← The Tony Kinnett Cast
The Tony Kinnett Cast
Ep. 508 - Democrats Scream, Chant “KKK” at State of the Union; Trump Urges Voter ID & Insider Trading Ban
02:44:11
Our usual roundup of the day's breaking and developing news, and a look ahead and predictions from Sen. Ron Johnson, Rep. Brandon Gill, Rep. Mark Harris, and Rep. Pat Harrigan. The SAVE America Act, a possible war with Iran, Tariff and Trade policy, AI, DHS, and everything else we can fit in!
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Tony Kennett
It's tax season and at Lifelock, we
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Radio Producer/Announcer
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Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
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Tony Kennett
One last big number.
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Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Save up to 40% your first year. Visit lifelock.com podcast for the threats you can't control. Terms apply. Tony Kennett.
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Kurt Schlichter
Tony Kennett. Tony Kennett.
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George Caldwell
Tony Kennett.
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Bradley Devlin
Tony Kennett.
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Tony Kennett
Tony Kennett.
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Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Tony Kennett, host of the Tony Kennett cast. Let's get down to business. You're listening to the Tony Kennett cast on 93 WIBC on CYTV here on the Daily Signal. Good evening and welcome to the Daily Signals State of the Union 2026 ultimate coverage. I'm your host Tony Kennett here from the Daily Signal. A lot of stuff to cover and we'll get to the State of the Union information. Don't worry. We have a nice little fancy stream here at the bottom where you can see all of the dignitaries that'll do their walk ins when it's time for that. You know, when they got to do the Met gala. But for people that you're paying too much to do, absolutely nothing. We'll get to that. First of all, let's talk about some of the news. The big news of the day comes down to a lot of complaining about the hockey teams. There are a bunch of journalists from various publications that people really don't read anymore, suggesting that Donald Trump is incredibly sexist because he got out there and said, you know, if we're going to invite the guys, we probably got to invite the women's hockey team as well. And then the hockey team laughed at it. The gall, the horror, the humanity, one might say. And this launched a thousand think pieces will actually go ahead and find that particular clip to you. Here are the guys laughing at President Trump's joke.
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Kurt Schlichter
Be cool. And we'll do the White House the next day.
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Tony Kennett
We'll just have some fun. We have medals for you guys.
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Kurt Schlichter
And we have to, I must tell
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Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
you, we're gonna have to bring the woman's team. You do know that. So they thought it was funny. It's so horrible. It's so terrible. You're not allowed to say anything. That's a joke that might have a woman in the joke. That's terrible. How just utterly inhumane and so all of the, I mean, from the Atlantic to the Washington Post, there was just outrage all over. News outlets were running the full gamut. Unfortunately, when they talked to Helen Hughes, also known as America's Soccer mom, or, excuse me, America's hockey mom, I should say that's definitely more apropos here. Here was her response about this remark that was supposedly the end of the world, of the United States, and he was inviting them to the State of the Union and all that. And then he said a comment that gained attention. He said, I must tell you, we're going to have to bring the women's team. You know that. And the room kind of laughs. And he added, I do believe I probably would be impeached. He was sort of joking through this, but you're cheering. He was sort of joking, yes. On both teams. How did that comment land for you?
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Virginia Allen
Well, I think at the end of the day, it's just about the country and the moment that these players, both the men and women, can bring so
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Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
much unity to a group into a country. People that cheered on, that don't watch hockey, people that have politics on one side or on the other side. And that's all both the men's team
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Virginia Allen
and the women's team care about.
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Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
If you could see what we see
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Virginia Allen
from the inside, and the men and women sharing, you know, dorms, dorm rooms and halls and flex floors and the camaraderie and the synergy and the way the women cheered on the men and the way the men cheered on the
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Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
women, that's what it's all about.
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Virginia Allen
And the other things they cannot control.
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Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
They care about humanity, they care about
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Virginia Allen
unity, and they care about the country.
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Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Very well put, because that's what the Olympics is supposed to be about. You're representing your country to the rest of the world. So aside from all of the Think pieces and the anger and the outrage, oh, how could Trump do that? By the way, the female soccer team, the U.S. women's hockey team responded that they're sincerely grateful for the recognition and the invitation, but the players are unable to attend, quote, due to the timing and previously scheduled academic and professional commitments. And, quote, we're sincerely grateful for the invitation extended to our gold medal winning U.S. women's hockey team and deeply appreciate the recognition of their extraordinary achievement. They were honored to be included and are grateful for the acknowledgement. Now, I, like a lot of other Americans, are hoping Sincerely that the U.S. men's Hockey Team will be filling out all of the empty seats down on the floor of the house that some of the Democrats are vacating. And that really is the weird split this evening. We're going to get into this here in just a little bit. There appear to be two camps over on the left side of the aisle. Either we're going to go do our own, our own State of the Union address, the drain, the swampy people, State of the something or other Union address. And that's either at 8 or 8:30 or I don't know, I'm not joking. By the way, defiance.org which sounds like the website that leads to a thousand therapists bank accounts, or moveon.org, a website for people who have never moved on once in their life, have stated that the counter rally starts at 8. But several other media sources say it's at 8:30 or it could be at 8:15 or for all we know, it could be on the 1st of October. Now, we'll pull some clips from that this evening. I'm sure it will be the most sleep inducing cringe fest that we've seen since, you know, the last Academy Awards. So we'll catch that on the other side of international news. And this is where things are getting interesting. The Iranian situation is not the biggest story of the day. The biggest story of the day is that the United States, through President Donald Trump, who had made it a priority to shove aside the old almost ignoring style of governance, the ignoring style of foreign policy when it came to Central and South America. In other words, China gets to do whatever it wants, Russia gets to do whatever it wants, Brazil gets to do whatever it wants. We just kind of let the Central and South America, we let our Western hemisphere just go to the dogs. The president of the United States said no and came in and said, panama, we dug your canal. We created your country. There's no such thing as Panamanians. Before they split off from Colombia. At the pressure of the United States, the president said, you're not going to sign on to China's Belt and Road Initiative. And then the president said to Argentina, you're not going to sign on to Argentina's Belt and Road Initiative. And the State Department under Secretary Marco Rubio has done a wildly effective job of essentially canceling or postponing into infinity, therefore effectively canceling over 26 planned Chinese Communist contracts. The most recent of these, you may remember, remember when Donald Trump was going to ruin the Panama Canal and we were going to send troops in again, and the president of Panama or whatever, he was all mad and angry and oh, it was just terrible, this horrible foreign policy. I was Told. You were told by the President of the United States. Oh, he's just like George Bush, the older one. And it turned out no. As of yesterday, the United States is happy to see that China has canceled its Panama port deal and has handed over the terminals to Maersk and MSC for shipping. That is an incredibly, an incredibly huge deal for the United States that will mean more to your pocketbook than almost any other foreign policy decision. Now don't get me wrong, there's a lot of international trade that goes through, for example, some of those Middle Eastern straits. And we will get to some of those things because of course, you know, it wouldn't be a day ending in Y with a, you know, without a bunch of yelling and flag burning and death to American from some of the parliament or legislature in Iran. Of course we'll get to some of the updates and kind of the U.S. buildup there. But before we get to that, I've teased long enough, we're finally going to tackle some of the one of two way Democrat responses to the State of the Union this evening. So of course, first of all, you have the boycott crew and they're in a bit of a conundrum because you can't just say I'm not going to the State of the Union because that means that they're not gonna be on camera. And that's a problem for them. They're not gonna be on camera. Well then no one's gonna see them grimacing and rolling their eyes and sucking on their dentures. I guess if you're Pelosi or trying to, you know, rip the papers in front of you in half. You know, you gotta get out there and shake your cane for the dastardly deeds undone, that kind of a thing. You gotta get out there and do a little performative. Well, you can't do that if you're boycotting. And you can't just have like somebody sitting in a soccer field freezing out there in the coat recording a video of themselves going, I'm once again asking for your financial support. That's not going to pull it. So there seem to be two approaches here. Either, number one, you pose what appears to be a developing security risk for the US Capitol, in which, according to several sources now we're still working on clarifying and confirming some of these things. Uh, the Department of Homeland Security has now warned that some Democrats in the House and Senate are quote, planning to bring illegal aliens as guests to tonight's State of the Union. Yeah, you can't do that. Now, am I here for seeing maybe the sergeant at arms finally do a little throwing of hands. Yes, I am here for it. I would be thrilled to see it. Let's go. We're going to talk about that with our correspondent over in Washington D.C. at the Capitol, George Caldwell here in a couple of minutes. But alas, the Democrats strategy of essentially bringing the saddest people that they can find without any kind of double checking is going to bite them in the butt. Ilhan Omar, who has decided that now is her time to shine. She is bringing out the lady who had obstructed traffic, parked her car at a 45 degree angle trying to block ice. And then when they came up and said, hey, you need to move out of the way, she starts yelling and screaming at them. I have a brain injury. Oh, I'm actually autistic. Oh, this is all very overwhelming for me. Which, by the way, just for the record, if you get sensory overload so that you completely shut down, you shouldn't be in a car driving ever. That, that. That's not. That's not any good idea. But alas, Ilhan Omar losing her mind. Radio crew, we have to send you over to the commercial side of things. We're gonna continue on the livestream here without those particular commercial breaks. It's the Tony Kinitkast here on the Daily Signal. Anywho, Representative Ilhan Omar deciding her honored guest needs to be the lady lying about sensory overload and obstructing ICE agents and, you know, breaking the law. No. I have spent the last month learning the names of the tendons in my shoulder because both of my shoulders are torn cartilage and tendon. Right. But what I haven't learned is the names of the people who did this to me. Ah, yes. I've learned all of the names for my tendons. This one I call Jerry. This one is Bartholomew. You know, they're very, very, very deeply important to me. But of course, the worst thing at all is that I don't know the people. Again, you drove to the intersection, you drove out of your way to obstruct federal law enforcement. And then when they told you to move an open road in front of you stretching wide and true, you said no. Well, actually, it was, you know, more the sound of a Yorkie hearing someone at the door. But, you know, no seems to be the general sentiment. And then you refuse to get out of the car, and then the ICE officers pulled you out of the car. And that's really challenging. But honestly, the thing that I'm far more concerned about than myself is that this is an ongoing fear and threat for people around this country. What happened to me is absolutely not new in the history of this country and we have not seen accountability that gives me any reason to believe this won't be done to somebody else. I love it. The woke scolding victim. Excellent, excellent. Great guests to begin with for sure. Now, on the other side of things, you have just the general boycott and complaint maneuver, which is, again, I don't personally believe it's going to come off very well. The best thing for the Democrats to do if you want to make Trump look bad, the disappointed parent routine is the way to go. I said this during the Biden administration. If you say, look, you have these fools in here who are acting like complete idiots and they're embarrassing each and every one of us. That maneuver works. That maneuver impresses people. But when you decide to go all in on acting like one of the children, it just, it doesn't impress anybody. Here's Senator Adam Schiff going on and on about legalities and lawsuits and just throwing himself a real tantrum. Donald Trump is violating the law and constitution.
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Tony Kennett
He is ignoring court orders.
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Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
He has weaponized the Justice Department to go after his enemies. He is letting loose ICE troops in our streets that are getting people killed. I will not be attending the State of the Union. I've never missed one. I have always gone both to inaugurations. He's a seasoned ticket holder. I guess the principal thing like Adam Schiff.
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Virginia Allen
Oh, yeah.
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Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
When I think of unbiased purple senators, I think of Adam Schiff. No one says that. No one believes that going on, going. I actually, I've never missed a State of the Union. But as that's what everyone else is doing, you know, to be very, very impressive, I have decided I shall stoop. Stoop as though shift. I am bending over to make it clear. I shall not stand the sergeant administration and to states of the Union. But we cannot treat this as normal. This is not business as usual. I will not give him the audience he craves for. Yes, that's what he wants. Trump wants to sit there for two hours and talk to Adam Schiff. Oh, yes. Yeah, that, that's that. That is that. You're depriving him. Oh, the horror. I hope he comments about the average neck length in the room going down as a result of Schiff's absence.
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Tony Kennett
The lies that he tells.
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Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
I'll be outside the Capitol with Midas touch and move on for the People's State of the union. 8:00pm Eastern time on Tuesday. Oh, Donald Trump is violent. 8:00pm exciting. He's going to be out there with a, you know, again, a left wing media network.
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Kurt Schlichter
Cool.
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Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Great. Excellent. And they're going to be out there, they're going to be protesting, they're going to do some yelling again. Exciting, exciting stuff. So I'm looking forward to seeing that. Of course, Stephen A. Smith over on the left side of the aisle, but who often criticizes his own party. Honestly, he finds this about as abhorrent and annoying as a lot of Americans do. And it's a pretty accurate take, I'd argue. At least. So worth. Worth. Worth checking out, I'd say. So some are talking about walking out in the middle of his speech. Others are talking about boycotting it all together and essentially finding something else to do. I'm here to tell you that neither is acceptable. Neither should be acceptable. At some point in time, ladies and gentlemen, there's got to be an adult in the room.
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Tony Kennett
If you're going to act as juvenile,
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Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
as petulant, as petty as you accuse the President of the United States to be, how are you ever going to hold a high moral ground? At least high enough to judge him accordingly? If people on the right can turn and look at you and say, you're no better, you act no better, where's it going to get you? That is the point for the 2026 midterms, because that's what the entire State of the Union address is about. It's setting the stage for the midterms. And this is going to be an election where you have to get people out to vote. Obviously, every election is about getting people out to vote. That's not quite what I mean here. Getting people to come out enthusiastically for candidates, that's what the State of the Union this year is going to be about. And if you can't actually point to anything and say, this is what we want. If you can't actually point to anything and say, this is what we've done, and all you have is the performative nonsense where you drop by the Capitol Hills, FedEx Kinkos and then waltz out like Ayanna Pressley and go, I'm ma.
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Virginia Allen
The state of our Union is traumatizing our children.
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Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Okay, that's not how you use the State of the Union. In the sentence the state of the Union should be followed by an adjective. The State of the Union is good. The State of the Union is bad. The State of the Union is troubling, or even the State of the Union is traumatizing. But that's not meant to be a verb. That is then followed by things. That's not how this works.
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Kurt Schlichter
Again.
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Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
I mean, I know you got to go make a trip to the FedEx Kinkos at the Capitol. You got to say, print me out a big poster of an AI photograph or just something that I threw together in Microsoft Paint. I mean, all right, if that's what floats your boat. It's better than a dancing video, I suppose.
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Virginia Allen
And that is because of the violent rhetoric and policies enacted by the occupant of the Oval Office, creating a state of child abuse, neglect and trauma.
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Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
I will remind, just for the record, that the Trump administration has arrested more individuals engaging in child abuse, more individuals possessing child pornography, more individuals who are pedophiles than any prior administration at this point into their term in office. That argument ain't gonna fly. It's not. It may work well on Blue sky, but it's not gonna float here. Now, bringing back our radio and TV partners from commercial, I do want to pivot over to Representative Brandon Gill of Texas, of course, one of the up and comers, an excellent firebrand when it comes to calling things on the carpet. Really good stuff. Representative Brandon Gill, our friend joins us from down in Texas. Unfortunately, not there, but in D.C. big state of the Union stuff tonight. A lot of votes flying around. Representative, what you thinking?
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Tony Kennett
Well, I'm excited to hear the president talk about all of the accomplishments that he's had over the past year in securing the border, deporting criminal illegal aliens, bringing crime down, bringing inflation down, which averaged 5% under Joe Biden is now sub 3%. I mean, these are major wins that impact the quality of life for Americans and make America safe and livable. And that's exactly what people voted for last November. I think that's what they'll be excited to hear about. A summary of all of the fantastic work this administration's done.
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Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
And we're going to see a lot of theater, a lot of claims that are being made, people being, you know, trucked in to stand up and yell. What are you looking for tonight from perhaps some of your colleagues that do show up? You know, they wanted enough attention. They know no one's going to watch their people's State of the Union cast thing.
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Bradley Devlin
What are you thinking?
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Tony Kennett
You know, the Democrats are going to do what what Democrats do, which tends to be act in an undignified way and cause disruption and commotion. But I think what, what the American people are looking for is stable leadership that's rooted in conservative policy and conservative ideas again, secure borders, a thriving economy, safe streets. I mean, those are things that Americans across the aisle agree with. But unfortunately, Democrats in Washington do not. I think the contrast between President Trump and the antics from House Democrats is going to be telling.
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Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
So with the immigration issue no longer really at the top of a lot of the polling, a lot of crime numbers coming down as well, both of those are law enforcement situations that are tending in favor toward the American people. Is that going to be enough to provide a lot of momentum this year for the president, or do you think that there's still a lot of counter narrative that's, that's doing some of the heavy lifting against the agenda of the president?
