← The Tony Kinnett Cast
The Tony Kinnett Cast
Ep. 555 - CUBA NEXT? Rubio Announces “Project Freedom,” Supreme Court Allows Redistricting Before Midterms
01:26:54
Secretary of State and acting National Security Advisor Marco Rubio addresses the press on "Project Freedom," the conclusion of "Operation Epic Fury," and the situation developing in the Middle East. ALSO: speculation swirls as Rubio is seen taking photos with SOUTHCOM's commander in front of a map of Communist Cuba.
Loading summary
Transcript119 lines
- [00:00]
Tony Kennett
Tony Kennett. Tony Kennett.
- [00:02]
Tony Kennett.
- [00:02]
Tony Kennett.
- [00:03]
Tony Kennett.
- [00:04]
John Herrick
Tony Kennett.
- [00:04]
Tony Kennett
Tony Kenna, host of the Tony Kennett cast. Let's have a show.
- [00:11]
You're listening to the Tony Kennett cast
- [00:13]
on 93WYPCV here on the Daily Signal. Good evening and welcome to the Tony Kennett cast here on the Daily Signal, nationally syndicated and first on 93 WIBC. I got to say, when you have a show that is so chock full of news that you start so early, you give your board operator a heart attack because the audio kicked in early, you're just going to roll with it. And speaking of, let's get to that news that the show is so chock full of. So while we are waiting on some of those beautiful election results to flow in from the primary races that are happening, the president of the United States very invested in Indiana and RINO senators as well as Vivek Ramaswamy's gubernatorial primary in Ohio. We're going to wait for a second and dive into the other big news from today. That is Secretary of State, acting national security advisor, chief capital architect, temporary secondary and proto numerary of all different kinds of jobs on the Hill. And now acting press secretary for the day while Carolyn Levitt is out having her second. Marco Rubio, the future emperor of Cuba got up to announce and then clarify a little bit on Project Freedom. So you may recall that Operation Epic Fury was when the United States took a hammer to the regime in Iran and carried out a initial Gulf War style air campaign. And then after this, there was a ceasefire that was announced. And while waiting on some things to halt there, the Secretary of War, Pete Hegseth, went before the Senate and said it my understanding that the timer stops and we're basically waiting on the quarterback to decide whether he wants to throw shotgun. And so, you know, third and 15, play ball. That's kind of the argument that the Secretary of War was making. Officially, things are paused. And now what we have is the Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, clarifying that what's going on is now Project Freedom. This is where the United States operates in several regions of the world, not just the Middle east, but in an effort to open shipping around the Strait of Hormuz, here's the Secretary of State, Marco Rubio.
- [02:22]
Marco Rubio
As you know, over the weekend the president announced this Project Freedom. And the goal of it is to, frankly, if you want to talk about it, it's to rescue like almost 23,000 civilians from 87 different countries that are trapped inside of The Gulf and left for dead in the Persian Gulf by this Iranian regime. You know, for more than two months now, these innocent sailors and commercial crew members have been stranded out at sea because Iran is conducting something that's not just criminal. It's criminal for sure, but it's desperate and destructive. This blockade of the Straits of Hormuz. Nations from around the world, the overwhelming majority of whom are not even engaged in any military hostilities, are now at risk, not just of losing their cargo, but the lives of their own citizens.
- [03:05]
Tony Kennett
So two things right off the top of the bat. First and foremost, you already know what I'm going to say. Calm, disappointed parent. This communicates. It resonates well with Americans. It's deeply unsettling to the press and those in the room. And there's really little that you can pick apart with it. This is one of the reasons that you see on a lot of these approval ratings of different members of the Cabinet. Rubio is of those who they take polls of up near the highest, if not the highest polling member of the administration. And there's a good reason for that. But right now, the United Arab Emirates has still got part of their airspace closed because Iran is continually launching drone and missile attacks under the claim that they are hiding Israeli troops in the region, which is. That's an interesting claim to make. The truth of the matter is that the Israelis as well as the United States are setting up air defense systems so that Iran has a harder time trying to shut down the Fujairah oil refinery secondary port in the uae, the kind of place that's not choke pointed by the Strait of Hormuz. So that's one of the things that Rubio is referencing here. Obviously, of course, the South Koreans, because
- [04:18]
Marco Rubio
of this blockade, these ships, you know, you don't leave a ship out there for this long. You start running out of food, you start running out of potable water, essential supplies. And they're at the mercy of this piracy, what it is. It's piracy. And not only that, but some of them have seen, you know, opened fire on and rained down senseless attacks on several civilian ships already. So, frankly, the way to put it, these are innocent bystanders. These are countries that. And ships and so forth that have nothing to do with any of this and nonetheless are being caught in the middle of it and being held hostage merely because Iran could do that just because of. Just as the regime brutally slaughtered tens of thousands of their own citizens for the crime of peaceful protests, because they're unhappy with the quality of life or the lack of quality of life in Iran today. And so they're sitting ducks. They're isolated, they're starving, they're vulnerable. And at least 10 sailors have already died as a result of the civilian
- [05:11]
Tony Kennett
sailors now moving forward. What does this actually mean? What is the so called operation that is Project Freedom here? Well, here's Secretary Rubio kind of getting to that specific point.
- [05:23]
Marco Rubio
Now what's really important for you to report and for everyone to understand is this is not an offensive operation. This is a defensive operation. And what that means is very simple. There's no shooting unless we're shot at first. Okay, we're not attacking them. We're not. But if they are attacking us or they're attacking a ship, you need to respond to that.
- [05:40]
Tony Kennett
So under the President's executive authority to embargo a country again, I told you, this all comes down to the language from the Supreme Court of the United States regarding tariffs. You will recall that a couple of weeks ago, yes, it has only been that long, the Supreme Court of the United States issued a ruling in which they said the President does not have the unilateral authority without Congress to step in and tariff. Using Peter Navarro's Tariffs for Dummies textbook little little quicks and quips here, there is some tariff leverage power of the President's that was illustrated by specifically Justices Brett Kavanaugh and Samuel Alito. Clarence Thomas had kind of a broader in this day and age, the President using executive agencies can do a lot of what he wants on foreign policy matters. But regarding the tariff situation, it was Brett Kavanaugh and Justice Gorsuch who made the case that the President of the United States does in fact have a tariff like ability to leverage economic hellfire upon the world. This would be the President has the ability and the authority under the Constitution to use the Navy to embargo a country whenever he so damn well pleases. That is 100% constitutionally correct. And so what Secretary of State Rubio is alluding to here, you're going to hear him talk about the War Powers act as well here in a minute or so. The United States is issuing this Project Freedom in a manner of saying we are going to keep the straight open and we are going to act as though Iran, which they are, is a belligerent to other powers around the world, which they are. It's one of the reasons, although we're not going to play the clip for it, Rubio points out the United States is going to be making a detailed call for the United nations which, you know, the United nations to issue a condemnation of Iran going after civilian craft in the Strait of Hormuz. Regardless of what that angry uncle told you on social media. This is an international body of water, and the United States has the authority to use the U.S. navy to do whatever they please under the U.S. constitution. That includes embargoing Iran. And if the Iranians shoot, that means shooting back. That's not under the Operation Epic Fury, which was a purely offensive targeting system of maneuvers. Now, that brings into question, what does that mean the United States is going to do? And that the weirdest of timelines ever involves Mary Margaret Olahan, a former colleague of mine and the White House correspondent for the Daily Wire, and then Elizabeth Mitchell, our White House correspondent at the Daily Signal. But all in good time, we'll let the secretary finish here talking about this defensive operation.
- [08:16]
Marco Rubio
You're not going to let some fast boat come up on a ship and shoot it up. We're going to respond to it, and we've been successful at it. I don't know what the exact number is, but I know a number of those fast boats have now been targeted and will continue to be. If they pose a threat to our forces, we'll shoot down drones, we'll shoot down missiles. But it's defensive in nature. This is defensive. So if you hear stories about attacks and launching of firing back and forth. It's not back and forth. We are only responding if attacked first. This is a defensive operation, and that's what's occurring here.
- [08:44]
Tony Kennett
All right, so that brings us over to one other kind of qualifying comment from Secretary of War Pete Hegseth. It was a full and very spicy day from the White House. So here's the Secretary of War, Pete Hegseth, as a direct gift from the United States to the world, we have
- [09:01]
established a powerful red, white and blue
- [09:03]
Marco Rubio
dome over the Strait.
