← The Isabel Brown Show
The Isabel Brown Show
Why Young Americans Are FURIOUS About The 50-Year Mortgage Plan, H1B Visas, & Feckless Conservatism
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- [00:00]
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Isabel Brown
Gen Z is big, big mad about the 50 year mortgage, 600,000 Chinese college students, and H1B visas among so many other things. And it begs the question, is Washington D.C. just totally missing the mark for young people? Yeah, they are. And the secret is pretty clear. It's because they're not conservative enough. We're breaking it down today on the Isabel Brown Show. Gen Z voters have a lot of big feelings this week related to our government leadership. And honestly, rightfully so. There are tweets just like this one going viral all over the Internet in the last 24 hours or so about the week of crazy policy ideas that are happening before our eyes in Washington, D.C. wall Street MAV says it hasn't been a good week for policy ideas floated by the White House. We've been talking about 50 year mortgages, $2,000 tariff stimulus checks that Americans are not talented enough to do jobs, which is why we need more H1B visas and bringing 600,000 Chinese students into American universities and college campuses to keep liberal universities alive. When you read it like that, it hurts. It hurts a little bit extra and it hurts maybe a little bit more for me because last week, as you guys might remember, I was on an election night panel in New York City at of all places, cnn and I was asked point blank about the tanking youth approval ratings for the Trump administration. The moderator at CNN claimed that young people were falling in their support of the policies coming out of Washington, D.C. in particular the the Washington White House administration. More than any other demographic of people that young people were, were losing their support more than any other age group. And this is backed up by a whole lot of polls out there. Pew Research says among Trump voters under age 35, the approval rating of his performance dropped from 95% approval at the start of this term to around 69% recently. That's a decline of about 26 percentage points. And that mirrors a CBS News YouGov poll among American voters under age 29. So those of us who are clearly Gen Z voters where approval rating for President Trump fell from 55% nationally across all political spectrums right after the inception of the administration to about 28% by the end of July. That's a drop of about 27 points. Why is this happening? When I was asked this at CNN last week, here's what I had to say then. Where young conservative men are at right now, they are wanting reinvestment in our own communities, politicians who are elected to represent we the people, instead of constantly making every single political conversation about something happening on the other side of the globe. If anything, I think any declining support for our president, of which, you know, that's a poll, I don't know how much we really want to trust that at this point. But if anything, I would argue young men probably don't think President Trump is conservative enough. And I think America is in for a very strong wake up call of what that looks like. Well, and I mean it, I mean it even more now, actually a week and some change later. Let me spell it out even more simply for you. Young people are frustrated with what is happening in Washington, particularly young conservative people and notably young conservative men, because we believe our leadership has not been conservative enough in their policy, in their messaging, in what we are enacting in real time, etc. I have been saying for years that the world, but even the right, is in for a rude awakening with just how conservative this generation actually is. I literally wrote the book, it's hiding behind my shoulder about how Gen Z is the most culturally and politically conservative generation since World War II and was laughed, casually offset at every single cable news network radio station podcast where I was promoting my book in the spring of 2024 last year. Because all those silly Gen Zers, all you silly Gen zers still have 37 genders and rainbow hair and you're going to school to study ethnic studies and gender studies. You guys aren't conservative. Lo and behold, we dramatically proved them wrong last November. But we still are, day in and day out because we are the most conservative generation culturally and politically in modern American history. And honestly, we're just done. I think as a generation accepting this is the best we can do. Politics we are, we want the American government to put the American people first, to be a government that was elected by the people, of the people and for the people. And we don't think that's a particularly controversial thing to say so when we see weeks like this, I'll throw this tweet back up on the screen for you from Wall Street Mav. When we see weeks with the solutions proposed for the problems young people are dealing with, completely misreading where young people are at, our passions rise. Because this fundamentally misses the mark for where real young people are at in the real world right now. People are already memeing this week, which I find phenomenal. God, I love meme culture. It just never really gets old. And the Gen Z stare championed by none other than Sydney Sweeney is the response to some of these policies that we've seen in the last couple of days. I think I have this meme to throw up for you. The Gen Z stare. When we hear that our government wants more H1B visas to have Americans be replaced by 600,000 Chinese students at universities and that the economy is the best it's ever been. Go off Queen. We love it. So look, I'm not putting this episode together to drag the Trump administration through the mud. We're going to get to this at the end of the episode. To the contrary, actually, I think the Trump administration, particularly Trump 45 read the room and was better in results for young people than any administration, certainly in my lifetime, but probably in modern history. But this particular week there seems to be some elbows rubbing, some clashing feelings, some missing the mark and misreading the room with the solutions that are actually going to help young people and with understanding why we are so upset with these proposed ideas coming out of Washington D.C. and I think it's important to for us as conservatives to hash out these ideas in real time. Because unlike the left, we are not an ideological monolith. We don't just blindly say, yep, cool, I forgot that we literally believed the opposite of that five minutes ago. And now I'm just going to salute and do my thing and get in line with the party. We believe in bringing bad ideas into the light and replacing them with good ideas through good old fashioned debate. So as we're watching this debate unfold on social media, we wanted to bring you guys into this conversation here on the Isabel Brown show as well. That said, I think we should start with this 50 year mortgage concept. In case you haven't heard of this and you're not as chronically online as I am, one of the solutions proposed by the Trump administration and the executive branch of our government this week to make it easier and more possible for young people, young families to purchase and own their first home was to change our structure of mortgages in America from 30 years to 50 years because it would theoretically lower the monthly payment on your principal that you owe on the home that you pay month to month. President Trump specifically defended this idea on Laura Ingram's show while interviewed by Fox News this week. And here's what he had to say.
