Trump & Biden shake hands in Oval Office, promise smooth transition of power

From the Fox News Radio Studios in Midtown Manhattan, it's the fastest growing radio talk show. Brian Kilmead.

So glad you're here, everyone. It's Brian Kill Me Chill coming your direction on a very historic day. It's already President Trump is already in the air. He's en route to meeting with the current president of the United States. Also, Secretary of State Blinken meets with the Ukrainian foreign minister, and ironically, that is going to be front and center for Joe Biden.

He's let everyone know I'm going to try to convince Trump to stay with Ukraine. And I'm not sure the president is so certain he wants to get out of Ukraine. He's just he wants to approach it differently and bring it to an end. Rich Lowry is going to be with us, editor of National Review at the bottom of the hour. Kevin Roberts, PhD and president of the Heritage Foundation, author of a brand new book.

It's excellent called Dawn's Early Light: Taking Back Washington to Save America. I'm going to get his take on the Trump team now taking shape. And also, I should tell you, too, that at the Hyatt Regency in Capitol Hill, Trump team walking in to meet with House and Senate leaders. Let's get to the big three.

Now, with the stories you need to know, it's Brian's big three. Number three. They're going to meet in the Oval Office at midday, and it's one of the few times these two men have met in person outside of the debates that they participated in this year and in 2020. The White House says that President Biden wants to take this opportunity to stress the importance of a peaceful and efficient transition. Awkward but yet necessary.

The smooth transfer of power moves closer as former and future President Trump meets with the lame-duckist, lame-ducker Joe Biden at the White House. Not present, Kamala and Melania. We cover it as tensions mount on the Republican secret ballot election of a majority leader and what it will say about the Trump agenda. Number two. I'm willing to sit down with this administration like I tried to sit down with the previous administrations in my 10 trips to Washington and say, we have a problem that's overrunning cities.

Mayor Adams. Comprehensive attack plan on illegal immigration, zeroing in on sanctuary cities.

Some deep blue mayors dig in to fight back on Trump, and others, like the New York mayor you just heard from, look to dig out. Number President Trump just announcing that our own Pete Hagseff will be his Secretary of Defense. Yep, Trump team building up quick and taps Fox talent to do so. We look at the team and who is on deck. Kevin Roberts, great to see you.

Congratulations on the book. Thanks, Brian, for having me. You're the hardest working man in radio and TV. It's always a pleasure to be with you in the studio. I was able to question you last night at your beautiful book party, your book launch yesterday.

It was a great event with all the heritage higher-ups and some friends there, too.

Well, it's a great crew. You know, it's a reminder for people who don't happen to be in New York City that there are thousands of great Americans here. They're with us. They're looking to wake up to a normal country tomorrow. Absolutely.

So let's talk about what's happening today. First off, with House leadership meeting with Trump. What's the message? It's huge. I mentioned this on X a little while ago that last week the election was vital, but this is the second phase.

That is to say, what happens in Congress is vital to the Trump agenda. We need a majority leader in the Senate who actually is aligned with Trump in Vance. We also need to be sure that Mike Johnson is re-elected. He's done a great job with difficult circumstances. I think both of those things will happen today.

You have, evidently, they do say that there's going to be possibly someone on his right. That's going to come for the Speakership. Do you see that happening? I mean, it's impossible to know what 200 people are going to do, but have you heard that? I have heard that.

I'm close to the Freedom Caucus. Those are good guys and gals. I would discourage them from doing that, not because they're wrong about wanting to be sure that the legislative agenda is conservative, but I do think that it's a better calculation for them to recognize Mike Johnson as one of the reasons that conservatives did so well in this election cycle. He's got a slim majority that's even slimmer because the President keeps appointing these great House members. I think Mike's going to continue to be a really important leader of the House, but also he's going to be a really important messenger for the Trump Vance agenda.

So today, after that meeting at 11 o'clock, President Biden's going to greet President Trump. You know, historically, you loved our history of our country, of the transfer of power. You know that John Adams was so mad with Jefferson, he left before he was there. We know that John Quincy Adams was not having a smooth handoff with Andrew Jackson, didn't go to the inauguration. And I think there was one other time in our history Andrew Johnson didn't stick around.

