This Week Unfiltered 04.06.25

Summary

Podcast Summary: "Truth in the Barrel" – Episode: This Week Unfiltered

Hosts: Amy McGrath and Denver Riggleman
Release Date: April 6, 2025
Website: www.TruthintheBarrel.com

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Introduction

In the This Week Unfiltered episode of Truth in the Barrel, hosts Amy McGrath and Denver Riggleman delve into pressing political and societal issues affecting the United States. As military veterans and political enthusiasts with a shared passion for whiskey, Amy and Denver navigate complex topics from constitutional rights to national security lapses, offering insightful analysis and spirited discussions.

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Due Process and Immigration

Amy McGrath initiates the conversation by highlighting a troubling instance where a Republican Congresswoman, Victoria Sparks, suggested that individuals deported to El Salvador forfeited their right to due process. Amy emphasizes the constitutional guarantees:

Amy McGrath [04:05]: "The fifth Amendment says no matter who you are if you're in this country, you get due process."

Denver Riggleman echoes Amy’s concerns, criticizing the erosion of constitutional protections in immigration enforcement:

Denver Riggleman [05:31]: "It's sort of the bedrock of what makes us Americans is our justice system and the fact that we give people due process."

The hosts discuss the potential for governmental overreach and the dangers of deporting individuals without proper legal procedures, citing the case of Andre Jose Hernandez Romero, a gay makeup artist wrongfully identified and deported based on misleading evidence.

Amy McGrath [08:31]: "There's no, Again, there's no due process there. There's no ability for him to say, hey, that's a tattoo that says mom and dad."

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National Security and Signal Gate

Transitioning to national security, Amy shares her firsthand experience as an F18 pilot, underscoring the critical importance of secure and classified communication channels. She critiques the mishandling of classified missions by officials like Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth who inadvertently leaked sensitive information through insecure platforms.

Amy McGrath [16:34]: "This is supposed to be the A team. These are supposed to be the people that are protecting our country."

Denver expands on the issue, highlighting the misuse of platforms like Gmail for official, classified communication, thereby jeopardizing national security.

Denver Riggleman [17:03]: "Not a government account with a .gov. And you know what I'm talking about."

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Government Communication Failures

The discussion intensifies as Amy and Denver dissect the ramifications of setting up multiple unsecured Signal chat chains for sensitive government communications. They argue that such practices not only breach the Federal Records Act and the Espionage Act but also undermine the integrity of national security operations.

Denver Riggleman [18:33]: "You can’t rationalize this. There is no defense."

Amy adds that the cumbersome protocols for handling classified information are deliberately designed to prevent leaks, emphasizing the severity of current administrative actions.

Amy McGrath [21:08]: "We make it hard so that if there's a spillage or a leak, we can figure out where it came from."

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Political Turmoil and Leadership Changes

The hosts express deep concern over the recent firing of key National Security Agency (NSA) officials, including Laura Loomer, drawing parallels to authoritarian practices and questioning the motivations behind such abrupt leadership changes.

Amy McGrath [23:07]: "This is unprecedented... We gotta watch this."

Denver speculates on the reasons, suggesting loyalty tests and political alignments as potential catalysts, further criticizing the administration's handling of national security.

Denver Riggleman [25:24]: "These are the people that are making decisions in the United States government complex... it's usually Occam's Razor."

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Economic Impact: Tariffs and Stock Market

Shifting focus to the economy, Amy and Denver discuss the detrimental effects of recent tariffs imposed by the administration. They highlight how these tariffs are crippling supply chains, increasing costs for consumers, and leading to significant losses in the stock market.

Amy McGrath [36:45]: "It's hurting Americans, it's going to hurt workers, it's going to hurt jobs."

Denver underscores the disconnect between policy makers and actual supply chain dynamics, arguing that tariffs are exacerbating economic instability without viable solutions.

Denver Riggleman [37:32]: "We're bleeding ourselves with leeches instead of actually using real medicine."

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Stock Market and Economic Stability

The hosts reflect on the current stock market downturn, attributing it to misguided economic policies and tariffs. They cite specific examples of companies like Nike and Ford struggling to maintain profitability amidst rising production costs and disrupted supply chains.

Amy McGrath [40:16]: "It's going to hurt us, and it is wrecking... the type of world economy that has been arguably kind of the greatest in human history."

Denver emphasizes the lack of practical solutions from political leaders to address these economic challenges, painting a bleak picture of future market stability.

Denver Riggleman [40:53]: "We're bleeding ourselves with leeches... That's really how these people think."

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Political Achievements and Celebrations

Amidst the critical discussions, Amy and Denver acknowledge recent political victories among Republicans, celebrating instances where conservative representatives have taken stands against extremist actions or policies.

Amy McGrath [40:53]: "Cheers to the four whole Republicans who actually voted to say those terrorists were bullshit."

They also commend the flipping of Escambia County in Florida, marking it as a significant political shift in a traditionally conservative region.

Amy McGrath [42:28]: "She flipped Escambia county blue. Hasn't been blue since 1992."

Furthermore, they toast to Susan Crawford's judicial victory and Cory Booker's substantive Senate speech against policies they oppose, reinforcing the show's advocacy for truth and justice.

Denver Riggleman [43:24]: "Cheers to Susan Crawford... Cheers to Cory Booker."

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Conclusion

Wrapping up the episode, Amy McGrath and Denver Riggleman reiterate the importance of seeking truth amidst widespread misinformation. They encourage listeners to engage with their content across various platforms and to contribute topics for future discussions.

Amy McGrath [47:35]: "Tell us what you think. There is a lot of topics out there... We want to know what the real deal is."

