"They Should Check Themselves": Rubio’s Stern Warning to Iran

From the Fox News Radio Studios in Midtown Manhattan, it's the fastest growing radio talk show. Brian Kilmead. I'm one of Brian Kilmead here. Thanks so much for listening. We have a great show coming your way.

This hour I'm going to be joined by Rich Lowry and Brett Baer. Don't ask me how I know. And also, just to remind you, and to get Brett Baer jealous, we have a YouTube page, youtube.com/slash at the Brian Kilmeat Show. It's all America is talking about for the most part. And we're keeping up to date on what's happening.

The president's making it clear things are moving forward and the market's reacting. The market is up significantly. We're getting closer and closer to 50,000, 49,792 on word that we're getting closer to a 14-point agreement and 30 days to finalize the deal. Before we get to Brett Baer and his brand new book that's number one on Amazon, it's called The Case for America. An argument on behalf of the nation.

Let's get to the big three. Number three. Congresswoman Porter, you recently put out an email, a fundraising email, with the subject line, F. Trump. Will F Trump be your guiding principle in dealing with the president?

I will absolutely stand up to him. 100%. Yeah, that'll soften our image. California governor race. Seven candidates left and only two will survive.

We review the final California debate as the left coach searches for a leader, but could they turn right? Number two. About 25 million people benefited from no tax on tips. The consumer is really, really firing on all cylinders, just like the corporate sector you're seeing in the earnings reports. And Kevin Hasley is actually in their pockets.

Kevin Hassett is actually right. The economic breakdown from Trump RX to the Big Beautiful Bill to drill baby drill. America is either all in on capitalism or all out. In exchange for socialism, they're going to have a clear choice come November. Number one, the message to Iran, these guys are facing, they are facing real catastrophic destruction to their economy, imposed on themselves by the actions that they're taking.

They should check themselves before they wreck themselves in the direction that they're going.

Well, that's a nice way to put it. Marco Rubio playing the role of press secretary. Project Freedom on pause is Iran and U.S. zero in on the final agreement. And I'm not sure I can really back this.

Not that the president's calling me for my backing, but there's 14 points in it, Brett. And one of which is 30 days to get it done. They'll have zero enrichment for between 12 and 15 years. Then they'll go up to 3.67 enrichment. I don't know what that point is.

They'd get lifting, they'd get some sanctions. Lifted, maybe all. They get billions of frozen funds unfrozen. And I'm not sure that would really fall. That would be pallets of cash being delivered because they don't want the real.

I'm sure they want our currency. There's still a lot to be worked out. Are you surprised we're in a pause? No, I think that the President has been searching for this exit ramp and giving the Iranians the most possibility to make it happen while having leverage because the blockade, in his mind, is working and pinching them. You know, I thought they were going to continue to escort ships through.

That's what I was talking about. Yeah, yeah. And so. I'm a little surprised by that. And why not continue to escort ships while you're in negotiations, unless the Iranians said.

We don't want that. But the blockade's still in place.

So that's the big thing. And listen, he's been trying to get this. They've been trying to get a negotiated deal. It's just he wants to have a dismount where he can declare victory. It just has to be clear enough that everybody goes, oh, okay, I got it.

This is why we did it. People talk about munitions and people talk about hardware. What are we going to be doing? That's why we've got to stop it. I think it's more the straight.

It's all about the economy. We continue to pound and push and prod. But when that strait's closed, I think he's getting pressure from allies and 1,200 ships just sitting there waiting to come through.

So that's what I thought Sunday was brilliant. You got the blockade, and then you got the umbrella. And I thought the umbrella was supposed to Provoke. It was definitely going to provoke some hostilities. They handled it.

Uh UAE got hit. And then the next day, We put it on pause.

So we don't know the backstory yet. Axio seems to have gotten it. Yeah, I do think that the Ally pressure is a big thing, and the UAE taking more than 2,500 missiles and projectiles is real. And I wouldn't be surprised if the UAE said, hey, listen, we need to not get hit anymore because they've had a real challenge to their air defenses, but they've pushed back effectively. I mean, UAE, if you think about it, has been the real country that stood up through this whole thing.

The ambassador that you had on, so impressive. I mean, I thought I was talking to somebody from NATO. Yeah. No, I mean, really impressive. And a firm spine.

And think about what they've done. They've pulled out of OPEC. They're doing their own thing saying that we're going to stand up to this regime. Right. And I do think fundamentalism are in place.

I'm pretty amazed at the economy. If we had opened up that straight and had the same operation and people were able to go through. Um I think the President goes for the total complete victory. But The fact that the market's approaching 50,000, the fact that the jobs numbers look good, that Kevin Wars is moving into the Fed. That we're seeing the earnings report go so strong.

I'm thinking to myself, What's going on here? Think about if this hadn't happened, if if Iran hadn't happened, and we can go through why it happened and the threat and what's important. But had it not happened, we probably would be seeing this major boom. And it's already hanging tough. It's very resilient.

The manufacturing is up significantly. Obviously, you see what the market's doing. But minus the gas prices, the economy looks pretty strong. Absolutely. It's very interesting because they were saying the affordability thing that got the President and he's supposed to give great numbers on the economy.

But I think that this took bold action to address a problem that's been festering. And the next thing is the President is Cuba. And you're in the Volume Florida. You've got a big house in Florida.

So that would mean so much to the people in Florida, especially, right?

Well, yeah. And the people of Cuba. I mean, I've been there six times over the years. Used to cover southeast and south and Central America. And remember the Ellian Gonzalez case, went down there.

Sure. Covered all that. Was he like 50 years old? He must be. He has to be.

He's the last one still liking Castro. I mean, he could be the next leader. Who knows? I think it's a big, big deal. I'll be interested to see how it plays out.

The Cubans are saying stuff that is pushing back, but the economy and the situation is so desperate there that I bet they're ready for a deal. All right, so you know what's exciting? I'm older than you, but I remember being in probably sixth grade, fifth or sixth grade during 1976. And everything was 76. Everything was the cover of your light switch was 1776.

Everybody was smoking back then. Everyone had an ashtray that said 1776 on it.

So we'll come to year 250. And I remember thinking a couple of years ago, are we even going to celebrate this? Because in America, there was so much anti-Americanism. We were pulling down statues that thought we were going to become a country of pedestals because nobody was worthy of a statue anymore.

So, Brett Baer, that probably prompted, and I can't wait to get the answer on this, The Case for America, your brand new book, An Argument on the Behalf of Our Nation. It's amazing you had to do this, but you had to do this. I started thinking that ahead of the 250th, what was needed? And I thought just laying stuff out like you're making a case in front of a jury. And having written about six different presidents, you know, George Washington, Ulysses S.

Grant, Teddy Roosevelt, FDR, Dwight Eisenhower, and Ronald Reagan, each one of those had unique moments where they made the case for America in their presidency, in different speeches. And I thought, if I tapped into that and then got really interesting people, historians, business people, politicians, others, to talk about their case for America, maybe this could lay out something that people could look at and say, hey, this is a 30,000-foot view of where we are. And for all, it's not a sanitized view of America. We have major problems. But we have to look back and say, look, we've been in dark, dark places in our country before.

And despite how partisan we may be, there are amazing things that we have inherently in this country because of the founders at the beginning. Also, we've always been partisan. I mean, we used to shoot each other. I mean, Andrew Jackson wasn't president, but he got shot in a duel, right? And then Aaron Burr famously killed Alexander Hamilton.

I mean, this was brutal. We had Sam Houston beating other congressmen with his cane. We had a lot of people. How about the relationship between Thomas Jefferson and John Adams? They run against each other in 1800.

Vice president takes on a sitting president. And we think campaigns are tough now. It was brutal. In the press, they called each other everything to the point where it was tied. Congress decided it after 36 votes.

Thomas Jefferson wins after Hamilton weighs in. And they don't talk to each other for 11 years. John Adams and Thomas Jefferson. Jefferson. They start a letter-writing campaign in 1811 and they become the best of friends.

By the way, they both die on July 4th. And at The end of their life they Credit each other for the formation of this country and come back together after brutal, brutal rhetoric against each other.

So there are many stories where we've been through a lot of crap and we come out to the other side because of resilience and optimism. And remember. I don't think any Adams ever showed up after they lost because John Adams, after he loses, does not go to the inauguration of Thomas Jefferson. And then John Quincy Adams, when he loses to Andrew Jackson, just leaves the White House. And by the way, Andrew Jackson comes in and has a huge party.

He wrecks the place. All his friends wrecked the place. They had to go protect him.

So both those guys are kind of sore losers. They are. But still, that's part of America. Donald Trump didn't go to the inauguration. True.

But he wasn't the first not to go to the inauguration or have a disputed election.

So Condoleezza Rice is born in the South and black, right? Dad's a football coach. She sees the crosses on lawns and sees segregation, the brutal segregated Jim Crow South. When you approach her about making the case for America, what's her angle? Oh man, she has such an amazing story.

It was not called Birmingham, it was called Bombingham because of all of the bombings at the time. She knew those girls who were killed in that bombing at the church growing up. And she Talks about her family and how they were working to really work for the kids to have a better life. And she lays it all out: that the country she sees is one that has made progress along the way and is always striving. And so she depicts standing in the State Department next to world leaders.

Thinking It's hard to believe that I'm that girl born in Birmingham, Alabama, in the segregated South. And she says Part of her case for America is that we are forever young and always striving to be better. We're never perfect, but we're trying to be perfect. And I think her words are really, really powerful. Right.

And at a time, and so interesting because you mentioned we're not perfect, right? And then we have a situation where we don't free the slaves even after the Revolution, even though we promised. And then after the Civil War, I believe John Wilkes Booth did more damage to this country than any single human being. Because, and you did a book on this. If you put Frederick Douglass and Lincoln and this heroic general, Ulysses S.

Grant, together, they knew what had to be done. And then we would have had the best chance to convert the South slowly. And they talked about reconciliation.

So wait. Former slaves. We're signed in on reconciliation. Frederick Douglass, born a slave, signed on on reconciliation. But 200 years later, we want reparations.

If anybody wanted reparations, it was them. They deserve reparations.

So people need a perspective. That's why your books, but this book in particular, is so valuable. I do think it gives you a prism of where we've been and maybe where we're going. When we're talking about those statues being taken down, when I was writing the Grant book to Rescue the Republic, a Grant statue was being taken down because his Father-in-law had slaves, and he was part of that family. Um, This guy Other than Abraham Lincoln, did the most for African Americans and blacks communities of anybody.

I mean, he fought the KKK in the South. He had more black politicians, senators, congressmen, Than any other administration, and makes this big deal to save the country from falling back into a second civil war. But Yeah. You know, he doesn't get credit for it. His father-in-law, and he got someone gifted him a slave.

He went to court to get free the slave. Freedom. And so, yeah, it's incredible. The book is called The Case for America: An Argument on Behalf of Our Nation. A few more minutes with Brett Baird.

Don't move. You listen to the Brian Kilmeat show. Politics, current events, and news that affects you. Brian's got a lot more to say. Stay with Brian Kilmead.

From his mouth to your ears, it's Brian Kilmead. All right, welcome back, everybody. Brett Bears here, a few more minutes: The Case for America, an argument on behalf of our nation. And, Brett, a couple of things. You are all over Times Square.

