Border war: Liberal mayors blame... Gov. Greg Abbott?

From Hayatop Fox News headquarters in New York City, always seeking solutions, never sowing division. It's Brian Kilmead. Hi everyone, welcome to the latest moments of the Brian Killmeat Show.

So glad you're here. A lot to discuss, including some breaking news. And this is, this is, we don't know where this is gonna go, but. You remember uh Uh, Salamani, uh, the vicious terrorist general, but very well respected, extremely bright. Qasim Salimani, four years ago, we took him out with a drone strike, thanks to President Trump and thanks to some great work on our side.

With a drone strike, blew him up in his car, landed in Iraq, he was up to no good. They were celebrating four years since his death. And there was an explosion at his grave site. At least 70 people are dead, 173 wounded.

So far, they have not come out and said it was Israel. That's the first thing you think of. They have not said anybody is responsible, but think about this. 24 hours prior, there was a takeout of a key Hamas military leader in Lebanon, site of Hezbollah. We'll keep you up to date on that.

This hour will be joined by Rich Lowry, but first let's get to the big three.

Now, with the stories you need to know, it's Brian's big three. Number three. There are people who have come straight out and said Claudine Gay was only appointed because she's black, because she's a woman, but especially because she's black. Why are these elite colleges capitulating to it and essentially making it so uncomfortable for these women leaders that they have to step down to be replaced by white men? Right, exactly.

It's about white and black and men and women, not Claudine Gay. I'm talking about Hiram. Harvard fires. Actually, she quit as their unqualified plagiarized president. And I'm talking about Claudine Gay.

But what does it really solve? Anti-Semitism, DEI on college campuses? Yes, she liked the UPenn president remain on the faculty, still get her full salary. And of course, other just call the whole thing racist. Number two.

We don't seek a conflict wider in the region. We certainly aren't looking for a conflict with the Houthis. The best outcome here would be for the Houthis to stop these attacks. And we have an obligation with our allies and partners to keep the flow of commerce moving there. The Houthis should stop these attacks.

Right, exactly, Admiral. That'll do it. Tell them to stop the attacks. Admiral Kirby, weak. That's how I characterize how we are handling the pro-Hamas protesters in America and how we are handling our attackers in the Middle East and how we are trying to rein in Israel, who thankfully is not listening.

Number What Governor Abbott has done in his total reckless disregard for using people as pawns, it just wants to create chaos. And we can't be so stagnant that we don't respond. Are you kidding? You're blaming the governor of Texas for your sanctuary city policies and the collapse of your Democratic president's border? The border war.

7 million plus have poured into our nation under Biden. Maybe that was his plan, but he could not have foreseen how it is affecting the people in the states that he won. Mayor Adams, New York City, paying the biggest price, yet they choose to make Texas the bad guy. This is just so unbelievable to me, and I've seen a lot. But now, yesterday, Rosanna Scotto, local Channel 5 anchor here, sat down with Mayor Adams and talked about.

The Sanctuary City status. Have over 100,000 people still here. Over 180,000 people have come here over the last two years. But we never used to give them hotels, three meals a day, and their laundry while refusing to deport them or investigate them. And they are committing crimes.

He admits that. But again, they blame Texas, Texas for putting them on buses and saying, guys, you probably don't want to stay in this small border city. Why don't you go somewhere else? And they do. Chicago, New York, Philadelphia, Washington, D.C.

They have to form at a heavy cost of $11 billion since 2021, the Lone Star Border Security Effort that challenges the federal government to do their job because they have to do it for them. And now, you know what the federal government is doing? They're actually appealing. The court ruling That said that they have to Leave the barbed wire at the border. Not only is the federal government not doing their job at the border, they want to make sure that Texas doesn't put barbed wire there, stopping people from coming through the border or at least slowing them down.

So now you have a delegation, about a third of the House, Republican side, led by the Speaker of the House, taking a detailed look at the border, led by Congressman Rodriguez of Texas, of Uvalde fame, and he's showing them exactly what needs to be done, exactly the problems, because they're in very intense negotiations to not only fund the Ukraine, Israeli, and Taiwan potential wars and current wars, but also to fix the border because it is a catastrophe. Here's Mayor Adams talking about why don't you change the Sanctuary City policy? Cut to. But everybody keeps talking about Sanctuary City, that we're not using it the way that it was originally intended. And I agree.

We cannot by law tell someone if they come into the city, you can't come into the city. We can't even turn them over to ICE. I know, we see that. There are crimes that are going on in the city that are migrant related. And there's no talk about that at all.

Why not? Can't the NYPD notify ICE? The law states that we cannot notify ICE. I cannot break the law and enforce the law. Why don't you make it a public mission?

To tell everyone about this law, the right to shelter and push it every single time. You sit down with the mass media, especially on this show. And you sit there and you say, This is what I need to be done. I need some help here. Governor, I need some help here.

Don't be, you've not been afraid, Mayor Adams, in the past to take on the governor, who's made your life miserable.

So do it again. Cut two. The President says the border is secure. Is it?

Well, I don't know the definition of what they're using as secure. I think too many people are coming through various pathways and cavities in our border. And we have to be extremely careful because not everyone that's coming is pursuing the American dream. Why does he sometimes sound exactly on point, and other times sound so detached and political?

Now, Mayor DiBasio, I had no hope for. Mayor Bloomberg, I thought, was a really good mayor. I don't care the big gulp and all those things. Those are the good old days when we used to worry about him regulating our diets. But Mayor Bloomberg understood it.

He understood what he was saying. I'm not for his green mission, but he wouldn't destroy an economy to fix he'd fix it. I also understood that Mayor Bloomberg took money out of his pocket to fix certain things. Here's what I don't want to spend the whole time on Friday Mayor Adams, but this is just too good. Cut for.

What Governor Abbott has done in his total reckless disregard for using people as pawns, he has shifted and just wants to create chaos. And we can't be so stagnant that we don't respond to his shift. And that is what we're going to do. We're going to be extremely calculative in how we do it, utilize our manpower, our resources, utilize our executive order's powers to not just be stagnant. We put out an executive order.

If he's shifting, we're going to shift.

Well, you know what he did?

So what he's discussing is he put in an executive order that basically says you've got to give a certain amount of notice before the buses come in. You can only come in a certain amount of times, and then they've got to go check the manifest to see who's on the bus.

Well, I hate to tell you, we have no idea who's coming through the border, let alone on the bus. Number two, you know what Mayor Adams did? He's telling the buses drop in New Jersey, then they go right to the train station in Secaucus, New Jersey, which is a big town, big hub, and they hop on a train and get to New York that way.

So that's how Mayor Adams got around it. And for him to blame. for him to blame Abbott is nuts because Abbott is not the problem. You could say the Mexican President is the problem. You could say Central and South America is the problem.

The cartels is the problem. But why should Mayor Adams pay the price because he happens to be located on the border that other states not feel the the Abdication of authority that the president is showing at the border or not showing. Here's what Abbott said to the criticism. The sheer hypocrisy of these Democratic mayors knows no bounds. They're now going to extreme lengths to avoid fulfilling their self-declared Sanctuary City promises.

Yet they remain silent as President Biden transports migrants all around the country and oftentimes in the cover of night, instead of attacking Texas' effort to provide relief to our overwhelmed border communities, these Democratic mayors could call on their party leader to finally do his job and secure the border, something he continues refusing to do. Of course, you are the magnet. And then this idiot governor of Los Angeles, excuse me, of California. Former mayor of San Francisco, he destroyed that.

Now he's trying to destroy the state. Is now pledged every illegal immigrant gets health care.

So.

Now Nice families in Ecuador, Bolivia, Venezuela, Nicaragua. Cuba Liberia Uh Uh Latvia. Why would you stay in your countries? Come to America. Free healthcare, free shelter.

They're not going to have a court date to look at my asylum status for seven years. I could stay. Do they understand the ripple effect of this? And what I understand too is he's got about thirty billion dollars worth of debt, so he's as much as they're overtaxed in California, it's still not enough for all their social obligations. It's crazy.

That's why it also gives me hope. I think you can fix things with just logic. When people care less about politics and more about the people that put them in office, things are going to really fall into place. But right now, I have no idea what's going on. When we come back, I'll take your calls and I'm going to expand on this too.

Also, we're following that story over in Israel of the over in Iran. with that explosion at Salamani's gravesite. They killed at least seventy and wounded over one hundred and seventy more. And of course, Iran, who now has floated a warship into the Red Sea right near our assets, right near the Houthi rebels, where they had a spy ship telling them seemingly telling them where to rocket.

Now we'll see where this goes in the region. It is on fire. Rich Lowry, the bottom of the hour, you're next, Brian Kilmicho. Politics, current events, and news that affects you. Brian's got a lot more to say.

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From his mouth to your ears, it's Brian Kilmead. These plagiarism allegations, where Claudine Gay has had to issue corrections, multiple corrections.

Now, we should note that Claudine Gay has not been accused of stealing anyone's ideas in any of her writings. She's been accused of sort of more like copying other people's writings without attributions. I can't even imagine what she's had to face. There are people who have come straight out and said that they believe that Claudine Gay, you know, before the plagiarism allegations even came out, that they believe Claudine Gay was only appointed because she's black, because she's a woman, but especially because she's black. Why are these elite colleges capitulating to it and essentially making it so uncomfortable for these women leaders that they have to step down to be replaced by white men?

Yeah, and they're talking about the interim president being a white man. He must be a horrible person. Black has nothing to do with it. Female has nothing to do with it. Plagiarism has everything to do with it.

Her ridiculous comments about anti-Semitism, the climate at the school, which has gotten a lot of donors saying, screw you, you're not getting billions of dollars, including Ackerman, who's one of the most respected investors in Wall Street, who was a big donor. He actually wants the U Penn person out. He wants the Harvard president out. He was successful both.

Now he wants the MIT leader out. But guess what? It's really not going to solve anything. What's it going to solve? She's still on staff.

They didn't say they're going to change the curriculum. They didn't say it was eye-opening to see the hatred towards Jews on campus or the pro-Hamas movement out there with their chanting in the streets. I'm not saying that happened on Harvard campus. They're cheering for Yemen to rocket commercial ships. I mean, where does that mindset come from?

It's just insane.

So Uh I um The fact that she lost her job after two weeks, evidently, she said last week she knew she was going to quit, but she probably wants to stem the investigation into her background and find out. The more people look at it, she's got the thinnest resume of anyone who was ever president of Harvard. Her PhD work is heavily plagiarized. They found 42 different instances. They're going to look at the other eight or nine things she read.

They're finding more of it. Chris Ruffo deserves a lot of the credit for this. He did an investigation. And that brought him to where we're at right now. That's what's happening with Harvard.

Remember, this is what spurned the whole thing. And the bigger story is not Harvard. Not Yale, not Columbia, not MIT. It's all of it. It's the University of Michigan.