Denver emphasizes the necessity of valuing truth over ignorance, inviting listeners to subscribe and stay informed through Truth in the Barrel.

Denver Riggleman [48:07]: "Value truth over idiots. Cheers."

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Key Takeaways:

1. Constitutional Rights: The unwavering importance of due process for all individuals within the U.S., regardless of citizenship status.
2. National Security Lapses: Critical examination of the mishandling of classified communications and the potential threats posed by such oversights.
3. Economic Policies: The adverse effects of tariffs on the economy, supply chains, and the stock market, highlighting the need for informed policy-making.
4. Political Vigilance: Recognizing and celebrating political actions that align with constitutional and national interests while condemning extremist and authoritarian tendencies.
5. Engagement: Encouraging active participation and information dissemination to combat misinformation and uphold truth.

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For more in-depth discussions and updates, visit www.TruthintheBarrel.com and follow Amy and Denver across their social media platforms.

Transcript

[Amy McGrath]

Welcome to Truth in the Barrel, the unfiltered edition where each week we run down the topics that you need to understand a little bit more because there is a lot of disinformation out there. I'm Amy McGrath. I'm with my co host, Denver Riggleman, and we're happy to be with you today.

[Denver Riggleman]

Good day. Good night. Every day is a new adventure. And today as we get started, Amy, I like to say, I know that this show is called Truth in the Barrel. Last week was a single barrel silverback. Today is the Christine Riggleman Reserve, which just got gold single barrel at the New Orleans Bourbon Festival. So I'm going to take a little bit of sip of that. I know we're going to need that later, right?

[Amy McGrath]

We will.

[Denver Riggleman]

I cannot wait to talk to you about the things that have happened over the last week or so.

[Amy McGrath]

Yeah, it's a lot. I mean, I feel like every single week it's just a deluge of stuff we have to talk about and really push back on. I want to make sure that anyone following this follows us on all the social media channels that you follow. So blue sky X, what else is out there? Truth through social.

[Denver Riggleman]

YouTube. YouTube. Gosh, we're everywhere. We're like a conglomerate of awesomeness that is spreading over the entire globe. That's why I love this.

[Amy McGrath]

You got to follow us and tell all your friends and family about this, this show because we're going to be talking about all of the things that happen and we're going to be distilling them down to the actual truth. That's what this is about. All right, so let's get started. So last week, and here's the thing, this happens quite a bit where you're driving down the road and you see somebody's bumper sticker and it says, I love the Constitution or I follow the Constitution. And quite often you meet these people and they have actually never read the Constitution. And so we have, you know, a member of Congress, last week at a town hall in Indianapolis, Indiana, she was asked, this is a Republican member of Congress. Okay. She was asked about the deportation of migrants from this country to prisons in El Salvador. And she basically said, hey, those people don't get due process. And here's the direct quote. If you violated the law, you are not entitled to due process. And I can't tell you how many people actually believe that. That is like the most un American thing you can possibly say. We have this Constitution. And in there it says, hey, the fifth Amendment says no matter who you Are if you're in this country, you get due process. And so I wanted to start out, just talking about this.

[Denver Riggleman]

You got to be referring. Is it Victoria Sparks?

[Amy McGrath]

Yes.

[Denver Riggleman]

Is that who it was? Yeah. Oh, Indianapolis. So Indiana. I don't think it's Indiana's fifth. I'm trying to remember the district. I bet I'm close. My guess is. And I'm going to do this as a Republican, right? As a former Republican, Amy, I bet people cheered. Now, I didn't see that. Right, But I bet people cheered. I did see some of the. I saw that it was her that had. Did that. You know, that. The statement. I read about it. But I think it's pretty amazing that you would pick up on that because, you know, the Republicans always said they were the party of, you know, the Constitution. You know, the. The guy here in the 6th district, Ben Klein, one of my former colleagues in the 116th, he carries a pocket Constitution waste during committee meetings, cheering this on. Oh, yeah. I mean, how do you cheer that on? You know, people don't deserve due process. It's sort of the bedrock of what makes us Americans is our justice system and the fact that we give people due process. And I can see. I can see where people will be horrified, right. That that would be said. Unless you're a Republican in a town hall with somebody cheering that stuff on.

[Amy McGrath]

And here's the thing that a lot of people don't understand. And I taught the Constitution, right to future military leaders of our country. The Constitution does not say if you are a citizen, only you get due process. The Constitution says persons here get due process whether you are a citizen or not. And that is true for free. Free speech, the First Amendment. It's true for pretty much everything except for voting. Right? And so these people that say they love the Constitution but then want to deport everybody without any due process, it's actually un American.

[Denver Riggleman]

We might actually touch on this throughout the show, but I think that cult behavior seems to dominate when it comes to constitutional discussions through a certain constituency. That's a lot of Cs. That's alarming alliteration right there. But I do think that that's what we have right now, right, Is that cult behavior overcomes any constitutional qualms based on the constituency that you have. And I think that's what we're seeing right now is that you have people just screaming for blood, right? Or going against what they say they're voting for or how they believe based on their belief in a certain individual or human being. It's just unbelievable what they bought into right now. And it's hard for me to even get my arms around when people are cheering for stuff like that.

[Amy McGrath]

Well, and we have to acknowledge what this is really all about. Right. This is the issue of immigration, the issue that Donald Trump ran on and actually you could argue won on. Right. In 2016 and again in 2024. And Americans really want our border to be secure. Most Americans want to know who's coming across the border. But we do have this constitution here. And you can't just have the government nab people who are here in the United States and send them to a prison in El Salvador, which is not a very good place to be without due process. Why? Because the problem is, and there may be many Denver who are criminals.