We know what happened with Trump on January 6th and what happened after. No one wants to revisit that. But what is likely to happen today when the doors closed? What do you think it'll be like with these two men? Let me say that I love this.

This is one of the things that makes America America. And hats off to someone I disagree with all the time, President Joe Biden, for doing this. And hats off to someone I agree with all the time, President Trump for doing this, because it shows the stability that the American Republic has. But to your question, Brian, behind closed doors, I think President Biden's going to try to put the squeeze to President Trump on Ukraine. I actually think there's more overlap there.

They both want Ukraine to maximize the territory that it protects. But Trump's going to bring an end to this war. It needs to happen. It needs to happen for everyone involved. But the second thing is, probably in their most private of private moments, I would speculate that President Biden will tell President Trump, good luck, and I'm here for you if you need me.

Evidently, Trump did leave him a nice note from 2020 to today. And you know President Trump well, and I know him some. That is Donald Trump. This image that the media create of him of being this ogre could not be more incorrect. He is a warm man.

He cares deeply, not just about the country and some sort of like Vague, esoteric, abstract way, but he cares about every American, including Joe Biden. I expect the meeting to go very warmly. What I hope is: you know, Bush 43 never talked ill of Obama. And Obama did behind closed doors, according to Gates. And you read his book, they said, guys, I'm here because the Secretary of Defense was asked to stay over.

Um Obviously, there would be no tension between Biden and Obama, but for Trump, I'm very, and he didn't really speak ill of Obama much, or certainly not to Michelle. What I hope is they just say, hey, guys, let's just between us, let's stop attacking each other. Yeah, what we hope is possible at Heritage, and I think most Americans believe this, is you can be conservative, you can be liberal, you can be in the center, but we can be civil about the differences of opinion we have. I think both men, because of their experience, perhaps because of their age, I think will exemplify for Americans that the way to heal this really fractious situation in our country is for them to take a lead today. I fully expect that to happen, Brian, and I think we should be proud of both of them.

So what do you think of the team as it's taking shape right now, the Trump team? For example, Pete Hegseth, the Secretary of Defense.

Well, I think the whole team is awesome. I know in New York I'm supposed to say it's like the 27 Yankees. I say that as a Braves fan. But Hegseth is my favorite appointment thus far, and I love all of the appointments for this reason. In the book that you mentioned, that I I just published, I talk about this metaphor of a controlled burn where we regenerate institutions.

Of course, mean this figuratively and metaphorically about a controlled burn. That's what a Secretary of Defense Pete Hegset will do with the Pentagon and the Defense Department. It's not that we don't want that to exist, it's that it needs to update its thinking. It needs to be prepared to fight the next war as opposed to continually going back to Congress seeking money for munitions and weapon systems that are for the last war. Right.

Recruiting, too. Heck, I think we will see recruitment spike just by the announcement of Pete as the appointee. Because they're going to stop with Awokeness, they're going to stop with the remember Mike General Milley came out and said, hey, you know what? I want to find out about. not white supremacy, white privilege.

He couldn't wait to find out and learn more about white privilege. We really need a four star general telling us about white privilege. And do we need the Pentagon to explore that? It is the most it is the most Uh homogeneous group. I know we had a segregated army for periods in our history, but it is a group that doesn't care about your ethnicity, doesn't care about your gender.

They just fight and they produce. And I just thought that was a huge step backwards. He'll be able to gut that. He will. And look, you think about this noble history of our noble armed forces.

Since Truman desegregated the armed forces, it really is a homogenous group, and it's a group that simply wants to be the most lethal fighting force on behalf of the greatest country that's ever been around. And all of this wokeness gets in the way, and it's a real shame that four-star generals get in the way of that by implementing it. I think Pete will clean that up and clean it up fast.

So tell me about the Dawn's Arler Light. This book is an attempt to look forward, where we're going, not just as a conservative movement, but as a country. And the way we go forward is to emphasize not just good politics and policy, Brian, but very importantly for most Americans who are not elected officials, not in Washington, D.C., we can take a step in leaning into our school boards, our county commissions, our churches. Churches, our schools, these institutions that actually are the fabric of American society. What I try to do is bring politics and policy into every home so people understand they play a very important role in that, even if they're not in Washington.