It's an absolute mess. What is happening in a school where you send your kids? I mean, I hear the things about the University of Texas. I mean, this is a wake-up call. Hopefully people don't think that they've gotten through the worst.

Here is a little of the exchange that opened people's eyes, Cut 18. Do you believe that type of hateful speech is contrary to Harvard's code of conduct, or is it allowed at Harvard? It is at odds with the values of Harvard. Can you not say here that it is against the code of conduct at Harvard? We embrace a commitment to free expression, even of views that are objectionable, offensive.

Hateful. But killing?

Well, free speech. You could kill each other or threaten to kill each other. I'm pretty sure that's a crime. Cut 19. She goes on.

So the answer is yes, that calling for the genocide of Jews violates Harvard Code of Conduct, correct? It depends on the context. It does not depend on the context. The answer is yes, and this is why you should resign. The way she came right in after that, it's so exasperating.

It just reminds me of sometimes with your kids, and you say, just admit that you did this or you didn't listen to me. And then they try to hedge and make excuses. And you got to be kidding. Where are you coaching somebody and you say, why didn't you run? Why didn't you overlap?

Why didn't you get back on defense? They go, well, I heard the refs whistle and made me go back. Come on, I know you didn't hear the refs whistle. You got to get back.

So To hear people think that has anything to do with race is insane. Plus, the person who got fired, the president who got fired at the University of Pennsylvania, is a white woman.

So she might even so she's it's great that she's a woman, but white, she's terrible must be a terrible anyway.

So it had to be done.

So here's a little of Elise Stefanik last night after the Harvard President quit, cut twenty-one. There is a reason that the testimony of the presidents of Harvard, Penn, and MIT made history as the most viewed testimony ever with over 1 billion views, and that's because their testimony was morally bankrupt and pathetic. My question was very simple. It was a moral question. Does calling for the genocide of Jews ruin your school's code of conduct?

Does it go against your school's code of conduct? And every single one said it depended upon the context. We know it does not depend on the context. It should be condemned. It is not that difficult to say that, yet all three failed abysmally, and the world saw it.

So at least Stevonik later tweeted out, Harvard knows that the long overdue forced resignation anti Semitic plagiarist President is just the beginning of what will be the greatest scandal of any college or university in history. She went on to say, stay tuned. Harvard Corporation board members' resignations must be forthcoming. They are complicit in covering up the massive scandal with unbelievable arrogance and cavalier attitudes that irreparably damaged Harvard's academic integrity and moral leadership.

So, Chris Ruffo, who did the investigation, and keep in mind it's two-tiered. One, it's a lack of leadership and acceptance of the anti-Semitic behavior on campus. And then, there's the fact that her credentials are thin and her plagiarism is plentiful. Cut 23. Certainly, this was my initial goal to topple President Gay from the presidency of Harvard.

But Harvard has to go much further. Harvard needs to abolish its DEI programs. It needs to put a permanent end to its racist admission system. It needs to pledge institutional neutrality on controversial political issues. And it needs to diversify the faculty not on skin color, but on philosophy, on political belief, on viewpoints.

That's really what Harvard needs to do to start rebalancing the institution. Our reporting on Claudian Gay's plagiarism, on her DEI empire, and on her absolutely botched handling of the campus anti-Semitism controversy shows that the institutions are weak, their ideology is a failure, and we're just getting started in this campaign for reform.

So Bill Ackman wrote he's the billionaire at two Sally.

So Sally Kornbluth is the one who is still running MIT. Reverend Al Sharpton never fails. Instead of weighing in, doing the right thing and saying that she was wrong to plagiarize, says black women in this country who put a crack in the glass ceiling announces Al Sharpton has pledged to picket the Manhattan offices of Bill Ackman after the billionaire hedge fund manager's successful campaign against Gay. Sharpton accused Ackman 57 of relentlessly campaigning against President Gay, not because of her leadership or credentials, but because he felt she was a DEI hire. That's true, too.

A DEI hire didn't rise to the occasion. Uh and the DEI thing's gotta go with ESG. A talk show that's real. This is the Brian Kill Me Show. You know, this president has done more in three years than any other president has done in two terms.

And that is important here, Audi. If you think about the legislation that deals with infrastructure, the roads and tunnels that are now are going to be really dealt with in a real way. You think about the Chips and Science Act. You think about beating big pharma and lowing prescription drugs. And so as we head into the new year, last year and out of the State of the Union, the President talked about finishing the job.

And so the President is going to continue to work on the economy. That is KJP yesterday trying to say how much President Biden has done. Yeah, he did the CHIPS Act. He did two spending plans, the Inflation Reduction Act, as well as the rescue plan we did not need. He also allowed more people to die with a vaccine than Trump allowed to have a vaccine during his last year in office.

So you could look at that. You could say he's got some numbers on his side. But the infrastructure bill, I don't think anything's been done on it. We just spent a ton of money on it. The CHIPS Act, I think in theory, is good to bring CHIPS home.

But some of the restrictions on the CHIPS Act make a lot of companies say, I really don't want to be bothered with the constraints. He is Not following through the border is the biggest disaster ever. And you look at the spending, we're at $34 trillion worth of spending. I mean, please. Where is this going?

Rich Lowry, editor of National Review, author of The Case for Nationalism. He also talked about this whole push to eliminate Trump from the ballot. But first things first, Rich, you got just a little bit of a preview of what 2024 is going to be like from the White House. What do you think about our argument?

Well, that's got to be part of their argument. The other is going to be disqualifying Trump, obviously. But the economic numbers have held up pretty good, except for, and this is a huge thing for most people, prices, right? And the inflation rate has gone down, but that leaves the prices for a lot of goods still a lot higher than they were when Joe Biden started. And that's obviously undermined his standing on the economy in a huge way.

The border, I mean, she's just always ridiculous on the border. The idea that Joe Biden is doing his utmost to six years of border is obviously laughable. That's a big issue. And then foreign affairs, you know, as we speak, we're getting humiliated by a small band of basically pirates in the Red Sea. The Ukraine war has not gone as ideally, obviously.

The counteroffenses was a bit of a fizzle. And then, you know, we have a war in the Middle East.

So people are going to look and say, wait wait a minute, why am I supposed to think any any of that's better than when President Trump was in office?

So and then you have the age thing. You put it all together and that's why his standing is so low and that's why he easily, easily could lose to Trump in November. I mean, he should lose. I mean, he has done nothing to keep that job. If you look at especially the area of expertise, as he calls it, with tell me things are better with China.

I will not, I don't know anybody that thinks things are better with China. Tell me things are better with Russia. There's nobody who thinks things are better with Russia. Tell me things in the Middle East are on the glide path they were the best they can with the Abraham Accords under the previous president. Obviously, isolating Iran was the key.

Going back to them has been the biggest disaster ever. The lack of a muscle vigorous response has led us, nobody wants to sign up for the military.

Now they really don't want to sign up because they're not even allowed to shoot the shooter. They can only shoot the missile that the shooter shoots, which is an absolute embarrassment. But first things first, you did write about the push to eliminate Trump, and you reminded everybody how desperate they were to eliminate Trump in 2016. And they failed. They never admitted that he won.

They said Russia put him there. Remember, they just now. He won in 2016. They said Trump's election was like the Flight 93 you reminded us. Rich, want to expand on that?

Yeah, so The There's a school of thought on the right that in 2016 you had to win, or this might be the end of everything. This is the last chance, the last throw of the dice. And I think that was hyperbolic, but a lot of people did make the judgment, you know, Trump, even if he's kind of unknown in certain respects, is going to be better than Hillary. And now the left has talked itself into the proposition that it'll be the end of the American Republic if Donald Trump wins this election. He'll inevitably be a dictator.

And for me, that just shows whatever the reaction was in 2017 after Trump won, you know, all the denial and the distortion of a law enforcement process to try to destroy his presidency, whatever that was and however bad that was, it's going to be multiples worse this time around. And if you really think someone's a dictator, a literal, no-kidding dictator, that justifies revolution, basically.

So I do think we're going to see extra-legal means to resist him. We potentially could see serious violence to resist him if Trump. Wins again.

So, what I said in this column is this year is going to be crazy, but if Trump wins, 2025 will be crazier.

Well, he's a dictator. He'll be unleashed. He wouldn't have to worry about reelection. And it's the end of democracy in the country.

So, it'll be the craziest you think last time was tumultuous. This will be off the charts.

So, I want you to hear.

So, now they're trying to get him off the ballot in multiple states. They have him off the ballot temporarily in Colorado and Maine, it seems. The appeals are supposed to be successful. Here's what this Palm Beach County state attorney said: Dave Ahrenberg on MSNBC, CUD 33. I know that some are saying, as you discussed, that this is undemocratic to take the matter away from voters.

But as Charlie said, this constitution of ours has to mean something, right? I mean, I think it's undemocratic to allow people to run for office who aren't qualified to do so. If Barack Obama announced he was running for president this year, Republicans would light their hair on fire. And Trump ironically built his political brand on saying that Obama didn't qualify to run because he wasn't a natural born citizen. Of course, he was.

But you can't say that the natural born citizen clause applies, but the insurrectionist clause does not. They are all qualifications to run for president, and you can't ignore one of them because you're worried about angering MAGA voters. Do you even understand that, what he's saying? I do, actually. At a level of abstraction, I agree.

We're not a pure democracy. There are these requirements. You know, you have to be over age 35. You have to be a natural-born citizen. You can't serve three terms, all that.

The problem is, if Trump actually engaged in insurrection, I would say, yeah, he's disqualified under the Constitution. But he didn't engage in insurrection. You know, that clause was put in there, obviously, post-Civil War. And it's not like a metaphor. It doesn't mean giving a speech people might not like.

It means engaging in insurrection, right? I mean, Trump had to be at the forefront of that crowd, you know, and urging them to violently assault the capital, which he didn't. He just didn't. I don't like what he did on that day. We've talked about it a lot.

But it wasn't an insurrection, and he didn't engage in it.

So that's why this is profoundly wrong. And it goes to just what we were talking about a minute ago, because they think democracy is that threat, they'll use any means to try to. supposedly say that, including frankly, undemocratic and unconstitutional means, which is this idea that he violated Article three of the Fourteenth Amendment and therefore just can't stand for election.

So all I can tell you is, I know it's easy to get confused with all these, and I get confused too. I got to remind myself almost every show.

So about what he's being charged with and where. But when you saw the New York case, I think a lot of Democrats are embarrassed by it. Then you saw the Alvin Bragg case, besides the civil case that he's going through now. The Alvin Bragg case, people are like, oh my goodness, is that it? And then you even saw this woman who accused him of rape.

They can't remember the year in which it happened and know that her lawyers would pay for George Soros. I'm thinking, okay, wait a second. He is with every case, he has dominated the news.