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Tony Kennett
Well, I think the American people can see all the great work that the president has done on immigration and on law enforcement, but there's still a lot more work for Congress to do. You know, a bill that's, I think, extraordinarily important, which is top of mind right now, is the Save America act, for instance. That's a bill that we got to get through the Senate. We've got to get to the president's desk. That's something that the American people, I think, will be excited about hearing about. They're also going to be wondering and wanting to make sure that we can actually codify the president's greater border policies and the law so that we don't see the same hell unleashed on our people that we saw under the Biden administration. And we've got a lot, a lot of legislative work for us to do and that I think the president can help us out with.
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Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Representative Brandon Gill, I know you had a really quick turnaround time. I know your staff has also said that you have to shuffle out because there's a ton to get done today. Thanks for giving us a few minutes.
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Tony Kennett
Yep. Thanks for having me.
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Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
All right, let's talk about some of the updates. Reportedly, the president of the United States, according to a couple of sources, plans to talk to Congress more broadly about his plans for the United States and Iran over the next couple of weeks. Now, of course, the president of the United States, of course, you can kind of see down in our little keeping an eye on things window so that when they switch over to their walking people in, you know, kind of procession, beautiful little wedding there in the House of Representatives, we can watch and ooh and ah and, you know, that kind of nonsense. The president of the United States addressing plans more broadly about Iran would pose a very interesting contrast. And we'll talk about that here in a second. Carolyn Levitt responded to a question earlier today about whether or not the president of the United States viewed Iran as a persistent, and I should say a worth keeping an eye on 247 kind of threat to the United States. Here was her response. But what the United States is doing to ensure that not only America is the safest country in the world, but remains the strongest country in the world, does he consider Iran a threat that remains abroad? Well, look, Iran chants death to America, so you tell me if that's a threat, Elena, of course, what she's referencing is the Iranian parliament or legislature, whatever you want to call them, after they put the goats down. They, of course, lift up a paper American flag that the Iranian FedEx Kinkos printed for them. And then they get out and they chant some things and they burn some things. You know, essentially a performative sorority party, but with a few more turbans. Now, don't let your eyes deceive you. That's not a WNBA game. That's actually the legislature in Iran. So, interesting stuff we're going to see tonight whether or not that's going to be top of mind. Also, of course, a lot of concern as to whether or not we are going to hear about the Save America Act. Obviously, there's a lot of questions regarding the filibuster. Senator Ron Johnson of Wisconsin will be joining us here in just a bit to discuss that in more detail. We're gonna be going over to our correspondent over at the Capitol, George Caldwell, in just a moment. Before that, though, I do wanna play Senator Ron Wyden, who looks as though someone stretched skin over a mannequin losing his marbles over the possibility of voter ID here in the country. Save act is a horrible, horrible, horrible piece of legislation that would turn back the clock in terms of voting progress and be particularly horrible for women in terms of their being able to register for the vote and all of the extra hurdles and barriers that have been placed there. Ah, yes, getting an id, something that's rather difficult for ladies, I mean, I guess because there's a lot of curbs on the way to the dmv, you know, I mean, it's difficult, I'm told. Interesting, interesting move. We'll see if that plays out. We are gonna move over to our White House correspondent joining us. Really good to see it, George, over in Washington, D.C. at the Capitol. How are things going?
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George Caldwell
Good. I actually just saw the men's Olympic team arrive at the Capitol. So they will be featured as some of President Trump's guests here at the State of The Union. And we can expect Trump to try to highlight some of the successes of his administration and preview what's to come.
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Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
So let's talk about a couple of those things because there's usually an air of expectation going into the State of the Union, especially there in the Capitol. You can hear some of the mutterings or, you know, in the case of, you know, looking at Klobuchar griping at her staff on the way to the room about what's expected to be discussed that evening. Are there any particular pressure points that you're hearing? Some of the senators and representatives looking for the president's comment on?
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George Caldwell
Well, Senator Mike Lee has been vocal about wanting the president's support for forcing what's called the talking filibuster on the Save America act, which is legislation which would require proof of ID and proof of citizenship from voters to participate in federal elections. So there is a faction that's seeking White House buy in there. Senator Johnson, who you're going to talk to, he's one of them. So that's a big thing. Speaker Johnson wants President Trump to highlight the successes, the tax cuts in the one big beautiful bill act from July of 2025. So you'll be seeing that.
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Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Excellent. Next question. I have, obviously, I didn't realize this until a couple of minutes ago, the Democrats halftime show spectacular. You know, they're, I don't know if they're gonna have Green Day perform or maybe they're gonna sing their own songs. I sure hope not. They're doing that on the steps of the U.S. capitol. Did I hear that correctly?
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George Caldwell
I believe there's a protest. I'm not entirely sure where the counter programming will be in Washington, D.C. but Governor Abigail Spanberger of Virginia will be delivering the response to the State of the Union in Williamsburg. And I know there's programming and separate bracketing events in many of the Democrat congressmen's home districts and home states.
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Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Oh, they're in their home district like the local tv. That's humiliating. So I, I just wanted to know because I wanted to see if there were as people are going in, I know there were some security sweeps. Our political editor, Bradley Devlin had talked a little bit earlier about some of the intended concerns regarding security sweeps moving over the next couple of hours, especially possibly maybe illegal immigrants that are being ferried in as individuals to sit in at the State of the Union address. What's the security atmosphere like, protesters versus Capitol police?
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George Caldwell
Well, as you know, a few days ago, there was recently an incident with an armed individual at Mar a Lago. So that's definitely a concern. But DC Is pretty shut down. They're setting up these fences and barricades and also, I don't know what they're called, but spikes to prevent cars from passing onto certain streets. We have seen bomb sweeps here, so it's pretty heavy security in Washington, D.C. whenever the president's moving.
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Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Excellent. George Caldwell, our White House. Well, our Capitol correspondent for the evening, thank you very much for giving us a little bit of an outline here. We'll catch in with you just a little bit later and see what some of the updates are. Thanks, man.
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George Caldwell
Thanks, Tony.
- [27:32]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
All right, a few other points of news to talk about. Obviously, George Caldwell mentioning Speaker Mike Johnson didn't have a pretty good zinger today, I'd argue. And you know, I am particularly partial to, you know, pointing out kind of the distinctions when it comes to attendance at the State of the Union. Here's Speaker Johnson talking about the hockey team in the absence of the Dems. Welcome, everybody. When President Trump said he was going to, we were going to usher in a new golden era for America, he meant it figuratively and literally. And we do want to thank all of our Olympic athletes who worked so hard and represented us so well in the Olympics. And the gold medal matches were really something to see. And you've heard a lot said about the hockey teams, the men's and women's gold. It was incredible, both of them. You couldn't have scripted it better. Overtime games and the excitement and euphoria that happened afterwards. Millions of people watched those games across the world and what a great moment it was for America. And it reminded us that we're all on the same team. And we hope that everyone will keep that in mind tonight because we are. The President called me Sunday night and he said, mike, we got to make some changes. We need some more guests. Okay, well, you know, the State of the Union is a very well attended event and the gallery is already full and we have waiting lists of people that want to be there. I said, Mr. President, how many people are you talking about? I think the whole team. Okay, well, so we're going to work out logistics and somehow, some way, we'll squeeze in the hockey players tonight and it'll be a great moment for America. I like that. The implication there is that maybe a couple of Democrats who would prefer not to be there will find their seat taken by perhaps one of the the greatest goalkeepers of all time in hockey. So we'll get over to some of that in a little bit. On the other side of the quick news, the performative nonsense is just hitting the high speeds. I mean, we are reaching cruising altitude with a lot of this performative nonsense. And I'm not just talking about congressmen and women, although, of course, we are seeing people like Representative Lamonica McIver, the Kool Aid man who barged through and body slammed federal agents in New Jersey. She's out in front of any media that she can find trying to beg for mercy, pleading for pity because, well, you know, she's currently under federal investigation and indictment for the aforementioned assault. Sorry, not the flag burning again here. Right. Clip There we go. I am Lamonica McIvor. You may not know my name, but you may have heard my story. I am the congresswoman that Donald Trump is trying to put in prison for 17 years. Trump's department of justice is going after me for what? For what? Why are they going after you? Why could you face 17 years in prison? Could it be a, that you tried to obstruct law enforcement and then answer there, the Daily Double, you then got in there and threw your weight around, quite literally. You know, it turns out that assault is, you guessed it, Steve, illegal. So trying to silence me and scare other people out of standing for what's right. Well, I mean, you know, I'm not going to talk about the, you know, what's right thing here, but I will point out that I'm not quite buying the whole standing up and doing what's right thing. I do believe that it is to intimidate those who would, you know, break the law. That, that would, that would be what upholding the law is meant to do. You say, wow, I don't want those consequences. I'm not going to do the thing that would result in those consequences. So, again, a strong thumbs up to her. On the advocacy side, there's a lot of stuff going on. Of course, we could talk about the singing protest I kind of referenced earlier. I sure hope that we don't see a singing protest again outside on the steps of the Capitol. That is what's going on in the Minneapolis City Hall. However, a bunch of elderly ladies on the left and just random dudes that they found on Craigslist came to sing a little heartwarming song of protest in the Minneapolis City Hall. Keeps us safe.
- [31:52]
Virginia Allen
We keep us safe.
- [31:54]
Pat Harrigan
I said, who?
- [31:55]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
I said, Oh, no. Quick, somebody tell President Trump they're singing in Minneapolis City Hall. Oh, man. Ah, poor, poor President Trump. He's going to, he's going to walk up there tonight and go. I'm sorry to tell you I was planning on giving a State of the Union, but after I heard the lesbian knitting club from Minneapolis talk about their feelings, I've decided to cancel my presidency and make Kamala Harris the El Presidente. I don't. I don't really think that's where he's gonna go now. Speaking of Kamala Harris, she is really starting to hint that maybe it's time for another, you know, hit you upside the head with a coconut little presidential run.
- [32:51]
Tyler O'Neill
Okay.
- [32:52]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Will you run again? I haven't decided. You're still thinking about it. Me answering questions as to whether I'm going to work off the holiday food weight. You gonna run again? I don't know yet.
- [33:04]
George Caldwell
Maybe.
- [33:06]
Virginia Allen
I might. Yeah.
- [33:10]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
That's what I've been saying. That's what I. I closed the book. And I'm like, oh, she wants to. She's just thinking about it. About it. If that was my impression. I don't know if that's what you intended, but that was my impression.
- [33:23]
Virginia Allen
No.
- [33:23]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Okay. I'm again, the. The left look, I understand that I look like the right wing podcaster, you know, influencer, whatever, pundit, stereotype, you know, guy in his 30s, white dude, beard, glasses. Okay, We've all seen it. Whether you call me Discount Matt Walsh or T. Moo J.D. vance, I hear you, but I'm going to make the point again. I don't know who Sharon McMahon is, but this Jennifer Welch, Nicole Wallace, every single Botox blonde lady that they can find. If you're going to interview the former Vice President of the United States, or again, just interview the lady who you wanted to be the President of the United States, perhaps come up with better questions than, you know, I was kind of thinking it's like Hakeem Jeffries writing an interview. It's so awkward about it. If that was my impression. I don't know if that's what you intended, but that was my impression.
- [34:13]
Virginia Allen
No, the book is about a specific period in time.
- [34:17]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
There was no agenda beyond what we've
- [34:19]
Virginia Allen
discussed already, which is just sharing with people.
- [34:22]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Wow. Slip my wrists. I can't listen to any more of that. That sounds more painful than actually sitting through the people's State of the Union style halftime show thing. So, again, just. Just. Excellent. We're really bringing out the best of the best here. Now, I. I do want to take a brief moment here. I believe that he is over on the line. I want to flip it over to Representative Pat Harrigan. He is the representative of the 10th in North Carolina. We're going to switch over to the commercial break really quickly just to pick him up, make sure everything is on and, you know, great to go and then we'll catch up with some more of this. You know, the same kinds of performative nonsense. It's the Tony Kennett cast here on the Daily Signal. Don't y' all go anywhere.
- [35:12]
Radio Producer/Announcer
They're doing the mess around.
- [35:14]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
It's the Tony Kennett cast on 93 WYPC in his 10th. Pat Harrigan, one of the guys who knows, if you're gonna get into these particular State of the Union details, maybe you ought to give it a little more than just kind of the rote talking point kind of stuff. That's why we had him on. Representative, thanks for joining us.
- [35:34]
Pat Harrigan
Well, hey, always great to be with you. Thanks for having me.
- [35:37]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Oh, a joy to have you. So let's dive right in. There's a lot of pearl clutching, a lot of boycott announcement thing going on. People saying, oh, I'm gonna sit over here. Oh, I'm actually gonna sit up in the balcony. Maybe I'm gonna sit outside. Maybe I'm gonna do my own State of the Union with blackjack and hook or whatever. It's really weird watching everyone posture. What do you think's going to be the end result of all of this?
- [36:01]
Pat Harrigan
Oh, I think we're going to see our Democratic colleagues over there in their seats. By and large. I'm sure we'll have 15 or 20 that won't be there. But look, this is the State of the Union. This is a national event. Show some respect for the president of the United States, even if you don't agree with him and, and sit there and listen to the president talk about where the country is and the direction that it's going to have an open mind and be outcome focused, not politics focused. I think that's really the critical thing that I hope my Democratic colleagues observe this evening. I doubt that they'll do it, but we can always have hope.
- [36:35]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Let's talk about some of that Hope for the 2026 year again, a ton that Republicans are hoping to see kind of through on the deliverable side for Americans. What are some of the key things that you have seen in kind of the deliverables area for your constituents? And then what are you hoping to see at least in the midterms as a result of it?
- [36:55]
Pat Harrigan
Yeah, look, I think you got to lay out and the president will lay out tonight the way things were versus the way things are now. We got to understand that President Trump inherited 9% inflation. He inherited a 7.8% average mortgage rate across the country and an absolute record number of illegal alien crossings into the country. And Today, inflation's at 2.4%. Wages are up nearly 1400 bucks for the average American. I think we just yesterday we had news that the average mortgage rate was now under 6% and border releases have dropped to zero for nine straight months. This is not a victory lap for the president, but it is proof positive to the American people who are willing to listen to facts that we are moving the country in the right direction. And I think that's the theme for tonight during the State of the Union. I also think that's the theme moving into the 2026 election. President Biden did not break this country in a day or a year. It took him four years to break it. It's going to take us some time to fix it, but President Trump and Republicans in Congress are working together to do that. We're on an entirely different trajectory, and the President should lay that out this evening.
- [38:08]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Well, it seems like the Democrats plan to at least counter so far. And we. We really don't know. We don't even think they know if it's gonna be at 8pm, 8:39. We're not quite sure when. They're a little sort of almost a halftime show is going on, but we do know that they've got two main strategies here. They're gonna talk about Epstein, and they're gonna talk all about the victims of ice, violence and manhandlingness. Do you think that's going to be effective, at least in the State of the Union speech room? Are we going to stand up, maybe hear Al Green shouting about dastardly deeds?
- [38:43]
Bradley Devlin
What are you thinking?
- [38:45]
Pat Harrigan
Yeah, we'll see if he ends up shaking his cane like he did last year.
- [38:48]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Have you thought about getting a cane, shaking it in contrast? Maybe.
- [38:52]
Pat Harrigan
Only. Only to make sure that I'm protected from him more than anything else. I'll tell you. I'm just hoping that my Democratic colleagues might actually stand up and clap for a few things. Maybe like a kid with cancer this year or something like that. You not forget that last year. But, you know, look, I, I think the Democrats have their talking points. Unfortunately, what is really clear on the Democratic side right now is that the best talking point that they have is keeping the government shut down. And, and for no good reason. Right. I mean, they're talking about ICE and they're talking about the Border Patrol, and the reality is a lot of that's been provided for in the reconciliation package. And the only thing that we're impacting in this shutdown right now is the Coast Guard, TSA and air traffic control. I mean, it's just, it's, it's, they're, they're talking about apples and we're dealing with something far more consequential to the average ordinary American who's just trying to move through their lives unencumbered by government mess and continued, you know, bureaucratic, you know, messiness up here in Washington. So I don't know what they're going to stand on tonight. It's a lot easier to stand against something than it is to stand for something. I think we very clearly understand Democrats stand, stand against President Trump, but we don't know what they actually stand for. I don't think that they're going to make that declaration tonight, but I think President Trump is going to spit out a lot of facts of why this country is headed in the right direction.
- [40:17]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Well, we'll see if you're right. I've got the under over on that, that cane thing. So, no, consider that really. Pat Harrigan, representative From North Carolina's 10th really appreciate your giving us a couple of minutes. We'll have you back on when there's, there's more time to kind of dive through some of these things instead of just that state of the Union before you have to head out to the horse tracks. So appreciate it again, sir.
- [40:39]
Pat Harrigan
Sounds like a plan. I'll be with you guys anytime. Y' all have fun tonight. Enjoy the show.