You are Times Square. I mean, there might be a gap ad and you. I mean, what does that feel like? I know you did your stand-up last night on that. Isn't that pretty cool?

It's really cool. It's a cool thing. And the funny part is, people walking by are like, wait, is that what? It's really cool. And who knows?

It's just a great thing for promoting the book. And I thought that it's an awesome visual in Times Square, the crossroads of the world. How about the fact that you write this book? And the king is here addressing a joint session of Congress and then has this state dinner. You had a chance to go.

I did. And my wife and I went. It was really amazing. References to the Boer of 1812. Yes.

Oh, that was really funny. We tried to do our own redecorating, he said. But in the receiving line, you know, President Trump says, hey, Brett, how about that speech the king gave? And I said, it was really something. Your Majesty, it's pretty remarkable that the King of England on the 250th from the Declaration of Independence gives a speech that tells Americans how to be more American, uniquely optimistic and forward-leaning.

I mean, that was that speech. And if you think about it, it was just really, really special. And he said, I'm glad you got it. Happy 250th. Right.

I felt You know, I always feel for these guys because they were so ceremonial. Like, they got nothing really of substance to do. But that was substance. Really substance. It was like he's like, wow, you guys have been saying horrible things about Stormer and our country.

They have, you know, no Navy. You guys are nowhere. We don't need you.

So when he comes over here, he really had to do something, not like, you know, not drop something. Yeah. And it was really eloquent, and he seems very comfortable in his skin, and he's very funny. Did you make any references to Princess Diana? I didn't.

Yeah, it would have been perfect. Yeah, it really would have been perfect. It would have worked out great. You asked to interview other people. You have Steve Wynn in the book?

I don't have Steve Wynne in the book. I have a number of folks like Dave. Oh, Ken Langone. Ken Langone.

So tell me about Ken Langone. By the way, Steve Wynn's is an amazing American story that should have his own book. Ken Langogen, obviously, business finance, the starter of Home Depot, an amazing man, grew up in Italian You know, in New York, and really worked hard and tells these personal stories about how he worked at a grocery store and was not making a lot of money as a kid, but next door was a liquor store, and the guy would take the boxes from the liquor business. And he decided that he was going to make the boxes and not charge the grocery store guy to work.

So he made money taking the boxes out. Years later, the guy gives him an envelope, says, I paid you every week that you didn't get paid. Wow. And he gave him cash. The case for America, Brett Baer, go get it: an argument on behalf of our nation.

A talk show that's real. This is the Brian Kill Me Show. The message to it, Ron, these guys are facing, they are facing real catastrophic destruction to their economy, generational destruction to their economy, generational destruction to the wealth of their country, imposed on themselves by the actions that they're taking. They should check themselves before they wreck themselves in the direction that they're going.

What a great line. Marco Rubio, I think, went over an hour yesterday as press secretary. And it just I mean, you couldn't be more relaxed, comfortable. The same way he is in front of the Senate. Wherever you ask him, he's not grasping because he understands it.

Also, It's really tough because no matter how brilliant the president is, or you don't think the president's brilliant, it's not your policy.

So it's not what you're doing, but you go ahead and implement it.

So the president could make suggestions to the president. The president could go the opposite direction. He's got to go and defend that decision. We can't say. Not my decision.

If you listen to me, this never would have happened. And you could tell, because they like trying to make it clear when it's not your decision.

So if he went out there and said, I believe the focus here wasn't there at the time and then explains the blockade or Or the decision to have a ceasefire. But Marco Rubio never does that. Backs up every policy you have no idea if it was his idea or not. I don't know if Rich Lowry feels the same way, but why not ask him? He's the editor of National Review.

Rich, what do you think of Rubio's explanation yesterday of all Trump's policies? Fantastic. I mean, it could be another job that he could take on White House Press Secretary, right? Yeah, when you know the answers, it's good to do the s it's good to do the press conference. Absolutely.

I think he's probably the the the most valuable player of the last two years. Maybe Scott Besson's up there too. He's he's been great. Sean Duffy's been great. You know, that's not as consequential as being Secretary of Treasury or Secretary of State.

But I think Rubia has helped himself. immensely. And a lot of people thought at the beginning, I was inclined this way as well. There are all these special envoys kind of nipping around in his territory. How is this going to work?

His relationship with Trump has been fraught, but he's done a fantastic job. He has no problem ever with Witkoff and Kushner. You need me, let me know. The vice president went over to Pakistan.

Okay, fine. I'll be here. I'm going to go to the G7. Or now he's going to go meet the Pope in a couple of days. President's going to go to China.

And it, you know, it just reminds me of somebody say, you know, I don't need the job, but I love the job.

So, but if you want to get rid of me, you can get rid of me. And it also reminds me of what the president said when they were vying for the vice presidency. At one point, he called up Ruby and said, Do you want this? He goes, Yeah, but you know where I am as president. I'm not going to bother you.

You know, you're going to make your own decision. And because, unlike everybody else, who is essentially, and that's their choice, auditioning for it. Yeah. So this all plays into whether he'll run in in 28. And I'm a little skeptical just because he he has one of the most powerful jobs on the planet.

I don't know, maybe there are 25 foreign heads of state that are more powerful than Marco Rubio. But he's right up there and working on stuff he really cares about, Venezuela, Iran, Cuba.

So is he really going to nine months or so or whatever it is, leave to rent a car and travel around Iowa? You know, maybe he will. Trump gives him a real sign that he'll be neutral in the race or maybe he'll endorse Rubio. Otherwise, I I think he's going to stay where he is. This is just a dream job and he's doing so well at it.

Rich, I don't think there's any way that he runs if JD's running. And someone told me. And it's not the person that's necessarily in, but just an analyst, said that there's a chance Shady doesn't run. And one of the reasons is because you don't know the Trump momentum coming out of this because he's going to be linked to it, and yet he's. Uh pretty well known to not agree with some key uh create policies that Trump supports.

And number two is He's got a young family, four kids, and they've already been under strain. And he sees the violence that's out there and thinks to himself. Do I really need this next step? Yeah, see people taking shots at me. Yeah, maybe.

I just think You're you're right at the cusp of the presidency. And in 28, who knows what it will look like. But if it looks like the the way it does now, it'd be hard for a Republican to win. But in the abstract, you have about a 50% chance of being president if you're a major party nominee.

So I think it's going to be hard for him. I've heard s similar rumblings. He's talking about people maybe not doing it. I'd be shocked. If you didn't run.

So, a couple of things. It looks like we're in a pause. Axios is reporting its 14 points. And if it's agreed upon, there's be a 30 days to work out all the details. But I'll give you some of the things that we know.

They want the strait will be gradually pulled back and open, and our black eyed, our blockade would be gradually pulled back and then open. 15 years will be the deal between it'll have zero enrichment, and then they'll go to 3.67. I didn't see it on this plan, but the word was that they were going to down-blend what they have already, and there's going to be much more robust inspections, which we will take part in. But they'll get the sanctions unfurled, and they're going to get frozen money back.

So these are some of the things that have been talked about. Rich, there's a lot of things I really don't like about it. I know the president's got reality in the midterms. Uh but you gotta finish the job.

Alright. Yes. I mean, the question is, can you finish the job within a time frame that works for us? If you just keep the block eight on, for I'm making up the number, but for seven months, I think you grind them down to dust. and maybe you get get them to actually hand over the highly rich uranium, and that would be a huge victory.

But I don't know whether that's in the all thing. And it's just it's just hard hard to know.

So I've always thought if you get sort of JCPOA plus, Sounds like this is what it would be, or what they're circling around. In addition to the massive destruction you've brought on their weapons programs and on their economy and on their industrial base, such that even if you leave them in the sanctions, it's going to take years for them to get back to where they were eight weeks ago. I think that's a net benefit to U.S. national security. Not my ideal, but I think it'd be a net plus.

So here is Admiral Horwood prior to this Axios announcement. But we did hear yesterday that the president was pulling back on Operation Epic Freedom and no longer essentially providing that security umbrella to any ships that came through, Cut 7. I believe at the end of the day, the real center of gravity remains the leadership in Iran, the IRGC, and their ability to control the people, leveraging these elements of power, be it the Straits of Ramouz, the nuclear weapons. the funding of surrogates.

So unless we address all those issues, it's just as Secretary Rubio said. We'll be back and dealing with this later.

So again, we'll have to see what the negotiations portend. But any control of the straits by either side seems unacceptable to the other at this point. But they can never control the strait. And as Marco Rubio said yesterday, there's other 15 places. That they could decide to start taking tolls.

And it'll be a horrible precedent around the goal. And if they're going to take tolls and control it and decide they don't like something and shut it down, number one, it's going to be a message to Reprogram a lot of your oil and a lot of your purchases. And the UAE is already doing it. Yeah, that's probably going to happen anyway, what whatever the deal is. But I think the problem is, Brian, they just controlled the strait and it's really hard to open up.

And we started this operation and we got what three ships through because it's not as though there's an Iranian Navy blockading the Strait of Hormuz. The Iranian Navy, as we know, is on the bottom of the ocean, but just the slightest threat from a fastboat or from a drone or missile, and the tankers aren't going to get through. They're not going to get insurance to go through.

So it and eliminating all that may require guys on the ground, on the shore.

So I don't think President Trump is going to be inclined to do that.

So the fact of the matter, that does give the Iranians significant leverage in negotiations more than you'd want, ideally. But you write in the National Review, Operation Epic Fury is highlighting the utter brilliance of Drill Baby Drill. That put us in a powerful spot, and we got a lot of clients out of this, too, didn't we? Yeah, so this was, I think, the most successful U.S. public policy in the last 15 years.

That doesn't mean we're immune to the turmoil from this, right? Gas prices are up. But if you look at liquefied natural gas, it's unbelievable.

So you have 20% of the supply cutoff that can't get through the straight or moves, and the price has actually gone down in the United States. While it's soared, you know, over 100%, over 80% in Asia and Europe, in West Texas, they have so much natural gas, they don't know what to do with it. They're paying people to come and take it away.

So we need more pipelines, more refineries, more terminals. But actually, drilling and exploiting all these resources under our feet was always common sense. And we've done it, and we're in a much stronger position geopolitically and economically because of it.

So when you talk about these environmentalists and the green fever. Is it just right now down, or is the fever broken? For example, I don't see anybody running on environmental causes, on the need to go electric like they were. And why? Because they're not in power.

Number two is. I don't know if there's a market for it. What do you think?

Okay. Yeah, I think if if we're off o off peak climate panic and you've you've had some people like Bill Gates You know, say it was always idiotic to think we could just crush our energy production and save the world. There are lots of other things we can do to help people now, you know, clean drinking water, better sanitation, all that sort of stuff.

So I think intellectually the case is much weaker than it was. Not that I ever consider it very strong. But if they have unified control of that forbid dump cuts in 28, they'll be right back on this.

So it it hasn't gone away. And we've also seen the real world effect of it in Europe, where they have kneecapped themselves in terms of their economy and their energy because they fell for this net zero nonsense. But Rich. If they know, it helps the economy. And it's already there.

They know if they start implementing some of these policies and forbidding the sale of. Gas cars, it will hurt them economically. It'll hurt their state, it'll hurt their country. Should the next president, would they go out of the way or would they take the win? Would they take the success?

