Invasion: Putin Enters Ukraine, Declares Separatist Regions "Independent"

Live from the Fox News Radio Studios in New York City, fresh off the set of Fox and Friends, it's America's receptive voice. Brian Killmead. Welcome to the Brian Kill Me Show. Brian has a well-earned day off, and Brian will be back very soon, partnering with Allison, Eric, and Pete. My name is Harry Hurley, an honor to fill in for Brian.

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Joining us on the Brian Kilmead Show is Dan Hoffman. Daniel Hoffman is a former CIA station chief, served in Moscow, Iraq, Pakistan, South Asia, Europe, to name some of his work, and a great Fox News contributor. What a day to welcome you, Dan. These are dangerous times. There's a lot going on.

Welcome to the program. Thanks a lot. It's always a pleasure to be here. And I'm actually it's good news that Brian's taking that well earned vacation. I'll just tell you, when I served in war zones in the Middle East and in South Asia, when it was time for somebody to take leave, They just didn't want to go, and we'd always say, hey, you got to just take a couple of days and recharge your batteries.

There's always something going on. I think the news cycle will still be there when Brian gets back, but we'll miss him while he's not with us. Dan, what you just said, Allison and I and Eric and Pete, we just had the same conversation. It's not just kissing up to Brian or anything. It's true.

Nobody works harder. I mean, he works morning, noon, and night.

So enjoy the day. And we've got your back, Brian.

Now, on this issue of Ukraine, you talk about what a KGB or what KGB-ness running through his veins. How about torturing not the English language, the Russian language, by calling this peacekeepers? Dan, peacekeepers? Yes.

So listen, Vladimir Putin, he had two major formative experiences in his life. The first one, as you mentioned, KGB operative, served in East Germany. That means the cloak and dagger espionage and disinformation. That's kind of how he conducts business. And so when Vladimir Putin's talking publicly Uh he's a purveyor of lies and propaganda.

And he uses his state controlled media, think of like George Orwell, nineteen eighty four, just to disseminate that drivel back to his own population. None of us here in the West is fooled by it, but that doesn't stop him and his sycophants from disseminating the You know, that propaganda. But you know, look, actions are speaking a lot louder than words. We know they're not peacekeepers, those are Russian troops. They've been there for the past eight years.

And they have invaded Ukraine and violated Ukraine's territorial integrity again. They already annexed Crimea and started the war in Donbas in twenty fourteen. This is taking it to the next level. And following up on that, Dan, sanctions didn't work too well then. Putin plans on the sanctions.

That's not going to stop him. It didn't stop him with what you just mentioned. And I'll tell you what, our mutual friend Griff Jenkins has been reporting all morning about President Biden's. And listen, I want to support my president whenever I can, especially during a tight spot. But these so-called sanctions that went into effect late last night with President Biden's executive order, Griff Jenkins is reporting it this morning.

They're really not sanctions at all. They don't stop really anything.

So, what are your thoughts about that? We watched, add to it, we watched Putin, the world, the American president. We all watched Putin put 75,000 troops on the border of Ukraine. And he was looking around saying, hey, Nobody's saying anything. You're just playing war games.

This is fun.

So, what's he do? He throws another 75,000 down, and I guess it's now upwards to 180,000, 200,000. Who knows? But he looked at what he could get away with, what the world would tolerate. I think he truly exploited Dan when the president made that horrific faux pas when he went off the teleprompter script.

He always gets in trouble. If he would just read the teleprompter and squint, he could get out of there. But he had to go ad-lib and talk about some minor excursion like he could permit that. Putin exploited that, didn't he? Yes.

So on that last point you made, yes, that was kind of like President Biden's inner voice coming out publicly. He called an audible, not very helpful. Nope.

So for couple of comments on your outstanding points there. First of all, I'm with you. I'm a Career CIA officer, I did my job without any predisposed ideological bias. I try to bring that same approach to being a Fox News contributor, try to let politics stop at the water's edge. Doesn't mean I'm not.

Going to be critical or laudatory of an administration's foreign policy, but just kind of call it the way I see it. And yeah, like you, I'm rooting for the home team on this one. On sanctions, You're 100% right. Putin lost 1% of his GDP after he invaded Ukraine in 2014 and annexed Crimea. That didn't deter him.

And one of the questions that I would have hoped President Biden would have been asking the intelligence community is, okay, what can we do to deter Russia? What can we do to induce them to withdraw their troops, which are there in violation of the UN Charter threatening Ukraine? And sanctions would not have been on my list of things based on my experience at CIA. And the reason why is because Ukraine is an existential threat to Russia, not because of any military capacity that Ukraine has. Russia's got all the nuclear weapons and the conventional forces.

It's because Ukraine is striving to be a Western-oriented democracy. And what scares Putin the most, it's not missiles or nuclear weapons, it's democracy. And that's why he has to rip that apart from Ukraine, sever their relationship with the West. Ukraine is now like The geopolitical fault line and the ideological struggle between democracy and totalitarianism, just like Taiwan, both of them. And that's the situation we face.

It's kind of like what Berlin used to look like during the Cold War, I'm very sorry to say. But no surprise, as you said, Vladimir Putin's the KGB operative in the Kremlin. This is how he rolls. The last thing I'll tell you is, and this is counterintuitive, he wants to have A horrifically bad relationship with NATO because that allows him. Uh to To play up In front of his own people, that he's the only one who can lead Russia, the leader of this besieged fortress with NATO at the gates, which is.

Totally false and not true, but that's why he wants the animosity between Russia and NATO, which he's incited himself.

So smart what you just said. Daniel Hoffman is our guest on the Brian Kilmeet Show, on the Brian Kilmeet Show, Newsmaker Hotline, the former CIA station chief. For those who don't know, Why does Putin want Ukraine? Is it as simple as this is just KGB runs through his veins, as I said earlier, and he wants to try to put back the old Soviet Union that he thinks this is just so unjust that this ever separated to begin with? Is this for the uranium ore and some of the other properties?

Is it all the above? Why does Putin want this?

So I think there's a lot There's a lot of reasons why I want to. The idea that Putin has said that the collapse of the Soviet Union was the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the 20th century. That is Preposterous. If we think about the history of the last century, I don't think that would be on our list. You know, there's a whole lot of other things that I got family members who fought in World War I and World War II and Korea.

You know, there were a lot of things that happened in the last century that really were geopolitical disasters. Collapse of the Soviet Union was something we celebrated and something Russia's neighbors celebrated. You know, the American diplomat, the late George Kennan, used to say that the Kremlin sees its neighbors in two ways. Only two ways. Vassals or enemies.

So if you're not their vassal, you're their enemy. And that's the way Putin sees Ukraine. He wants. to exercise command and control over Ukraine, kind of like the old Brezhnev doctrine of the Cold War. And he does see value in controlling Ukraine politically for sure.

He doesn't want any level of democracy in Ukraine, which would be a clarion call to his own population, whom Putin is repressing. He also sees the economic potential of Ukraine. And in a longer kind of longer term issue here, Russia and China are allies today, but they are very much long term strategic adversaries. And Ukraine's number one trading partner isn't Russia, it's China. And Vladimir Putin may want to kind of cement his control over Ukraine right now, fully cognizant that today's enemy is the United States and the West.

But tomorrow's enemy just might be China. There you go. You're reading my mind. Earlier today with Allison, Eric, and Pete, I brought up something that I had spoke about earlier this morning. And it was: what if all the enemies got together, like the Batman villains, like the.

I think it was, forgive me if it was Eric or Pete. One of them said, The Legion of Doom, what if you got the Marvel characters together and Zhe decides to go grab Taiwan right now? And if. Kim Jong-un tries to light off some fireworks, and if the mullahs in Iran get together and want to do some provocative stuff, what if they all got together at the same time because they are perceiving American weakness, that we just aren't where we typically are in terms of American leadership on the world stage? I think that's a fair comment.

I'm trying not to undermine my president when I say that, but like you, I'm a former official, and I call balls and strikes.

So I think if they all decided to gang up and get together, now we know that chairman and president for Laiji and Putin are becoming fast friends. What if the whole Legion of Doom got together and tried to pull their stuff all at one time?

So one of the things that I I could tell you from my time at CIA and it was such a change from when I started, gosh, thirty years ago, but we have never ma faced such a wickedly complex challenging array of threats to our national security like we do today. And even if there is some coordination on the part of North Korea, Iran, China, Russia, those are the big ones, but let's not forget global international terrorism, which is still out there. They're all testing us. They are all. Focused on targeting the United States one way or another.

So even if they're not, they are working together, they share a lot of intelligence among themselves. They have strategic discussions. Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping have met 38 times. Uh and they got a very robust exchange of intelligence again and policy, all with an eye towards countering, deterring and defeating their main enemy, the United States. Um That makes it very, very difficult for us.

But let me emphasize that Here's how we make it worse, self-inflicted wounds. When we make a policy mistake, an error of gross proportions, like we did by withdrawing from Afghanistan, where we could have. Stayed with a few thousand troops. But didn't. Uh You know, that country is now a terrorist state.

enabled that. Afghanistan has never been more of a threat to our nation than and the world than it is today. And we thought we could swivel and focus on China. No, that's where you focus on China in Afghanistan. China's trying to stay.

E.O. Afghanistan's natural resources. And I can tell you that. that the intelligence community has to focus even more than ever before on the terrorists in Afghanistan, Al Qaeda and ISIS, who now enjoy ungoverned space. The biggest lesson we learned from nine eleven, don't give them that.

Well, we did. And so that's where I'm critical of this administration for having committed that Extraordinary self-inflicted wound that makes it so much more difficult to deal with all the other wickedly complex challenges that we have. And even the order that he did it, even if he was not going to leave a few thousand troops, which I agree with you we should have done, the order that he did things ensured that the Taliban has billions of dollars of weaponry which they can sell. They can sell it to other countries that hate us, that will reverse engineer. I mean, it's incalculable what that did.

Forty-five seconds to a hard break. Give us your best 30 or so seconds on how should the American people feel when they see the American president doing press conferences every day, addresses to the nation every day on the border of Ukraine and Russia, but has nothing to say about the border.

So I'd what I'd like to hear from the President is just outline what is our what are our foreign policy interests why we care about Ukraine. I could talk about it, and that's great, but I'm a Fox News contributor and I've been out of the government for a couple of years. The President needs to explain to our people, here are the threats, our southern border. Why is Ukraine important to us? What about North Korea, Iran?