- [09:05]
Tony Kennett
Now you may say, wait a minute, why is the US Providing gifts to the rest of the world? The United States is creating an operational test of the Golden Dome for missile defense here at the United States over the Strait of Hormuz. Meaning that we are now doing, instead of going through the Israelis with Iron Dome technology, instead, Hegseth is making the case that we are establishing a red, white and blue dome and task force, effectively allowing the United States to own the Strait of Hormuz. You say, tony, why does this matter? There's a good, good reason that this matters. The Chinese, if they are unable to hold the Strait of Malacca, which we've already talked about regarding a major breakthrough with several of the Southeast Asian countries and the Indo Pacific nations if they are unable to hold other major trade choke points around the world. And the United States is able to maintain full naval control of both the Panama Canal, which we never should have relinquished, as well as the Strait of Hormuz. It, it is game over for China. It is game over on an international level. You say. Well, I'm really worried about the midterms. Very fair. Absolutely. And we're going to talk about some of the things that might be needed in order to either alleviate or boost oil production or alleviate the stress in the Strait of Hormuz. We'll get that. The president was asked about that today from our own Elizabeth Mitchell. However, the long game of the United States possibly avoiding the Third World War with China racing right here, right now by popping the balloon before it gets too big to cause any damage is a very, very big deal. And it's receiving almost no coverage on the international scale. Radio crew, we got to send you over to the commercial. It's time for y' all on the local side to get your commercial break. We're going to continue unabated here on the live stream. It's the Tony Kennedcast. All right, boys, girls and squirrels, let's dive into just a little bit more of that. There was a little bit of levity today. So, you know, at one moment the secretary of war joked about kamikaze dolphins, which I'm not entirely sure if this is a joke to the CIA's program or an old command and conquer red alert joke. Either way, incredible joke from the secretary of war says, look, I can't tell you whether or not we have kamikaze mind control dolphins, but the Iranians sure as heck don't. And I can't confirm or deny whether we have kamikaze dolphins, but I can confirm they don't. Ultimately funny indeed. Now back to the the Rubio hearing here because again, a lot of this stuff really does matter. There was a moment that although there was levity, I didn't really care for as much and, and not to be, you know, the Sally Saab story, you know, the grumpy Gus that doesn't like when there are moments of levity in press hearings. But the the senior White House correspondent did ask Secretary Rubio in this he this press conference about Project Freedom and what the United States is going to be doing next, not to mention regarding Cuba, and asked took a moment to ask him about a viral video of him over the weekend asking if he was like A dj. It is funny. I wouldn't, I wouldn't really, you know, you only have so many questions in there. But anyway, Secretary, many people want to
- [12:10]
Rob Bluey
know, what is your DJ name?
- [12:13]
Marco Rubio
My DJ name?
- [12:14]
Tony Kennett
Your DJ name?
- [12:15]
Marco Rubio
You're not ready for my DJ name.
- [12:19]
Tony Kennett
Now, is it funny? Yes. Do I think that, you know, it's enjoyable, and I think that Rubio is indeed very funny. Yes. There are a limited number of questions you get to ask the secretary of State when he's in this role. And again, I know that I'm just some bum hick from Indiana and maybe moments like these happen all the time. But to you, when you guys ask me questions in mail time, some of these I take to the bench and I kind of sit there and think about it and wish that I was able to ask some of these questions. And so let's look at some of the questions that are really, really important here. There was a question about, again, is President Trump going to, you know, nuke the regime and all of the people? Is he going to kill the people of Iran? So, again, stupid questions aren't just in the levity side. They're also from people who really pretend to be journalists. Here's Rubio pushing back on that rhetoric.
- [13:06]
Marco Rubio
This regime is not. Guys, I know I've said this. I think I said this in my hearing before the Senate when I got confirmed. I don't know of any country in the world where there's a bigger difference between the people and the people who run the country. Okay? This country is run by radical Shia clerics, and that's not what Iran and the Iranian people are.
- [13:22]
Tony Kennett
Now, there is an attitude among a lot of Americans right now that are tired of explaining things. And Rubio is tapping into this, like, on purpose. No, I think that there is an attitude among a lot of Americans that are so, so, so tired of explaining that crime from illegal immigrants is preventable and unnecessary, that fraud is wrong, that communities who value fraud maybe shouldn't be given super special, protected, wonderful, lovely immigration status here in the United States, that, yes, it is, in fact, a good thing for the United States to sink Islamic pirates. That, yes, we should not be importing mass numbers of Islamic immigrants from around the world. Those are common sense things that Americans are really tired of explaining. Explaining that, yes, the regime in Iran is bad, the people are good. Kind of an important distinction. But we've made this point before, and you can get a bit of an idea here that there's less of this kind of retreading the same thing over and over and a bit of exhaustion from it.
- [14:21]
Marco Rubio
Maybe Shia, but they're not radicals and they're not clerics. And they just want a normal life and a regular life. And in many ways, a very cosmopolitan country with an incredible history, incredible history and incredible legacy and the like. So there's this huge divide between the people of Iran, whom we sympathize with and who the president sympathizes with because they're the ones suffering. Look, the world is a victim of Iran, okay? The world is a victim of Iran because they're terrorists, because of what they're doing now in the streets. But the people of Iran are daily victims of the regime. And the president has deep sympathy for what they're going through. And I think he's just expressing that sympathy and that frustration that they don't have the ability to do more to get rid of this regime that has crushed this country.
- [15:00]
Tony Kennett
Now, I do want to make it quite clear here as we dive into some of these details. If you haven't yet wondered, well, then, what's going on inside of Iran, then you're not really paying attention. Everyone should be wondering right now, well, then, what's going on on the inside? Are we running guns or the Kurds going to do something? Are we going to see ethnic conflict over on the Far east again? You have Afghanistan and Pakistan, who is increasingly mirroring China's PR statements on weird optimism. You have UAE that looks like they're getting ready to prepare a possible airstrike against Iran. Which, by the way, one of the reasons this is where I will openly say, hey, speculation warning here. I believe that you are watching the United States try to protect a couple of craft, but not directly responding to some Iranian strikes because at some point either the Europeans in the Middle east are actually going to carry their own security decades from now, but starting today, or we're just gonna waste time forever. That brings us to one of the most important questions asked to the President. We gotta bring the radio crew back from commercial. Don't go anywhere. We got a ton tonight. It's the Tony Kennett cast.
- [16:06]
It's the Tony Kennett cast on 93 WIPC.
- [16:13]
Welcome back to the Tony Kenneth cast here on the Daily Signal. Let's talk a little bit about the President of the United States. Very, very important question. Am I just trying to tease you endlessly? No, I'm going to skip right to it here. Elizabeth Mitchell, our White House correspondent, asked the president today, are we running guns to the Iranian people? Are we running guns to the Kurds? What in the world is going on now? It is, it is a really cool thing to see someone that you know and that you like ask an incredible question or perform really well on, on TV or on some kind of professional stage. When I saw Elizabeth ask this question, I didn't feed it to her. I wish I did. I stood up from my chair and almost knocked it over. You don't get a lot of these every day. Here you go. You said recently that if Iran, Iranians
- [16:57]
John Herrick
were armed, they could take over their regime.
- [16:59]
Tony Kennett
Do you plan to arm them soon?
- [17:01]
Well, I don't want to. So, again, just for those of you who couldn't necessarily hear, Elizabeth said, you said recently that if the Iranian people were armed, they could overthrow the regime. So what's going on? And here's the president's response.
- [17:12]
John Herrick
They could take over their regime.
- [17:14]
Tony Kennett
Do you plan to arm them soon?
- [17:16]
Well, I don't want to say that, but yeah, I mean, people say, why aren't they, they protesting, they want to
- [17:21]
protest, but they don't have any guns. So you could have 200,000 people protesting
- [17:27]
and have five or six sick people
- [17:29]
with guns, and when they start shooting them right between the eyes and you
- [17:32]
see a guy fall and another one fall and you have no guns, very few people would be able to stand there and do it. I mean, I understand.
- [17:40]
I tell them not to.
- [17:42]
Don't. Now, there's a couple of things to pull directly from this. First of all, right up front, the president saying, I'm not going to tell you is a perfectly acceptable response. You don't want to say, oh, yeah, here's everything. And also here's photos of Jennifer Mahmoud. She's got an AK47. She's ready to use it. That, no, no, not something the president of the United States should do, no matter how much Joe Biden did so in the Oval Office or on Rehoboth beach regarding the gun running in Iran. The ticking clock has been positioned to the rest of the world as Trump up against the midterms. If he doesn't get stuff happening soon, then, oh, man, you know, then, then the midterms are going to fail. That's the only reason to do something. Not necessarily, but the real ticking clock behind the scenes is that there is a critical mass that is currently being reached. The real reason, the real reason the Internet right now in Iran is still shut off is not for you. It's not. There are a lot of people, a lot of pundits out there that are saying, well, it's so the Rest of the world can't see what's going on inside Iran. No, it's not about you. It's about them. Because if they can communicate, they can coordinate drops, they can encrypt things, they can get further firearms and munitions as well as all of the logistical support that's needed from the Kurdish areas on the western side of the country to the rest of the people. So there's a ticking clock already because the guns are flowing into the country, but it's a question of critical mass. When does that signal come? And you can see the Iranian regime getting more frantic because there were two different reports that were released on Iranian state TV today that said one thing, we're going to shoot all of these ships in the Strait of Hormuz. And then another said, we're going to target U.S. bases in Gulf states and only U.S. ships. Yeah, that's two different things. So what we're going to see over the next couple of weeks is going to be the wellspring of this statement. And of course, what the President says is correct. Can't have a bunch of, you know, people without arms running around and doing things that. That armed people do. I'm sorry, person with no arms, terrible paper hanger. And a person without a gun is a terrible revolutionary. So moving on from that, that brings us to one note that is getting a lot of anger and coverage here. One from the Secretary of State and then one from the President here, Secretary Rubio calling the War Powers act itself unconstitutional. Boy, that's going to be a wild one to argue in front of the Supreme Court. He's not necessarily wrong. Here you go.