- [40:43]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
All right, I say we bring over some of our brilliant Daily Signal analysis crew here. Right up at the front we have our wonderful Virginia Allen. She is kind of our national security correspondent, our senior producer. Excellent stuff there. And then, of course, our political editor, Bradley Devlin. Guys, good evening.
- [41:03]
Virginia Allen
Good evening. Great to be with you, Tony.
- [41:05]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Well, Virginia, let's kick it right off to you here. Do you think the president of the United States is really going to go into this detail on a, perhaps an Iranian plan with Congress tonight, or is he maybe just going to say whether or not he really wants a deal? What do you think?
- [41:21]
Virginia Allen
He's definitely going to talk about a deal. He's going to talk about the interests that the US Has, I think, insecurity in the Middle East. He's going to really reiterate the US Commitment to Israel. I don't think, unfortunately, I, I would of course, be eager to hear the president in detail lay out, you know, these are the plans. This is what we're going to do in Iran. As a journalist, as someone who covers Iran, I am eager to see the President make some clear statements on that. But of course, because it is an issue of national security, I don't think he's going to lay out any plans in detail. But there's no doubt and you know, I, I was thinking back to about a week ago and the big question a week ago was is a strike on Iran going to happen before or after State of the Union? Well, now it's after. So there's no doubt the President is going to make reference of it, talk about it in some way. But I think he's gonna be very careful about how he addresses it tonight. Cause of course it is such a sensitive issue.
- [42:12]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
So obviously Bradley, there's a lot of issues that aren't really sensitive for the President of the United States. He's got a lot of things he's gonna want to hit as far as accomplishments over the last year. So I really want to get your perspective on what you think he's going to spend the most time talking about.
- [42:29]
Bradley Devlin
Yeah, I think that is the question. Tony. We're going to get one of three speeches tonight. It's either going to be an accomplishment speech, it's going to be a forward looking speech, or it's going to be the America250 speech. I don't, I think those are the three options on the table. Of course we're going to get a little bit of everything. But what is the main narrative that the President is driving here? Is the President going to lean on what he pulls very well in, which is everybody thinks he's a pretty patriotic guy, that people don't doubt that about the President. And so is he going to lean into America 2:50 Speaker Mike Johnson's gonna gavel it in with George Washington's gavel. The second option, this accomplishments option, he's going to go through his stump speech, his list. It's going to sound a lot like the joint address from last time around. The joint address? Yeah, last year, only a little bit more enhanced, a little bit more emphasis potentially on the criminal illegal aliens that have been removed from the country as well as the crime rate going down across the country because of law enforcement activity. So that's the, the accomplishments version of the speech and then finally the forward looking version of the speech I think ties a little bit into the Iran question. And that is this is the President's opportunity to lay out in front of the entire nation while the eyes are fixed on him even more so than it typically is, right. Why Republicans should remain in power come 2026 and going into 2027, why Republicans should win the midterms. This is the President's chance to get every Republican in the same room and say, this is the hymnal. We're all reading hymnal 432. Or in this case, I believe it would be hymnal 4547. And really drive that narrative. That could be affordability. It could come in the, in the, you know, foreign policy realm. And that ties into Iran because this is also Trump's opportunity to explain to the American people the purpose of his military buildup in Iran. We don't need to go too far into details with war plans, but one of the things that Trump struggled with before the successful military option operation in Venezuela was, okay, why are we doing it? Right? The public wanted a more thorough explanation and the public is still struggling with that question. I think Trump wants to avoid that if he's going to take serious military action against Iran in the coming weeks and days. And this is his opportunity to do it.
- [44:57]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
So let me pitch this back to both of you here. This is something that I think, at least broadly, a lot of Americans are wondering, what am I betting on, right? The poly market, you know, the call she market. Are we going to have somebody stand up and yell? Is somebody going to throw a shoe? Is someone going to cry? Are we going to walk out? Is somebody going to wrestle? Is the hockey team going to escort one of the Democrats out? Virginia, you obviously hosting problematic women, you know, a thing or two about being problematic. And so I got to ask just, you know, up front here, what do you think are the biggest blow up moments that we're going to see? And are we all expecting it so much that we're going to be disappointed? What are you looking at?
- [45:37]
Virginia Allen
I mean, now I'm going to be disappointed if hockey players are not hauling Democrats out of the chambers. Tony, you've just set the bar really high. So in that regard, yeah, you're disappointed. But no, I mean it is classic now. It has almost become the MO of Democrats that it's like a pre agreement that someone's going to be the person to make a fool of themselves. I think just given all the controversy that we have seen, seen specifically over the past month related to ice, that at some point we know Trump's going to talk about the issue of border and immigration and it's very likely that a Democrat is going to stand up, going to yell something, going to be angry you're going to hear a lot of booze from Democrats probably when the President is talking about how successful he has been in deporting criminal, illegal aliens out of this country. So there's no doubt there's going to be a lot of showmanship. We're going to watch that camera pan the audience at critical moments. You're going to see a lot of Democrats refusing to clap for victims of, of illegal immigration in this country. It's going to be a real embarrassment for them. And, you know, it's always, it's always this kind of back and forth of optics really, as Republicans show up with this show of force for the President's policies, as they did last year, and Democrats refuse to honor even the policies that the vast majority of Americans respect and agree with.
- [46:57]
Bradley Devlin
My wild card here is if Trump attacks the Supreme Court viciously, because very possible ruling very will you get an eye roll from a justice? Like an eye roll from a justice, in my opinion is worth 300 Al Greens shaking their cane.
- [47:14]
Virginia Allen
Okay. Who would give that eye roll, though?
- [47:17]
Bradley Devlin
I think ACB is probably on the short list. Like, oh, no, you might have sodom Ior. You might have sodomy or, you know, doing her thing. But I think if he goes after in particular the justices that he appointed to the Supreme Court, that could be. That could be. Who gets the eye roll. It could be Gorsuch, though. Gorsuch can get a little.
- [47:40]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
You can get a little feisty, maybe a little expecting. You know, say I put you there, I put you there, and you're not acting very grateful. But I, I could tell you, here's my. Over under on this one. He calls out a totally different Supreme Court justice. And Katangi Brown Jackson, who wants the attention, wants her Broadway moment, is going to start acting incensed, like he was going after her. And no one, no one even talking about her. She's going to make the moment about her. What do you think?
- [48:08]
Virginia Allen
I could see it. I mean, you know, I kind of think part of it is for the justices, and maybe rightly so, I'll play devil's advocate a little bit here. They feel that, hey, if one of us is attacked, we're all attacked. We all represent the law. We all represent justice here at the Supreme Court in the United States. So, you know, to be fair. But yeah, Tony, you're right. I certainly would not be surprised if we see that.
- [48:31]
Bradley Devlin
Yeah, I guess my bet on Sotomayor was probably the worst bet compared to Katanji Brown Jackson, just in terms of how much attention Jackson brings onto herself inside the courtroom.
- [48:46]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Unless she's jealous.
- [48:47]
Bradley Devlin
Right. Her word count total is like super high.
- [48:49]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Yeah.
- [48:52]
Bradley Devlin
So that's, that's a possibility. If we do get a Supreme Court mix up, I would frankly, I would love to see just a little bit more of the judiciary tipping its cap that it's, it's still a political branch of government. There's no way that you can separate politics from the judiciary. And I think, I think that, like you, of course, want the Supreme Court to be held in high esteem by the public and by our public servants.
- [49:19]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
But while I'm wishing for things, I'd love a pony.
- [49:22]
Bradley Devlin
Yeah, yeah, exactly. But this mythology that the Supreme Court is completely above reproach has really been, you know, kind of an advent of the progressive era in the 20th century, in particularly the like era of good feelings of the late 20th century, when everybody thought Americans institutions were just so healthy. And, you know, kind of the magic of Trump is Trump comes into politics and says all of these institutions you think are so healthy, healthy and so right, aren't. They really aren't. And that has been, I think, his big project over the last 10 years. If that fight comes to the Supreme Court, wouldn't be surprised. Will it be tonight? That's the big question.
- [50:01]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Kind of the final, kind of the final bit of theater question I have for you. Because obviously we'll come back, you know, afterward, after all of this is said and done when it's three or four in the morning and we'll very blearily give, you know, kind of our takes on a few things here.
- [50:13]
Virginia Allen
It's at least going to be two hours, Tony. I'm banking on at least a two hour speech tonight.
- [50:17]
Kurt Schlichter
Excellent.
- [50:18]
George Caldwell
Awesome.
- [50:18]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
I slipped my wrists. Okay, so last question here on kind of the theater of it all. According to Axios, Representatives Thomas Massie and Ro Khanna, Republican Thomas Massie, Democrat Ro Khanna, Kentucky and California, respectively, who have formed an unlikely partnership around the Epstein issue, plan to sit together and hold hands. Okay. It doesn't say hold hands on the Democrat side of the aisle, A source familiar with their plans told Axios. Is this going to be anything or is it just going to be really awkward because again, there's going to be some standing and clapping moments for things that theoretically Massey would stand and clap for. I mean, how's this going to play out?
- [50:59]
Virginia Allen
This is going to be what the media makes it. And I think the media is going to make it pretty big because they're going to be paying attention. This is an Issue that the media has been covering heavily going into tonight is how are the Epstein files going to be covered? There's going to be allegedly, there's going to be survivors in the crowd in the audience, and people are paying attention to this on both sides of the aisle. I mean, I'm thinking back to last year. One of the biggest supporters of President Trump that was in the audience was Marjorie Taylor Greene. She's not in the audience this year. Why is she not in the audience? Largely because of the Epstein files, because she disagreed with the President on issues related to that. There was tension, there was controversy, and she put her foot in the ground and really got on Trump's bad side. So, I mean, this is. This is an issue that's not going away. People care about it. The media knows the American people care about it. They're going to talk about it. So I think likely you're going to see a lot of camera coverage on those two tonight.
- [51:57]
Bradley Devlin
Bradley, make or break moment for masses. Right. Massie has been the guy to vote with Democrats a ton this Congress, not because he agrees with Democrats on the particular policy issues, but because he kind of positions himself as this principled libertarian member of Congress. And so I don't bemoan Massie. I think Massie and I probably get a get along on 97% of the issues on principle. It's the politics that Massie has played rather poorly here. And if Massie stands up boldly in a sea of Democrats for the things that he says he principally cares about, then I'm going to be like, okay, this is Thomas Massie doing a Thomas Massie thing. Move on.
- [52:38]
Virginia Allen
Yeah.
- [52:38]
Bradley Devlin
If he sits down the entire time and only stands when Democrats stand, applause for the President. That will tell you that the principled Thomas Massie act was actually charaded. If you're not going to stand on the House of. On the floor of the House of Representatives and cheer on the things that you principally agree with the President on, then, yeah, the President is right to primary you. I think. I think that is going to be Massey's test tonight. If there are images of him, like, applauding, like hardcore applauding in a sea of Democrats that are like, oh, hand on face.
- [53:13]
Kurt Schlichter
Oh, no.
- [53:14]
Bradley Devlin
Then I think that's a good look for, For Massey. If it's the other way around, I think, yeah, Massie might face a cold, cold electoral winter.
- [53:22]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Yeah, Interesting. I'm really. I'm really looking forward to see how this stuff pans out. Bradley Devlin, our political editor over at the Daily Signal Virginia Allen, host of Problematic Women and also our senior news producer. Thank you guys very much for giving us a little bit of your time here tonight.
- [53:39]
Bradley Devlin
Absolutely. Thanks, Tony.
- [53:40]
Virginia Allen
Thanks, Tony. See you in a bit.
- [53:41]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
All right. Before we head over to kind of the very brief kind of commercial in and out to satisfy the FCC rules that I am definitely stretching thin this evening, I also wanted to point out that you could see a couple of rules changes come out of this particular State of the Union. I'll ask Rob Bluey and our Tyler o' Neill about this here in a little bit. Mainly just, you know, just, just one, one pal to another here. I don't know how it's going to go if you have U.S. hockey players and then whichever special guests every congressperson decides, they get, you know, 15 guests and their brother that wants to come and see the State of the Union, so they're all sitting on each other's laps and squeezing into the same chair. I gotta ask at what point we actually have a building that's either big enough to hold these people or this might as well just be in a big stadium. I'm not really seeing how this is gonna. I mean, if they have all the seating charts and stuff planned out and plotted ahead of time, sure. But at some point, not everybody can bring a guest to the State of the Union. You heard Johnson. The galley's already full. So I don't know. I think that could get a little interesting tonight as well. Regardless, the House is not gonna be the focus for long. The real question is going to be what happens in the Senate. Senator Ron Johnson over on the line for us here in just a minute. Don't go anywhere, guys. We got a lot of great coverage tonight. The Tony Knitt cast here on the Daily Signal, nationally syndicated in first on 93 WIBC. This is the Tony Kennett cast on 93 WYBC. We go over to good friend of the show, Senator Ron Johnson of Wisconsin. That's right, the Hammer of Milwaukee himself. Joining us for a few minutes here, sir, how's it going? A lot of stuff going on.
- [55:36]
Tony Kennett
I'm doing well. Hope you are, too.
- [55:38]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Oh, as well as can be expected. State of the Union stuff, of course, getting shoved into that House of Representatives chamber this evening. A lot of things to talk about. Americans minds are in a million different places. What are you expecting out of the State of the Union this evening? What are, what are you looking out for at least as far as your particular voters, what they're going to be hearing in the speech?
- [55:59]
Tony Kennett
Well, my hope is that President Trump will keep it short and sweet. It doesn't sound like that'll necessarily be the case here. But, you know, President Trump has to lay out, these are the things we've accomplished. These are the challenges that lie ahead. I think it'd be totally appropriate to point out the resistance, the lack of cooperation he's getting from the other side as he's trying to clean up their enormous messes. So, again, I think it's about, you know, being honest with the American public, lay out the reality and say, this is how we have to move forward together.
- [56:31]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
So this is something that I talked about with Representative John James yesterday. We're in the industrial belt. I'm down here in Indiana, though. It's a national show. Obviously you in Wisconsin, our friend, as I just mentioned, up in Michigan, this industrial manufacturing belt of the country is experiencing a lot of growth in ways that maybe other parts of the country weren't looking for. The revitalization of our manufacturing industry itself. What are you seeing over the last year that is kind of a work in progress? What are the successes going forward? I know you and I have talked about this a lot, kind of off camera, but I'm curious to pick your brain a little bit here on what you think about all of the pro manufacturing promises that were made during the campaign trail into now.
- [57:16]
Tony Kennett
Well, obviously, manufacturers loved what we did in terms of making sure we didn't have a massive automatic tax increase increase. We made a lot of the provisions permanent. That gives them certainty and stability. When it comes to trade policies, it's a real mixed bag. I mean, what was always surprised me is even people who are experiencing the pain of the uncertain trade policies and tariffs, that type of thing generally say. But I appreciate what President Trump's trying to do here. They realize that for decades, our trading partners, we've been magnanimous toward them being the world's superpower, the largest economy, we've been magnanimous. We've helped literally lift billions of people out of poverty around the world. But as a result, people have really taken advantage of us. And that can't go on forever. So President Trump is trying to really re establish free and fair trade, and that creates dislocation and lack of stability. I was quite honestly, very disappointed in the Supreme Court. They didn't really solve anything whatsoever. They left, you know, unspoken. Well, what do we do with the $175 billion of tariff revenue that's already been collected? I mean, that just sets up court challenges that'll drag on for years. I was hoping that whatever the Supreme Court decision would come down, it would be unanimous and it bring return stability and certainty to our economy. It didn't do that. So again, the problem with the tariff policies being employed right now is it does create uncertainty and instability. That's not good for businesses. That's not good for business investment. Although again, a lot of people realize we've got to do something certainly about China and we need to insist on fair trade from our trading partners.
- [58:56]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
There's something that I wanted to ask you about for some time, this kick the can down the road mindset that seems to have encircled American policy. I know that you have been frustrated about this in the Senate for quite a long time that yeah, there may be instability, yeah, there may be frustration, yeah, there may be a disconnect from what voters want solved, but we'll sort of address it and then kick the can down the road another 10 years. Let it be someone else's problem. To see this from the Supreme Court of the United States is very concerning because now we, as you said, we're going to be wrestling with another decade of decisions that's going to create a lot of uncertainty. Is there any path out of that that you can see right now, or are all we left with a bunch of legal challenges and court battles no matter what we do?
- [59:39]
Tony Kennett
Well, Supreme Court has a lot of power in terms of choosing which court cases they want to decide, and they can choose cases that will actually bring clarity and certainty to different situations. What they did in this case is they picked up a case that then they decided on it very narrowly and left all kinds of questions undecided. And that seems to be a real hallmark of the John Roberts court. He'll write the majority opinions that only address a very narrow legal issue and leave the rest of the country sort of in the lurch. Now, I primarily blame Congress, you know, particularly in this situation we've passed. I wasn't part of it, but previous Congresses have passed laws that are sloppily written. They don't lay things out, they're subject to interpretation. So the Supreme Court interprets, but they only interpret. They only go so far to a certain extent. I understand that as well. They don't want to overstep their bounds as well. So I really lay most to blame on Congress and pardon my French here for the half assed and unprofessional approach that I witness every day around here.