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Laura Ingraham
Housing costs are still out of reach. And another thing that your administration is trying to tackle. Many Americans, the average age of first time homebuyers are now up to age 40, which is sad. The country, you and I inherited that.
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Donald Trump
Look, you have to understand, right?
- [09:10]
Laura Ingraham
But let me get to the question though, because your housing director has proposed something that has enraged your MAGA friends, which is this 50 year mortgage idea. So a significant MAGA backlash, calling it a giveaway to the banks and simply prolonging the time it would take for Americans to own a home outright. Is that really a good idea?
- [09:31]
Donald Trump
It's not even a big deal. I mean, you know, you go from 40 to 50 years and what it means is you pay, you pay something less from 30 that some people had a 40 and then now they have a 50. All it means is you pay less per month. You pay it over a longer period of time. It's not like a big factor. It might help a little bit. But the problem was that Biden did this. He increased the interest rates and I have a lousy Fed person who's going to be gone in a few months.
- [09:58]
Isabel Brown
In fairness, that is true. President Trump has asked the Fed to lower interest rates probably like 60 or 70 times since he took office in January. He is begging the Fed to lower interest rates, which really is one of the primary issues that young people are not buying homes. They can't afford to buy homes because why would we ever buy a home with a ridiculously high interest rate that we will never be able to pay off even if we could afford the monthly principle. It just doesn't make any financial sense whatsoever. But Laura Ingram touched a nerve there. And I think this is interesting to unpack because clearly this has touched a larger nerve with the MAGA base. People are really, really upset with the idea of a 50 year mortgage. Of course, a lot of the apologists for this idea are saying, oh, if you don't like a 50 year mortgage, just don't get one, which I'm never a fan of as a political argument. That's literally the same as if you don't like abortions, don't get one. Which is empowering. The death of 3,000 innocent children in our country every day. We've used that exact same logic throughout every crisis in human history. If you don't like it, just don't do it. This is actually going to fundamentally change the housing market as we know it and make things over the long term significantly worse for affordability when it comes to young people. We're going to unpack that here together. But interestingly, the short term looks like a better solution, right? It looks like, oh, you'll pay less per month in your principal, basically the version of your rent when you are buying a house. Because I know none of us know how buying a house actually works as a generation because no one took the time to actually educate us in the broken American education system how this process works. But Laura Ingram was retorting there with some really interesting true pieces of information. She brought up the average, the mean home buyer age now being about 40 years old. For first time homebuyers in the United States, the median age of a new home buyer. Let me pull this up for you. Is actually up to age 61. The median age of a home buyer, this is from AF post in the US now stands at 61 years old with first time homebuyers hitting a record low of 21%. Just as Trump plans to unveil a 50 year mortgage, the age of first time homebuyers also reached a recent high. That being that mean figure, the average figure Laura Ingram tossed in that interview of about 40 years old. Maybe it's me, but this whole conversation about policy mattering matters so much more after I became a mom, and more on that in a second. But especially after having my daughter, I've started to realize that every decision I make about my health too isn't just about me anymore. It's about showing up for my daughter Isla, being present for all of her milestones and, and having the energy to keep up with her for decades to come. That is a totally different kind of motivation. But here's the problem. Our healthcare system is built to be reactive. You wait until something's wrong and then you try to fix it. So when you want to take a proactive approach, it can be really hard to know where to even start. That's exactly why I have been partnering with Jevoty. They make proactive health easier than ever. Jevoti offers tons of different membership tiers so that you can choose what fits you, your specific health needs. You get comprehensive at home blood draws, testing over 100 different health markers way beyond what your standard checkup at the doctor's office covers. They have personalized health plans with custom supplement protocols, access to functional longevity specialists for ongoing guidance, plus discounts on all kinds of supplements and specialty testing. Jevoty is now available in 47 states across the country. So if you are ready to be there for the people that you love, not just today, but for decades to come, use code Isabelle at the link in the show notes of Today's episode for 20% off because investing in your health now means so much more time with the people who matter the most. So since people are waiting until they are 40 plus to purchase their first home, I think it begs the question why? Why? Why are we waiting to buy homes? Why can't we afford homes? Why are we choosing not to purchase them if it doesn't make financial sense for us? And we're going to solicit some of your answers here that I asked last night to share on the show today. But the solution being this 50 year mortgage concept as a better short term cost saving solution maybe isn't really addressing the problem. People