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Josh Hammer
donald trump says that iran's counteroffer to end the war is totally unacceptable meanwhile bibi netanyahu on sixty minutes saying that the war against iran is not over so if all that's true what exactly is the holdup and why have the hostilities not started i'm josh hammer and this is the josh hammer show so we've been in this very awkward song and dance for weeks now it's neither a ceasefire it is neither war and we're trying to figure out in real time what exactly is going on because frankly the situation is highly fluid and it changes on a daily really changes on an hourly or even minute by minute basis but last we checked in definitively we by which i mean the united states we were still waiting for our iranian interlocutors our purported party truly purported on the other side of the proverbial negotiating table to respond to the pakistani mediators as to whether or not the terms laid out by donald trump and our american negotiating team led by steve wykoff and jared kushner we are waiting to find out whether or not iran was ready to play ball with any of these terms all this happening in the context by the way of donald trump flying all the way to beijing china this week to meet with xi jinping xi jinping being the essential king overlord of pakistan the mere fact that these negotiations were happening in pakistan was a chinese power play and also china is close to iran itself so there's just a lot going on here and the latest which came just over the transom on sunday is that trump posting on truth social that iran's response is in all caps classic trumpian verbiage here quote totally unacceptable and essentially what this boils down to is that iran basically said that they want the blockade which is absolutely crushing and decimating their petroleum industry on which they are heavily reliant for their whole economy they want that blockade lifted and then maybe maybe they open the street of hormuz and then everything else we can kind of just kick the can down the road we'll address this when we come to it there we'll address the nuclear issue there yeah we just want to have enriched uranium proliferate for purely civil peaceful purposes as for a missile program you know we're a country we care about self defense we want missiles and trump is saying this is totally acceptable why because it's totally unacceptable there is a very simple reason here and unfortunately this is just who these people are i don't know how else to say it this is who the people in iran's regime are it is who they have been for forty seven years you cannot trust these people as far as you can throw them this is the reason why so many conservatives were up in arms were up in arms back in twenty fifteen when the barack obama regime led by people like john kerry when they were bending over backwards to try to negotiate with the regime is that not only is this regime ideologically oriented and ideologically oriented towards frankly islamic shiite supremacist messianic ends the resurgence of the twelfth iman the mahdi all this deep in the weeds sharia stuff that we are not going to get into today not only are they fundamentally messianic in their own very bespoke shia way you just also cannot trust them again this gets back to the concept of tahiya the legitimizing of lying to westerners for the sake of civilizational jihad and pursuing your goals there and they are just never ever ever going to agree with you this is fundamentally different than trying to get a quote unquote rational actor to the table it's very different than that ridden trying to negotiate with someone like the soviets at the height of the cold war now donald trump fordsworth is still saying all of correct things when it comes to the issue of nuclearization and uranium he actually was asked he was actually asked by cheryl atkinson about the enriched uranium which remains in iran there and here's what he had to say about that let's go ahead
Katie Pavlich
and play clip two where are we in the war if we've not yet gotten the nuclear materials the enriched uranium
Donald Trump
from them well we'll get that at some point whatever we want we have it surveilled you know i did a thing called space force and they are watching that every if somebody walked in they can tell you his name his address the number of his badge no we have that very well surveilled if anybody get near the place we will know about it and we'll blow him up we'll blow him up so meanwhile
Josh Hammer
around the same time mike waltz who is the current american ambassador to the united nations doing a great job in that most irksome and awful of bodies mike waltz saying that donald trump is leaving no stone unturned before we return to to active offensive facing hostilities there again that raised the question as to what more could it possibly take to get us back to that this song and dance this ceasefire is not ceasefire has been going on now for about a month actually technically it's a little bit over a month now and still still after we already called off jd vance and kushner and wyckoff from going to pakistan for the second negotiation because as trump properly intuited there was really no one to actually represent to the regime the quote unquote regime is so wildly divided the so called supreme leader mushaba khamenei still has not made a public appearance in two and a half months because he's been so grievously injured by the strike that took out his father is the quote unquote regime represented by ahmad vahidi who is the head of the islamic revolutionary guard corps the terrorist wing is the regime led by aragachi the foreign minister or other quote unquote moderate factions they're really not particularly moderate but they're comparatively moderate relative to the irgc who the heck represents iran we have no idea meanwhile trump is saying that their latest proposal that purports to come from iran is quote unquote totally unacceptable but it's not just donald trump the other half of this us israeli tag team what pete hegseth and dan kaine our chairman of the joint chiefs refer to over and over and over again as this historic binational operation against iran the other leg the junior partner there the israelis are also saying that this operation is not done so around the same time that donald trump was sitting down with cheryl atkinson and bibi netanyahu the prime minister of israel sat down with major garrett over at sixty minutes for this widely discussed interview that aired on cbs just on sunday evening as part of that interview bibi netanyahu saying that the war against iran is not over for the same reason they just heard that there is still enriched fissile uranium remaining here is netanyahu on sixty minutes i think it accomplished