- [60:48]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
That's exactly what I wanted to ask you about because we expect this kind of stuff in the, in The House.
- [60:53]
Bradley Devlin
Right.
- [60:53]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
We expect, you know, the kind of performative theater we shouldn't. We expect the very vague language that's written. I'm disturbed in the C span filming of committees that we see, you know, non stop now that in the Senate a lot of your colleagues on both sides of the aisle, I'm not going to name any names particularly, but they want to do the theater, they want to go out and they want to pontificate about how wonderful or terrible something is. And then once you get to the legislation, it's very vague, not useful, just soft handed, waste of time. It's not even duct tape, it's that weak masking tape that you bought at the dollar store being used to fix things. What are we going to see at least in the long term of Americans response and reaction to that? Because I don't think theater is going to satiate the hunger.
- [61:44]
Tony Kennett
Well, I'll tell you, the only solution is to reduce the size, scope and cost of government because this is the way it's always going to be. Our country, our economy, our government has become so large and so complex and the people writing this, I don't even know who writes most of this legislation. You have a concept for something, you've got to turn it into legislative text. So you have ledge councils writing stuff that is pretty much incomprehensible. You cannot read most pieces of legislation, make any, any sense of it whatsoever. You need, you know, all kinds of law books laid out before you. Because you're changing this word in this subsection of that again. It's, it's literally incomprehensible. And we just have that layer upon layer upon layer of incomprehensible text written by people that quite honestly really have never participated in the private sector. So they have no experience in, which means very little knowledge of and maybe even worse, very little sympathy for what we experienced in the private sector. And even worse than that, most of these people have never even been part of a functioning organization. So you see these decades of dysfunction where you can't pass a budget, you can't pass appropriation bills. I've been here for 15 years now. Unbelievably in that time we should have passed 180 appropriation bills before the start of the fiscal year that they were funding. We've passed 6. It's a 96.7% failure rate. And yet people in Washington D.C. are right now patting themselves in the back going, hey, we funded 11 of the 12 appropriation bills four months in the current fiscal year. And of course we didn't fund dhs, Department of Homeland Security. I would think that'd be one of the primary functions of the federal government and that is up in, up in the air. And of course during the whole debate we wouldn't, they didn't pass my Shutdown Fairness act which would at least pay the people who we are forcing to work because we deem them essential. So again, no, I am sick and tired of the dysfunction. The business of as usual in D.C. doesn't cut it. Again, I'll repeat it again, it's half assed, it's unprofessional. It's not the way private sector companies approach things, it's not the way you solve problems. We just create bigger messes. And it's again, an analogy would be you got the ship estate, right? Over the, over the centuries, the decades, you've got a bunch of barnacles piling up on the ship estate, slowing it down. The solution's obvious, clean off the barnacles. That's not what we do. We just say I got another barnacle here, just pop it on there, make it even worse. So by and large, from my standpoint, most piece of legislation make things worse. They don't make them better.
- [64:23]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
So that leads us to kind of the questions about rules and procedures, right? So obviously if we're going to talk about maybe in a corporate structure, if you have a policy set up on some kind of a corporate board in which you need, let's say six or seven out of nine votes to pass major corporate policy through in the interest of everyone being on kind of the same side and having something argued out, hammered out, a much more clean thing then you can run the risk of getting into the bureaucratic milk toast, you know, oatmeal without sugar kinds of legislation that we see leaking its way through with the desperation to try to reach 60 votes, is it time in the United States Senate to start utilizing the talking filibuster? Although it may add a couple of weeks on to some of these things, like with the Save America act for instance, is it time to actually start taking some of these soft handed rules and procedures from out of the Civil War era and say, you know what, it's not worth it. There's too much junk. We're never going to get some of this junk cleaned up anyway.
- [65:24]
Tony Kennett
Well again, I'm not aware of any state that has a super majority to pass legislation in a bicameral legislature. I think this is pretty unique to the Congress where you have a 60 vote threshold to pass legislation through the Senate which has slowed us from becoming a socialist nation prior to this. So again, I, I reluctantly give up, of course merits. It absolutely has. I mean without that Democrats would have, because Democrats have been in control a lot more than Republicans. It would have forced all kinds of awful, awful legislation, turned our nation into one party state decades ago. So that's given, that's given protection to the minority. And basically Republicans, conservatives have primarily been the minority. The problem is Democrats have now shown their hand. The next time they have they're in the position they will end the filibuster.
- [66:17]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
The train is coming anyway.
- [66:19]
Tony Kennett
They purged two people that prevented them from doing it last time. Next time they get into power, they're not going to blow their chance. They'll turn Puerto Rico, D.C. to states. That's probably four new Democrat senators. They'll pack Supreme Court. You'll never have decent Supreme Court decisions again. Again. Their goal is a one party nation and they'll do anything they can to acquire and maintain that power. So that's the very sad state of our democracy right now. So I reluctantly have gone beyond talking filibuster. I would end the filibuster. We don't have the votes in Republican Senate because other Republican senators, again I very sympathetic with their viewpoint. They're very reluctant to get rid of the filibuster because they know what it has prevented. But they're just not looking at reality right now. And if we're going to do it, we better do it fast, but we better do it on excellent pieces of legislation. What we don't want to do is we don't want to nationalize American elections, but we want to put in place basic controls and guidelines to guide the states as they administer elections. That's what the Save America act. Okay, you can't vote if you're a non citizen. But we have all these states who don't require citizenship proof, don't require decent ID to make sure that noncitizens can't vote, that your legitimate vote isn't canceled by a fraudulent one. So again, that is a piece of legislation that we should pass. It's going to be very difficult to do without eliminating the filibuster. We can talk about the talking filibuster, but unless we go back to a 1986 precedent that Robert Byrd changed with, by the way, all he needed was a majority vote. He got over 90 votes on this where they changed what the definition of a speech is. So prior to anytime a senator would stand up, basically anything they say that would count as a speech, which means you'd be limited in the number of amendments you can offer, but that precedent changed. So at this point in time, if we don't change the rules of the Senate, basically a talking filibuster, the Democrats can offer an unlimited, an infinite number of amendments. And it really renders the talking filibuster its ability to bring the debate to a close, to actually vote on something, just a 50 volt threshold, it's going to make that very difficult. Now maybe you can exhaust the other side, but the other side's got a much easier job if we, if we force them to talk. It seems like they're, it'd be a lot easier because they'll just offer amendment. We're going to have to muster the, the quorum to actually table that amendment time and time and time and time again. So I know it sounds good. We'll just, just make them talk. They'll exhaust themselves. It's a lot more complex than that. And nobody really can guarantee the outcome or really predict how it would, would possibly end.
- [69:03]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
It's a really bizarre game of Simon says. It's just bureaucratic, Simon says. All of these different micro procedures and rules and careful little outset. I mean, it's got to be just beyond maddening to deal with. Senator Ron Johnson of Wisconsin, thank you very much for giving us a couple of minutes. I appreciate the candor, the clarity. And my personal favorite, at no point did your eyes bug out of your head and you started ranting about things from New Jersey on the Senate floor. So huge. Thanks for that.
- [69:29]
Tony Kennett
Have a good day.
- [69:31]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
All right, let's switch over to some of our other news for the evening. Thomas Massie has now come out to push back against the allegations that he is sitting on the Democrat side of the aisle. That report from Axios he posts this evening, this is my view tonight at the State of the Union from the Republican side of the aisle. So he's pushing back against that. There you go. A little bit of an update from Representative Massie himself. Now we're gonna get over to some of the real State of the Union address nonsense. Of course, the White House saw this photo and then, you know, put a sombrero on it. But for more on these updates, we're gonna head over to our George Caldwell. He is our correspondent at the U.S. capitol this evening. George, just kind of a curiosity here. As we get closer to this State of the Union livestream from the President of the United States, what's kind of the current drama going around the Capitol
- [70:33]
George Caldwell
Bill, in terms of current drama, several of the Democratic lawmakers are attending the State of the Union address with accusers of Jeffrey Epstein, alleged victims of Jeffrey Epstein. And it seems that there will be a big messaging battle taking place. President Donald Trump, of course, has his guests as well, such as Erica Kirk, such as the men's Olympic team. And so that will be a big storyline tonight. Hopefully the cameras catch it in in the House chamber, sort of how both parties are messaging against each other. Now, a lot of Democrats will not be in attendance and instead will be taking part in rival counter programming. But we'll see how it plays out.
- [71:20]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
A kind of a question here for you on some of the other information. Do we, do we know as of yet who the Designated Survivor is for the administration? Who was, who was left behind to carry on in case, you know, obviously an event of some kind of horrible tragedy?
- [71:36]
George Caldwell
I'm not, I'm not sure if that has come in. It might have, but there always is one. I believe last year it was Doug Collins, the secretary of the VA Good to know.
- [71:44]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
All right. Well, keep an eye on that one. That's always kind of a little interesting tidbit there. I know that Bradley, our political editor, is particularly interested in that one. I do have one question for you. I know you've seen some of the betting markets stuff as well kind of over on the poly market side of things. You know, when time is it going to begin? What's going to be the duration? I don't know if you saw this. One of the betting markets is how long will Trump and J.D. vance shake hands at the 2026. So let me hear. You're under over our capital correspondent.
- [72:16]
George Caldwell
You're there.
- [72:16]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
You're close to the action. How many seconds do you believe? Let's hear it. This is hilarious.
- [72:24]
George Caldwell
I am imagining a very swift handshake between President Donald Trump and J.D.
- [72:30]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
vance going for the swift market. I like it. Apparently Representative Mike Thompson has been he's reporting that he's been selected as the Designated Survivor. So interesting stuff. I'm interesting I his office put out a picture of him with like the really strong as like he's really excited and proud to be the Designated Survivor. Interesting stuff for sure. But anyway, moving over slightly to one of the last questions that I've got for you here as we get ready to get moving. I know the president of the United States has also invited a lot of angel families as well. So we're kind of looking toward the president of the United States talking about some of those that had lost loved ones in some of the abysmal situations over the last administration. Do we have any information on how many of those are going to be in attendance or if there are any particular individuals that he's focusing, maybe in a larger highlight?
- [73:30]
George Caldwell
I believe there will be multiple individuals. I know that there will be, I believe a mother of an individual who died in a car wreck with an illegal immigrant. I think the important subtext and background here is that the Department of Homeland Security is currently shut down due to Senate Democrats denying the votes for a funding bill to advance only Senator John Fetterman. He's the only Democrat who's voting to advance that. So what I think Trump will attempt to do is put pressure on Democrats to back the administration on immigration law enforcement and immigration law enforcement funding.
- [74:14]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
So I think that we can look forward to a very long evening as it is. But kind of the final point, anything that you're hearing from some of the representatives and senators that is probably not being talked about kind of on the national stage, any, any kind of wild card instances that you're predicting or hearing kind of on the rumblings from the Capitol building this evening, wild card in
- [74:37]
George Caldwell
terms of something unexpected that could happen?
- [74:40]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Well, I mean, it's, it's, it's, it's going to be theater in front of everyone. It's all going to be unexpected, you know, ducks in a row and nonsense. But, but aside from that, I mean, policy discussion tonight, at least anything the president is expected to speak about tonight, that is perhaps kind of the wild card. No one was really expecting him to bring this up in his, his first State of the Union officially address as president second time.
- [75:03]
George Caldwell
I'm not sure entirely of what topics Trump will talk, will talk about, but what I think we know for sure is that he'll tout some of the tax cuts that came in the one big beautiful bill act. And he'll attempt to present himself as the president of affordability. He's gone back and forth over whether or not he likes that term, but he'll attempt to present himself as the answer to Biden era inflation and instability.
- [75:32]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Excellent. George Caldwell, our Capital correspondent for the evening. Thank you very much. Appreciate your work.
- [75:38]
George Caldwell
Thank you, Tony.
- [75:39]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
All right, we will shuffle out of those particular kind of live updates to a few other very bizarre responses this evening. I wasn't expecting perhaps the influencer style push to come out in his full force as it has, for example, a large movement of some of these anti ICE protesters, left wing influencer groups have released Videos that I guess are supposed to convince people. Now, if you're still completely unconvinced, you're still kind of on the fence as far as the Homeland Security goes here in the country. I guess this is supposed to get you on their particular side. Here you go.
- [76:20]
Tony Kennett
Hey, guys, we got to talk about ICE right now.
- [76:22]
Virginia Allen
ICE agents are violently detaining, searching, and
- [76:25]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
arresting our neighbors at alarming rates. Adults and children alike are being taken from their homes. Oh, my. Their jobs and their schools.
- [76:35]
Virginia Allen
With little warning and even less legal protection.
- [76:37]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Resistance to the enforcement of this administration white supremacist police state is being met with lethal force. Wait a minute, wait a minute, wait a minute, wait a minute. Is that the dude from the Try, Guys, man, he's let himself go, got the comb over. Is going really wild there. To the enforcement of this administration's white supremacist police state is being met with
- [76:56]
Virginia Allen
lethal force by unqualified individuals who disregard the law.
- [77:01]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Oh, yes. Yes. That's what I want. Yes. Bring me your saddest Sid the Sloth impersonator in a sweater and have them tell me about human dignity, please. I want this more than anything.
- [77:12]
Virginia Allen
And human dignity.
- [77:13]
Tony Kennett
Linda Davis, Keith Porter Jr. Silverio Villegas
- [77:16]
Virginia Allen
Gonzalez, Isaias Sanchez, Renee Goode, and Alex Pretty.
- [77:22]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
I'm gonna level with you. I'm gonna level with you. If this is the campaign ad for 2026, don't get me wrong. Republicans are masters at snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. I know that. You know that, but I mean, if this is the move. Remember end of the 2024 elections, the left came out and said, we need a liberal Joe Rogan, which was you. You had one. Uh, they came out, they needed some podcasters and influencers. This is their answer. It has taken them until now, February 24th of 2026, to come up with their influencer lineup. I know maybe one of these people, and I say maybe one of them because I could totally not see the face correctly. And I. I don't know that one. That one place where they eat that one show. My wife watches it, or used to, where they eat everything on the menu of a restaurant or something. That particular show. I think I recognize a dude from the. I have no idea who this is. I have. No, I. I don't. I'm. I'm not getting it. Maybe I'm just not hip with. The youths are unfortunately just like, who is this? Who is this? What sad freshman from the local college dormitories did you pull out for this particular influencer video? The few of ICE's victims. And we must honor their legacies and make change for good.
- [78:40]
Virginia Allen
And that's where you can help us.
- [78:42]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
So far, we have raised. Wait, oh, you can't just. You can't just. You can't just, like, scoot past, you know, the.
- [78:47]
Virginia Allen
The.
- [78:47]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
The miracle whimsical good witch of the whatever.
- [78:51]
Virginia Allen
That's where you can help us so far.
- [78:54]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Ah, yes. Okay. Strawberry Shortcake's drag queen has. Has come out to give us advice on politics. We have raised over $340,000. So, like almost 1-500th of a normal congressional campaign. The National Immigration Law center, one of the most trusted organizations fighting for the rights and advocacy of low income immigrants and their families. It's 1979.
- [79:21]
Virginia Allen
We are urgently working to raise $500,000
- [79:24]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
to help detained Immigrants and their families Act Texas. Critical legal representation.
- [79:28]
Virginia Allen
Often the difference between reunification and permanent separation. Immigrants make America great, and they're not going anywhere.
- [79:35]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Okay, so the idea. So Hollywood did this back during the COVID era, where they got a bunch of people, like famous celebrities that, you know, and they basically trot them out there and say, Matt Damon. And like, that was like the whole thing, like, wear a mask. Wear a mask. Like, wear a mask. And it didn't really do very much for people. But getting a bunch of random influencers. Again, I only know at most one of these people. Everyone else just looks as though they sell hacky sacks for a living.
- [80:02]
Kurt Schlichter
Their lives are on the line and
- [80:03]
Virginia Allen
their families are at risk.
- [80:04]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Please donate what you can and share every dollar. I don't know who the who. Who are these mystical color hair creatures like who? Please donate what you can. Who is this? What Game of Thrones parody film is this from? I'm so confused. And share every dollar helps protect someone's future. ICE is Gestapo. Okay, so again, there you go.
- [80:29]
Tyler O'Neill
That.
- [80:30]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
That's. That's the crew that they've got. Here we go. We're ready. We're coming to play. It's exciting stuff. All right, all right. I'm not quite sure. Oh, it's the. Who is this guy? That's Damien from Smosh. Oh, that's exciting. I. I remember when Smosh used to be funny years and years and years ago. So there you go. A bunch of random YouTubers. That's the strategy. We got Rosa Deloro dancing. Remember the podcast app? Kamala Harris was announcing her little 6, 7. Podcast app.