He's not doing it as effectively as he should. He's not using the bully pulpit that he has that other presidents like President Reagan used so, so well. Final second, Stan. and strategically. And that's the concern I would have.

You don't get buy in when you don't do that. Daniel Hoffman, you're awesome. Thank you for visiting on the Brian Kilmeat Show. Thanks, always a pleasure. Great job.

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So let me begin with the fact that modern Ukraine was entirely created by Russia, more precisely Bolshevik Communist Russia. In this regard, I consider it necessary to take a decision long overdue, to immediately recognize the independence and sovereignty of the Donetsk People's Republic and the Luhansk People's Republic. And of course, as Eric said right before airtime, that really is a land bridge to the sea. That's all that is. It's not peacekeepers.

It's his path to do exactly what he wants. None of that. That is the torturing of the English language at a level that is breathtaking. It's intellectually dishonest on its face. It's stunning, actually.

But to give you an idea, these are very serious times.

So you would think that the partisan left, hard left media could just check themselves before they wreck themselves even more, but they're incapable. It is a case study. In cognitive dissonance. With Allison, with Eric and Pete, I'm Harry Hurley, filling in today for Brian Brian. We'll be back real soon.

This case study is so stunning that it qualifies as cognitive dissonance. They just vote against their own self-interests. They work against their own self-interests. And let's not forget, When you hear this cut that Pete is going to share in just a moment, Obama Biden, the last time Ukraine needed our help, and he needed our help in a big way, Obama Biden sent blankets. If you don't believe me, Look it up.

It's true. This group, whether it's MSNBC, which this cut is going to be, and Apple Bomb. or any of the other typical hard left socialist Democrat networks or outlets, they hate former President Trump more than they love their country. There's no other way you can really look at that because now is not the time to blame President Trump for Ukraine. And remember, This is the gang that had nothing to say when Obama Biden sent blankets.

Putin was sending cannon fire and bullets. Obama Biden was sending blankets to Ukraine. Pete, if you do the honors, cut nine. Putin has made various efforts to undo Western military support for Ukraine, including during the Trump administration. If you remember, the argument over Trump's first impeachment was about Trump refusing to give military aid to Ukraine because he imagined he could get some dirt on Joe Biden from the Ukrainians.

So why didn't Putin do this during the Trump administration? Because he thought Trump was weakening Ukraine, especially on these grounds.

So the problem of Ukraine being unfortified goes back several years, and much of the fault lies in the Trump administration. That is stunning. And Wholly dishonest, but expected because they have just a terminal case. of Trump derangement syndrome. They they they only can point everything towards President Trump.

Of course, when it's bad. Not the jobs that were created, not the economy that we had pre-Biden, none of that. Just anything that's bad. Pin it on President Trump. That is embarrassing.

When we come back, we will visit Lieutenant Colonel Alan West. He's a candidate for governor of the great state of Texas, and we have a great series of agenda items. This is the Brian Kilmeet Show. Hey, it's Will Kane, co-host of Fox and Friends Weekend. Join me as I share my thoughts on a wide range of topics from sports and pop culture to politics and business.

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It's Brian Killmead.

So, will we hear something more directed at Putin today? You know, the criticism so far has been that sanctions right now Are impacting regions in Ukraine. They may be the separatist regions, but they're not very direct toward Vladimir Putin. Will we be hearing? from the President significant action today.

Yes, I don't want to get ahead of the specifics of the announcement, but you will see significant sanction steps directed at Russia in the coming hours. It's Deputy National Security Advisor John Feiner on MSNBC, media credit there. Distinguished guest on the Brian Kilmead Show Newsmaker Hotline is my friend Lieutenant Colonel Alan West, U.S. Army Lieutenant Colonel, Bronze Star Medal recipient. He commanded the 2nd Battalion, 20th Field Artillery Regiment.

He served in battle, the Persian Gulf War, the Iraq War. Of course, a very, I believe, effective and excellent congressman from the 22nd Congressional District in Florida from 2011 through that session to 2013. He is the author of Hold Texas, Hold the Nation, Victory or Death, and We Can Overcome, an American Black Conservative Manifesto. You can follow him on his handle on Twitter at Alan West. That's A-L-L-E-N-W-E-S-T.

Early voting, by the way, is underway, and he is a candidate for governor of Texas. Colonel West, welcome to the Brian Kilmead Show, sir. Harry, it's good to be with you. Thank you so very much. Good to be with you.

You have experience when things start going sideways. How are we doing relative date line? Russia, Ukraine.

Well, we're not doing well whatsoever. And I think that what you see happening is kind of like what Yogi Berra would say, deja vu all over again, because when it was the Obama Biden administration, that's when Vladimir Putin made his incursions and took over that land, pretty much so with the Russian separatists that supported him in eastern Ukraine and also the Crimea. And so now you've got Joe Biden there at the top of the ticket and you have a very weak Vice President, and we're not exuding strength. And what solidified that in the mind of Vladimir Putin was the means by which we extricated ourselves out of Afghanistan, which was an utter debacle. And we turned it back over to the Taliban.

And now it's a sanctuary and a haven once again for Islamic jihadists. And we still do have Americans that are trapped there in Afghanistan.

So Vladimir Putin knows that you have a very weak president here in the United States of America. He knows that his approval ratings are down below thirty five percent in most places and that he does not have a good strong foreign policy team between Anthony Blinken and Jake Sullivan.

So he's looking at an opportunity right now. I left out on my brief resume introduction of you on purpose because I wanted to frame it in a question. Colonel West is on the Brian Kilmead show Newsmaker Hotline, Lieutenant Colonel Alan West. You were positioned in Kandahar, Afghanistan. You were an advisor to the Afghan National Army.

Afghanistan, as we know it today, in my estimation as a layperson, will get you with your military pedigree, which is immense, is unrecognizable. Women are being abused again. I mean, I could go on and on with a narrative of how horrific I don't know that we could have handled, our president could have handled worse the order of how he did things with the military leaving before we got the Americans out, and of course, all those billions of dollars of weapons and so on left that we could have done something with, like got it out of there or at least destroyed a lot of it. It's inconceivable to me, incomprehensible to me, how bad that is. But now you take the American president's attention and you put it on Russia-Ukraine, the Taliban must be.

Just doing cartwheels right now, thrilled over their playground, aren't they? No, you're absolutely right because this gang of characters that we have there cannot balance all of the different challenges that you see on the international stage.

So, the Islamic jihadists are very happy. Iran is very happy. China is very happy because they can continue to step up their incursions and their threats against Taiwan. And when you combine that all with the thing that we're dealing with here in the state of Texas, a wide open border, and we're dealing with our own terrorist organization down here, the cartels, and Joe Biden has completely abdicated his constitutional duty and responsibility there.

So all of these things are coming to a head, and this is just one year. One year of this administration and all of these things have fallen apart. That's why you got to go back and remember what Ronald Reagan said. Peace comes through strength, and we're not exuding or showing or displaying that strength. You're listening to Lieutenant Colonel Alan West, candidate for governor in Texas.

I mean, obviously, we saw some recent polling. How do you feel things are going?

Well, you know, I always tell folks you've got to fight hard until there are all zeros on the scoreboard, but we're very encouraged about the polling that we've seen. And without a doubt, we feel at this point in time there will be a runoff for this gubernatorial nomination here in Texas, and that runoff will be the 24th of May. But we continue to fight strong. And as a matter of fact, I'll be heading out later today to Paris, Texas, and then I'll go down and be in Marshall, Texas, tomorrow. And we did some stops through Central Texas yesterday.

So this is about getting out there and bringing your message to the people. And Texas is looking for really resolute leadership with all the things that we're facing, with the drug trafficking crisis due to the fentanyl, the human and sex trafficking crisis, the public health crisis. uh and many other things, but our our board is the biggest concern for Texans right now. For those who don't know, Colonel West, Texas works that you need a majority in the primary and that ends the election. Failure to secure a majority, the top two have a runoff, something like that.

Correct. That's exactly w uh our our election law.

So your goal is to make sure you get at least second and then you have a head head to head? Yeah, sure. I mean, I'd love to be first in the runoff, and I'd love it if, you know, I could just get the 50.1% and win it outright. But without a doubt, this has been an incredible journey. You know, I stepped down for being the chairman of the Republican Party of Texas because I just saw that the Republican quote-unquote leadership here was not effective.

And the fact that you are putting Democrats in charge of committees in our own Texas State House and a lot of the legislative priorities of the Republican Party of Texas are not being met.

So, yeah, you had to step up and be in this position. And I'm just so humble and honored the response that I've seen across the great state of Texas. You touched on it, Colonel West. Let's bring a state issue that intersects with the international affairs that are going on right now. Our president has been regularly, almost daily, doing addresses to the nation on the border, Ukraine and Russia, and all of this.

There's never been a speech ever on the southern border or any of the other problems that we have. What do you think most people in America think? Most Texans, if you want to speak parochially in your own state for a moment, but expand it even to Americans that say, well, wait a minute now. We've had probably millions of people, some of them that hate us, the drug cartels, the human smuggling, all these things that have gone on, these late flights with people getting flown to states and people don't even know they're coming. I mean, this is just insidious.

It's unbelievable. What should people think when they see the American president's willingness to, I have to say, it's got to be purposeful to leave our border unsecure while Investing so much capital and American speeches from the American president on a daily basis about how important the Ukraine border is, I think.

Now, I take the first issue, the international issue, very serious. Obviously, Obama-Biden handled it very poorly. The last time Putin did this, they sent blankets, as you know.

So let's see what happens. But what about that? What about Americans that are saying, hey, what about our own business, our own border? No. No, you're absolutely right.

It is purposeful. It is intentional. This is the implementation of an open borders ideological agenda, and it has been done unconstitutionally by executive order.

Furthermore, the Constitution of the United States of America and Article 4, Section 4, which is the guarantee clause, Says that the federal government is supposed to guarantee to every state in the Union to protect them from invasion. We had over 150,000 border crossings in last month. We had 178,000 in December. We're talking about 2.5 to 2.6 million border crossings. That includes the people that were apprehended, which means they just are released, and then those folks that are called the getaways.