- [20:06]
Marco Rubio
Look, guys, I love talking about this topic. He's about the War Powers Act. Okay. I love it. I was hoping somebody would ask. All right, hold on, hold on. No, no, you don't let me answer. I got to answer the question.
- [20:16]
Tony Kennett
Anytime this happens in a press conference. Again, kindred spirits here, I'm sure you've seen when there's something that I'm really eager to get going on or he doesn't have glasses to take off and set down, but that man is ready to go because there are a lot of bureaucratic pieces of garbage that came out of the Cold War that, that are unconstitutional. And to hear the possible next presidential nominee's statements on the Constitution, that is a huge matter of import for the next 10 years of this country.
- [20:42]
Marco Rubio
Okay? And I love it. I'll tell you why I love it. Because even as a senator, I said something. The War Powers act is unconstitutional. 100%. Now, this is not the position of me, not the position of the President, United States. Now, this is the position of every single president that has occupied this position since the day that law passed. It's completely unconstitutional. Now, we comply with it in terms of, like, notification because we want to preserve good relations with Congress. Right. And we do that. But even as a senator, I would say that the War powers Act is 100% unconstitutional. And look, I know some of you, whatever you want to say, but this is not this president's position. That has been the position of every single presidential administration since the day that law passes an infringement on the President's constitutional powers. We don't acknowledge the law as constitutional. Nonetheless, we comply with elements of it for purposes of maintaining, you know, good relations with Congress. And we want them to be involved and we want them to be informed. I have gone on Capitol Hill, I don't know, four times.
- [21:39]
Tony Kennett
So then he talks about the different levels of compliance. There is something that this administration does really, really well to generate momentum. Because we talked yesterday, the midterm season, it's all about momentum, ladies and gentlemen. And right now, Democrats have fumbled momentum more than Oregon in any football game in the last year. Sorry. Anyway, the number of fumbles from the Democrats to take any opportunity for momentum and then drop it is always followed by someone in the administration picking it back up and running the ball a little further. Rubio is an excellent example of this. So it's the blitz, all right? Everyone at the same time, move forward, do all of the things. We'll talk about this with some executive order stuff later regarding Rubio's statement right then and there, saying this administration doesn't believe that the bureaucratic overhaul of just garbage that smacks Americans over the head, like standing in the street and getting flattened by a garbage truck, is not acceptable. We're not going to play this game forever. And that kind of a statement takes the speculation around certain photos. If you're watching the live stream, there's another photo that popped up and, oh, this one had everybody talking. So Secretary of State Rubio took this picture with the commander of southcom. That's the, again, the command of the Navy and the United States military in specifically Central America, the South American sphere of influence. And then, of course, the Gulf of America and the Caribbean. They. He, you know, has Secretary Rubio shaking hands with him. But if you look behind them, there is a picture. Now, gentlemen, this is what I like to call gaslighting. This is absolutely baiting and gaslighting. It is very pro level baiting and gaslighting. Here's why. They are shaking hands in front of a map of Cuba. So now what do you have a lot of people doing? You have a lot of senators who are freaking out and losing their minds over the idea that the United States is about to Bay of Pigs to electric boogaloo, which by the way is not what's about to happen, but it is, it is some premium gaslighting that at any time the Trump administration simply might rewrite the map. And rewriting the map is how the Trump administration seized all of Venezuela's oil, you may remember, or cut China out of the soybean market in South America. It's going to get really interesting here in a couple of minutes. Radio crew, we're going to send you guys over to commercial and get into a couple of details on the live stream. So much news tonight, so little time. It's the Tony Kennett cast. All right, while they're away on the commercial side of things, let's talk a little Cuba. A lot of you have messaged asking me about Nick Shirley, of course, He's a conservative YouTuber independent journalist who went up to Milwaukee or excuse me, Minneapolis, you remember, and he went up to the Somali run daycare centers. He kind of seized on some old Minneapolis or I should say Minnesota Star Tribune articles and then from there did a bunch of FOIA requesting bunch of filming right in front and exposed to the nation a bunch of horrible fraud that the Walls administration in Minnesota was doing nothing about. Excellent work. So he went down to Cuba, so traveled to Cuba late April 2026 to document the country's ongoing humanitarian crisis including severe shortages of food, fuel, electricity and the impacts of long term communism as well as the US Embargo. Here is what we know of the events because he came out with this full video suggesting that he had been seized by the Cuban communist regime and that they had threatened him within an inch of his life and a whole other list of things. And then the Cubans came out who were about as trustworthy as Flint Tap Water. And, and yes, we're absolutely sponsored by Cove Pure. Who could even cure the horrible Flint Tap Water anyway, Nick Shirley, the Cubans accused of being sort of a spy and a big drama queen. Here are the details that actually occurred at the airport when Shirley arrived, Cuban authorities seized most of his professional cameras and gear, leaving him with only his iPhone. That's number one. Number two, intelligence agents absolutely did follow him throughout the day. I don't know if anyone else has reported this. Yet there are international databases that, that some organizations that are not the government have access to where we have information that says we think these people are the intelligence assets of other countries. This has been a thing for a long time, not necessarily a new thing. Before there was MySpace, there were intelligence databases. The individuals that kept popping up in selfie photos with Nick Shirley and selfie recordings are absolutely those that have been suspected or just very clearly members of the. Of who we suspect to be members of Cuba's intelligence agencies. So that would be for the first there agents absolutely did wait in his hotel lobby overnight that being at the Hotel Nacional. It's a government link luxury hotel on the US prohibited accommodations list. Of course Shirley was terrified that he would be taken hostage, imprisoned or prevented from leaving. And then he also emphasized the lack of free speech under the regime and how going without an official government guide escalated the risks. All right, so the Cubans said he entered on a tourist visa, not a journalist one. He conducted unauthorized recordings and interviews. Again, communist country number three. He was summoned for a routine immigration interview. Uh huh. And then finally he voluntarily changed his flight and left early. Okay, couple of things here. First of all, communists are bold faced liars. And yes, the Cuban regime does in fact suck and will do all of the standard communist fare that a country. I'm banned from traveling to China. And one of the reasons that I absolutely will not go to China even if I wanted to, other than even if they hadn't banned me, which is another story for another time, then I would expect the exact same treatment as him right here. Communist countries do not let you come in and film everything. I love Nick Shirley. Talked to him a couple of times. A great dude, very proud of him. He should have expected this. Don't go to Cuba unless you're with the Marine Expeditionary force that someday once again seizes San Juan Hill. So just to be clear with all of you, am I, am I blaming Nick Shirley for this? Absolutely not. Communist regimes are terrible. They shouldn't do this stuff. Should you expect if you go to a country like this to be treated like this? Absol freaking lutely. Don't go to Cuba. Don't. There's reasons that people are are attaching flotational styrofoam to old Chevys and Cadillacs and floating them to Florida. More news here in a second. We gotta get some Capitol Hill coverage stuff. So a little bit of Rob Bluey coming. Don't go anywhere. It's the Tony Kennett cast. Dad. Bingo. It's The Tony Kennett cast with special guest Rob Bluey. You heard the music. And that means we bring on Rob Bluey of the D Daily Signal. A little update from Capitol Hill. A lot of stuff going on as things pick up. Rob, how's it going?
- [28:44]
Rob Bluey
I'm doing well, Tony. It's good to see you. Sorry I missed you last week. We were in the midst of launching the website and getting everything all set. I love the logo behind you. You see a new look behind me. So we're in business.
- [28:57]
Tony Kennett
Absolutely. And if only Congress was as in business. Right now, I'm seeing a lot of kind of Ireland over whether or not we're actually going to get any pieces of legislation through the mill by the time we get to midterm. Are there anything or is there anything that you actually see the House and the Senate talking about on the right side of the aisle as things that they really want to push through?