- [80:59]
Bradley Devlin
Yeah.
- [80:59]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
No one's watching it. No one's going to that app. No one's listening to these fools. It's awful. It is garbage. Or in a more accurate term, it's rather French. Oh, Hassan Piker's in it. I, I, I, okay, that's exciting. That's exciting. Thank you very much, producer Josiah, for keeping an eye on just the riveting, riveting coverage that that particular crew is bringing to bear. All right, so I very, very briefly want to cut over to our last congressional guest of the evening, some really, really good stuff from Representative Mark Harris. A little bit more of the substantive stuff here because, you know, we, we get into the dessert situation, as the guys over on the, the Ruthless podcast, for example, would call it. You have your, you have your candy and then you have your vegetables. And so I personally, I think if we're actually going to get out here, we're going to do this, we're going to get ready for the State of the Union, then an accurate checklist that also doesn't make you want to slam your head into a wall is kind of useful. So we're going to cut over to him here in just a second. Don't go anywhere. It's the Tony Kenneth cast here on the Daily Signal, the Tony Kennett cast on 93 WIBC. Joining us from over in North Carolina's 8th, we've got representative Mark Harris. Sir, good evening.
- [82:23]
Mark Harris
Good evening. It's great to be with you tonight. Thank you so much for having me.
- [82:27]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Let's talk about the big anticipations. Of course, you serve on the Judiciary Committee. There have been a lot of issues with kind of the federal judicial courtroom brawls that have been happening this year and then also the education workforce committees as well. Let's dive in. As a man of the judiciary, what are you looking for in tonight's State of the Union? Maybe what's given you a bit of apprehension, that kind of a thing?
- [82:50]
Mark Harris
Well, as I come into the listen to the State of the Union tonight, obviously I'm very excited to hear President Trump talk about the things that we've been able to do. I mean, where we are now from where we were 13 months ago, we've come a long ways, baby, as they say, the things he ran on of sealing the border, he's done just that. I mean, we've, I think we've eight months running that we have not had illegals getting across the border and into our country, which is huge. He has started, of course, the finding those criminal illegal aliens and, and getting them deported. And that's a huge step in the right direction. We've seen hundreds of thousands of folks deported we've seen nearly 2 million that have self deported at this point because of the emphasis that he's had. So that's very important to me. And of course, from a judiciary standpoint, that was a big piece of what we were working on during the reconciliation bill was making sure that we had the funding in there for ice, making sure we had the funding in there for the custom border patrol, those extra beds that we were going to need in the deportation centers, as well as the extra agents we were going to need to be able to do the work. And I would love to hear him tonight address the sanctuary city emphasis that was very important to me and judiciary because until we deal with the sanctuary city problem, we're going to continue to have problems. And I for one believe that we don't need to send another tax dollar to a sanctuary city. Federal taxpayers are tired of seeing their money go into these cities that are turning into havens of crime. And look, what we've seen happen in Minneapolis is a perfect example of what could go wrong because you didn't have the federal, state and local authorities cooperating together in order to get criminal illegal aliens detained and then getting them out of the country. And that sort of became all of what it is. So tonight I'm looking to hear some things about sanctuary cities. And the president has been taking a major lead on that and I'm very excited about it.
- [85:02]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
So obviously getting the legislature to get some of those particular sanctuary city, let's say, loopholes closed, removed, that's a huge thing. Also, a lot of federal judges that have gone after the administration. For example, on the Kilmar Abrego Garcia situation where they're talking about Paula Zinnis or James Boasberg, are you expecting the president of the United States to call on Congress to impeach some of the federal judges who have committed rather egregious abuses of what they consider to be their constitutional authority, even though, of course, you know, when they're drawing with crayons, it's not exactly, you know, something to be impressed by. What are you looking for?
- [85:43]
Mark Harris
Well, you know, I don't know that he'll get as specific. He might, and I won't be shocked if he does in calling out judges by name for impeachment. I think the one thing that I would love to hear him do is to point out that we passed the no Roe rulings law in the U.S. house of Representatives and sent it over to the Senate and it's still sitting there. And that legislation was so important because it kept these federal district court judges from making just rulings, indiscriminate rulings, and suddenly they became nationwide over an individual case. So it was a good law. We passed it in the House, it's gone over to the Senate and it's just set there. And so look, and that's not the only thing. There's several things that what I'm looking for would love for him to call the Senate out and remind them who they are and remind them that we still hold a majority over there and the American people are watching. If anything else in these midterms is going to be very important, is that the American people are watching to see if this president and this Congress, who hold the majority in both houses and in the White House, if we can do what we said we were going to do. And that's going to be up to the Senate, from the Save America act to other things, they need to pass those things.
- [87:07]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Now, let's talk about some of the track record, especially regarding North Carolina, over the last year of Trump's administration. FEMA was a huge topic of conversation, especially given how North Carolina was hit from the storms, from the lack of immediate recovery response. There's been an entire year, little over since that was a major issue in the media. But that doesn't mean that everything's been cleaned up for the folks out in North Carolina. How are things going out there? Have the feds been of assistance now?
- [87:39]
Mark Harris
Well, listen, you're exactly right. And things have not gotten back to normal and it's going to take years for us to get back to normal. But I'm going to tell you it's important that we have got to continue to keep the heat on and making sure that the folks in western North Carolina do not get forgotten. But I will say if it weren't for incredible ministries like North Carolina Baptist men who are building houses and literally they are getting a thousand homes, people that are still out of their houses and getting them back in their homes in 2025. They've done that and they're continuing that again in 2026. So there's so much rebuilding that's going on. There is FEMA help that is there, but the state and the federal are needing to work together and we've got to continue to make sure that those channels of funding keep moving forward so that they can get the help that they need. It's just it was an enormous tragedy with incredible disaster and it literally is taking everybody working together to pull this off. And, and so those conversations we've had some very bipartisan conversations with our delegation from North Carolina. We've met with our Democrat governor in conversations there. We're working with fema. Some of those numbers are trying to get refined. But, yes, we, we've got to continue to have the prayers of people across the country for the folks in western North Carolina who are trying to get their lives back on track.
- [89:11]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Last question for you here, Representative. The Committee on Education and the Workforce. This was something that was talked about endlessly ad nauseam in the lead up to the 2024 election. All of us were going to be illiterate. Now, apparently, that's only Gavin Newsom. And there was all of this Talk that Linda McMahon was going to destroy education. We were all going to, you know, be walking around, bumping into walls without the Department of Education. As a member of the House Education and Workforce Committee, what are you thinking over the last year of Trump's administration, and do you think he's going to take maybe a lap of victory on more support for school choice, for example?
- [89:48]
Mark Harris
I certainly think that he should take that lap of victory. There's been a lot of work that has gone in. Secretary McMahon actually was in my office just about two weeks ago. We met together. She has made many of the steps that she set out to take when she went into the office, taking the services that the Department of Education has been doing and starting to give those services to other agencies that can do them not only as well, but in some cases, better. And at the same time that she's been doing that, we are looking toward, again, the congressional action that's going to be necessary to actually shut the Department of Education down. Because, again, we're trying to cut the waste, the fraud, the abuse and the bureaucracy. And. And you're exactly right. So many people, doomsday folks were saying education is going to suffer. Well, I got news for you. When you look at the billions of dollars that have been spent through the federal government on education, that has been for naught, and our scores have continued to go down further and further. The American people had had enough. And I do think that that was a prime thing President Trump ran on, that he was going to get education back in the hands of the states, get it back in the hands of parents, and that becomes critically, critically important. And I hear that, I hear that from our committee. We had a hearing today in Education Workforce, a subcommittee, and we were dealing with the issue of AI and it was really refreshing to have witnesses that were up there when they were being asked, talking about what the Reaction had been of teachers and of parents and of even students to the whole AI issue. And that is front and center in a lot of the conversations that are happening. And so I'm excited about that.
- [91:42]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Representative Mark Harris, North Carolina's 8th really appreciate your taking a minute to stop by and enjoy the State of the Union.
- [91:48]
Mark Harris
Thank you so much. An honor to be with you.
- [91:55]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
It's the Tony Kenneth cast on 93 WYPC. Oh, we got a little alert from our pals over on the FCC side of things. It's been a little bit of, a little bit of time since we had kicked out for one of our required commercial breaks. So in addition to giving my phenomenal crew a smidge of a heart attack, before we hop into some of the discussion, over with again, the excellence of our dear representative friend from North Carolina. Nothing wrong with the stream side of things. I just got a little bit of a notification. We had to swing back and pick up about half of our radio audience. Timer fell just a bit out of sync. Before we get back to our dear friend, the representative, I do want to point out we do have information the President of the United States. The motorcade is on the way. So, you know, I'm, I, you know, we get all to the big kind of theatrical stuff here, but, you know, the motorcade on the way, you got the beast rolling and moving. So the time does absolutely draw an eye. Additionally, we have folks over on the leadership side of things like Chuckles Schumer, as where, excuse me, as well as the minority. What in the world. The Catherine Clark, the minority whip. So the Democrat whip, essentially suggesting that they're both going to boycott and not boycott the State of the Union, which is a little bizarre. Just, you know, for transparency's sake, we'll let her make her argument here. Before we go back to Rep. Harris, we've heard that a number of your Democratic colleagues are planning on skipping the State of the Union address tonight. Do you plan to attend?
- [93:43]
Tyler O'Neill
I do not and let me tell you why.
- [93:45]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
What we have seen from this president is a series of lies of disrespect
- [93:51]
Tyler O'Neill
for the American people.
- [93:52]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
He campaigned that he would lower costs on day one. He would keep people safe and secure, and he has done just the opposite. So I'm going to spend my evening
- [94:04]
Tyler O'Neill
while he is spewing his misinformation tonight,
- [94:08]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
talking to my constituents about their State
- [94:12]
Tyler O'Neill
of the Union and how this administration is impacting them.
- [94:17]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Okay. Really bizarre on a messaging standpoint. Really, really bizarre when we have said before and we have that Democrats are currently in a really awkward place where they do not have any sort of leadership in the party. Any sort of leadership at all in the party. This is what we're talking about. Because leadership would say, all right, we're all going to get under this one tent. We're going to go. We're going to listen to the State of the Union or all of us. We're all going to leave the Senate and the House. We're all going to migrate over instead, and we're going to this one location to do this one town hall or to do this one hodgepodge State of the Union thing, which, by the way, on YouTube, nobody's watching. And then that's what we're going to do. It's going to be unified. Instead, what you have is about half of the crew that's not going. We're going to have, like, a little impromptu sort of watch party town hall. You have another crew that's. That's doing a kind of alternate State of the Union, which is different than the other miniature sort of State of the Union thing. This is really, really bad. And then you're gonna have people on the inside. I really do feel for people like John Fetterman from Pennsylvania or Jared golden from Maine. The senator and representative, respectfully, who are just tired from the left side of the aisle of a lot of the nonsense. You're gonna get nonsense. By the bucket load this evening, Senator Chuck Schumer as well. Just again, Senator Chuck Schumer coming out with his incredible majestic takes. Tonight is going to be long, painful,
- [95:47]
Tony Kennett
and tedious for the American people. We know how tonight works. Trump will claim that everything in America is going great.
- [95:57]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
He's in a huge bubble. America is deeply unhappy with Trump's leadership. Did you get.
- [96:03]
George Caldwell
You get that?
- [96:03]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
He did the.
- [96:03]
Bradley Devlin
Did the.
- [96:04]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Trump.
- [96:04]
Bradley Devlin
The huge thing?
- [96:05]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Huh? Were you impressed by that? Oh, you didn't. You weren't impressed? You didn't care. Oh, excellent. Okay, great. Good work, Chuck. Stellar. Stellar stuff. He'll blame everyone else for our country's troubles.
- [96:17]
Tony Kennett
He'll blame Biden.
- [96:18]
Bradley Devlin
He'll blame the Supreme Court.
- [96:19]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
He'll point the finger at everyone but himself. But tonight, the American people will see
- [96:26]
Tony Kennett
a president whose ego does not let him see reality.
- [96:30]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Mm. Yes. Whose ego will not let him see reality. Okay. Yeah. Because all of the individuals that are protesting or running around to various angry, nonsensical little chants or rallies or alternate programs or sort of halftime shows or passionate singing protests in Minneapolis. Yeah. There's no ego involved there. When Adam Schiff gets up in front of the country and goes, this will be the first State of the Union I've ever missed in my entire life. My dad used to take me to State of the Unions when I was a kid, and I'd get a elephant ear and some cotton candy. There's no ego there. Really. The biggest mistake that Democrats have made in dealing with Trump is that Trump walked out with his big ego and said, I'm Trump. Put my name on everything. You're gonna think it's a highway or an airport with Reagan. That's how everywhere my name is gonna be. And then Democrats said, you know what? We need to have a really, really, really big ego, too, only none of the substance behind it, and humiliate ourselves in the meantime. And that weird strategy is going to be their undoing. There's just. There's no other way to point that particular thing forward. Now, regarding some of the updates from the Middle east, we do have information showing a couple of the flights that are over Iraq and Iran, which are now being diverted. Not entirely sure whether this is. You know, I don't think that Trump's gonna get up there and go, Iran. You see it now. Now you don't. I don't think you're gonna. I don't think. I don't think you're gonna see that. Who ordered the parking lot? I don't think. I think that's gonna be. I don't think that's gonna be the move. But there are some flights in the area that are being routed away. There are also a lot of fueling tanker activity. But to be fair, there's been fuel or tanker activity for some time now. So, you know, just as far as things are considered here, it's going to be a pretty interesting evening regarding Iran as it is. So I'm interested to hear what the President of the United States has to say about a lot of these things. I think that at least moving forward, you know, as we kind of bring things through, the President of the United States is going to have a pretty sizable step towards getting a lot of these particular foreign affairs advocated before the American people. As Bradley Devlin, our political editor, said just a bit earlier, Otherware in the breaking extra news area here, just to kind of keep things rolling as we prep for the State of the Union stuff, Democrat Senator Chris Murphy has decided to take kind of the field by bragging, and I'm. I'm not joking here, by bragging that the government shutdown is totally a Democrat thing, and they'll do it as Long as they need to. He says that we effectively shut down the government. We are shutting Homeland Security down right now. I just man the worst possible communication strategies going into the election cycle. I just don't recommend it. I don't recommend it at all, Sam. I am. It's not a good idea. It's not something that is going to play well with voters. But alas, this seems to be the place that we are. Don't go anywhere. We're going to swing back out to the commercial real quick and we're going to pick up where we left off with Representative Harris in North Carolina. Don't go anywhere. Tony Kennedkast here on the Daily Signal for our State of the Union coverage. All right, let's take a brief moment here before we dive into the brilliant analysis from Rob Bluey and Tyler o' Neill over at the Daily Signal. We have footage. We actually have footage of the people's State of the Union. That's right. I was also a little bit shocked on this one because no one cares about this at all. No one. No one cares about the people's State of the Union broadcast. No one's clipping it. And one of the reasons why is insufferable individuals like Joy Reid are currently hosting it. Tonight.
- [100:39]
Virginia Allen
You are going to hear people that
- [100:41]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
have been impacted directly by the bullshit of this administration. Amen. And because I'm also a church girl. Oh, yes. Oh. Notable devout Christian lady Joy Reid. Okay.
- [100:57]
Bradley Devlin
Sorry, Joy, for my language.
- [100:58]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Oh, no. I'm a cussing Christian, sis. It's all good. I'm a cussing Christian. But we want to start off this night by doing something that I think is so important. Katie, please. And that is reclaiming the Christian voice from white Christian nationalism.
- [101:15]
Kurt Schlichter
That's right.
- [101:16]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Ah, yes. The group that wants to throw out prayer. The group that wants to throw out any semblance of Christianity as a vestige of white nationalism. That's what you're gonna pull out. Oh, yeah. M. Which not only threatens our freedom, but also threatens a very important faith throughout this world. Christianity is not what you have been sold by Project 2025. I'm sorry, excuse. Oh, yes, yes. Very deeply.
- [101:46]
Radio Producer/Announcer
Yes.
- [101:46]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
We all know. Yes. Excellent. Excellent stuff. So we're going to swing over now to far more palatable individuals, people that don't make you want to stab scissors into your ears. That would be, of course, Rob Bluey, president of the Daily Signal, and then Tyler o', Neill, our excellent editor. Good to see both of you guys here. Hope you guys are enjoying the people's State of the. I can't even say it with a straight face. How many views you guys think this is gonna pull in tonight, Rob?
- [102:17]
Radio Producer/Announcer
I don't know.