[Denver Riggleman]

Sure.

[Amy McGrath]

Who should be deported. Like most Americans believe, as I do, if you're here illegally, you certainly, if you're a criminal, you, you need to be deported. The problem is with the government coming in and nabbing these people and just sending them without due process, we have the potential for what. For mistakes, Right.

[Denver Riggleman]

Huge mistakes.

[Amy McGrath]

And that is what we're seeing already happening, right?

[Denver Riggleman]

Well, yeah. I mean, there's going to be. It almost feels like they don't care that they throw the baby out with the bathwater. There could be innocent individuals or legal immigrants or people who are misidentified that are rounded up. Right. And that's something that we've always sort of, you know, said, oh, gosh, that's, that's like some of these awful dictators and authoritarians. But isn't it sort of easy where you can wrap nativism, xenophobia and racism into a neat rapper of illegal immigration and throw them out without due process? And there should be a rationalization or validation for me as a God fearing American living in Indiana that we should be throwing these people at it. You know what? And if we, if we wrap up a few, you know, that are innocent or just have families, you know, or maybe are misidentified, you know what? That's just the way it is. And I think that's the thing that absolutely blows my mind. If you claim to be a conservative, if you claim to be somebody who's a constitutionally minded individual, that would be, yes, we hate criminals, okay? Especially violent criminals. You're right, Amy. I want them to go back, get out of here. You don't belong here, you're a criminal. However it can be that justice is where we should be going. Right. Without automatically saying, let's just throw everybody out based on the color of their skin. That's really what we're. I don't want it to come to that. That scares the hell out of me. And I do believe that deportations and justice don't have to be mutually exclusive. I mean, that's just. That's just a belief that I have.

[Amy McGrath]

Yeah. And, and I hear from folks on the right exactly what you just said. Like, oh, well, of course there's. There's going to be mistakes, but it's for the greater good. Well, no, we have this constitution for a reason. You can't just do that because mistakes are made. Right. There was one just in the. In the past couple weeks. A man who, Whose name is. Is Andre Jose Hernandez Romero. And he was a gay makeup artist who had a tattoo. And his tattoo basically said mom and dad on it. And the feds ice nabbed him, said that his tattoo is evidence that he is a gang member and sent him to the El Salvador prison. So there's lots of problems with that. Number one evidence of being a gang member is your tattoo. Okay. But there's no, Again, there's no due process there. There. There's no ability for him to say, hey, that's a tattoo that says mom and dad. You know, there's no a way. And, and that's just wrong. Right.

[Denver Riggleman]

Well, I. Amy, I haven't seen any crime statistics where there's a gay makeup artist crime wave happening. I don't know if you've seen this. I, I've looked everywhere. I can't see a gay makeup artist with tattoo crime wave happening across the United States. I don't know even what to tell. I mean, the story is so outlandish, what you just told me. I, I'm sort of. I know this is your thing, but if I remember correctly, I think even Joe Rogan weighed in on this, Right. Saying it was horrific. I mean, when Joe Rogan weighs in on something against the Trump administration, you know, it's gotta be bad because that guy's a homer. It is bad. It is bad.

[Amy McGrath]

Just the idea that the American, the federal government would just go in and nab somebody and then send them to a prison in El Salvador. I mean, we should be outraged about this. It's just. It's just wrong. But the broader, the broader topic here of immigration isn't going away, and we need serious people in government to actually tackle this problem. Right. And I know that the Trump administration has cracked down on border crossings, and a lot of Americans want that. And I think, you know, most Americans want the border to be secure, but it is going to take more than just cracking down at the border to fix the problems that we have with immigration, Right?

[Denver Riggleman]

Yeah, it is. And again, I think I don't want to put words in the mouth of the esteemed Amy McGrath, but I think, and what you're trying to say is due process and securing the border don't have to be mutually exclusive. And the story you just told me also is that just because the color of your skin or you have a crown tattoo doesn't necessarily mean you're a gang member. And that's the importance of due process and the constitutional protections that we have. And Amy, you are an instructor on the Constitution for these individuals. And I think that's probably why it hit so close to home for you. And I'm, you know, and I think that's why this show today, and like every day we're looking at this unserious government that can't seem to do anything, that seems to follow what Americans think Americans should be. Unless you're sort of this bizarre cult follower of the whole Trump administration.

[Amy McGrath]

Yeah. And it's not just the Fifth Amendment of due process that these people who say they love the Constitution who are the Trump mega following, it's now also the First Amendment because they're going after people who are in this country who are here as students and saying that, you know, they, they can't write op eds, we're going to deport you now. So apparently, if you're here as, as a student, you're not an American citizen, you don't have the right of free speech. Apparently that's not important either.

[Denver Riggleman]

Now, I guess over the last 10 years, I think there's a permission structure for people on the right to allow these type of awful feelings to come out and then try to rationalize it or validate it through arguments that don't make sense in a lawful or constitutional way. And that's why, I mean, the party sort of left me, Amy. That's why, you know, me and you talking about this. Right. How do you, if you say you're a conservative, Constitution loving, due process, law and order constituent, and you let a tattoo, right. That's sort of a cultural signifier, automatically tell you that you're part of a gang and you're not even looking at the big picture, you don't even have the nuance or the critical thinking to think that maybe that's just a tattoo. What I'm worried about, Amy, is that my wife has tattoos. I mean, she could be part of the white distiller gang that's going around, you know, knocking over liquor stores. Right. Because she has a copper tattoo, because she likes to do copper distillation. It's just so ludicrous that it's hard to wrap your arms around the ignorance of this type of targeting. And I think, I don't want to get too far, because then I get angry and I start being directed targeted attacks at people that are stupid. Right. Because stupid is a terminal disease, as you know. You've heard me say, Amy. So I'm worried that that stupidity will be terminal for us. But you said something pretty interesting. You talked about this. This administration. I don't think we have adults in the room. I mean, if you look at how they're acting on everything that they've been doing lately, from, you know, passing classified information on to this. This lackadue process, it seems to me that it's very difficult for us to have any faith that they're making any good decisions right now.