are starting to ask AI like chat, GPT and grok hey, how does this impact long term affordability? Turns out according to AI, most Americans are moving every on average about five years. I have a graph to share it with you here. Most Americans are moving about every five years. Here's what happens in those first five years. On a mortgage of $500,000 at a 5% interest rate you build actual principal versus you bleed actual interest. So you are bleeding more interest than you are building principal the longer your mortgage is getting. Typically we look at a 30 year mortgage. So look at that third row of this chart where the principal, the value in the home that you are building, the equity in the home that you are building is about $41,000 over 30 years or in those first five years rather on a $500,000 mortgage. But you are losing $120,000 in interest and that goes up substantially while print principal that you are building goes down substantially when you increase the length of a mortgage over 50 years. Let's put this even more simply actually I just asked Chat in general what happens when you have a 30 year versus a 50 year mortgage about affordability and the answer is actually quite Disastrous on a 6% fixed interest rate for a $500,000 house. Which side note just by the way, good luck, good luck buying a $500,000 house if you live in Cleveland. Maybe my sister lives in Cleveland for medical school right now. Sure you can buy a $500,000 house, but this as the general rule of Thumb a half a million dollar house for a safe, wonderful family home in an area that you can enjoy living in for a longer period of your life. If you are in any major metropolitan area in the country, good luck finding something for 500,000. But let's pretend you can. At a 6% fixed mortgage rate, for a 30 year mortgage, your monthly payment is just under $3,000 a month. So over 30 years you are paying about $1 million, about $1.1 million. With your interest specifically being more than the value of the house, $579,000. That alone is insane. And that's why young people aren't buying houses. But then if you bring that monthly payment down $200, that's it. That's the affordability solution here. To have people pay $200 less for their monthly payment. At 2750, the total amount you are going to pay over 50 years goes up from $1 million to $1.7 million with over $1.1 million paid in interest. That's insane. You're saving $250 a month versus a 30 year mortgage, but you are paying $571,000 more in the extra interest paid. I don't know about you, but this to me is not, hey, let's help young people afford homes. This is telling young people, actually you're never really going to own it outright because if you buy your first house at 30 years old and the life expectancy in our country is 78, really, the bank is always going to own your house and you are going to owe us so much in interest that you fundamentally never will be able to pay off your mortgage. You will never own your home outright, which is not a conservative value at all. It's giving, you will own nothing and you will be happy. It's giving Klaus Schwab, it's giving World Economic Forum. None of this is giving American Dream at all. It's not really more affordable. But neither, by the way, are the so called solutions that the left is proposing either. And I find it really interesting that this 50 year mortgage thing was pitched as a solution to affordability. The week after everyone was talking about affordability being the primary reason that Zo Ron Momdani won the New York City mayoral election. So Rahmani's solution to home affordability is for the government to just repatriate all of the privately owned homes and housing developments in New York City, for the government to seize the means of production, for the government to freeze rent to put up more affordable housing units et cetera and it's still the same problem. It's too much involvement by the governments or big banks and not putting control of housing and actual ownership stake back in the hands of the people. I follow a guy on X who I really really love in the Catholic world. His name is Patrick. He has a substack called Catholic Pat and he put out this analysis on his sub stack today that I think totally nailed. The problem with the 50 year mortgage idea and Zoran Mamdani's problems, he says here's the problem with both solutions. Trump's 50 year mortgage lowers your monthly payment by like $200. Okay, great. So you have more money left over each month. Okay, great for what? To consume more? To hoard more cash in your checking account? If you are paying a mortgage for 50 years, you don't really own that house. You are renting it from the bank. Again, it's giving. You will own nothing and be happy. With the average age of first time home buyers hitting 38 years old, you will probably be dead before you ever pay off your mortgage. The mortgage optimizes for money, not for ownership, which is where real wealth is built. The same goes for progressive proposals like cheap rent or rent control. Allah Zo run Momdani. They keep more money in your pocket each month, but they don't help you own anything. You are permanently renting your apartment, permanently dependent on landlords or government assistance. You are optimizing for consumption, not for wealth building. Both sides are trying to help people make a living by giving them more spending money. Neither side is asking how do we help people actually own something Brilliant. No notes Catholic Pat. You 100% hit the nail on the head. And it is precisely just how far our conservative government is missing the mark on what it means to actually conserve things like generational wealth. Being able to own a home outright and pass it down to your children. Being able to raise your kids in the same community where you grew up. Which is something that I for