- [29:20]
Rob Bluey
Well, before Congress decided to head, head home for, for another recess, there were three big things that they needed to accomplish. Number one was reconciliation to fund the Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs of Border Protection. We had the Farm bill and we had FISA extension, which, you know, they were, I guess, somewhat moderately successful on some of those. For instance, conservatives, and I think this is what you're getting at, wanted to make sure that the reconciliation bill, because it requires a simple majority in the Senate, included as many pieces of the Trump agenda as possible. Instead, they decided to take the easy route and just fund those pieces of the Department of Homeland Security that the Democrats were obstructing. There's doubts as to whether they'll have the stamina to be able to push through a third version of a reconciliation bill, which is entirely possible if they have the willpower to do so. But there are some big questions as to whether or not the senators and the representatives in the House will be able to do that when it comes to the other pieces of legislation. You know, there were some debates about the farm bill. There always are when it comes to, you know, how much taxpayers should be on the hook for these SNAP benefits, particularly when it comes to sugary sodas. FISA has a whole separate set of issues when it comes to surveillance and some of the abuses that we've seen our national security agencies use in the past. So these are all important debates that Congress is having. But because the margin is just so narrow in both the House and the Senate, as you know as well as I do, Tony, that a single member or two can really derail the entire agenda. And so it's a difficult task for Speaker Johnson, but I think that the concern is, and you mentioned the midterms. If things don't go well for Republicans, this could be their only shot to really make sure that the Trump agenda is solidified ahead of a Democrat controlled House or possibly even a Democrat controlled Senate.
- [31:17]
Tony Kennett
All right, so enough of my crying in my own oatmeal about Congress not doing anything that's, that's a day ending in. Why, as much as we'd love to see legislation passed through on the express train, maybe that's not so. So what else is there right now in D.C. that Americans should be keeping an eye on? I know there's a lot of fraud investigations, but usually when there's big media coverage of one or two events, a lot of things start to slip through the cracks. So what is it that we need to know right now?
- [31:43]
Rob Bluey
Yeah, I mean, obviously, just as you cover every night, I mean, there's a lot of focus on, on what the next step will be in the war with Iran. And, and does the President decide that the current policy that he has in place is working and is it effective? Is effective and putting on the Iranian government? There's obviously a debate within the Republican Party about how some of the, as successful as it is militarily, what are the political implications of that? So I'd be remiss if I didn't mention that at least. But I think some of the other debates that might not be on everyone's radar are some things that we've been covering on the, at the Daily Signal. Elizabeth Mitchell, for instance, has been doing a remarkable job covering the debates over artificial intelligence and AI policy and the dispute that you're seeing between some states which would like to have more stringent regulations on AI and some of the data centers that are causing disruptions and concern in some communities versus the national policy that the President would like to set and establish and really have the federal government take the lead role because he sees this as a competitive challenge with countries like China and others who, who on a global scale will, will try to take away some of the US Advantage when it comes to artificial intelligence. So that's another story that we've been closely watching. You've mentioned fraud. I think it ties right into some of these left wing organizations that for years have not only escaped media scrutiny, but in some cases have been bankrolled or funded and supported by the federal government. Tyler o', Neill, certainly doing yeoman's work on the Southern Poverty Law center. And yes, we should keep absolutely a close eye on the fraud investigations taking place in Minnesota, Ohio and other places where taxpayer resources were being used in ways that I don't think many taxpayers would actually want their money to be used.
- [33:30]
Tony Kennett
Absolutely. So we've got kind of the crime and fraud, that side of it covered. There's a lot of, obviously that, of course, the international conversation. What are you hearing, at least in terms of kind of the national security angle, with these increases in violent attacks either on political officials or on, on warehouses, things like that around the country? It does seem as though the rest of us outside the Beltway are seeing an uptick in this violence. Of course, it was in D.C. just a couple of weeks ago and then the shots fired yesterday. We still don't have all of the clarity on it. Does the administration appear to be doing anything extra to combat this, or is some of that behind closed doors?
- [34:09]
Rob Bluey
Well, certainly it's all part of. It's always going to be behind closed doors simply because there are some security concerns. Tony, I think the thing that really troubles me about this is that if you're a federal official, whether you're working in the Trump administration or serving in Congress or the judiciary in some capacity as a judge, you probably have some sort of protection to keep you safe. It's all of the rest of us, those of us who may, you know, like you host a show or run a news organization or just, you know, an average grassroots conservative who turns out to a rally or some sort of protest and finds themselves in, you know, subject of this leftist violence and the rhetoric that you so correctly have pointed out for a long time, that really inflames some of these crazed individuals to take matters to the next level. Those are the things that concern me. And that's where I think we would like to see, as conservatives, definitely the government step up and make sure that those who are forming these cells and plotting these attacks against those who may have a different perspective or opinion really come under scrutiny and attention. And I think that there's a role for Congress here, certainly through holding hearings and doing the kind of oversight work that is necessary. But I think it's ultimately probably gonna come down to these law enforcement agen, which were manipulated so wrongly during the Biden and Obama years for President Trump to root out those bad actors and make sure that they're focused on preventing attacks like this in the future.
- [35:44]
Tony Kennett
I hear a lot of the media, the whistleblower stuff, suggesting that, oh, the FBI is rushing through this SPLC thing or Americans have now, just because Trump is in power now. They've lost trust in institutions. Obviously, we know a lot of that's kind of white noise. But, but I do ask in D.C. and especially from, of course, some of the research that we're doing, I know you see kind of an overhead of these things and those that you talk to around the country also, do you get a feel that Americans have a little bit more trust in how some of these law enforcement agencies are carrying out these tasks now, or does it just feel like more of the same from the Biden years?
- [36:22]
Rob Bluey
Well, I think that hopefully the trust is increasing because you're not seeing them prosecute grandmothers or devout Catholics or any of the other groups that during the Biden years, the FBI seemed to be targeting. You have a change in leadership. You don't have a James Comey or a Christopher Wray or an Andrew McCabe or individuals who lied to Congress and were caught in the web of lies that they were trying to spin. And so hopefully with more stable leadership and the focus back to their core mission, that will increase trust. But, Tony, you know as well as I do that trust in institutions, particularly government institutions, even the news media, you know, is not trending in the right direction. I think that's one of the things that we're trying to change at the Daily Signal, quite frankly, by having a commitment and a promise to tell people the truth and not just have an agenda, which so often is the case with so many legacy news organizations that seem that their sole purpose is to do everything they can to try to undermine what President Trump is trying to accomplish as a duly elected president. So I don't know ultimately how if you're in a position of law enforcement, you do that, other than just having a focus on delivering day in and day out what your responsibility is to keep the American people safe.
- [37:46]
Tony Kennett
I think that's pretty well put. Rob Bluey, president of the Daily Signal. Thanks for giving us a little update from that Capitol Hill.
- [37:52]
Rob Bluey
Thanks, Tony. It's good to see you.
- [37:53]
Tony Kennett
All right, we're going to send the radio crew over to commercial very briefly, and when we come back, we've actually got some information on some of the local election results in Indiana and Ohio. Again, huge focus by the president against several Indiana senators. So radio crew will catch you guys in a second. All right. While they are away, we're going to get into some of the bizarre. I mean, the fraud in Ohio was getting worse by the second, by the second. So as a quick reminder, the primaries in Ohio were today that included the gubernatorial Obviously, we saw Vice President J.D. vance casting his ballot. I have to hide it from the reporters. I don't want them to know who I voted for. That kind of stuff there. The situation regarding the fraud in Ohio today has kind of changed how this race is. Race is covered, and I should say these races are covered. So, for example, Vivek Ramaswamy running for governor, I believe that Yost has, if not hasn't conceded yet, is conceded by now because Vivek has been officially endorsed by the Ohio Republican Party, President Trump, et cetera. Originally, Vivek was doing these styles of interviews. For example, over on Will Kane today.
- [39:10]
Oh, look, there's, there's a absolute market for it. But the job of leaders is to actually lead people in a positive direction rather than playing to their basest instincts. And let's talk about this debate about capitalism, Will. I think this is long overdue. I think we as leaders, particularly of the Republican Party, need to make the case for capitalism, the greatest system known to the history of man, to lift people up from poverty.
- [39:33]
Okay, so that brings us to the rather, I mean, there's no better way to say it, the dumpster fire regarding Governor DeWine's lack of leadership here, at least his administration's lack of leadership regarding this Somali fraud. So Luke Rosiak from the Daily Wire had has been teaming up with Parker Thayer over from the Capital Research Center. Both are excellent guys to dive into this latest scheme of Medicare and Medicaid fraud that just may be rife all over the entire country. Because if you simply say, hey, I'm caring for, I'm totally caring for my relatives and stuff and give me money for Medicare and Medicaid. There are a lot of places, like Ohio, for example, where Somali communities set up huge, huge shell companies, where they stuffed hundreds of these shell companies into corporate parks and big office buildings and then like, blocked out all of the windows. And we're going to try, I think we're trying to get Luke Rosiak on later this week to kind of give us a bit of a detail. But in just one or two locations as they're going through all of these various locations where these members of the Somali community and surrounding countries have participated in this massive alleged Medicare and Medicaid fraud, that all of the office owners filing a quarter billion dollars worth of Medicaid firm stuff, 288 of them of these firms, one landlord alone owns seven buildings in Columbus. So he's kind of getting into some of the details on this particular mess. There's one particular politician who said that. I mean he had one job and then on a totally different level, like his side gig was this $11 million scheme that he didn't even mention in his bio. It's just rife with, with mess. And so the reason I bring this up is that when you get over to Parker Thayer's side of the investigation, when they were walking through the abandoned room, you know the, the abandoned building where all of these Somali offices supposedly are.