So every state in the United States of America is becoming a border state because you're absolutely right, Harry. People are getting put on these planes and on buses and flowing out of here in Texas and landing in Pennsylvania, New York, Florida, Tennessee, what have you.

So this is a treason that's undermining. Of our own constitutional republic, and a lot of people here in Texas are scratching their heads and really being upset because nothing is being said or done about the border encouragers that are here. The fact that we have the cartels, who are really a terrorist organization, firing across the Rio Grande River into the state of Texas, that's an act of war.

So instead of being so quote unquote concerned about 180,000 Russian troops, what about what's going on right here on our own doorstep? And so a lot of people see this whole thing with Russia for the Biden administration as a wag the dog to try to get away from talking about the serious domestic failures that we have here in the United States of America, which Preeminently includes the border, and fentanyl is the number one killer of 18 to 45 year olds in the United States of America right now. We are visiting in very consequential times with Lieutenant Colonel Alan West, gubernatorial candidate from Texas and a former member of Congress. In terms of I think there's a a reason for this. President Trump was in office for four years.

I don't recall Putin once even genuflecting, twitching involuntarily towards Ukraine for four years. I believe that's because he knew President Trump would do something that would really hurt. I believe that Putin knows that Biden believes he's incapable of that. You know, the first round of sanctions didn't change anything when Putin invaded Ukraine and annexed Crimea. Those sanctions, he plans for that.

That didn't matter to him.

So I say there on the Brian Kilmey show with Lieutenant Colonel Alan West, there is a reason why for four years Putin didn't even think about doing this and in one year or less, jumped right on it. I don't think it's a coincidence, sir. No, it's not a coincidence, and all of the despots, dictators and autocrats across the world know that they've got a window of opportunity as long as Joe Biden and Kamala Harris are there. They don't care about the fact that the House and the Senate may flip. All they know is that you have a weak person, and there is the President as Commander-in-Chief.

And think about another thing, Harry, is that Joe Biden comes in and again, unconstitutionally, implements the ideological agenda of this green energy saying that we're going to cease and cut back on our oil and gas production here in the United States of America. But then he wants to go and beg OPEC to increase their production for us. You know, Texas. If Texas were its own country, we'd be the third largest energy producing country in the world.

So, why aren't we? shipping more of our oil and gas resources over to Eastern Europe. And that's how you undermine, that's how you undercut Vladimir Putin. Instead, Biden supported the Nord Stream two pipeline, which means that that's more money going into Putin's pocket. 13 months ago, we were literally energy independent and a net oil exporter.

Look at us now. Correct. That's not a coincidence. No, it's not a coincidence. And I think that these are the type of things that the American people and the people here in Texas need to start understanding.

So I will tell you, as Governor of Texas, I would be exporting liquefied natural gas over to the Ukraine, to Poland, to any of the countries in Eastern Europe, to the Baltic states, to let them know that you do not have to be dependent upon Vladimir Putin. And that would not enable him to be sitting on people's borders because he would not have the funds by which to do that. Colonel West, we've got a little under two minutes, and I think this is something worth spending a little bit of time, especially with your experience in Afghanistan. And I realize the American people get inundated and news cycles come and suddenly they go. And there was a time where Afghanistan was very much front, you know, of top of mind.

We still have Americans there. It's awful what the Taliban is doing all over again. Share with Brian's listeners where you see Afghanistan at the present time because of the disastrous decisions made by President Biden. Afghanistan is now once again a hotbed and a sanctuary for Islamic jihadists. And as long as we allow that to be there, which we have, and as long as we don't do anything against these terrorists that we have to the south our border here to call the cartels, they will gladly accept money from anybody and get them across the border into the United States of America by way of Texas.

So what we have seen happen in Afghanistan is a huge national security issue, which I pray does not happen, but the propensity for us to see another large scale terrorist attack will happen. And guess what? If they can get in and disrupt the oil and gas industry of the state of Texas, Then we're really in a hurt. And that's why that border needs to be secured. That's why I wish we had not turned Afghanistan back over to the Taliban.

Without a doubt, Lieutenant Colonel West, always an honor to present you, sir. My pleasure. Take care, Harry. You too, sir. Lieutenant Colonel Alan West, just remember that women had rights.

There's a generation plus of women that had rights, could go to school, could drive, could go out. Right now, the Taliban said, oh, we're going to have women in our cabinet. Only, no, they don't. Oh, women can go to school and they burn the schools down. It is horrific.

It's as bad as it was before. Things improve so dramatically. We'll be back in just a little bit with Allison, Eric, and Pete. I'm Harry Hurley, filling in today for. The Great.

Brian Kilmead. This is the Brian Kilmead Show. Newsmakers and newsbreakers. Hear it first on the Brian Kilmead Show. The more you listen, the more you'll know.

It's Brian Kilmead. Welcome back with Allison, Eric, and Pete. I'm Harry Hurley. This is the Brian Kilmead Show. Brian, we'll be back soon.

Thanks for spending this portion of your day with us on the Brian Kilmead Show. Big news day, a lot still to go.

Now, let's end the hour with a little perspective of how do Ukrainians process all of this. because they're not deaf. They hear the American president on a daily basis, and the press secretary to the American President, Jensaki, saying it's imminent. Then the next day they were saying it's not imminent. Then it's imminent again.

It's not imminent. Every day, they are hearing the drumbeat of war from the most powerful nation on the planet. What I have been struck by. I mean, Vladimir Zelensky, president of Ukraine. You're not supposed to say the Ukraine.

President of Ukraine, friend of mine from Ukraine. Taught me that. They don't say the, you know, we say the United States, it's Ukraine, not the Ukraine. Vladimir Zelensky was going to leave. When it appeared that Ukraine might be attacked.

within hours or within a day. They are used to this. I hate to put it that way, but they are so stoic. In dealing with these kinds of things in ways that most nations could not even process. Pete, cut four.

We are on our land. We are not afraid of anything or anyone. We don't owe anything to anyone. We won't give away anything to anyone. We are confident in this.

It is not february, twenty fourteen, but february, twenty twenty two. And the more things change, the more they stay the same. Biden was number two then, the Vice President of the United States. But of course, I mean, he supported the entire Obama Biden agenda. And when Ukraine was in a real, real tight spot, And there's a lot of truth in that statement that you just heard translated.

That was the words of Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky on how they don't. They don't back down. They're not afraid. They're not going to give you anything. We're confident.

I mean, it's really stunning, striking. To hear that. And it's not February of 2014 when Obama-Biden sent blankets when they needed bullets. They needed a lot of help in 2014. Look, I don't think they can take Russia in 2022.

I do believe President Zelensky, when he says they're better prepared for it. But these are no doubt very, very challenging times. Thanks for spending this portion of today with us. It's a special day, a palindrome of dramatic proportion to 2222. That's backwards and forwards around the world.

It's the Brian Kilmead Show. Live from the Fox News Radio Studios in New York City, fresh off the set of Fox and Friends, it's America's receptive voice. Brian Kilmead. Welcome to the Brian Kilmead Show. Brian has a well-earned day off, Brian.

We'll be back soon, partnering with Allison, Eric, and Pete. I'm Harry Hurley. Welcome again to the Brian Kilmead Show, which holds a place. On the Mount Rushmore of talk radio programs in America today. You can follow Brian at BrianKilmead.com or BrianKilmeadShow.com.

The author of a number of best-selling books, including his latest, The President and the Freedom Fighter, Abraham Lincoln, Frederick Douglass, and Their Battle to Save America's Soul. All of Brian's books are available in his bookstore at briankilmead.com, and Brian will personalize them, he'll sign them.

So it really makes a nice gift. BrianKilmead.com. And don't forget Brian's Saturday nights in the 8 o'clock hour on the Fox News channel, One Nation with Brian Kilmead. It is a great show, very, very relevant. And Brian's doing terrific with it.

Joining us now on the Brian Kilmead Show Newsmaker hotline is Mark Bernovich. Mark is the Attorney General of Arizona. And this is a, I know he knows this. This is, it's a, it's actually, I consider it just as a layperson, I'm not an officer of the court, but a privilege to argue before the United States Supreme Court. You think about the highest court.

In the nation. The stakes are very, very high. This is the case that involves the public charge rule. It's a shame. I don't even think this should be necessary.

But President Biden abandoned the rule last year.

So Attorney General Bernovich stepped right in to defend the law. I mean, we're a nation of laws. I mean, so this seems rather appropriate. General, welcome to the Brian Kilmey Show. How are you, sir?

Very good, Harry. Thank you so much for having me on.

Well, this is a pleasure because, first of all, I want you to let Brian's listeners know first what is the public charge rule and what's at stake here.

Well, the public charge rule is basically a common sense immigration policy that ensures that emergency assistance programs, you know, like welfare, housing, medical programs, are available when Americans need them most. And for about 100 years in this country, there's a statute that basically provided that if you're an immigrant and you want to come here and you're not a citizen, you want to live here, you have to be able to support yourself.

So, different administrations have interpreted it different ways. The Trump administration went through the painstaking rule process, and they basically came up with a rule that basically said you cannot be on government or welfare benefits for more than one year of your first three years here. Like I said, a common sense approach that basically wants folks, if they're going to come here, they're going to immigrate here, to be socially and fiscally responsible.

Well, the Biden administration unilaterally withdrew that rule, even after the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to hear a case with lefty states and lefty groups challenging it. Mm-hmm. In states like Arizona and myself as the Attorney General of Arizona X. Want to step in and defend that common sense rule.

And getting to what you said right at the beginning of this. You know, your segment. I just. I'm a first-generation American. I mean, my parents lived through World War II, they lived through communism, and The fact that someone like me could become our state's chief law enforcement officer and literally now be arguing at the U.S.

Supreme Court against the President of the United States and his Department of Justice speaks volumes to this country. And what the key is that the rule of law, the rule of law has to mean something, and it does mean something in this country where even a first-generation public school kid like myself can sue the President of the United States and literally be arguing at the U.S. Supreme Court. See, General, what I think, General, what I think people get mixed up on sometimes, and maybe some of them on purpose, some of the more liberal side of the aisle, if you will, get mixed up on purpose because I think they very well know there's nothing unreasonable about this. I mean, and you are, you are, and I'm so happy you said that.

You are such an example of the greatness of this country. We're a country of beautiful legal immigration, and that you have the opportunity. I didn't invent this statement, but I love it and I swear by it. I think it should be a doctrine that. America provides equal opportunity.

