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- [00:01]
A
What if a few minutes with God could change the direction of your entire Day? With pray.com you can begin each morning with powerful daily prayers, inspiring Bible stories and messages created to strengthen your faith. Whether you need peace, encouragement or a fresh start, pray.com helps you make prayer part of your everyday Life. Download the Pray.com app today.
- [00:30]
B
Well, hello everybody and welcome to Wired in. I'm Cabin Phillips coming to you live from Daily Wire hq. I hope you all had a wonderful weekend. I for one was up in D.C. with my wife and kids and I'd like to take this chance to apologize for a take I had on the show last month. I had a harrowing nine hour drive with a two and a half and a six month old and I confidently declared that long car rides with two small children are the single biggest tests of a parent's resolve. And I was wrong because flying is somehow worse, especially flying today. But that's a story for the end of the show. For now, we have a lot to catch up on. Democrats are salivating at the idea of turning Texas blue this November. We're going to talk with the Republican candidate looking to defeat James Talarico and hold the red wall. Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Is taking on ultra processed foods as part of his MAHA agenda with we're gonna hear from a top ranking HHS official about what exactly they're targeting. A new investigation claims that Alexandria Ocasio Cortez is intentionally refusing to marry her longtime fiance for political reasons. We're gonna hear from a reporter who broke that story and says that it looks like it's all about hiding money. And of course, stick around until the end of the show for our live listener Q and A. If you're a Daily Wire member, get those questions in the chat right now. If you're on Apple or Spotify and want to join in, go sign up@dailywire.com subscribe and if you want to help the show, please go subscribe on Apple and Spotify. And leave us a review while you're at it. I missed you guys over the weekend. I'm excited to be back to it. Let's do this thing. Roll that graphic. All right, let's get down to Texas where far left Senate nominee James Talarico is looking to become the first Democratic senator from the Lone Star State since 1993. We are very excited to be joined now by the man running against him, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton. Attorney General Paxton, it's great to have you on. Thanks for joining.
- [02:32]
C
Hey, thanks for having me. This is We've got a pretty interesting race in Texas.
- [02:36]
B
Yeah, I'm excited to talk about it. Now, for folks who are just now tuning into the midterms, summer's starting to end. They're going back to school, and they're taking account of some of the big races. They might be surprised to hear that Texas is such a close race. But tell us just what is at stake right now in your state.
- [02:53]
C
Look, this is huge. We've got the most far left, radical socialist Democrat running in Texas, probably history, who's trying to hide all his positions from his last 10 years in the House and just interviews, talking about his radical positions. And so we have this opportunity. We can elect a conservative Republican like Texas has done for. For decades, or we can elect a very similar guy to Mandani or other socialist Democrats that are out there running right now. It's a. It's a.
- [03:24]
D
It's.
- [03:24]
C
It's actually stunning that this guy won the Democratic primary and that because the media doesn't really cover his actual positions. He's. He's covered up in being suddenly a moderate Democrat, which is as far from the truth as it could be.
- [03:39]
B
So what are some of those positions that concern you the most and you think should be concerning to Texas voters?
- [03:44]
C
There's so many. I mean, right now, he's running as a guy that wants to cut our taxes, but every single opportunity in the Texas legislature, he voted for a state income tax, which we don't have in Texas, but he wanted one for us. And he voted for the death tax, which we don't have in Texas, but he wanted one for us. He voted to allow cities to raise property taxes, which we have a very high property tax, so we didn't need to raise it more. He was very. He called the tax cuts that were passed by the president on wages, overtime wages, on tips, on Social Security, and even on the child tax credit. He called them deeply immoral to have passed those. So he's definitely not in favor of tax cuts. He wants more taxes on business. He wants more taxes on individuals. Any possible tax. This guy's for second. He talks about securing the border, but guess what? He never voted for a single bill that I can tell that that actually improved the border situation. He voted against law enforcement in every possible case along the border, whether it was creating our own border patrol or helping the federal Border Patrol, whether it was inter, you know, state cooperation, whether it was creating more detention centers, more courts, whether it was creating any kind of infrastructure to stop illegal immigration. He was against it. And Then of course, he's been a big pusher. Voted to have boys and girls sports several times. And he also voted to. He also pushed the transitioning of children, both in schools. Just the ideology and also the idea that we wouldn't stop it in Texas.
- [05:19]
B
As you mentioned, James Talarico has been very supportive of transgender identifying kids. At one point in a podcast, he was asked what he loves and that was seemingly the first thing that popped into his mind was trans kids. You are on the very opposite side of that issue. And I think our viewers would be interested in hearing more about your efforts to settle with a hospital that was pushing trans medical procedures for kids and then open up a detransition center. Can you tell us more about that?
- [05:48]
C
Yeah, it's pretty exciting. We spent a lot of time suing doctors that were doing these transition of children. We stopped hospitals. We actually forced one hospital to leave the state. And Texas Children's Hospital, which has been around a long time in Texas, a big good hospital, unfortunately, they were doing that as well. We sued them and we got an agreement recently and it's been fully executed as of this week. And it provides that every doctor that was doing the transitioning was fired. They have to have policies in place that do not allow that to happen again. And then they paid the state of Texas and the federal government, mostly the state of Texas, $10 million plus they're opening up a detransitioning unit, which is the first of its kind that I know of in the country. And they are going to provide services to detransition children that were transitioned, like I think for five years at no cost. So it's, it's, it's a historic settlement. It's something very unique and it's very unique to Texas. But I really do hope that other states will follow suit and get these type of arrangements accomplished.