Benjamin Netanyahu
a great deal but it's not over because there's still nuclear material enriched uranium that has to be taken out of iran there is still enrichment sites that have to be dismantled there are still proxies that iran supports their ballistic missiles that they still want to produce now we've degraded a lot of it but all of that is still there and there's work to be done how do
Josh Hammer
you envision the highly enriched uranium will
Benjamin Netanyahu
be removed from iran you go in and you take it out with what
Josh Hammer
special forces from israel special forces united
Benjamin Netanyahu
states well i'm not going to talk about military means but what president trump has said to me i want to go in there and i think it can be done physically that's not the problem if you have an agreement and you go in and you take it out why not that's the best way
Josh Hammer
what if there isn't an agreement can
Benjamin Netanyahu
it be taken out by force well you're going to ask me these questions i'm going to dodge them because i'm not going to talk about our military possibilities plans or anything of the kind
Josh Hammer
of all right so a lot to unpack here and again the big question is if both leaders trump and netanyahu are seemingly on the same page that the current situation is totally unacceptable and that there is more work left to be done the real question then is why aren't we doing it well there's a lot to say on that we will address that in just a moment but for now folks just a quick word from our sponsor of today's show which is balance of nature you know i try to eat a very well rounded meal i actually cheated a little bit this weekend for mother's day i had some sweets who doesn't but generally speaking i am pretty low on the sweets i'm pretty low on the carbs in general i'm pretty heavy on the fruits and vegetables nonetheless we are all very busy people and because of that i take balance of nature i take these dietary supplements the spice and fiber supplements as well as the fruit and veggie supplements they have this patented process there the products are all lab tested there are no binders fillers or flow agents it supplements your diet and supports a lifestyle of eating whole foods they have a tailored process where whole foods are dried and using a vacuum cold process it's then powdered and packaged and put into these wonderful containers again i take it i feel like a million bucks it's totally maha friendly by the way my w loves these ingredients my wife is a total maha mom she has signed off totally on all this for what it's worth here in the hammer household the whole health system patented by balance nature gives you forty seven ingredients of fruits vegetables spices and fibers and again we encourage you to eat a well rounded diet but this can absolutely and it really should supplement your diet so go ahead to bounceofnature dot com comma put in the discount code hammer you actually get ten percent off of the whole health system as well as the fruits and veggies and then the fiber and spice supplements again discount code hammer at bounceofnature dot com comma our sponsor today is bounce of n so why in the world is this operation not picking up again if both donald trump and bibi netanyahu seemingly are on the same page well it's complicated there are domestic factions certainly in both respective countries we talk primarily about the united states because obviously this is an american program here and here in the united states you know that there are some deeply deeply deeply war weary if not outright anti war factions even within the administration we know that the vice president is something of a skeptic to put it mildly perhaps he is even a behind the scenes critic again that's just speculation we don't know but at a minimum he's a skeptic of the war against iran we know that tulsi gabbard is shall we say less than enthusiastic about the war against iran there these are very powerful people within the administration donald trump has essentially at this point ditched every one of his super hawkish close inner circle advisors and there was a concerted effort to try to ditch a lot of the old neoconservative guard during the presidential transition administration there donald trump junior we believe based on what we heard at the time was involved in trying to nuke the chances of people like mike pompeo from getting a role in a second trump cabinet there so he basically left with marco rubio who is definitely not an isolationist he's not exactly a full on neocon he has a very prudent view of iran pete hegseth who has a very prudent view of iran these men these men are not neo on the other hand though you definitely have a strong vibrant isolationist faction there so there's that working as well and there of course also is the issue of gas prices there and the fact that no one likes the fact that we are paying what i mean paying here in florida i saw a price of regular getting four and a half close to dollar five maybe over dollar five it's not great it's not great but having said that there is some interesting precedent for the notion there's precedent for the notion that the president himself is not responsible for necessarily for gas prices actually this came up during the biden administration this is a wonderful clip that we found here from joe biden secretary of energy jennifer granholm so to be really clear