[Amy McGrath]

Well, and that leads us into the next topic that I think is really, really important, and it's something near and dear to my heart, which is our national security. And I know that the Trump administration would love to just gloss over this. This signal chat gate is what we're talking about, many in the media are talking about right now, but is. It's a really big deal. And I was an F18 pilot. I did strike missions in both Afghanistan and Iraq. And I can tell you again that launch times and time over the targets, those times are classified. And in the case of what happened with. With Secretary of Defense Hegseth, just tweeting out, or, I'm sorry, not tweeting out, but chatting, signaling out. Signaling out these times. And the very mission itself, the existence of the very mission itself is classified because it was a mission that was secret. The Houthis did not know we were coming, and that's by design. And so the incompetence continues. It's not just the signal gate, but we've learned just in the last week that the National Security Advisor, Mike Waltz, set up over 20 different signal chat chains to talk about different regional crises should they arise around the world. Now, when I heard that, I was like, are you kidding me? I mean, this is supposed to be the A team. These are supposed to be the people that are protecting our country. And the pushback already is, oh, well, these guys are smart because they're. They're putting together a signal chat chain so they can all discuss these things. No, that's not smart.

[Denver Riggleman]

You know, it's amazing, Amy, as you Talked about the one signal chat, it's now 20 times worse, right? He had 20 signal chats. Can you imagine? First of all, you're running ops through creating signal checks manually. Hey, let's add Bob. Who else might be cleared? Jay. Is Jay cleared? You know, the other thing, too is it's better that he was also doing official business over Gmail. The very classified and secure Gmail account.

[Amy McGrath]

Yeah.

[Denver Riggleman]

Not a government account with a dot gov. And you know what I'm talking about. Or a ic.gov. right. Or any of our stuff, right. Our SIPPER accounts or our J. Wicks accounts or NSA net accounts or any of our specialty accounts, you know, when we were doing liaison work with SOCOM and things like that. It's amazing to me that not only is he setting up random signal chats, but he's doing official business over Gmail. I wonder if there's a training issue for security, you know, in. In the nsc, Right. You know, or what was the.

[Amy McGrath]

What was the training guy we all had to do in the military where we had to go through the annual, you know, training.

[Denver Riggleman]

Annual security training.

[Amy McGrath]

Put the stick inside the. Inside the computer on the side. Remember that? From. From 10, 15 years ago. They need to get through that training. But in all honesty, though, it is really serious. Number one, this is not secure. And that means that all these signal chat chains that they had in these 20 different regions, all that they were discussing, guess what? The Chinese can easily read it. The Russians, our enemies can read it. You know, and so that's number one. And number two, as you pointed out, it's not preservable. So these chats, look, when you're talking national security and you're making decisions, you're supposed to be able to preserve those communications so that the American people know how those decisions were made. That's really important. And. And by the way, it's like that's the law.

[Denver Riggleman]

Well, it's contradictory to the Federal Records Act. Right. And even if me and you had an accidental disclosure and we were using the wrong comms path, we're also subject to the Espionage Act. So now you have two things going on here, right? You have the Federal Records act and the Espionage act. That both can commingle, right? They can cross those streams. Can cross based on if you're using a wrong comms channel or unauthorized channel and. Oh, it was an accident. I didn't mean to leak time over target. I'm sorry. You know, okay, bullshit. You're using an unauthorized channel. You're already have issues with the Espionage act and the Federal Records Act. The Federal Records act is that you can't store any of this data as you're talking about. Right, Amy? And that's, that's the thing that gets me is that there's no way to look at even doing, as we know, a post mission debrief. Right, right. You can't even, you can't even look at the mistakes that you might have made based on the data. Not, not to mention that the taxpayers are paying for this and there should be record kept based on official government business. The other thing too when you're looking at this is there's so much arrogance and there's arrogance through ignorance and we, and that's the thing that gets me too is that people are trying to defend this. It is under, there is no defense. There's, there's no legal defense, there's no moral defense, there's no ethical defense. The only defense is just deal with it because that's who we are. And that's the thing again, I know this all wraps back into rule of law, constitutionality and what we think as public servants. But how in the hell, how in the hell do you rationalize this? You can't rationalize it.

[Amy McGrath]

You can't. Well, to two points that I think people have to understand who aren't in government and who haven't been in government and dealing and had to preserve classified information. The first point is that we make it cumbersome for a reason to deal in classified circles. We make it hard. Why? Why do we make it hard? We make it hard so that if there's a spillage or a leak, we can figure out where it came from. And, and you brought up a really important point of the arrogance. I, I think, you know, I know this show is based on fact, but, but I, my, my, my theory on this is that if you look at the people on this chat chain, most of them have not been in the executive branch in government. Most, they've been in Congress. I'm sorry, but that's different.

[Denver Riggleman]

It is.