We don't provide equal results.

So, if somebody attempts to come here, there should be every incentive to be great, to be self-sustaining.

So, I think that's fair. You get a year sort of leg up because obviously, if you come from somewhere else, you may come here with very little and you've got a heavy lift, but you have a year out of three to get it going. And I don't think that's unfair. And we see what people have done with this opportunity. How do you like your chances?

I know it's quite an experience from friends that I've talked to that have argued before the Supreme Court, presented before the Supreme Court, because they can start firing questions out like crazy. You have to be very well prepared, don't you? Yeah, and I'm, you know, before I became AG, I had never run for office. I was a prosecutor. And so, you know, I prosecuted gangs.

I worked actually for the U.S. Attorney's Office prosecuting crimes.

So I have a lot of litigation experience, and I'm actually fortunate enough to have argued two other times at the U.S. Supreme Court. But obviously, you know, when you're arguing in front of, you know, the top jurists in the country and, you know, people that are, you know, have a bunch of law clerks and, you know, they're going to be firing questions. Yeah, you have to be very, very prepared. I learned a long time ago never to predict what any judge is going to do.

And, you know, for full disclosure, actually, my wife is a federal judge, and I can't even predict what she's always going to do.

So the point, though, is that. The Supreme Court had accepted this case. The Biden administration abandoned the defense and they are letting us come in and argue it. And I think that, that hopefully is some indication that the court understands the importance of this case because really and this is one of the things I'm going to emphasize tomorrow is that this really isn't about Donald Trump's immigration policies in some way. I mean, that's an important part of it because, you know, as we were just talking about, you don't want to create the wrong incentives for people to come here.

We want people to be financially self-sufficient, right? But at the end of the day, if you allow the Biden administration to basically do this. Kind of sneaky surrender. In essence, you're setting this terrible precedent where future administrations can basically gut. The rulemaking process, the Administrative Procedures Act, by kind of using the courts.

Is a pawn and their policy wars. And so I think that it's important to, you know, really for the court to stand up and say: look, the states can come in and defend. These policies, these common sense rules, even when the Biden administration won't. The solicitor is not going to be there to argue for itself, right? You will be doing this.

Well, they'll be on the other side, basically. They're arguing. They're going to argue against you, correct? Right. They're going to argue that the states can't come in and do this.

And, you know, so obviously. We believe very strongly that the states have an interest, obviously. I mean, you know, these programs have a fiscal impact on our states, and states furthermore have an interest because if you'd allow the Biden administration to do this, then in the future, states Interests will be undermined or manipulated by the federal government.

So it's important for people to come in. And obviously, you know, as we were all also just talking about, look, we are a nation of immigrants. I think we all recognize that. But the reason why so many people want to come here is because the rule of law means something. And it means just what you were saying: that no matter who you are, where you come from, how you spell your last name, that we are all treated equally under the law.

And that's the important part: no one is treated differently, or there's no exceptions for this person or that person. You know, we want consistency and certainty in the application of the law. And what the Biden administration has done, as we've seen on immigration, is they've obviously decriminalized it. And that's part of our lawsuits about him failure to deport individuals that are ordered to be deported. And that's resulting, I think, in people that are charged and convicted of crimes being released.

We know they stopped building the wall, remained in Mexico policy.

So there's a whole myriad of lawsuits. And this is just one of them that's finally made it up to the U.S. Supreme Court. Court where the Biden administration is essentially incentivized and decriminalized people not following the rules. You are listening on the Brian Kilmead show to the Attorney General of the State of Arizona, Mark Bernovich, who will be arguing this important case, the public charge rule, before the United States Supreme Court.

This is, I think, almost a A case study, a typic, a vintage sort of case that the Supreme Court will always take because it's gone through the second, the seventh, the ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. It was reversed, I think, part of it in one of the questions that was presented. It was reversed in the fourth court.

So you have a split decision, you have multiple high courts right underneath the Supreme Court.

So this will be the once and final arbiter and decider. This is a very important moment, isn't it, General? Yeah, absolutely. This case is so important because the Biden administration has shown that they are intending to gut our immigration system as it is, and they're diminishing the rule of law. And I think this case epitomizes it, where you have them basically involved in collusion, colluding with the other side to basically gut the rule and undermine it while it was literally pending at the U.S.

Supreme Court. How broad would this be? If you win, do you win big or do you win narrow? And if you lose. Do you lose big?

Well, to answer the second question first, I think if we lose, it is a big loss because that means that the Biden administration was essentially allowed to withdraw this rule without going through the formal legal process. And it also means that states, all the states are going to have to provide additional benefits that are going to cost state taxpayers money.

So there's a fiscal impact, there's an impact on the system itself. And then I also think that in the future, if you have a new administration that wants to essentially reinstate this rule, it's going to be more and more difficult because one of the things the Biden administration did is the only decision that they didn't vacate or dismiss the case on was a district court out Illinois that basically said that this rule was unconstitutional. And so it's going to be tough when you have that case hanging out there to try to reinstate the rule.

So obviously. The presidents, or you know, the president, whoever's speaking, is your piece, his lawyer's a DOJ, did something very sneaky, but savvy in order to basically withdraw this rule without having to go through the process and basically create a precedent that'll make it more difficult for any future administration to try to enact something similar.

So that's why this case is so important because if we don't win, the Biden administration is going to get away with not only doing something sneaky, but it's going to make it harder for future administrations to try to address this problem. That is exactly right. It's almost like that Obama executive order. The courts actually uphold it because once it's in place, I mean, an executive order is supposed to be able to die when the president leaves if the next president does not extend it. And Obama executive orders have actually been found to be Trump's lost on Obama executive orders.

I mean, it's madness. How do you lose on something that the definition is that leaves with the person unless the next president agrees? I mean, there's some things. From Jimmy Carter, that still presidents renew each year.

So I get you on that, Attorney General Bernovich, very, very loud and clear. It's interesting how everything is political. We're in about the final minute and a half. Everything is so political, it's so tribal right now in America that if you're a partisan Democrat, you've got to be against Attorney General Bernovich on this. And of course, if you're on the other side, you're in favor of it.

But I like the way it's worded in the affirmative. This is a rule, the public charge rule, which ensures that non-citizens are able to financially support themselves in order to become a U.S. citizen or to obtain green cards.

So it's not in the negative. This is really in the affirmative if we're being honest about it, correct? Yeah, and I yes, and I will save Kamala Harris and the Biden administration of the Democrats here in D.C. the $310 million they're going to spend on studying the root causes of immigration. People want to come to the United States because this is the greatest flipping country in the world.

And it's the greatest country because the rule of law means something. The Constitution means something. It's a republic if we can keep it. And that's what I'm fighting for every day. People can get into the weeds on some of the policy stuff and we can have an honest intellectual debate about The way some of these systems should or shouldn't be run.

But at the end of the day, we have to have the Constitution as our doorstar. And we always have to begin with what does the Constitution say? Where does Congress get this power? And we need to make sure that we appreciate that powers and rights are just. Two sides, or they're two sides of the same coin.

And any time the federal government increases its power or undermines the rule of law, that means that we are losing part of our rights. I think that's exactly right. I know we have to say goodbye, General, but I'll just end by saying that we wish you well because and tomorrow and going forward, because I believe that when you win, we win. And if you lose, we lose, because this will then be the precedent. This will be the way that it will be.

And it is a dramatic departure from what was in effect just 13 months ago. This is a big deal. It is. And Harry, I really do appreciate you having me on.

So thank you, everybody. Go Bruno, right? Yeah, well done. Burn, burn, baby, burn. I don't mean that in the Sanders sense.

Mark. Berneau sense. Burn. Yeah, Berneau. Yeah, exactly.

Don't forget the vowel. Bernie. Yes.

All the best to you, General. Take good care. You've been listening to the Attorney General for the state of Arizona on the Brian Kilmead Show, Mark Bernovich. This is a very big deal, even if you haven't heard about it, and that's why Brian's show is so important, even if you haven't heard about this until today, this public charge rule is a big deal, and it affects the entire nation. We'll be right back.

This is the Brian Kilmead Show. Coming to you on a need-to-know basis because Mandy, you need to know. It's Brian Kilmead. If you're interested in it, Brian's talking about it. You're with Brian Kilmead.

Welcome to the Brian Killmead Show. Harry Hurley filling in for Brian. I'm with Allison, Eric, and Pete. And thanks for spending this very special day. Worldwide, it very rarely happens because of the way that the different nations report their calendar.

Some with we do typically, although in military, and I'm looking at my father's Bronze Star Medal Award, they would do things in a different order in the military many times than we do on a regular basis. But most of us put the month, so we would maybe write two, and then we would put the day, and some people use a slash, some people use a dash, and we would put 22, and then we would put a slash or a dash, and we would write 22 again. And if we didn't pay attention to today, we would say, wow, look at that. Then your mind might wander and say, Hey. When's the last time something like that has ever happened?

And it would be, well, for something like that. quite a while. And it's going to be four hundred years. Until it happens again, because a what they call a grandest. Palindrome.

is one where left to right, right to left, No matter what order you put the calendar. Day, month, year. Month date. year, so on and so forth, it's always going to be the same.

So this will not happen again unless there are some dramatic breakthroughs in the life expectancy of the human race. This will not happen again to anybody that's listening to today's Brian Kilme show, and I regret informing you of that. But it will happen again in the year twenty four, twenty two. That would be the next worldwide crisis. Grandest of them all, palindrome.

So it's simple, a palindrome. If you ever hear the word and it gets a little, you know.

sounds like jargon or confusing. It just means it reads the same In either direction, left to right or right to left.

Some of them, and they don't always have to be. The same number. This is an extraordinary one. On a Tuesday, So that even gets thrown into the two. Tuesday, TWO.

They're playing with that with different things in social media and elsewhere.

So I think it's an interesting thing that's happening that we'll never see again. We will have a few palindromes next year, I think something like four, but they won't be the type, there'll be alternating numbers, not the same. Two. Two, two, two, two. It's pretty cool.

when we come back. This is really important. Because the last time That The Republicans in the House of Representatives. Did what they're about to do, something very similar to it. Democrats have been in control for 40 years at the time, four zero, 40 years.

A lot to talk about with Congressman Madison Cawthorne. of North Carolina next on the Brian Kielmead Show. Radio that makes you think. This is the Brian Kill Me Show.

