Dan Bongino (9:00)

We're not calling it a terror attack at this point. Again, it's way too early to speculate motive. You know, I know there's a lot out there on social media, but I ask just to give us a little bit of patience while we work through a really complex scene. A lot of witnesses were here. We've taken them to another location to debrief them and interview them. As we do that, I think the picture will become more clear. But it would be. It would be irresponsible for me to. To speculate on motive this early on. We're only a couple hours into this thing.

Vince (9:28)

Yeah, it's not. It's not up to you. First of all, this guy is straight up yelling about his terror motives. It's obviously true. From all of the eyewitnesses, the video, you can see why he conducted this attack in terms of his motivations. And also, look, you are the Boulder, Colorado police chief. I don't know if terrorism charges are at your fingertips, but regardless, your job is to handle the local crimes that were violated and to give people updates on this guy. Taking the cops that you have working for you, taking this guy into custody, that's your job as far as terror goes. Leave that to the officials who actually are saying that and charging that. Why do you even have to go down that road? We're withholding a judgment about whether it's terror. How about shut up. How about that? Because this is a terror attack. Don't lie to us. Don't lie to us. Why are you withholding on this subject? What could possibly be the motivation for that? These are members of your community, Jewish demonstrators who week after week are calling for the release of hostages and. And have now been attacked because of who they are and what they stand for, which is decency. That's a terror attack. That's a terror attack, and you should have the balls to say that. Police Chief Boulder, Colorado Wild. Yeah. So the guy was arrested. Here's cut six. This is video of the cops showing up and getting this guy down on the ground and putting cuffs on him. Take a look at this video of the arrest you see in the foreground. I do not know what these guys are arguing about. There's water being poured onto the body of a poor woman who was just set on fire at this hour, her condition unknown, and she's being doused and being cooled by that water. Apparently the bystanders who were there, including people who were at a restaurant across the street, they ran out, they grabbed buckets and they went to the fountain that was right there by the building and they were hauling water from the fountain in order to douse the flames that were all over these poor people. All over them. In the background you see, of course, the police officer. He's got the terror attacker in custody, putting handcuffs on him and that's the way it went down. Yeah, look at the buckets of water here in the foreground as people are trying to put this poor woman out and take her out of her misery here. In terms of getting the feeling of that burning off of her skin. I just can't even imagine. One of the most horrific things that could possibly happen to a human being. And there's the suspect on the ground taken into custody by the first cop who showed up there. You'll not in this video, but moments later, yet another cop showed up with a long gun and urged people to get back and away from the scene. But a terror attack here in the United States of America. This is the media. Let's talk about who this guy is now because the media are really not dwelling on the subject with any meaning whatsoever. This is an Egyptian national who, who was let into the country two years ago. He came into the country two years ago. This would be under Joe Biden and he overstayed his visa. He overstayed his visa. His name is Mohamed Sabri Salman. He's 45 years old. He was, as you know, arrested at the scene. Fox News reporting on this. After he set his victims on fire as they, of course, peacefully rallied on behalf of Israeli hostages still being held by Hamas in Gaza. He was heard yelling once again, this is a terror attack. Free Palestine. And other anti Israel slogans, again blaming Zionists for the deaths of people in Gaza. And so therefore these poor demonstrators deserve to have themselves set on fire based on his warped logic. Department of Homeland Security and Immigration and Customs Enforcement sources telling Fox News that Salaman is in the country illegally. He's a visa overstay. He came in under a tourist visa during the Biden Administration. He flew into the United States in August of 2022. He arrived at LAX on a B1, B2 non immigrant visa. Solomon was authorized to stay through February of 2023, but he never left. That is, he's here illegally now. He overstayed his visa. On September 29th of 2022, he filed a claim of some kind, possibly for asylum. Fox reports. On March 29th of 2023, U.S. citizenship and Immigration Services under the Biden administration gave him work authorization which was valid through March of this year, which means he no longer has that work authorization anyway. So wait a second. The guy was here under a tourist visa. He overstayed the visa, then he filed for asylum. Am I understanding this correctly? And it was granted asylum for. From Egypt. On what basis are we taking refugees from Egypt? Why in the world would an asylum claim from Egypt qualify, including after he was already here illegally in the United States of America and then he was granted work authorization? How demented could the Biden administration possibly get? And so now you get yet another illegal alien conducting a terror attack on American citizens, on American soil.

Dan Bongino (15:09)

And.

Vince (15:10)