[Amy McGrath]

And they have this arrogance of, oh, we are smarter than everybody who has had a career in this stuff. And so while they're telling us they have to, you know, we have to go through these cumbersome measures of going through classified channels to talk about these things. We're smarter than them. We're just going to set up a signal chat chain. And they, you know, they probably had some civil servant who said, hey, Mr. Secretary, that's probably not a good idea. And he probably said, oh, I'm smarter than you. I'm going to do it, do it my way.

[Denver Riggleman]

Shut up, Lucy.

[Amy McGrath]

Yeah, that's number one. I mean, we make it cumbersome for a reason, so that our enemies cannot hear us and so that if there's a leak, we can figure out where it's coming from. And number two, just in January you had a Department of Homeland Security official, longtime civil servant, who made a mistake, and she went to her colleagues and said, I accidentally put in an unclassified government email. I accidentally added a journalist onto this email where I was talking about an ICE raid that was going to happen. And guess what happened to her? She was removed from her position and she was, her security clearance was revoked. Did anything happen to any of these guys that I would argue actually released more worse information over.

[Denver Riggleman]

Over signal, more damaging information from a higher echelon in government? There's layers of awfulness. But you know what we can do, Amy? We can deport Pete Hegseth because of his tattoo, his white nationalist tattoo, because we can say he's a domestic terrorist and we don't need any due process. So I think we need to start to deport Pete Hegseth friggin chance, you know, based on his tattoos. You know, and don't get me started.

[Amy McGrath]

With Pete Hegseth and you know, taking, taking his wife to high level meetings as well. That's, that's kind of a breach of, of security. But, but now we have Laura Loomer apparently getting national security officials fired. So that, that makes me really nervous.

[Denver Riggleman]

Well, you know, yesterday was a just tragic, right? When you have Laura Loomer who's a 911 truth or a racist. Just an awful human being, right? And I think, you know, when, when she goes in and talks about loyalty tests with Trump, God, we're all the way back to people rationalize behavior for deportations and due process and signal gate and misuse of government resources and the Espionage act and everybody making excuses for that because we have the most ignorant, I would say executive branch level appointees, directors and secretaries in the history of the United States. And now Laura Loomer is going to Trump actually presenting the litmus test where he's firing NSA individuals. And then last night, a person I have met, I was introduced to long ago by a former general buddy of mine, Tim Hawk, who's Dern's director of the National Security Agency, was fired late last night. I got calls from inside nsa and my guess Is I wonder, Amy, if there's a cascading effect, you know, from her applying that loyalty test and directing who should be fired. I mean, think if people look up Laura Loomer, you're. It's like, it's like the Joker determining, you know, who should be fired in Gotham. Right. I mean, it's that nuts.

[Amy McGrath]

It's very scary. But. But a lot of people don't understand what NSA is or does. So who is the head of nsa?

[Denver Riggleman]

The head of NSA has to be a military individual. That's durns, that's a four star general. You know, people that you know initially had been. Darn you talking about people like Mike Hayden. Correct. Who I briefed in the early 2000s over and over. Actually on the 8th floor at NSA, the DDR, the Deputy Director is a civilian. Right. And the civilian was also.

[Amy McGrath]

She was fired as well.

[Denver Riggleman]

Absolutely. And I think she was redirected maybe to the Undersecretary of Defense, usdi. I'm trying to remember. So you have, you know, these two individuals, the two top performers. Right. The leaders in NSA that run everything, they run the whole SIGINT confederation. That's the best way to put it.

[Amy McGrath]

So signal.

[Denver Riggleman]

Yes. SIGINT is signals intelligence. Thank you. Thank you, Amy. Right. That's broken into two major subdivisions of comment, which is communications intelligence and elint, which is electronics intelligence. Right. Underneath that umbrella you have people who comet or elint or joint. Right. Who can collect signals, make sense of those signals, which helps in targeting, situational awareness, looking at what everybody has in their environment electronically, not only for targeting, but for deconfliction of signals in that battle space. For people who might be flying an F18 into combat on 89 combat missions or on that aircraft, you know, executing that mission, you want to know what that environment looks like, what you can target, what you can hit. So NSA has all of that. NSA is a combat service element under the dod. A lot of people don't know that it's under the DoD funding lines. But what it does is so crucial to our defense. Right. That if you have people who don't know what they're doing directing the mission, it can get very confusing because of SIGINT authorities. SIGINT authorities are very, very defined by the US government and by the intelligence community. So if you have two yahoos that are going in there to replace these types of professionals, again, we have loyalists in charge where we should have competent professionals. And that could create real issues in the National Security Agency.

[Amy McGrath]

It's worrisome because National Security Agency, they listen in and they get intelligence on foreign actors. They don't have the authority to do it here domestically. Okay. And so my concern with this firing is why there hasn't been any. I mean, they did it at 10:00 at night. Right. And there hasn't been any reasoning for that. I mean, was this general, like, too woke? You know, maybe they were upset that, that he had a woman deputy, because they don't like women in high positions in the national security arena. Except for Tulsi, I guess. But, you know, I, I just, I'm a little worried about this. This seems like a really big deal.