There's no more Maduro to make a deal with the devil with.

So you realize how much it would hurt. Then politically To go backwards, wouldn't you? Yeah, but they're they're fanatics on this issue, and they really think it's the right thing, and they really think the existence of planet Earth is at stake. Rationally, yeah, they that you do what you're you're gonna do. And maybe if you get a more moderate Democratic president in twenty eight, if they win, maybe that happens.

But I don't think we're I don't think they're nominating a moderate in in twenty eight. I think they'd snapped back as much as they could. I don't think they can go all the way back. We've created a lot of facts on the ground which you can't reverse. But they they would to the extent they could.

So, President Barack Obama sat down with Stephen Colbert yesterday, and he's getting set to launch his library.

So, we're going to see a lot of interviews with him. But I was struck by what he said about Zorah Mamdani and I just, it just blows me away when he talks about the party and anybody. Look, when the tea party was hot. You must have got this a lot, what's happening to the party. You know, the Tea Party candidates were running off traditional conservative Republicans.

I don't remember people saying it's no big deal. It was definitely a big deal. But what Barack Obama said about Momdani, I was fascinated with because I think it's divorced from reality. He talked about how talented he is. Cut 28.

I'm not as worried about this so-called rift between the left and liberals as you describe it. You look at somebody like Mondani. who I think is an extraordinary talent. He wants people to be able to afford housing in New York.

Well. You know, uh I d I I would assume liberals and New York want the same thing. And so I don't worry as much. What I'm more interested in for Democrats is. Do you know how to just talk to regular people while we're not in a college seminar?

I think that's one of the powers that Mom Donnie has. That's correct. Is that he also, not only does he talk like a normal person, but he lives a normal life, but he also names what is obviously wrong. Yes. And he goes, we should change that thing.

That doesn't make any sense. And not have a bunch of gobbledygook around it. Yeah. Oh my gosh. Rich, but he's missing the point.

The guy wants to. He's the bad guy are landlords and rich people. He says, I'm a socialist. Billionaires should be banned, which means, by the way, we should not have billionaires, which means we should, Barack Obama should give up at least a billion dollars.

So, I mean, he's probably worth about $5 billion.

So why does he act like that's not a problem? It's how you do that. How do you get to affordable housing? Yeah, so it's not enough to say he wants affordable housing. He doesn't want affordable housing.

But when your solution is one that's been tried for decades and failed consistently, it nearly destroyed New York City in the 1970s, that's a big problem.

So I think there's a little whistling past the graveyard. I do think this is a big fight between, you know, Obama and Democrats are now relatively modern in the party and these Tea Party-like forces that are pro-Hamas, pro-violence. They're exemplified by Hassan Piker, the streamer, by Plattner up in Maine, by El Saib, who's running in Michigan. And these are real radical people. They're pro-Hamas.

So the Republican Tea Party was pro-Constitution. These people are pro-Hamas. And I think they had the energy and the momentum within the party. Rich Larry, thanks so much. I think it's going to be an interesting debate.

I never thought they would just avoid doing the debate.

So that's what Barack Obama is doing, but he considered himself a leader. I guess he is. He is a leader on the left, and he's really not leading. He's commentating. Thanks so much, Rich.

All right. Thanks, Brian. Talk to you. All right. And just a quick thing.

He says, I didn't want to. continue in politics and it strained my marriage. But because Donald Trump has been Donald Trump, I feel I had to be the voice on the other side. You stayed in Washington after. You stayed through the Trump administration, then you stayed through the Biden administration.

If there was ever an exit plan, when your vice president becomes president, if you don't want to be a part of politics, that was your go sign. Please. Spare me. Back in a moment. Coming to you on a need-to-know basis because, man, do you need to know?

It's Brian Kilmead. A radio show like no other. It's Brian Killmead. I can't believe that on a stage with 30 minutes of interrupting and bickering and name-calling and shouting and disrespect for everyone up here who's stepping into public service, that anyone. Wants to talk about my temperament.

You were actually interrupting them, too. I don't know why you want to act like you weren't. Yes, I. I did not interrupt. I did not go back and forth.

Mr. Bianco, you've been very well behaved tonight, especially compared to CBS. And I actually appreciate it that you've been waiting your turn and following the rules. And I would appreciate it if everybody could do that. Because I think Californians are actually owed some answers to questions.

So Katie Porter tried to show that she had a great temperament. She also had an ad out. That kind of mocked the fact that she was screaming at her co-worker or subordinate to get out of a shot.

So that really she's tanked. What they say yesterday Um out of the seven The one that did the best is will who came across the best is Villa Garosa, who was once the mayor of Los Angeles, doesn't know his stuff and not a radical lefty. They all admit that California needs to be fixed, but they none will really, outside Steve Hilton and Bianchi, would be critical of Gavin Newsom. Matt Mahan is the most reasonable. As you know, he's somewhat of a moderate Democrat who's got Silicon Valley backing and the business backing.

But for the most part, he is Been in single digits, so I'm not sure he's going to resonate. He'd be done right now if Swalwell stayed in and it wasn't exposed with what a Uh what a horrible person he was, even though you probably had the instincts to hear it. Here's a little of Matt Mahan. Talking about uh talking about Trump, got twenty. We deserve better.

I'm the only Democrat in this race who has challenged the establishment within my own party to demand better results. I've made San Jose the safest big city in the country, unblocked thousands of homes that are now under construction, led our city to reduce homelessness faster than any other city. We don't need MAGA values, but we also don't need more of the same.

So that's that's tough. You know, that's something that is a little moderate. And that's why he's got so much money. But so far, I have not seen it on the polls. The crazy thing is.

Is if they you go with Bashira. Because he was a terrible HHS secretary, he was a horrible congressman, he's ridiculously partisan. Also, he was MIA really during the pandemic. And I thought he was about to be fired.

So I'm not even sure why he's running. And he might be a default candidate because they're afraid it's going to be Bianchi and Hilton to get through. But good news is: Steve Hilton, great friend of the show, by almost all accounts and almost all polls, will get through. He's extremely likable, very smart, and very composed.

So we'd like to see if he, with a British accent, could be the next governor of California. He's got my vote, but I can't vote. From high atop Fox News headquarters in New York City, always seeking solutions, never sowing division. It's Brian Kilmead. So glad you're there.

It's the Brian Killmead show coming your way. Carl Rove is standing by and Congressman Chip Roy wants to be the next Attorney General of Texas. And I think he's one of these real consequential congressmen, too. And I always say this. I just like to make it clear.

I always think it's great when you go into Congress with principles and this is what I believe. Then you got to go do what's possible. All right, this is what I think. I'm a conservative, but I have the majority, but I only got a three-vote majority. And I got a lot of moderates on my side.

So how do I get the most out of those moderates? How do I push and prod the speaker? But at the end of the day, get towards something you agree on. That's what Chip Roy does. He's a pit bull.

But he also is there to get things done. Carl Rove standing by, I can't wait for him to weigh in on that. Keep in mind, too, in New York City, front page in the New York Times, 67% of the people unhappy in New York. 67%. And you're going to hear from Ken Griffin a little bit later.

The billionaire, multi-billionaire from Citadel, says New York is not welcome. It does not welcome capitalism. Let's get to the big three. Number three. Congresswoman Porter, you recently put out an email, a fundraising email, with the subject line F Trump.

Will F. Trump be your guiding principle in dealing with the president? I will absolutely stand up to him, 100%. Wow. Good luck with that, Katie Porter.

California governor's race. Seven candidates left, and only two survived. We're going to review the debate as the left coast searches for a leader. Could they turn right? Number two.

About 25 million people benefited from no tax on tips. The consumer is really, really firing in all cylinders, just like the corporate sector you're seeing in the earnings reports. And they're doing that because they have so much more money in their pockets. Kevin Assett, weighing in, economic advisor, the economic breakdown. From Trump RX, drugs, to the big beautiful bill passed to drill, baby, drill every day.

America's either all in on capitalism or all out in exchange for socialism, and it seems Barack Obama is okay with the latter. Number one. The message to Iran, these guys are facing, they are facing real catastrophic destruction to their economy, imposed on themselves by the actions that they're taking. They should check themselves before they wreck themselves in the direction that they're going.

That is a funny way to say it, Marco Rubio. Project Freedom and PAWS as Iran and U.S. zero in on a final guarantee and a final agreement. I'm not sure I can buy into that. And I'll just tell you what I know so far.

It looks like they're talking about zero enrichment for 15 years.

Some say 12, I think it's 15. They say then up to 3.67 because they want Right. They want to be able to use nuclear power. They also. Want a thirty-day pause as they work at the details, and they will submit to more enhanced inspections that they were used to, wherever I heard that before.

And they want all their money that's unfrozen, unfrozen and handed back to them in sanctions relief. Carl Roe, former Deputy Chief of Staff, Senior Advisor to President George W. Bush, you know all about. What it's like to fight a war, try to win it, at the same time try to win elections.

So Carl, what do you think so far what Axios has written if this is indeed true?

Well, it's a movement by the Iranians, but it doesn't appear to be much. Remember, they've lied to us for decades about their enrichment program, so I'd have to see the details on the enhanced oversight. And look, this whole deal that they need to enrich to have nuclear power is baloney. They can buy. The uranium, that they can buy the fuel they need for their reactors from a number of countries in the world they don't need to enrich.

They can buy it. And it's cheaper for them to buy it than for them to build this gigantic enrichment program hidden underneath giant mountains. I mean, you know, look, commercial use of nuclear power, great, wonderful. But you don't need to do what they've been doing for decades.

So I'm distrustful. Let's see how it plays out.

Well, I love the idea of the umbrella, security umbrella, along with the blockade. And I thought that was the best way to handle it at this point. While the ceasefire, and if they want to come out the umbrella, that's on them. And do we go after the guys that, you know, the launchers that were launching these cruise missiles? That would be the bigger question.

I didn't think this was going to be removed. And I'm perfectly open to saying I don't know everything, right, Carl? I mean, I'm not on the inside. And what happened yesterday about two o'clock in the afternoon or five o'clock in the afternoon? Yeah.

Well, I think that's right. I mean, remember, let's step back for a moment. The Iranian economy is in terrible shape. And the delay of getting their oil to market and selling it to their customers in India and China is simply making things worse. We're talking about 150% or greater inflation.

We're talking about millions of people losing their jobs. We're talking about losing food security. They've got a huge water problem. This economy is a disaster. And the Revolutionary Guard doesn't care.

But at some point, they will care because you cannot have 90 million people starving and out of work and facing squalor and having been already impoverished. This used to be one of the richest countries in the region.

Now it's one of the poorest, if not the poorest. And it's because of the Revolutionary Guard taking all the money to support terrorism in the region and muscle up their ballistic missile and drone programs.

So my view is that we don't know how bad it is, but it's bad. Bad, and it's only going to get worse the longer they delay opening the Gulf, the less revenue they have, the more they eat into their reserves, and the more difficult their economy gets to be. And they will face an uprising on the home front if they don't do something. I mean, you've got 1,200 ships waiting to pass through the Strait.

So, I mean, pressure on those ships and on everything, the world economy is true.