one could never afford to do. I can't afford a home in my hometown and that's devastating. That's heartbreaking. That is not American or conservative. And it's something that we need to be talking about if we are serious about restoring the American dream. The truth is though, I'm not an economist and I know most of you are not either. Money makes literally no sense to me, probably because I never received a financial education from our broken American education system. So I don't know what the exact answer is to fix the housing crisis among our generation. Chances Are it is wildly complex and there are multiple factors that are going to have to play in here to allow Americans to own their family homes and be able to share that with our children. But I think there's a few pretty good places to start. When the 50 year mortgage idea was first being floated, I tweeted, hear me out. Maybe Instead of a 50 year mortgage, we make it illegal for BlackRock subsidiary corporations to just buy up all of the single family homes in this country, which some estimates are suggesting now that they will own 60% of single family homes by 2030. That's lovely. Maybe we ban illegal immigrants from living in section 8 or affordable housing or I don't know, just outright we ban property taxes. That's where my head's at. And yesterday I decided to solicit your feedback on Instagram and X as well. I asked you guys in an Instagram poll on my story on the 50 year mortgage plan, do you think it's great or are you not a fan at all? With about 7,000 votes in from you guys, 94% of you say the 50 year mortgage sucks. I do not want to vote for this. And then on Instagram I solicited, Instead of the 50 year mortgage, I want this instead. Listen to these answers because this tells me where the base is at and you just have to ask people where they are. April lower interest rates. To be fair, Trump really is trying to do that. It's the Fed that won't do it. We've got MZ Lewis illegals out tax advantaged savings accounts for buying a home. Idk Colin. I'm very uninformed on this, but I think we should penalize companies, big corporations that are buying large swaths of land. Hmm, interesting. Good bowl outdoors. Ban groups like BlackRock from investing in housing. TL Mace lower interest rates for first time buyers. Suede the Ripper. End income taxes and end property taxes. Hmm. Jess no income tax. No property tax. WB Raider more tax credits. Seems to me like a trend is happening here. What a fascinating idea. More than abolishing income and property taxes though, there was one answer that was more common than any other answer. And this is where young American voters and people are at. From S. Bella 83. Deporting illegals. Deport illegals and revoke housing vouchers. Jim F Removes several millions of people that are here illegally and their housing subsidies. Period. Full stop. Mass deportations. Mass deportations. Mass deportations. Mass deportations. I have thousands of these responses from you guys on Instagram alone. If you guys have been following me for years, you'll know that we have dog hair, like on every surface of my house. I call it Corgi Glitter, much to my mother's chagrin. She hates it. Every once in a while it'll even make it. Oh, there's one right here on my microphone here in the studio. Which is why I am so grateful that our family has partnered with Rabbit Air to have air filtration throughout our whole house. 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You can visit rabbit air.com or call them 24. 7 to speak to a Rabbit Air consultant. I asked you on X, are you in favor of the 50 year mortgage plan? 88% of you? No, I hate it. Okay. Do you think the 50 year mortgage plan will help you buy a house? 86% of you? No, it will not help me buy a house. What's the single biggest obstacle for you to afford buying a home? 37% of you the cost of the down payment and 43% of you the monthly mortgage cost. Interesting. I don't think $200 a month is going to be dramatic. To help you with there, if I haven't purchased a home yet in my life, why is that 57% of you? I am single, I am not in a committed relationship relationship and I'm not married. So maybe we should be incentivizing marriage a little bit more. And I said finally, what solutions do you propose other than the 50 year mortgage plan? Let's read this. Reduction in regulations, especially environmental to new home construction, that is less government involvement in the process, prevent corporations from buying single homes Cut property taxes. Cut income taxes. As in get rid of them. Deport all illegals. Deport all illegal immigrants. Deport tens of millions of illegal immigrants. Stop corporations from buying homes. Kill our entitlement programs that inflate the cost of everything. Lisa Deport all illegals. Housing will open up and be more plentiful. If kids were born here, they can come back when they become adults. Pay down our debt. Doge all government entities. This is fascinating stuff. Mass deportations. Mass deportations. Mass deportations. Get rid of every illegal immigrant. That's where young people are at. But those in the Executive branch as well as those in the legislative branch don't seem to understand why we are so radicalized for these crazy ideas. So indulge me for a minute while we go on this rant. Benny Johnson has an interesting theory as to why this is happening. He tweeted a shocking graph last night about the percentage of people in Congress that are over the age of 70 years old and he says, I wonder why the economy feels completely rigged for old people and gives no hope to young people. Oh wait. Dot dot dot. Look at this graph over time of the percent of Congress that is over the age of 70. Let me say out front, there is nothing wrong with being over the age of 70. There's nothing wrong with being an older person. We need to respect