So even though he's not on the news, not on CNN, not on Fox as much, not on any other channel as much, he's dominated the news because they're looking to get him out and they think these trials are news, and they are. Listen to what David Oxarod has said. And again, he's being honest, cut 34. He's only gained since he started getting indicted. You know, what you thought might be kryptonite for him has turned out to be battery packs, and this is a big one for him.

Presumably, the Supreme Court will deal with it fairly quickly. And I expect that they will leave him on the ballot. I do think it would rip the country apart if he were actually prevented from running, because tens of millions of people want to vote for him. I think if you're going to beat Donald Trump, you're going to probably have to do it at the poll. I like his assessment.

He can't figure it out. But he knows to putting down 73 million people that voted for him last time is probably not going to be in his benefit if you want to stay just putting them down doesn't really work either. Yeah, I mean, every part of that is absolutely right. One of my least favorite words in journalism the last couple of months has been despite, because all these stories will say, well, here, Donald Trump is winning the Republican nomination despite being indicted multiple times. It's not despite, it's because, or at least in part because.

I mean, he'd be very strong even without the indictments. But clearly, as Ackelrod put it, it's been a battery pack. These actions knocking him off the ballot are a battery pack in the final weeks. of the campaign.

So they made him stronger. And the idea is at the trials, that's when they'll come in and drop the hammer and that that will hurt him and and destroy him if they make him a convicted felon. And maybe, maybe, but I'm skeptical. I mean, my guess is no one can know. If he's convicted, it'll be like the Access Hollywood tape for two or three weeks, it'll be the most shocking thing we've ever encountered.

His polling will go down and then it'll be forgotten and people absorbed by the system and everyone will kind of focus on the really important issues again. And we'll be back to a really close selection. There's two things. There's a couple of things happening. If you asked me in 2022, after so many of his candidates failed in key states, they didn't win back the Senate, which they should have, and they should have expanded their lead in the House.

And so many of his governorships, I said, okay, between the trials coming up and the candidates that he picked and their lack of productivity, he didn't really finance them either, besides after giving the endorsement. The money did not flow. I said, the thing is, he could get the nomination, but he can't win the general. I no longer feel that for two reasons. The Jet fuel and attention that some of these unfair cases have given?

Number one, Jack Smith's belligerence and aggression in going after him, even on cases that might have more traction. And then number three, how inept this President is and how things that he has tried have just fallen apart. His idea at the border It's a disaster in blue states as well as for our country. His view what is he doing in the Middle East? He put it on fire.

And then when you look at what's happened in Ukraine, haphazardly supporting them by giv by slow walking weapon systems, not following up with the auditing on on the the money that we're giving them, And now in a spot where they can't get financing because he has so little credibility for it, please tell me that you th anybody that you know that thinks that China is less aggressive now? And if you look at the ineptness in which he's handling it, it's made people want to go back to the way it was handled by the guy that they thought was just crazy. Absolutely right. I mean, there are basically only two things that have happened in this primary, which has been incredibly boring journalistically, the indictments that we've talked about. And two, Biden's weakness, which has led to the strength of Trump's polling.

Trump did not lead, I think there was one Rasmussen poll, but otherwise did not lead in one poll in 2020. Not one.

So, you know, it's easy to say he's probably going to lose. This is a strong, and, you know, Hillary, he ticked a buffer occasionally, but it was small. I mean, this is the strongest polling we have seen in a general election for Donald Trump ever during his political career. And it comes at a time when his opponents wanted to make an electability argument against him. And that's just blown that out of the water.

So all this has contributed to an environment where, you know, he hit 70 in one poll nationally a week or two ago. He's above 50 in Iowa, which is an incredibly dominant position in a multi-candidate field. And now he's weaker in New Hampshire. And I think it could actually lose New Hampshire. But even if he does, what does Nikki do with that?

She'll surge to 30% nationally. Immediately afterwards, and then it's really unclear where she's going to make up the other 20%, and she'll still be losing. Two to one.

So this thing just does not seem like a contest at the moment. How do you view her answer on slavery and what it does for the primary? I don't know whether it has a huge effect, but I mean, we're in the third or fourth news cycle of talking about it. It was a really notable event. She was completely at sea and felt cornered, obviously, by this question when she knew the answer.

And it was because she was afraid. She was afraid of saying the wrong thing. And that's another benefit Trump has generally. He may say the wrong thing or he may say dumb things, but he never shows fear. He is utterly fearless.

And that's why so many Republicans associate him with strength in a way they don't with Nikki Haley or Ron DeSantis who seem overly calculated.

So do you agree that I know what you just said about the polling, but this Rich Lowry, with all your experience and your contacts, as Editorial National Review and all the shows you've done and all the years and experience you have, you do believe that he has a shot at winning the general election? If you ask me today who will win in November, I think it'll be Donald Trump. And what if I asked you last year? But uh I mean last DS year at this time. Biden.

Biden. I would have said Biden. But things have changed. Biden is in I mean, it's hard to see how he gets out of the hole. Maybe he drags Trump down into the hole with him.

That's got to be kind of his strategy. But I think results matter. If Trump is winning by double digits on the economy, Uh in November, he's the next President of the United States. He just is. Right, I just saw the Wall Street Journal poll that says he wins by four.

He's up by four without a conviction. After a conviction, he loses by one.

So I'd keep an eye on polls like that. That was a Wall Street Journal poll. But that can obviously, you get hit hard and then he bounces all the way back. Rich, thanks so much. Fascinating time.

It's going to be a great year. You too. You got it. 1-866-408-7669. We'll talk about that.

And we're also going to talk about the other breaking news in commemorating the four years since Salome was taken out by a U.S. drone strike. While everyone gathered at his grave site, two explosions killed at least 70, wounded over 170, right in the center of Iran. We'll talk about that when we come back. Expanding your knowledge base, it's the Brian Kill Me Show.

A radio show like no other. It's Brian Killmead. It is so important that we figure out what happened with this sex trafficking ring, this human trafficking ring. You've been talking about the border and the cartels and the amount of human trafficking. And Sean, we know that human trafficking and sex trafficking has gone from being about a $500 million a year business a few years ago to upwards of $150 billion a year.

This is modern-day slavery. There are women and children that need this protection. Marshall Blackburn, the Senator Marshall Blackburn, who's leading the charge to get that Epstein list out. Everybody wants to see it. We know Bill Clinton evidently is on dozens of times.

Could President Trump be on there? Yesterday, Jimmy Kimmel was accused of being on there by Aaron Rodgers. Kimmel went back on Rodgers on that. I know they hate each other on the vaccine stuff. And, you know, Jimmy Kimmel likes to attack everybody all the time, but of course, he does nothing wrong.

He spends every show just beating up on Trump. Doesn't care if the rest of his audience just tunes out. That's why he's in third. Hey, Jim, you are listening in Virginia. Hey, Jim.

Good morning, Brian. What's in your mind?

So, I was just listening to your conversation about the polls showing Trump the head and all, which I get. My frustration is: I feel like a lot of the pundits, and I don't know where you are on it, but I just don't believe for a minute that the Democrats are going to let Biden be the nominee. And in every other poll, when Biden is not the nominee, Trump gets crushed.

So, I just feel like we're setting ourselves up. No, I mean, the last time I saw him against Gavin Newsome, he was beating him.

So was Nikki Haley beating Gavin Newsom. I don't remember what DeSantis was. I don't think Trump gets crushed against anyone. The question is: this. Does every Republican have an easier time against Biden?

Jim, I hear everybody talk about how Biden's not running, except Biden. And he's got the machine. Unless they have something over him, like they're, for example, holding off the dogs on how he's linked with Hunter Biden, how he's linked with his son directly, unless they have something over on him, he will not do this willingly. He basically spent the whole time on vacation. He doesn't get involved day to day.

He doesn't want to give up the power and possibly the ability to pardon his son.

So I I keep you oh, he's gonna be pulled at the last minute. I haven't seen any indication of it. I haven't seen the movement. And Michelle Obama. who everyone says can't lose, never did anything before in office, hasn't hasn't been a lawyer in a job for thirty five years.

Last thing she did productively was grow a garden. And she never wanted to be she never said, I want to be in politics.

So I think I think he's in. I do. I know everyone says he's too old. I think he's too old. I think his family should step in.

But barring any type of fall, I think it's going to be Biden. The bigger question is: will it be Trump? I think right now the answer is likely, but it's not over. They didn't even start yet. From the Fox News Radio Studios in Midtown Manhattan, it's the fastest-growing radio talk show.

Brian Kilmead. Hi everyone, Brian Killmead here. Like the guy said, welcome to 2024.

So thrilled to be here. It's going to be an exciting year on almost every day. What I know we can expect, just the events on the calendar will make it an exciting year, let alone the unexpected, including a terrorist. It looks as though a terrorist strike inside Iran, commemorating the death of Salome due to a U.S. drone strike.

There were two explosions. It killed 70. It wounded over 170 of those numbers expected to climb inside Iran. They have not said who is responsible. 24 hours prior, it looks like Israel took out one of Hamas' military leaders in Lebanon.

So, right hanging out with Hezbollah. Not a healthy thing to do if you are a Hamas leader, to be anywhere in the region or on the planet because of what they did. Coming up shortly, Andrew McCarthy will talk about that, as well as Daniel Hoppin, former CIA station chief who served in Moscow.

So let's get to the big three.

Now, with the stories you need to know, it's Brian's big three. Number three. There are people who have come straight out and said Buddy and Gay was only appointed because she's black, because she's a woman, but especially because she's black. Why are these elite colleges capitulating to it and essentially making it so uncomfortable for these women leaders that they have to step down to be replaced by white men? Exactly.

That's right. Get the women out. Harvard fires their unqualified plagiarizing president. And what does it really solve, though? Anti-Semitism and DEI on college campuses rages.

She, like the UPenn president, remains on the faculty for the same money. And of course, just another call to say, to give an opportunity to say America's racist. Number two. We don't seek a conflict wider in the region. We certainly aren't looking for a conflict with the Houthis.

The best outcome here would be for the Houthis to stop these attacks. And we have an obligation with our allies and partners to keep the flow of commerce moving there. The Houthis should stop these attacks. Weak. That's how I characterize how we are handling pro-Hamas protesters in America and how we are handling our attackers in the Middle East and how we are trying to rein in Israel, who thankfully is not listening.

Number one. What Governor Abbott has done in his total reckless disregard for using people as pawns, it just wants to create chaos. And we can't be so stagnant that we don't respond. Unbelievable. The border war.

That's Eric Adams, obviously, the mayor of New York City. He's blaming Mayor Eric, the governor of Texas. Border war. 7 million plus have poured into our nation under Biden. Maybe this was his plan, but he could not have foreseen how it's affecting the people who put him in office.

These blue states. Mayor Adams of New York City paying the biggest price, yup, right here. Yet they choose to make Texas the bad guy. As you know, they set up some rules that say you got to give notice before the buses come in. You can only come in a certain amount of times.