[Denver Riggleman]

Well, Tim Hawk would never sign a loyalty pledge. Number one, he wouldn't do that as a military member or public servant. Number two, my guess is he has some of the same attributes as General Milley, where he's very honest and blunt about what's happening. And also I would say, what if nsa, and, you know, the thing about conjecture and theoreticals and hypotheticals is you don't want it to go out there. But if NSA was aware of Signal Gate without it being released by Jeff Goldberg, was that actually identified? Oh, that causes issues. The other thing, too. What if he refused to do a specific mission criteria that didn't match his signals intelligence director directories? There's that too. Right. So you have this effect, like, why? Or was it simply this? Was it simply that there were somebody who was in Trump's ear saying, you need to go with this guy because he's just simply not that guy, because he's not a Trump guy. Biden put him in there. So he's got. And listen, you're talking about conspiracy theorists, you're talking about fantasists, you're talking about people who probably believe that Lord of the Rings is a documentary. Right? These are the people that are making decisions in the United States government complex, Amy. And I think all of those things could be possible, but it's usually Occam's Razor. I think the probable and the reason they pushed him out of there, he's a Biden appointee and he refused to profess loyalty to Trump. I think it's probably that simple. And I know Tim, and he's probably like, I'm just not doing that. And probably the writing has been on the wall for a week. We just didn't know about it. And they pulled, they pulled the trigger last night and got him on a plane and sent him back to dc.

[Amy McGrath]

Yeah. And people need to know. This is unprecedented. I mean, to come into office, fire the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, fire all these, you know, the chief of Naval operations. Now fire the head of NSA for, for really no reason. It's, we gotta watch this. But something else, something else happened last week that I think maybe was glossed over in, in the media, but I, I think it's really kind of scary and important as well. A, a Republican representative from Texas on the House floor quoted one of Hitler's best friends, Joseph Goebbels. Yeah, Joseph Goebbels was the propaganda, the lead Nazi propagandist. Okay. Back in the 1930s and 1940s, and the Republican member of Congress was having a back and forth with Biden's chief disinformation officer. They were, there was a hearing and he was arguing with her and he made, he, he said, and, and I quote, and this is the quote from Joseph Goebbels, he said, it is the absolute right of the state to supervise the formation of public opinion. And I think that may be what we're discussing here. And of course he said this. Another representative Democrat from Texas pointed out that, hey, that's like Hitler's best friend. Maybe you shouldn't be quoting Hitler's best friend. And he got very defensive and he came back and said, hey, and this is what he said, probably best not to throw stones when your party supported funneling millions of dollars through Biden's State Department to shape public opinion.

[Denver Riggleman]

Yeah, he's talking about Nina Jankowicz's digital government's board, if you remember that. Right. Which the DGB probably isn't the best frickin name for a, I would say an entity that goes after disinformation. I actually, when it happened, I'm like, that's not going to last. However, that's not what it was at. And you know, when you're talking about Self, right. We're talking about Congressman Self, you know, not the brightest bull, but the Home Depot. Amy. Right. But you know, it's, you know, and somebody who's using Goebbels, right, as a quote to go after the Biden administration is actually a Goebbels technique. And that technique is to accuse that which you're guilty to create confusion. So now you have a guy using a Goebbels quote, trying to apply that to the Democrats. When we know, right, that this sort of, this tamping down of free speech in our government space is based on the firings, hirings, all based on loyalty, based on what people are going and the attack that we're having on The First Amendment right now from the right. And that you're allowed to be fantastical and go into disinformation and spread conspiracy theories. That's the First Amendment. That's great. But you have a guy actually quoting Goebbels against the Democrats when they're doing the very thing he's accusing them of. And he's using a Goebbels technique to quote Goebbels to go after that. It seems like the whole party is the pointing Spider man meme. Right. And so it's like, that's really. Oh, it's Ashley Projection. You know, every. What is it? Every accusation is a confession. Right.

[Amy McGrath]

I really want the truth on this, though. So here. When. When he. When his team was. The media reached out and to his team, to his staff and said, what. What is this all about? And the staff, of course, doubled down. The communications director said in a statement what he was talking about is this. It is, quote, indisputable that the Biden administration weaponized its State Department to censor and suppress American citizens from their right of free speech. What are they talking about, Denver? Because the State Department deals with foreign countries, not here in the United States. The State Department doesn't do anything with free speech or any speech here in the United States, unless you're like talking about your passport.

[Denver Riggleman]

So there's multiple stupids here. First of all, you're exactly right about the State Department. The other thing people forget. I know, it's just incredible memory of mine. You know, it's that Air Force IQ I have. But I think that people forget the Global Engagement center was shut down by the Trump administration. The GEC was the one who's supposed to identify and suppress foreign disinformation that could go after our elections and things like that. They also cut people out of cisa, if you remember that. Right. The Cybersecurity and Information Security Agency. So underneath of dhs. So what they're doing, what he's talking about is multiple layers of stupids. First of all, yes, the State Department doesn't do that, but the State Department was closed down for doing that by the Trump administration. Right. And when you look at when the Biden administration was severely underfunded. Right. This is actually started by Obama, I believe, back in his 2008 administration. So that's what's happening.

[Amy McGrath]

This is an agent, this is part of the State Department that was designed to go after disinformation that foreign actors.

[Denver Riggleman]

Foreign are.

[Amy McGrath]

Are pumping into our country.

[Denver Riggleman]

Yes.

[Amy McGrath]

It was designed to try to tamp down on that disinformation. And that's what they're talking about here.

[Denver Riggleman]

Well, that's what he thinks he might be talking about, but he's confused. When I said there's multiple stupids, he's talking about the Hunter Biden laptop and the 51 signers also, that's what he's referring to. And the suppression of election disinformation in the January 2021, January 6, 2021, or the November 2020 election. He's also referring to that. And the other thing that he's talking to his constituents, because that's what he's hoping for is a clip is Covid, that obviously Covid was faked or there was an overreaction or that Dr. Fauci is evil. So this is the whole bag of crap that Congressman self dumps into a speech so he can replay it for fundraising to his constituency. This is what's happened. When I say multiple levels of stupid, stupid translates to money for Congressional Republicans right now. And I think that's why he mixes everything. He doesn't even know how the government works. That's really, really bottom line.