- [41:48]
Rob Bluey
So let's go down the hallway. We've got the Somali Education Resource Center, Baby boomers healthcare.
- [42:11]
Tony Kennett
Let me tell you how much they got.
- [42:13]
Rob Bluey
$6 million to add Sirac Yusuf.
- [42:19]
Tony Kennett
So just the entire building's empty. This particular, this little, this little issue right here, this letter from the Office of Bureau of Criminal Investigations from the Attorney General. There's a bit of an issue here and we're gonna have to cover that in a minute. And I'm sorry to kind of bail and go back to a different thing. We actually have some local updates on the elections in Indiana that President Trump was focused on because of the redistricting efforts in the state that failed due to some Republican state senators. So we're gonna flip over to the radio, cover that lot to cover tonight. I'm sorry it's a little scattered, but we're gonna do our best. It's the Tony Kinnid cast here on the Daily Segment. This is the Tony Kennett cast on 93 WIBC. Welcome back to the Tony Kenneth cast here on the Daily Signal as well as wibc, our home station in Indianapolis. John Herrick is joining us live. I believe you've had a pretty busy evening getting those updates in. John, how's it going?
- [43:20]
John Herrick
It's going well, Tony. Yeah, some starting, starting to see some races get called here. And so we're off and running on what'll be the chaotic rest of the evening, I'm sure.
- [43:29]
Tony Kennett
So there are a couple of districts that are Trump targeted races. These were some state senators who Trump wasn't particularly thrilled that that was getting involved in voting no on the mid decade redistricting session. District 11, 19, 21, 41, 1 23, not in that order. How are some of these races turning out so far? Are we seeing more Trump endorsed challengers winning or are we seeing the incumbents in the lead so far?
- [43:58]
John Herrick
Well, so far the incumbents, but we're also starting to see some other races get called early on and you just don't quite know how everybody else is going to, you know, jive with all that. But it Is the races are starting to get some winners at this point and it'll be something that we monitor closely throughout the evening, especially as it comes to redistricting, which matters to some but as you know, doesn't matter to everybody.
- [44:24]
Tony Kennett
Right. So that brings me to kind of my, my next question here. Are there any races that are particular breakaway? So obviously some of them are rather close. A little bizarre for a primary season. I know there are some congressional races that are uncomfortably close but, but some that are kind of might be more breakaway. Are there any of, of note so far that, that you might say are going one way or the other?
- [44:46]
John Herrick
Yeah, I, Craig Snow, his, his district had just got called overwhelmingly because he has 76 vote in that win over Daniel Coors. So I, I think mo most outlets calling that Paula Davis and Ray Collins getting into it in State Representative District 30. And Paula Davis has about 67% of the vote there, not all the precincts in, but she looks to be very comfortably ahead at that point. So. And then Tony issa in District 51, he's, he's getting the check mark as well. A race that fascinates me is District 57. Uh, Tina Turner and Wesley Bennett were going at it pretty close, but now Wesley Bennett starting to gain some separation. Turner was a pretty popular candidate, especially on the south side of Indianapolis and in the Greenwood area she was gaining some traction but it looks like Wesley Bennett pulling away from her.
- [45:37]
Tony Kennett
So Turner and a couple of other candidates spent a lot of their times hitting AI data centers and, and maybe some more infrastructure related policy. Again, I'm looking for bellwethers. You know me, I'm, I'm going straight to the forecast. Are there any representatives, senators, candidates, congressionals maybe that focused really heavily on an issue that, that appeared to be driving voters enthusiasm. I know this is 100% speculation. I'm not asking for you to give me the forecast on that now, but is anything sticking out issue wise, at least from some exit polling?
- [46:07]
John Herrick
Well, I don't necessarily know if it's from the candidates, but it's definitely from the voters. The voters have expressed their interest over data centers one way or the other. They're either heavily in favor of it or very much against it. Gas prices are a big thing and, and a lot of people are either going to be voting for a lot of candidates are either going to be promoting themselves or let's face it, attacking their opponent. We saw a lot of that in the Michelle Davis Greg Walker lead up in State Senator District 41. Michelle Davis is Starting to pull away a little bit. 53 to 47 in favor of Michelle with a little more than half of the precincts coming in there. So. So it's really not so much issue driven I would think in terms of the politicians, but it's definitely issue driven from the voters.
- [46:52]
Tony Kennett
Gotcha. Last question here. And this is kind of on the congressional side. I know there have been a couple of maybe speculative kind of questions from kind of the national media as to whether we might see a couple of Indiana House members flip up. We're getting ready to cut away from you to go over to the Ohio stuff because they just closed at 7:30. But I would be remiss if I didn't ask you. Uh, I mean I, I think we ended up seeing from District 4, Jim Baird is sitting pretty comfortably so far, even though there's only about 30% of that vote in Stutzman from northeastern Indiana. Of course he's a signee of the Dignity Dodd act. Uh, he's 67 to 32 again with about half of the votes in there. Any other congressional races in the primary side that are, that are interesting to you?
- [47:37]
John Herrick
I mean, those are the big ones. I, one thing.
- [47:40]
Tony Kennett
I am so sorry, John.
- [47:43]
Rob Bluey
It's all right.
- [47:43]
Tony Kennett
It's okay.
- [47:44]
John Herrick
I do want to see if Andre Carson wins in a runaway. I do want to see how much he is challenged because he, the sentiment among his competitors is that he's, he's apathetic, he's running on reputation, he's not really doing much to help voters. So you have Denise Hatch running against him, you have Destiny Wells running against him. And so the question is if he wins, how much does he win by? Or is anybody there going to try to close the gap? Because you just like I said on Hammer and Nigel earlier, I, I just think you're going to see a lot of incumbents win because people's habits are a tough one to break.
- [48:20]
Tony Kennett
Yeah, yeah. And that brings me to kind of the last question here. Or. Well, I mean just to get kind of your, your flip on it. They're, according to some of the map data Here, the District 7 that be Indianapolis Congressional, this would be the one that is really just in Marion county right there in the center of the state. That being Andre Carson's district, there was a question as to whether Carson bringing up redistricting and maybe the Supreme Court's voter right act change there was going to get people to, instead of coming out to vote for Destiny Wells, who was seen as kind of the social progressive on that side coming out to him based on kind of a, a racial representation arc that was suggested by a member of his press office. Have there been any other statements that have suggested so far? I mean, he's, he's rocking a 20,000 to 7,000 vote lead against destiny here.
- [49:10]
John Herrick
Yeah.
- [49:11]
Tony Kennett
I mean, have they issued any statements as to what they think that I, what I would assume would be close to a victory with 66% of the vote in yet?
- [49:19]
John Herrick
I don't think so. I think it's a lot of. It's just listen, our opponents are going to try to do whatever we can to attack us. I've got the name recognition, I' got the backing of my constituents and whatever he has to do to distance himself, that's what he and his campaign will say. But again, as we see every election cycle, it doesn't seem to take very much for Andre Carson to pull away early. And it looks like that's what's happening here.
- [49:42]
Tony Kennett
Awesome. And then just last question is again, a little speculative. But you know me, I'm the analysis kind of guy. And John, you know, I love just, you know, getting a little of your, the vibe check here in my own home district, Indiana City, sixth, I think. And if I'm looking at the data in front of me here, and I think I'm looking at it right, if we, if we leave District 1 alone and we ignore it, other than that, District 6, Jefferson Shreve versus Mrs. Brown, 55 to 44, that that's pretty close for an incumbent election.
- [50:13]
John Herrick
Yeah, it is. And, and I again, the sentiment that we're getting about that is that it's not that Jefferson Shreve is. I mean, Jefferson Shreve's got money and name recognition, but the people that are against him say he hasn't done much and all he wants to do is run again and stay in office. So that is where the critics are coming after him to try to pull away some of his votes. But we'll see exactly how that pans out for Jefferson.
- [50:38]
Tony Kennett
Well, the goodest, the greatest, John Herrick of 93 WIBC. Really appreciate your giving us a couple of minutes, man, and not a problem.
- [50:46]
John Herrick
Thanks, Tony.