And none of this had to happen. None of it. None of it would have happened had the Biden administration not let this guy in. So that's what's actually going on. Stephen Miller at the White House is describing this accurately as suicidal migration. Stephen Miller posting overnight, a terror attack was just committed in Boulder, Colorado by an illegal alien. He was granted a tourist visa by the Biden administration, and then he illegally overstayed that visa. In response, the Biden administration gave him a work permit. Suicidal migration must be fully reversed. Suicidal migration. Stephen Miller is right. There are a lot of victims of this type of disgraceful human trafficking into the United States of America. People like Lake and Riley and Jocelyn Nungaret. And now the victims of this attack, who would be of whole body today, who would be healthy today, were it not for the decisions that the Biden administration did to not only import illegal aliens, but then to not only allow them to stay here, but to also grant them asylum and work authorization here in the United States of America. Suicidal migration, Biden illegals. That is the correct terminology. Stephen Miller's been using it. And yet another terror attack. Now this terror attack happens. You can't decontextualize this as the media does. We won't. We won't remember it was a week and a half ago that we just saw a socialist lead a terror attack on two Israeli diplomats right here in the nation's capital, walking up to a Jewish museum event and blowing away two beautiful young people in the prime of their lives, now dead. Were they responsible for anything? Did they attack or kill anyone? No, they were subjected to a terror attack here in the nation's capital. The same another attack happened on Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro as another deranged lefty anti Semite attacked Josh Shapiro's governor mansion in Pennsylvania merely because the governor's Jewish. These anti Semitic attacks keep taking place. They keep taking place and the media either make excuses for it or downplay it entirely. I've got. So, for instance, here's one for you this morning. First thing this morning, the New York Times ran a summary piece on everything we know from the Boulder attack. Here's what we know they said as of this morning in the who is the suspect section. Omri Sarin writing here. He works with Senator Ted Cruz. He writes they had nothing on the guy's nationality, he's Egyptian. Nothing on the guy's immigration status, he's here illegally. Nothing about how he got into the country. He got here on a visa, a tourist visa, that he overstayed it when he got into the country, got in under the Biden administration, et cetera, to the extent that his origin is even gestured towards at all. He's described as of Colorado Springs. You've seen this before, haven't you? Oh, he's a Colorado Springs man. He's just an innocent Colorado Springs father. The media describing him as a Colorado Springs guy this morning. He is not. He's an illegal alien from Egypt. This is like the Kilmar Abrego Garcia saga where Kilmar was described as a Maryland father instead of an Ms. 13 gangster from El Salvador illegally in the United States. This is the media's cover up once again on display. One more for you, NBC News. This morning they had a headline. They've now changed it, but as of last night it goes up and they write, multiple Gaza hostage awareness marchers injured in attack in Boulder. What are Gaza hostage awareness marchers? Is it too hard to use the more economical term? Jews? Multiple Jews injured in attack in Boulder. They didn't say that. Why didn't they say that? Why the COVID up always? That's our media today. All right, coming up, I gotta take you inside the FBI. What's going on? We've got some important reporting about the FBI you need to know about. Eg Antoni the Economist is gonna join us as well. Stay with me. I've got a lot of really, really important stuff coming up and I'm so grateful for you. You're the best damn audience in media. Really are. Hey. While we may have won this election, the fight to restore our great nation is only just beginning. Now is the time to take a stand. Patriot Mobile is leading the charge. As America's only Christian conservative wireless provider, Patriot Mobile offers a way to vote with your wallet without compromising on quality or convenience. Patriot Mobile is not just about providing exceptional cell phone service. It's a call to action to defend our rights and our freedoms. With Patriot Mobile, you're gonna get outstanding nationwide coverage because they operate on all three major networks now. If you have cell phone service today, you can get cell phone service with Patriot Mobile with a coverage guarantee. I did. You can do it. But the difference is every dollar you spend supports a company that believes in the first and the second amendments, the sanctity of life, and our veterans and first responders. Switching is very easy. You can keep your number, you can keep your phone, or you can even upgrade. Their 100% US based customer support team is going to help you find the perfect plan right now. Go to patriot mobile.com vince or call 972-patriot and you're going to get a free month of service with the promo code. Vince, switch to Patriot Mobile today and defend freedom with every call and text that you make. Visit patriotmobile.com vince or call 972-patriot- LOVE patriot mobile. Thank you for your support, Patriot Mobile. All right, the chat, all fired up about this. Angry about the media's predictable again. It's not shocking, but it is appalling to see the way that the press covers all of this. They're disgraceful. Disgraceful. Also disgraceful. The Boulder police chief to come out and say, well, we're withholding judgment about whether or not this is an act of terror. What does he need to scream for you to know that this is an act of terror? It is crazy. Yes, that's right. El Souder saying this is Democrat party propaganda news that's going on. And Carol Ann Royal writing on the chat, all fired up. All fired up about this. I don't blame you for that. It is crazy. Anita McGroin. The great Anita McGroin. The media has zero credibility left to lose. They don't care at this point. Yes, that's right, they don't. They're brazen. They're absolutely brazen about it. Not shocking, but it is appalling. Okay, speaking of the media and their distortions, I gotta take you into something that our buddy Dan Bongino's dealing with right now because this is. This is an amazing. An amazing story that I absolutely love. Now check this out. That the New York Times has a report up this morning. Unease at FBI intensifies as Patel ousts top officials. The Times writes senior. So understand something here as I'm about to go through this story with you. The reason this story is so important is because the New York Times is portraying this in their dishonest way as Cash Patel and Dan Bongino are weaponizing the FBI. Danger lies ahead. Something awful is going on. But for those of us who care about the truth, the way to read this story is to understand all of the action that's taking place right now at the FBI. That's the important takeaway from this. In other words, Dan and Cash are overseeing dramatic changes to an agency that desperately needs to be changed and fixed. And there's panic going on inside of the FBI among people who've never been held accountable before, who've abused their power or stood by as others did. And now there are very big, meaningful, radical changes going on. And the way this news is coming out is the New York Times has sources who have always been for beating up on the American people, who've been wantonly being tyrannical as members of the FBI and then work with their sources in the New York Times to dress up what they're doing, their tyranny as something that's righteous. Now they're panicking, and they're going to their favorite reporters at the New York Times in order to convey their panic. So this story is amazing for a bunch of reasons, but I love what it tells us. Unease at the FBI intensifies as Cash Patel ousts top officials. Now, fellas, I'm gonna move here, so you're gonna have to move the focus of the screen. Before being confirmed as the director of the FBI, Cash Patel made clear his intent to remake it in his own image, the Times says. Reflecting a larger desire by the White House to bend the agency to its will. Cash wrote in his book Government Gangsters, the FBI has become so thoroughly compromised, it's going to remain a threat to the people unless drastic measures are taken. Well, yes, that's true. He asserted that the top ranks of the bureau should be eliminated. The Times says that behind the scenes, his vision of an FBI under President Trump is quietly taking shape. Agents have been forced out. Agents have been forced out by Cash and Dan. Others have been demoted or put on leave with no explanation. And in an effort to hunt down the sources of news leaks, Mr. Patel is forcing employees to take polygraph tests going on. This has been going on the entire time Dan and Cash have been there. This is the New York Times in an all out panic over the fact that they're making these changes. Taken together, the moves are causing worrisome upheaval at the FBI. Good. I like worrisome upheaval at the FBI. I prefer it over worrisome upheaval in the United States at the hands of the FBI. The changes are eliciting fear and