And you talk about your home and your upbringing in this. I was able to interview you last night at your great event, and we had to go through the book, read about 120, about half the book. And you do talk, you're very honest about how tough an upbringing you had. Your parents got divorced, they didn't speak to each other. You kind of were on your own for a while.

They dated and married other people. And to have a fractured home is something that you saw the damage it could do. And ultimately, your brother at 15 years old took his own life. Promising athlete, seemed to have everything going for him. Got in a car accident, thought to himself, I'm not going to be able to talk my way out of this.

Look what I did to my family's only car. And he took his own life. And in fact, as we sit here, 41 years ago today is when that happened. And while, of course, that is a horrific tragedy that I think about every day, what That caused me to realize at an early age, I was nine, was that while government has a role, the people who are really important in life are not government officials, but our community. For me, my grandparents, my mom's parents who live nearby.

Well, you dedicated the book to. I did. Mark and Betty Petrie, both great Marines, veterans of World War II. And my story is not special. There are tens of millions of Americans who had it far worse than I did.

The reason that I decided to talk about that publicly for the first time is because, just like J.D. Vance did in Hillbilly Elegy, we as a people in the United States, regardless of whatever differences we have, share a lot of common bonds. And the more we emphasize that, recognizing we might have some political differences, the better off we're going to be as a Republican. Right. And you talk about, you know, you saw what a family, fractured family does, and you could see the benefits of a family that works together.

And that's what you have right now. Oh, that's exactly. That's right. My wife and I have been married 27 years. We have four kids.

And I should say, all of the family members I mentioned in the book I have great relationships with, love my mom and dad. Who've reconciled, happily married to other folks. This is a quintessential American story, not because Kevin Roberts is special, but because every single American is special. I think that's why we need to talk about that. All right, good.

We're going to continue, Kevin. Can you stick around? Absolutely.

Kevin Roberts here with the Heritage Foundation, and he'll talk about his brand new book a little bit more, Dawn's early light, and also reflect on this historic day. I mean, we see the leadership taking shape. It looks like, despite many people a year ago, thought it would be impossible. The Republicans are about to hold on to the House. We're at 216, they need 218.

There's going to be their meeting with the president, the president-elect, and then the president-elect is going to go meet President Biden today. No first ladies, that story, and we come back. Diving deep into today's top stories. It's Brian Kilmead. I'm Ben Dominich, Fox News contributor, editor-at-large of The Spectator, and editor of the Transom.com daily newsletter.

I'm inviting you to join in-depth conversations every week on the Ben Dominich Podcast. Listen and follow now at FoxNewsPodcast.com. The more you listen, the more you'll know. It's Brian Killmeade. Kevin Roberts with us now and we're waiting.

It's probably 90 minutes until... Until both presidents meet. Even though Trump was running a little bit late this morning, he's supposed to leave at 6, Kevin. You have to figure that he's going to make up the difference. You don't really show up late for the White House, right?

I know he's been showing up late for campaign events, but yeah, that's right. And Trump is very respectful of the office and certainly of President Biden. I'm sure that was just a logistical issue, and I'm also sure President Biden understands that.

So the story with Milani is interesting, and it's not denied. She's really offended when they broke into Mar-a-Lago and they went through her drawers and they destroyed the place. And she is not going. And the word is, she hasn't confirmed it or denied it. Word is, she has no use for the Bidens, and she is not going to go up there and say hello to Jill.

That was offensive for her. And obviously, you don't raid a former president's golf club, you know, where he calls, his resident. It's just reprehensible. And you think about those of us who are just ordinary folks, if it was your wife or my wife, they would say the same thing, right? Because the FBI raided not just a former president's home and his wife's home, former first lady, but to do that to any woman, I think it's very appropriate that the first lady has said that.

All right, good. And do you think that Kamala Harris asked J.D. Vance to come and tour around the observatory because Biden brought around Pence? No, I think Kamala Harris suffers from small-mindedness. She does not have the experience or the magnanimity, frankly, that President Biden is exhibiting right now.