- [50:47]
Tony Kennett
All right, we're gonna let the radio crew saddle out for the evening and we're gonna continue on the Tony Kinnit cast. We've got way more news to cover this Ohio situation, how that's framed. Of course, polls have closed there. It's the Tony Kennett cast. Way more to talk about. Radio crew will catch you guys tomorrow. All right, now that we get those radio nerds and TV geeks out of the way. Let's talk a little bit about this Ohio situation. And then we're going to cover some scotus because for the first time we've seen Alito just reach back and pimp slap Katanji Brown Jackson who? Boy, that's going to be some wild stuff. But first, let's, let's pivot over and cover the rest of this Ohio stuff before I give myself a rash. So that brings us to the situation regarding this bizarre fraud that just keeps on coming out of Ohio with the Somali migrant communities. Because as Parker Thayer from the Capitol Research center pointed out, in one of these supposed bustling offices of home care that are just empty buildings that you should totally not look at whatsoever, there was a letter they found. And this letter, it's. I'll. I'll read the. The tweet verbatim here, it says, you just can't make this stuff up. We were walking through one of these buildings and found a notice letter from the Ohio Attorney General's Bureau of Criminal Investigation just sitting out in the open, untouched. It was from five months ago and nobody had been by the office. Now, two things you can take away from this. Number one, you can say nobody had been by the office from the office itself. There. The letter was sent to, to actually pick it up because it's just closed. Hey, just, just give us the money and who cares? The question that I have is, what on God's green earth is the Attorney General's Office of Ohio doing? What are they doing? I seem to remember that in my home state of Indiana, Attorney General Todd Rakita and Secretary of State Diego Morales, after being called to do an investigation into voter fraud, did an investigation into voter fraud. And in one election, they found over 20 cases of voter fraud. It wasn't the huge, amazing, magical number that a lot were expecting, but they did the investigation and they were roasted for that. I saw an Attorney General's office and a Secretary of State's office acting on the request and doing the investigation. You are telling me that five months ago the Attorney General's office of the state of Ohio under Governor DeWine's administration said, hey, there seem to be some issues. You're in this building, crammed in there like old Mother Hubbard in the shoe with all different kinds of these other definitely totally real Somali home healthcare, WINK organizations. You want to tell us what's going on and why you're taking millions and millions and millions of dollars? And they sent the letter. And then nothing happened. Incredible. This is where I think things start to get from rubber to meeting the road. So Vivek Ramaswamy, again, big primary day. He's going to be in charge of the next administration. Now the election becomes about how you would handle the fraud. Fraud, That's a totally different thing because Vivek's opponent on the Democrat side of the aisle. So far we've heard all Democrats completely discount fraud and say that actually Republicans are being super mean and stinky and racist if they ask about it. But yet it's again, the only plan that Democrats have brought forward as a policy for Americans when they say, hey, how are we going to afford X, Y and Z? The argument that's brought forward by Democrats is, well, we're going to have the government pay for more stuff. And then Vivek Ramaswamy runs out in a month and announces they're all out of money again and they have to raise your taxes now. But, alas, this is what the election is going to pivot to. Vivek Ramaswamy went on with Ben Shapiro today, and this is what the question was, and here's how Vivek addressed it.
- [54:44]
What do you make of that? And what would you do as governor of Ohio to crack down on that? So, look, I think that the reality is all states, including Ohio, I think, have turned a blind eye to this level of rampant fraud of the welfare system, broadly including Medicare. And it starts, Ben, with enforcing the laws that are already on the books. So you could talk about passing new laws. I think that's a reasonable conversation to have. But that requires the legislature. That takes time. And furthermore, you get asked the question of what's the point of passing new laws if the ones that are already on the books aren't being sufficiently enforced? So one of my top priorities is to take the egregious cases here of fraud that frankly, your reporting was really intriguing or daily wireless reporting was really intriguing to me. I wish I could.
- [55:29]
That's the Luke Rosiak story.
- [55:31]
Say that it was a shock compared to what I hear on the ground. Unfortunately, it was not a shock. But I appreciate you putting a national spotlight on it in my own home state. And I think what that does is it forces those who are in power to be able to pay attention to an issue that may have been swept under the rug for too long before.
- [55:48]
Okay, I agree with him and I disagree with him. So first of all, he says, you know, a lot of people saying, hey, we need new laws, but you need to Enforce the laws on the books. That's great. I've heard that before. Okay, good to go. Grand. Excellent.
- [55:58]
New.
- [55:58]
Neat. When the Ohio state legislature could absolutely pass bills that. That super. That circumvent or realistically overshadow the federal government, the word I was looking for might have been. I don't think superimposed fits there. That was the, hence the little hesitation there. They could supersede the federal government and essentially say, if you are caught doing some kind of fraud, we immediately turn you over for possible immigration issues. States have done that before. I believe Oklahoma does that. I believe the state of Texas does that. Florida absolutely does that. You could pass that kind of legislation. But the argument is to. This is really, really good because it puts a national spotlight and it forces people in power to pay attention. What was Governor DeWine's office doing amid all of this stuff five months ago when we know they knew about it based on those letters? I mean, unless they're. They're reaching out via the attorney General's office to say, hey, have you considered a question about your car's extended warranty? I mean, at some point you do actually have to ask when Republicans, Democrats, whoever, are going to do the accountability holding that they're running on during the election. And the reason I say this is that, for example, the Indiana governor's office, I will never, ever, ever forget going to the primary back when Braun was running in 24. And I went and I sat down and I listened to Suzanne Crouch, she's the former Lieutenant governor. And then I heard Mike Braun and then Jamie Rettnauer and other candidates who I have long since forgotten who have told me all of the wonderful things they were going to do. And I remember that when Braun got up to speak, it was a very hands off approach as governor. And there's a lot to be said for that. On an economic standpoint, a lot of people want to be left alone. They want things to develop. But in a lot of our states, there has been this attitude that, well, the fraud's either at a federal level or there's so much abundance in a lot of red states, we can afford a bunch of this fraud. And, you know, I mean, better not to rock the boat and be accused of being a racist. Oh, no, if my local USA Today paper affiliate calls me a racist, oh no, that kind of crap. That's not what voters want anymore. The era of just like, as long as the Chamber of Commerce is happy, voters will be happy. That age is leaving. Now, what I'm seeing so far from a lot of the election results is, it's, it's not looking as much of a, a kind of a runaway election for a lot of the incumbents as perhaps many were expecting. Now, again, I don't think that it's, it's expected just yet that it's going to be like a huge, you know, Trump endorsed these people. Everyone came out and voted in the primaries. I, I really, I just, just, I just don't see that. But getting rid of incumbents is not always an easy thing. But seeing propensity elections where not necessarily a high propensity everyone comes out, but a low propensity elections start to shift the other way, it clarifies what voters are looking for. Now, I'm going to make this quite clear. I also have an issue with any attorney general's office who essentially does the Sailor Moon meme. So the Sailor Moon meme is a, essentially a guy showing up in a tuxedo and saying, my job here is done. And the response is, but you didn't do anything. And he's like, exactly, and then leaves. There's a lot of attorney general's offices around the country who act like that. Well, I sent a letter, so that's good enough. No, my job is done here. But you didn't do anything.
- [59:26]
Exactly.