[Amy McGrath]

This wasn't the first time that he quoted Hitler's best friend, by the way.

[Denver Riggleman]

I wonder what memorabilia he has hanging on his wall.

[Amy McGrath]

I mean, here, look, I, I can, I have a few quotes that I've memorized over the years. I have a couple from Eleanor Roosevelt, Maya Angelou, some people, even Alan Shepard. I, I, I have not memorized any quotes from anyone that, that knows Hitler. What I can just say that I don't know. Another big thing that happens we'll quickly touch on are the extremely stupid shooting ourselves in the foot tariffs that this president has now instituted. And what I hear from the right in justifying this is we all have to suffer. Don't worry, President Trump knows what he's doing. We all have to suffer for it because it's going to make America better in the long run. Trust him. That's what I hear from the right.

[Denver Riggleman]

Yeah. It's like we're trying to fix the economy by bleeding ourselves with leeches. And by the way, we were completely healthy. Right. It's like, you know what? Hey, I know you're really healthy. You look really ruddy today, but the stars are telling me, astrologists are telling me you're going to be sick next week. So we're going to stick leeches all over your body just to make sure you're not sick next week. That is really how these people think. I mean, I know that it feels like, maybe I'm actually being very nice to them. I think it's actually worse than that. The thing is, how are penguins gonna fight back if we tax penguins, right? I mean, he's out there taxing penguins so they can't fight back. Wow, that's pretty smart. You know, penguins are digging in their pockets like, shit, I got an ice tax today.

[Amy McGrath]

I mean, the whole thing is stupid and it's gonna hurt us, and it is wrecking, you know, the past 80 years of the type of world economy that has been arguably kind of like the greatest in human history in terms of, of the ability for, for humans to progress. And he's throwing that all away. I mean, it's just. It's really dumb. And it's hurting Americans, it's going to hurt workers, it's going to hurt jobs. I. I don't know.

[Denver Riggleman]

So as we're doing the show, you know, we've already had a bad, bad stock market day, right? And we're in the middle of other bad stock market days as me and you are talking right now. And this comes out pretty fast. We're pretty current, aren't we, Amy? We're pretty current here on Truth in the Barrel. So the thing that you have is what is your total loss on your trillions? So when you're looking at, you know, companies losing 44% of their value, like certain companies did yesterday, you're looking at Nike, who does most of their, you know, their shoe make in Vietnam and China. And Nike's like, well, how do we actually even have a profit now? What do we do? They just won't sell shoes in the US or they'll just be really expensive. Everything about this is so ridiculous. And I had somebody the other day go, well, Denver, this needed to happen. This correction, like you said, Amy, I said, well, this really needed to happen. Okay, so what is the plan? What's the plan? Well, we're going to make more stuff. Who's going to make more stuff? But are you going to make the Eyeballs and the Barbie dolls? What stuff are you talking about? What are we going to make more of? Well, cars. Look at what Ford did. Ford came out and said, we're selling cars at our employee pricing. Well, that's because they're in a glut. They're trying to get rid of their 2024 models, and they're already saying that their prices are going to go through the roof. So they're hoping they can dump their inventory to absorb the shitstorm that's about to hit. Them on tariffs because they get a lot of their parts from fricking Mexico and other countries. So give me a break. And then that's what everybody comes out. The Trun Trump cultists come out with their MAGA hats and their T shirts that, you know, has this homoerotic Rambo body with Trump's, you know, face on it. And they're out there going, yay, we're gonna make more cars. No you're not. That's not how it works. You know, you've never worked a supply chain job in your life. You don't know how things work. What's really gonna happen is this massive colossal collapse until we can somehow scramble together us coming back up why we're ruining, ruining our decades long relationships in trade. And lastly, I thought Republicans for free trade instead of free trade, we're taxing Republicans.

[Amy McGrath]

Used to be.

[Denver Riggleman]

It's just unbelievable. And I think that's why I hate to, I know that we're supposed to sometimes do things based on how we want to do things on this show, but I'm going to jump to something right now. Can we start with a cheers to the four whole Republicans who actually voted to say those terrorists were bullshit. Can we just. Yeah, I, I just, I know we're talking about it right now. So, so I know that, you know, I, I think. Cheers to that. Cheers to that. I mean I, I just, I'm to a point, you know, Amy, that I jumped on our cheers here. But it was so perfect, right?

[Amy McGrath]

No, it was that we could do this. The truth is there's a lot of, there were a few victories, a few things that we should celebrate from the past week. Still some good news out there. And that, that was one of them. Here's another one. Well, Florida Republicans, you know, they, they won these two special elections, right? That's not good. But you know what? They didn't win them by the same margins that they won in 2024. And in fact those two districts were moved quite a bit and that was because of the hard work of the two candidates in those districts. In fact, one of them gay Valliman in Florida 1, which is a super huge ruby red district. I mean this is the panhandle of Florida.

[Denver Riggleman]

That's Gates. That's Gates's old district, isn't it?

[Amy McGrath]

Yes. She flipped. Escambia county, which is. Escambia county is the furthest west county in Florida. It, it has Pensacola. It's where I used to live when I went through at flight school. I went down there to, to Do a town hall with Gay and she flipp. Escambia county blue. Hasn't been blue since 1992. Now, she didn't win the overall district, but flipping that county, I think is. Is a really good indicator of. Yeah. And also what people need to know about that county. Hugely military, lot of veterans.

[Denver Riggleman]

Yeah. And so Eglin Air Force Base is down there, right?