Interestingly, knowing J.D. Vance pretty well, he would do that for her. Her, if the roles were reversed. He wrote the forward to your book and he wrote the forward to project 2025. He did not write the forward to project 2025.

He did not contribute. No, that's an invention of the radical left. I've tried to mischaracterize. He wrote the forward to my book, Dawn's Early Light. Yeah, so which is out right now.

But Project 2025, were you shocked when they started using it against Trump and saying this is his handbook and this is what he's going to do? I was surprised. Even though you back up everything in the book, you're a private. Sure. Yeah, we have nothing to apologize for.

We're very proud of it. I was surprised that it got as far as it did. And when I talked to President Trump about this in July, he got it. I mean, for him and his campaign, they understood that this had become a political liability, which was not to say that the personnel and the policies were bad. And I said, look, sir, we're just going to get this out of your way.

It's not our desire to be in the news about all of this. It's just that the left had nothing else to run on. And they spent four or six weeks bashing the project. And the tactical error that we made, I made, the book stops on my desk, was not responding to that. Because we're so careful with our donors' money on that.

Looking back, if they were to do that again, we would figuratively bash them for what they're doing. Lesson learned about how the radical left plays a case.

So, Kevin, you're saying that as soon as they started saying Donald Trump's blueprint is Project 2025, the 900-page book that you put together, you should have come out and said, no, it isn't. We did that immediately. It was six weeks prior to that. Counter-ads you should have done? We did do counter-ads.

My point is that six weeks prior to the left making that wrong connection to President Trump's campaign, they were beginning to run ads about Project 2025 being, quote unquote, this catastrophic radical idea, and they were using this in house races. And my point about the tactical error is that's when we should have tried to neutralize it. We didn't see coming that they were going to draw this wrong, but for a little while, effective political connection between our project and the president's campaign.

So, when you write Dawn's Early Light, you want to give your personal perspective, what you vision for our family, but also a vision. Vision for the future, but also where we've been and what separates us. Are you a little taken aback that you have to put that in a book, that we've gotten so away from our foundation that you have to redefine to people where we've been and where we are? Completely. I was halfway through writing the book, Brian, and I turned to my chief of staff, who's great, and I said, Wes, he's younger than I am.

I said, Wes, do you think I really have to explain all this? He said, Absolutely, you do. And he said, Kevin, you are an educator, you're someone focused on education policy, and this is just natural to you. But he said, I'm just letting you know, he's a millennial. We did not learn this, even at good schools, even at great schools.

And it's really important that you not only teach us this, but use the book as an opportunity to connect for Americans our wonderful history with what the future may be. And so, the point, Brian, is that even though there are obstacles for us today and they may seem insurmountable, the founders thought that. The generation after the founders thought that. Every generation has thought that. We have Problems to be sure, but we also have men and women who are rising up and great ideas to solve them.

You bring up the Roman Empire, you talk about the Greeks, you also talk about in the book, you know, France and the difference between their revolution, what their aims were, and how they ended up with Napoleon, and how we ended up after our Civil War, we ended up a better country. That's right. And really, the corollary between the French Revolution and today is that so much of the radical left is actually intellectually connected to the intellectual totalitarianism of the French Revolution. The beauty of the American Revolution, to your question, Brian, is that in spite of the fact that it was, in fact, a real revolution, we know that ideologically, intellectually, it actually was a revolution of continuity, that we're trying to balance these two competing goods of liberty on the one hand and order on the other. And for the most part, with some exceptions in our history, we have done that.

I actually think the election of Trump and Vance is a signal that we're getting back to that after three and a half years of the radical left, sort of like the French revolutionaries being in control. Heritage is going to be a resource for the administration? I'm sure we will be. I say that not out of entitlement, but we have since we were founded 50 years ago. Right.

Reagan saw it that way. He did. Right. And I anticipate that in the future. Excellent.

Kevin Roberts, congratulations. Pick up his book, Dawn's Early Life: Taking Back Washington to Save America. Forward by J.D. Vance. Rich Lowry next.

Brian Kilmicho. We have all the events as they unfold. Don't move. If you're interested in it, Brian's talking about it. You're with Brian Kilmead.