Katie Pavlich
obviously the president does not control the price of gasoline no president does but what we're seeing right now is this global mismatch between supply and demand oil production is lagging behind as the rest of the economy roars back to life
Josh Hammer
after the shutdowns all right so just a wonderful wonderful precedent there from just a few years ago the biden administration is saying that the president does not control energy certainly of course foreign policy and middle east chaos definitely does have an effect on gas gasoline prices and we're not saying that they don't there but the notion that donald trump could just flip his fingers and bring gas back down to three to two and a half whatever it is dollars a gallon there is totally nonsense well there's a lot more to unpack on and so many other topics as well also katie pavlitz joins us later in the show to unpack this and much much more it's a jam packed show for you today folks stay with us through a short break we'll be right back with more after this now i'd like
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Josh Hammer
welcome back so donald trump has this domestic faction that is less than enthusiastic about the war against iran this is one of the reasons certainly that we have not gone back to epic fury it's been over a month in this weird song and dance where it's neither war it's neither ceasefire it is something the problem of course when you come across as overly zealous as overly eager for a deal perhaps even any deal make a deal let's just make a deal for the sake of making a deal the problem well is that you're desperate and desperation typically breeds awful terms now that only goes so far because again on sunday john trump said that the latest ronnie counter proposal is totally unacceptable so there's this weird intellectual tension where clearly clearly clearly clearly the administration wants to go back to domestic issues clearly they want talk about other things like the fact that the violent crime rate is actually an article over the weekend from axios the violent crime rate has absolutely plunged in america's biggest cities just in the first few months of twenty twenty six homicides dropped seventeen point seven percent robberies down by over twenty percent there these are huge drops in homicide washington dc homicides down sixty five percent philadelphia fifty three san diego fifty percent memphis which had the national guard thirty four point five percent there louisiana houston all massive double digits look there's a lot of stuff happening on the domestic front the administration has an amazing story to tell when it comes to issues like this when it comes to violent crime when it comes to issues like the southern border when it comes to plenty of other issues as well i get it really i totally totally totally understand the instinct but this is the united states of america and this is a puny little theocratic shiite country it's not so puny i guess it's over ninety million people give or take but in the scheme of things they're puny ish america's real foe is china and that is why i bring up the china card because donald trump is going to china this week for this deeply deeply important dare i even say indispensable meeting with xi jinping xi jinping is someone who donald trump has a complicated relationship with i think that donald trump has a proper and sober view of xi jinping he oftentimes will kind of talk nice to his face as trump oftentimes does with people who you may not like a lot there but he's actually quite harsh in dealing with them he did the same thing with putin over and over again by the way during his first term in office there so the timing of this meeting given what we just laid out when it comes to the state of play with iran is actually absolutely fascinating what donald trump really ought to do what he ought to do here and again because this was commenced with planning with netanyahu and the israelis it probably should be continued with such coordination as well there what trump really ought to do and the power move the actual power move given the context of the fact that pakistan and iranian satrapy an iranian province of sorts that pakistan has been the place of these u s iran negotiations given the fact that there are so many people there so many people there who are rooting for him to fail in general both on the domestic and on the world stage there and given the fact above all that donald trump has the sobering correct instincts on the iran conflict this really is one of the most important takeaways donald trump's instincts when it comes to all things middle east are actually fantastic he genuinely might have the most shrewd on point political instincts when it comes to that particular region of any politician i've ever seen in my entire life he just fundamentally gets it he understands that forever globalist moralistic uber interventionist boondoggles are horrible nonsense not very good and ultimately redound against the national interests he hates that crap we all saw when he essentially took out jeb bush back during the twenty sixteen primaries on the other hand trump understands that people like terrorists like khamenei et cetera in countries like iran and non state actors like hezbollah hamas et cetera are massive massive threats this has been his triangulation of the conservative realist nationalist needle for years and years and years he has always had advisors who try to steer him wrong in this respect i think back actually all the way to the first term in twenty seventeen one of the earliest middle east foreign policy challenges donald trump faced was in i believe was june of twenty seventeen you had some of the