uncertainty as Mr. Patel and his deputy, Dan Bongino, quickly restock senior ranks with agents and turn the agency's attention to immigration. Their persistent claims that the bureau was politicized under previous directors, in addition to their swift actions against colleagues, have left employees to wonder whether they too will be ousted, either because they worked on an investigation vilified by Trump supporters, or had ties to the previous administration. Good, good. I want them in a panic. I want you to be freaking out. You deserve it. The actions have obliterated decades of experience in national security and criminal matters at the FBI, the Times laments and raised questions about whether the agents taking over such critical posts have the institutional knowledge to pursue cornerstones of its work. This is all euphemistic bullshit. What they're describing to you are that the power brokers in the FBI who are there as a part of the deep state from administration to administration, who feel like they've always been above the law, who've never been held accountable, who've never had anyone confront them for their tyranny, are worried that their stranglehold on power is disappearing. That's what that paragraph means. You can't read this and think, oh really? Institutional knowledge is disappearing. Criminality is going to run rampant because of this. That's not what's happening. You and I know that. You can smell it from 10,000 miles away. What's happening here? Dan Bongino writing the deputy director, Writing on social media last week, the Times points out. The director and I will have most of our incoming reform teams in place by next week. The hiring process can take a little bit of time, Dan said, but we're approaching that finish line. This will help us both in doubling down on our reform agenda, he wrote. The Times goes on to complain about the fact that Dan and Cash and the team are investigating the Dobbs leak from 2022, or that they're investigating the cocaine that was found at the White House and then summarily destroyed by a corrupt Secret Service. Or the pipe bombs that were found near the capitol building on January 6th. The Times is upset about this. I'm not. You're not? This is the kind of accountability we've been looking for. They go on to quote Dan once again. The director and I evaluated a number of cases of potential public corruption that understandably have garnered public interest. Dan said this is. Listen to the Times, oddly referring to the pipe bombs as a potential act of public corruption rather than domestic terrorism. There's nothing odd about that. There's nothing. What's odd is that the FBI gave up the hunt for the pipe bomber. Why did the media give up on the pipe bomber? Why did Kamala Harris, whose life was allegedly imperiled by the pipe bomber, never talk about the pipe bomber during her ill fated campaign for President of the United States? There's nothing odd about Dan's behavior. What's odd is the government's behavior. Right. To call it public corruption. Then they go on to say that these are right wing conspiracy theories and blah, blah, blah. This is all very stupid. And they say this. Former and current FBI officials are warning that attempts by Trump loyalists to mold the Bureau to their worldview could ultimately have a chilling effect on agents seeking to open cases that could upset Mr. Trump or his base. They added that they viewed many of the personnel moves as retribution. Well, good. You should view the personnel moves as retribution. That's what they are. Their accountability. Their accountability. You need to be moved out, you need to be fired, and some of you need to be charged. I hope that happens. If it's within the statute of limitations, of course. These guys are following the law. Mr. Patel and Mr. Bongino have sent a clear message on previous FBI investigations that focused on Mr. Trump or his allies. In essence, former officials said, nobody is above the law except Mr. Trump. Once again, bullshit on the part of the New York Times. President Trump is not above the law. In fact, he's been beneath it when the left is wielding its power in recent weeks. You ready for this? Here's the rundown of some of the great stuff. I love this article, by the way. I love it. It's not what the New York Times intended. In recent weeks, the FBI disbanded the Washington Field Office's elite Federal Public Corruption squad, which was best known for investigating Mr. Trump's efforts to overturn the 2020 election. In other words, for advancing garbage, political garbage. That's what this elite FBI unit did. So they've been disbanded. Something is happening, isn't it? Something is definitely happening. The move, former and current agents say, suggests that investigations involving Mr. Trump could be out of bounds. No politicized investigations, attacking people for their support of Republicans. That's out of bounds. Those extended to inquiries that might ensnare senior Trump officials. They claim when new leaders take office, they admit that they do want to make changes to the agencies, but they're concerned that there's a significant loss in expertise going on at the FBI. Is the claim including the abrupt retirement of an official running an office established in 2020 to uncover and reduce the risk of misuse of national security surveillance, arguably one of the bureau's most important intelligence gathering tools? I'm sorry, what did the Biden administration do with the FBI when it came to national security surveillance? Remind me, what did they do? Oh, that's right. They spied on parents going to school board meetings. They had FBI agents writing down their license plate numbers out in the parking lot. They treated traditional Catholics as if they are radicals, extremists, terrorists for merely attending a traditional Latin Mass. They treated American citizens who supported President Trump as deserving of SWAT teams at their doors. They destroyed the lives of anyone they possibly could. And they did it under the guise of national security. Spare us your lectures, New York Times, about what it means to uphold national security. You people weaponized it against American citizens. Lastly, then I'll move on from here. But I just as I celebrate this coverage because I love what it actually reveals, the New York Times says The Bureau's webpage, that is the FBI's webpage detailing the agency's leadership roles, is in disarray with employees who have left still listed as working there. Now, the way the Times is describing this, the reason they want you to hear this is because they want you to think it's incompetent what's going on at the FBI. It's so crazy they're making all these changes, they can't even update their website. I'm here to tell you what the real takeaway is. They are firing people so quickly they don't even have time to update the website to let people know. That's what I want. That's the pace I want. That's the aggression I want. So a fun, fun piece from the New York Times here, designed to mislead you on what's going on, but instead revealing some very, very interesting developments going on at the Federal Bureau of Investigation. We'll keep digging in on this subject, I assure you, because it matters a great, great deal. Coming up, I'm gonna talk about the economy with our in house economists, the great E.J. and Tony. We'll get to that in just a moment. In terms of the economics of this show, I've gotta thank our sponsors who make all this possible. Now, you're gonna think I'm describing weight loss injections here, but I am not. These remarkable weight loss testimonials came from a doctor formulated weight loss supplement that's called Lean by Brickhouse Nutrition. Now Patty S had this review quote, I've finally found a weight loss product that works. I wanted to lose 20 pounds and lean really curbs my appetite. Lori M wrote this quote, I've struggled to get weight off and Lean has been a lifesaver. 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Thank you to Brickhouse Nutrition and Lean. They're so great and the administration. I need to tell you the administration has their sleeves rolled up and streamlining monumental moves right now. But it is difficult for them to take your personal finances into account when trying to fix the country. You've got to do that and that's why tens of thousands of Americans are buying gold right now from Birch Gold. Here are the facts. In the past 12 months the value of gold has actually increased by 30%. Central banks are buying gold in record quantities and the Rio reset on the horizon where some BRICS nations will be looking to unseat the US dollar as the global reserve currency. But you can find peace of mind in gold. Birchgold makes it extremely easy to convert an existing IRA or a 401k into a tax sheltered IRA in physical gold. Or just buy some. You can store it at home. Just text My name Vince to 989-898 Birchgold will send you A free info kit on gold. There's no obligation, only useful information with an A rating. With the Better Business Bureau. Thousands of happy customers protect your savings today. Text the word Vince to 989-898. Data and message rates apply. Our thanks to Birch Gold. Love them. Speaking of the economy and what's going on for that, the only person to turn to is my next guest, the in house economist for Vince the Vince show and the chief economist at the Heritage Foundation, E.J. antoni joins us right now. E.J.