I'm sort of amazed by how staid the conversation has been to this point about Hagseth, because if we're being frank about it, the reason he's picked is because he's on Fox and Friends, right? And this is true of a number of these picks, right? Mike Walls also happened to be the congressman who had appeared on Fox more than any other sitting Republican member of Congress in the past two years. These people grabbed Trump's attention because of their television appearances. He's drawn to the idea that they can present on a medium that he loves.

Contemporaneous reporting, I should say reporting from last night, suggests that the Hagseth decision was done in a matter of 24 hours, that there's internal confusion about it. Of things that Sam Stein. Number one, Congressman Mike Waltz knows Trump from Florida. Number two is they were allies in Congress when he was in the White House. Uh he was going to help.

Donald Trump, he was going to help Mike Waltz become. Governor Mike Walsh does come on a lot, but you know where else he goes? He goes to CNN, goes to other networks, to Sunday shows when he was asked. He also was working for Dick Cheney.

So yeah, he sees Mike Waltz. But it's a person relationship, so he's wrong on that. And for Pete Hagseth, yeah, he goes on Fox. But they became personal friends. They're fa uh same with uh Jen, his wife.

They go to the White House. Uh they got he got married. Pete got married at uh one of Donald Trump's golf courses in Bedminster.

So that's a relationship. If Pete never won on Fox again, That was a relationship that was dug in, and Pete's got the resume that he has. And he's still building it up.

So, I mean, this guy was was dabbling in truth. But don't listen to him. You can't be an expert on something you do not know. And that's what you're looking at right now. Rich Lowry is the editor of National Review, author of the Case for Nationalism.

Hey, Rich, welcome back. Hey, how's it going?

So what do you think of the Hexeth pick? It is a little stunning. I mean, we all know Pete and love Pete. He's a hugely impressive guy, right? Decorated military veteran, sterling academic credentials, has a really important take on the military and how we need to extricate all the DEI stuff and focus on warfighting, which is really important.

Excuse me, I think that the one concern is this is a massive, a massive institution, hugely complex.

So that's the one thing that gives me pause. It's just it's such a managerial challenge.

So I would have gone a little more conventional, giving them veterans, and then when the SEC deaf, the first SEC deaf left after two years or whatever, then maybe consider the Pentagon. But it's enjoyable seeing the other side freak out. Mike Huckabee, I got assured by someone higher up in the Trump team, will be Mike Huckabee, his great move for Ambassador to Israel. He understands and has passion and would be able to communicate like nobody else about the mission there. And it sends a great message to Hamas, Hezbollah, and Iran.

This new administration coming in likes Israel. Yeah, absolutely. And doesn't like Iran.

So Iran is one of the biggest losers of this election because nearly all all the names we've talked about in the national security orbit are Iran hawks.

So that's something, another area where there's going to be a huge shift from the Biden approach. Here was Mike Huckabee last night with Sean Hannery, too. I think he's impacting that conflict before he's even sworn in. You're seeing a scrambling all over the Middle East of countries suddenly trying to behave differently because they know a new sheriff has come to town, and this isn't a one-bullet Barney with a bullet in his shirt pocket. This is the real deal.

I mean, this is Donald Trump that they are afraid of. And he's going to play that, and he knows Netanyahu very well. And I thought Ambassador Friedman was fantastic, too. And the thing is, it's not going to be, well, Israel, whatever you want. That's not the point.

He also, you know, a boss called Trump as well. Immediately, congratulate him on the victory.

So they're smart. They have to show. I mean, he's useless. Yasser Arafat handpicked him. But.

He's been totally steamrolled by Hamas.

So right now, there is nobody to deal with. At least he's saying, put his hand up and saying, you know, I'm not in a tunnel in Gaza. Yeah, and this, Brian, it's so funny. It started immediately, basically on election night. Everyone around the world wants a deal.

Everyone around the world is maneuvering for advantage. Everyone around the world is trying to get Trump's favor. And that's what you want, right? You want someone who's so powerful, so scary, so potentially unpredictable that everyone wants to get in good with them. That's good.

That feels much better than what's happened over the last four years. I'd love that Rubio is about to be named Secretary of State. What I was saying before is, I said, well, is the fact that it's delayed, does that mean there's a problem? And I was assured, absolutely not. He's going to get the Secretary of State job.