Now, politically, you're seeing what's happening with the market even prior to this, even prior to the talk of a ceasefire. I mean, the talk of a deal.

So you see that the Big Beautiful bill seems to be working. You see that the earnings report was extremely strong. Unemployment has not been a catastrophe. It's been pretty steady at 4.2%. If I put you into the White House now where you were.

And you have this war, and you were there during the Iraq war. And you have six months into a midterm, which will really decide if you're going to get anything done for the next two years. Do you understand the pressure on Trump? to try to do the one thing that might be weighing the economy down. Yeah, I do.

And we saw it in two thousand six. What would you recommend? My recommendation is you will be judged by history by the success of the mission. Stay the course. I think it's absolutely right.

Yeah, it's really important. I think two things. One is to have dial down the politics for the president. Say, you know, we're not going to have him on the campaign trail. He needs to be the commander-in-chief, not the campaigner-in-chief.

So dial down the politics and dial up the communication that he has with the American people about what's going on. I mean, I thought Marco Rubio's news conference was terrific. I think the vice president has begrudgingly been supportive of the administration. But the biggest voice and the biggest megaphone is the president, and he needs to share with people why he's doing this and what he believes in. And he needs to say it time and time and time again.

You know, he has no difficulty talking to the press and no difficulty talking to the American people. He just needs to be more disciplined to keep the focus on here's why we're doing this and here's what the outcome is that we're seeking and this is what will happen when we get it. What is radioactive about using the term regime change? Not with me. And look, we've already had one regime change.

We took the bad guys, they were killed, and they've been replaced by even worse bad guys.

So in a way, we've already had one regime change. I'm in favor of, you know, we want Iran to be a country that can live in peace with its neighbors. And can focus on creating prosperity for its people, not on exporting terrorism around the globe and dominating the region.

So Barack Obama is getting his library done. I know what you're thinking, so soon. And he sat down with Stephen Colbert, who's also done with his show. And listen to what he said when people were asking about the fracture on the left, which is clearly a problem, I thought. Not to him, cut 28.

I'm not as worried about this so-called rift between the left and liberals as you describe it. You look at somebody like Mondami. who I think is an extraordinary talent. He wants people to be able to afford housing in New York.

Well You know, uh I I I would assume liberals and New York want the same thing. And so I don't worry as much. What I'm more interested in for Democrats is. Do you know how to just talk to regular people like we're not in a college seminar? I think that's one of the powers that Mom Donnie has.

That's correct. Is that he also, not only does he talk like a normal person, but he lives a normal life, but he also he names what is obviously wrong. Yes. And he goes, we should change that thing. That doesn't make any sense.

And not have a bunch of gobbledygook around it. So, Carl, you're witness. Who are these two people and what planet are they from? I mean, Mom Dami is talking like ordinary people. Yeah, we're going to have government-run grocery stores.

We're going to have free buses and free that and free this. And we're against people who are successful. And we're going to, yeah, we want everybody to have affordable housing. And the way that we're going to get it is to pick the government in charge of deciding who gets what. I mean, look, this is not, I mean, I'm delighted that President Obama seems so clueless about what is going on in his party that he's not going to step in and say, hey, we need to be more to the center of American politics.

I mean, clearly, that was his message in 2008. They're not red states and blue states, but the United States. He was going to bring us together. He didn't. But this is even more clueless than what he did as president, stuffing Obamacare down our throats and telling the Republicans when they showed up at the White House to offer suggestions, get lost, quote, I won, end quote.

So, no, he's obviously spending way too much time in his various estates in Martha's Vineyard and Hawaii and not enough time in Middle America. But he is the would you say he's the number one person out and you're friends with David Axelrod. And would you say he's the number one power? He's the top guy, top Democrat right now. People listen to him more.

If you get him to appear at your event, you're going to get the most money. Yeah. Well, you know, he is the last Democratic president that people are willing to be associated with, but he's, you know, that ain't a big, with Joe Biden being the alternative, that's not a big, you know, and Bill Clinton is increasingly disappearing from the scene.

Now, look, this is clueless, and this is indicative. You've got a West Coast liberal comedian and Barack Obama telling each other nothing's wrong with the Democratic Party, and Mondami is the future. This guy got 50.4% of the vote in a town in which there's 66% of the registered voters are Democrats, and only 16% are Republicans. And he barely got past the 50% mark. As you said earlier, two-thirds of the people in New York things aren't going in the right direction.

This guy is not the future of the Democratic Party. He is the future of the Democratic Party's demise. There is a reason why the Democratic Party today is less popular than the Republican Party and less popular than the president, as unpopular as he is. These two guys having this conversation into Hollywood are indicative of why the Democratic Party is in deep trouble. I was talking to.

I was talking to John Trendy yesterday of Real Career Politics, and he says, with this ruling from the Supreme Court in Louisiana that says you can no longer redistrict on the basis of race, he believes the House is back in play for Republicans. And as they moved in Tennessee and they moved in Alabama and And they've already solidified a new map in Florida. If all these withstand court challenges, Do you believe so?

Well, I think it has, in the short run, modest impact because you've got this terrible district, the Serpentine district in Louisiana, and you've got funny things in Alabama. But, you know, a lot of these are major metropolitan regions. Take Indiana. Marion County is largely one congressional district, Indianapolis, and it has got a substantial minority population. The only way to get to change that from being a Democratic district is to take all those Democrats and split them up and put some into each of the four or five adjoining Republican districts that are suburban and rural.

And that's going to make some of those districts more at risk.

So, look, I do think it's ending a pernicious practice. I mean, that Louisiana district, you talk about a gerrymander. It does look like a salamander. It reaches from the northwest border of Louisiana down towards all the way down to Baton Rouge and nearly close to New Orleans in the southeast corner of the state. And at points, it looks like it's literally a road connecting these pockets of black voters in order to achieve a black majority district and have no retrogression.

That is, no chance of sliding back.

So, I think the court was absolutely right to do this. It'll be good for the country. It'll be good for our politics because it's going to make more districts competitive because those black voters are not going to be packed together in a surefire Democratic district. They're going to be put into communities of interest where there's a geographical cohesiveness to it. And Democrats and Republicans both are going to have to go after those voters.

So, your answer is. Maybe, or narrow the or increase the chances, or Well, you know, look, I think there's maybe one district to be picked up in Louisiana, one district to be picked up in Alabama. Georgia is not going to redistrict now. If it does, it may be one district. I can't look at it here in Texas and see, you know, yeah, you could take the black population in Dallas and Houston and carve it up and create districts that are more compact and cohesive, but you're also going to make those districts, which are nominally Republican, more competitive.

Do you want to see the Republicans have real primaries? Do you want to see a fighter? Do you want to see a coronation? I think it's to the advantage of us to have a real primary, and guess what? We'll have it.

Think about how popular Ronald Reagan was, and yet George H.W. Bush had a primary. And I think it was good for both him and for the party to do so. You know, the modern era is such that nobody gets a free ride. But it would save a billion dollars if Republicans said, okay, J.D.

Vance is my guy. And yeah. And they may say that, but they're going to say it because they see him out on the campaign trail and find him worthy of their support. Remember, everybody was so hepped up about DeSantis. Isn't he going to be great?

And he turned out to be a terrible candidate. And, you know, all the Democrats got behind one person in 2024, didn't they? Yeah, we don't need to have any competition now that Joe Biden is stepping inside. Kamala Harris is just going to be great. Did she turn out very well for him?

No, I don't think so. I'll take your point, but I do think that before you close the door in Ron DeSantis, remember how much better Rubio got. And maybe DeSantis, who's a fantastic governor. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, no, he has been a great governor, great governor. But there's a difference between being a great governor and being a great presidential candidate. And you put your finger on it. In that process, you either get better or you don't. And it's important that we put them through that process because if we don't, we end up with the Kamala Harrises of the world, people who look good on the surface but are not so good when they put them out there for performing.

We look good on the surface and we perform well, Carl. Thanks so much for your time. Appreciate it. Thank you, buddy. All the best.

Back in a moment. Keeping you informed, engaged, and always a step ahead. It's the Brian Kill Meat Show. The more you listen, the more you'll know. It's Brian Kilmead.

Just had a couple minutes left. Just gotta tell you. Um I'm gonna be uh I I believe I'm going to be hosting Laura Ingram on Friday. That's official. You got One Nation on Sunday.

And amongst my guests are going to be really, it's going to be great. I can't wait. I've been trying for this for the longest time. A harrison career. This is one of the MVPs of this administration.

He has cut all these fantastic trade deals and is at the hub of cracking down along with Scott Besson on Iran. And we're going to discuss that this week, and it's going to be great. Sage Steele is going to be with us on Sunday, too. And a quick note, you'll find me on the 30th with my Fox Nation streaming shows. That'll be coming up in Reno, Nevada on the 30th of this month.

So go to BrianKilme.com, as well as on the 11th. In Pensacola, Florida. And then on the fall, it's going to be huge. I have shows in St. Louis, in Clearwater.

In Jacksonville. Uh, in Westbury and Red Bank, New Jersey. And when you see the show that we put on, really going to bring America to life. It's a Uniting the States tour come in the fall, and you're really going to love the theme on America's 250th birthday.

So keep it here. Awesome. If you're interested in it, Brian's talking about it. You're with Brian Kilmead. And here's the practical effect of what's going to happen.

Because we are going to eliminate using race to draw these congressional lines, it means that especially in these southern states, we are going to add maybe a dozen more Republicans to the United States Congress. Texas is going to add five Republican seats. Florida's going to add four Republican seats. There'll be many more in other southern states. And we will finally make those districts look a whole lot more compact.

That is the governor of Texas, Governor Abbott, talking about they redid their maps and it passed and held up to scrutiny.

So it's going to be in there.

Now, the Republicans got to make sure to continue to make gains with the Hispanic vote, or else they're not going to get many of those seats. Joining us now is Congressman Chip Roy, who wants to be the next Attorney General, and I imagine nothing's standing in his way. Attorney General of Texas, but right now he's focused on Congress, where he's introducing the end the visa, the U Visa Abuse Act. And we're going to talk about that. Congressman, first off, what do you make of the gerrymandering madness we're seeing in almost every states?

Well, Brian, great to be on the show. And look, this is something that has been a part of American politics since the very beginning, right? His very name is Elbridge Gehry, right?

So it's been a part of political decision-making. But what happened was a number of things. Number one, we got racial gerrymandering in the aftermath of the adoption of the Voting Rights Act, which was adopted for very good purposes to ensure that everybody had access to the polls without discrimination. But then it was used and interpreted by the court to say that maps had to be drawn to effectively create racially based districts.

Well, the court rightly found now that that was unconstitutional. Governor Abbott was articulating that very well. Chief Justice Roberts did as well. And the best way to end racial discriminating is to not discriminate by race, to paraphrase Chief Justice Roberts.

So that is now over. That is a good thing.

So maps are going to have to adjust. That's very good. The maps. That we've been passing in Texas, or for example, in Florida by Governor DeSantis. Look, we're not even close to how bad they are in the maps that you see in, say, Virginia, which I'm hoping report will toss out.

All of New England, all of New England is literally blue. even though its voting is roughly sixty forty.

So California, overwhelming. Prior to these this redistricting, Texas was 25 Republican, 13 Democrat.