[Amy McGrath]

Eglin. Eglin is. Is a little bit further east, but Pensacola is in Escambia, Pensacola. And that's a big deal. That's a big deal.

[Denver Riggleman]

Cheers to that, then.

[Amy McGrath]

Cheers.

[Denver Riggleman]

My God. Cheers. God.

[Amy McGrath]

What else?

[Denver Riggleman]

This might be the part of the show we keep going crazy. Well, you know what? Cheers to that. I got to take a drink, though, with the cheers or it's bad luck. That's delicious. I think there's cheers to Susan Crawford, the judge who won in Wisconsin over Mr. Schmiel, I think. Is that how you pronounce this day, baby? And the fact that Elon Musk spent $25 million and just blew that money out because Susan Crawford crushed that guy. So I think we have to have a cheers for that, for a good friend, Susan Crawford. And by the way, I want to ask a question. It's a serious one. Amy, was his name Shamel?

[Amy McGrath]

I don't even know.

[Denver Riggleman]

Shamil. It sounds to me like something that happens when you get sick. I mean, is there like. I just had a Shamil. Oh, man.

[Amy McGrath]

A bad one.

[Denver Riggleman]

Now I gotta go change my pants, you know. You know, it's one of those.

[Amy McGrath]

So you already talked about the Senate.

[Denver Riggleman]

I talked about that, yeah.

[Amy McGrath]

I talked about the tariffs.

[Denver Riggleman]

Yeah, absolutely.

[Amy McGrath]

You know, my. My two senators in Kentucky who I almost never, ever, ever agree with, actually voted against the tariffs. Of course, the House isn't going to do anything, so.

[Denver Riggleman]

No.

[Amy McGrath]

Well, it's just kind of.

[Denver Riggleman]

The thing is you are in the bourbon capital of the world, right? I make bourbon, and I think that's part of truth in the barrel here. This is so neat that this is happening with the Commonwealth of Virginia, the Commonwealth of Kentucky joined here to say, hey, we might hate all Americans, but if you mess with our bourbon, we're voting against you, Donald Trump. Hey, and I love that.

[Amy McGrath]

That. That is. Bourbon is the. One of the most important things here.

[Denver Riggleman]

But I tell you what, bourbon is truth.

[Amy McGrath]

To New Jersey Senator Cory Booker. All right.

[Denver Riggleman]

Oh, yeah.

[Amy McGrath]

Cheers to him. Because he, you know, being a former football player, being somebody who, you know, loves this country, he had the longest speech on the Senate floor, beating out in history. Beating out the racist strum Thurman, who was against the civil rights in the 1950s.

[Denver Riggleman]

Right.

[Amy McGrath]

Cory Booker took to the floor to rally not just Democrats, but I think all Americans. His speech was substantive. It wasn't just reading Cat in the Hat. It was, it was talking about these, what Trump is doing and how it's hurting America, talking about how the Social Security cuts will hurt Americans, talking about Trump's, you know, trying to, to go after health care, talking about the craziness of, of invading Greenland and taking Canada as the 51st state. So all of what he talked about for, let's see, 25 hours and five minutes was substantive. So cheers to that. You're cheering on Trump and we need that. We need a fighter. So thank you, Cory Booker.

[Denver Riggleman]

Here's Cheers. Can I add something on the cheers? I know that me and you are in the drinking mode right now, and truth in the barrel and complete truth and facts, you know, in whiskey Veritas. Right, Amy? But how about an African American man pushing against an administration that pardoned white nationalists from January 6th and destroyed the filibuster record of a racist senator who actually filibustered against the Civil Rights Act? I would hope, yeah. That the media can revisit that. That's good trouble right there. So here's cheers to good trouble.

[Amy McGrath]

Cheers to that.

[Denver Riggleman]

Cheers to that. Delish. My God, she makes good whiskey. Yeah. Dang.

[Amy McGrath]

All right.

[Denver Riggleman]

Yeah. And you know, it's six in the morning here. No kidding. That's a joke. Everybody is definitely still not noon. But no, this is, this is fantastic. Another incredible show here. And I, and I know people are like, God, this might be a little longer than usual, but look what we covered, you know, due process, the Constitution. Right. Signal gate, using Gmail for official business. Right. Joseph Goebbels. We talked about Laura Loomer running the purge yesterday in the NSC and the nsa. And we talked about tariffs in the stock market and then self inflicted face shots where we're bleeding ourselves with leeches instead of actually using real medicine and directed tariffs and nuance. And it's amazing to me that we've been able to cover this in such an incredibly concise time with facts and truth. And that's why I think I love truth in the Barrel, Amy. And I don't know if you wanted to say anything before we go, but do you have anything left in that truth canon of yours, Amy, that you want to talk about?

[Amy McGrath]

Well, I would just say that we're, we're on YouTube, so go ahead and like. Or follow our channel. We're on all the social media platforms and also, you know, tell us what you think. There is a lot of topics out there. We cannot cover them all. But what are the ones that are the most important? What are the ones that you are feeling like? Hey, there's, there's just a lot of disinformation out there and I want to know what the real deal is. So send that to us. And, and in future shows, we're going to tackle it all.

[Denver Riggleman]

I tell you that. And if you're not subscribing to the pot of your choice for Truth in the Barrel or you're not subscribing on YouTube, I'm not saying you're a loser, but I'm saying you need to educate yourself on who the cool cats are. And the cool cats are on Truth in the Barrel. So I hope you join us next time. Thanks. From me and Amy McGrath. Have a great day. Drink responsibly, but also value truth over idiots. Cheers.

[Amy McGrath]

All right.