It is the Brian Killmead Show with Allison, Eric, and Pete. I'm Harry Hurley. Filling in Brian has a well-deserved day off. Brian will be back soon. This, and it's no surprise it's the Brian Kilmie show.

This will be one of the most important segments. of today anywhere in America. Most important segment because This contract with America 2.0 Uh I'm young enough. And I can't believe it's been this long, but I am young enough to have been on the air and covered it in real time. Had Speaker Gingrich on before he became Speaker Gingrich, after he became Speaker Gingrich as well, with the contract with America of 1994.

Just to roll back briefly the Wayback Machine, and then we'll get to the distinguished Congressman, Congressman Cawthorne of North Carolina, because this is now back to the future. It is appropriate. It's the first time that Republicans are doing anything like what they did in 1994. This is a tipping point moment in American history. This is a watershed.

I mean, every cliche that you want to throw out on this one, this election matters so consequentially. I think you can make the case it's the most important election in our lifetime. Look where we were 13 months ago. Energy independent, net oil exporter, peace, prosperity. Russia was in check.

Russia wasn't looking at Ukraine, wasn't even blinking towards Ukraine. Look where we are now. Inflation and don't listen to seven point five percent. There's not a single Bit of energy or your food consumption, any of these things that are absolutely going through the roof. This is double-digit to the max what's going on right now.

With inflation. Your paycheck is not holding up. I mean, there are so many. Consequential things going on at one time. And for my Pardon this, November 8th cannot come quick enough.

I wish the first Tuesday was not the first on the calendar. This is waiting one more week longer than it is for my liking. In 1994, Republicans told the American people, they actually published a book, which I still have, and it's autographed by the whole team, including Newt. They told America, elect us. Look, Democrats have been in control of the House of Representatives for 40 years.

Elect us. Into the majority for the first time in 40 years, and this is what we will do. And the Republicans told the American people Not what they wanted to hear, but actually. Promises, I know this is rare in electoral politics, but they kept every single promise. And even had Clinton on the run with Triangulation, where he wanted to win a second term.

So he went along with the contract. They got a contract with America. Of course, Hillary and Bill. denounced everything that they had believed in. For decades, just opportunistically to try to win the presidency a second time.

But this is like then. Only maybe even more important. I think it is.

Sometimes you just think the more recent time is the most important time. But I mean, look at where we are right now. Anyone being objective and not political. This is this is got to stop. And where all spending measures originate in the House.

The Senate is going to be a close call. I think Republicans win both. The House is going to change, and I believe this strategy that the distinguished Congressman Madison Cawthorne is going to talk about in this segment is so vital. This proposal, imagine if Build Back Better had happened with what we see now with inflation. Congressman Cawthorne, welcome to the Brian Killmeat Show, and thank you for letting me do that introduction.

Terry, I appreciate the introduction. I think you really captured and set the stage for. The dire times that we are living through right now. And that's why I wanted to work on creating the new contract with America. Fantastic.

Just like. just like the first one, and it was an honor for me as the youngest member of Congress to be able to spend hours on the phone with Newt Gingrich, getting his wisdom, having him walk me through where the minefields were, how to avoid the big pitfalls and the big problems. To now be at a point where we're able to go on offense yet again, and instead of what so many Americans always say, oh, well, the Republicans are just the party of no. You know, when they were there with Newt, they really stood for something.

Now we get to go to the American people, let them have buy-in, and say, Look, this is what we're going to do if you give us the power. What's so incredible about this, Congressman Cawthorne, and for those just joining us on the Brian Kilmeet Show newsmaker line is Congressman Madison Cawthorne of North Carolina's 11th congressional district, and he serves on the Education and Labor Committees and the Veterans Affairs Committee. This new contract with America, imagine that we're even like this is novel or something. We're having this fantastical conversation about telling the American people that if you vote for us, this is what we will actually do. Isn't that kind of incredible that that is considered, I guess, unique?

In other words, I mean, look, Biden, President Biden didn't run that he was. Going to do all these things, blow up Afghanistan, make a mess of the economy, have runaway inflation, all these different things that are going on. He didn't say, elect me and I'll do all these horrible things. You are actually putting something together that you intend to fulfill. Pretty pretty interesting, isn't it?

You know, it's sad that, that is a considered to be a remarkable thing in politics today. But you know, I speaking to Newt about the way he rolled his out, the real main objective for the most of the history in our country for Getting something done in Congress was convincing 218 members of Congress to all vote for it, giving you the majority, and then you could accomplish something. But we have found a way that we can kind of circumvent that process to where you can have a lot more influence as a freshman congressman normally than you would. It would normally take a decade to acquire that much power. And it's instead of convincing 218 members of Congress.

Just go and convince thirty million Americans. And as most people know, members of Congress can be fickle and afraid of large crowds and of when their constituents really get behind something. And so that's our real goal here is to convince the American people directly and then let them convince all of Congress throughout these this midterm season. And so I think that we're going to see a large amount of buy in from the American people across this country. Congressman Cawthorne, in terms of selling it to what is, I believe I mean, there's a dour mood in our country right now.

I think that if this election, if these were just normal times and people were not this upset with sometimes spending $100 to fill up their gasoline tank, I mean, who listening to Bryan's program could ever imagine if you waited until you got down to near empty, 80, 90, 100 plus dollars for one fill-up. I mean, the wages are not keeping up with people's income. The inflation is crazy. They literally, I'm not using a term on Brian's show. It's called runaway inflation.

And as you know, because the government can do this to the American people, they. conveniently leave out energy And food pricing from inflation.

So we know that this number is well beyond double digits.

So people are hurting right now. In a normal election, For the whole history of the two-party system, which as you know, our founders didn't even want the two-party system. Maybe they knew something. But at least one side is better than the other, and the American people will have a choice on November 8th, and as you know, early voting well before that. In terms of where we are right now, if it was just a normal atmosphere, I guarantee you 25 seats would change hands and Republicans are going to win the majority, but you can't take anything for granted because obviously these are unusual times.

I would have to think with the dour mood in America right now and how many things we've just been driven into a ditch with these policies of the Biden administration. This should be a wave election of dramatic proportion, shouldn't it?

Well, Harry, I think you're absolutely right. I believe this election is going to be cataclysmic for the Democrats and for the people who want to see us as a globalist nation. By the way, isn't that Congressman? Isn't that why they now are even Schumer and the rest of them almost never in favor of defunding the police? They're now against all this radical stuff they were in favor of because they know the American people are voting on November 8th, don't they?

Oh, exactly. It is hard to have to do. We're in favor of Locked down, they were never in favor of masking their children, they were never in favor of defunding the police, they were never in favor of canceling the pipeline. When you start looking at all these things and you realize it wasn't increased rate of suicides that happened in America. It wasn't the increased rate of crime and murders and rapes and convictions that were happening in our country.

It wasn't the fact that people's pocketbooks are starting to get hit incredibly hard by this runaway inflation like we've been outlining that made them change their mind of the of why they wanted to change their tune. No, it was because of their poll numbers. And if that is not the most political thing I've ever heard in my life, and if that is not the number one reason that I went to Congress, is because the American people are sick and tired. Of these elitists who rule from their ivory tower and have nothing to do with the American people. Couldn't agree more.

So, for Brian's listeners, Congressman, that would like to know. What is the new contract with America? Because you're not just dusting off the 1994 book. We have different problems, and some are similar, but different problems and such. What is the new contract with America?

What will the American people have to look forward to if you prevail?

So the new contract with America is something that really captures this America first doctrine. The new contract with America has ten key pillars, very similar to the first one for the first contract in the 94. Focus on government spending, economy, government reform, health care, education. It focuses on culture and the family unit, energy and the environment, immigration, technical innovation, and finally, defense in our veteran. And when we start focusing in on all of these, what is unique about our new contract with America is that although once you start get down to the real text of the bill, it has about forty three key issues where it says where Congress should act and what policy we should enact, There is also supplemental legislation that will be connected to each and every single one of those forty three points that are stand alone bills that can easily be taken to the floor.

Some of them are written by my office, some of them have been written by other members of office, some of them have already been introduced. And they just need to have the momentum put behind them. And so we already have the legislation already finished that will actually be the roadmap. To achieve this America first vision of taking the government back from the elites and giving it to the American people. Congressman Cawthorne, I love seeing smart people like yourself play three-dimensional chess when the other side is playing checkers, crown me.

I love it because what's going to happen here is you're going to keep your word. You're going to win because you would win in any environment. You only need five seats. You're going to win, and you're going to win by a lot. I don't know if it's going to be 60-some, like the Obama first midterm, but it's going to be, in my estimation, somewhere.

North of 25 to 50-ish. It's going to be a big win, and you're going to have a pretty comfortable majority. It's not going to be like a couple of seats like we have right now, in my estimation.

So when you win, and then the American people see you actually bring up. The legislation that you promised you would, and then pass the legislation that you promised that you would. And then we'll have to wait and see what happens with the Senate, but also with the President if the President vetoes this, and then, of course, the Democrats will block and you won't have the ability to override the veto. But then you have, what I mean by the three-dimensional chess, then you say to the American people: look, we did, we voted for all this, all of it, every bit of it, but we need somebody else, we need a Republican president. And this can all happen, but it can't happen now because the other side is blocking.

So then I think you tee up the twenty twenty four election beautifully, which of course would be another reelection year for you and your colleagues. What are your thoughts of my sort of theory there.

Well, Harry, I didn't want the Democrats to hear the end game plan, but you just gave it to them. You know, I believe that they can't help themselves anyhow, so it's okay. It's okay. And even if they could, I'm not sure they would be able to stop us because the entire vision behind this is that we wanted to give the American people a Give them the opportunity to give Congress a clear mandate. We want you to accomplish X.

We gave you 60 extra seats in the House for the majority, and we want you to accomplish the new contract with America. Then, once we pass all of our legislation through the House, bring it to the floor, we fulfill our word, and then you have Joe Biden repetitively veto every single piece of this, then we can look at the American people and say, You told us to do this. We're executing your wishes and your will, and this tyrant is standing in the way. And that is not going to do well for their poll numbers. Congressman Cawthorne, thank you so much for visiting today on the Brian Kilmey Show, and your leadership has noted the new contract with America.