I love that. Yeah, and just Trump's foreign policy. Mark Thiessen has been on this for a long time. I think he's right. He's not an isolationist.

He's a Jacksonian. It's a real traditional American attitude. It's basically, we don't seek out conflicts, and we'd prefer to mind our own business here at home, but we're going to be strong. And if you mess with us, that's it. If you mess with us, we're going to hit back twice as hard.

So I think it looks like on the foreign policy, just based on the personnel choices, it's kind of a hawkish restrainer alliance the way it was the first time around. Not going to seek out major Middle Eastern wars, obviously, but going to send the message that people can't mess with us either. Right. So a couple of things. I just want to bring you to the Democratic side for a second, as we know it's mostly about Republicans, but I am just stunned on what has been unveiled through various channels about how much Kamala Harris's team spent in 107 days and what they spent it on.

It is absolutely sickening to see. that they gave Al Sharpton. Millions of dollars in order to get an endorsement. It goes to his air quotes organization. I am stunned that they gave Oprah, it said to Harpo, it didn't say Foundation, Oprah, millions of dollars in order to show up an interviewer where they had to build a set and hundreds of thousands of dollars to get that podcaster to interview her.

They got only 800,000 views. Yeah, $100,000 on that set. I guess Brian is just an example. If you got a billion dollars, you've got to spend it on something, right?

So they weren't pinching their pennies. And it just goes to the fact money is important. You need enough money to get your message out. But at a certain point, it's a vanishing advantage. It doesn't make that much difference, right?

You either have a good candidate with a good message or you don't. And money's not going to make up for that. And it didn't make up for it here. And it's just stunning that they could be in debt. And a million dollars for a set, that Oprah set, if I remember it, it didn't look like anything special.

And they could have gone to any like public T V station outside Detroit. It would have looked just as good and not cost a million dollars.

So it's just insane. And Al Sharp, I'm glad that's getting attention because that's just how that game has played for a very long time. You want his endorsement, you got to pay.

So I'm thinking about this.

Now, when you see an endorsement, at least I thought sincerity. Is clear, and just how much of an impact it makes is the question.

Now, from now on. Every time I see a celebrity, Or official, I wonder. Are they getting paid to say that? Yeah.

So I mean were they an were they a twenty two year old? Influencer with purple hair and nose rings just online saying, you know, buy this deodorant. I mean, anyone all these people can be bought now that you would think can't be bought because they're so rich. Yeah, it just goes to how synthetic the whole phenomenon was. She was a puppet.

There's nothing there. She was a cardboard cutout.

So even her endorsements were fake and paid for. And if she had won, it would have driven such paranoia and cynicism about our system. Like, who's really in charge? Who's really running things? Who are the puppet masters?

So I think just all these financial reports, you can see where the strings were.

So it was terrible and a very good thing that she lost.

So, from the National Review perspective. Where do you guys stand? What are your expectations for this four years?

So much is unprecedented about it. The speed in which their staffing is noted, they know there's no reelection and they know that they got this window, and we don't know what's going to happen in the midterms.

So, how would you characterize what you've seen right now, holistically? I think it's been impressive. They clearly learned from the mistakes of the first time around where they really didn't know what they're doing. They know what they're doing this time around. The freak out on the left has not been anything like I expected.

I expected unrest in the streets that would have been destabilizing. Hasn't happened. There isn't a Russia investigation or anything equivalent to it that's going to blight the first two years.

So, I think it's pretty clear running room, but you know, there are always events, and things can go wrong. The things I'm most worried about are prosecutions of political opponents, which I think would be a waste of time and hurt him politically and fail. And we haven't heard any talk about that so far, which is good. Worried a little bit about tariffs, you know, so we'll see are they negative. Negotiating tactic?

Are they really going to be sweeping and across the board? And I'm a Ukraine hawk.

So I'm open to an unsatisfactory deal. I think that's what we're looking for, but I don't want to see Russia get too much.

So you write about the most effective ad through this cycle would be he and they, we're here for you. That whole trans. That whole trans campaign, which has been jammed down our throats for the last six years, maybe more, and then all of a sudden hit its zenith. We're paying, and Kamala Harris is all for it, for illegal immigrants to get gender. Affirming care, if I could just throw up in my mouth.