- [06:54]
B
We know that the Democrats nationally are, again, they're just salivating over the idea of being able to say we turned Texas blue. And I'm sure there is all sorts of support coming in from outside groups, dark money groups, whatever it is. What are you seeing in your race when it comes to Democrats from outside of Texas pouring money into the state to try and support Tyrico?
- [07:15]
C
Yeah, look, he had a three month head start on me because he didn't have a runoff. So he was able to raise money in the spring where I was spending money. I came out of the runoff with $0 and started in June. So in Texas, summers are tough to raise money in. But we're doing it and we're going to compete. But yes, his money, I think he had about $30 million coming out of. When I came out with Nothing, he had $30 million, most of it from California and other states. I know he had $10 million contribution from a guy from California, and he had most of his contributions from states like New York, California, Illinois, but not from Texas.
- [07:54]
B
You mentioned the runoff. You ultimately prevailed over the incumbent, John Cornyn, but it was a bruising primary, there's no doubt about that. Are you confident that you have coalesced the GOP voters around you? And are you confident that folks who were in the Cornyn camp are now all coming over to your campaign?
- [08:11]
C
Yeah, we've been working on that. It's a process. Some people, with Texas summers being so hot, a lot of people are on vacation. It's hard to get to everybody. But we're in the process of trying to bring every single one of them over because there's a stark choice between me and James Talariki. I don't think we agree on a single issue, and we aren't even close. He's so radically left and he's so woke and he is a socialist Democrat. So this is. And we're also talking about whether we keep the US Senate in Republican hands if we lose Texas. I don't see that happening. So this is a really important race for not just Texas, but for the entire nation.
- [08:48]
B
Yeah, I understand polling can be all over the place, and folks have good reason not to trust the polls. But if you do look at the available polling data right now with independent voters, Talarico does seem to have a pretty significant lead over your campaign. We have, again, good reason to doubt the polls. But I'm interested in what your message is to an independent voter in Texas who they don't consider themselves far left, but they're feeling let down by Republicans in D.C. what do you say to folks who just simply want to see something new?
- [09:18]
C
Yeah, I think we've all felt like Washington in general hasn't performed the way we want. It's why Iran. I offer a new type of leadership. It's not based on Washington politics. It's based on what's best for the state of Texas. I think if you look at my record as Texas attorney general, I represented all Texans. These settlements, whether these lawsuits against the federal government, whether against Big Tech, Big Pharma, our whole push towards suing companies that are misleading people about health benefits and the whole MAHA movement have. We have many lawsuits that have protected children that have protected adults, that have protected everyone. And so my, my message is, look, we're here, one, to look out for all Texans. Two, we've offered up an economic program that applies to everyone and that would be first time home buyer tax deduction of $50,000. And actually we'd have a second time which would be the same time. So you get two bites at the apple. We would also give a 25%, $25,000 tax deduction for out of pocket medical expenses because the cost of medical has gone up. And also your insurance premiums, all of that would be covered. We also offer, I'm offering up a $5,000 tax deduction for healthy living. So if you want to spend money in a gym membership or some type of nutrition program, sports for your kids or even doctor prescribed GLP1s things that allow for healthier living, we're going to promote. And then finally we're going to, I'm pushing the tax, the Trump tax tax accounts for kids that we, we continue those and we expanded beyond the years that they're already going to be there. And then also double the child tax credit. So instead of $2,200, it'd be 4,400. So that's for everybody. That's for independents, that's for Democrats, that's for Republicans. And so look, we offer, we're offering something for every Texan.
- [11:08]
B
One final question. If you get the chance to take the debate stage with James Talarico, which topics are you most excited to press him on and what questions would you ask him?
- [11:18]
C
Well, I mean, I am kind of curious. I mean I just, because I can't seem to figure this out. Like what, what are the six sexes? I've, I've muddled that around in my mind and I would really love to hear him answer that question. Like what are they, James? What are the six sexes? And what did you mean? And why did you push this whole transitioning movement in Texas? And why did you push the boys and girls sports? Most parents would not, especially most parents would not be pleased with that. So I would have a lot of questions. I would say this. We do need help@kenpaxson.com and you can donate there. And we need as much help as we can get from around the country to win this race.
- [11:55]
B
If I may propose one other question, if you could ask him what he meant when he claimed from the pulpit that God was non binary, I would also appreciate some clarification there.
- [12:05]
C
You know what, I have that same question. It's just there's so many questions for the guy that would be nice to hear what he was thinking when he said it. There's probably 50 different questions like that. It's just a matter of, like, prioritizing. Which one do we actually want to hear the answer to? And my guess is he'll either deny that he still believes that stuff because he's in a general election, he needs to mislead voters, or he'll change his answers based on just, you know, being in the moment.