other gcc countries there in the gulf countries like saudi arab libya bahrain and the uae above all who actually at the time had an economic and diplomatic boycott on qatar for exporting terrorism and trump's instincts were to support that which was correct he was talked out of doing so by people like rex tillerson the former exxonmobil ceo who was then secretary of state who was essentially a big oil guy he basically said that you need the qataris that's a very small example but the point is that donald trump's instincts on this stuff are typically right i get the sense especially after this latest truth social post this all caps totally unacceptable in respons response to iran's latest proposal i get the sense that trump is ready to go back to hostilities against iran as he should be because it's been enough it has been enough of this dilly dallying with this utterly insatiable messianic eschatological driven islamist theocratic clerity by which i mean the islamic republic of iran it is enough trump is saying the job is not done trump is telling cheryl atkinson that they're still monitoring that is the administration still monitoring the enriched uranium there in iran netanyahu speaking for our allies in this joint operation as saying that the job is not done other specifying to major garran sixty minutes that the enriched uranium remains what kind of power move would it be if trump and netanyahu recommenced hostilities against iran by starting to take out more of the missiles and drones by trying to in earnest devise a plan i don't even know what that would look like but they're smarter than i am to devise some sort of plan to actually take out the enriched uranium if iran's not gonna give it up it must be taken out not necessarily with a weapon but smuggled out somehow surely the cia and mossad have some way of working hand in glove to devise some sort of game plan in order to get that done these are the kind of things that should be happening and i say make it happen this week make it happen this week while donald trump is in beijing while he is there what a power move to be on the physical soil of the leading patron of iran and to recommence hostilities against iran i think timing frankly is just too too symbolic and too too good to give up speaking of not giving up democrats are not giving up on their catastrophic loss at the supreme court of virginia on friday so on friday as we reported the supreme court of virginia ruled on procedural grounds in a four three decision that the democrats gerrymander which they spent at least sixty five to seventy million dollars to get past there has not passed constitutional muster under the virginia state constitution if you listen to the show at the time ken cuccinelli the former attorney general of virginia predicted on this very show that that would be the result and sure enough he was right so the new york times reporting on this amazing phone call on saturday this past weekend that included hakeem jeffries the minority leader in the us house along with many others where essentially the idea was floated to virginia democrats including the governor abigail spanberg to essentially devise a plan i don't even know how this would be legal to essentially prematurely terminate the terms of all the justices essentially nuke all seven justices from the virginia supreme court and get a brand new slate of magically abigail spamberger nominated justices by which this thing could then go ahead and pass muster and it's hard to even know where to begin with that apparently reports read epstein of the new york times apparently there was mixed reaction this quote drew mixed reactions on the call said people on the call i guess read epstein's sources i wonder why because that's utterly insane have you all noted the irony of how whenever it is that courts give democrats exactly what they want let's call it the same sex marriage cases windsor twenty thirteen obergefeller twenty fifteen the latter of which essentially constitutionalized same sex marriage from sea to shining sea when the courts give democrats what they want even acting in overtly activist intellectually indefensible fashion as in the same sex marriage cases there democrats cheer and say oh they're a guardian of democracy this is a guardian against majoritarianism run amok james madison's book of factions not they really care about the founders but you get the idea and then on the other hand when courts stop democrats from illegal power grabs such as their power grab in virginia which they did not do under proper procedures that's why it was struck down by the supreme court of virginia then they say oh my god they're thwarting the will of the people they're thwarting the democratization of the process the people's will pick one literally pick one you can't have it both ways it's like last week in tennessee when they were protesting the redistricting in tennessee to comply with the supreme court case on the voting rights act you had this one guy justin jones the state representative who held up a confederate flag and said we will not go back then his colleague representative parkinson said that memphis should secede from tennessee well pick one the confederacy is the embodiment of secession and your colleagues calling for mini secession again none of this makes sense but it's all absurd there and frankly above all shows how outrageous democrats are when they talk about norms they don't care about norms whether it's abolishing the senate or adding puerto rico and washington dc or packing the supreme court or now this gutting the supreme court of virginia they don't care about norms all they care about time and time again is their own power folks a quick commercial break we'll be right back on the side with katie pavlich of news nation she will help us unpack all of this more stay with us for kate and pavlicha
Katie Pavlich
forget everything
Josh Hammer
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Katie Pavlich