So we get to switch genders and go to a women's prison, all this stuff. And you write about that. You say the Dems learn the hard way. We won't be bullied by trans moralism. The hard way was the loss.

Yeah, so the thing is they're not giving this up. Seth Moulton, who kind of stuck his head above the parapet and said, you know, I have a couple of little girls. I don't want them run over by boy on the playing field. He's his top aide resigned. You've had Tufts, the university up there, denouncing him.

He's been announced by all these alphabet groups. And they're not going to give this up. They believe it's the civil rights cause of our time, having boys compete against girls in sports and having these surgeries, including for very, very young people.

So it's insane. It wasn't the most important issue in the campaign, but it made the point that she is out there and she doesn't have a compelling explanation for why she's supposedly a centrist. She didn't say she could have just said, look, I've seen where this has gone. I regret my past support for this. And no, boys shouldn't compete with girls.

She would never say that, right? It was just I follow the law, right? Which was a nonsense, vacuous talking point, like so many other things she said. Mm-hmm. I want you to hear some of this exchange on CNN, which, by the way, nobody's watching, literally at all.

You've got to see the ratings. But this was on late, this is on. One of those late-night shows. Let's listen. I think there are a lot of families out there who don't believe boys should play girls' sports.

They're not boys. I'm not going to listen to transphobia at this table. I am not going to listen to transphobia. When you call a trans girl a boy, allow me to finish my explanation. When you use a word to stop first, I'm going to interrupt.

That's not how it is. Change. They're not boys. They're not boys. They're not playing girls.

I'm not going to sit there and say, let's just reset for a second because I. Look, this is a really heated issue, right? And Sharmichael, I know you. I know that you understand that people have different views on this. I think out of respect for Jay, like let's try to Talk about this in a way that is respectful.

Okay, so let me rephrase this since I'm being targeted here. I don't think you're not. Let's be clear, you are not being targeted. But I am, but it's okay. I'm specifically saying that I know that you are not intending to be transphobic.

He should know that I'm not intending. But he wants to be aware of that. I'm not calling transphobia, but I want to give you some idea. I want to give you a question. No, regular people interpret it.

That's not regular people. That's not regular people. There's no consensus that these are actually boys. This whole thing about trans girls is a canard.

So that is really Everything boiled down. Yeah, everything boiled down. It's it's a a hate crime to call biological males boys, right? And and this is supposed to be uh a down-the-middle news network, and Abby Phillip is supposed to be a down-the-middle anchor for a news network. We know it's not true.

And she doesn't say, oh, excuse me, uh the Republican Sure Michael here can use whatever term he wants, because that the the terms themselves are hotly contested. She shames him and and tells him he's being disrespectful.

So yeah, that's a party that is is going to keep losing if that's their attitude. You know, I'm going to figure in there's somebody else not at the table that is more important, the viewer. And the viewer all sides with uh sheer uh Michael. Singleton.

So, I mean, he's the one. I mean, people understand exactly what he's talking about. You have a 12-year-old or a 14-year-old girl, and all of a sudden, a team going through gender identity crisis decides to flip genders.

Sorry, you can't play field hockey or volleyball or soccer against the girls. Whatever you're going through, best of luck, whatever you need to do. But there are certain rules after that. And that's what almost everybody agrees with, except these idiots with all the money on the Democratic Party and these spineless candidates who won't stand up for it.

Now they want to speak up after the election. Yeah, well well even Moulton who I mentioned and another Democrat Congressman Swazi, they voted for all the trans stuff. They voted against Republican bills that would have stopped it. Biden, there have been Biden advisors out there saying, well, he never would have supported this. He would have said that boys shouldn't compete in girls for all the rules, everything that the officials did there tended towards the trans insanity.

So they're all hypocrites. And I don't think they're really going to change because all the pressure in their party on their side is the other way.

So I want you to listen to this.

So Jon Stewart decides to take this angle, and I think he's way off base. I don't care if you agree with him or not. He usually is insightful. This is a total skewing of reality. Cut 25.