Dan Bongino (36:35)

Vince, good to see you.

Vince (36:36)

There you are.

Dan Bongino (36:36)

Beautiful studio, by the way. My first time in here. I love it.

Vince (36:38)

Thank you. Tell me more about how wonderful the show is.

Dan Bongino (36:42)

Enough about you. What about you? What do you think of me?

Vince (36:44)

Yes, I want to know about that. Thanks for being here.

Dan Bongino (36:47)

My pleasure. Thanks for having me.

Vince (36:49)

So I saw the Treasury Secretary, Scott Besant was on television over the weekend and he had to remind one of the stupid hosts he was talking to that she thought that Trump's tariff plans were going to explode inflation in the United States. These tariffs are going to wreck the economy. I love how the media suddenly discovered the role that government might play in inflation when Trump is in office. But that actually hasn't happened, has it? What has happened since President Trump announced all of these tariffs and what has it done to the economy?

Dan Bongino (37:19)

No, we've actually gotten very, very good inflation numbers in part because when we look at these tariffs, a lot of them haven't even been implemented. Just the threat of the tariffs alone was enough to bring countries to the table and to kind of get everyone to call a truce. If you do get into some kind of really prolonged, protracted, I should say, trade war, then, sure, you might end up seeing some of those price increases. But as of right now, that's not what's happening at all. And it's so ironic, Vince. The exact same people who for years told us Biden's policies aren't going to cause any inflation. Right. And then obviously it did. Now tell us Trump's policies are going to cause all kinds of inflation. These people are just prepared. Perpetually wrong, but never in doubt.