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Josh Hammer
welcome back so you likely know of katie pavlich she has been a ubiquitous presence among conservative media for many years now she is now the host of her own new show katie pavlich night over on news nation and katie pavlich joins us now so katie welcome to the josh hammer show you're a first time guest i hope it will not be your last time it's great to see you thanks for doing this so today we're talking off the top about the state of play with iran and the state of play is kind of hard to figure out because frankly i'm not really sure what state of play is and frankly i'm not entirely sure exactly what our leaders think the state of play is to be honest with you there so let's just kind of zoom out for a little bit katie how do you assess where we're at right now it's been this weird kind of middle ground where it's not war it's not ceasefire trump saying that iran's latest proposal is totally unacceptable netanyahu going on sixty minutes saying that the war is not over where do we possibly go from here when it comes to the iran
Katie Pavlich
war well since the ceasefire was put into place my assessment of it was that they're going to try again to negotiate with a regime that lies its way through every has lied its way through every negotiation that we've had with them in modern times but certainly over the last forty seven years they've never acted in good faith so i've seen this as a break for the united states military to get even more assets into the region to get the strategy solidified and to wait for the perfect timing to go in and finish the job and get the nuclear material that's a simplified way of stating it but i'm not so sure that this is a period of time that is necessarily being put forward for the iranian regime i think it's for the united states to be able to get some more time and to get this thing done if you'll remember this kicked off because they intelligence showed that there was this going to be this meeting between the supreme leader and a number of other iranian regime leaders all in the same place so they kind of got put out quickly before they weren't necessarily ready to go they were obviously ready enough but if you look at the number of assets in the region you look at the president's statement yesterday saying that they've just been tapping us along tapping us along i think he does understand exactly who these people are and what their goals are they're simply trying to wait him out they have no interest in actually negotiating and the bottom line and i'm not advocating for this but you cannot necessarily you can't hold territory without boots on the ground and rifles in the hands of marines that's just a fact you can only do so much from the air and if that we can achieve our objectives from the air which secretary of state marco rubio and even the president have stated we have fine but if we have other things inside the country like securing the uranium without the help of the regime for example getting equipment in there to do that you need bulldozers you need all kinds of construction equipment to do that then it's going to take more than just bombing from the air and i'm not sure that this administration is willing to do that but we also don't know that the extent of their plans i'm not one to believe that they don't have a number of plans i think that they do they're just waiting for the right opportunity to implement one of them and i think the president is very clear that these are the types of people who are not negotiating good faith and he doesn't trust
Josh Hammer
them at all kay pavlich is the host of kay pavitch night on newsnation you follow her on xatypavlich so i could not agree with you more i think that donald trump has a very clear eyed sober view of who these people are he frankly has a forty seven year old track record of calling out the iranian clericity for exactly who they are literally going back all the way to the jimmy carter hostage crisis i guess the question is katie is can he withstand the current pressure that he is feeling i'm not saying that there is a cabal inside the administration rather what i'm saying is that gasoline prices obviously are soaring i think that he's getting a lot of pressure more generally spe speaking from republican groups at both an official and unofficial level to try to transition and focus on domestic issues when it comes to this and to be clear the domestic success of this administration i think is dramatically dramatically understated i mentioned today how there's this new report out about how homicides have come down just in twenty twenty six by shocking fashion they were already coming down to one hundred twenty five year lows so there's a lot to talk about on the domestic front however i just don't think that the job is done when it comes to iran and what i've been arguing on the show is that this administration and the greatest country in the world the united states we can walk and chew gum at the same time there so i assume that's probably how you see it too in the lead up to the november
Katie Pavlich