So Governor Abbott said, okay, well, drop him in New Jersey then. Andrew McCarthy, Fox News contributor, former assistant U.S. Attorney for Southern District of New York, best-selling author, joins us now. Andy, hope you had a great new year. Welcome to 24.

Thanks, Brian. And same to you and your family. I couldn't help but notice listening to you talk about Governor Abbott, I wonder if in New Jersey, Um I've lived here for about twenty years. And we say that you can get in for free, but you have to pay the toll to get out. Um so I don't know if those guys I don't know if they had to had to they just hop on the Sekakis train and they're in New York City.

That's right. That's right. And that's what they're doing now. But yet Mayor Adams is a bad guy. Hey, live up to your Sanctuary City policies, your right to shelter policies.

You bring people in, they take them. That's the magnet anyway. It's not because Texas is so welcoming. I mean, my goodness, they're being sued to not put Bob Wire up.

Now, can you believe the federal government is petitioning the appeals court who overturned the taking down of the Bob Wire put up by the Texas authorities, and now they're petitioning to have it removed again? What are your thoughts about that?

Well, I think it's a continuation of the Arizona case that was one of the more famous moments of the Obama Biden administration, where the Obama administration. went to the Supreme Court to try to get the state authorities in Arizona Not permitted to enforce federal law that the Obama administration didn't want to. Um in force. And I remember at the time You know, Justice Scalia. in one of the opinions he wrote in the case.

famously said That is something to the effect of If you if when they had the Constitutional Convention, you had told the states That they were forfeiting their Power. To keep people who were not authorized to be in their territories out of their territories, nobody would have ratified the Constitution. They would have run they would have run from For the exits in the Philadelphia Convention Hall.

So, this is actually. a critically important Question. about whether our constitutional system as it was designed Still exists because, in our system, our federalist system, the states are sovereign. in the areas of Of the life and governance that they are supreme in compared to the federal government. And the fact of the matter, Brian, is.

Self-defense. is a key ingredient of sovereignty. If you're not allowed to defend yourself, if you're not allowed to defend your territory, then you're not sovereign.

So, what the federal government is basically saying is that the state of Texas is not sovereign within its own territory. It can't. Keep people out of its own territory, even if it's unlawful for them to be there. It's a profoundly important issue to. whether we can keep this constitutional system as it was designed A lot of so a couple of things.

So, Mayor Eric Adams talked to Rosanna Scotto of Channel 5, Fox 5 in New York, and they were talking about the problem with illegal immigration. Listen to this give and take, cut to. But everybody keeps talking about Sanctuary City that we're not using it the way that it was originally intended. And I agree. We cannot by law tell someone if they come into the city, you can't come into the city.

We can't even turn them over to Addis. I know, we see that. There are crimes that are going on in the city that are migrant related. And there's no talk about that at all. Why not?

Can't the NYPD notify ICE? The law states that we cannot notify ICE. I cannot break the law and enforce the law. Can he over can he get rid of the Sanctuary City process status? Can he get rid of the right to shelter?

Those are the two things that would stop the would at least diminish the magnet strength. Yeah, the problem is the the chief executive of a municipality can't by himself repeal laws that have been passed by the legislature.

So what's happening here is New York is simply being forced to live under the insane laws that they have Enacted. And there are some, you know, there's some places where an executive has discretion about whether to enforce the law or not. But if the state legislature has taken power away from executive agencies like the police, then they can't go out and make arrests that aren't that aren't permitted under state law.

So I hate to say this because this comes up in a lot of things that we end up having to discuss, Brian. But they voted for this insanity.

So that this is just a matter I mean, it's terrible for the rest of us who look at it and told them while they were doing that, you know, you're you're crazy to do this. But the people in New York keep electing these people, and they do insane things. And you would think that if they did enough insane things, maybe you would change course and elect a different kind of person, but they don't do that. They just double down. Here here's more cut six.

This is a real problem. And the governor of Texas continues continuously state that while you guys are a sanctuary city, that has nothing to do with this. These people are paroled into the country. They're legally here. You thought.

Well, Biden's parole is illegal. And what Biden has done, which is just a scheme that it's It's very bad that the courts haven't brought the hammer down on this at this point. But what Biden has done is instead of Having a situation that his policies invite, which is that everybody just shows up. at the door or at these ports which we see on in our coverage on Fox night after night after night. Um his little arrangement is you can use an app.

And schedule your illegal entrance into the United States. And then he gives them. Authority to come in, which is not legal authority because only Congress can enact visa laws. But so far he's gotten away with it.

So they then pretend. that those people who come in are not illegal immigrants. And in the meantime, all they are are illegal immigrants who are conspiring with Biden to get in the country. And if they don't put those reforms into the reform that's coming down the pike that they're going to now, it's a waste of time. I don't want to hear about more border funding.

I don't want to hear about a bigger wall. You have to change the asylum policies. You've got to stop the parole in its tracks, right? Yeah, if they just increased funding, the Democrats would be delighted to increase. Border enforcement funding because what they call border enforcement funding is the money that they take.

That the public thinks is being dedicated to keeping the border secure. But what the Democrats are doing with it is they're transferring it. To what they deem to be the obligation to process these illegal immigrants so that they can get the system moving and get them into the country. I don't think most people when people hear that the government's spending a bunch of money on border security, I think most people think that means We're shoring up the border, but it actually means the very opposite because these people transfer these public funds to this process of bringing people in who don't have any authorization to be here. I want to talk about the Trump cases.

Now, Maine and Colorado are trying to get him off the ballot or gotten him off the ballot, they think, and now they're waiting for the Supreme Court to rule. Other states are waiting for the same thing. What do you expect to happen? What timing do you think there is? And there's a difference between the two states, right?

One, the Supreme Court in Colorado ruled. The other one was just the Secretary of State that ruled, correct? Yeah, that's right. And when I think when it was first reported yesterday, Brian, at least this was my impression of it, that people thought that there had been an appeal to the Supreme Court. Weirdly, the Trump team hasn't appealed the Colorado decision to the Supreme Court yet.

The appeal yesterday that was brought was to the main Supreme Court. And that's because, as you just correctly pointed out, it was a government official, not a court, that decided to take Trump off the ballot.

So now, what the Trump team is doing, which is the right thing to do, is they're going to the Maine Supreme Court and saying that that official doesn't have the authority to do that. Then, if the Maine Supreme Court rules against them, the next step would be to the Supreme Court of the United States. But I'm a little bit puzzled why. the Trump team hasn't already appeal to the Supreme Court on the Color on the Colorado case. A Republican organization represented by Jay Seculo.

appealed. But they haven't covered everything in their appeal that needs to be covered. And the person who ought to be appealing is former President Trump.

So January 5th, I think, is practically speaking the deadline because they have to make a decision on what the ballot is going to look like.

So I'm a little surprised they haven't appealed already, but I expect in the next couple of days they would appeal to the Supreme Court. Yeah, here's the Colorado Secretary of State, Jenna Griswell, CUP 32. We have expected an appeal from the former President and hope that the court acts with urgency. I certify the names onto the ballot for the presidential primary this Friday. And so we do hope that the court understands that presidential primaries are rapidly approaching and gives us a definitive answer whether or not the former President is disqualified from the ballot.

There you go.

So they want a quick answer, too. And then that would stop the other cases in his tracks?

Well, it depends on what the court did. But you know, it's hard to expect the court to act with urgency if the guy who should appeal hasn't appealed yet.

So I think they really got to get on with this. You can't really blame the court for not acting quickly if they haven't appealed. Understood. You wrote a column saying it's not you said the Constitution's answer to Trump's misconduct remains impeachment, not criminal prosecution.

So you're saying that if he wins the election, the trouble will begin again.

Well, I think yeah That'll only be one part of the trouble that begins again, because the D Democrats are going to do what they did the last time, which is resist everything he does. And they would be trying to impeach him from the first day. Um What I was trying to point out there, Brian, is that Um It's one thing if a president commits a private wrong, like the situation with President Clinton, where he encouraged perjury in a private lawsuit while he was president. It's quite another thing when you're talking about prosecuting a president over actions. That are within the ambit of his executive authority.

And by the way, that doesn't mean those are good actions. Like, for example, I didn't think you could prosecute Bill Clinton. for the pardons, the scandal at the end of his administration. Not that the pardons were good. They were scandalous.

He should have been impeached over them if he was going to continue in office. but they were within the realm of his executive authority, so I don't think he could be prosecuted over them. He could be impeached over them, but he couldn't be prosecuted. And I think this is the same situation. They're trying to prosecute Trump in the Washington case over actions he took as President, which were within the ambit of his executive authority.

I think the Constitution's remedy for that is impeachment, not criminal prosecution. And of course, if they lose the House, the day he'll get in, they'll just start impeaching him again. Yep. I bet on it. Yeah, and what a colossal waste of time this is, which we all see it is.

One's an investigation, one's not. I guess we'll see what happens. The courts are going to decide so much this year, Andy. Real quick for everyone, we have under thirty seconds. Out of the one case that Trump should be most worried about, what should it be?

I think it's the Washington case because it's the case that's most likely to get to trial. I don't think the Florida case is going to get to trial, and I doubt the other, the two state cases, are going to get to trial. All right, Andy McCarthy, always great. Thanks so much, Andy. Thanks, Brian.

Yeah, and pick up his column, too. All right, when we come back, we'll take your calls: 1-866-408-7669. Then we're going to bring you over to the latest with the Middle East and all the chaos over there. There's been a huge explosions inside Iran. Daniel Hoffman, CIA fame, joins us next.

Or no, excuse me, joins us at 34, but your calls are next. Don't move. Learning something new every day on the Brian Kill Me Show. The more you listen, the more you'll know. It's Brian Killmead.

And I've noticed that President Trump has given me some attention. And I appreciate that because that means he sees what we're seeing. But in his commercials and in his temper tantrums. Every single thing that he said. has been a lie.

Every single one. I looked for some grain of truth. Every single one. That is Nikki Haley knowing that she's gotten $24 million last quarter was pretty impressive. She's getting a lot of momentum and money.

She's also getting a lot of attacks from DeSantis. DeSantis, a lot of attacks from Haley. They're both trying to get each other out and minimizing the attacks on Trump, which drive Chris Christie crazy, which is why he is staying in, but only qualifying for the debates next week is Haley and DeSantis, which should be interesting. Not qualifying because the poll numbers, Vivek, Ram Swamy, and then not qualifying because of poll numbers and maybe more is Chris Christie.

So this thing is narrowing down quickly. Also, Steve Scalise and Senator Tom Cotton have just endorsed And Tom Emmer have just endorsed Donald Trump. That just came across. If you want to see me in person, and who doesn't, go to Rialto Square Theater on January 21st, Joliet, Illinois. It'll be streamed on Fox Nation right in the afternoon.