- [12:33]
B
Well, Attorney General Paxton, we're going to be covering this race very carefully, very closely. And we appreciate your time. We know you're a busy man. So thank you so much for joining us.
- [12:42]
C
Hey, thank you. Have a great day. I appreciate having me on.
- [12:44]
B
Absolutely. That was Republican nominee for Senate in the great state of Texas, Attorney General Ken Paxton. All right, we checked in on D.C. we've heard from Texas. How about we jump up to the great state of Montana where our good friend Washington reporter editor in chief Matt Foldy is standing by. Matt, you've already sent me a selfie video today standing in front of a giant grizzly bear, which I assume was not real. I hope was not real. How are we doing?
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E
Where are we going?
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D
Actually, I killed it myself.
- [13:11]
B
You killed it yourself? Okay.
- [13:13]
E
So we are right now on the side of the road in Drummond, Montana, because that is where I can connect with you for the show. And we're gonna talk about the craziness of Montana politics. Trust me, it's crazy here. But you were just talking with Ken Paxton and it gets to a bigger point about the Democrats. Why do these people have primaries? James Talafrico may actually be more unelectable than Jasmine Crockett, given what we were just seeing Ken Paxton lay out. And in two and a half hours, here is one of the major deadlines for candidates to drop out of this race. You're seeing Democrats across the country push for the Democratic nominees who Democrats voted for Graham Platner in Maine to drop out of Senate races. So I think that's what we're about to talk about. Great to be with you as we continue the Matthew Folby Travel show with you.
- [14:01]
B
Exactly. And you're in Montana, as you alluded to, because you've got a wild exclusive this morning regarding the Senate race there and an apparent harassment campaign to try and drive a Democratic candidate off the ticket. What is going on? Walk us through this exclusive.
- [14:17]
E
You've got Democrats in Montana voted for this woman, Alani Bankhead, to be their nominee. Now, right now it is a three way Senate race between her, a fake independent named Seth Bodnar, who was recruited by the former Democratic senator here, Jon Tester, and the Republican, Kurt Almy. But Democrats, they look at Montana and they say we can't win if Democratic votes are being split between Alani Bankhead and Seth Bodnar. And even though it might be a good year for Democrats, Montana is still Montana. So what do we as Democrats wanna do? They wanna force the Democrat out of the race so that they can have someone who claims to be an independent go in this as a head to head with the Republican. Now the Democrat is not playing ball. And I reported earlier today or last night, I can't even remember that supporters of Seth Bodnar. This was disavowed by Seth in a video he posted earlier today attacking my outlet. But supporters of Seth launched a coordinated attempt to basically bully Alani Bankhead, the Democrat, out of the race. They created a list with her family and close friends and their social media platforms to say, hey, if you guys could please write to people important to Alani and in essence harass them, begging her for the future of democracy, for her to drop out of the race, that she was again nominated by Democrats to win. This follows what we saw in South Dakota where the Democrat running for Senate there also dropped out after his house burned down. Now, there are a lot of questions that we don't know about how that fire started, but I think you're really seeing Democrats across the country in these red states, both A, play hardball and B, try to get their own candidates to stop running because they know that people don't want to vote for Democrats.
- [16:11]
B
And one of the crazier parts of your reporting was A, one of the messages that was sent organizing this apparent harassment campaign. In the message, they said, hey, we have some suggested language for you, but try to spice it up a bit so it doesn't sound like it's being written by ChatGPT or being written by AI. So they say, hey, let's make this feel very grassroots. What do we know about.
- [16:32]
E
That's exactly right.
- [16:33]
B
Yeah, what do we know about the dark money groups that are behind this effort?
- [16:37]
E
So again, across the country, and Montana is no exception, Democrats have been relying on these very sketchy groups to again push the Democratic nominees for office off the ballot. The people in this mostly Facebook group whose documents I got, they are claiming I'm reporting on their claims. They're saying that we are in close connection with top national Democrats, the dnc, the dscc. I don't know how accurate their claims are, but we have seen publicly the top Democrats Senatorial committee, they have said we are not going to support our Senate nominee here in Montana because we know that she doesn't have a way to win. So there is a lot of smoke here. And look, I am in Montana, the eastern part of the state. There are crazy fires right now. So there is no, no shortage of smoke in Montana. Shortly after I landed, my eyes were watering because of how much smoke is in the air here. Even in Drummond, Montana, where there's smoke, though, with this story, I think there's a lot of fire. And again, you look at what's happening in Idaho, the Democratic nominee for Senate was just forced off the ballot there. Graham Platner, we've covered on this show, he was forced out of the Senate race there in exchange for a guy who was, you know, stuffing his cousin at least twice. Troy Jackson here in Montana. I don't honestly think that the Democrats are going to have success in forcing Alani Bankhead off the ballot. She had a press conference right after I landed here earlier today reiterating that she is not going to drop out. Seth Bodnar, the fake independent, he said he is not dropping out. This is the best news for Republicans that they could possibly get.
- [18:08]
B
Yeah, it is certainly good news for Republicans. And I think a lot of people are saying, hey, stay on that ballot. Don't give in to this harassment looking big picture. I know your outlet. You guys cover all the big races. Let's get to South Carolina. There's a big primary tomorrow night. President Trump holding a telerally this evening for Darlene Graham. What do you expect to happen in this race tomorrow to pick the Republican nominee ultimately to be Lindsey Graham's successor?