Newt has said it, and it's the perfect timing. He hadn't felt that there had been another, you know, it's every other year, another cycle where this should come back, but so strongly believes that now, because of the consequences and the state of our country, this is perfect time to bring back the contract with America in the form of the new contract with America. I wish you well, and I know you're going to do well with this. Good to talk to you, sir. It's an honor, Harry.

Thank you, my friend. Goodbye. Thank you, my friend. Congressman Madison Cawthorne of North Carolina's 11th Congressional District. It's the new contract with America.

It worked beautifully the first time. It's going to work a second time because its time is ripe. This is the Brian Kilmead Show. Okay. Giving you everything you need to know.

You're with Brian Kilmead. Breaking news, unique opinions. Hear it all on the Brian Kill Me Show. Welcome back to the Brian Kilmead Show. Allison, Eric, Pete, and your Shruly Harry filling in today for Brian.

Brian will be back very, very soon. Fox News is breaking word about what's being called the People's Convoy.

Now you have to think about this. What happened in neighboring Canada? was completely organic. It was not organized and it just continued to just gain momentum. And of course we saw I I saw something that I never thought I would see.

I mean, literally, right across the border, a leader, Justin Trudeau, taking. Dictatorial, beyond monarch, it seemed, level authority, and actually bragging now that he's keeping it because, after all, they might do it again. I mean, the emergency's over. Emergency powers, it's what we've always said, and I've heard Brian say it so many times. And it was the big concern from the very beginning of the pandemic.

And that is that certain leaders would take power that under normal circumstances the American people would never tolerate and would not let it go. And that's what we saw. If you're being objective and not partisan, that's what we have witnessed.

Now Fox has it first. I haven't seen anyone with this story. They actually have the details, the plan, a copy of the plan of how big the event will be.

So check that out on the website, FoxNews.com. because all the details are there. This much I can tell you, they're telegraphing what they're doing. And also remember, when you see these what we knew were riots and the Democrats would call them Peaceful, remember peaceful but fiery protest. Remember this insanity that was going on during the summer of love and the summer of chap, chaz, and all of that.

Craziness. Notice none of them are talking like that anymore. They're not talking about defunding the police. They're refunding the police. They're singing a whole different tune, which I promise you shows you the importance.

of American elections because they know. They know that what they espoused in a fake atmosphere that they created. To win an election, and it worked. They utilized and exploited the pandemic, and they did everything they could. And it worked.

But I'll tell you what. There's been buyer's remorse. very, very quickly ever since. But the people's convoy They're going to be in major cities, in major states, making their way ultimately to their final destination, the District of Columbia. They're holding that private.

For their reasons, security reasons, and others, but the details at foxnews.com on this breaking news story about the people's convoy. And I predict, no way, no how, the Democrats in America saw. What Trudeau and they did in Canada. It's not going to happen here like that. But it's going to be bad.

We'll be back. It's the Brian Killmeat Show. From the Fox News Radio Studios in New York City, giving you opinions and facts with a positive approach. It's Brian Kilmead. Welcome to the Brian Kilmead Show with Allison, Eric, and Pete.

I'm Harry Hurley. Filling in today, Brian will be back soon. Welcome. To the Brian Killmee Show, which holds a place on the Mount Rushmore of talk radio programs in America today. If you get my analogy that's there's only room for four.

And Brian is not in the fourth place. You can follow Brian at BrianKilmead.com, the BrianKilmead Show.com as well. Brian is a best-selling New York Times, best-selling author. His latest work, The President and the Freedom Fighter, is available right now, as well as all of Brian's books. And he autographs them for you, so they really make nice keepsakes, nice gifts.

All that is at Brian's store, BrianKilmead.com. And Brian Kilmead, of course, because as my father told me long ago, if you want something done right, you give it to a busy person.

So, of course, Fox and Friends every morning from 6 to 9, right to the Killmead radio show. And then, of course, Saturday nights in the 8 o'clock hour, Why Not? The Fox News Channel News Sensation, One Nation with Brian Kilmead. Check it out. It's relevant.

It's great. It's well done because everything Brian does, he does well. Honor to fill in for Brian, and we have a great guest. She's been absolutely wonderful before, during, and now. I hope we're very near with the way people are talking, even both sides of the aisle, and call.

Off a lot of rules, I've asked this question of the great Dr. Jeanette Neshwat. Probably ten times over the past two years, and that is: are we? From pandemic to endemic, yet, or when do you think, and so on?

Now, of course, we know it was Alpha and Delta, and wasn't there Moo? And that was supposed to be a big deal, but it wasn't, and Omicron, of course. But a big item that we're going to cover right up front with the Fox News Medical Contributor and Family and Emergency Medicine Doctor, Dr. Jeanette Neshwad. And you can follow Dr.

Jeanette. Simple to do her handle on social media is at Dr. Jeanette. That's J-A-N-E-T-T-E at Dr. Jeanette.

Dr. Jeanette, welcome to the Brian Kilme show. He's Great to be with you. It is great to be with you.

So, I'll just, before we get into this CDC situation, which I think is a very serious topic to discuss. Have we gone in this pandemic from pandemic to endemic? Are we there?

Well, for example, here in New York, I'm going to say yes, absolutely. I have had one positive COVID patient in the past two weeks, so it's nearly gone. That means we need to move on with our lives and live our lives like we normally do and not let COVID and Omicron take over or dictate what we do, where we go, and any ridiculous mandates at this point, because it's obsolete and unnecessary. Where do you think we go relative to the vaccine? Many of us I I'll confess I'm one.

I I did what I thought was right. I consulted with my doctor. I didn't have any comorbidities, and I think that I was young enough to not have to do it, but I wanted to be here for my children and my wife, so I made the decision and Decided that I would get the vaccine, and I went in with confidence. I just felt that what was said to us was credible and that it was something that I should do.

So I took the vaccine. Then, of course, if you take the vaccine, I took the booster, and then I also, or I took the second shot rather, and then, of course, I took the booster on top of that. But at a point in time, just like with the flu vaccine, we'll have little to no protection at all. Where do you think we go, before we get to the CDC debacle, where do we go forward in terms of the therapeutics of this, the annual rite of passage? Do we do this every year?

What are your thoughts about that?

Well, first of all, you did the right thing by getting the vaccine and protecting yourself and your family, especially if you don't have any natural immunity. But moving forward, one thing we need to look at is Who is the most vulnerable? Who is the highest risk of severe complications? What does the data show that we have? It tells us most of the people that lost their life or were hospitalized or put on a ventilator from this virus were those who were senior citizens, those with underlying medical conditions, those who were not vaccinated in rare circumstances.

So I think we need to take all of that into consideration.

Now, we do have Moderna, we do have Pfizer working on boosters, but they boosters specific for Omicron, but we still need to gather more information and data to determine: do we need it once a year? Do we need it every five years? Do only the high-risk senior citizens with underlying medical conditions need it?

So, we're still gathering more of that information. Right now, what we're doing is gathering looking at the information from Israel, from the UK, because the CDC doesn't give us the information that we need, unfortunately, when they should be doing that. Why don't we? I mean, I guess it's not for you to answer, but I'm sure you have an opinion. Why?

And I've said this many times with you, and other times we've talked about it. Why have we relied on Israel and the United Kingdom to be doing the best research in the world when we should have led the way, we could have led the way? What happened there? Did this just totally become political?

So we didn't do what we should have done? I don't understand why. And even it was embarrassing. You would hear Dr. Fauci, well, you know, Israel has a study that's out.

Yeah, well, why don't you have a study that's out? I don't understand. And another thing I want to throw out, it sounds like almost like a gripe session. Why didn't we? Protect the most vulnerable.

Why did we do a strategy that left the most vulnerable? to become the most affected by the COVID-19 virus. I mean, I hope we have learned. I know hope is not a strategy, but I hope we have learned we made some, I think, fateful mistakes over the past two years. Yeah, we've made some massive critical errors from shutting down schools, closing down businesses that have, you know, have had reprehensible damage to our children.

And hopefully, we never make those mistakes again. We saw here just recently with Omicron completely unprepared, not enough tests, we don't have enough medications, we didn't have antivirals, a monoclonal antibodies. Our White Health Administration completely dropped the ball, and that should never happen again. You know, to me, that's that's you know, when you have 350 million American lives that you're in charge of and you put their lives at risk, that's impeachable to me.

So I never want to see that again. I think planning and preparation is critical. But when it comes to the CDC, I don't think it's that they're lazy. I just think that there's just a lack of competence. They're just not capable of handling and managing massive data, massive amounts, large volumes.

Of information, and then when they have all this data, it becomes politicized. They cherry-pick what they want to release to the public because of fear that it might dissuade patients from getting their booster or getting their vaccine or not wanting to follow mitigation efforts. But right now, Harry, we are at a point in time where masks, vaccines, it should all be optional. And we need to eliminate mandates. People should have their choice now because we are at a point where, for example, here in New York, two 3% positivity rate, we've achieved our goals, we've accomplished our mission, we flattened the curve.

That's it. It's done. Move on. We don't know how long it'll last until we get another variant, but we certainly know how to treat it, how to manage it. It's just a matter of having those resources lined up, which we didn't in December, but hopefully moving forward, we do.

The always intellectually honest and sensible Dr. Jeanette Neshwat on the Brian. Kill Meet Show Newsmaker Hotline. The American people were suspect from the beginning. When Dr.

Fauci told America that don't wear a face mask, because if you're not a professional, if you're not a nurse, a tech, a doctor, somebody that knows how to use them, you're going to touch your face, you're going to touch, and the mask is going to be contaminated, you're going to infect yourself that way.

So we got lied to. We're grown-ups. They should have been able to tell us we don't have enough PPE right now. We need to leave it for our professionals who are at the most risk dealing with COVID-positive patients. And we will catch up and we will have the PPE.

And at that time, we urge Americans to wear face masks. Instead, they lied to us, unless you don't agree with me on that, but I vividly remember Dr. Fauci telling us why. Then, of course, he went to you wear a face mask and just didn't even explain the first lie, just wiped it out like it's a sitcom soap opera where you can just somebody dies and then they're alive again because it's the next episode. And then he tells us not to wear just one face mask, but two.

And then all these other things.