midterms yeah and i think that he's doing exactly that there's a lot of noise around impatience with the american people there obviously needs to be strategic patience when it comes to iran we've been at this for almost four months now in the grand scheme of things that is a very short period of time when it comes to warfare i completely understand this aversion and skepticism about staying in these conflicts for far too long because it is true we were in afghanistan for far too long we were told over and over again that things were going well they were not so i understand that but this is a different president as you know josh this is a different strategy and i've repeatedly heard president trump say that he understands that the political pressure is there but he's not concerned about that because he is saying the exchange for a little bit of pain at the pump which is temporary given his domestic energy agenda will be worth not having to deal with this ongoing iranian nuclear threat for future generations i think secretary of war pete hegseth understands that i think secretary of state marco rubio understands that very well and on the domestic side their political team is actually taking care of business james blair has been ahead of the curve when it comes to this redistricting war that democrats started republicans are winning the redistricting war and they will continue to win it just based on the numbers that you look at in terms of the maps that are available all across the country republicans are doing well on issues like the economy the trump administration the jobs numbers in the private sector not just federal jobs numbers that are padding the statistics are real tangible results gdp is up and while inflation is one of those issues that of course inflation is the reason it's such a sin and when the government causes it it's because prices don't go down they slow in their pace of increase but prices very rarely go down when inflation kicks in but prices have slowed in their increase significantly so you can say that inflation is no longer a big problem in terms of continuing to go up and causing the price of domestic goods for americans to be too expensive whatever aspect of life that they're looking at things are affordable and then if you look at the polling in terms of democrats people don't trust the democrats they don't trust them on any of these issues so while maybe they're not as political and they don't necessarily love republicans they don't trust democrats to serve their best interests especially when the democratic party is moved so far to the left in terms of embracing terrorism embracing far left candidates who are actively open socialists and communists saying that's what they want for the future of america the majority of the country does not identify with that so on the domestic i would say the republicans are actually doing pretty well ahead of the midterms and i think that they actually have a chance to hold onto the house and that the trump administration has been taking care of business by putting blair or james blair out there to get this done so the president finish the job done which is one of a moral imperative so that this doesn't continue to be a problem in the
Josh Hammer
future so i'm really happy that you mentioned james blair who's that's a name that probably most people have not heard of he's a he's a white house deputy chief of staff who's been the general general of this redistricting battle which republicans are absolutely going to and especially in light of the supreme court virginia's decision on friday to strip abigail spamberger of her four seat power grab they will come out on top in a way katie that i think actually puts the house to me something like a toss up frankly i look at the prediction markets i see the democrats are still heavily favored to retake the speaker's gavel i'm actually not really buying that for all the reasons frankly that you just laid out that democrats are still not trusting and with the redistricting so just about a minute and a half left before a break here how do you actually assess the midterms again we're pretty far out at this point still but how do you assess republicans chances maintaining both chambers come january i think
Katie Pavlich
the chances are pretty good and you know between now and november is a lifetime in politics so anything could happen over the summer there could be another national crisis et cetera et cetera so all of that caveated but we're going people the narrative tends to get away from people just in the sense of typically the person in power loses the midterms president trump lost the midterms during his first term barack obama in his own words got shellacked but i'm not willing to just go off of what we have already seen and what the typical historical nature of this race is if you look at the map and you look at the issues at hand republicans are still winning and i think they're far more strategic than someone like minority leader hakeem jeffries when it comes to winning these battles and not overreaching in lots of different ways and we've seen democrats just you mentioned in virginia and they're going insane now we can talk about that after the break but i think americans are seeing that and so i'm not willing to obviously there's historical precedent for how these things typically go but the numbers here look a little bit different in terms of what people care about who they trust so i'm not sure the republicans are going to lose quite yet yeah here there
Josh Hammer
and everywhere the best thing going for republicans katie is that the american people absolutely can't stand the currency of the democratic party and that is going to be the silver lining and frankly in many ways the saving grace of the party for years to come folks a quick commercial break but katie pavlich will rejoin us on the other side she is the host of course of katie pavitch nights on news nation stay with us through one final break we'll be right back with katie pavlich welcome back and katie pavlich rejoins us if you are a consumer of conservative media which i assume you are because you are watching this program then you probably know who katie is but in case you don't she is the host of katie pavitz on news nation and she rejoins us now katie i want to pick up where you left off actually so we mentioned earlier in the show how democrats are allegedly considering nuking the entire supreme court of virginia i don't even know what that really means to be honest with you they're trying to find some sort of dubiously legal way to prematurely retire all seven justices just in response to the fact that they ruled correctly to say that their referendum did not pass constitutional muster the whole thing is just totally crazy there but but it does shine a spotlight on the broader problem for the democratic brand at this moment which is that these people for lack of a better term are crazy they're crazy when it comes to a lot of these so called cultural issues when it comes to trans when it comes to immigration but they're also crazy when it comes to their view of institutions and norms despite their rhetoric to the contrary they claim to care about institutions they claim to care about norms they don't care about any of that though do they katie no no