- [59:28]
Yeah, that crap. No, no, no, no. That, that kind of stuff does in fact need to end. Now, this brings us over to two things. One, the pearl clutching of the century regarding the White House ballroom and just really awful media coverage. Coverage and something that I think is probably just a bit more pressing here, that some of the really, really wild situation kind of on some other local front coverage, news. So we're going to pivot over to the commercial side. When we come back, we're going to talk to the supreme on the Supreme Court issue. Again, it's hard for me to say how insane it is to watch Ketanji Brown Jackson getting decked. And also regarding the redistricting effort across the country, major Supreme Court ruling, although a procedural issue, kind of a big deal. So we're going to cover it. Don't go anywhere. Tons to talk about tonight. It's the Tony Kennett cast here on the Daily signal. I'm sorry, Ms. Jackson,
- [60:33]
this, this is
- [60:34]
the Tony Kennett cast on 93 WYBC to see Patanji Brown Jackson's opinions be so objectively awful that even Justice Alito, Justice Thomas, Justice Gorsuch Roberts, Amy Coney, Barrett Kavanaugh even again at times before Justice Elena Kagan, the Liberal have told Catanji Brown Jackson that she doesn't know what she's talking about and she needs to shut up. So as a reminder, the Supreme Court of the United States States issued a ruling saying that you are not allowed to racially segregate congressional voting districts. It's not allowed. You are not allowed to set up a district based on the racist idea that because they're all black they will probably all vote the same. No, it's also really gross to suggest that no one could ever represent the voting values of the majority of a zone unless they are the color of the majority group in that zone. That's dumb. That's stupid. Because I don't know if you know this, but like this ain't Harry Potter. There ain't like pure bloods and like half bloods anymore. Everyone's kind of a mud at this point. Everyone's got a little bit of a mix in them. And so the idea that we're going to do this highbrow eugenics calculus is dumb. So the Supreme Court issued another procedural ruling because I told you right after that ruling that the, the Louisiana crew said, well, hey, hey, we have these racially set up voting districts and there are going to be all these lawsuits that try to stop us from redistricting and drawing not color based voting districts before the midterms. You have to basically issue a procedural ruling here that says we can redistrict right here, right now. Which would mean that a ton of states across the south, maybe a few across the Midwest would have the opportunity to do so. That's why you see a bunch of gubernatorial calls for special sessions from Governor Bill Lee all the way down to K. Ivy in Alabama and on and on and so forth. So the Supreme Court of the United States issues that rule. And that brings us over to Ketanji Brown Jackson because now we're getting the individual opinion. So again, Ketanji Brown Jackson issued this bizarre loan dissent in which she argued that everyone but her is really racist and stinky and awful and stupid because only she really cares about, I mean, from her actual term. Let's see, let's see if we have here, here. So Katanji Brown Jackson suggested that
- [63:18]
Marco Rubio
you,
- [63:18]
Tony Kennett
the American people needed to unshackle themselves from white supremacy in her opinion and furthermore suggested in her little lone dissent that what the Supreme Court did was completely illegitimate. Because while the government is allowed to crack down on racial gerrymandering one way, the federal government is not allowed to crack down on racial gerrymandering. The Other way. Essentially, she set up a racial hierarchy in her opinion, which. Holy crap. That's quite a thing. That is truly quite a thing. So she attacks the court in her dissent, saying, quote, to avoid the appearance of partiality here, we could, as per usual, opt to stay on the sidelines and take no position by applying our default procedures. So she went after the Supreme Court again, why on this procedural ruling? Because she says, well, sure, we ruled there should be no racial gerrymandering, but I mean, come on, guys, elections take so long to happen and we should really just let Louisiana in this big midterm, have racially segregated districts just one more time. We should stay on the sidelines as quote. But today, the court chooses the opposite. Non content to have decided the law, it now takes steps to influence its implementation. The Court's decision to buck our usual practice under Rule 45.3, which she didn't even read all the way, and issue the judgment forthwith, is tantamount to an approval of Louisiana's rush to pause the ongoing election in order to pass a new map. Justice Samuel Alito. I'll quote the. The. The context here as well. It says, quote, Justice Alito, with whom Justice Thomas and Justice Gorsuch joined concurring the dissent in this suit. That's Katanji Brown Jackson levels charges that cannot go unanswered. The dissent would require that the 2026 congressional elections in Louisiana be held under a map that has been held to be unconstitutional, essentially saying the Supreme Court ruled racism is bad and Catanja Brown Jackson threw a fit, saying, but you have to allow him just one more. Come on, one for the road. Essentially, Catanja Brown Jackson is the ex you're breaking up with that wants just one more kiss or romp in the hay, which is a bad idea. Essentially, Catanja Brown Jackson has Jennifer Aniston's idea of closure as her actual legal opinion. So, anywho, the dissent does not claim that it is now too late for the state legislature or the district court to adopt a new map that complies with the Constitution. Nor does the dissent assert that it's not feasible for the elections to be held under such a map. So essentially, they're saying she's not actually making the case that Louisiana doesn't have the authority to write the new maps, and she's not arguing that it's not feasible for elections to happen. So instead, the dissent offers two reasons for its proposed course of action. One is trivial at best. The other is baseless and insulting. So first, they say one is childish and the other is retarded. We are so close to Neil and Samuel and Clarence accusing Ketanji Brown Jackson of writing her opinions in crayon. Please, please, Lord, it would be so funny. Here's what they say. Quote, the first is compliance with the 32 day rule set out in the court rule. But because the court's order explains there's good reason to depart from the default rule because districts are racially gerrymandered. So essentially she says that, oh, things are taking too long and it's not really how what you said, it's how you said it. So that's not a good argument. They say the second reason offered by the dissent is that we should allow the period to run out to avoid the appearance of partiality. So essentially Ketanji Brown Jackson makes the argument that they need to levy favor towards black hierarchy, but saying non hierarchy, essentially everyone is equal and therefore race shouldn't play a part. That doesn't mean the Supreme Court should intervene. So they say. Ahem. The dissent goes on to claim this is Alito writing about Jackson. The dissent goes on to claim that our decision represents an unprincipled use of power. Then they cite where she said that way. That is a groundless and utterly irresponsible charge. What principle has the court violated? The principle that Rule 45.3, 32 day default period, should never have been shortened even when there's good reason to do so. The principle that we should never take any action that might unjustifiably be criticized as partisan. This is a rather special time. And it's a rather special time because it reminds us of two things. Maybe Joe Biden shouldn't have picked a justice on the merit of she's blind, blackened, has a vagina. Although again, I'm told that's not what actually being a woman means. So I'm. Who knows? Wow. Who could possibly come to grips with such intensive and incredible whatevers? Beautiful stuff. Beautiful stuff indeed. Over on the Supreme Court side of things now, again, because we're talking Midwestern stuff and because we're talking Supreme Court stuff, there was a political interview with JB Pritzker in which after an interview about Supreme Court decisions, Voting Rights act stuff, there were some questions about J.B. pritzker's rhetoric about the assassination attempts and threats against Republicans in the country. Here is how J.B. pritzker decided to turn this conversation.
- [69:04]
Because of the political violence. I think that the anti Semites out there and the people who are racist because they Know that I stand up for communities of color, have come out of the woodwork and, you know, and I receive threats. I'm sure that politicians across the country are receiving more threats than they have before.
- [69:22]
Oh, yes, here it is. See, because J.B. pritzker said, we're going to make sure that we try to keep Illinois's illegal, racially gerrymandered districts in place again. The Illinois congressional map currently is one of the most mocked racial garbage maps out there that is also partisanly gerrymandered to the point where I've seen snake games played by bored people on their blackberries that weren't as convoluted long snakes as some of Illinois's congressional maps. It is awful. So when he's criticized, when he's questioned about this, his immediate response is, well, actually, all these, these racist people are calling me and I'm sure everyone, but, oh, I'm getting all these threats because I'm JB Pritzker. I'm really special. Now, I do appreciate that after all of the criticisms that, you know, maybe JB Pritzker should stop being a whale, that he holds his little Politico interview in a restaurant. That's not really necessary to this conversation. I just enjoy it. But anywho.
- [70:20]
But I hear about it, and in particular, sometimes I hear the mention of my Judaism. Right. Of my religion that has spiked in
- [70:26]
the last couple of years.
- [70:27]
Yeah.
- [70:29]
I'm sorry, I have not seen. Again, I'm. I'm harassed by groipers online, as many of a lot of people are, are. And I have never once seen in any criticism of J.B. pritzker that the dude is Jewish. I've never seen that once. Now, you know, political chambers, echo chambers, things like that. Maybe I've just never seen it. But of all of the criticisms of J.B. pritzkers, I just really don't think that the top criticism is like, oh, yes, he's clearly protecting racial gerrymandering. That there are no, by the way, there are no Jewish voting district gerrymander in Illinois. That's not a thing. That, that's. No, I'm, I'm a little. Everyone would be a little confused here as to what you might be asserting,
- [71:14]
John Herrick
like threats against you and your family.
- [71:16]
Tony Kennett
Yeah, I mean, I, I don't want to overstate it, but it's true. And it's more than it was in years before.
- [71:23]
John Herrick
What's the driver of that, do you think?
- [71:26]
Tony Kennett
I think the environment. Look, our leaders set the tone. Tone in this country.
- [71:30]
Who's the Governor of Illinois.
- [71:31]
And I think that the President of the United States has set a tone where political violence is. Okay, he's advocated that himself.