Vince (38:00)

They're perpetually wrong, but never in doubt. Yeah, you're right about that. And I'm gonna steal that forever. Okay, so when it comes to what's happening with the economy, we've actually, we've had some stabilization in prices, right?

Dan Bongino (38:13)

Yeah, absolutely. In fact, depending on which metric you want to use, some of it show this happened for the month of March, others for the month of April. So it Just depends on which individual metric. We actually have a lot of different ways to measure inflation, but several of them now have showed prices actually declining. In other words, inflation went negative. So we talk about inflation a lot and say, okay, inflation came down. What does that mean?

Vince (38:35)

Right.

Dan Bongino (38:35)

It just means that prices are going up slower than they were before. So it's like if you're driving along in your car, your speedometer is showing you the inflation rate, how fast you're going down the road. The mile markers on the side of the road are showing you how far along you are. So if you slow the speed of your vehicle down, you're still going forward.

Vince (38:54)

Yes.

Dan Bongino (38:54)

Right. That means the mile markers continue going up. So, yes, inflation has come down, but prices are still rising. So what we saw again in either April or March, depending on which metric you want to use, is that some prices were actually going down. That's phenomenal news.

Vince (39:10)

That is phenomenal news. So let me add to your analogy for a moment, and I may screw it up entirely. But wages are also going up, right?

Dan Bongino (39:18)

Yes.

Vince (39:19)

So if wages are going up, the road is actually moving forward ahead of you as you're going, because. So how has the change in wages impacted people? Do they have more money to spend now?

Dan Bongino (39:30)

Well, so not only do they have more money to spend, but the money's going further. So the big problem under Biden was the fact that, yes, the average paycheck just went through the roof.

Vince (39:39)

Yes.

Dan Bongino (39:40)

But it didn't go up as fast as prices.

Vince (39:41)

Prices outpaced everybody's earnings.

Dan Bongino (39:43)

Exactly, exactly. So that's why people were so frustrated with the fact that, yes, they were working additional jobs, they had more income, they got raises, whatever the case may be, but they could still afford less than they could four years prior. That was the big problem under Biden. Under Trump, it's been exactly the opposite.

Vince (39:59)

Has it been already?

Dan Bongino (40:00)

Yes. If we look at how fast incomes have risen compared to prices, incomes have risen about 1% faster. Now, obviously, that's not a huge number, but we're only a few months in, and the fact that we're already seeing this much of a difference, I think that's tremendous.

Vince (40:14)

I'll take it. I'll take it. So Puke12 writes in the chat, Puke, go ahead. Puke says, I'm calling bullshit on this. Good. Tell us what's bullshit about it, Puke. And as soon as you do, I'm gonna let EJ know and then we'll talk about it. Because you're just looking at the cold, hard numbers Here. Right, so tell me how it is that President Trump can do this. So, like, you know, oftentimes when we talk economics, if it's a bad thing, politicians will disclaim it. They're like, I have nothing to do with that. It's outside my control. If something good happens, they take credit for it. Tell me why the shift from Biden to Trump is having an impact on the numbers you just described.

Dan Bongino (40:50)

Sure, sure. There's. So there'll be some that are very broad, like energy, and then there's some that are, that are really hyper specific, like eggs. Taking that, that, the latter one first. What we saw under Biden was this insane policy where they were literally paying the farmers of egg laying hens more to kill chickens to cull flocks than they could get by raising those chickens and bringing the eggs to market. And yes, that was in response to the avian flu, but it was a very stupid way to handle it because you caused hens that were perfectly fine to get slaughtered en masse. So if you kill all of the eggs, all of the egg laying hens, what's going to happen to your egg supply? It's going to plummet. That's exactly what happened. We had shortages. We had prices go through the roof. By simply reversing that policy and putting better ones in its place. You saw the supply of eggs explode again. And so prices for eggs have come way, way down, down like 60% now in just a couple of months. So that's tremendous news. But then you have very, very broad policies as well, like with energy. So in terms of energy, you're talking about a sector that's very, very forward looking. They're not so much concerned about the economic constraints today. They're looking into the future. The reason for that is because almost everything they do takes a very long time. It takes not just months, but years, decades to build a new refinery. It takes many months to conduct the maintenance on a pipeline that's gonna keep it operational.

Vince (42:13)

Right.

Dan Bongino (42:14)

And so under Biden, what we saw was facilities getting mothballed that are now being brought online. Because under Biden, it was a very anti energy regulatory establishment, and under Trump, it's exactly the opposite.

Vince (42:25)

Yeah.

Dan Bongino (42:26)

And so as this new supply is anticipated to come online, it doesn't even need to hit us yet. Just the anticipation of new supply is driving futures prices down, which is how we trade energy on the futures market, and that's actually bringing down prices at the pump.

Vince (42:40)

So, yeah, okay, all right. So a new administration provides economic certainty and that has big Impacts for the rest of us. Got it. All right, so Puke 12 is back. He wanted to. So I did ask, and rightfully so. He said that he thought this was bullshit. And here's what he says. He wants to know about prices of homeowners and auto insurance. So apparently Puke has detected that homeowners and auto insurance is up still. You did mention a moment ago, of course, that prices still continue to rise. The key element that we're talking about is that incomes are now starting to rise above prices, which really matters a great deal. But you are seeing that in the insurance markets.