It'll be a patriotic, motivational, inspirational night, VIP opportunities where we talk politics and so much more. One-on-one, BrianKilby.com. Click on tickets. See you there. If you're interested in it, Brian's talking about it.

You're with Brian Kilmead. There's definitely a code for calling for an escalation, but let me tell you this: Saleh Ala Kheri is. If Isma Khania was the interior minister of Hamas, Alaouri is the exterior minister. He's a serious terrorist that's been on Israel's list for a long time. That's a big score behind hundreds of terror attacks, specifically in the West Bank.

And that was a very important hit, and there's going to be more. Israel's got a long list. And that is Aaron Cohen. And there was a big hit in Lebanon, Hezbollah area, where this key. Military leader was killed.

He was targeted. After all, he planned the October 7th attack. And then, this is what we're following. There were two huge explosions at a ceremony to commemorate the death of Qasim Salimani, I guess, his life. But he was thankfully taken out by a U.S.

drone in 2020. He was the brutal killer general of the Quds force in Iran.

Well, there were two explosions there. It's four years since his death. 73 people, at least, are dead, 170 injured. State television was covering this.

So now they're saying at least. A hundred people are dead.

So this is major. You have to wonder who did it because, believe me, Salome had a lot of enemies inside Iran, and you've here heard about the protest. We've seen the protest brutally put down by this government. It is not a popular government here to speculate the best way he can with all his years of experience. Daniel Hoffman, Fox News contributor, former CIA station chief in Moscow, Iraq, Pakistan, South Asia, and Europe.

Dan, welcome back. What's your take on first off the explosion we just are following on commemorating four years since Salome's death? Yes, so the the attack on the procession was a mass casualty terrorist attack. Has all the markings of al-Qaeda or ISIS taking the opportunity to To target Iranians who were gathering, particularly those associated with Soleimani. As we all know, he ran Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps, their paramilitary forces, who have taken the fight themselves to Al-Qaeda, ISIS.

Obviously, they targeted Israel and the United States. That's a major target for terrorists. And on this, the fourth anniversary of the Trump administration's targeting of Soleimani, I think terrorists saw a great opportunity to inflict harm on their Shia enemy.

So if it is a terrorist attack by ISIS or Al-Qaeda or an affiliated force, how easy would it be for them to blame Israel, or will they? I don't think they would blame Israel. If they did, then there would be certainly a demand in their own country to do something very, very serious about it. And they don't want a direct conflict with Israel. And we all know, and they know too, that Israel is their modus operandi are targeted assassinations Very precision assassinations, for example, of Iran's nuclear founder of their nuclear program, Fakhrizadeh, a few years back.

So, I don't think that's the case, but this is a massive intelligence failure. Iranian intelligence. Failed to detect the threat to these civilians who were out commemorating Soleimani's death. And this is what you get. They are in incident response right now.

As you noted, over one hundred people have died and I think roughly one hundred seventy or so injured.

So it's a major mass casualty event.

So let's talk about the forces captured a compound we know in Gaza. It's called Rodwan, a neighborhood in Gaza City. The Defense Secretary says Israel forces are isolating Khan Yunus to find Hamas fighters underground. We know about the number of tunnels have been discovered, the weapons caches, how they lead all these arteries lead to one lead to another. At the same time, you hear about this strike inside Lebanon with this surgical strike to kill Salah al-Or-Ori.

How significant is that for them to do, and what message do you take from that if you are Hezbollah?

Well, Israel delivered the message on October 7, right after the attack on their innocent civilians, which is that they would hunt down all of the Hamas terrorists involved in that October 7 attack and bring justice to them, just like they did with the perpetrators of the Munich Olympics attack on innocent Israeli athletes. And so this guy, as you've noted in the program, Salah Aruri, very senior, the deputy of Hamas, essentially, and responsible for all of their West Bank operations. He was also a liaison to the IRGC and to Lebanese Hezbollah and involved in Hamas's massive network of fundraising outside of Gaza.

So this is very important that Israel took him out concurrently while the operations in Gaza are ongoing. But I would emphasize that the cleanup in Gaza, those ongoing kinetic attacks on Hamas strongholds are expected to continue throughout This year, I wouldn't be surprised if six months from now we're still talking about the war in Gaza. Interesting. Six months from now, let's see what's going to happen with the protests here in response to that. Talking to Dan Hoffman of CIA fame, Dan, there's been push by the White House to not escalate this fight, to tell Israel not to escalate this fight with Hezbollah in the north.

A lot of pressure. But for Israel, they feel as though they've already told 100 miles, they've already backed everyone off 100 miles off the border. They've already been disrupted, and this might be the best opportunity to. to uh diminish this threat. Who should win out on this fight?

Well, listen, this is It's basic like international law that the Biden administration should recognize, which is that when Lebanon is allowing Hezbollah and Hamas to homestead on their territory and launch attacks on Israel, then Israel has every right to respond. including preemptively.

So I think that this is a case where Israel's intelligence is on high alert to determine what Hezbollah's plans are. We've seen a lot of attacks back and forth, but we haven't seen a war that, frankly, I think neither side wants right now. But it's a slippery slope and one we've got to watch very carefully. That whole region is just so extraordinarily combustible right now. And I will just say, from my own experience of having served in Iraq for a year and been the chief of CIA's Middle East operations.

You've got to escalate sometimes in order to de-escalate. We've got to show that we can hit the Houthis. Their networks and the launch sites. Otherwise, we're just going to keep facing down their rocket attacks in the Red Sea. And sure we can shoot those down, but we would be far more effective if we would go hit the point of attack and and we're not doing that.

We're not allowed. Uh the White House evidently said you cannot shoot the shooter, you can just shoot down their rockets that the shooter shoots. Is that insane to you? It is And it's a false assumption that if we were to take out the shooters, that there would be some sort of an escalation. No, they're emboldened by the fact that our rules of engagement prohibit us from taking the fight to the enemy.

If there's one thing I learned about terrorists, you've got to take the fight to the enemy. You've got to find, fix, and finish them, or else they will do that to you. It's as simple as that. The Houthi rebels, we understand, have been armed by the North Koreans predominantly. They're supported but not run by Iran.

They're gaining prestige, even though they're not popular, because they're shooting at Israel and shooting at us. Is if everything I say, can you sign off on everything I said? Yes, I mean, they're getting a lot of money and a lot of tactical assistance from Iran. They are Iran's proxy terrorist throwing gas on the fire that's already burning pretty hot in the Middle East. And that's the challenge for U.

S. foreign policy, is that Iran has got proxy terrorists in Iraq and Syria and the Houthis and Hezbollah and Hamas and Palestinian jihad. They all launch attacks on the United States and our allies And if one of the considerations for us is do we take the fight to the to Iran, which is responsible for all of this? We're not doing enough. that's the bottom line.

Whatever we're doing isn't working. And I would hope that in the White House situation room they're having meetings and talking about what we could do better. But it's not working right now, and we're running the risk of a massive escalation. Imagine if If U.S. forces in the Red Sea or in the Gulf were hit and we lost our servicemen and women were killed, that's going to result in a massive escalation.

The way to prevent that. Is again, take the fight to the enemy and do it with a little bit more alacrity. Yeah, that would help.

So, anybody who thought just because we blew up three of their boats, they would Kuthis would get the message, you're wrong. Because yesterday, They shot off two ballistic missiles right at commercial ships right in the Red Sea. We also know that Iran sailed in with one of their warships as the USS Gerald Ford left the region.

So if you were to game plan that out and people said, Dan Hoffman, give me some advice on what do you think Iran's up to, what would you tell them?

Well, Iran is probing us. They're going to go as far as they can go. They are disrupting the world economy. And look, I I'm not a I don't do politics. I'm here to tell you what the view from Tehran is or from Pyongyang or the Kremlin.

But I will say as a citizen that the Biden administration's got the election Coming up, and the Iran's attacks in the Red Sea are causing shipments of oil and other goods to be rooted around the Horn of Africa. That's driving up insurance costs, that's driving up the cost of oil. That's bad. For the world economy, bad for, by extension, President Biden's reelection campaign.

So there's a real reason to do something about this, a political reason, aside from what's right for national security. And Iran is just going to continue to ratchet this up like they're boiling water. They don't want to fight with the United States, but they're going to go as far as they can to the point where. That just doesn't happen. But they're going to inflict a lot of harm on us and on the world economy in the process.

So, Hamas has got Chinese weapons. The North Koreans have given the Houthis. Given the Houthis North Korean weapons, and we see that China is using Hamas weapons, and we know that Russia is loving all this. Uh Is it so obvious that they want us distracted in the Middle East? Every time we try to p uh go away from there and focus on Asia, this happens.

I'm not saying we shouldn't react, but doesn't it bother you that they're pulling our strings?

Well, we've got to be able to do everything. I'm sorry that we're the United States of America and we're a global superpower. And we've got a bullseye on our face because we have democracy, freedom and liberty, everything enshrined in the Constitution, the Bill of Rights in a lot of countries, specifically this axis of tyranny, Iran, Russia, China, North Korea, they don't like it. And so they're aligned, those four countries, like never before. Because of the war in Ukraine and the war in Gaza, we're seeing that very clearly.

And God forbid, China attacks Taiwan, we're going to see that same axis of tyranny support China. That's and the United States, we've got to build out our alliances and our allies have to trust us that we have the guts and the determination To deter our enemies. And deterrence means. Countering our enemies and taking the fight to our enemies. We're not doing that.

We've got to lead. If we don't lead, then our allies aren't going to trust our ability to. To take the fight to the terrorists and to deal with China, Iran, North Korea and Russia. And that will fray our alliances, and that's of concern to me.

So, how do you characterize Russia's war machine right now on Ukraine? They are using this opportunity of equivocation in the West to try to maximize the pain on Kyiv and Kharkiv and others. Other side. You know, and and Vladimir Putin has a high pain threshold because he he's running a dictatorship in Russia and public opinion doesn't matter. It certainly matters in the West and it matters to some extent in Ukraine.

And Vladimir Putin is uh assesses that he's got a chance. To divide the West, to divide the United States. There are some in our country who don't think we should support Ukraine, even though I believe we should. It's not our war, but it is our fight. If we fail, To counter Vladimir Putin, he's not going to stop at Ukraine, and the world is going to be a far more dangerous place.

Dan, I'm 100% in the belief that Ukraine's got to be successful. And to let them isolate now, if you think it looked bad if Afghanistan falling the way we left Kabul, if you imagine if Kyiv falls after for two years they show they're better fighters, more organized, with better equipment, and we just decide, well, politically, it's a political year, let's not arm them. Yeah. Yeah. You and I are about the same age.

We grew up when President Reagan was president. What would the Reagan administration do right now? How would they handle this? I think we know the answer to that question. But I say that because the Reagan administration and George Herbert President George Herbert Walker Bush administration got it all right when they were handling our just most wickedly complex national security challenges of the eighties and early nineties.