- [18:38]
E
I think it'll be very surprising if there is not a runoff. Right now it seems like everyone is assuming that Darlene Graham will make it to the runoff. The question is who is going to be the opponent? I think there are three at least plausible opponents. Two of them are in Congress. One is Ralph Norman, who just ran unsuccessfully for governor. Another is Russell Fry, who has been backed by Trump in the past. And then the other one, just based on the strength of his name id, is a little bit of a crazy guy, Mark lynch, who just was blown out of the water by Darlene's brother Lindsey Graham in their primary. But in a timeline as short as this, what's really important is infrastructure and she has inherited Lindsey Graham's unbelievable statewide infrastructure and your ability to get that name ID out quickly. She also has raised a lot of money. So I think she combined with Trump's endorsement. He also posted a video today from the White House reiterating his support for Darlene. This is not. You've seen Trump do half baked endorsements of people in the past. He is all in for Lindsey Graham's sister, I think is a testament in part to the very close relationship that he cultivated with Lindsey Graham over the 10 years that they worked in politics together. Remember, it started off very rockily. Donald Trump gave out Lindsey Graham's phone number. I don't think Graham appreciated that that much. But over the years they got very close. Tomorrow I think it'll be Darlene and then probably one of the two congressmen running and then it'll advance to another runoff. I think I would expect to see Trump's forces get very involved for Darlene in the runoff as well. Although I don't want to rule out the possibility of another famous Trump dual endorsement because of what he just did in South Carolina with the governor's race. He had originally endorsed the lieutenant governor and then when it looked like the attorney general was gaining on her, he did a dual endorsement. And now the attorney general of South Carolina, Alan Wilson, is basically the prohibitive favorite to be the next governor of South Carolina next year.
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B
Yep, it's going to be a fascinating race always. Also very interesting to see President Trump putting his foot on the scale. We will see what sort of impact that has for Darlene Graham in a big one. Yeah. Matt Foldy, always great to have you, man. Thank you for wait.
- [20:49]
E
One important animal fact. I want to tell you my friend Charlie is chauffeuring me around here. I know that we think about Montana, we think about cougars and moose, but an animal that you actually have to look out for, river otters, if you are rambunctious, they will bite your ear off here. So that is my plan is to avoid that next time I'm on. If I'm missing any ear, I'll have Van Gogh though. You know what happened.
- [21:11]
B
I just wish I could be with the person who's watching this show for the first time and is thinking why is this guy randomly bringing up an animal fact? And they don't realize that you do this every time you were on. So I just can't wait to get you back on for the next animal fact. Tim Rice.
- [21:25]
E
I'm always happy to have first time listeners to your show.
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B
Tim Rice never brings animal facts and everyone loves Tim Rice. But I think this is your way of trying to I tried to show
- [21:33]
E
as much chest hair as he normally does, but that is physically impossible.
- [21:37]
B
All right, Matt Foldy, editor in chief of the Washington Report. Great to have you, man.
- [21:41]
E
See you guys.
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B
All right, let's get back to Washington because today, as part of the Make America healthy again initiative, HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. Announced sweeping new reforms cracking down on ultra processed foods which have been linked to a host of negative health outcomes for years now. And who better to explain it all for us than HHS Assistant Secretary for Health Admiral Brian Christine. Admiral, great to have you back. I had a great time chatting with you last time, so we appreciate you making time again.
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A
No, it is great to be back. Thanks for having me on today. And you're right, it was a great day here at the Department of Health and Human Services. Exactly what you're saying. Another big win for Maha and Maga.
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B
Let's get the details then before we get to the actual announcement itself, I just want our audience to understand what exactly is an ultra processed food? How are we defining this now?
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A
Well, you know, what we talk about in our dietary guidelines is we want us to get our nutrition from whole real food, nutrient dense food. When you think of ultra processed foods, really, the name says it. It's foods that are that are really almost, we like to call them fake foods. You know, those sugary cereals that you buy or those kind of things. That's not the kind of foods that we recommend that people really depend upon to get most of their nutrients, their vitamins, their minerals, their protein, their fat, their carbohydrates. So ultra processed foods really are the way to go. And when Secretary Kennedy says that the epidemic of chronic disease in this country, obesity, diabetes, hypertension, the things that are really killing us from the inside are really fueled by ultra processed foods. He's right about that. And so having a definition of ultra processed foods, incredibly important. And of course, also today, now the food manufacturers and food companies are going to have to tell the FDA when they include an ingredient that is considered to be generally regarded as safe. Announcement that came out today. So again today at hhs, big wins going on for the American people.
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B
For the folks at home who are wondering, why is this such a big issue? Can you just flesh out for us a bit some of the negative impacts on public health that are brought on by ultra processed foods? What does the science say on that topic?
