← The Kinzinger Report
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- [00:06]
Adam Kinzinger
I'm Adam Kinzinger, and you're listening to the Kinzinger Report, where I bring you top stories and analysis on current events and the growing threats to our democracy. After serving over a decade in Congress, I help you know what's true and what really matters so that we can all work to save this country that we love so much.
- [00:30]
Well, everybody, welcome back. Thanks for being here. Top story today. Surprise, surprise. The war on Iran is back on. Kind of. Yesterday, Iran attacked three tankers in the Strait of Hormuz. In response, we pulled the deal that let Iran sell its oil and hit more than 80 targets inside Iran. Overnight, Iran fired back at our bases in the Gulf. And this morning, the President stood at a NATO summit and declared the ceasefire, in his words, is over. Oil prices are already spiking. Looks like we are right back where we started and nobody in this administration can tell you where it ends. We're also going to cover a chaotic day at the NATO summit, two fresh court losses for the White House on elections and Trump holding anti terrorism funding hostage. Oh, yeah, and Ken Paxton being accused of breaking his own voter fraud rules. Anyway, do me a favor, like, subscribe share this with someone who needs to see it. You don't want to miss an episode because like I said, you're the coolest person in the world when you watch it. So let's get to it. The ceasefire that the President has been bragging about has collapsed again. Overnight, the US Military carried out a series of strikes on Iran. CENTCOM says it hit air defenses, radar sites, and more than 60 small boats belonging to Iran's Revolutionary Guard. I thought we already hit all those. Oh, this was because Iran went after commercial ships in the Strait of Hormuz again. Three tankers were attacked on Tuesday, including one that was carrying Qatari natural gas. In response, the Treasury Department yanked the temporary waiver that was allowing Iran to sell its oil on the open market. Then this morning, besides the NATO chief in Turkey, here's standing beside the NATO chief in Turkey, I should say, here's what the President said about the status of his ceasefire, if you can call it that at this point. Is the ceasefire over? Is the ceasefire done? Is the MOU dead?
- [02:30]
Donald Trump
It's a very interesting question to me. I think it's over. I don't want to deal with them anymore. They're scum. You know what scum is? They're scum. They're sick people.
- [02:41]
Adam Kinzinger
The moment Trump said this, oil prices jumped. Brent crude oil shot up almost 6%. That is something that we all will feel a direct result of the President's actions, starting this war and being unable to finish it. You don't go into a fight without knowing how to finish it. Look, it's been hard to know when the news on Iran is actually different from the day before. The President says one thing, does another, the ceasefire's on, then it's off. It's always been a chaotic ride, but this time does feel different. The President doesn't want to talk about Iran anymore. He's been over it for a while now.
- [03:16]
Really.
- [03:16]
On day two, he tried to claim a fake victory and he hoped things would miraculously shake out on their own. And they did. And now the military seems like the only tool he has left. He's already promised to, quote, hit him hard again tonight. The President is desperate and we can all feel it. Just this morning, he threatened new strikes, floated a naval blockade, talked about seizing an Iranian island, and even suggested we might skip a peace deal altogether because, in his words, it's easier. That's not a plan. That's a man throwing everything at the wall and hoping something makes this go away. This is blatantly ineffective leadership and it's embarrassing on the world stage. A foreign policy blunder for the ages, and one that will define Trump's legacy on foreign policy. Look, we are in a tough situation now, and probably using the military may be the best option to compel Iran to the table. A war that never should have been started. But that said, the President also needs to use the other tools, the diplomatic information and economic. You don't just start throwing bombs everywhere and not have a plan. The President delivered the Iran news from a NATO summit where he spent all of Wednesday pouting and complaining like a three year old. Last time I checked, a NATO summit is supposed to be a proud show of unity. Instead, the President turned it into a grievance tour where he seemed to be in a terrible mood for all of it, scowling through the family photo and picking fights with allies one after another. Starting off strong, he said again that Greenland should belong to the United States, not Denmark, a NATO ally. By the way, take a look at what else he claimed to know about the island and its history.
- [05:05]
Donald Trump
Greenland is very important for the United States, but it's not important for Denmark. In fact, when Denmark was overrun by the Nazis in less than one day, Hitler beat them out in one day, took over. They asked us to take care of Greenland. In fact, we took Greenland and then, stupidly, we gave it back. We shouldn't have given it back to them.
- [05:26]
Adam Kinzinger
No, Mr. President, respectfully, we never had Greenland. It's been part of the kingdom of Denmark for centuries. Yeah, During World War II, we took over defending the island. And, yes, we still have a defense agreement with Denmark today. That deal actually gives us military access to Greenland right now. We have a space force base there as we speak. Does the president know any of that? It doesn't seem like it. Then Trump started going after Spain. Spain's the one ally that would not commit to NATO's new 5% defense spending target. It also refused to let us use its basis for the Iran war, just like Italy, whose prime minister was also attacked by Trump, by the way. So take a look at the moment the president of the United States turned to his treasury secretary and ordered him to cut off trade with an ally.
- [06:17]
Donald Trump
Spain is a terrible partner in NATO. I don't want anything to do with Spain. Cut off all trade with Spain, please. Including visits. Okay. We don't want anything to do. Watch them come running back. Oh, they'll come running back. They're hopeless, bad people.