those older than us in our society because they have a lot of wisdom and lessons to teach us. But I have always said, and I will say until my dying breath, wisdom does not always directly correlate with age and there is no better example of that than the United States Congress. Period. Four Full stop. We have been pushing for term limits in Congress because of corruption, but frankly I think we need to be pushing for age limits. Age ceilings too. Because it is wildly obvious to me this week, maybe more than any other time except the Ban TikTok era. Does the wi fi in my house connect to the home TikTok signal era? That was a rough time in government that these people have no realm of concept for the reality that young Americans are living in. They have no idea what our day to day issues are when it comes to affordability, buying a house, who we're up against in the job market, why we have so many student loans, the fact that we will never be able to probably pass generational wealth down to our children. They have no concept of that because the vast majority of these people over the age of 70 in Congress have been suckling off the government teat. Literally sorry to be graphic, for longer than Twice the time I've been alive. If the retirement age is 65, it is unacceptable to me that 50 members, half of the United States Senate are over the age of 65 and nearly 150 members of the US House are over the age of 65. If you are too old to be allowed to pilot a commercial airplane, to serve in our military, to be a law enforcement officer, you should not be able to sell out the financial future of your constituents to personally benefit your bank account for decades upon decades upon decades. And I'm looking at you, Nancy Pelosi and Co. When I say that you are literally not allowed to be on the board of directors where your whole job is to just show up once a quarter or less and vote on a handful of things at a certain age cap, which is typically under 70 at most major Fortune 500 companies at Apple, Disney, Coca Cola, Boeing, Proctor and Gamble, Johnson and Johnson, IBM, Exxon Mobil and most other publicly traded companies. 70 is too old for you to even sit on the board. But you want me to really blow your mind. If we set a 70 year age cap, a 70 year old age cap in Congress, that would eliminate a third of the United States Senate, 33 members and 86 members of the United States House. That's insane reminder, by the way, that the literal life expectancy of America is 78 years old. So when we're talking about stuff like a 50 year mortgage, we're talking to people who literally have a few years left in their life. They're not thinking about the long term financial implications on tens of millions of young families who are desperately trying to make anything work for ourselves and for our children. They're not thinking that the average rent in most of these big cities that young people are paying is $3,000 a month. I looked this up. Average rent in the top biggest cities, top 10 biggest cities in the United States today is about $3,000 a month for like a studio apartment. That's what young people are dealing with. They're not thinking, how am I going to afford school tuition, college tuition, savings accounts for health care problems for my kids, buying a car, saving up to send my kids off into the world and to achieve their dreams. They've already been there and done that. So there is a clear generational moving of the tectonic plates that is happening here in Washington D.C. where those older than us who are occupying arguably the vast majority of power in Washington D.C. do not have the same vested interest in the future of the American individual family, but certainly in the financial future of our country as well. And that's now manifesting this week in some other policy ideas too, like education, where it's being floated that we should bring in additional 600,000 college students from China. When millions of young people here are struggling to get a job, they are struggling to get scholarships to go to school. They are struggling with thousands upon thousands upon thousands of dollars in student debt that they, they probably never will be able to pay off. Nayland Haley, the son of Nikki Haley, who we're very much hoping to have on the show in the next couple of days, made his Fox News debut earlier this week as a Gen Z who was specifically saying our leadership is not conservative enough. And he said that not one, not one of his friends out of college has a job yet, despite going to the best schools and getting a top tier education. And maybe most shockingly, I think, is watching this generational tug of war being felt not just on home buying, not just on education, not just on the economy, but on the immigration front as well. And as we're watching this argument play out in real time in Washington, D.C. it's really obvious to me that there is a missing of the mark when it comes to where real people, particularly real young people are at versus everyone who lives in the Washington, D.C. bubble. I have a unique circumstance where I live in the Washington, D.C. bubble and I brush elbows with it every single day. So I am watching this play out in real time and my message to you guys here in the bubble is very, very simple. Spend five minutes outside of the bubble, please, for the love of God. Because when I'm watching, I don't know, conversations about H1B visas happening, it goes to show just how much our elected representatives are misunderstanding what is going to solve the problems that young American citizens are dealing with. In that same Laura Ingraham interview, President Trump defended the use of H1B visas and talked about how there is not enough talent when it comes to the American worker population. So we need to be bringing people in from other countries. Here's what he had to say.