And I think we could take a page out of that book. I'd like to see somebody get up on the bully pulpit and explain U.S. policy. If there's some on the Democrat side and the Republican side who don't support arming Ukraine, well, the President needs to have a President Reagan or a President John F. Kennedy moment at the bully pulpit and explain and win the argument.

That's what he's got to do. He's not capable of doing it. That's the scary thing. And he's slow-walking weapons. Reagan never would have done that.

And the weapon system that he eventually got, they get later after people die and infrastructure is destroyed. It is insane. No Patriot missiles, we got them. No High Mars, they get them. No Attackums, they even got some.

They used them already. Remember, we give them tanks, so we're going to give them harpoons. They got all of it. But they got it eventually. Imagine if they got it right away.

Imagine if they got F-16s. Yes. Look, the intelligence failure that we suffered with Ukraine is that we ran the equivalent of a live Twitter feed as Russia prepared for the invasion without any corresponding policy. We could have sent all this stuff in the fall of twenty twenty one, before Russia invaded and said, Hey, you've massed 70,000, 80,000 troops on Ukraine's border. That's a violation of the UN Charter.

Withdraw, and we will take our weapons back. Don't withdraw and Ukraine will use those weapons if you attack. And that's the first example, very prominent one, of the Biden administration suffering escalation paralysis. They were too afraid to give Ukraine what they needed when they needed it. And I'm sorry for that because it's really damaging our national security.

And as you correctly noted, we're paying the price today for the errors of policy that we made now two years ago. It's I mean, this is what you run on. This is where you run it.

Now you can't, you don't have the political, you don't have the street cred because people don't think you're capable of running successful military operation. And then you have more evidence of it, so that people just want to throw up their hands, like J.D. Vance, who I normally have respect for. But to see all these Republicans, like Senator Josh Hawley, not understand or choose not to understand the The reason why we have to support Ukraine effectively, I find maddening, and Reagan probably wouldn't have any patience for them either. Dan, thanks so much.

I appreciate it. All right, Brian. Have a good rest of your day. You too. Back in a moment.

Coming to you on a need-to-know basis, because Mandy, you need to know, it's Brian Kilmead. Radio that makes you think. This is the Brian Kill Me Show. Hey, welcome back, everybody. 1866-408-7669.

Just a quick note: the other thing to keep an eye on that everyone's focusing on, and maybe it's a little bit People Magazine or Or page six. but is the number of people on that On the Epstein Manifest, they showed taking frequent trips. Uh frequent trips to The Epstein Island, a lot of them with underage girls. For people like R. F.

K. Jr., if he said, Yeah, you might find my name on the list. I went with my entire family at Epstein's Plain. We were going fossil hunting. I'm not sure if there's any holes in that story.

I'm just going to tell you. Other people were pushing hard not to expose that list. One was Senator Dick Durbin. Listen to him on December 6th. Cut 40.

Why won't you subpoena Jeffrey Epstein's flight logs?

So, who are you? Hilary Vaughan with Fox. With Fox, of course. I don't know anything about his flight logs. But why won't you subpoena them?

Why don't you want to know? I don't know the issue. I know who Epstein was, but I certainly don't know anything about the issue.

Well, he was charged with sex trafficking, so why don't you want to know who was utilizing his private plane? Never been raised by anyone.

Well, Senator Blackburn has wanted to subpoena them, and there hasn't been a vote in your committee. Not a word. Aren't you curious, like, what high-profile or powerful people might be closeted predators and pedophiles? Doesn't that concern you?

So, why won't you subpoena them if you can? It's the first time anyone has raised it. Thank you, Fox.

Well, Senator Mosher Blackburn says a dramatically different story, and now it's out. Part of it is Bill Clinton. Double figure visits there. But of course, he said, Nado, not with underage girls. I think underage girls might be speaking out now that they're of age.

We'll see. Epstein's list will remain sealed until at least January 22nd now. One of the people is worried about their welfare. Thanks for that. From high atop Fox News headquarters in New York City, always seeking solutions, never sowing division.

It's Brian Kilmead. All right, everyone, Brian Killmead here. Latest moments on 48th and 6th in Midtown Manhattan. A lot to discuss today, including a bombing over in Iran that killed now over 100 people. They had a wounded 170.

I'm not sure if that number is rising to a series of explosions. We have that all commemorating the death of Salome, that horrendous but very lethal paramilitary leader. You read the El Quds force over in Iran. It's not believed Israel had anything to do with this. It's not really the type of stuff they do because they target leaders like they did with Lebanon yesterday.

They don't usually do this where it can kill civilians, despite what people report over in Gaza. Coming up shortly, Michael Barone, senior political analyst for the Washington Examiner and author of a brand new book, Mental Maps of the Founders, and Martha McAllman, about 15 minutes.

So let's get to the big three.

Now, with the stories you need to know, it's Brian's big three. Number three. There are people who have come straight out and said Baudine Gay was only appointed because she's black, because she's a woman, but especially because she's black. Why are these elite colleges capitulating to it and essentially making it so uncomfortable for these women leaders that they have to step down to be replaced by white men? There you go.

Bringing race into it. Harvard fires their unqualified plagiarizing president after six months. Boys really solve any problems. Anti-Semitism at DEI on college campuses rages. She, like the UPenn president, remains on the faculty, full pay.

And of course, just another call. to make it about race. Number two. We don't seek a conflict wider in the region. We certainly aren't looking for a conflict with the Houthis.

The best outcome here would be for the Houthis to stop these attacks. And we have an obligation with our allies and partners to keep the flow of commerce moving there. The Houthis should stop these attacks. There you go.

John Kirby, thanks, weak. That's what it is. That's how I characterize how we are handling the pro-Amas protesters in America and how we are handling our attackers in the Middle East and how we are trying to reign in Israel, who thankfully is not listening. Number What Governor Abbott has done in his total reckless disregard for using people as pawns. It just wants to create chaos.

And we can't be so stagnant that we don't respond It can't be, I guess. Mayor Eric Adams, the border war. $7 million plus poured into our country under Biden. Maybe that was his plan, but he could not have foreseen how it would have affected cities like New York Cities, cities that he wins, states that he dominates, Adams and others paying the biggest price as if people like us who paid a ton of taxes and now find the city in deficit and spending over $7 billion a year on people that don't belong here. The illegal immigration issue will be one of, if not the biggest, but Michael Barone knows it all, senior political analyst for the Washington Examiner.

Michael, welcome back. Hey, it's good to be with you, Brian. Mike, congratulations on the book. I want to get to it, but your thoughts on immigration and how much it's going to impact the election if it was today.

Well, I think one of the problems for the Biden administration is that people sense this is out of control. You know, you've got people coming across the border. December was the biggest month of border contacts in history, and most of the people they have contact with are not deported. They're brought here in the United States. They're shipped around by plane by the Biden administration and by Governor Abbott of Texas.

And suddenly, The cities like New York and Chicago that proclaim themselves sanctuary cities, we love illegal immigrants, we're not going to give them any hassle. suddenly find they want to pull the welcome mat out of the doorway and uh put up bars and build uh what some people might call a big beautiful wall. around the sanctuary cities. I think I know who you're talking about. Michael, the other thing is that I've never seen a time when Republicans probably had more leverage with less of a majority as they're negotiating right now with this administration.

They want funding for Ukraine, Taiwan, Israel, and they're not going to get it unless they change asylum policies along with some funding at the border. Do you sense they have this leverage?

Well, I think they do have leverage. The Republicans have not always been skillful in the use of leverage in legislative elections, in legislative situations.

Sort of missed commentary from people who constantly lament that Republicans and people on the right are not willing to. Compromise, they're not willing to deal constructively with the other party. It looks to me like they're trying to do that right now, and they're trying to get a compromise in which. The Republicans get something of what they want, as well as the Democrats getting something of what they want. You know, it's in this way they're proceeding in a bipartisan fashion.

We'll see how the successful that becomes. I know there's so much that is atypical to this election season. As before we get to your book, we talk about 2024. How much of these court cases is going to make this undeterminable when it comes to the polls?

Well, it's uh You know, one of the things that's fascinating is that if you go back to March 30th of 2023, you see a situation in the Iowa polling where, as I recall, you had Donald Trump ahead of Ron DeSantis by 15 points, Trump well under 50 percent, a situation that looked like DeSantis could have a real shot at taking him over. What happens on March 30th?

Well, Alvin Bragg, the district attorney of Manhattan, who was elected by a margin of 8,828 votes in 2021, Democratic primary there, decides to indict Donald Trump on what obviously flimsy and made-up charges. And the Republican primary voters, like, you know, What was it? The geneticist rings the bell and the dogs do something.

Well, the Republican primary voters all say, Hey, you're trying to you pavlaw, yeah, you're trying to take people out of you're trying to take people, our candidate away from us, and we're going to defend him. We're going to come out in favor of him even more than we were before. Reminds me about how Democratic voters came out much more for Bill Clinton after the Monica Lewinsky scandal. They basically said, We won't let you take him away from us. And that seems to be the response of Republican primary voters.

So that DeSantis and Nikki Haley are way far behind now. Maybe they could do something like what Gene McCarthy did in New Hampshire in 1968. But the odds look to be against it. Michael Barone, you wrote this book, Mental Maps of the Founders, How Geographic Imagination Guided America's Revolutionary Leaders. What prompted it?

And what cities do we have right now because of it?

Well, I Know over the years, the last dozen, 20 years, I've been reading many of the wonderful books about the founding fathers. In fact, You've written at least one of them yourselves, Brian, on Washington Spies. And I wanted to see if I could add something more about it. I mean, my friend, the great political reporter and Reagan biographer Luke Cannon, said, if you really want to learn something about a subject, write a book about it.

So I thought, what can I add? to the founding fathers and i thought I'd like to add something about maps. We all carry mental maps in our heads, and some of us are very map-oriented. I'm one of those people. Um and uh I thought what What did the world look like to the Founding Fathers?

They didn't have accurate maps of North America. Once you got up to the Appalachian Ridges, they sort of filled in the empty space with their imagination. Our suppositions. They did them during the revolution. They didn't know what the new.

what the new nation would look like if they won the Revolutionary War and secured recognition by Britain as well as by France, which was their ally. One of the reasons George Washington, in most of the military action in that war, hangs around New York City. And hires, as you've written, Brian, hires spies to go into New York City, which is held by the British, and where there are lots of loyalist people loyal to the British crown in New York City. Is because he, I think, that he was looking forward to a map of the new country that would include New England. Which were strongly against the British during the Revolutionary War.