- [102:18]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
16,000 on a, on a good night, maybe. What do you think they're gonna try to communicate to the American people? Because someone somewhere decided this was the place to go, this was gonna be the thing. I want to get Robin, then Tyler's opinion on what it is they're going to try to sell because they got to sell something.
- [102:33]
Radio Producer/Announcer
Well, clearly they, they know that there are the most passionate and dedicated political observers tuning in tonight. I mean, that's typically who would watch the State of the Union. So I think that probably on the left side of the aisle, they are going to try to get them to be passionate in their hatred of Donald Trump and all of the policies that he's trying to advocate. And, and that is ultimately, I think, what their aim is. They recognize that President Trump faces an uphill battle when it comes to the midterm elections this year. A lot of people say that the momentum is on the side of the Democrats and so they're going to try to foment that anger, Tony. And that's, that's, I think, what this alternative programming is intended to do.
- [103:11]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Tyler. So kind of on that, I want to ask, talking about this momentum, they're trying to capitalize on the momentum, but there's 46 different plans right now. We have, oh, you know, over here we're going to, you know, do some heavy lifting and nonsense with a special broadcast. Others are going to go, but they're going to sit, I guess, outside the building. Some just are gonna go and sit quietly. How is their momentum if they're all doing something completely different?
- [103:35]
Tyler O'Neill
Well, I think they're destroying their momentum. I mean, if you have a separate event called the People's State of the Union, I happen to remember 2024 when we had millions and millions of people vote for President Donald Trump. I mean, if, if you wanna know the People's State of the Union, it's happening right now in the People's House, in the House of Representatives. So any Democrat who decides that it's a better idea to protest outside or to go speak at the People's State of the Union, they're just self defeating because the real energy is there in the room with Trump. And if you're a smart Democrat who wants to oppose Trump smartly, you probably would do some silly protest thing or, you know, God forbid, another one of these raising your cane and shouting at Trump and getting forced out. I mean, that's where the eyeballs are going to be tonight, as you very well suggested. And I think, you know, if Democrats are smart, they're going to go and then they're going to wait and then they're going to do a very slight thing to oppose Trump. But you know, everybody who's out there at this people's State of the Union with Don Lemon is just embarrassing.
- [104:47]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Oh, Don Lemon's there too?
- [104:49]
Tyler O'Neill
Yes.
- [104:50]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Oh, what a star studded event, Booker. Oh, okay. So that, that brings me to the next question here because at some point this over to Rob, something we've talked about quite consistently, if you are going to pitch things, there's got to be deliverables, right? You have to promise something directly to the voters and then you have to deliver on that. What do you think that coming out of this, Trump is going to call mission accomplished? And kind of on the back of that, what do you think that voters might still be looking for for the deliverables for this year between now and let's say next year, your State of the Union?
- [105:22]
Radio Producer/Announcer
Sure. I think the most clear cut mission accomplished moment is probably on border security when I mean, even Democrats, Democrats begrudgingly give President Trump credit for sealing the border and bringing to a stop the influx of illegal aliens into our country. I would say where work still needs to be done is probably around immigration enforcement. I hope he uses this moment to get back on offense. The headlines and the pictures that we saw coming out of Minneapolis were obviously not great for this administration. There are a lot of local jurisdictions all across America, including, by the way, in parts of Minnesota that are cooperating with the Department of Homeland Security. President Trump needs to talk about some of those stories. He needs to lean into some of the, the, the tragic circumstances, unfortunately, with people like Lake and Riley. He had the angel parents at the White House yesterday. I think that you'll probably continue to hear him talk about that. But Tony, as you and I have talked about on our weekly, weekly visits, the number one issue that's likely to decide the midterm elections is going to be around the economy and the affordability issue the Democrats have attempted to capitalize on. And I think that President Trump is going to have a partly declare, partly that the mission has been accomplished because they passed the one big beautiful bill. We're already seeing the positive effects of that in this first part of 2026. But you're already hearing some rumblings in Congress about a second reconciliation bill in which they might tackle some Other issues that could address some of those cost of living issues that Republicans unfortunately don't seem to be getting enough credit for right now, despite the policies they put in place.
- [107:03]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Tyler, that often can get into kind of a sticky game to play if you say, well, I mean, there are a lot of things they should be getting credit for, but they're not going out and getting the code credit for it. So from your perspective, again, I know that you're following a lot of these particular investigations in which there are considerable victories. Help us out, what's one of these situations here or some of the things that either the deliverables, are they not being advertised correctly or they're just consistent concerns still. What seems to be the gap that
- [107:29]
Bradley Devlin
needs to be filled?
- [107:31]
Tyler O'Neill
Well, I think one of the major victories that we just saw in the administration is the overturning of the so called endangerment finding with the epa. This is a transformational move that the Trump administration is taking because this endangerment finding was the centerpiece of all of the federal regulations when it comes to greenhouse gases. And so getting rid of that, you know, really uproots the entire system of regulation that is holding our, you know, holding the energy industry down. So getting rid of that is going to do pay tremendous dividends. And I think the administration can't do enough to sell how monumental this is. It's also part of, you know, we all remember the Doge effort, the idea of rooting out this waste, fraud and abuse. Well, the endangerment finding was the centerpiece of the Obama administration's claim and the Biden administration's claim that they needed to shovel money at these green energy industries because they were the only way that we could move away from fossil fuels. Now we get rid of that, that means not only do we have coal, oil, gas unleashed, and that's gonna drive down costs, not just for Americans driving to and fro, but also for the basic goods and services that we all pay for. So, you know, the major problem we had during the Biden years with inflation, this will have very strong deflationary effects. But it's also going to cut out all the excuses we had for that waste, fraud and abuse in the Biden years. And hopefully it will take a significant amount of time. This is the sort of regulatory change that will not be immediately reversible in the next administration. They're going to try to reverse it. But in order to reverse this, they would have to go through the entire regulatory process again and they'd essentially have to create something like the Endangerment finding again. So I think that's one of the big things they need to sell. They need to sell the big beautiful bill. I think Americans are going to feel, and we're already starting to feel the positive economic effects of lower taxes. But I think it's important for this administration to say, look, if we didn't pass the Big beautiful Bill act, your taxes that you're dealing with right now to get ahead of your filing by April 15, those taxes would be significantly higher. And somehow making those things concrete, they, they need to sell this because hopefully they will get another reconciliation bill. And I think they need another bite at the apple, particularly for dismantling the deep state. But when it comes to the first reconciliation bill, there are a lot of positive things that Americans won't immediately be knowing and feeling. And so unfortunately, you know, the administration has to say, look, your life is concretely better for this reason.
- [110:41]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
So, Rob, I mean, that brings up the question of the filibuster, right? Are we actually going to see President Trump go after the filibuster? Is he going to go after, after scotus? I mean, really, at this point, you have to wonder, I mean, what exactly are we, you know, are we going to, we going to, we going to see there for that? That's, that's one of the key questions for kind of voters coming in, coming into this.
- [111:01]
Radio Producer/Announcer
Tony, I was, I was quite surprised by the willingness of Senator Ron Johnson earlier in your show to, to take a whack at the filibuster in the way.
- [111:10]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Sledgehammer, for sure.
- [111:12]
Radio Producer/Announcer
Yeah, exactly. He, he seems as frustrated as so many other Republican senators are with the realization that the Democrats are probably going to, to come in and if they were ever to regain power in the Senate, which eventually we know they will, will ultimately probably do away with the filibuster. And so I think that the challenge is, as Senator Johnson talked about, if, if the filibuster were not in place, this country would already be in a much worse position because Democrats would have certainly passed the for the people Act, H R1, they would have probably decimated the Second Second Amendment, all sorts of things that the freedoms that we take for granted in this country. And so President Trump may bring it up. It's a little bit, you know, I don't know how many Americans are actually paying attention to that level of detail in the US Senate. But he may, I expect that, yes, he will probably take a shot at the Supreme Court. He was quite displeased with the decision Friday on the tariff case. He'll probably talk about tariffs because I would expect, as we know from President Trump's pre presidency, even from the first term, I mean, tariffs were, were a big piece of his policy agenda because he felt that the, the American people were getting ripped off by, by foreign countries in terms of how the trade policy was operating. And so, yes, I think that that's a piece of it. One other point on that, though, I mean, Speaker Johnson was out today saying that that despite the fact that the US Supreme Court said that the tariff action needs to originate in Congress, he threw some cold water on it and indicated that he didn't necessarily think that that was the direction that Congress might go. He's, he said that perhaps Congress might explore some more tax cuts. And, and I hope that they certainly take up, as Tyler suggested, some of the, the deep state issues when it comes to, to cleaning up those problems with a reconciliation bill. But I don't know that Congress is necessarily going to go along with President Trump's tariff plan, but he might put the pressure on them tonight.
- [113:04]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
So as y' all can see over on the live stream side of things on the radio, you'll just have to use your imaginations. We have the various sections secretaries who are walking down the aisles. They're filing in the Supreme Court justices have filed in sessions being gaveled in here. The last question that I have for you guys here before we get to the presidential stuff, do you think that in this year we see kind of a breakout as far as possible presidential candidate opportunities coming out of the secretary class? Because that's who has been on camera, I'd say arguably as much as Trump wanted them to be going into this particular election. We'll do Rob, then Tyler on this.
- [113:39]
Radio Producer/Announcer
Well, certainly we all know that President Trump picks many of these Cabinet secretaries because they were great on television. You can go right down the list. Many of them worked for Fox News, right. So, I mean, they had had a lot of practice. But the two that a lot of people are talking about are Obviously Vice President J.D. vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio. And it seems that President Trump likes to talk about the two of them. Doesn't necessarily give a nod to either, although I would just naturally think, based on what Secretary Rubio has said, that he would defer to Vice President Vance. Importantly, Vice President Vance has been given the job of finance Chairman for the Republican National Committee, which means he's going to be in a position to have to raise a lot of money when it comes to helping Republicans in these midterm elections.
- [114:21]
Kurt Schlichter
Right.
- [114:21]
Radio Producer/Announcer
So he will have the opportunity to hit the road this year.
- [114:23]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Tony Tyler, what do you think?
- [114:26]
Tyler O'Neill
Yeah, I love that answer from Rob. I've been following both Vance and Rubio. I think Pete Hegseth, there's a lot of discussion about him, too. I'm not sure how much he would be a presidential contender, but I do think we have a lot of opportunities. This, this class, this cabinet is really top notch. And we're seeing, I mean, even over at the epa, I've been very impressed with the way that Lee Zeldin has been handling those issues. And Lee Zeldin was not always a warrior for, you know, our, our side on the climate issue, but the way that he has been navigating, both caring for the environment, which is a good conservative priority, and also fighting the climate change insanity has really stood out. And I think he's making a good name for himself. Many of these people, even if they're not gonna be presidential candidates like we're looking at Vance and Rubio, you know, three years is an eternity in politics. So we don't know who's actually going to be at the top of the ticket, and I think we'd be foolish to say we do. But even those who are not going to run for president, I think we should be keeping a close eye on them.
- [115:40]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
I think it's a pretty accurate take on that side. And I do want to share one thing with the both of you here before we cut over to the State of the Union footage here. That is the people's State of the Union. The Democrat halftime show temporarily went down. It just completely lost signal, fell apart.
- [115:59]
Tyler O'Neill
So, I mean, communism hard at work?
- [116:04]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
I don't know. I mean, I kind of felt bad for a minute because, you know, we got kind of a warning that we were kind of exceeding commercial time there. But hey, I mean, at least we didn't completely bog out and lose kind of the general crew there. So. So good stuff there, gentlemen. Really appreciate it. Excellent work as always. We'll catch you guys soon. Very much. Tyler o', Neill, our senior editor. And then of course, Rob Boulie, president of the Daily Signal.
- [116:29]
Radio Producer/Announcer
Thanks, Tony.
- [116:30]
Tyler O'Neill
Thanks, Tony.
- [116:31]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
All right, really quickly here, while we get ready to pivot over to the State of the Union, it appears just so far that the cabinet secretaries going in, the Supreme Court justices, there is some tension, there is some discomforture in the room this evening. So I'm, I'm very much looking forward to seeing this kind of stuff. Apparently, the, the People's Choice Award Union, State of the nonsense kind of stuff. I am told now that that is finally back online and I believe the President is getting ready. So we're gonna pivot over to that here in just a second. Don't go anywhere. We're going to be back after this State of the Union address for some analysis. It's the Tony Kinnit cast here on the Daily Signal, nationally syndicated, first on 93 WIBC, over. Yeah, over to the president in the State of the Union. Well, that was the President of the United States, Donald Trump, in what is now the longest State of the Union address in our country's history, beating out Bill Clinton. Tonight, I must say a few things before we dive into some of our particular reactions, especially from our excellent crews here, there, everywhere. We have some excellent people to share that with you. But first and foremost, the President of the United States did three things tonight. Exceedingly, exceedingly well. At the top of this list, he did not go all in on some of the things that Trump usually does at these kinds of speeches. Um, it was a much more toned down State of the Union from the President of the United States, which just to be completely clear with you, for him, that is a major victory. Not because the president kind of tamping down on this particular, you know, rhetoric, kind of leaning in, going at things, going off script, kind of down rabbit trails. Not that that isn't effective, having been to a couple of his rallies where he does that. It's very entertaining, engaging with the crowd. The president did not spend a half an hour, an hour going all in on tariffs. He did not. And instead, what we saw the President do, and he didn't go after the SCOTUS justices, anything like that. He snubbed, I believe, in a handshake with Kagan, Elena Kagan going in. Instead, he allowed the Democrats to act like complete fools, including. And I want to make sure that. I want to make sure I get this right, actually. I'll play this clip for you here on the stream while Kurt Schlichter of Townhall.com is, is hopping in here. That right at the outset when people were chanting usa, USA for the hockey team, when they were very, very much in on the Americanism of the presidential grandeur of it, Rashida Talib next to Ilhan Omar got out there and while the American crew was chanting usa, usa, she appears to be chanting kkk. So I want to play that one more time here. There is no doubt she's absolutely chanting kkk. That is despicable. It is disgusting. It is one of the lowest things I think I've ever seen at a State of the Union address. Of course, Al Green right across at the beginning getting thrown out for, you know, acting like a complete fool. But to go over some of this, you don't want to hear this from me. What you want to do is you want to hear this from one of the greatest guys that I believe we've got out here. We've got Kurt Schlichter. We'll bring him on over. Kurt, my man. Crazy stuff. State of the Union style. How's it going?
- [120:34]
Kurt Schlichter
Well, it's been a, that may have been the best State of the Union I've ever seen.
- [120:39]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
It was a good one.
- [120:41]
Kurt Schlichter
I mean, it was pretty amazing. I was not bored at all and I have the attention span of a NAT on meth.
- [120:53]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
I mean, did he, did he hit the kind of things that you thought he was going to tackle here or.
- [120:57]
Kurt Schlichter
It was not. Look, I was guest hosting for Hugh Hewitt this today. Wow. I said, I don't know if we're going to get organized focus Trump or we're going to get Trump, walk out, grab his groin and shout. I got the State of the Union right here. And I mean organized Trump.
- [121:14]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
That, that certainly, that certainly could have been the kind of thing that again, we could have seen. But yeah, I mean, you're right, we didn't see that from, from him at all. I'm very, very surprised.
- [121:27]
Kurt Schlichter
Very little riffing, very focused. And it was, if you look at, it was a very strategic speech. This was the kickoff of the 2026 national congressional campaign. This was, we're going to reset the board. We've taken some hits. Our polls don't look as great as they used to. People aren't sure what's up. And you, a fair minded person, couldn't watch that and not come out at least a little jazzed. I mean, again, he brought hit after hit. And then, you know, the golden age of America, then the legacy of heroes, but also things like, hey, our firemen, yay. And you know, go over the Democrats and there's like a tumbleweed across them as they're sitting there like, you know, all sullen and unhappy. They looked terrible.
- [122:20]
Pat Harrigan
Terrible.
- [122:21]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
I mean, I was thinking going in, we'd asked one of our, one of our particular panelists that how strange it was to see them all doing something different. You know, some of them were holding up their posters, some of them were doing a little alternate events, that kind of a thing. But once they got inside, they didn't even, I mean, you had people standing up until they turned around and saw Nancy Pelosi sitting down and then sat back down quickly like it was a really cheap game of Marco Polo.
- [122:47]
Kurt Schlichter
It was. It was bizarre. And you had, you know, the usual cast of idiots, you know. Al Green took time off from his pioneering particle physics research to carry a sign that referred to a. A news cycle about two weeks ago that nobody remembers.
- [123:02]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
But he held his hand.
- [123:05]
Kurt Schlichter
Yeah, it's filed under Cindy Sheehan with those dead communists in Minnesota.