Now it's going to be something like 30 to 8. It depends. You know, there's a couple of seats we don't know. Maybe 28 to 10. It'll be something in that zip code.

And the bottom line is, all we're doing is frankly a soft version of what they've already been doing for years. Democrats don't like it when we call their bluff. President Trump and now the new Republican, the America First Republicans, are the first to respond to the Democrats. For too long, we've unilaterally disarmed. We've let Democrats gerrymander to all Democrat seats, and we've been giving them seats in the House they never should have had in response.

So, look, this is all about trying to make sure we have a strong Republican majority in the House and the Senate so we can have two more years under President Trump to deliver.

Well, I guess so. And that's going to go through. And we're going to see about Tennessee and Alabama now. And the Republicans, excuse me, the Democrats are trying again to get that seat out in New York. Like they're desperate to get Nicole Maliotakis out of there.

I'm not really sure why, except for they just want that advantage again.

So we'll see what's going to happen because we have a terrible governor and an embarrassing mayor. I want you to hear, talk about the difference in the party. You guys had the Tea Party. And a lot of people thought, well, the Tea Party is really hurting the typical conservative movement. But no one denied that there was friction on the right, right?

Well, of course, correct. And thus it has been now for a good 15-plus years where we've had a response to, frankly, old guard Republicans that were letting Democrats getting away with this sort of thing for a long time. Tea Party response, I mean, you remember it well. I remember it. I was a part of all of those efforts.

We got, remember, we got Marco Rubio instead of Charlie Crist in Florida.

Now, look how great that is to have now Marco Rubio, Secretary of State. We got Rand Paul instead of Trey Grayson. We got Mike Lee instead of Bob Bennett. We got Ted Cruz instead of David Dewhurst. We set the stage for a new order.

The Freedom Caucus was created. Donald Trump comes to Washington. It's a new dynamic where you have the Republican Party led now by President Trump, backed up by the Freedom Caucus, and conservatives that came out of the Tea Party wave that are not taking the business as usual and saying, why are we unilaterally disarming and letting Democrats run the show?

Now, there are a handful of Republicans in the Senate that are still. Of that old mind frame. And that's why we're having trouble with the 60-vote fake filibuster. The Mitch McConnell's, the Tom Tillises, others that have their foot out the door. All of those folks are saying, oh, we've got to stay with the way we used to do it.

We've got to protect the Senate. What good is it to protect the Senate if the Senate is not advancing the cause of freedom for the people of the country? A 60-vote threshold is fake, and now we can't pass the Save America Act. That's old thinking. New thinking is President Trump.

Get it done. And that's what we're trying to do now with the maps. That's what we're trying to do on legislation. But you know what? The thing is, I don't want to get rid of the filibuster.

If they did it last time, you would have had two more states. You would have got rid of Electoral College. It would have been real damaging. I love the idea of putting some of the Save America Act into a reconciliation program and try to getting it that way, and then putting the pressure on pure voting ID because so much of the country is for it. Even Democrats would be slitting their own throat to fight it.

Well, and I'm happy to put the voter ID on any moving vehicle, and I'm happy to put whatever we can to get reforms. But let me tell you two or three things. And I've had this debate with our mutual friend, Kim Strassel, in the Wall Street Journal, and our good friends, and there are reasonable debates on this. But let me tell you this. Number one, the only reason they didn't blow up the filibuster last time was two Democrats, Kirsten Sinema and Joe Manchin.

I do not believe going forward that when the Democrats get a majority again, that there will be two Democrats to block it. I just don't believe it. That's number one. Number two, I'm a creature of the Senate. I was Ted Cruz's chief of staff.

I know it well. I love having an ability to block bad bills. I want to stop court packing. I want to stop, you know, for example, making D.C. a state.

But I do believe Democrats will do it. Number one, and number two, we can still have rules that would protect the ability to stop some of that stuff if you just embrace, for example, the talking filibuster. You know, it took three months to pass the Civil Rights Act. Michael E is correct. We need to be able to move legislation like the Save America Act to save.

This country while we have President Trump. And I think having a cooling saucer is great, but make them go talk. There's nothing in the Constitution or there's nothing sacrosanct about 60 votes. What there is something that's sacrosanct is that if you're a United States senator, you should be able to go to the floor of the Senate and hold it and debate and force a fight. I fully support that.

I just don't, I don't support an artificial 60-vote threshold.

So I want you to listen to some because I thought about you right away. Barack Obama was talking about what a great relationship and how they knew how to work in attorney general presidency and keep them separate, unlike what we're dealing with now. Listen to him. Cut 29.

Now that you're no longer in office, what powers do you believe the President should not have?

Well, there are a couple that I followed even though they weren't law. And I want us, we're going to have to do some work to return to this basic norm, and we probably now have to codify it. The White House shouldn't be able to direct the attorney general to go around prosecuting whoever uh The program works faster. Right, because technically it's under the executive branch. Technically, the norm is that it's independent.

The idea is that the Attorney General Is the people's lawyer. It's not the president's concigliary. All right. So you want to be attorney general of Texas, but you also, there, he's upset, I guess, at Pam Bondi. And now Todd Blanche is close to the President, thinks he takes orders from them.

Did Barack Obama have a wingman called Eric Holder? And who called himself the wingman? Eric Holder actually called himself the President's wingman. Yeah, I mean, Brian, this is maybe one of the most egregious displays of hypocrisy I've ever heard. You know, President Obama, he pretty much wrote the book on politicizing the federal government and the Department of Justice.

Does everybody remember Lois Lerner and the Internal Revenue Service? To your point, do you remember Eric Holder? And I remember it all too well how much Eric Holder was politicizing the Department of Justice. And they set that whole stage. And by the way, the intelligence apparatus and everything else.

And Barack Obama was neck deep in Russia Gate and everything else. They literally are the ones that we're having to respond to with respect to the politicization.

Now, let me be clear. If you're the Attorney General of the United States or say the Attorney General of Texas, you are supposed to follow truth wherever it may lead. You are supposed to follow the law. Whatever you bring before a grand jury, you should be able to make that case, get the indictment, and have something that you can take to a jury and prosecute and return a concern. Conviction.

We are with federal judges. That was always the thing when I was a federal prosecutor. You do not bring cases that you do not have a legitimate basis for. And that does not mean political cases where you're just going after your enemy. But when you have blatant violations of the law, When you have people, where you had abuses of the law, but you know, targeting of American citizens through the intelligence apparatus, the use of Arctic frost to target me.

Brian, they came and got my record as a member of Congress. Like, they were doing things that are beyond the pale. And then, what were they doing with respect to the sentences for J6 individuals? It was obscene what they were doing. How about the FACE Act?

They politicized people who were carrying out their First Amendment rights, engaging in at worst misdemeanor behavior in front of abortion clinics, and they wanted to put a 91-year-old survivor of gulags in Eastern Europe in jail for 13 years. That's political prosecution. And I think there ought to be consequences for that. And I think President Trump and now Todd Blanche and whoever he might make the permanent AG are correct to follow that justice.

So tell me about what you're doing with this type of visa you say is being abused. It is the NU visa. Abuse Act.

Okay. Well, so this is something a lot of people aren't aware of. People are getting more familiar with H-1B abuse that we've seen, particularly in the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex, which is egregious. They're very well aware of illegal immigration. They're well aware of that we've had way too much flexibility in terms of bringing people in from all over the world under diversity visas and chain migration.

But U visas is something that's different. This is a visa that allows an illegal alien who's here present to basically say they're a victim of crime. And they can, by the way, accuse anybody, and they have, and then get status under a U visa to stay in the United States. It's a perverse incentive. I had a, he was not a constituent, but a guy nearby here in Austin, Texas, who had to deal with this firsthand.

He was charged with a crime. A guy accused him of a crime, an illegal immigrant. And that illegal immigrant falsely accused this American citizen. He had to go through all sorts of hell. As it turned out, we figured it out, and the guy was exonerated.

And his name was cleared, but only after a lot of fighting and hardship for him and his family. And this illegal alien got a U visa in the process.

Now, I think that's gotten sorted out, but we've had numerous examples of fraud where you can have an illegal alien and they'll just get their cousin or their uncle and they'll say, oh, yeah, that guy, you know, and then they'll say, accuse him of a crime or whatever, and they'll get a U visa and be able to stay here in the United States.

So I think we should end it. There's no real purpose for it.

So I've introduced legislation to get rid of this abusive visa.

So, any support? What could you tell me about the support you've received?

Well, you know, a lot of my colleagues are learning about it for the first time. I introduced it last week. They're looking at it. I think it's going to get a lot of support. People are joining on as co-sponsors.

We're going to push it. I mean, look, there's a lot of things that we're trying to push that open people's eyes. It's hard because the 60-vote threshold we already talked about. It's hard to move stuff through both bodies. But I want to continue to elevate things.

And hopefully, we can get something like this, which should not be that controversial, attached to a moving piece of legislation, maybe one of the spending bills before the year is over. But look, the problem we have with the Democrats and what they do to block common sense stuff. For example, just funding ICE and Border Patrol. We had to, as you know, and talked about a lot on TV and on radio, that the Democrats were politically blocking the funding of ICE and Border Patrol. We had to end run it using reconciliation.

And that's not the way things should work. But we're going to try to attach good legislation to anything moving. I hope we have a strong Reconciliation 3 package where we have, yes, defense funding, but some stuff to help middle-class families. And to solve some of the problems Democrats are creating, we've got to win this election this fall, so we need good bills to finish out this year. How's your race going?

It's going great. I mean, look, it's a tough race, actually. The guy I'm running against, he's a state senator. He's a self-funder. He inherited a lot of money.

He spent $18 million in the first primary. He's spending millions now. We've raised a lot of money. It's pretty much a 50-50 race at the moment, but we're closing strong and working hard going across the state of Texas. I'm going to be touring up through Longview, Dallas, Fort Worth, out to Weatherford, out to Midland Odessa, down to South Texas, back to Austin.

I was in Houston a couple days ago, San Antonio yesterday. People want somebody who's been a prosecutor, who's been in court, who's been a lawyer. The former first assistant attorney general, Ted Cruz, has endorsed me. A lot of the gun groups, gun owners, and National Association of Gun Rights, Tea Party groups, Jenny Beth Martin have all endorsed me. And so we're working across the state.

We feel good, but we're going to have to finish strong. And we need Texans to show up and to vote for someone who's actually been a lawyer, unlike my opponent who's never practiced law.

So you need a real lawyer as Attorney General. You shouldn't be able to buy an election. And also, Congressman, there's no greater fighter. You already have a track record.

So just challenge people to look at your track record. you'll win. Congressman Chip Royd, thanks so much. Thanks, Brian. God bless you.

You got it. Back in a moment. It's Brian Kilmade. Radio that makes you think. This is the Brian Kill Me Show.

Look, our leaders set the tone in this country, and I think that the President of the United States has set a tone where political violence is okay. He's advocated it himself before. It's a terrible thing. He's experienced. He's a target of it too.

That's what I'm saying. He's experienced the other side of that. We got to stand up against this. We need to be speaking out against political violence. Yeah, and blame Trump.