And that would include the middle states down to Pennsylvania, which was supporting them, Virginia, which was Washington's home state. And so he hovers around New York. He's kicked out of New York by the British in the last months of 1776, really routed over a landscape that we can only imagine because it's covered with New York City now. And he spends winters in Valley Forge near Philadelphia, but also in northern New Jersey, in the Hudson Valley in New York. And he's looking ahead to what the country would be, and he wants to unite.

These two disparate regions and wants to reconquer, to take over New York. And that's part of his mental map of North America is going in that direction. He's also looking out, as he had from the time he was a teenager, and doing surveying for Lord Fairfax, the big landholder in Northern Virginia. Going past the for Blue Ridge and the Appalachian chains. And going up to, he's hired by the House of Burgesses because of his experience surveying the frontier to go to warn the French not to come to the forks of the Ohio, where the Allegheny-Monongahila River formed, they come together to form the Ohio River, what now is Pittsburgh, of course.

And he's not entirely successful in that, but he gains the military experience that led the Second Continental Congress to appoint him commander-in-chief of the Army.

So, Washington has a mental map going up there. One of the things he notices. When he's going up towards what is now Pittsburgh, he says they have some very fine degree of coal here. He's really foreseeing, isn't he, something like the Industrial Revolution that makes Pittsburgh our great initial steel manufacturing city.

So the geographic vision of the different founding fathers, and I deal with six of them in this book, Metal Maps of the Founders, has a real bearing on the way the country comes together and the way that it argues about public policy and politics. Understood. Mental maps of the founders: how geographic imagination guided America's revolutionary leaders and led us to the country that looks the way it is. Michael Brone, congratulations on that. I'll talk to you again soon.

It's going to be a great year. Don't you know? Thanks, Brian. Big care. You got it.

1-866-408-7669. When you come back, Martha McCallum will join us in the studio. She's got a big announcement that you might have heard, but she's going to talk more about it when she rejoins the Brian Killmee Show in just a moment. Educating, entertaining, enlightening. You're with Brian Kilmead.

Breaking news, unique opinions. Hear it all on the Brian Kill Me Show. These plagiarism allegations, where Claudine Gay has had to issue corrections, multiple corrections.

Now, we should note that Claudine Gay has not been accused of stealing anyone's ideas in any of her writings. She's been accused of sort of more like copying other people's writings without attributions. I can't even imagine what she's had to face. There are people who have come straight out and said that they believe that Claudine Gay, you know, before the plagiarism allegations even came out, that they believe Claudine Gay was only appointed because she's black, because she's a woman, but especially because she's black. Why are these elite colleges capitulating to it and essentially making it so uncomfortable for these women leaders that they have to step down to be replaced by white men?

If a black woman is replaced, it has to be racism or people who don't like women. Everybody knows that. Martha McCallum, the story, has got a big announcement that you might have heard about, but we'll talk about it in a second. The firing or the resignation of Uh hardly seems to me uh to be racist related. I can't figure we already saw one president step down from an Ivy League school.

There's a couple of others who also testified alongside Claudine Gay, who will now find themselves in uncomfortable positions. But what they, you know, it's always been my theory that if, like, if an institution thinks it's time for you to go, they're going to find other stuff, right? And sort of make their case.

So it's clear that they were uncomfortable with her leadership. And from what I understand, there was some tension in the Harvard Corporation, which has been running this institution since 1650, as they got together to decide what to do. But then these plagiarism issues kept coming and coming and coming, like little salvos that finally weakened this ship and it sank yesterday. It has literally nothing to do in terms of the evidence and the coverage of this story. The anti-Semitism was the first thing, and then many counts of borrowing other people's ideas and not citing them properly, which a Harvard student, including the students, Ted Kennedy paid the price for.

So I'm not sure why she hasn't. I mean, now she is. Here's one of those students this morning on Fox and Friends First, Shabus Kirstenbaum, Cut 24.

So I found it really striking that in her resignation letter, this lack of contrition, the lack of personal responsibility, saying that I am sorry for causing all of this. If she didn't want to be ousted, don't plagiarize. If she didn't want to be ousted, then simply say when you were under oath in front of Congress, when you were asked 17 times, that yes, calling for the genocide of Jewish people goes against school policy.

So on the one hand, I do feel sorry. I'm sorry that it ended this way. This is an upsetting conclusion, but it's also the only realistic conclusion. Yeah, and the thing is with the plagiarism on top of the denial and the walkback and now the resignation. But Martha, it's like someone saying to us, okay, we don't want you anchoring your shows anymore, but you're going to get paid the same.

We'll call you if we need you. She's going to stay in the faculty, make the same amount of money, and probably give some more speeches on being targeted because she's a woman of color.

So she's really, nor is the University of Pennsylvania president. Right.

So, how much of a message are they really trying to send? It looks like they are trying to do the least possible to appease certain avenues of this controversy. If they really wanted to send a message, they should have the guts to say, No, we can't continue to employ you. You're a plagiarist, and you made us look terrible on the national stage when it came to Hate on our campus.

So I think the most telling number is the 17% decline in Harvard admissions, in Harvard applications.

So people do vote with their feet. If they start to feel like an institution is going to be embarrassing to have a diploma from or that you'd be better off having one from somewhere else, that will matter. But they've got a $50 billion endowment at Harvard University.

So unfortunately, money does not matter and never will at Harvard. But reputation, I think, does ultimately.

So Al Sharpton says President Gay's resignation is about more than a person of a single incident. This is an attack on every black woman in the country who's put a crack in the ceiling. It's an assault on health, strength, and future of diversity, equity, and inclusion. Good. At a time in which corporate America is trying to back out of billions of dollars in commitments, most of all, that was a result of Bill Ackman's relentless campaign against President Gay.

Now the National Action Network will show Ackman that his attacks on DEI, President Gay, and black. Americans have consequences. He's going to pick it outside the offices of New Yorkers, his investors in corporate America, and see Ackman, do CB Bill Ackman for who we are.

So they're going to protest against him. Yeah, I mean, this is a country that was built on meritocracy. I think there's a hunger in the nation to get back to that and to stop worrying about checking these boxes. You should be judged on your performance.

So she, I mean, from all intents and purposes, there is nothing, you know, she may have received some disturbing racial messages on social media and things like that, but there's no indication. And that's too bad, obviously, but there's absolutely no indication. She should be saying in this letter, no one takes responsibility for anything that I can see, or it happens so rarely. She should be saying, you know, I handled myself poorly at that hearing. I did not reflect well on this university at that hearing.

I regret it, and I'm stepping aside because I don't want this to be about me anymore. Martha shows on at 3 o'clock, a big announcement when she comes back and expands on what. It's good. The details of that big event that's taking place next week in just a moment. Brian Kilmicho.

The fastest three hours in radio. You're with Brian Kilmead. First of all, I will tell you this: that I said right off the bat, I did respond to it right away. When you grow up in the South, you grow up, and slavery is a constant. Comment, constant point of discussion.

You learn it in school, you talk about it. The South is actually very comfortable with our history. What I should have said immediately was that the Civil War was about slavery, but I just assumed that that was a given, and I went on and said it was also about the role of government and about the rights of people economically, socially, and otherwise.

So, yes, we know the Civil War was about slavery. That's always the case. And I'll remind you that I was the southern governor that brought down the Confederate flag after we had a horrific shooting of nine African Americans that were killed in a church.

So, obviously, we thought that was one of their strongest points that, as a governor of a state, after the shooting, she took down the Confederate flag.

Now, of course, it seems like a no-brainer. But back then, it was relatively controversial that she did that. And now it looks like a real strength. That's why it was such a surprise to get that question and her to fumble on it so badly. And she didn't.

She basically just admitted that. That answer came three minutes ago, literally four minutes ago on Fox News channel.

So Martha McCallum and I heard it the same Martha McCallum for the anchor of the story at 3 o'clock for the first time. Did she effectively finally walk that back, Martha, from what you just heard? Yeah, I mean, she did a mini walk back on it right afterwards. And then this, when she was talking to Harris just moments ago, this is the kind of thing that happens on the campaign trail when you get this close to voting. You're going to get questions like this that are going to become a news story for several days.

She agrees that she didn't handle it well. We'll see if it becomes a problem for her. The issue is that they're, you know, in her lane. She's looking for independents. She's looking for potential crossover Democrat voters.

Remember, Jamie Dimon asked Democrats to cross over and vote for her in the primary in order to block Trump.

So far, according to the numbers, that doesn't seem to be happening. But that that's her lane, and she she may have lost some some support on this in certain areas of of the lane that she's in. People should remember, too, it was the Democratic Party that was KKK for segregation. That was a Democratic movement. George Wallace was a Democrat.

Jim Crow was a Democratic move to go back to a previous time. Clinkin was a Republican president.

Somehow there's a jiu-jitsu after LBJ in the 1960s with the civil rights reform. But people are getting that confused as of today, and then the governor saying what she said. I'm curious.

Now, first off, When did you learn and was a brilliant move that your town hall with Brett Baer will be taking place next week? Um, it's been in the works for several weeks, and uh, we're very pleased to have this opportunity to sit down with President Trump. We haven't done a town hall with him since uh Scranton. We were in Scranton, Pennsylvania, the three of us, right before COVID exploded across the country.

So it's going to be very interesting to sort of bookend that and look at that time. And now we have the president running again for the White House. There's obviously so much to talk to him about. The border, we have international. Issues that I think are really unlike we have seen in our lifetime.

There is tremendous pressure in the Middle East, in Europe. You look at what's happening today with these killings of Hamas leaders in Beirut yesterday.

So there's a lot going on. I think it's going to be very interesting to see what's on the voters' minds in Iowa. The president is far ahead in that race, according to the polls. But you keep hearing from Nikki Haley and DeSantis, who we're going to also do town halls with on Monday and Tuesday, that they believe that the numbers are going to be very different when people actually caucus.

So we will see. I was talking to an official with the Chrissy camp saying that walking through New Hampshire, which he's very familiar with, he says a lot of people are insulted that Governor Sununu is telling them who to vote for. and they have the independence streak and they'll say, excuse me, we'll make our own decision, and they want to see more of Trump down there before they're going to vote for him. Or if they're going to vote for Nikki Haley, they want her to be stronger against Trump. And that, as you know, brings peril.

Because if you're really strong against Trump, you have the risk of losing his voters, even if the press likes you for doing it, like the press loves that Chrissy does that. I'm not sure that strong Nikki Haley voters are Big Trump supporters.

So she's walking this line where she has to really be strong with independent voters. She has to be a moderate Republican who's going to bring in women voters, who's going to bring in crossover voters.

So it it's You know, in terms of Sununu, he promised that once he picked his candidate, he was going to campaign for that person really hard. He said, I'm not just going to check a box and sit back. I'm going to try to convince New Hampshire voters why I picked this person and why I think they should too.

So I don't think that should come as a big surprise. Clearly, Christie was bruised by that selection. It was something he really wanted and needed, I think, in New Hampshire. But. Live free or die, right?