Katie Pavlich
this so what's happening in virginia for those of you who may not be totally familiar the democrats tried to redist the entire state ahead of the midterm elections by going around the virginia constitution which has very specific ways that you can amend the constitution to do this ahead of an election they violated all of those rules so it went they got sued after it went up for election a couple of weeks ago northern virginia of course controls the state in terms of their voting just like a number of other city urban areas control parts of other states where rural voters are not represented properly by the people who live living in these urban areas northern virginia is the deep state it's where all of the federal employees live it is deep deep blue they wanted to basically draw like finger like districts to break up northern virginia into four different districts that extend hundreds of miles into virginia into rural virginia so the map went from six to four democrat republican representation in congress to ten to one they eliminated all republican representation in the state despite it being a pretty fair state when you look at the representation in terms of presidential elections then they get sued because they went around the constitution to get this referendum done then the supreme court of which many of the justices were appointed by democrats who were trying to do this including senator warner who is a mayor from virginia now because they cut down based on not the idea that they can redistrict but because they went around the virginia constitution now they want to do this crazy thing where they just eliminate all of the supreme court justices by passing basically legislation in the democrat controlled legislature to say they're all too old they're no longer qualified so we're going to get rid of them all replace them all with people that we like and then shove through this ten to one map i mean if that is not crazy in banana republic style politics
Josh Hammer
i don't know what no it's absolutely nuts frankly and i think it gives away the game and you laid out there just extremely well so thank you for that for that deeply clear and detailed explanation and the voters ultimately will have the final word here when it comes to which party is crazier at a bare minimum if not who has the better vision although i think i know i think i'm pretty sure i know the answer katie frankly on both fronts katie unfortunately there is a block of individuals there are some people within the purported right of center folds who i think are trying to subvert the right's chances for success not just at the ballot box this november but frankly when it comes to the broader heart and soul of america you've actually been been very outspoken about what we refer to as this information operation to this effort to try to make people depressed and stupid and to hate donald trump and to hate jews and to hate america there individuals of course like candace owens unfortunately tucker carlson these days and others as well and we talked about it a lot on this show because i think it's actually really important katie my general opinion on this topic is that the west will not be saved unless america is not saved america will not be saved unless the american right is saved because the left sure as heck is not gonna do it and the american right is not gonna be saved unless it maintains its true vision and principles and is not sold out in a basket of goods to whatever kind of islamophilic neo pagan neo putin neochinat whatever this is that is trying to say that it is the alternative vision for the future of the right so i say all that because i want to get your two cents here not that i don't know that you don't see the problem which i know that you do what exactly is happening where is this coming from there and what is the end goal for some of these individuals and some of their broader causes well i wish i knew
Katie Pavlich
the full answer because i think that's the question we've all been asking where is this coming from how is this happening why is it happening how is it that these positions that were one hundred eighty degrees on the other other opposite side have now just completely changed on big principled issues i don't know exactly why it's happening but i do know that in my assessment of it a lot of the people who are pushing this type of foreign anti american propaganda have never really been in the conservative movement in the first place they may have been popular media figures they may have been put into popular positions with big platforms they may have built their own platforms but if you look at at the way that some of these people kind of have jumped in the front of the parade once it was popular i'm not so sure that they were ever quote on the right i mean i started my career out with the tea party movement way back in the day and in the conservative movement and i never seen any of these actual positions taken this is all very new but it doesn't feel american it feels foreign in nature in terms of the confusion that they're trying to sow i think on twitter over the last couple of years we've seen these improvements of showing where people are tweeting from having location of which country they're in i think that's been very helpful but it doesn't feel like it's pro american that's for sure and so i think the solution is just to continue to push forward with the principles that have worked because you're absolutely right if america does not survive the west does not survive and i think when you look at these new positions that are being taken that are contrary to that smart smart thinking individuals which i do believe that the majority of americans are smart can see these contradictions to what they are and they're opportunistic if you're searching for audiences not based on any kind of principle or the truth then it's very clear to me what you're doing so i think everyone has to run their own race and do their own thing but i certainly have seen a lot of that and believe in the same way that you do that it's not helpful to the future of the country not to mention the west and the freedoms that we tend to enjoy now after two hundred and fifty years which in this experiment that you don't see anywhere else in the world and you have never seen in the history of the world and there's a