- [123:09]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
He held his hand over the. The aren't like the A and aren't. So instead of black people aren't apes, which is what he was trying to communicate, it looks like he said, black people rent apes. And then I had additional questions,
- [123:23]
Kurt Schlichter
just like, wait, what? And then they had the little tiny Epstein things, and Epstein's blocked out and redacted. But it took me like, look, I'm not an idiot, you know, I'm not a Democrat. I'm looking at it. It was like, oh, they redacted the word Epstein. I get it. But I was actually had to pay attention because I get paid to. Normal people look at and go, release the black box file.
- [123:51]
Virginia Allen
What?
- [123:52]
Kurt Schlichter
And then, of course, Rashida Talib, you know, I. I don't know, maybe how she didn't get, like, her dinner spilled on it because she's kind of fat. She had a blank ice button that the networks caught, which, you know, you're looking at that, and normal people are like, you know, maybe you don't drop an F bomb in the State of the Union. Maybe not. And of course, Illinois. He was brilliant when he handled them. He didn't, you know, they. She'd scream. Because he was accurately pointing out the massive corruption.
- [124:27]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Oh, dude. Shout out to the House cameraman, though. The House cameraman, as soon as he said the Somali pirates. And the camera guy was like, omar.
- [124:37]
Kurt Schlichter
The other thing, he starts saying, you know, grab this poor girl, and they're trying to turn her into a different gender. Immediately goes to that deviant who is pretending to be a girl. Oh, right to it. 435 Congress idiots, and it goes right to perverto mc trans freak.
- [124:57]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Hey, hey, hey. Say what you will, say what you will. Kurt. It took balls for Sarah McBride to stand up when Pelosi was sitting down. There you go. I'll be here all week.
- [125:09]
Kurt Schlichter
The thing is, he was giving them these terrible choices, like, hey, who's against cutting drug prices? And the Democrats are like, I think I should stand, but maybe not. I. What do I do? My Favorite was the, the, you know, the party of the working man wouldn't stand up for the working mom, right, who, who's getting no taxes on her tips and the working husband who's not getting taxed on overtime and the kid who's not getting. And now getting a. A tax credit. And they don't stand for that. Again, the party of the working man.
- [125:46]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
This is the question that I want to ask because obviously when it comes to your town hall columns, when it comes to these kind of things, that you dive in, you do it in the kind of trial lawyer. Liar. Excuse me, the trial lawyer fashion that, you know, presenting the case. Here's the outcome, here's what we're looking at. So I gotta ask, this was supposed to be the tone setter for the 20, 26 midterms. Was that the case? And if so, what are kind of the big takeaways here?
- [126:12]
Kurt Schlichter
If this was. If this tone. If he has successfully set the tone, and we won't know it because there's always a chance you get pulled off off message by the latest round of idiocy like, oh, a bunch of men with hockey pucks are, are enjoying themselves way too much.
- [126:28]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Simone Sanders on Ms. Now. Lost it over that. So then, so then what were the big takeaways then? Whether or not we'll kind of keep an eye out for that. What else?
- [126:34]
Kurt Schlichter
Give me, like, your economy's doing great. America is a land of heroes. I mean, did you see that chief? First of all, a Chief 5.
- [126:43]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Dude, I don't know. The chief warrant officer is like, I'm a Warrant Officer 5. That's like, yeah, I'm trying to explain
- [126:50]
Kurt Schlichter
what that means to my wife and she's like looking at me like I'm crazy.
- [126:53]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
And she looks, you see one of
- [126:54]
Kurt Schlichter
those and immediately, 28 years old. I'm like, he's. He's 28 going on 90.
- [127:00]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Yeah, that. That man is a myth and a legend. Of course, he's an army helo pilot.
- [127:05]
Kurt Schlichter
And he just, he just looks the. You and I know, he just looks the.
- [127:08]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
That is a refrigerator that they stuffed into uniform.
- [127:11]
Kurt Schlichter
Oh, my God. You know, all I could think of is watching this is the freaking aviators and the Navy are going to be free and the Coast Guard are going to be unbearable tonight. And I don't begrudge them a bit. How about that young naval rescueman? How about that guy? How about that staff sergeant who got shot and now he's standing up and they're pinning a purple heart on him. I mean, how can you not look at that and just be like, oh, hell yes. That's the message, that's the takeaway. This is the vibe we've been looking for. I was around and conscious 46 years ago when the Americans had the miracle on ice. And that was one of the first steps towards the Reagan 80s, which were everything your dad has told you if you're a younger person. I mean, Miami Vice, great music, no limits, amazing opportunity. That's what Trump's trying to get. He's really trying to remake the 80s. Dude, we just had our own miracle on ice. Our economy's getting better. We have a president who understands freedom. Our military is kicking butt. Dude, if this is, if we can hold this up, this a great start. We just got to carry it through, throw the history books out the door. We could, we could improve our position in midterms.
- [128:47]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
I think that that sets a pretty accurate summary there. Kurt Schlichter, Townhall.com thanks for hopping on giving us a couple of the takes.
- [128:53]
Kurt Schlichter
Thanks for having me.
- [128:54]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Yeah, we're going to swing out. I'm going to go to bed here pretty soon. Take care, buddy. Audios all right, really briefly here, want to play one clip for you. A couple of you in the comments section are asking, oh hey, what about Abigail Spanberger? What about that? I mean I can see on the pre zoom cam right now our Virginia Allen is sitting there watching Spanberger. She's laser locked. Because no one captivates you like a middle aged white woman on the left. I mean, yee haw. Get out the library cards and the pride flags. I'm sure that is going to be the most zingy, exciting, ecstatic of the responses of all time. I mean, remember Elisa Slotkin's response? Yeah, okay, Matt, you mean either. So we'll swing it over. Virginia Allen, Bradley Devlin, our incredible crew over in Washington D.C. virginia, you said over two hours. You do in fact win the, I don't know what, what prize, but you're winning it.
- [129:50]
Virginia Allen
I don't think so. Tony. I think was just under two hours. I, I have to take an L on this one, I think, but I do believe it was longer than last year's. So the president went for a long time. I think it was about an hour and 50 minutes when all was said and done.
- [130:05]
Bradley Devlin
Speaker 3 Speech. He works the chambers for 20 minutes on both.
- [130:08]
Virginia Allen
Yeah, if you include the chamber working,
- [130:11]
Bradley Devlin
your terms are very clear with your booker before you make.
- [130:14]
Virginia Allen
From the moment, from the moment that gavel struck and he began speaking, I Think we were about an hour and 50. But look, this speech made you proud to be an American. I think that's my biggest takeaway. Whether Republican, Democrat, of course, we're, you know, we're going to hear Abigail Spanberger try to give some sort of haphazard response that no one's actually going to watch. But look, this was a speech about American pride, about looking both to the past of where we have come from, of our heroes, of honoring those heroes, but really, in doing so, the President put out this call forward to say, hey, as a nation, I think twofold, put out a call forward in a political sense to the midterms to say, hey, if you want these policies to continue, if you want to see American excellence and pride on the world stage continue, you need to ensure the Republicans win the midterms. But then also in looking even further forward, really, this call to American excellence, that we can continue this winning streak for years and years to come. I was, I was honestly surprised that Trump didn't get a little bit more aggressive or political at moments. I thought he took a lot of opportunities to lean into moments of unity that was really aided by his guests. He had fantastic guests who I think, really demonstrated that spirit of American excellence just beautifully, of course, with Team USA Hockey leading off that just incredible litany of individuals in the audience who represented so well American patriotism. But it was a pretty stirring speech. And, and I was, quite frankly, I was pretty surprised. I knew it was going to be a good speech, but I didn't think it was going to create so clearly this moment of, hey, as Americans, let's remember what we're really about, what we're achieving, what we have achieved and where we can go from here. And I think the President did that very clearly.
- [132:26]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Bradley, what do you think?
- [132:27]
Bradley Devlin
I thought it was a brilliant speech from the President, and I was going in with some pretty tempered expectations. President Donald Trump usually has some really great lines, but he, he goes back to the stump, he has his. His canned lines, he has his stories that he likes to tell. But we got something that was completely different tonight, and that was even the case last year, right? He had some great moments, like going through the Doge list of all the crazy programs and grants that the US Funding. But he also reverted to what we saw a lot of on the 2024 campaign trail. And if you do this for a living, like we all do here, you've heard that speech a million times. This was not that speech. When we were on before Tony, I said, you're Going to get one of three speeches. You're going to get the America 250 speech, you're going to get the accomplishment speech, and you're going to get the moving forward speech. We got the moving forward speech tonight, no question about it. Of course, there was a little bit of all three of those elements. We said that from the outset. But this was a concrete legislative agenda for Congress to act on. This was not reflecting on the past year. This was a call to action, setting the terms of what success looks like come November. He said these next eight months basically are make or break, not only for this administration, but for Republicans in Congress. And he gave them the actual policies that he wants to see enacted and that will deliver those successes for the American people. It's the GOP health care plan providing that money to the American people instead of large healthcare firms so that the American people can get their insurance at their price. He talked about banning insider trading for members of Congress. And Democrats all sat down.
- [134:00]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Well, eventually, by the way, for the
- [134:02]
Bradley Devlin
Democrats all sitting down. This was Trump at his best here. Trump did not take the bait. He threw the bait. That was brilliant on behalf from the president because he started with some of his major, major campaign accomplishments, major agenda accomplishments, and put them in terms where the average American cannot object to them. Right. Like removing criminal illegal aliens from our country. 60 to 70% of the American people agree with that and agree how the administration has pursued that. And it, and it gets lower when you throw in the Alex Preddy and the Renee Good of that, of all that when you look at the polling. But at a principal level, the American people vastly agree with that. And Democrats could not stand for the idea that the American government is there to benefit American citizens and not illegal aliens. And he made the Democrats look so bad time and time and time again. And he showed Republicans tonight, this is how you win the midterms. It's a legislative agenda and it's not being afraid to be a little partisan and say this is a very clear divide here. There is a Pro America party that celebrates the U.S. men's National Hockey team winning the Olympic gold. And there's the Anti America Party of which some members refuse to stand for those men.
- [135:16]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Simple as I, I think that built on those things here. And this is, this is really one, really one where I want to get kind of your perspectives here. I'm, you know, the entire brand of the Tony Kenneth cast here. It's 11:18, you know, whatever. We're just going to go ahead and have this conversation a lot of our brand and politics is calling things ahead of time. You call things ahead of time, you get to say scoreboard. You don't call things ahead of time. You need to shut up or. Excuse me, shut up. Sit down and, you know, sit there and, you know, get. Get the schooling. Tonight was one of those nights where I had a completely different expectation of what I was gonna see in this speech. And I don't just mean because of Trump. At the beginning, I actually saw Democrats trying to do just a little bit of the. A little bit of the clapping, a little bit of the standing. Our producer Chat was really shocked that, you know, the producer, Josiah, pointed out that they had maybe learned a little bit from last year that maybe for just a few minutes, they said, well, hey, hang on a second here. Maybe we should at least clap a little bit here so they can't say we, you know, didn't clap for anything that wore off. Was it. Did you guys expect maybe that would wear off as quickly as it did? What are you guys takes on that flip from the Democrats just a little bit on the inside there?
- [136:28]
Tyler O'Neill
Yeah. There's a.
- [136:29]
Bradley Devlin
There's a saying in Washington that a good hearing from a crisis congressional, from a nominee. Right. To an administration position is the hearing that gets no fanfare. Like, it just happens. The committee votes partisan. You know, Republicans all vote together and the person gets advanced, passed on the floor, and they have their administration post. And I think Hakeem Jeffries and Democratic leadership wanted that to happen tonight. You could see that from the way that Jeffries was posturing with respect to some of the boycotts that were going on around town tonight, getting members like Adam Schiff to go there instead. Right. He didn't really like that. He just wanted them to stay calm, cool, and collected, clap on the common sense things and just don't give Trump that oxygen. And as soon as Democrats got. Gave him that ops oxygen, which I think Jeffries isn't commanding enough to keep his conference that much in line.
- [137:20]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
There's no leadership.
- [137:21]
Bradley Devlin
Yeah, but. But, like, he doesn't have the iron fist of Nancy Pelosi. If Nancy Pelosi was running that conference, you bet your bottom dollar they would have clapped when she clapped, they would have stayed seated when she stayed seated, et cetera, et cetera. But it did wear off quickly, and Trump was brilliant in letting them stew in it. That moment where they did not stand up for putting American citizens over illegal aliens is going to be remembered more than that moment in the Democratic national or the Democratic presidential primary in 2020. When every single Democratic candidate raised their hands and said they wanted to give health care to illegal immigrants, that was the gift that kept on giving for Republicans. Democrats gave President Trump that in the halls of Congress tonight. And then President Trump just kept taking those steps. That was the big moment, the crescendo. But there was still an outro to this piece. And he would say the simplest things, like criminals deserve to be. To be put in. Jailed. To be arrested and put in jail. And Democrats would stay seated and he would just let them sit in it time and time and time again.
- [138:25]
Virginia Allen
And he pointed it out, and I think that was the smart thing he pointed out. They're not standing, they're staying seated. And if the GOP is smart, you will have members that are running for reelection or running for election use that in their ads. They will not let the American people forget that the Democrats did stay seated on really common sense principles and policies that the vast majority of Americans agree with. And they just refused to. To acknowledge. Yeah, this is a good for America. Even with guests, even with guests that, my goodness, these are people that every single American. I would, I would argue as an elected official, you have a duty to honor that they stayed seated. And, I mean, that's fodder for ads for months to come.
- [139:09]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
We have that clip ready to go here. Let's throw it up here and watch it. So tonight, I'm inviting every legislature to you join with my administration in reaffirming a fundamental principle. If you agree with this statement, you can see at the very beginning there where this, the. I don't know what Democrat this is with the American and the Ukraine pin on. He's like leaning on his hand, looking really tired and bored. Bradley, do you know who this is?
- [139:34]
Tony Kennett
Virginia.
- [139:35]
Bradley Devlin
I can't see it, Tony. I can only. I can only hear you.
- [139:38]
Virginia Allen
But we trust you, Tony.
- [139:39]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
We trust you. Well, discount. Mitt Romney is sitting there again. I know that doesn't really narrow it down, but sitting there again, salt and
- [139:48]
Bradley Devlin
pepper hair, is booing the President of the United States.
- [139:50]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Yeah, I know, I know. Yeah. Anyway, it's not illegal alien. So the Republicans stand up and you get this drawn out shot of all of the Democrats refusing in any way, shape and form that they have here, refusing to stand up or even just clap or nod for. Yeah, well, you know what our goal is, because I thought their goal was to make all people that were in the country American citizens. Right. This is what they'll get up and they'll futz around with on tv. They'll say, well, you know, we just want a fast path to citizenship. That is going to be a devastating campaign advertisement. I mean, I don't know, how do you flip that?
- [140:32]
Bradley Devlin
How do you flip it?
- [140:33]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Well, how do you, I mean, how
- [140:33]
Kurt Schlichter
do you spin it?
- [140:34]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
You get out there, you flip it, you try to, maybe you just say, well, Trump was just being performative. When you get on to talk about that devotion voters.
- [140:40]
Bradley Devlin
Yeah, I think, you know, you just like, well, Trump used the State of the Union for a two hour self aggrandizement campaign strategy nonsense. Right? Like you just do that, you just clear that out of the way. You say it's the state of delusion as they've been saying on Twitter. I think Nancy Pelosi and other Democrats have been using hashtag state of delusion
- [141:00]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
instead of like 436 different. No, I mean like they've had so many seriously different State of the Union titles, hashtags. This has to be the most disjointed State of the Union rebuttal from Democrats. I mean, they had Joy Reid doing one side. Now there's a totally different counter. Virginia, where's the counter from Abigail Spanberger even airing, are they airing that at the other Democrat events?
- [141:27]
Virginia Allen
I mean, it is an embarrassment. I think usually, usually those responses are very poorly viewed. Very. And people don't really pay attention, honestly. You know who's watching that? You know who's paying attention? It's people inside the beltway of Washington D.C. they're the only ones who care. Reporters who are being forced to stay up late and write a piece on that. But apart from that, the American people are going to bed and they recognize the fact that the President delivered a great speech tonight. He delivered a unifying speech. He spoke about a lot of common sense policies and quite frankly, he held Democrats feet to the fire on a lot of issues. And I'm willing to bet that Abigail Spanberger is not going to address much of what President Trump said, but is just going to move through a list of Democrat talking points.
- [142:19]
Bradley Devlin
But I think Tony, you made such a great point there, which is this is super disjointed. Right. It wasn't enough for the boycotts ahead of time and say this is just state of delusion. Right? That's the first step. But the second step in that process is you need to have a central narrative, that central narrative. They wanted it to be health care. Trump had a great moment in pointing at all of the Democrats and saying, you are refusing to let the American people buy their own health care. And you'd rather give that money to big corporations. Who's for the people now? Right. So he neutralized that. I've seen Elizabeth Warren tweeting that he didn't mention child care once. It's a lot of Democrats searching for a narrative and seeing what's going to stick. And I think the next 12 hours
- [142:57]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
didn't mention child care.