- [34:10]
Donald Trump
There's never going to be a country like what we have right now. And does that mean Republicans have to talk about it?
- [34:15]
Laura Ingraham
And does that mean the H1B visa thing will not be a big priority for your administration? Because if you want to raise wages for American workers, you can't flood the country with tens of thousands or hundreds.
- [34:26]
J.D. Vance
Of thousands of foreign workers.
- [34:27]
Donald Trump
Also do have to bring in talent.
- [34:29]
Laura Ingraham
When we have plenty of talented people.
- [34:31]
Donald Trump
No, you don't.
- [34:32]
Laura Ingraham
We don't. Have talented people here.
- [34:33]
Donald Trump
No, you don't have, you don't have certain talents and you have to, people have to learn. You can't take people off an unemployment, like an unemployment line and say, I'm going to put you into a factory, we're going to make missiles. Or I'm going to put, how did.
- [34:45]
Laura Ingraham
We ever do it before?
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Donald Trump
Well, let me, I'll give you an example. In Georgia, they raided because they wanted illegal immigrants out. They had people from South Korea that made batteries all their lives. You know, making batteries are very complicated. It's not an easy thing and very dangerous. A lot of explosions, a lot of problems. They had like five or six hundred people, early stages to make batteries and to teach people how to do it. Well, they wanted them to get out of the country. You're going to need that, Laura. I mean, I know you and I disagree on this. You can't just say a country's coming in, going to invest $10 billion to build a plant and going to take people off an unemployment line who haven't worked in five years and they're going to start making missiles. It doesn't work that way.
- [35:30]
Isabel Brown
So apparently we don't have enough talented people in the United States. And honestly I understand why the President would say that, but I think that's an indictment not on the American citizenry on our education system putting a band aid on a bullet hole and saying, oh, we'll just make up for the deficit and bring in literally hundreds of thousands of people every single year from other countries who have gotten their crap together when it comes to their education systems, training in stuff like STEM and technology specific jobs instead of, I don't know, ethnic studies and underwater lesbian basket weaving. That is not solving the problem like at all. And maybe the problem is way more complex than do we encourage more H1B visas or not. Maybe the problem is should we completely overhaul the American education system, which is not an easy solution. That's going to take a long time. There's going to be a lot of pain points associated with all of that. But that's solving the underlying problem, not putting a band aid on a bullet hole. Maybe it's just being disillusioned with everything happening in politics, but my faith feels way more important to incorporate into my day to day routine so much more than just doom scrolling aimlessly on X. And that's exactly what I tried to remind myself this morning. If you are also looking for a quick but meaningful way to help you engage with scripture more deeply every single Sunday and every day of the week too. You can check out the Breaking the Bread devotionals from the St. Paul Center. These pocket sized devotionals are stunningly beautiful. They are full color clothbound companions for your Sunday worship. Each week features rich reflections on the Gospel readings, corresponding teachings from the catechism, and sacred art that brings God's Word to life. I went back and I reread last Sunday's Gospel readings this morning and it was just a really powerful, peaceful, beautiful way to recenter myself on what the week is all about and what we're doing here as people. Because it matters so much more than arguing for politics on the Internet. Whether you're reading before church, with a cozy cup of coffee in your small group or during quiet time with God, breaking the bread helps you to slowly slow down, to reflect and to truly encounter Scripture in a very meaningful way. You can use code ISABELLE20 to get 20% off the complete set at St. Paul center st.paulcenter.com breakingthebread or visit the link in today's show notes there's a whole fascinating conversation unfolding right now among the political conservative echelon about legal immigration. And I think it's an important conversation for us to be having because even within the Trump administration, you're seeing dual interests and dual points of views and perspectives play out in real time here. This morning I was supposed to be on Fox News and we ended up getting bumped because a handful of the members of the Cabinet were on Fox and Friends this morning instead. And I was sitting in the control room listening to Kristi Noem talk about how we have more people being naturalized now. And that's a good thing. Here's what she had to say. What is the administration's position on these visas?