Now look, Trump could definitely tone down the rhetoric, but that's the way he's always been. But to think that the governor who calls him a fascist, calls him a dictator because he wants traction and he gets it, no one's worse than Gavin Newsom, who's 20-somethings, co-put out his social media statements, dictator, fascist. He doesn't say Hitler. I get that. Others have said it pretty regularly.

And you look at those guys in the view, you say it over and over again, and that's what gets three assassination attempts. And when pro confronted, oh, well, you just tell your boss to tone it down. That's what Jimmy Kimmel says, too. And I mean, he's got a 2-1 rating. There's not one person that voted for Trump that would ever watch Jimmy Kimmel unless they were stuck in prison somewhere.

Everything is anti-Trump. You can't even say, well, I don't like his monologue, but everything is anti-Trump. And almost all of his guests are political.

So, same thing with Stephen Colbert, who's done in two weeks. And he made that statement last week.

Well, I didn't really want to do politics, but a friend of mine, my producer, said, you know, that's the only thing that rates. And now, what happened? You marginalize to the point where your crowd is so small and partisan that you're and losing $12 million, they decide to call it quits. Among the people that are upset is David Letterman, and he condemns CBS, calls them liars, and mocks that Oracle's founders' son has owned the team. Excuse me, it owns Oracle, owns Oracle, and now used that money to buy CBS.

Okay. David Letterman, I thought the guy walked on water for 20 years. He is like losing his mind at the end of his life. Just to. I don't know.

He must be a depressed guy, but he has gone way to the left. And that's pretty much where most of these guys are. Barack Obama sitting down for a long interview with Stephen Colbert, kind of a salute to everything he's done. He talked real quick about what his library is going to be like, CUP 33. I want them to put my presidency in context, right?

I assume in my eulogy somewhere it'll be mentioned. He was the first African-American president. I will say something about that. But what I want people to. understand is that There was this extraordinary journey this country took.

to get to that point. Was an episode in that. And it's this struggle between the idea that we, the people, includes everybody. that it's not just some, it's not just some select few. All right, I'll tell you what, on the outside, it's the ugliest building I've ever seen.

The fact that it took this long with this overbudget destroyed a neighborhood is the subplot. From the Fox News Radio Studios in Midtown Manhattan, it's the fastest-growing radio talk show. Brian Kilmead. So glad you're there. It's the Brian Kill Meat Joe, and I'm here at 48th and 6 in Midtown Manhattan, heard around the country and around the world, where we just watch.

Ken Griffin, a big conference, basically say, I'm in a city that no longer welcomes business, and the tax of the rich is a slur. And I agree with it. It makes people an enemy for being successful. And that's exactly what this ridiculous mayor, who, by the way, President Obama just said is a tremendous talent who had this great line to make housing affordable. It's genius.

Who would ever come up with something like that? Martha McCallum is going to be with us in the bottom of the hour, and Ben Shapiro is standing by. In fact, let's get to Ben right now, Daily Wire, co-founder, host of the Ben Shapiro Show, number one New York Times bestseller. Ben, great to see you. Hey, good to see you too.

How are you doing? Hey, by the way, I saw some of your great speeches, especially the one at the University of Austin. Very impressive, of course, well delivered. And there were no protesters. Can you believe it, Ben?

It was almost too easy. Yeah, University of Austin happens to be a great institution. That's actually one of these startup universities that was started by Joe Lonsdale and Neil Ferguson and Barry Weiss. And it's done a fantastic job of actually trying to do higher education in a different way.

So that was cool. It was a bit different from the usual. First off, when it comes to the Iran war, they say 36% approval. Most Republicans are on board with it. It looks like the president is looking at a one-page, 14-point deal that he says has some promise.

And if it moves forward, this thing could come to a close. I'm not really comfortable from what I've read so far. What about you? Yeah, I mean, I think that the points that I've seen, and again, it's sort of vaguely reported by Barack Ravid over at Axios, what's in that 14 points. I wouldn't be satisfied if our President Trump with that deal.

I do understand that Iran giving up its enriched uranium is probably the key sticking point in that deal. Iran is already apparently saying that they have problems with the deal. Again, the the IRGC is embedded.

Well, into the not just into the government, they run the government, but they are really sort of dead enders. They are willing to go all the way down into the ashmen of history if it requires them to do so, to not give up their nuclear weapons or to not give up their nuclear development.

So I think that continuing to starve out the IRGC, continuing to deprive them of oil flow, continuing to deprive them of revenue, and continuing to degrade their ballistic missile capacity, that I think is going to be the path forward in the most likely scenario here. In pure political sense, you see everything hitting turbo speed with the President. You look at the earnings report. You look at the unemployment. They said it's going to boom.

AI has taken all jobs away. It hasn't shown up at all so far. And you see the fact that the Big Beautiful bill has produced the type of revenue people thought and has been reflected in the economy. In fact, we're close to 50,000 right now on the promise that this could be coming to a close. And how much is this war risking the success Republicans might be able to have at the midterms?

I don't think that it's that risky. And the reason I say that is because I noticed that we have a calendar, and the calendar says that it is now May. And because it is now May and the election is not going to happen until November, there will be approximately 2,387 news cycles before we get to the midterm elections. My belief is that this war will come to its terminus sometime in the next few weeks. I do not think that we're talking months away until the end of this.

I mean, I think the president, if he wanted to, could probably end this war within the next 72 hours by blowing up Kharg Island, destroying the refinery capacity of the Iranians, and then basically saying to the Europeans, okay, it's your problem to reopen the Strait of Hormuz because we are perfectly well supplied here in the United States. The price might be a little bit higher than it was before, but we're also making a lot of money from exporting American oil. Permanently depriving Iran of its capacity to export would presumably put the administration there, the IRGC, on its last legs. And then you could leave it to allies in the region to help degrade their nuclear capacity.

So again, I think there are a lot of off-ramps here the president could take if he wishes to.

So, Ben, how amazing is it that you have a situation where Israel is. is not in the center of the storm. And when uh Iran has to take a shot, they take a shot at the UAE. Who, by the way, I could not be more impressed with. And I think they're going to end up extremely tight with us and the wes and Israel eventually as they break from OPEC.

So, why do you think that is? Why do you think Iran played the Gulf States or the problem card? I think that the Gulf states they felt were going to be their leverage. They believe that because the United States wants the free flow of oil, that if they threaten the oil supplies in UAE and Saudi, that was sort of their final trump card to play. They only had a few cards to play here.

One was trying to create that ballistic missile shield that the United States and Israel took down. And the other was their nuclear program, which has been significantly degraded. The third was the Strait of Hormuz, which it appears the United States will either find a way to reopen or will simply continue blockading the Iranian oil coming out. And their final trump card is really just bomb everything in sight in terms of oil supplies in an attempt to throw a crimp into the oil industry. The problem with that is that they're hurting their allies significantly more than they're hurting their enemies.

And the United States is pretty well supplied in terms of oil. That is not true for Japan. That is not true for China. That is not true for a lot of the countries that are actually quite aligned with Iran. And so Iran is on its last legs here.

And whether it takes six months or a year or two years for the regime there to fall apart, I I think that they are, it's a matter of time. I think the president knows that, and that's why I think the president keeps saying over and over that he has time and they don't. And he's right, he has three years left. And I'm not sure that that economy lasts another three years. I'm not sure that it'll last another three weeks given the current blockade.

You're right. I mean, if there's going to be some unrest, it'll happen maybe after the fighting stops and then people realize we have no water, I have no money, I have no job, and maybe we find a way to get them some guns.

So, Ben, as I look what's happening over with Lebanon and Israel, once again, I see so much misinformation. The expansion of Israel. They're trying to grab land from Lebanon. They're trying to expand Israel. They're never going to leave.

Ben, why is it? That Israel is in the place it is inside Lebanon. Maybe people should understand: Israel has no interest in Lebanon except to live in peace. They're pushing forward in order to stop the rocketing that's stopping them from putting people, Israelis, in the north of their country. But yet it's being spun that Israel is expanding.

I mean, again, I think the thing to understand here is that the Lebanese government is not particularly opposed to what Israel is doing. This, by the way, was also true in the war that Israel fought in the early 1980s, late 1970s in Lebanon. They're actually working in conjunction with forces inside Lebanon because essentially Lebanon, which was once a Christian country, is always amazing to me to hear how Israel is somehow anti-Christian when Lebanon was literally a Christian country and has now been turned into a divided hellhole by Islamist terrorist groups springing from Iran and Palestinian terrorist groups in the south of Lebanon. The fact is that the Lebanese government is at the mercy of Hezbollah, which is a large-scale terrorist organization run Essentially, from Iran. They fired thousands of rockets into northern Israel.

They cleared out the entire north of Israel for fully two years. I mean, people had to abandon their homes in the north of Israel for two years. They were living in hotels in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem for two years. And their kids were going to different schools for two years because of that rocket fire. Israel moved into southern Lebanon after repeated warnings, specifically in order to clear out that terror nest.

And the Lebanese government would love nothing better if they had the strength than for Hezbollah to be defenestrated. The problem is, the Lebanese military is not strong enough to go up against Hezbollah by itself. And that's why the United States has been attempting under Secretary of State Marco Rubio to broker some sort of talks between the Israelis and the Lebanese government in order to combine forces to go after Hezbollah.

So this is not an Israeli attack on Lebanon. This is an Israeli attack on Hezbollah, which controls southern Lebanon. It was essentially a mini-terrorist state. I want to bring you to the theme in your speech at the University of Austin. You believe America's institutions are in crisis, that there's really nothing that America is, or there's very few things Americans can count on that we have.

done in the past from the FDA on down. Do you want to expand on that for our audience? Yeah, I think that what's happened, I think we all feel it, particularly since 2020, is a lack of faith in institutions. A lot of lack of that faith is earned. You know, our institutions in the scientific realm failed us during COVID.

Our institutions of higher education, they failed us. If you go back to the 2007, 2008 crisis, there's a feeling that our institutions on Wall Street failed us. And so the reaction to that has been a rampant anti-institutionalism, destroy the institutions, not correct them, not fix them, not make them better, but destroy those institutions wholesale.

Well, the problem is that institutions are also where we interact with one another. And in our daily lives, right? You and I interact via. you know, a news sort of institution. That's how you and I are interacting right now.

If you go to church, you're interacting within the context of that institution. If those institutions degrade, what you end up with is individuals who really dislike each other because they never interact with each other. They don't know each other and they're not governed by the same rules. And so the sort of hatred that Americans are feeling for one another can be laid at the foot of the death of those institutions. What this means, though, is that we really have a duty to fight people who wish to further degrade those institutions or to destroy them rather than to fix them.

There are some institutions that are probably beyond repair, but when it comes to the future, Comes to our constitutional institutions, for example, the attempt that we see now to destroy, for example, the Senate of the United States or destroy the filibuster, to destroy the Supreme Court on the part of the left. There are so many of these attempts. Those attempts are going to make the country worse, not better. They're just going to drive division that doesn't need to be there. We need to work together to restore the credibility of these institutions and replace the people leading them rather than simply surrendering to the idea institutions have to be leveled.

How many times have you sat down with people that you've thought you've known for a while and they say, you know, there's no proof we went on the moon, 9-11 was an inside job? And I'm thinking to myself, what? Are you kidding me? Am I sitting next to Rosie O'Donnell? Am I sitting on the view?