Dan Bongino (43:13)

Oh, sure. And that's something that we knew was going to happen in 2022, for example, and this was something we actually talked about back then, I think on your WMAL show, how whenever you have these huge spikes in prices, in other words, prices rise very quickly in a very short period of time, it takes a while for the insurance market to catch up because all of a sudden cars become very expensive to replace, to repair, and the insurance market sees that. And then they decide in the coming months and years we need to start hiking premiums to cover these higher costs.

Vince (43:45)

Is this the same thing? Is this the same phenomenon with gasoline? It's the rocket feather kind of situation where insurance prices will go up quickly because they anticipate future future spend, but they come down more slowly because they don't want to ease up on consumers too quickly.

Dan Bongino (43:59)

Not quite. It's that the insurance market actually takes a while to observe the real world market conditions and to see, all right, how much do we need to charge in premiums to cover our costs? This is why the insurance market just, I mean, they got their clocks clean for a couple of years there because the premiums they were charging folks were way too low given the cost to repair a car or repair a home.

Vince (44:22)

Yes.

Dan Bongino (44:22)

And so now basically all their actuarial tables were completely out of date.

Vince (44:26)

Oh, I see.

Dan Bongino (44:26)

In literally just 12 or 18 months. So now as they recalculate all those things. And this is why the insurance spike under Biden didn't really start happening until his last year or so, but it's unfortunately continuing today. And those prices are probably gonna stay elevated for a while.

Vince (44:41)

Yes, yes, indeed. Okay, let's talk about new investment in the United States of America. Where is it, as far as you can tell, how much more money and what kind of difference is it gonna make to the economy? Cuz the President has been proud of this and rightfully so.

Dan Bongino (44:57)

Sure.

Vince (44:57)

How do you see it?

Dan Bongino (44:59)

I think it's great news. We have about. Actually, it's over $4 trillion now of basically guaranteed investment. There's a lot more that has been pledged, they call it.

Vince (45:09)

There are verbal plans, there's verbal commitments where the president will come out and say something like $10 trillion. But in terms of just actual money flowing in that we know is coming. And you're saying it's at least 4.

Dan Bongino (45:20)

Trillion right now, right? Right now. That's going to be over several years. It's not immediate, it's not all at once, but still over four or five years. That's a phenomenal increase in investment. And it's going to allow us to do things like build that steel mill in Louisiana that the South Koreans are paying for. It's going to create revenue, obviously for them, but it's also going to create revenue for the American investors and it creates American jobs. It allows us to build up our industrial base. That's phenomenal news.

Vince (45:44)

Yes. And so what are the second and third order effects of building up a plant like that in terms of, like the local community and how many times that those dollars exchange hands and how many times those dollars are taxed? I mean, what is, what's the downstream effect of bringing new manufacturing in?

Dan Bongino (45:58)

Well, you get essentially this kind of economic snowball where you create jobs in the area. Those people now are going to spend their income in that area disproportionately. And so that will create other jobs because other businesses are going to see more revenue, more demand. And this just snowballs now. Those businesses are hiring more folks, which means more people in the area, which means more development, more spending, more income, et cetera. So exactly the opposite of what we see when the economy's turning down in a recession, let's say, where job losses lead to more job losses and it snowballs downwards. This is an upward spiral instead of a downward spiral. So looking at the US Steel deal, for example, that they're hammering out right now with Nippon Steel, that's going to add about a billion dollars just to the greater Pittsburgh area, which could use.

Vince (46:47)

It absolutely, big time. If you've been to Pittsburgh lately, they could use an infusion of investment. Okay. You and I talked a lot during the Biden catastrophe about credit cards. Last year, if my memory serves correctly, credit card debt exceeded $1 trillion for the first time in the United States.

Dan Bongino (47:07)

Right.

Vince (47:08)

And people, as you told me, were using credit cards in order to make ends meet because their paycheck did not go the distance.

Dan Bongino (47:14)

Right.

Vince (47:15)

This was panic spending in terms of how people were Using these credit cards. They were just trying to survive with credit. What's the credit picture look like right now? Has that improved at all?

Dan Bongino (47:26)

It has essentially stabilized. So it is no longer getting worse, which it was up until January, maybe February.

Vince (47:33)

Wow.

Dan Bongino (47:33)

So it is basically stabilized right now. You're still seeing people. If you look in aggregate across the country, it's about $300 billion annually that people are paying in finance charges just on, on credit cards. And that's just the finance charges. That's like your, your interest in your late fees.

Vince (47:50)

Yes.

Dan Bongino (47:51)

That has nothing to do with anybody trying to pay down the balances on their credit card. So it's a very, very terrible situation.

Vince (47:56)

Yeah.

Dan Bongino (47:57)

The silver lining here is, is twofold. One, it's not getting worse, like we just said. And the other thing was what you mentioned earlier, Incomes are now rising faster than prices. And we're seeing that when we look at disposable income, specifically that statistic is rising even after adjusting for inflation. And so as people get more money in their pocket, they can start to pay down that debt. Okay. It's gonna be very painful. It's not as if we can flip a switch. And it's all perfect now. And I'm not gonna try to paint that overly rosy picture for you, but things at least have stopped getting worse and now are starting to get better.