- [23:53]
A
Sure. Well, exactly, you think about it. Look at the epidemic of obesity that we have. Hypertension, cardiovascular disease, again, as opposed to eating nutrient dense, real Food like lean beef, like poultry, like fish, as opposed to eating healthy fats like you might get in a piece of salmon, for instance, as opposed to eating healthy carbohydrates that you might get from fresh fruits and vegetables and legumes. What ultra processed foods are again, is almost that fake food. They've been, they've been produced, manufactured, they're not real food, they're not nutrient dense food. And so you get those calories, you get those foods that you eat a bunch of them and it leads to obesity, obesity leads to hypertension, leads to diabetes, leads to, you know, sugar intolerance, it leads to inflammatory disease. Again, ultra processed foods, we want to stay away from those. We want to stick with the nutrient dense real food, eat real food is what we say.
- [24:51]
B
As you mentioned earlier, this reform will require food manufacturers to notify the federal government when they determine that a food or ingredient is generally recognized as safe. But how can we be confident that these corporations will actually do that? And what sort of consequences will they face if they don't?
- [25:10]
A
Well, I think that's the important point here, is that for decades what's happened is it's been that these corporations didn't have to let the FDA know that they were considering something generally regarded as safe. Now with this proposed rule change, and that's what we have going on here, it's a proposed change of a rule. With this proposed rule change, they will have to let the FDA know that they've included something that they consider generally regarded as safe. And that's going to give excellent oversight by the FDA to look at these things that are in the food to say, hey, what is this they're talking about? Are they really regarded as safe? Again, this is a proposed rule change. So what will happen is that there will be public commentary that will run through December 9th, and then the FDA will look at all those comments, look at all that information and decide how they're going to proceed. So a proposed rule change, but a really important proposed rule change. Increasing oversight, increasing the ability of the FDA to look at what's going into food, human food and animal food and say, yeah, you know what? This is okay, or maybe it's not so really important day.
- [26:15]
B
Admiral, we have all sorts of warning labels and advertising restrictions for harmful products like cigarettes and alcohol. Why don't we have the same thing for ultra processed foods if we know that they are leading to diseases that are killing people? Is that something that you think we should consider?
- [26:32]
A
Well, we are doing everything we can do here at the Department of health and human services, to evangelize and to help people to understand the dangers of ultra processed food and more importantly, the benefits of real food. That's why we really are working hard to roll out our dietary guidelines. That's why we're working hard to do things like we're doing today, Cabot, where we're talking to each other, letting the American people know what's going on at HHS and what these important advancements and changes are.
- [27:00]
E
Yeah.
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B
Let's get to another big topic that was addressed at the White House today. Vaccines. President Trump said that he's gonna be signing, or I believe he already did sign, an executive order to revamp childhood vaccine recommendations. What changes in particular are being looked at?
- [27:16]
A
I think what's really important with this is that this is another demonstration that the Trump administration and certainly us here at HHS are gonna rely on upon gold standard science to guide what we do for our people, how we guide ourselves, how we guide vaccine recommendations, how we guide our dietary guidelines. We're looking at science. Everything that we do is based upon gold standard science. And again, that's what we're seeing today. We're gonna have input from all of the different divisions at the Department of Health and Human Services related to the vaccine schedule. We're gonna collate the science, look at the science, do what's right for the American people, break up those vaccinations that tend to be group try to when we can, break them up into individual vaccinations. Again, it's all going to be guided by science. We never want to sacrifice the health of the American people just on a whim. It's all guided by science.
- [28:09]
B
So walk us through the science, because we know that in Europe and a lot of other developed countries, they're not giving 1 year olds, 3 and 4, 40 different vaccines that are all grouped into one. They are spacing them out. And that's something that President Trump is calling for in this executive order. So what does the science say on the benefits of spacing out those childhood vaccines?
- [28:30]
A
Well, I think you're right. There are other countries that have vaccination schedules that are different from ours. And you're right about that. One of the things that's really important is letting parents make the decision as to what is right for their kids and how these vaccinations should be done. It's really important that we have parents make the decision what is right for their children in terms of when they're going to get vaccinated. And incredibly important, again, science and parental control and parental decisions.
- [28:56]
B
One more thing before we go. I wanna get to some of these new pieces of private communication that we're getting this week from Dr. Fauci and the phone he was using during the pandemic. We were talking earlier with our White House reporter about him seeming to allude to colleagues that, hey there, look like there could be some adverse side effects caused by this vaccine, especially for pregnant women and women who are menstruating. What do you make of that, those disclosures?
- [29:23]
A
Well, I haven't looked at many of those yet. I know that's just that was being talked about today. I haven't gone through a lot of those texts. But again, it raises the question, you know, what's being told to the American people? And I think that's always something we have to be careful of. We want to be sure, we want to know that's what's being told to the American people, whether it be at a congressional hearing or what people are saying in interviews like this. And so I know we're going to be looking at those texts. Again, I haven't dived into them yet, but I'll be very interested to see because I'm just starting to hear about those today as well, just like you.
- [29:55]
B
Okay, so we've been talking about good whole foods to eat before we go. Let's hear it. What is the best piece of meat to throw on the grill? What is your ideal whole food meal that you're going to put together?