No, these are people with educations, but they're listening to certain other people and questioning everything, which is not a bad way to go to life, but go through life. There's every everybody's foundation seems rocked and and uh and fragile. Yeah, and I think that when people say that they're questioning everybody, that is not really true. They're questioning people who they perceive as experts, and they are not questioning the non-experts. They are not asking hard questions of the people positing the conspiracy theories.

They're asking hard questions of the people who are not positing the conspiracy theories. And I understand very well, don't trust the experts, but that should not then turn into trust the non-experts. That is not the same proposition. Obviously, everybody should be asked hard questions. The real question is, how do we restore institutional trust such that we don't have conspiracism run amok, people believing that the moon landing was fake, also believing that the banks are controlled by nefarious forces or that President Trump is controlled by space aliens or whatever the stupid conspiracy theory of the day happened.

They're controlled by Israel. Yes, no, that one comes up an awful lot. I can guarantee you, the President of the United States is not controlled by anyone. I mean, if you've dealt with the President or followed the President for any length of time, you should be able to tell that he is definitely his own man. Ask Marania.

I'm pretty sure he's calling his own shots there.

So you've done some work, the Daily Wire did, on fraud in Ohio, and J.D. Vance spoke about it yesterday. Tell me what you discovered. We've been focused on Minneapolis and California, but there's more.

So, our investigative reporter, Luke Roziak, did a fabulous job. He went into Ohio and he actually checked out some of these home health care centers, basically buildings that are stacked with hundreds of offices that are basically empty. And they are organized as home health care services and receiving Medicaid dollars. And in some cases, the applications are basically going out to people who are caring for their own parents, people who are supposedly getting taxpayer dollars in order to go and read to mom or dad or to bring mom and dad dinner. And then they're applying for federal aid on that basis.

And tens of millions of dollars, hundreds of millions, probably billions of dollars being cleared through these sorts of fraudulent services.

Now, it's possible that this isn't actually technically legal fraud, right? It could be that all this is happening within the purview of the program, which speaks to the broadness of these programs and the amounts of waste that is in these programs. But again, it is hard to see how that is a good use of taxpayer funds when you have literal empty buildings that are just registered for 300 home health care services and hundreds of millions of dollars clearing through these false addresses. Yeah, it would just seem to me if when we start doing these fraud stories, it should be a bipartisan effort. And then you hear laws being proposed that would go after people who are pursuing fraud.

What is it California? What we're seeing now. I mean, and I imagine Ohio, you might be getting people that will say thank you. Yeah, I think that's right. I think that Governor DeWine will probably move on some of this.

Certainly, Vivek Ramaswamy, if he becomes governor, has already pledged that he's going to move on a lot of this. The state legislature is Republican over there.

So I think that, again, fraud exists in all states, blue and red, but I think you'll get more action on it in red states than he would in the blue states. All right, a couple of things going on. There are problems on the right, and we just discussed them. There's a podcast world that has turned on Donald Trump, and it's not really affecting much in his ratings, but certainly something that Democrats are jumping on. I was struck by Barack Obama who sat down with Stephen Colbert, and they talked about this upcoming talent that we are saddled with here in New York, Cut 28.

I'm not as worried about this so-called rift between the left and liberals as you describe it. You look at somebody like Mondami. who I think is an extraordinary talent. He wants people to be able to afford housing in New York.

Well You know, uh I I I would assume liberals and New York want the same thing. And so I don't worry as much. What I'm more interested in for Democrats is. Do you know how to just talk to regular people like we're not in a college seminar? I think that's one of the powers that Mom Donnie has.

That's correct. Is that he also, not only does he talk like a normal person, but he lives a normal life, but he also names what is obviously wrong. Yes. And he goes, we should change that thing. That doesn't make any sense.

And not have a bunch of gobbledygook around it. Does it amaze you a guy with this type of political experience thinks that Mondami is the future? And if he is, I'm scared for the country.

Well, I mean, first of all, I think that Barack Obama was exactly Momdani's type of politician.

So this is not shocking to me at all. I think Barack Obama was always a radical, masquerading as a traditional liberal. And he unleashed that in his first term. And that's why he got shellacked in the 2010 midterms. And that's why he ran a competitive race with Mitt Romney in 2012.

I mean, so this idea that Barack Obama was ever some sort of moderate is totally insane. He is always somebody who masqueraded as moderate while pushing Bernie Sanders-esque policies. And so he agrees with Momdani. I mean, that's the dirty secret. The dirty secret is not that Momdani is somehow a traditional liberal.

The dirty secret is that Barack Obama was a leftist and that this party has moved so far to the left over the course of the last 20 years that it's unrecognizable from, say, the 1998 Bill Clinton Democratic Party. It is a completely different species. And so I am not surprised at all that Barack Obama, who has sort of a personal history somewhat similar to Zorn Mamdani's in the sense that, I mean, writes and dreams from my father. All about sort of his background, his feelings of split identity, and all this kind of stuff. That's very similar to how Mamdani thinks of himself, or the idea that Barack Obama, who did not live sort of the normal life in the United States, right?

He went to Occidental College and then he went to Harvard Law School and then he came back and he was a community organizer and was working in Highfalutin law firms and then treating himself as a man of the people, saying that Dora Mamdani, who is literally an itinerant rich kid. Who rapped for a non-living until he ran for public office, and that that guy is living the life that New Yorkers are living. I mean, it's totally insane. But again, when you hear from Obama, you have to understand he sees in Momdani a kindred spirit. And so I think that the gap between Obama and Momdani was basically non-existent.

And so, of course, he sees this as a non-issue. The gap between John Fetterman and Momdani is very much existent. The gap between Josh Shapiro and Mamdani is probably existent, but the gap between Barack Obama and Momdani is non-existent. Ben Shapiro, thanks so much. Always great.

Check out the Daily Wire. Thanks, Ben. Thanks a lot. All right, back at a moment. Where big stories meet bigger conversations.

Stay informed and energized with the Brian Kilmeet Show. Breaking news, unique opinions. Hear it all on the Brian Kill Me Show. Hey, Martha McCallum, I went along with Ben Shapiro. I was very fascinated, but I also wanted to talk to you, and we got a whole half hour after this, but real quick, do you know who you're having on your show?

I know it starts at 3 o'clock today. I think we're working on Brian Kelmead. I hope he's going to come through.

So we're seeing how busy his schedule is. Is there anybody else? Do you need a whole hour? Is it just me? We're talking to Matt Whitaker.

Obviously, we're going to be digging in deep into this potential memorandum of some sort of agreement with Iran. There's obviously a lot of questions around what that might look like and whether or not. It's a good deal.

So, you know, we know the president has said that he would not settle on anything short of a good deal. And the parameters so far are pretty vague.

So we'll see where that hopefully is. Yeah, we got a rundown of what Axios has said, and there's a lot to be done. But there's only I'm sure of is that NATO is not evolved, right? I mean, which he's a fascinating guy to talk to because what has happened to that alliance has got well, and then you have the Canadian Prime Minister saying, you know, the future of Europe is the future is Europe-led. That's interesting.

Really? Yeah, how are you going to do that? Good luck with that. Exactly. Good luck with that.

So apparently, Canada is abandoning us for a Europe-led. Future geopolitical setup.

So that should be interesting, I think, right? Yeah. Yeah. I'm sure the French are going to do a good job, shooting. Windmills.

It'll be like Don Quixote, like fighting with windmills.

So good. I mean, every time he criticizes us, his ratings go up.

So I think he's enjoying this. Oh, my God. He does.

Well, we'll see. Martha McCowell. More on her in just a moment. Listen to Brian Kingston. Come on.

The fastest three hours in radio. You're with Brian Kilmead. Hey, welcome back. Martha McCallum is here and uh Martha, first just trying to get a hold of what Act shows is reporting, all I could see. It's one page, 14 points.

And one thing would be zero enrichment for 15 years, some say 12, 12 to 15 years. I can't imagine the president saying any putting a threshold on it anyway. But let's say it's 15, and then they'll be able to go to 3.2 percent. They get their sanctions gone and their money unfrozen. They'll gradually release the blockade as they gradually open up the strait.

And we're not supposed to bomb them anymore, and they're not supposed to have nuclear weapons anymore. It doesn't say anything that I could see about Hezbollah, supplying Hezbollah, Hamas, Islamic Jihad and ballistic missile limitations.

So It's hard to, you know, this is, there are outlines here that look familiar to JCPOA. Which is going to raise a lot of questions, I think, in people's minds about whether or not lifting the frozen Iranian funds, which is something that this administration has been very critical about in the past. But there's no doubt in my mind that because when I interviewed Pazej Kian about nine, ten months ago, and all he wanted to talk about was that their money was frozen and that they how can they because I said, why do you have such a lousy economy? Why do you have inflation through the roof? This is all before the war.

Why is your currency absolutely worthless?

Well, we can't have an economy, he said, because our funds are all frozen and we have sanctions against us everywhere we turn.

So how are we supposed to have a good economy? And yet, all the money that they got. Was poured into their weapons programs, their proxies, and the nuclear program. Totally.

So, you know, I just would be super wary of believing anything they say, basically. And I think dealing with these guys has to be sort of like step by step: prove that you did this, prove that you did that. We need anywhere, anytime inspections. Anywhere, and then we'd have to show up immediately to see and then surprise them two weeks later. Oh, we're here.

We have to see what's going on. You know, in terms of the, I think one of the big questions that I still have is about these 900 pounds of highly enriched uranium and where it is. Because they went back and forth on this before the war. Remember, they said they took it out of the country? They moved it away.

It was in another location. Then we were told that intelligence points to it being in Isfahan, buried in the rubble underneath. Yesterday, we heard from intelligence reports that they have basically a year breakout period again, which is where they were a year ago.

So there is so much that would have to be verified in this deal, I think, to make it appealing at this point. But I understand there's a big push to move on, but I don't see how you make any deal with this regime, honestly, that can be trustworthy. I like the security umbrella they put together. And now, since then they did on Monday. I thought this is, yeah, they'll get resistance.

And sooner or later, they'll realize you're not going to be able to hurt, you're not going to be able to get to us, and we'll be able to get these ships going. And everybody except Iran would be allowed to move in and out.

So I liked what they were doing, but the next day, yesterday was around your show. That we found out about the freeze? On the press conference toward the end of the show. Yeah, why lift this new operation so quickly? What do you think?

Well, he said Pakistan asked us to lift it in order to get the talks going.

So, number one is shared. But who benefits? Who benefits from lifting it? If it's helping to keep the transit moving and keeping everyone safe, I think the only person that benefits from it is Iran if they think they can start charging people $2 million to get through safely again.

So, I mean, maybe, you know, maybe it's just not clear yet what that deal is, but I agree with you. Lifting it, I don't understand that move. Right. And they both violate, they definitely violated the ceasefire, rocketing the UAE, going after our ships. Ten times.

Yeah. So we said he hasn't hit the threshold yet. And that's not the military talking. That's the president. Right.

So how much pressure do you think the president's under, Ted, to end this? Like when you think about the midterms? I think there's a lot of political pressure on it. He sees some of his approval numbers weak right now for sure. He sees gas prices moving higher.