- [142:59]
Bradley Devlin
What child care, which he did, by the way, when you're talking about no tax on tips.
- [143:03]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Yeah, he absolutely did.
- [143:04]
Bradley Devlin
Family tax benefits. You're also talking about the expansion of the child tax credit that could potentially help with some child care. You're also not realizing that, you know, a lot of the, the GOP health care plan is going to try to make sure that you have lower health care costs for children.
- [143:20]
Virginia Allen
Trump accounts.
- [143:21]
Bradley Devlin
Trump accounts that on the head, too. And so you have all of these different policies that Trump mentioned that affect the American family directly and to the vast majority of Americans. That sounds pretty good to them. But Democrats are going to be looking for the things that he didn't say and trying to capitalize on that. But again, if Elizabeth Warren's talking about childcare, and I just came off the top of my head with five different things that Trump was talking about to provide financial benefit to families for their children specifically, that's going to be a really difficult needle to thread.
- [143:54]
Virginia Allen
But I think that that lack of unity, that disjointedness that we're seeing from Democrats right now and all these kind of different spouting off and messages really goes back to the fact that Democrats clearly do not have a leader right now. So everyone's just sort of doing their own thing. But like you said, you know, Nancy Pelosi would have been able to kind of have them all in line doing the same thing with the same talking points, and they just don't have.
- [144:19]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Instead of ducks in a row, you had her right now. I mean, that's.
- [144:22]
Virginia Allen
No, it literally is like herding cats. And, you know, obviously we're a long way out from the next presidential election. That leader could arise, but it just, that individual doesn't exist right now.
- [144:33]
Bradley Devlin
I mean, the important thing, too, is. Oh, go ahead, Tony.
- [144:36]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
No, I just, I just wanted to, you know, I just wanted to say just briefly that the, another kind of facet of the evening, kind of the different behaviors that we saw represented from the various parts of the Democratic Congress and then around the country, you saw Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar, like, doing a really, really bad impression of, like, the two old Men, Muppets. Like, if they were like, like I think over there, how was the really not politically correct way it was put online? If you got a bunch of like, you know, found two old foreigner lesbians to do your, I'm sorry, to do your, your, your commentary for the evening as the hecklers. I mean they were their own branch. The camera like panned to a preset shot of them as though they were their own leadership.
- [145:19]
Bradley Devlin
I didn't see purchased by Disney. So they actually have employment opportunity in those specific roles for the Muppets.
- [145:26]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
Tony, look for their music video with Sabrina Carpenter real soon. Gracious. Okay, so we have that stuff aside, apparently Abigail Spanberger is on screen saying energy costs are too high. Yet again she is trying to push a bunch of green energy regulations. Democrats have picked at Trump for a while about whistling past the graveyard on certain things regarding the economy. This has been their thing. Like, oh, you, you say it's really great, but actually people really don't like it. Now you have Abigail Spanberger out there saying energy costs are too high. You have that kind of line coming out. Yet she's expecting people to forget that Democrats energy policies have never once made energy more affordable. Is this going to become kind of their own bear trap to step in? I mean, at least a Slotkin speech didn't really matter last year. I don't think Spanberger is really going to matter this year. Maybe I'm wrong. Either of you feel free to take this one.
- [146:19]
Virginia Allen
Yeah, I mean, I. But she's speaking, I think to a real minority in the United States that
- [146:24]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
like, you mean telling them she got 940 on the SATs. Oh, different minority. Sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry about that.
- [146:30]
Virginia Allen
And windmills are great and everyone should get solar, but really it's a very small percentage of Americans that I think really are still fully bought in to. Gosh, what's the latest prediction on when the world's going to end because of,
- [146:46]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
you know, they're claiming the blizzard is a result of climate change.
- [146:49]
Kurt Schlichter
Yeah.
- [146:49]
Virginia Allen
The latest narrative, whatever it may be, the vast majority of Americans recognize we need all energy options on the table. And I think Trump actually hit this really well. The President at times, I think, has struggled to really address that economic message, that energy message really clearly. He did this really well tonight by calling out specifically the price of gas in various locations across the US where it is now even below $2. We saw again, Republicans all stand and clap for that. Democrats remain seated. But it felt like in a way the President was able to deliver that economic message in just a more direct way than maybe he. He's gotten a little sidetracked in delivering that in previous messages. And I think that this is maybe the beginning of that. And I know the President, he used the word affordability tonight, but he didn't use it much at all. He's hesitant to use it, but it felt like the first time that maybe that message started breaking through really clearly from the President this evening.
- [147:52]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
He didn't really say, I mean, just before you start, Bradley, just as a kind of flavor text here. He didn't really stick on anything for a long time. I thought he would stick on tariffs. That man breezed through tariffs. Not like it's so short that you could write about it. It. I mean, that was a paragraph, and then boom, onto the next thing. I couldn't believe it.
- [148:10]
Virginia Allen
He moved.
- [148:11]
Bradley Devlin
Yeah, yeah, he did move. And that was another brilliant part of the strategy here. I mean, whoever came, undoubtedly not only with this State of the Union in terms of its content and the writing quality here. I mean, the clincher, the ending remarks that the President gave about the American spirit and the American dream and the American ability to turn a bad situation good, which is what his administration is really all about. And he makes no bones about making that very clear to the Democrats whenever he's in a room with them. Right, right. I mean, those lines were fantastic, but it was the pacing, and this is something that's so undervalued in. In rhetoric, especially political rhetoric. It was the pacing that allowed him to move onto topic after topic after topic and to kind of create that snowball effect that, as you said, Tony. Right. The Democrats weren't able to contain themselves. It wore on them, and they had to oppose Trump in any way, shape or form that they could in that chamber. And it was just a brilliant paste, a brilliantly paced speech from the president and so crystal clear on what Republicans need to be doing in the next eight months. What happened in the first year and month, year and a month of this administration is not enough to win the midterms. We need to be aggressive. We need to push the envelope. We need to call your, you know, call your congressman if you want to see the Save America act passed, which will stop illegal aliens from being registered to vote and require voter ID nationwide. You know, call your congressman if you're tired of other people in this chamber profiting off of illegal congressional insider trading, call your congressman if you want to see the GOP health care plan passed, call your congressman. And it just goes on and on and on and on. This is the legislative vision. Vision. We need to push the envelope. He even pointed to John Thune and said, right, John.
- [150:02]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
And we're talking about the name drop.
- [150:03]
Bradley Devlin
There's a lot of talk about the talking filibuster. So this was aggressive. It was partisan and he made the Democrats wear it, but it was also aggressive in pointing the finger at the legislature, his own party in the legislature, to get moving. This was a call to action. And for the president, I think he believes failure is not an option here.
- [150:22]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
And rarely am I able to say that our guests as well, our congressional guests as well, of our panelists this evening actually got what it is that they wanted. That's about once in a lifetime. No, I don't mean the Coldplay song. So with that said, I'd say, guys, excellent work tonight. Bradley, your team, stellar stuff. Virginia, yours as well. Thank you guys so much. I'm going to show this crew a couple of these clips that we've been talking about, and then I'm going to get them to bed. And you guys, I hopefully will see your beds pretty soon as well. Thanks, guys. Thanks, Tony.
- [150:52]
Virginia Allen
Have a good night.
- [150:53]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
All right, let's dive into a couple of these clips because, you know, I'm not going to wait around for the morning shows and then the Rush Limbaugh time slot shows to, you know, dive through and get, get them all out there for me. Absolutely not. I had my team save these clips. We're gonna play them and my team will say very bad words about me for being up at 11:34 behind their back. So first and foremost, Al Green, dastardly deeds undone. I. I've said that on the show enough now that I did get text as soon as he was escorted out. So he was waving his sign and yelling at people, black people aren't apes. But again, he had his hand over the A in aren't. So instead, it looks like black people rent apes, which. Okay, weird stuff for sure. Of course. Other key moments from the night, it looks like as Kamala Harris was named the border czar, and that was an incredible failure for the Biden administration. Vice President J.D. vance is being reaffirmed as essentially the czar on the war on fraud. JD Vance started four months ago. I am officially announcing the war on fraud to be led by our great vice president, J.D. vance. That's a very good move as well because it gives kind of the more populist style of Vance's rhetoric something to really focus on. And again, I think that's a very, very Good move. And I don't mean that the vice president has nothing to do. So giving them something to do. So they're not playing solitaire or canasta all day. Well, I mean, you know, you can only watch the VHS tapes of the old Clue series. So much sitting there in the executive office building. So that said then of course, Ilhan Omar going berserk, losing her marbles. The Somali pirates who ransacked Minnesota remind us that there are large parts of the world where bribery, corruption, again, House cameraman panning to Ilhan just, I mean, incredible work.
- [152:58]
Tony Kennett
10 out of 10 lawlessness are the
- [153:01]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
norm, not the exception. Importing. And he kept the camera on her too. He's like, come on, I know you're going to speak out, I know you're going to get mad. These cultures through unrestricted immigration and open borders brings those problems right here to the usa. And it is the American people who pay the price in higher medical bills, car insurance rates, rent, taxes and perhaps most importantly, crime. We will take care of this problem. Rashida Tlaib, fresh off of chanting kkk. We're gonna take care of this problem. We are not playing games, Delilah. I like it, I enjoy it. It's good time. It's good fun. It is. It really, really is. And then of course, the moment I referenced the standup sit down musical chairs for insider trading in which Sarah Tim McBride stood up to cheer banning congressional insider trading and then turned around and looked at Nancy Pelosi, daddy, big bucks, the insider trading queen. And then sat down real quick. As we ensure that all Americans can profit from a rising stock market, let's also ensure that members of Congress cannot corruptly profit from using insider information. And here's the play. You see some of the Democrats, they're in the white pant suit that looks like Michael Scott in the office wearing a women's suit because you know it's a dude. So you can see Sarah Tim McBride stand up cheering Elizabeth Warren, she's clapping. She's not really sure where she is though. Chris Coons is really mad that someone's taking a photo of him clapping. They stood up for that. I can't believe. I can't believe it. So in the pan away, as you see the individual standing up immediately, about five or six sat down when they saw they were about three seats away from Nancy Pelosi. There you go. You can actually see is a lot of the people are up. Some of them start sitting down immediately. Incredible. They're up, they're down there all around it's the Heffalumps and Woozles song from Winnie the Pooh. Stellar stuff. Just incredible. Of course, President Trump's call for voter id, hugely powerful. It's very simple. All voters must show voter id. Hakeem Jeffries sitting there, angry, mad. I mean, I've just incredible. Of course, some really great moments as well. The paying tribute to Irena Zarutska's mother. I have a couple of surrounding clips that I want to showcase. Some of the special guests with the Trump administration. They also, a lot of them did private interviews with the White House beforehand. I think we are going to save those for tomorrow. Just to kind of go through those with a bit more respect than kind of an end of the show run of the mill. The same with the Medal of Honor winners, Chief Warrant Officer Eric Slover, Navy Captain Royce Williams. We'll talk about those as well. Also, the individual Enrique from Venezuela, saved from those prisons. I do want to play one final thing, though, in case you were wondering how the media is going to pull themselves out of this mud and morass, they're not. No one is against USA in our
- [156:36]
Virginia Allen
athletes and our Olympic athletes.
- [156:37]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
They should not be being used as political props, though, and frankly allow themselves
- [156:42]
Virginia Allen
to be used as political props.
- [156:43]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
And I think that is the, that is going to be the question and the discussion going forward. It is very clear why the president did this. What is unclear to me is why the men's hockey team allowed themselves to be utilized in this particular class. Oh, no, I see a lot of this. Oh, they were utilized. How, how dare they be utilized by an event that is not supposed to be a particularly partisan event? Again, that's the point that Bradley and Virginia made very aptly this evening. Just do the thing. Just do the thing. Encourage unity. That's what he was supposed to do. And I'm sure you'll see all of the think pieces and little clips and videos from our saying, oh, Trump was old and tired. That man went at the same pace, the same energy for almost two hours between an hour 40 and an hour 50. Incredible work. Very, very incredible work. Now, just as a little last thing here, I'm getting a, a bit of a nod from producer Jen, who informs me that the State of the Union for the People's Republic goofy nonsense had had their little moment this evening as well. I'm fresh out of an ice prison in Minneapolis. I've been arrested three times by ice over absurdity over us being ourselves. So that's their state of the swamp. Their, their state of the swamp Speech again.
- [158:19]
Mark Harris
I.
- [158:19]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
It's hard to keep track of all of these. You move on Defiance. I'm one more time shot of an ICE prison in Minneapolis. I've been arrested three times by ice over absurdity, over us being ourselves, over me singing songs like hey Mr. Tangerine
- [158:43]
Tony Kennett
man, get swear to me.
- [158:47]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
What is this? What is this? Rid of brown people for me. I'm Aryan white. There ain't no place I'm going to. And then whipped out the harmonica. What on earth? I've never been more confused in my entire life than I am right now. All of a sudden, he's not ready for primetime player. Ice agents with two weeks of training come after me. I got arrested in Portland. I got arrested in Minneapolis in the last three weeks, twice. But they can't erase a movement, all right? What I went through is 1,1000 of a lot of marginalized people and what they have to go through. So a couple of things here. Just, just a couple of things just right off the, right off the bat here. Just first of all, so you had your peoples of the Union state thing with Joy Reid and some other chick. They were mad. And then you had the swamp of the Union where you had the giraffe suit man. And then after the giraffe State of the Union man did his little, you know, act blues traveler little routine. Then you had your little watch parties all over the country. And now you've got Abigail Spanberger delivering a really bizarre follow up response address the absolute state of the Democrat party. I. I don't even think you can.
- [160:28]
Tyler O'Neill
You.
- [160:29]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
I don't even think you should follow it up with anything outside of. Of whatever that truly bizarre nonsense was. I'm gonna give it one more try though. Just, just for me, just one final video here. Sri Tanidar. I. I will point out I don't have a clip of this yet. I'll go find it. The Entire, the entire State of the Union. The man was white, knuckling his armrests in the chair in the main room. Looked like he was holding onto a toilet in like the handicap stall for dear life. That man was gripping the sides of his chair and hoping he didn't fall through it. It was a special time, a special time at the State of the Union accoutrement this evening. So again, thank you guys very much, really appreciate it. Kind of close the business things here at the end, a little bit of the mail time things. We got a couple of super chats again, you guys don't have to do that, but we really want to thank Derek Impossible. Really nice five dollar super chat. He said Democrats are a bunch of virtue signaling theater kids. He sent that at 7:23pm and the man was right. Also, welcome to Eric McGraw, Lazaria Bain, Brian Pate, and then Robert Marrier for joining the YouTube membership thing. You don't have to do that. We're just glad that you guys are here. We're thrilled that you guys chose to stick around with us for our State of the Union coverage. There's a link in the description to the Discord if you want to hang out with us there. There are a lot of questions that have come in about various things from this evening that I want to give a little bit of time to. But thank you very much for tuning in to the President's State of the Union versus The Chicago Sky. I think that Trump kind of ran away with it on this one and we'll be back tomorrow with some of the follow up. It's the Tony Kinnet cast here on the Daily Signal, nationally syndicated and first on 93 WIBC. Y' all take care.
- [162:28]
Kurt Schlichter
I'm Matt Davis, CEO here at Maranatha Baptist University, and I'd like to invite you personally to Maranatha's fourth annual Leader
- [162:37]
Tony Kennett
to Leader conference on March 5th and
- [162:39]
Kurt Schlichter
6th here in Watertown, Wisconsin. This event, sponsored by our School of Business, offers two days of practical insights, valuable connections and leadership development that will
- [162:51]
Tony Kennett
impact your career no matter your field.
- [162:54]
Kurt Schlichter
This year's conference includes keynotes from Ken Barbik, a Maranatha graduate and former Senate confirmed Assistant Secretary of Agriculture and currently serving as a senior lobbyist and advisor through Fortune 500 companies my friend Tony Kennett, another Maranatha grad who now serves
- [163:13]
Tony Kennett
as a national correspondent and syndicated radio
- [163:16]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
host for the Daily Signal and Adam
- [163:19]
Kurt Schlichter
Morgan, president of Majesty Music and a former member of South Carolina's Legislature. Becoming a more intentional, effective leader starts here. Take the next step in your leadership
- [163:31]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
journey and join us March March 5th
- [163:33]
Kurt Schlichter
and 6th or 2 days of learning, networking and growth that will set the
- [163:37]
Tony Kennett
tone for the rest of your year.
- [163:39]
Kurt Schlichter
To learn more, visit mvu.edu leadertoleader can't wait to see you here on Maranatha's
- [163:46]
Tony Kennett (Host/Narrator)
beautiful campus March 5th and 6th for
- [163:49]
Kurt Schlichter
the 4th annual leader to Leader Conference.