So I think we have been suspect of what they've done from the beginning, and now we learn in the very recent past that the CDC purposefully isn't publishing large portions of the COVID data that it collects. And I think that is malpractice. Dr. Neshwat, your thoughts? Yeah, it you know, I don't know if he lied or if he just didn't want to scare Americans or they just didn't know the answer, but in that case, they should have said, Look, we don't know, we don't think so, save it for the doctors and the nurses.

But you've got to be honest, but it's the inconsistency that leads to a lack of compliance, and ultimately, lives could be lost because of that dishonesty and being straightforward with Americans. But I was very disappointed, Harry, to find out that, especially when it dealt with the age group between 18 and 49-year-olds, the CDC withheld that information. And that is important. I want to know that information. I want to know if my patients between the ages of 18 and 49 needed to have a booster.

Did they need it or were they already protected with two shots? Because I want to know, w am I causing them more harm by encouraging them to get a booster? And are we causing our country more harm because we're using boosters, enforcing boosters, instead of providing vaccines to third world countries where the variants are coming in from, India, South Africa, the UK?

So I think number one, yes, we we need truth, we need transparency, that's so important. Having that extra information could help us better fight the virus in certain groups, can help us target where we see any potential outbreaks that might be brewing. And it can help us bolster our efforts to try to fight the virus. But instead, it it may have had the the opposite impact. And of course, we may never know that because we're not going to have the data to prove that.

But regardless, there's absolutely no reason to not provide doctors, healthcare providers, the community with all of the information so that I can better care for my patients. For example, if I had a patient that had natural immunity from previous infection, they don't need a vaccine right now, they don't need a booster right now, they should wait. because natural immunity we know is so effective.

So I think it could it ended up being a waste of resources when we forced a certain population who is not high risk of severe complications or death to take certain medications and vaccines that they didn't need. Is this a Jack Nicholson movie, Colonel Jessup moment that the C D C decided that we can't handle the truth? Is that what happened here, or is it something else? I I find it I found it to be a little bit insulting that they don't think that us doctors are able to interpret this information. If they felt that it would be misinterpreted or that it would dissuade patients, then present it in a way that is easily understandable.

And just be honest. That is always the best route is just to be honest with all the data. That means, usually, means better compliance. But you lose trust, you lose credibility, you lose confidence when you cherry-pick bits and pieces of what you want us to hear. And it can be harmful as well.

Overall, it could potentially be harmful if I'm not allowed to provide the best care for my patients based on the most accurate and the most up-to-date information. Dr. Neshwat, 30 seconds for a closing comment. I know this is a tough question for 30 seconds, but what did we learn from this pandemic? What's a lesson that we learned?

I think it's important to just know your risk and take responsibility and accountability for your own health. If you have underlying medical disease, if you're in a high risk group, protect yourself and then go on, live your life. Thank you for being so phenomenally important during the pandemic, and you will continue to be Fox News Medical Contributor, the great Dr. Jeanette Neshwat. Thank you, Doctor.

Thank you, Harry. Have a good one. You're welcome. What an awesome individual. What an honest doctor.

I mean, that's we can handle the truth to Dr. Fauci, to CDC. And I'll tell you, I think Rochelle Walinski is actually a much better person than her job has allowed her to be perceived. I can tell I see pain on her face when she says some of the things that she has said. She knows better.

I really believe that. We'll be back in just a moment. This is the Brian Killmead Show. Expanding your knowledge base. It's the Brian Killmead Show.

The fastest three hours in radio. You're with Brian Kilmead. Here's a picture of you. Right here on Facebook with a crowd of people. That's it.

With no mask on. This is my time, and I don't interrupt you. Here's another picture with you with a new mask on. I'm sorry, Miss Vaught, you are done. Can we have a police officer, please?

You should be able to say her peaceful. I've had to listen to people come and criticize me. That doesn't make it right, Jamie. You're right, but I had to say her. Those are my family.

That's my family. That is then fine. What do you think about our family? I am not. Our family has been suffocated today.

We're coming for them, all of them. And they're going to get them. If you haven't learned Commonwealth of Virginia from what just happened in San Francisco, it's something that I predicted on the Brian Kilmeat show in the past: that anybody that was eligible, you have to wait till someone's in office a year. You can't just say, hey, you won, I'm going to recall you the first day you take office.

So it's fair. You get to mess up for a year, and then you can be recalled. That almost is standard around the country. It's a little bit different in some, but it's almost universal.

Now, if San Francisco is canceling people with this behavior of wanting to change school names that bear the names Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln, and these crazy things that they were doing, and now in Virginia, notice something. Where elected officials, whether it's the lowest elected official school board member, and I was a school board member, I know the position. I never would have talked to a parent like that ever. You take the position because either you want to do well by the school, you want to do good for yourself personally, you want to run for the next office, but you want to have a little bit of a resume.

So you run for the school board, then you run for your local government, so on and so forth. Everybody out there that's done it, you've done it for altruistic reasons or you've done it for your own personal political reasons, but you've done it. But speaking out words like, that's it, you're done, and things like that. And I love that answer from Alicia Vaught. We're coming after you.

She was ready, the one board member was ready to give up her seat. Oh, we're coming after you, and they'll get you.

Now Here is something. That I know is a fact, but it's going to sound like an opinion. You always know how effective an individual or a movement is by the reaction from the other side. When they overreact and go crazy and call you domestic terrorists, when you are moms and dads that love your children unconditionally, would die for your children. And you see things going on that for two years their social-emotional well-being has been under assault.

They've lost the ability to have nonverbal communication. You know, if you've ever done it before, go look at yourself in the mirror with a face mask and you have dead eyes. Smile. And it's amazing. You almost feel like the face lit up as well that you can't see.

This mask thing was more injurious than anyone is being honest about. Brian Kilmey has been honest about it. But that's when you know. Trump, for example. Trump was such a threat to the swamp.

He was such a threat to the establishment that even people on his side of the aisle. considered him a threat. Because he wanted to change the way the game is played. Because he came in from the outside, and they don't like people crashing their party. That's why they called you domestic terrorists.

Keep doing what you're doing. It's legal. It's appropriate. Don't let them put egg timers on you and tell you to shut up. Keep doing your job.

This is the Brian Kilmey Show. The talk show that's getting you talking. You're with Brian Kilmead. From those who have seized and are holding power in Kiev, we demand an immediate cessation of hostilities. Otherwise, all responsibility for the possible continuation of the bloodshed will be entirely on the conscience of the ruling regime and the territory of Ukraine.

Wow. Is that chutzpah on steroids, times infinity? Oh my gosh, the words of Russian President Vladimir Putin, where he is leading peacekeepers, if we're to believe him, and just really intellectually dishonest tripe. Joining us on the Brian Kilmead Show, on the Brian Kilmead Show, Newsmaker hotline, and all my respect, he is near one of the hottest spots in the world right now. Lucas Tomlinson, enjoy your work all the time.

Pentagon correspondent for the Fox News Channel. This is quite a moment. I think it's a tipping point moment in many respects. Lucas, welcome to Brian's show. What can you tell us?

Well, thanks very much, Harry. It's great to join you. I would say that only the Russians are calling these peacekeeper forces. The rest of the West, NATO and then U. S.

forces are not. They're calling them, quite frankly, an invasion force. And you saw the language in the White House today ratchet up calling this incursion into these contested areas of Eastern Ukraine an invasion. And the NATO Secretary General is speaking right now and saying that a large scale invasion, the threat of one, still exists. For the Brian Kilmy Show listeners, Lucas Tomlinson is in Lviv, Ukraine, the western portion of the country.

Relative to what your ears are hearing and your eyes are seeing, are you hearing the sounds of things blowing up? I mean, has this started and just no one saying it officially? What can you say relative to that?

Well, it's definitely starting in the eastern part of the country. Keep in mind, Harry, that Ukraine is about the size of Texas. I'm all the way in the western portion of the country, more or just on a map speaking, El Paso and what's going on in the east, you could say Houston or something like that.

So it's quite a ways away, over twelve hours away. That being said, All the diplomats here that evacuated Ukraine's capital Just fled yesterday to Poland.

Now I'm told some are coming back.

So U.S. officials are very jittery. And there are Russian forces hours away in Belarus. In fact, 30,000 Russian forces, and they just finished a joint military exercise in Belarus. And surprise, surprise, and when the exercises ended Sunday, the defense minister of Belarus said, actually, these Russian forces are going to stay.

So they haven't gone home. There are still 150 Russian troops in the north, south, and east. And of course, let's not forget there's about six warships full of Russian Marines. Tanks and other armored units at sea. And some officials I've spoken to think that's a vulnerable area.

The Sea of Azov and parts of the Black Sea, of course, you have the major Port city of Odessa, a big vacation spot for the Russians and a major port and drives a lot of the commerce. Remember, Ukraine, they have a lot of minerals here. You heard the Chinese say they hope Russia respects the Ukrainian boundary, not to get too off on a tangent here, but there are a lot of countries that you might not suspect that actually are telling Russia, wait, hold on here because they're trading partners of the Ukrainians. They want the industry, the materials, and all that, and they don't want to see Russia get it. But the speech that you uh played coming in here.

Harry, he was a s Putin was essentially reading from the 5,000-word essay he penned over the summer. It's actually posted on the Kremlin's website in English. One Google and Mahi search away, take Gat and then watch. Putin essentially said Ukraine and Russia are one people.

Now when you walk the streets of Ukraine, the Ukrainians here, of course, bum their nose at that and say, B yes, we're happy to be Ukraine if we're happy to be free. A majority of this country wants to be part of the West. They want to be part of the European Union. They want to be part of NATO. They long to side with Western Europe, the United States, not Russia, and certainly not Vladimir Putin.

The playbook was written over the summer with this 5,000-word essay, and that's what Putin, you know, you know, it was just Chalk full of history, of course, revisionist history. And don't forget, This is a crisis over 30 years in the making when the Soviet Union disintegrated and fell apart. Who wants to put it back together? When the Soviet Union fell apart in the woods of Belarus outside Minsk in 1991, they didn't even have a typewriter or a computer. They just wrote it.

And so there's a lot of conspiracy, like, okay. why can't we get this thing back together? That's Putin's whole mentality. He thinks Ukraine is not a separate country but part of Russia. In fact, a former senior intelligence official told me, hey, Lucas, once you dust off that map of nineteen thirty eight Soviet Union, that's what Putin wants.