- [30:09]
A
Yeah, well, I tell you what, it's really hard and I'll tell you, I in terms of red meat, I really like bison. I like bison. I do like to cook bison, a bison steak or get ground bison to make bison burgers. It's got great healthy fat in it. It's got great protein to it. You know what, if I'm not going to cook a piece of meat, I'll probably cook a piece of salmon or a piece of tuna. Again, great protein, great fat in those, you know, chicken too. I definitely like chicken breast. I probably prefer chicken thighs because it's got some great fat in there as well. But again, any of these are going to be those real foods that we talk about, those nutrient dense sources of protein and fat that are real food as opposed to the ultra processed fake food that we were talking about at the start of this discussion.
- [30:53]
B
I was hoping you were going to say just a big bone in ribeye, because that's my personal favorite. I know the macros aren't great on a bone in rib eye. A lot of fat in there, but that's still my favorite. Maybe I'll grill up some bison burgers this weekend in your honor. Or at least like 60% bison burgers. I still want a little fat from the beef mixed in there, but try it out.
- [31:16]
A
Listen, try out the bison. You will like it again. Get that good, healthy fish. Get those chicken thighs out there. You know, there's so many wonderful foods that we can have. There are so many great foods grown by American farmers, American farmers producing American food for Americans to stay healthy. Try it out.
- [31:34]
B
Thank you, Admiral Christine. You're welcome at my barbecue anytime. Really appreciate your time.
- [31:39]
A
All right. Thanks, brother. Have a blessed day.
- [31:41]
B
Absolutely. That was HHS Assistant Secretary for Health Admiral Brian Christine. Well, guys, if you're watching Wired in live on the Daily Wire plus app, thank you. If not, that's where you should be. That is how you get push alerts when we go live, breaking news as it happens, and of course, the latest smart investigative reporting team. The Daily Wire plus app is free and available now on the App Store. Google Play, Apple tv, Roku, Samsung lg. Well, it appears Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio Cortez is manipulating congressional rules to shield her fiance's financial records from voters. That's according to Republicans on the House Ethics Committee. Joining us with details is Andrew Kerr, investigative reporter at the Washington Free Beacon. Andrew, great to have you on, sir.
- [32:25]
E
Hey, thanks for having me.
- [32:26]
B
So typically, the love lives of elected officials, not of much interest to me. But this is a fascinating story that appears to have major political implications. So just to start for our audience, can you give some context on AOC's relationship with this gentleman, Riley Roberts?
- [32:44]
D
Yeah, she's been with this guy since 2011. They've lived together since 2016, which is before she entered Congress. She's on the record talking about how she talks to them every morning. They live together. Photo records show that they share the same house. When they got engaged in 2022. It was nationwide news. Every news outlet covered. It was a big deal. AOC got engaged, and that was four years ago, and it's been crickets ever since. She stopped wearing her wedding ring in late 2023, but she's still been spotted in public several times with her with her fiance. So I, too, typically don't care about the marital status of members of Congress. What I care about with this story, though, is that there are certain disclosure requirements of spouses of members of Congress. You know, if you're the spouse of a member of Congress, you get certain privileges which AOC has shared with her fiance. He has a congressional spouse pin, so he gets access to special parts of the Capitol. She has brought him along on special trips funded by outside groups, which you can only do if you're a spouse of a member of Congress. And she claimed that he was her spouse when she went to the Met Gala with her infamous tax the rich dress. So she's claiming that this guy, Riley Roberts, is her spouse. For all the good stuff. The downside of being a congressional spouse is that there are financial disclosure requirements. So spouses of member of Congress are a vector for potential unethical behavior. So by disclosing their finances to the public, which every congressional spouse has to do, they have to disclose their assets, their. Their debts, their stock trades, their places of employment. You know, all of that is a shield to protect against potential conflicts of interests. And also members of Congress being influenced or their spouses being used to influence the Member of Congress, you know, under. Under the table. Since AOC is not legally married to Riley Roberts, even though they were effectively spouses, his financial affairs are completely shielded from the public. So he is the only effective congressional spouse that. We don't know where he works. We don't know what he makes, we don't know if he trades stocks. We don't know if he's in any sort of debts. We know nothing. It's extraordinarily hypocritical considering the AOC as she makes a big deal every couple of months. She regularly introduces bills that would ban members of Congress and their spouses from trading stocks. All of those. None of those bills would affect her fiance, who she lives with, because they simply haven't legally tied the knot. Why are we talking about this right now? Well, over the weekend, big news. She discloses she has decided to freeze her eggs. She's 36 years old now, so she's getting up in age, and a lot of people are asking, like, well, this is weird. Like, aren't you engaged? Like, why? You know, you have a future husband kind of in line, like, why not get married and have kids? And I think that the answer is that there's a disclosure. There's something that she doesn't want to disclose to the public about her fiance's affairs, financial affairs. And yeah, the House Ethics Committee even rebuked her last year in the report when AOC was penalized for accepting impermissible gifts in connection to her Met Gala appearance. And they even noted that, hey, it's super weird that AOC is claiming Riley Roberts as Her spouse for all the good stuff. But when it comes to financial disclosure, he's not her spouse. And so she's gotten away with this game. For several years. I've been trying to call attention to it. I'm so glad that now people are starting to pay attention to it, because I think it's a pretty wild loophole. That aoc, who has presented herself as this champion of transparency and good governance. She is unique in Congress of being engaged to someone this long. This guy is effectively her spouse, and yet he is not held to any of the disclosure requirements of any other member of Congress. It's a wild arrangement.