Vince (48:30)

Okay, tell me about jobs. Every time you and I talk too, during the Biden administration, we kept getting these awful reports. What was happening were American citizens weren't getting jobs. Native born Americans were not getting jobs. They were losing jobs. Under Biden, all of the job gains, to the extent that they were real, were going to immigrants to the United States. And the job market was disproportionately being artificially inflated by government jobs, which are not really good jobs because they take what, 80 private sector workers to fund every one government job.

Dan Bongino (49:03)

Right.

Vince (49:03)

So what are the trends now on those subjects on native born Americans, immigrants and government jobs?

Dan Bongino (49:10)

So we are still seeing growth in foreign born employment, but the native born component of that has really picked up. And it's actually the same thing when we look at like part time and full time jobs. Yeah, right. Especially in the last half of the Biden administration, full time jobs are going down. All the job growth was part time and as you pointed out, it was pretty much all going to foreigners.

Vince (49:28)

Yes.

Dan Bongino (49:28)

So now what we're seeing, it's not just native born Americans are getting jobs in addition to foreigners, but full time employment is coming back while part time employment keeps growing so in other words, we are seeing only additions and not subtractions, which I think is a good thing overall.

Vince (49:44)

Yes. And full time means that you get the benefits typically of a full time job.

Dan Bongino (49:48)

Right. And then with the government, that's one where that's actually reversing. Now we've seen government jobs. So if you look at federal employment, and I like to take the Postal Service out of that, so you're just looking at kind of the bureaucratic bloat in D.C. right. The Postal Service is thrown in with federal jobs, but it's really its own agency. I'm trying to look at just federal employees, ex Postal Service. That's gone down every month this year.

Vince (50:11)

I mean, doge is, when has that ever happened before?

Dan Bongino (50:14)

You have to go back years. I mean, if you exclude Covid. Right, because Covid, everyone lost jobs for several months there. But if you exclude Covid, you have to go back years to find a time when the private sector was adding jobs this steadily while the federal government was laying folks off.

Vince (50:30)

And that's where we are now. So the private sector is adding jobs, there's more full time employment, more income, it's outpacing inflation. The federal government is laying people off. I'm sorry, tell me which part of this I'm supposed to hate.

Dan Bongino (50:41)

Exactly. And then you talk to the Fed and they're all worried about everything. I mean, it's just, it's incredible. This really is all good news. Now, is it great news? No. I'm not gonna come in here and say everything's fine.

Vince (50:53)

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Dan Bongino (50:53)

And we should rejoice. We got into a very deep hole after four years of the Biden catastrophe, as you called it. It was horrible. And it took Biden four years to make that mess.

Vince (51:04)

Yes.

Dan Bongino (51:04)

It's gonna take us a couple of years to get out of it.

Vince (51:06)

So let me lastly, the big beautiful bill. I just wanna ask you not about the whole thing. There's a million different components to it, but the tax cut component of it, making the tax cuts permanent, which is what they're trying to do, which President Trump wants to do, and giving some new tax cuts on things like on tips, overtime and Social Security. What will the effect of that be on the economy? And will we also see government revenues go up as a result of these tax cuts? What do you think?

Dan Bongino (51:33)

I think overall, yes. So one of the problems with things like taxes on tips is it costs the treasury so much to enforce it that it basically equals the revenue they get out of it. So if the treasury wants to get another dollar in terms of tip receipts, tax receipts, they have to spend a dollar to do it. I mean, it's a waste. You should get rid of the tax just for that. But also things like no tax on tips, no tax on overtime. That encourages people to work more, to work harder. That has a big supply side effect. It's like cutting marginal tax rates.

Vince (52:03)

Yes.

Dan Bongino (52:04)

So that would definitely end up increasing economic activity and leading to a net increase in revenue. And you mentioned making things permanent. The one thing that they did not make permanent, and I really hope the Senate fixes this, is the expensing provision that's probably the biggest program.

Vince (52:20)

Explain it, explain it.

Dan Bongino (52:21)

So this, this allows a business, let's say they, they buy a big beautiful studio like this. Right. You want that business, since they spent the money right now to buy the studio, you want them to be able to deduct that today. Instead, what this does, this bill does is it just basically gives a couple of years extension on that. And then a company like this is going to have to essentially deduct, not just this year, but then possibly for the next 39 years, the full cost of the studio.

Vince (52:48)

Right. Because you can't take the full deduction in just one year's time. Right. Now you have to, you have to spread it out.

Dan Bongino (52:53)

Right. And sure enough, when Biden let this expire, this provision, we immediately saw an effect in investment. It completely chilled investment. Not only did the trend dip down, but we had several quarters where it actually went negative. We were losing investment.

Vince (53:07)

Right.

Dan Bongino (53:07)

Not gaining it. I mean, it was, it has, it has a terrible, terrible.

Vince (53:11)

Well, this is one of the reasons. So, so for instance, there's a, I think a fundamental misunderstanding about how this works because there's been reports through the years such and such a company didn't pay any taxes this year. Well, the reasoning for that is because they spent so much in capital investment that they were able to deduct off of their taxes. But what you're saying is that basically what Biden allowed to expire, it really constricted capital investment and slowed down the economy.