- [38:45]
Kristi Noem
We're going to keep using our visa programs. We're just going to make sure that they have integrity, that we're actually doing the vetting of the individuals who come into this country, that they want to be here for the right reasons, that they're not supporters of terrorists and organizations that hate America. And that's what I think is so remarkable, is under the Trump administration, we've sped up our process and added integrity to the visa programs, to green cards, to all of that. But also more people are becoming naturalized under this administration than ever before. More people are becoming citizens because we're not just streamlining and building some processes back into our immigration policies. We're also making sure that these individuals that are coming into our country and get that privilege, that they actually are here for the right reasons. The Biden administration let thousands of terrorists into this country. They opened the southern border, they abused our asylum programs, abused our protective programs and visa programs, and we fixed all of it. It's remarkable what President Trump has done, and it's because he's a great leader, he's a visionary, and this man is going to go down as a legend in history, as our greatest president ever.
- [39:51]
Isabel Brown
It is. It is remarkable what he has done. And we talked about this the other day, that there have been literally zero people walk across our southern border since we had President Trump really take ownership of this issue in the last few months. That is a win. But you said the quiet part out loud there in the middle of that interview, Secretary Noem, you. You literally said, oh, yeah. Under the Biden administration, we let in thousands upon thousands upon thousands of terrorists into our country, and we haven't deported all of those people. There are millions of people that are here from just the years of the Biden administration alone that are completely unaccounted for. They're still here. They're theoretically voting in our elections. In places like New York City, where you don't need to show an id. They're still threatening terror attacks in the United States of America. Was there not a radical Islamic terror plot thwarted in Dearborn, Michigan last week? Has it not been verified that Denver International Airport, my home airport growing up, has arrested more than 50, 50 card carrying members of Al Qaeda over the past few years? Coming through D E N DIA, as we call it as Colorado natives. Seems to me that maybe we should just halt the immigration process entirely until we can get a handle on who is in our country, on who is occupying American affordable housing, on who is taking American available jobs, on who is taking spots in American public schools that should be going to citizens at the better schools. And as this all pertains to H1B visas, obviously this is a very nuanced conversation. We don't have a whole lot of time to get into it on the show today. But Matt Walsh had a really great point on this this morning that I wanted to highlight that he tweeted. He said, even if it were true, that we don't have enough talented people in this country, which it isn't, that would be. This is exactly what I said to my husband over a cup of coffee this morning in our living room. All the more reason to stop importing foreigners. That is putting a band aid on a bullet hole. We need to train our own people, fix the education system in our country, give actual Americans a shot A shot to be talented, to be educated, to be well equipped to succeed. America is for Americans. At some other point, I would love to do like a full breakdown episode with you guys about the difference between an H1B visa, which is a skilled worker visa, versus a genius visa. There are a few different options for that, but, like, nobody is upset that the Elon Musk of the world are coming to the United States and wanting to be here and bring their business here and help the economy and employ thousands upon thousands of people. If you are a true genius, Allah and Elon Musk, you are not an H1B visa recipient, period. You're just not. The genius visa is what we should be focusing on as. Yeah, of course we would want the. One of the. One of the 1% of the most skilled, genius, innovative people coming to our country to make our country better. That's not what we're talking about with H1B visas. We're talking about literally like half a million people brought here every single year to take jobs that otherwise could be going to Americans. And again, I mentioned we'll get into that maybe in another episode, the Genius vs H1B visa. But on the H1B visa conversation, I mentioned some people are getting it. And there is this dual competing narrative, even from within the Trump administration, specifically between President Trump and Kristi Noem And Vice President J.D. vance, who just two weeks ago, a little over two weeks ago, had this to say about H1B visas on Newsmax.
- [43:38]
J.D. Vance (continued)
But I make a couple points about this. First of all, I've heard a lot of the criticisms, the fear that we're going to have a brain drain. If you go back to the 50s and 60s, the American space program, the program that was the first to put a human being on the surface of the moon, was built by American citizens, some German and Jewish scientists who had come over during World War II to, but mostly by American citizens who had built an incredible space program with American talent. This idea that American citizens don't have the talent to do great things, you have to import a foreign class of servants and professors to do these things. I just reject that. I actually think we invest in our own people. We can do a lot of good. You've heard that criticism in particular as the President has talked about cracking down on foreign. Foreign student visas and their abuses. But I think that's actually an opportunity for American citizens to really flourish.
- [44:31]
Isabel Brown
God, I love this man. If he's not our next president, I will be very, very upset. And he even went a step further about limiting H1B visas. He was asked point blank, should we be limiting immigration in total at Ole Miss, when he was speaking in Charlie's place just a few days ago at the this Is the Turning Point tour, taking open questions from the audience, soliciting people's feedback, and he said we should not be afraid of putting a moratorium on legal immigration.