- [71:38]
Oh, yes, yes, yes. Oh, I see. Very, very exciting. Again, what about all of that, you know, political violence and other, you know, situations and such? I'm just gonna, I'm just gonna be clear. I don't see this driving a lot of momentum. And again, it is all about momentum in the midterm year here. That's what it's all about. Who can actually take some things, get voters forward. Uh, and, and we don't really have enough time to talk about this tonight. We're gonna have to talk about some of the polling data in California that is really going to talk a little bit more about momentum regarding maybe a jungle primary that is deeply, deeply unfavorable for the left regarding Steve Hilton versus Becerra and Porter and Steyer and all the of rest. But we'll have to catch some of that later because lastly, the one thing I wanted to hit this evening is one of the most bizarre media stories that I really didn't think would be an issue. So we talked about this with Rob a little bit. There's all these appropriations bills and reconciliation bills and various other kinds of bills coming out of the Senate. One of these bills was from the Senate Appropriations Committee that said, hey, we are allocating for security upgrades to the White House House a set number of dollars because after the President of the United States has been the target of several assassination attempts, after we've looked at a series of security problems, because the White House is really allowed to get dilapidated and run down and it's time for some upgrades on a lot of things. We're going to set the standard for some additional funds to the White House. And so the Republican controlled Senate Judiciary Committee requested about a billion dollars in funding that could go to general security improvements around the President of the United states and Washington D.C. now, there is a very, very specific piece of language which says under no circumstances. In fact, there's this big, huge, bold piece of text in the appropriations bill that says, hey, limitations, none of this money, none of it at all, can be used for the President of the United States ballroom project. Regardless, regardless what I had the genuine confusion I'll say of seeing was after again, some of the initial coverage and I'd read through some of this, an article from Aaron Blake, senior political analyst over at cnn, who wrote, quote, the goal posts on Trump's ballroom keep moving. Now, it involves taxpayer money. Now, this makes it very Very clear to the average viewer what that all of the sudden your taxpayer dollars, my taxpayer dollars are going to go towards building Trump's ballroom. Is that not what this tweet sets up? Is that not. I mean, hey, the goal posts keep moving. Now it involves taxpayer money. Now taxpayer money is getting involved in the ballroom room. That was very, very interesting. And the reason it's interesting is because that's just straight up dishonest. It's a lie. It's not true at all. Now when you actually click on the article, all of a sudden the headline changes. Now it's just, oh, it's becoming a very, you know, political and politically ambiguous and, you know, project for the President of the United States. Here's how he frames the funding from the Senate Judiciary Appropriations bill, quote, or the. The Senate Judiciary. I should. Yes, the Senate Judiciary, that's correct. So he says, quote, the big news Monday was that the Republican controlled Senate Judiciary Committee has requested a billion dollars in funding that could go to security related to the $400 million ballroom. So all of a sudden, we're already hitting speculation territory. This funding that could go to the ballroom, quote, the money, which is tucked into an expected party line bill that is otherwise focused on immigration enforcement, is designated for, quote, security adjustments and upgrades. The security uses include work on the White House grounds to, quote, support enhancements by the United States Secret Service relating to the East Wing modernization project, end quote. And then underneath that, Blake from CNN says, and the East Wing modernization project is just code word for the ballroom. So right off the top of the bat, you're wrong. You're wrong. And the reason I say you are wrong is because anyone who has a brain that contains more than three active neurons knows that underneath the East Wing of the White House is the command bunker, meaning that if there is a threat on the United States, if there is a threat on Washington D.C. the president and his senior staff can go to that safe and secure bunker, which has not been updated and made modernized since the middle of the Cold War. And so it kind of needs a couple of upgrades. It does. But you may say, well, Tony, I mean, if the ballroom is going on top of it, doesn't that mean the taxpayer dollars are going to be funding in one or the other? No, because again, in these explicit text of the bill, and don't just take it from me, from the Washington Post, and I quote, again from the Washington Post, notable conservative outlet from the the Washington Post, quote, the proposed legislative text says the money would be used for security features that the administration has declined to fully detail. The text explicitly says the money could not be used for non security elements of the project in reference to Trump's planned ballroom. I'll go one further. Here's the actual text, line 23 of section 5, subsection B. Limitation. None of the funds made available under this section may be used for non security elements of the East Wing modernization project. That's it. Some are saying, well, what if, what if on the roof, on the roof there's security measures like anti aircraft or something, there's some type of, of a Javelin automation system, whatever, something, you know, some type of a miniaturized thaad battery or perhaps, perhaps one of the many redacted type of anti drone countermeasures that have been so popular lately on the kids social media that aren't exactly describing how it works. But that doesn't matter. What about those? Well, just because it sits on the roof of the ballroom doesn't mean it's part of the ballroom. So no, no, this ain't money going to the pillars and the chairs and the squares. I'd say at best, maybe the kind of bulletproof glass that's used, maybe. But again, if it's on the outside and it's pointing outward at, for example, keeping someone from doing something to the inside of the building, I'm guessing the entire White House is getting these improvements. So, no, it's not going to the ballroom at all. Now, he wasn't happy that I made this particular, you know, criticism. And he responded, he said, hey, well, you should try reading the piece again. He said, the bill does not explicitly keep ballroom construction from taxpayer dollars. It keeps only non security money from these specific taxpayer dollars. Okay, that's not how appropriations bills work. That's not, that's not how appropriations bills work. An appropriations bill asks for money for a specific purpose and then says, here's what you can and can't use the money for. So, for example, if I take out a mortgage on, you know, on a property, whatever, for a house, you know, whatever that I'm either doing work on or building or whatever, and I take out that mortgage nowhere in any of those financial agreements and I, if I'm appropriating that money on a loan, does it require me to then list what I am or am not going to use my paycheck for in other places unless it's explicitly stated in a bill? It's even, it's even more open on an appropriations bill. That's just not how it works. And, and the reason I bring this up is because this is the next outrage clickbait, the next headline storm that those are people are trying to generate is that oh actually everything that you were told wasn't happening is actually happening. And you can see this because using the article in this way, here's Leveraged today, here's Jonah Goldberg on the CNN panel doing this exact song and dance.
- [79:51]
John Herrick
I don't think that's a billion dollar
- [79:53]
Tony Kennett
facility just for a ballroom. Well, and if you're trying to explain this to the American people, Jonah.
- [79:58]
Rob Bluey
Yeah. So first of all, just on the math, when you say the price keeps going up, all increases from zero are in fact infinite. And
- [80:09]
Tony Kennett
I'm sorry that we're starting off strong with just the most. Well actually when they say the price goes up, spending any money means the price is going up. Yes. That's really great, sweetheart. Excellent. You're doing real swell.
- [80:22]
Rob Bluey
And also, I mean you mentioned it very briefly a second ago, they just
- [80:28]
John Herrick
tried to put a guy in jail
- [80:29]
Rob Bluey
for construction overruns on the cost of the Federal Reserve building and now he's talking about how it's going up to a billion dollars. So like at some point those sound bites are going to be a next segment on the arena where they're going to play say like why shouldn't you go to jail for cost overruns?
- [80:45]
Tony Kennett
No, no. The Federal Reserve building that was built specifically with taxpayer funded dollars in questioning cost overreach is different than the president of the United States funding privately a ballroom and then security measures have to be put on the entire White House anyway. And so putting an anti air missile battery on the roof, it's not as though if it's taller, it needs two additional batteries for every 18 inches that's stacked on top of it's silly stuff. Silly stuff. So those things said there's a lot of yelling around the country today. There's a lot of of pearl clutching so far. I think that the best take on all of this is that the United States from the administration level still has a couple of cards to play from the Secretary of State's office, from the Department of War office. We're going to be talking later this week with the Small Business Administration on kind of agricultural aims in the Great Plains states. There's also a couple of things moving forward on the United States fuel economy, economy and whether or not gas prices are going to come down, when they're going to come down, how production is going to change, what the international market responds to in kind of in that whole frame regarding refineries in the middle east, there's a lot that's still up in the air as far as the elections this evening. I'm not seeing a walk away on either side that I was just promised. You know, it was just going to be a huge slam dunk, smashing success kind of for either crew here. We'll have to see how some of that plays out. I think we're going to be closing our coverage off this evening. But first, before we head out very quickly from our friends over at the Alliance Defending Freedom, it is May, it's National Foster Care Month. And so because it's National Foster Care Month, I want to tell you just a little bit about what the Alliance Defending Freedom, our friends over there are doing in order to support foster and adoptive families here in the United States. Over 300,000 kids are in foster care right now and states desperately need parents that step up and meet that need. In some states, however, no shock to you, government officials are turning away Christian foster parents all because of their biblical beliefs on sex and gender. The Alliance Defending Freedom is standing with these parents against this discrimination. Thankfully, they've helped overturn some of these ridiculous state policies. However, some states are still discriminating against Christian foster parents. The Alliance Defending Freedom is standing with a family in Washington whose foster care renewal was restricted because of their faith. Your gift helps parents stand up for their rights in cases like these all over the country. I very much encourage you to go to joinadf.comtony or text Tony to 83848. Again, huge thanks to the Alliance Defending Freedom for sponsoring the show. We love them. Excellent stuff. Also Huge thanks to mattcat1520 for the very kind $2. Super chat. Really do appreciate that. We don't ask you guys to do that, but we really do appreciate those of you who take a moment to do so. I'd say that about wraps it up for our coverage this evening. We'll be back tomorrow. There are some economic data that's coming through that's I'd say a little more than a silver lining regarding the employment data. And then a ton that we've got for you on the mid part of this week that's news that hasn't even been touched yet. It's the Tony Knitcast here on the Daily Signal, nationally syndicated and first on 93 WIBC. Y' all take care of.