Great update, Lucas. Live from Lviv, Ukraine, on the Brian Kilmeat Show is. the Pentagon correspondent For Fox News, Lucas Homlson, and we pray for you because, regardless if you're in the western portion of the country, I mean, you are near one of the hottest spots on the planet right now. And I'm a Shakespeare fan, especially when it comes to Antonio and that past his prologue. If we go back to 2014, when the then Obama Biden administration sent blankets to Ukraine.

They were in a tough spot then, as you know. Putin had invaded Ukraine, annexed Crimea. The sanctions didn't mean anything to him whatsoever. He got what he wanted. And should should we have done more when he had seventy five thousand troops at the border and then he watched what America did.

He watched what the world would do. And then he decided, hey, you know what? Nobody seems to mind this too much. I'll just say I'm doing like military exercises, even though nobody believes that. And now they're peacekeepers, as you know.

And we talked about that. And now, so how about 150,000 and maybe throw another 30,000 on top of that? And oh, by the way, we're going to do these things like, say, you're independent areas, but it's really just part of his bridge to the sea, as Eric said to me before Showtime this morning. And I throw that out to you in the form of: were mistakes made? Obviously, Putin is capable of doing whatever he wants.

I think he's planned for sanctions and he's ready for them, and that that's not going to stop a single thing that he would do. But did we blow it in a sense?

Well, there's no question, Pruden, this is all part of a master plan. This is a step by step process. If you're any football fans out there, there's like a lot of run pass option, little RPO. Going back to Crimea, what's very interesting is that when Russia annexed Crimea in twenty fourteen, which was about eight years ago Sunday, fifty eight nations abstained from criticizing Russia, the United Nations. I mean, that's over a quarter of the world.

So it's not just the United States who installed on Russia, there's a lot of people. And not just I'm just talking about the dictators and Democrats. We're talking about some democratic nations. There's a lot of criticism, and certainly, you know, in hindsight, was Putin deterred? And you're right, if Putin is going to go as far as saying.

things he can get away with. There's no question. And you see this what's happening in the East. Uh and by the way, if if the gun boss, you know, Juhan Stunetsk and Crimea all get put under the Russian flag and Russian takes this territory. That's about thirteen percent of Ukraine's land.

So you're seeing this big bite out of the of eastern Ukraine right now. You see Russian forces going in. They're not going in on a year rail path. They're going in on T seventy, T tens, T eighties, all kinds of real Russia has modernized its military. Going back to two thousand eight when they invaded Georgia, throughout the seventy thousand number, that's about how many troops Russia had in the invaded Georgia right after the Olympics, by the way.

This Russian military has come a long way since it is modernized. is a whole different force. We're seeing it with these missile tests over the weekend. There's an intercontinental ballistic missile test, missiles fired from submarines, from ships, from bombers, from fighter jets. Uh you know Part of what's going on, the calculus of Putin showing the world what he has, and also strangling.

Ukraine. Former Lieutenant General Ben Hodges, I interviewed him last weekend, former head of U.S. Army Europe. He basically who's less concerned about a full-scale Russian invasion and more of just Russian forces squeeze Ukraine like a boa constrictor. They don't have to take the capital.

They can just squeeze this country, not necessarily to death, but you're already seeing, besides the American journalists here, there's no tourists. They don't walk the streets right now of Ukraine, whether it's Kyiv or the capital or here in Lviv and meet a whole lot of tourists. This is where I am at the university town. People are going about their business, but people are starting to feel. They're starting to complain.

I've been here over three, about three weeks now. There's definitely a marked difference when I first arrived in the country and now. People. They're seeing the satellite images, they're seeing the news reports, they're definitely scared. Back to your question about did the West blow with Putin?

A big part of what he's doing is to get respect, Harry. I think a big part of Putin's calculus is, let's not talk about the Middle East, let's not talk about China, I want to talk about Russia. I want to be back on the big stage. Putin, the saddest day of his life as a mid-grade KGB officer, with the Soviet Union falling apart. You know, he wants to put that back together.

He looks at the Tsars or the Tsarinas in Catherine the Great's case, who, by the way, said the only way to get stronger is by expanding the borders. This is the Putin playbook, and he knows. you can do it under the guise of protection. You hear this term peacekeeper forces. He's going into Eastern Ukraine to protect the separatists.

He thinks he's helping them. That's why some officials I talk to are less They're not right now seeing what Jake Sullivan is predicting about this massive airstrikes from the sky, missile strikes and from jets. But there's certainly a lot of concern. The question about whether people blew it, I'll let the historians and the pundits. I'll leave it there to them.

But there's certainly a case that When Russia took Crimea and has been mucking around in eastern Ukraine, that Putin did not get the message. See, there you go. That was one of the smartest, most important narratives that any broadcaster in America has shared because you're in country and you know the difference between when Ukrainians were just living their lives and not knowing for sure if it was going to happen and having a sort of fresh memory from not that long ago what can happen and what Russia is capable of, to now it seems like it's very real. And so it changes the whole modality of this situation. In terms, those just joining the Brian Kilmey show on the Brian Kilmey Show Newsmaker Hotline is Pentagon correspondent Lucas Tomlinson.

He is live from Lviv, Ukraine. And is it palpable? Do you get the feel that this is ready to just unload? Is that sort of the feeling, or is it still in doubt? And by the way, if you could add to it, Lucas, you Ukraine 2014 versus Ukraine 2022 preparedness, how they could hold up, do they think they actually stand a chance?

Or are they just almost accepting that they're going to be taken if Putin wants to take them? What are your thoughts relative to all of that? And make no mistake. Yoshi has it. Russia's defense budget is ten times greater than Ukraine's.

If Russia launched a full scale invasion, Ukrainian forces would be completely outgunned, outmanned. Of course, where it would get very tough for the Russians quickly is, of course, the Ukrainians would fall back and launch an insurgency, turning into global warfare. It would almost be like the U. S. invasion of Iraq, but in reverse.

um you know the u s military has supplied the ukrainians with Hundreds, if not thousands, of Javelin anti-tank missiles. The Baltic states are providing American Stinger anti-aircraft missiles. These are not going to blunt a full-scale invasion, but they can make life a living hell for young Russian soldiers, a third of whom are conscripts. far away from home. Yeah.

It's concerning officials right now is think about those troops that have now moved outside of garrison, outside of their barracks, outside their little bases, and they're now poised to strike on the border. About half the Russian forces are on the border right now, prepared to strike. They're in the woods. The conditions are pretty tough. At some point, they either need to come in and invade or go home because they're just not in a position.

They didn't stay there for too, too long. Your question about has Ukraine built up its army since 2014, there's no question. A lot of that has to do with the fighting in the east. I've talked to officials about this. I went to some militia training, men, women, children learning some basic combat skills, how to make bombs out of basic ordinary goods.

You've heard of the Mall Top cocktails. They've been teaching everybody to make that nasty brew. You know, people are learning this stuff and they're being taught by military veterans who have come from eastern Ukraine. Keep in mind, Harry, over 14,000 Ukrainians have been killed fighting the Russians and Russian-backed separatists. We're on the street and I ask people, hey, what are you about the Russian invasion?

Most of the time, and this is not lost in translation, most of the time they just shrug and say, we've been at work for eight years. They know what it's like to lose land in Crimea and Eastern Ukraine. They've seen loved ones come back in body bags. They've seen brothers go to the Eastern Front and fight in this almost like World War I conditions, trench warfare and artillery. You're seeing it now when you hear about all these ceasefire violations.

Most of those rounds, when you hear about 2,000 ceasefire violations, there's actually one round that's considered a ceasefire violation. Yeah, this is just it's Crude stuff. It's you know, kleshnikovs, 762 rounds, artillery, even tank rounds, I've been told.

So People here are grizzled, they're veterans. At the same time, just, you know, in the capital and here in Western Ukraine, How young people, they're pretty cool, they're pretty wicked, right there. It's like going to a big city i in the States. And by the way, with regrets, Lucas, 30 seconds. We've got a hard break in about 30 seconds.

What an important presentation. What a world-class presentation. Let me steal the last few seconds just to say to you. Stay safe. Do your job as you do so well and get home safe.

And this was such a world-class presentation that you made. I wish you well.

Well, thank you, brother. I really appreciate it, and it's an honor to be here. Stay safe. Lucas Tomlinson, Pentagon correspondent for the Fox News channel, live from Lviv, Ukraine. Does it get any more real than that?

It's happening now. He is there and he is reporting at such a high scale level. We'll be back. This is the Brian Kilmeat Show. Newsmakers and newsbreakers, hear it first on the Brian Kill Meet Show.

He's so busy, he'll make your head spin. It's Brian Kilmeade. You want to be decommunized?

Well, we're quite fine with that. But don't stop halfway, as they say. We are ready to show you what decommunizing Ukraine really means. Can we say on the Brian Kilmeet Show, wow. And if I still had the great Lucas Tomlinson here, Pentagon correspondent for Fox News Channel, this just came out about two minutes.

Before coming back from the break, Foxnews.com, you have to check it out. Your head will want to spontaneously combust. You'll have to read it a couple times because you'll say, come on. is just s some kind of Saturday Night Live skit. Is this Larry David playing Putin?

Is this what is going on around here? This is Greg Guttfeld playing Putin. This is insanity. Uh Putin has just said it. that he is calling on Ukraine to demilitarize.

Now you just heard Eric Play. that Putin has called previously for Ukraine to decommunize. There is just no mistaking it here. Vladimir Putin is reinventing language. He is assigning words that when you hear them or you read them, They bear no resemblance.

to reality, to the truth. I mean, this is just out minutes ago. Vladimir Putin. Calling for Ukraine to demilitarize, while he has somewhere in the neighborhood of at least. 180,000, possibly more.

Standing by. Right there. Near or in their country. And deciding for himself areas that are no longer Ukraine and. All of this.

What an eventful time it has been today. On the Brian Killmeat Show. Thank you to Allison, Pete, and Eric for making it such an honor and a privilege, and Brian for trusting me to fill in today. Brian will be back very, very soon. This I can promise you.

Tomorrow is going to be another big news day, so make it right here on the Brian Kilmeet Show. Put the power of over 100 meteorologists and the worldwide resources of Fox in your hands with the Fox Weather Podcast. Precise, personal, powerful. Subscribe and listen now at FoxNewsPodcasts.com or wherever you get your podcasts.