And then he looks up right now and goes, this is great. Oil's down $7 today. The market, the Dow's taking off like a rocket. But we've seen this whipsaw over the course of this whole thing over the past couple of months already. My hope is that, and General Jack Keene sort of.

Yeah. suggested this in an interview that we did yesterday, I guess, or the day before. He said something to the effect of, you know, we just hope that our intelligence agencies and Israel's intelligence agencies have. A lot going on when it comes to Iran and the people and the future of the regime and the government. I mean I would put a whole lot of hope in that.

I think that until you get an actual change in leadership there, you really can't trust any deal. How much do you think it is our munitions depletion? If you look at New York Times, who always says the glass is half empty when it comes to Trump, how much does that have to do with this?

Well, I I mean it's of a concern. I mean, military sources say that they're concerned about this as well. Can we ramp it up? There's a story a couple of weeks ago about the potential to ask the auto companies to start creating to start building missiles and drones. That that that sounds like a pretty serious need if you're considering converting them.

You know, the last time we did that was during COVID when we got them we got manufacturers to start building um Ventilators, right? Yeah, which we're killing people, but I don't want to slow you down. But we digress. I'm not laughing at people who died during COVID.

So. That it's clearly a question whether or not we're short of munitions. One of the things that I think obviously is very interesting in all of this is this meeting in China next week and how all of this plays in. Is China going to pressure Iran to end this war, to agree to something so that they can get the street moving again? Maybe China is influencing this question of lifting this, what was the new one called?

Operation Freedom, excuse me. Operation Freedom. Do you think maybe China puts some pressure on this because they need their oil from Iran? But here's the thing: Operation Freedom was not affecting China. In theory, our blockade was stopping China.

So the blockade is still there.

So that's blocking China. Correct me if I'm wrong here, but China gets a lot of its oil from Iran. The blockade was still in effect, blocking coming or going from Iran.

So that would include oil going to China. Absolutely. So they were not benefiting from Operation Freedom. They were not. Boxed in the middle of the middle.

So Rocco Rubio said, I'm talking to China constantly about put pressure on your guy. You get 80% of your oil from them. You basically armed it. That's been the conversation we had for so long with North Korea, right? Right.

So, you know, put pressure on them, but now it's affecting them directly.

So that's Marco Rubio says putting pressure on. And President Xi says, according to the President of the United States, President Xi has been very... very deferential in their conversations. They have not brought up anything like you're denying me my oil, but they are going through their reserves. We know about lines, gas lines that were happening in China.

We've heard about that. We know about the Philippines is rolling blackouts, and we know that Pakistan has it too. I imagine Japan and all the others are paying the price.

South Korea. They're the ones who depend heavily on this. Absolutely. And you know how many troops we have in South Korea protecting them from the north? 60 something?

60? We say, hey, you got some ships. Why don't you fight too? They said, no, not really. We're not really into it.

It's crazy. I did an interview with the president a couple of weeks back, and he was basically saying, you know, we wouldn't have a deficit if we didn't spend all this money protecting all these countries in Europe and in Asia. You know, all of our money going to protecting these countries where they are based on these relationships, post-war relationships, they need to step up. I want you to hear that. You need to say thanks a lot.

What can we do to help?

Well, I mean, absolutely. I understand they were a little insulted that they didn't get a heads up, but as we mentioned last week, Martha. When you saw the buildup in the region that lasted weeks, what would you think we were doing? Cut seven is Robert Horwood. I believe at the end of the day, the real center of gravity remains the leadership in Iran, the IRGC and their ability to control the people, leveraging these elements of power, be it the straits of Ramos, the nuclear weapons, The funding of surrogates.

So unless we address all those issues, it's just as Secretary Rubio said. We'll be back and dealing with this later.

So again, we'll have to see what the negotiations portend. But any control of the straits by either side seems unacceptable to the other at this point. I hear you.

So I want to come back and I want to talk about what Ken Griffin said yesterday about the city that we're in, about New York, what Barack Obama continues to say about Mamdani, extremely talented future of the party, really, socialist, because he brought up this thing called we want to make housing affordable and free buses. How? 34 years old, no business experience, no world experience. Uh he's supposed to be doing it. I'm surprised that he He thinks he's spotting talent there, but I want to get his take on that.

Also, California had a big debate to be the next governor. Seven people on the stage who will emerge. Don't move. From breaking news to big name guests, Brian brings you insight you won't hear anywhere else. You're listening to the Brian Kill Meet Show.

The talk show that's getting you talking. You're with Brian Kilmead. It was creepy and weird. Agree. I I mean like knock knock knock on the window like huh.

Yeah. Mayor of New York City. On the screen, yeah. Yeah, on the screen. How many times have you watched that video?

Three. Like you literally looked at the first time and you're like, you you gotta be kidding me.

Okay? And then the second time you're like, you know what, this is actually This has gone from creepy to actually not really creepy. This has gone to frightening because the CEO of United Healthcare was killed just a few blocks from my house. And anything that creates like an agitation in the extremist. Right.

On either side of the aisle is a frightening dynamic. I mean, if we look at what happened in DC.

So that is Ken Griffin at a conference yesterday, being asked about the fact that Zo Ramam Donnie on TikTok did a shoot where he went out there on a tape and pointed Ken Griffin's $238 million apartments as his second home. Why is he here? We should be taxing him more. He gives hundreds of millions of dollars to charity. He's about to spend $9 billion on an office building because taxes were so high, he left Chicago.

And now you're vilifying Gen Griffin, CEO of Citadel. He's the guy, Zo Ramon Donny, who says we should not have billionaires. Martha McCallum here, her show starts at 3 o'clock Eastern Time.

So Ken Griffin is making a lot of sense. I couldn't wait to hear him. He met with the governor. Martha, if I'm him, I don't buy a building here. No, I mean, I think he is probably getting much closer.

I don't think anyone would be surprised if he pulls that project out of Manhattan. He doesn't need to have it here. He could do it in Florida. He could do it in a lot of places. You see that you have.

Most JPMorgan workers now work in Texas.

So this is real. I mean, this was a very childish move, this little tap, tap, tap. We're going to tax the rich. I guess this appeals to the 20-something voter for Mondani in the mayoral election. But.

You got to be real. I mean, you got to figure out, you know, who built the hospitals and the parks and every good thing about this city was all built by people who were tremendously successful and were raised and taught. You know, most of them came from nothing.

Okay. I'm thinking about, for example, Ken Langone, right? Who built the hospital system, a huge part of the hospital system in New York. Look at the Tisch family. Look at what they've done for Manhattan.

All of these people who literally. Built these businesses and then turned around and gave back to the community in huge ways. Those people are being chased away. Ken Griffin's a huge philanthropist as well.

So, I mean, just like you gotta think a couple of chess moves ahead on this stuff.

So he says New York does not welcome success. He says he considers the phrase, tax the rich, a slur.

So, what do you mean, Texas-rich? What are you trying to do? Are you trying to create tension in this country? And that's what they're saying with Michigan that Senate race with both those candidates. That's certainly what they said in Seattle with that mayor.

Remember, she doesn't care if the millionaires leave. Billionaires leave. Ha ha. Bye. She said, bye.

So he's thinking about not doing the $9 billion apartment, but he said he's thinking more and more about Miami. And he said, I want to build more and more in Miami. They welcome it. It's a great environment. Families like it.

I know how crowded it is, and it's got a downside, but there's more upside. And there's a lot of like-minded people in that area. Look. America needs to embrace success. The way that you build an economy, and this is certainly what Governor DeSantis did in Florida, you make it very attractive for businesses to come in.

You lower regulation. You have a tax framework that is very inviting to businesses. And you get out of their way and you let them compete with each other. You let them succeed. They hire a lot of people.

I mean, New York City should be giving people tax companies, tax incentives to move here. I mean, look what happened after COVID. Look at Wall Street, okay?

Now, I realize the business changed and that so much of it is done electronically now. But when I used to work down there on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange for CNBC, all of the buildings around you, when you walked out of the building, were just jam-packed with investment banks. all kinds of banking businesses.

Now they're all they're all apartments. They're all apartments. Those companies left. They moved first to Jersey City, then other places. They moved their operations further out.

And this is not a productive environment for New York City. You got to encourage people to be successful. We got to get back to that. You know, we're both working on books about the 250th anniversary of the country. Like, this merit.

And competition is what made America what it is. There's no guarantee of continued success, right? Every empire has fallen.

So if you want this to continue, you have to keep getting back to what made us a great country. And if you don't, it will fail. It will fail.

So another thing is, Barack Obama thinks that Mondami is doing a great job. I don't want to play the sound bite again, but he came out along. He said, This guy is a great idea. Let's make housing affordable. Who can argue with that?

Well, how do you make it affordable? It's like saying I'm against crime.

Well, what are you going to do to fight crime? Tell me your action plan. But why would Barack Obama, with all his experience, say Mondami is a great talent? who has a great has a great plan for New York. I really don't know the answer to that.

Maybe he's just trying to be optimistic about his party and he's looking for talent and he hopes that this guy's going to grow over the years. He's very young. He has a lot to learn about how things work. Obama was very young when he started out. Maybe he sees something kindred in him.

But President Obama, when you look back at his history, he was.

So much more moderate than these folks.

So much more moderate than these folks.

If you actually just look at his policies, you know, starting with. I mean, he was he was initially you know, he changed his mind on gay marriage over the years.

So, I mean, that's just one example. I mean, the other economic factors also that he was fairly moderate on, I think even on the border, right? The things that he said, Oh, you know what, you you can't just you can't just come across the border. You got to get here legally.

So I think he's just looking for something positive, I guess. He's looking for somebody who's got some charisma. I have no idea. But he should point out that the future of the party, you would think. Who's he going to point to?

Maybe Bashir, but every time I bring up Bashir, people in Kentucky say, Are you kidding me? He is not a moderate, but he does have 60% approval rating. Shapiro, you could say those two guys. You could say, oh, I got some ideas that Fetterman has, but I don't think he'd ever say that. Do you think Fetterman's going to become a Republican?

I don't know what's holding him back. Is it his wife holding him back? Uh, there's something holding them back on that, and I'm not sure what it is. But I think it would come it's going to come down to the fact that I think they got a primary, don't you? Probably, yeah.

I know he's got another two years.

So he's probably got to 28.

So I think he's got some time. But the president really goes out of his way to compliment him. What the president does not do, he does not really welcome Bill Moore.

So, for those people who are liberal that agree with him, He does He does not, you know, unless you're all in every day all the time, that's it. Right. So tell me who's coming up on your show for people just tuning in right now.

Well, we're going to obviously be talking a lot about what's going on with this Iran deal. Matt Whitaker is going to join us. We'll talk about the future of Europe and whether or not it's going to be the center of the global dynamic future, as Europe and the Canadian prime minister seem to think. And we're also going to talk about what happened in Indiana with this primary situation that was pulled off by. Like, really, two super PACs in Jim Banks in Indiana.

The president said he's going to primarily. The president looks at the situation, I think, and says, I know history says that you're going to lose in the midterms. If you're a sitting president, your party's going to lose in the midterms, but like, I want to try to turn this on its head.

So, he's all in at trying to undo that trend. And being that we're separate now by three or four seats, he knows it's changed. Not much has changed. Martha McKellen, thanks so much. See you through.

Great to see you, Brian.