These voters have not gone to the polls yet, and we'll see what they actually do when they get there. But you note also that Chris Christie was told by Chris Sununu, drop out. And he does not like that. No, absolutely not. He is no shrinking violet, and he has really staked a lot on New Hampshire.

I think what everybody will be looking for in Iowa and New Hampshire is any sort of surprise, anything that comes out that doesn't look like these polls that we're seeing. And hello, the midterms last time around did not go the way the polling looked. We've had a lot of experience with being very cautious about how these numbers look. I don't think people speak to pollsters the way that they used to. I don't think they're necessarily reflective of what's going on.

Granted, the gulf is so enormous for Trump right now, it's hard to imagine a big shift in it unless there's a game changer, unless there's some kind of catalyst, unless something happens with one of these cases, which seem to be doing nothing but helping him at this point. Yeah, that's pretty clear. Here's what Nikki Haley said about the attention Trump's giving or CUD 27. And I've noticed that President Trump has given me some attention. And I appreciate that because that means he sees what we're seeing.

But in his commercials and in his temper tantrums, Every single thing that he said. has been a lie. Every single one. I looked for some grain of truth. Every single one.

And that's what she says about. I don't know what he calls her bird brain. I haven't really heard it substantive. I think that Nikki Haley, part of the reason she's holding a fire and not saying that she would never accept a vice presidential nomination, is because I think she might accept a vice presidential nomination. And if the studies show internals that she brings over moderates, do you let Don Jr., who came out and said that's a bridge too far, I would never accept?

Nikki Haley as a vice president. Does that matter to his dad? Yeah. I mean, there's a very strong Trump team that is very anti that decision. But I think what we see over the course of time with, I mean, look at who he picked last time.

He picked Mike Pence for a reason. He wanted someone who had the kind of experience he didn't have on the Hill and someone who he felt could be a, you know, sort of a good balance for him. The voters that Trump is having trouble with, and I, you know, you talk to people all across the country and everywhere, I always ask people, what are you thinking? What are you thinking? A lot of women say, I'm not going to go there again.

And I say, you know, what about if Nikki Haley was on the ticket? And that is a game changer for some voters.

Now, that's just anecdotal when I ask people this question, but clearly that's something that the former president. Has to be asking himself at this point as well. Who knows what he'll decide if that moment comes.

So, getting into Martha McCallum here, Martha, so you and Brett, what time is it going to be on? Where's 9 o'clock on Wednesday night in Iowa? At the convention center. At the convention center. So you're going to have a live audience out there.

We're going to have a live audience. We'll have questions from them. It's going to be the town hall format that we have done in the past and it works really well.

So we're really excited to sit down with him and the other candidates. Have you looked at the format that how many times will you and Brett just do the block and how many times you'll spray in other people? We're going to try to get as many questions in as we can. I think, you know, in the past, we always kind of mix that up, right?

So if there needs to be a follow-up or something needs to be fact-checked in the question that came from the audience or the response that comes from the candidate, that's what we're going to do.

So we'll have some of our own questions, but we're going to hear from the audience as much as we can. Will the audience be screened to independent, undecided? Yeah, there'll be a good mix of people in the audience, absolutely. Absolutely. You want people in there who have decided that who are.

Very supporters, people who have deciding between Haley and DeSantis and Trump, people who are some Democrats and Independents who voted for Biden last time around.

So we'll work to get a very good mix into that room. Very interesting. And then days later, it's going to be New Hampshire. Are you covering both? Yes, we are.

In state. Yeah, we'll be in New Hampshire. We're going to be in Iowa for 10 days and then we'll come back for a couple of days and then head straight to New Hampshire, which is really exciting. And there's nothing like being on the ground and talking to voters and going to the diners and hanging out in different places where you get to really get a feel for voters. I love going to candidate events in these places too.

Last time around, we went to Bernie Sanders events and Amy Klobuchar events and Trump rallies and all of it.

So you get a real feel on the ground, which is you can't do any other way. The one thing that no one's been able to even challenge me on, and I think you might agree, is Trump has the best support team he's ever had. He does. Absolutely. So they have this whole caucus captain project that they've done where you get a Caucus captain hat, and you're basically given a list of 25 people and asked, you know, get 10 of those people to show up at the caucus.

They know that they had a sort of a light footprint last time around. They don't want that to happen again. Ted Cruz beat him in 2016 in Iowa, and he's looking for a decisive win here that he's hoping, I would imagine, would force some others to drop out of this race and a game and create sort of a shift moment in all of it. And they are definitely more prepared than they've been. It's hard to get people to caucus, it's a whole night commitment.

The numbers are small. I mean, when you look at this whole process, the nominee is picked by a very small group of Americans in a few states across the country. And it's the way it works, but it's a very small group of people who end up making this decision. My sense. If I was a game plan this out, if the polls are somewhat correct, and it's a big one for Trump and Iowa and New Hampshire.

When I remember Kasich, how long he stayed in, having only one Ohio, and that was just barely. Nikki Haley's got so much more money than Kasich ever had, and so much more acceptance from people with money and more of the traditional Republicans. And with all these court cases pending, there's a strong case to hang in there where Kasich felt pressure to drop out. Yeah, no, absolutely. 100%.

I think she has a lot of momentum at the moment. She's got this money. She's got the support. She hauled in a lot of people that DeSantis wanted. But I will say this.

Voters are what matters. It's going to be very interesting to see this smaller group now that has emerged. And I think people have wanted to see Haley and DeSantis go head to head in this race, which is clearly what's happening. You have Avek Ramaswamy and Kickstarter. Your counterprogramming is that one-on-one.

Exactly. Uh do you think if you're not on that debate seed, you're done? The vaccine Chris Christie have to be done.

Well, what happens is, you know, the voters get to decide who wins, but the donors decide who has the ability to hang in and create. Ads and do direct media, all of that.

So when they dry up, it becomes very difficult to hang in there. I know we've talked about this in real life and on television, on radio. But the question is, with foreign policy, I want to get to that next. I'll take a time so we have a legitimate amount of time because it's breaking news in Israel. Um With Trump, he says it never would happen if I'm there.

Okay, we got it.

So you got to take that away.

So, Mr. President, I know you believe that Ukraine wouldn't have happened and Israel wouldn't have happened if you're there. But now you could walk into a situation where you have to deal with it. And you know what? In the past, his answers to those questions, which I've watched very closely, is: I don't want to telegraph what I would do.

Because he's a former president, he has relationships with these people, he doesn't want to telegraph what I would do.

So, is that enough for voters, or do they want a better sense of whether or not he's going to continue to commit American dollars overseas, which is a very sensitive issue for a lot of voters, especially people who feel that the economy is in tough shape, that the border is overrun?

So, I think it's going to be very interesting to see what his responses are to those. Mr. President, if Kyiv is overrun when you are President of the United States, That's as bad as Barack Joe Biden letting Afghan Kabul get overrun when he's president of the United States. Don't you agree? My thing is, they are bombing like hell.

They think this capitulation, this prevarication of the West and EU Hungary standing in the way of EU aid, and now people like Josh Hawley and Senator Vance standing in the way of US aid. And I love the leverage on the border, I really do. But people have to understand there's an urgency for Ukraine not to lose. And I hope the President realizes that. I have no patience for people that don't.

Yeah. Well, I I know, and I've heard you I've heard you talk about that. I think it's um I think it was smart of them to link the border to this aid. And I think that, you know, it'll be interesting to hear how nuanced. President Trump is on this issue and how much he is willing to share.

Because I don't think you can get away with just saying, I don't want to telegraph what I would do. I think people want to know when they go to the voting booth where you stand on these issues, because we're in the most volatile situation that we have been in as a world since World War two. No question, but I also think, believe it or not, I do believe it's solvable. And that's just optimism. I think it's solvable.

We'll discuss that when we come back. And what just happened in Iran that should be of interest to all the listeners. Don't move. Brian Kill Meat Show. Want even more, Brian?

Download the podcast at BrianKillMeatShow.com. Every episode, exclusive interviews on demand. More of Kill Mead coming up. The talk show that's getting you talking. You're with Brian Kilmead.

So, um And about three hours ago, we got word that it was an explosion, Martha McCallum, in Iran, right and marking the four-year death. of Salome, the Quds force leader who we took out in a drone strike.

So in it, it looks like over 100 people now are dead and over 140 are wounded. Who would do something like this? Dan Hoffman, the CIA, says, I don't know if it doesn't look like Israel, and no one's accusing Israel yet, but this is more al-Qaeda, ISIS, this is more Sunni. They can go after the Shia.

Well, you and I were talking about this in the break because it becomes that question: who would do this? We've seen sort of veiled. Attacks on nuclear facilities by Israel, but not on a, you know, on a population like this inside of Iran.

So it is a very unusual attack, and it does feel more like it's a Sunni-Shia situation. But as you pointed out, there's also a lot of people who want to overthrow the leadership in Iran within the country, and they have been sort of muscling for decades to overthrow.

So there's that possibility as well. I mean, we're going to learn more about this in the hours to come, but this is a huge attack, and it has left more than 100 people dead and about 140 injured at this memorial for Qasem Soleimani.

So if they call out Israel, they're going to be forced to attack Israel. Oh, yeah, Israel's responsibility got to go hit him. Good luck. And Israel says. Good luck.

We know you're the problem anyway. Maybe we should just get this over with now. What about the drone strike that killed four people, including one of these leaders over in Lebanon yesterday? One of the military, the one who heads up the military wing. Yeah.

We expect that Nasrallah, Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of Lebanon, is going to speak later this afternoon.

So we're going to be covering that live on the story today and getting reaction from General Keith Kellogg to it because it feels like a tinderbox in the Middle East. You have. I can't remember a time. You know, it reminds me of Jake Sullivan saying, I can't remember a time when things were so peaceful in the Middle East.

Now we're in a situation where we can't remember a time that was so incredibly volatile. And in that volatility exists opportunities for all of these factions, and we see them taking advantage of it on a daily basis. I don't remember a time when I haven't asked you for your guest at 3 o'clock, and you've said, no, I refuse. Will you go along with my request and tell me some of the people you'll be. You know, we're going to talk to Robert F.

Kennedy Jr., who's been an interesting player to watch in all of this. He is now on the ballot as of today in Utah, and this is part of their strategy. Without a party. They say they're going to get on as an independent. They say they're going to be on 20 more ballots in the coming weeks.

So we're going to have him kind of walk us through what his strategy is because it feels like he kind of disappeared for a little while. But now he's back on the scene.

So we'll see what he has to say. And as I mentioned, we'll talk to Keith Kellogg as well. We'll get an update from all of these members of Congress who are on the border today.

So no singing and dancing. More facts, exactly. Thanks, Martha. Bye, Brian. Thank you.

Listen to the show at free on Fox News Podcast Plus, on Apple Podcast, Amazon Music with your Prime Membership, or subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. Mm.