Josh Hammer
reason for that very well said and fundamentally this really is an anti american information operation which is what we call it and what we called it from day one it's not about the jews it's not about any other group it is fundamentally about trying to undermine the united states seemingly on behalf of our greatest enemies on the world stage china or russia and others as well before i let you go i want to end on a slightly lighter note so this show is a product of newsweek we have a partnership agreement with salem media but i was originally hired to newsweek to run the op ed section in twenty twenty so i have experience working at mainstream not conservative coded media brands even though that i am obviously a very vocal outspoken conservative i say all that because you also have made your career as a very vocal conservative and you host a show now on news nation which is covering the whole spectrum i don't think people think of it as a conservative network there so i wanted to ask you how's that going and more generally speaking what does it say about the state of play of the media that a very outspoken conservative like yourself is now hosting a primetime show there on a cable network just about a minute left if you
Katie Pavlich
can i think news nation saw an opportunity and their slogan is news for all americans and there are millions and millions of americans who think like i do donald trump got seventy one seventy two million votes in the last election so they saw a need and an opportunity for someone to come and have a different perspective that wasn't represented in their primetime lineup so it's been awesome to be there we put forward the best show we can every single night covering the news in dc and i always say that american our journalists are writing the first draft of american history and we need more of them who love america doing that so it's an honor to present that in a different perspective every night to the news nation audience and the broader audience and it's been great to be on your show josh so thanks for asking me about my show i appreciate it yeah you
Josh Hammer
bet of course and i was delighted to be on recently as well i mean honestly i think it's great i love that newsweek news nation even the washington post now actually has a lot of right center people contributing op eds there the la times runs my syndicated column it's a brave new world katie and its diversity actually is our strength when it comes to intellectual diversity anyway of course i digress katie pavlich one final time folks she's the host of katie pavlich night on news nation follow her on next katie pavlich katie you've been great thanks so much we really appreciate it come back again soon if you can yes anytime folks have a great rest of your evening josh hammer signing off for now we will be right back as always with a brand new show tomorrow
The Josh Hammer Show | May 11, 2026
Host: Josh Hammer
Guest: Katie Pavlich (NewsNation)
This episode explores the persistent standoff between the U.S./Israel and Iran, focusing on why President Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu—despite tough rhetoric—have not reignited a full offensive against Iran over its nuclear program and regional aggression. The conversation delves into high-stakes international diplomacy, domestic political constraints, the current hold-up in escalation, and broader implications for American conservatism and institutional norms.
Timestamp: 00:30-07:42
Timestamp: 00:30-07:42
Notable Quote:
“If you have an agreement and you go in and you take [the uranium] out, why not? That’s the best way.”
— Benjamin Netanyahu (07:27)
Timestamp: 09:59-13:22, 23:55-28:20
Notable Quote:
"You come across as overly desperate...typically breeds awful terms.”
— Josh Hammer (13:13)
Timestamp: 13:22-16:15
Timestamp: 23:55-27:09
Notable Quote:
“You cannot necessarily...hold territory without boots on the ground and rifles in the hands of Marines. That’s just a fact.”
— Katie Pavlich (25:44)
Timestamp: 27:09-32:11
Timestamp: 16:15-23:22, 33:17-36:46
Notable Quote:
“If that is not crazy in banana republic style politics, I don't know what is.”
— Katie Pavlich (36:46)
Timestamp: 36:46-41:46
Notable Quote:
“If America does not survive, the West does not survive.”
— Katie Pavlich (39:34)
Timestamp: 41:46-42:30
The episode offers a detailed, critical examination of the U.S.-Iran standoff, the political pressures on the Trump administration, and the challenge of staying tough while avoiding broader conflict during a pivotal election year. Through a blend of global analysis and domestic insight, Josh Hammer and Katie Pavlich dig into the complexity of conservative strategy, warning against both despair and opportunism on the right.
For those who haven’t listened:
The episode explains not just the complexity and paralysis of U.S./Iran policy, but broader problems afflicting American politics—partisan overreach, energy policy myths, intra-conservative infighting, and the quest to keep America (and the West) intact amid ongoing institutional and cultural upheavals.