- [45:04]
J.D. Vance
So what is your view on legal immigration? Should we reduce it? Also? What is your plan for a merit based system? Yes, sir. Well, I appreciate the question. And look, my honest view is that right now America thanks in parts the Biden border invasion, but also thanks in part, in part to a lot of bad immigration policy right now, we have let in too many immigrants into the United States of America. That is just a fundamental reality now. Now, look, legal immigration is complicated because we let in about a million legal immigrants into the United States of America every single year. And I think the evidence is pretty clear that a lot of those immigrants are actually undercutting the wages of American workers. It's one of the reasons why the President of the United States States. It's one of the reasons why the president, United States and a lot of us in the administration have encouraged H1B reform. Because if you look at the H1B visa, what it's supposed to be, what it's supposed to be is that you have a super genius who's studying at an American university, who's working at a great company. You want that super genius to stay in the United States of America and not go somewhere else. What it's actually used to do is hire an accountant at a 50% discount to an American citizen. I don't think that we should be hiring accountants from foreign countries when we've got accountants right here in the United States that would love to work for a good wage.
- [46:24]
Isabel Brown
That's what not missing the mark looks like. That's what understanding where young, real people, particularly young, real families are at. So when we're watching this competing narrative thing play out in real time in Washington, D.C. and beyond, I think we have to ask ourselves, where do we go from here? What does this mean for the future of conservatism? What does this mean when it comes to our governance strategy on the right? The Trump administration, as I said at the top of the show, has been more beneficial economically, especially in the Trump 45 term, even more than now to young people, more than any other presidential administration in my lifetime. And I think that's why this week feels so randomly out of touch and completely missing the mark. Comparatively because our standard of comparison is the literal only administration in modern history that has historically understood where real people are at and then has governed appropriately. You saw that on the campaign for the 2020 or, sorry, 2016 election and how the Trump 45 administration governed. You saw that in the campaign this last go around, even being willing to go on the BRO podcasts to speak to young people about what we were going through and to govern appropriately. But it's seeming to me that for whatever reason, once we are back in power, we're afraid of governing again. As conservatives, we're afraid of going on offense instead of just opposing bad ideas from the left. We are afraid of doing the hard thing and we are afraid of saying the hard thing. We are afraid of conserving our society. But why? Because there's a threat of being impeached. They're going to impeach you anyway because there's a threat of bad media coverage. They're going to lie about you and smear you all over the media anyway. That's what we did our episode about yesterday. Because you want to leave a strong legacy after you leave office, your legacy is going to be dependent upon how your supporters feel about how you governed with the situation that we're currently in as a society. And asking those questions isn't saying that you're disloyal or you're abandoning the cause. I know some people are saying that out there this week. That's ridiculous, frankly. But it's because we believe in the cause now more than ever before. How do we turn the ship around? End Wokeness suggested this on X and totally hit the nail on the head. Trump should host a meal in the White House with a randomized selection of Trump supporters to discuss their concerns. It would do wonders. Hmm. The bottom line is this. Conservatism is based in fundamentally hashing out ideas, having real conversations out in the open. Because we are not a monolith ideologically. We don't have a prescribed bullet point list of authoritarian concepts that we all just have to agree to. And the moment you disagree with one, you are excommunicated from the party. Conservatism is an opportunity for genuine debate, not just among those in power, but among those who elect those in power. I think this week has been a really powerful window into what that debate is supposed to look like. Not that you're abandoning your cause, you're abandoning your side of the aisle, you're abandoning your preferred politicians, but because you believe in their ability to govern on behalf of we the People. More than ever before. Last thing I'll share with you is that I was scrolling through all of this last night and seeing just where people were feeling about all these things and soliciting some general feedback from everybody preparing the show. And I came across a tweet from Charlie tweeted just a few weeks before he died in August. God did I miss this voice of reason as the person who could pick up the phone and call President Trump, tell him all of this stuff he said in August. This is the societal or social rather compact breaking down. We need urgency to restore it 1 mass deportations 2 stop the H1B scam 3 dramatically reduce legal immigration 4 end chain migration and the visa lottery 5 build 10 million homes for Americans, not for foreigners and 6 crush the college cartel. If you take nothing else away from the blueprint of where we go forward from here, let it be that I don't know what the perfect solutions are to immigration or the housing crisis or college affordability or any of that. I don't think any one person does have all the answers, although maybe Charlie was pretty close. But never be afraid to ask the tough questions, to say the hard things, to advocate for the hard thing, and to speak the truth, even if it's difficult, or to people who are on your side. Because that is when it matters the most.
- [51:43]
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- [52:14]
Isabel Brown
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