to consider before, that there could be consequences and that's that. So that's a, that's a part of this. I've said to you before, I've explained, you know, we were just talking about who is the actor, I'm blanking on his name, who just, just passed away, who is in heat? Val Kilmer. Thank you. Val Kilmer. Val Kilmer's best role in my opinion. You can argue, I know some of you are going to say the doors, but I think Val Kilmer's best role for me is Tombstone where he plays Doc Holliday. And there's a great scene, I've mentioned this to you before in the context of foreign policy with Trump. I think it applies here too, where Wyatt Earp, very competently, very well played by Kurt Russell. They kind of, they throw the, the double barreled shotgun when they're about to have the shootout in the OK Corral. They didn't know it was going to be shootout, but they were preparing. He throws the shotgun and he goes, let's put Doc on the street. Howitzer. They might have less itchy trigger fingers as a result, something like that. Right. But let's put Doc Holliday on the street. Howitzer. Being you want the crazy guy with the bazooka is basically the idea in this analogy. Trump is the crazy guy with the bazooka on trade. You want, you want to play this game with him or you want to be reasonable? You want to be fair? You want to deal with the reciprocal tariffs? You know, for a guy who has survived two assassination attempts, two impeachments, you know, four baloney criminal trials. Beat the Hillary machine, beat the Biden, you know, Kamala machine. I think he's earned the right to try this his way and at least have those of us who have believed in him all along look at this and say, let's see what he can do. And just remember this catastrophism and selling panic. It's just such a cheap way of getting attention for so many people. It's, oh, you know, the sky is falling stuff. Cheap way of getting attention. Cheap way of having people think that you have something worthwhile to say. Stock market's gone down. Look at the stock market. It hasn't gone down in any meaningful way really since 2008 other than the pandemic drop. And the pandemic drop was completely a self inflicted wound. And anybody like me who was paying attention was like, well, this is going to be great because people are going to realize this is like a cold and we should just go back about our lives. And there's no, you know, the economy isn't destroyed by the pandemic. That was just lunatics who made it anyway. So, yeah, there may be, there may be something of a, of a drop in the stock market for a bit. I believe it will be temporary. Look, if it's not temporary, then the American people can go and vote and they can hold Trump and the Republicans accountable for this decision the next time around. I think they're going to say when it comes time for that, wow, what leadership. Look at how things are going better for us now. And that's what leadership is. When you have what you believe truly based on all your wisdom and all of your life experience and all of your expertise, this is the right thing to do. It's in the best interest of the people I lead and I'm going to do it because of that. I'm not going to sit around and, you know, oh, which way is the wind blowing? So this is what Liberation Day is about.