- [36:50]
B
When I was in high school, there was a guy who was. I knew, who was dating a young lady. Her family was very wealthy. And so he was happy to say, oh, yeah, I love you so much, honey, you're my girlfriend, because stay at a lake house. And he'd get to go to lake house every weekend whenever he wanted. And he was happy to get those benefits of the relationship. But then with the guys, he was saying, no, no, she's not my girlfriend. That's not what it is. That's kind of what this sounds like. Of, well, we're married when it's convenient. We're married when I can fly you on the government's dime around the world. We're married when I can get you free tickets to the Met Gala. But we're not married when it comes to disclosing your finances and letting the general public actually have an idea of whether you are profiting off of inside information coming from the congresswoman. How has she responded? Has she said anything to you after your reporting or anything to the House Ethics Committee?
- [37:37]
D
Nothing. I've reached out to her office so many times, simply asking, has Riley Roberts, her fiance, ever bought or sold a stock since she has entered Congress in 2019, and she has not answered the question. I think it's bizarre that she stopped wearing her engagement ring several years ago. It was last spotted in late 2023. So we don't know if she's still with this guy. Honestly, I don't care if she's still with this guy. What I care about is that if a very prominent member of Congress is living with what she claims to be her spouse, in certain contexts, the public is entitled to information about his financial affairs that we simply are. All the news about former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and her stock trades. That was all her husband's stock trades, and that was a massive story. We are entitled to information about Nancy Pelosi's husband's stock trades, just like we're entitled to the stock trades of AOC spouse and his financial affairs. At the very least we should know where he worked, where he works at. I mean, this is something that all congressional spouses disclose. And so no, she is not, she's not clarified this. He's not addressed it at all. I don't think any other media outlet is talking about this. Even though the House Ethics Committee is on the record saying, hey, AOC is taking advantage of this, of this loophole. At the very least, I think that she owes the public an explanation of whether or not she's still with this guy, considering that it was front page news in every major news outlet when she got engaged to him in 2022. So yeah, I think that she has just not responded to this at all.
- [39:15]
B
Yeah, I guess I shouldn't be surprised by that. And I also should not be surprised by the legacy press and their indifference towards this story. This is the same media that will breathlessly report on every single development of Taylor Swift's dating life and married life and every other celebrity. But when you have an actual elected official with power who could be circumventing the system to profit, it's crickets. They don't care. And we are glad that you care. We're glad that you have been digging into this. This is such an important story and we appreciate the work you guys are doing at Washington Free Beacon. I would encourage everyone to go read Andrew's reporting and keep up with your coverage of this story. Andrew, thank you so much for coming on and explaining all this for us.
- [39:53]
D
Thanks for having me.
- [39:54]
B
Absolutely. That was Washington Free Beacon investigative reporter Andrew Kerr. Well, on Friday, in a rare bipartisan effort, the U.S. senate voted 86 to 11 to advance significant new economic sanctions on Russia as their years long war on Ukraine continues. Here with more on the latest package and what is going on in this conflict more broadly is Kerry Filippetti, former Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Kerry, thanks for coming on.
- [40:21]
F
Oh, it's great to see you.
- [40:22]
B
So, big picture, just walk us through this legislation. It's heading to the House now, but what exactly is in this package?
- [40:31]
F
Yeah, so this is new legislation that has been on the agenda for quite some time. Senator Lindsey Graham was really insistent that this go through. The purpose is to make sure that Russia can no longer support its war machine through its oil and gas sales. So essentially what it does is it establishes sanctions on leading figures in Putin's regime. It establishes sanctions also on leading Russian banks their oil and gas sector. And importantly, it also allows for up to a 100% tariff on any country that tries to break these sanctions. It's basically a secondary sanctions policy that would largely impact China and India, who are the main purchasers of Russian oil. And this is really consistent with what we've seen in polling in terms of average Americans and Trump voters in particular, about 75% of them over the last few months have really said Russia needs to be held accountable for its refusal to engage in a good faith negotiation to bring this war to its final conclusion. So the purpose of this, you can consider it, is essentially to make sure that Russia is denied the resources that it could use to, to continue to fund its military campaign against Ukraine.
- [41:41]
B
So we know that there's already a pretty extensive sanctions operation against Russia for the last few years. What sort of impact have those sanctions had? And could this kind of push things over the edge?
- [41:52]
F
Yeah, I mean, the thing to remember about sanctions is there's the sanctions architecture itself. So when the sanctions are announced, and then there's the specific designation of certain entities. So what you would call the enforcement of those sanctions and what we've seen is when you have enforcement, so not just naming the entities, but really designating them and saying that they will be held accountable, then you start to see a change in behavior. So, for example, previous Russian sanctions were in place for many, many years, but when specific tankers were designated, we saw that about 60 to 70% of them stopped carrying that Russian oil. So that's a really good rate. So as long as we see that these are actually enforced, I think it could make a difference when you look at the amount of money that we're talking about. So Russia in 2024 made about $120 billion from its oil and gas sales. Their defense budget that same year was $140 billion. So you can see why it would make a significant impact if you can truly cut it off. The problem is China is a huge purchaser of Russian oil. It also is a huge purchaser of Iranian oil. So the real incentive here is to try to prevent China from continuing to do its sanctions busting that has allowed this war to continue.