- [06:34]
Adam Kinzinger
And then Trump's words at the summit went from ridiculous to just straight up nonsense. Take a look at a couple of the bizarre moments that we put together to show that this president has zero idea what in the world he's talking about.
- [06:48]
Donald Trump
We had 111 missile shot by the Islamic Republic of Japan. JCPOC. A question for President Putin. Do you have a question for President Putin? What would you like to ask him? Because I'm going to ask him that question.
- [07:10]
Adam Kinzinger
Look, our allies are watching the same videos. We are probably people doing videos just like mine in a different language. What both see is an American president who is throwing a temper tantrum, stumbling over his words and threatening to blow up the trade and alliances that kept all of us safe. I don't know what the president thinks this type of behavior accomplishes, but it certainly is not a display of strength. And this is right in the middle of a resumption of the war in Iran. While the president was overseas, the courts handed him two more defeats in his war of how we vote. First, Georgia. Yesterday, a federal judge quashed a Justice Department subpoena that tried to grab the names and personal contact information of every single person who worked the 2020 election in Fulton County. That's the Atlanta area the president has falsely blamed for his loss. The judge called the scope of the request, quote, staggering. And guess what? The judge who shut it down was appointed by Trump. He wrote that the statute of limitations on anything from 2020 expired long ago, so no charges could even come from it. And that handing over those names would scare people away from ever working an election again. That sounds like common sense. He also wrote that whether you support the President or not, whether you think 2020 was fair or stolen, everyone should be worried about the government using a grand jury to grab your private information with no legitimate purpose. The second loss came in the fight over mail voting. A judge refused to pause an order that blocked the president's attempt to use the postal service as a weapon, where the mail would only deliver your ballot in your state if your state first handed over its voters list to Washington. That block stands in 23 states and D.C. and a separate judge already ruled the Constitution gives the President no powers over elections at all. Look, the courts keep saying the same
- [09:11]
thing over and over.
- [09:11]
The president does not run elections. States do. That actually used to be a huge argument from Republicans, and he's losing the argument in front of his own appointees. The system is holding, but he's not stopping. The President of the United States is like a toddler that can't take no for an answer. It's ridiculous, it's unfortunate, and this definitely is not the end of it. But even when the courts keep telling him no, Trump just looks for other ways he can influence our election. This time, he chose FEMA's Terrorism Prevention Program, which grants more than a billion dollars a year for cybersecurity, emergency planning, and protection for crowded public spaces. That money is supposed to keep Americans safe. It's what we rely on to stop threats before they reach us. But under new rules reported yesterday, FEMA will hold back some funding from states that don't comply with the President's election demands. This is insane. In order to receive their full grant, states will have to submit plans to rip out certain voting machines and hand over entire voting rolls to a federal database meant to purge non citizen voters. But remember, the administration's own intelligence office went looking for proof of fraud with these machines, but instead found that not a single vote changed the President's own investigation. But of course, the report was buried by the White House. And just two weeks ago, a federal judge struck down that same citizenship database, which already wrongly flagged actual American citizens as potential non citizens. So once again, the Trump administration is putting American lives at risk so they can continue their war against your vote. And even when they keep losing the battles, they won't give up the fight because they know what's coming for them in November. And finally, the Texas candidate who made a career hunting voter Fraud is now accused of committing it himself. What party do you guess? Well, Ken Paxton. That's right. The Republican nominee for Senate in Texas has long spread wild conspiracies about his political opponents committing voter fraud.
- [11:23]
Ken Paxton
And the reason I know is I used to work with the DA's in these counties who were Democrats who used to prosecute cases. And now suddenly Soros went in and knocked all of them out and put his own people in. So I know that they're not going to prosecute voter fraud. And this is a strategy that isn't going away for the, for the left. They're going to continue to try to steal elections. And I know it's controversial to say it, and somehow they get to cheat. I'm just telling you there's lots of voter fraud going on. We have proof of it. And don't let people make you feel stupid for bringing up the obvious.
- [11:53]
Adam Kinzinger
This has been a signature issue for years. As Texas Attorney General, Paxton built a special election fraud unit and made cracking down on so called illegal voting central to his brand. And back in February, he set up a tip line for people to report suspected voter fraud in a list of violations to look out for. Paxton warned Texans that it's illegal to misrepresent your residents on election records and that you must register to vote using the address where you actually live. His warning could not have been clearer, at least to everyone in Texas but himself. A new investigation found that Paxton appears to have voted six times over the past two years under an address where he does not live. His wife said in a divorce filing that he moved out of their home two years ago. Reporters have since linked him to a different house in a different county that he's not registered in. So Paxton may have broken the exact laws he warned everyone else about. Does that surprise anyone? The people who shout the loudest about voter fraud and really actually anything, right, you know what we're talking about. They seem to turn to be the ones that actually corner themselves and were the ones guilty of the very thing they accused everybody else of. The fraud they keep hunting for barely exists. But the hypocrisy is very real. Well, that's it. That's show for July 8th. Do me a favor like share, subscribe to someone who needs to see it. You never want to miss an episode because like I said at the beginning, this makes you extremely well informed and cool. I will see you tomorrow.