Dan Bongino (53:37)

Exactly. And what's really terrible about that is that investment is the only driver of long run economic growth.

Vince (53:43)

Yes.

Dan Bongino (53:44)

Under Biden, the short term driver of economic growth was just government spending.

Vince (53:47)

Yeah.

Dan Bongino (53:47)

Right.

Vince (53:48)

But by the way, that money is being taxed.

Dan Bongino (53:50)

Right.

Vince (53:50)

So, for instance, to build this studio, you know, whoever sold us the television, whoever installed the panels, whoever put in the ceiling, whoever puts in the lights, all that money is going out the door. They have to pay Taxes on the income. So that money is being taxed. The government just wants to tax it more.

Dan Bongino (54:08)

Exactly, exactly. This is another case of double taxation.

Vince (54:11)

Yeah.

Dan Bongino (54:11)

Right. And so what I. Look, as you said, it's a huge bill. There's some good stuff in it, there's some bad stuff in it. I think there's some ugly stuff in it, too. And I'm really hoping that the Senate just makes it better, make it a bigger, more beautiful bill than it already is. And I think they can do that.

Vince (54:27)

Yeah. All right. Well, ej, thank you for joining us, as always. I'm gonna actually, what I'm gonna do, maybe just stick around for a second. Cause I may actually consult with you on this next video I'm gonna play. I've got video here and audio for you on the audio podcast of Crazy Crockett. Jasmine Crockett sitting down for an interview. I know, I know you love this stuff. And she says that voters are just too ignorant to know how great Democrats are. I think this is wild. Let's take a look here. Here's Jasmine Crockett, cut three, talking about the ignorance of American voters.

Jasmine Crockett (55:01)

The winning playbook, I think, overall, is just communication, education. I think that you can talk about kitchen table issues all you want to, but it comes down to actually having a rapport and making sure that people actually understand what it is that you're talking about. I don't think that we fail to talk about kitchen table issues. But basically, Trump was simple and lied, right? Like he said, hey, the price of eggs are high. I'm gonna reduce it on day one. It was a very simple message. It was a lie.

Dan Bongino (55:29)

We're going down.

Jasmine Crockett (55:30)

I mean, after they went up through the roof, I mean, yeah, like, let's be clear. And honestly, they may be down for the second. But again, having people be educated about what it is that the FDA does and talking about things such as the bird flu and talking about if you have less birds because they are sick, then that's less eggs, but the demand is still the same, Then the price goes up. Like, we have to make sure we do education. One of the other issues that I think that we had is that people didn't understand that the global pandemic was the cause of our inflation. They were like, oh, everything's high. And they just said, well, that's the person that's in office instead of actually having this global conversation.

Vince (56:11)

Okay, so that's an economics lesson from Jasmine Crockett. All right, so let me understand what she said there. She said that President Trump failed to bring egg prices down. And then the interviewer corrected her. Well, they're actually coming down dramatically. She said that egg prices went up because birds were killed off. That's true. Didn't she just say a moment ago it was Trump's fault that the egg prices were high? And then she said Covid caused inflation. E.J. antonio, I'm pretty sure that was government printing too much money that did that.

Dan Bongino (56:43)

Oh, I think all our collective IQ just went down having to listen to that drivel. My goodness. Yeah, yeah, it was. It was very simple. When the government prints trillions of dollars out of thin air, they become less scarce. And scarcity is fundamentally what gives things its. Its value. Yeah, right. This is, this is part of what, something called the. The diamond water paradox, which now that they can make synthetic diamonds, it's not as true anymore. But, you know, why is it that even though water is so much more useful, its price is so much less than diamonds, which have almost no utility?

Vince (57:17)

Yes, right.

Dan Bongino (57:18)

Especially compared to water.

Vince (57:19)

Yes. And there's a finite supply of water, for what it's worth.

Dan Bongino (57:22)

It's because water is so much more abundant. Diamonds are so scarce, so if you make something less scarce, its value goes down. That's exactly what happened. That's exactly what we did to the dollar. I mean, the Fed literally doubled the assets on its balance sheet, which is the basis of the money supply, essentially. What do you think's going to happen to the value of your currency when you devalue it?

Vince (57:44)

Right. And then, of course, the media play this game for years where they're like, well, there's just no explaining it. One last one for you, because she goes on to say that inflation during COVID was a global phenomenon. It was a global phenomenon. My view of that has always been. Wait a second. The US Dollar is the global reserve currency. So if we print too many, that affects the whole planet, doesn't it?

Dan Bongino (58:03)

Exactly, exactly. Because you still have. It's not as true as it was in the gold exchange standard, but it's still true today when other currencies are based off of the value of the dollar or when they use dollars as the basis for their money supply. Sure. You increase that supply, you're going to increase the supply and therefore decrease the value of other currencies.

Vince (58:24)

Now you know why I spend all my time talking to E.J. antoni, great economist. Thank you, brother. Good to see you here.

Dan Bongino (58:28)

You too.

Vince (58:28)

Thanks for joining us on Vince. I'll be back with you tomorrow.