- [43:10]
B
So if China were to be hit with higher tariffs, again, this legislation would give President Trump even more tariff power against countries, I believe the top five countries purchasing oil from Russia. So if President Trump came out and said, hey, China, you're still buying Russian oil, we're gonna hit you with 25, 30, 50% tariffs across the board. In addition to those already in place. How do you see them responding? Are they just gonna do the same thing back to us and it ignites what we saw back after Liberation Day?
- [43:36]
F
Well, I mean, this is part of the problem, right? Tariffs are one component of this. And of course, as you said, it's up to the discretion of the President. In my view, it really is the sanctioning authority that is so significant here, as well as the threat of those tariffs. So one of the things when I was in the administration was it was really beneficial, especially in a hyper polarized environment, when you had Congress come together and say that they're insisting on a certain policy that actually gives the President a huge, huge amount of negotiating power and leverage even before anything ultimately passes. And so we won't see Congress meet again, we won't see the House come to consider this bill until at least September. And so I'm hoping that the President will use that opportunity to try to force the Russians to negotiate more in good faith before these sanctions even have to take effect and before the tariff needs to be considered. You're absolutely right that the Chinese have a significant amount of leverage on us as well. So it's possible that the President will not necessarily use that authority to its full extent as it relates to China. But the hope is that the sanctions will have a chilling effect on their desire to support the Russians. And I will just add, we have seen how China has backed off when America has shown force and power. Right. In Venezuela, there was actually a Chinese delegation on the ground that had just met with Maduro literally hours before. Absolute resolve, which was when we apprehended Nicolas Maduro. The Chinese did nothing to support Venezuela after that. During midnight hammer and epic Fury, China also backed off from its endorsement of Iran. So when the US Shows force and strength, we have seen that our adversaries, especially China, have sort of taken a step back. So I think that's part of the hope as well, that psychological impact on the Chinese.
- [45:19]
B
So the other big country that could be affected here is India. As you mentioned, they are a top purchaser of Russian oil as well. In the past, there's been some concern from folks that sanctions like this on India, higher tariffs on India could further drive them towards China and cause that relationship to cozy up a bit. Do you think that's a legitimate concern?
- [45:39]
F
I'm always really skeptical of the arguments that these countries are going to be pushed towards China. I mean, we've seen people making the same argument. The United States pushed Petro in Colombia or Lula in Brazil towards China. Not completely ignoring the fact that these were countries that had always wanted to partner with China, that were ideologically committed to China. I think ultimately what this depends on is whether the. What the Indians decide to do. And so they will see that these tariffs are there. They will see that there is a choice between partnering with the United States and partnering with China. And they have shown an interest in partnering with the United States. They are a major economic player. So I think the idea is, rather than forcing them into the hands of China, it would really kind of bring them around to understanding the importance of continuing to partner with the United States and not really playing footsie with our leading adversary.
- [46:29]
B
You mentioned China and the response that they often give to American force. What sort of impact, though, have the wars in Ukraine and also in Iran had on the Chinese and Russian relationship? What have we seen there over the last few years?
- [46:42]
F
Yeah, and I mean, part of the main reason why I think it's so important for Americans to care about what's going on in Russia is because of their partnership with the ccp, the Chinese Communist Party of China, as well as their relationship with. With Iran and other adversaries that are directly targeting the United States. We have seen how China has supported Russia in busting sanctions up until now. Again, it's hoping that this legislation changes that. We have seen that Iran has provided, for example, drones to the Russians to use against Ukrainians. We've also seen that the Russians have provided intel as well as strategies for targeting Americans. So the Tower 22 attack in 2024, that was an Iranian drone that used a Russian strategy developed during the war with Ukraine in order to kill American service members. So these three countries are in this very broad. I don't necessarily want to call it an alliance because it's not formalized in that sense, but we have had their leadership on the record saying that they're trying to create this new triangle that connects Russia, China and Iran to replace the hegemony of the United States. So China is a core reason why it's important for us to focus on Russia, because if we can take a major player, essentially a major American adversary and a major partner to China, off the map of our competitors by decimating their military by supporting the Ukrainians, then we will be able to focus all of our energy and effort on the pacing threat, as they call it, which is the Chinese Communist. So I view those two challenges as very much connected.
- [48:20]
B
Kerry, this is always complicated stuff when you're talking foreign policy, so thank you for making this all much more digestible. Easier to follow. We really appreciate it and we would love to get you back on in the future. This was great.
- [48:32]
F
Thank you so much. Kabat. Great to be with you.
- [48:34]
B
Absolutely. That was former Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Kerry Filippetti. And this was Wired In. Thank you guys so much for tuning in. If you are on Apple or Spotify, I will see you guys tomorrow. Don't forget to go leave us a review and subscribe to the Wired in channel on both of those platforms. And if you're on either platform and you want the show to continue, you want to get in on that party that we have every day in our live listener Q and A, you got to go to DailyWire.com subscribe and join in right now. I will see you guys tomorrow.
- [49:10]
A
Sam.