Everyone's talking about this wokeness theory. From cable news to the op-ed section. I only have one problem with the woke theory. I just didn't recall seeing any Democrats running on woke shit. Yeah.

They didn't talk about it. Pronouns, they didn't say Latin X. It was the opposite. They didn't do the woke thing. They tried.

They acted like Republicans for the last four months. They wore camo hats and went to Cheney family reunions. Democrats were mostly running against an identity that was defined for them based on a couple of months of post-George Floyd Defund the Police Me Too Instagram posts from four years ago.

So he's wrong. They tried to overcome their issues by trying to run ads that made them look like Republicans, but the horse was out of the barn. Yeah, I mean, he actually inadvertently puts his finger right on the point, right, Brian, when he said for the last four months. They've run as Republicans for the last four months, right?

So is that going to be a camo hat? You know, the most left-wing governor in America doesn't know how to load a shotgun when he's hunting quail, that's going to convince people? No. And it wasn't just, you know, a couple days or a brief period after George Floyd, you know, in 19 and 20 and into 21 and even into this administration, they pursued all this stuff.

So it's all on them. You know, a lot of people say woke is a fake thing. It's a term they came up with. A lot of people will say, oh, it's very rare that boys compete against girls.

Well, if it's rare, just say it's wrong. But they can't and they won't. Rich Larry, thanks so much. Natural Review, a vital read, especially during the next four years. Rich, thank you.

I'm looking for more cabinet picks from the Fox and Friends couch, Brian.

Sorry, we can't give any more up. We'll lose the balance of power. Thanks so much, Rich. Back in a moment. Politics, current events, and news that affects you.

Brian's got a lot more to say. Stay with Brian Kilmead. Radio that makes you think. This is the Brian Kill Me Show. Hey, welcome back, everybody.

We're just watching the President of the United States walk in to meet with leadership in Washington. It's going to be a historic day. He meets with President Biden today, and he's going to fly back. You know, they say it's going to last about an hour, but if it goes well, I just looked at President Trump's schedule. There's nothing after that meeting.

So it goes flies back to Palm Beach.

So I think it's open. And Trump is a conversationalist. Especially if he beats you. After he beats you, he'll talk to you forever. Hence Marco Ruby is about to be Secretary of State.

So hence Ted Cruz got bailed out by Donald Trump. He went there multiple times.

So once you beat you, it's over.

So You know, with Jeb Bush situation, he doesn't really talk bad about the Bushes at all anymore. Even on the stump, sometimes he got caught up in it. As a quick note, History, Liberty, and Laughs, patriotic, motivational, inspirational, time on stage. We have a good time. I'll be in Jacksonville at the Florida Theater February 15th.

I know it seems like a long way away, but it's over 1,000 seats.

So I want that place filled up, maxed out. It's in tandem with Fox Nation, the whole touch of Fox Nation specials, too. Brian Kilmicho. From Hia Tom Fox News Headquarters in New York City. Always seeking solutions, never sowing division.

It's Brian Kill Me. Hop from 4866 in Midtown Manhattan, heard around the country, around the world. It's a Brian Kill Me show. Exciting day. This is a day in which Joe Biden welcomes in the president-elect to the White House and they talk.

And I think Joe Biden's going to put pressure, you know, just going to lobby for Ukraine and said, don't give up on them. And I don't think President Trump's going to give up. We'll talk about that later in the hour. And President Trump's now addressing House. The House is going to go Republican.

They're now two official votes away, but there's some races to be decided. The House did lose two esteemed members, Elise Stefanik and Michael Waltz, lost them both to the Trump administration. Waltz becomes National Security Advisor, Lee Stefanik to U.N. Ambassador, and she's in New York with a plus-nine of Republican, R plus nine. And Mike Waltz is, you know, he had a tough battle the first time to get that seat.

I know the St. Augustine area, and I think that'll stay Republican. But if you're Speaker Johnson, you got to get somebody there right away.

Now, DeSantis will pick up the pace and do it quickly. I don't know if Hoko will. I know on the face it wouldn't. But if Hoko does want financing for these major projects that she wants from Trump that they spoke about already, Don't gum up Elise Stefanic. It would be dumb.

Josh Rogan at the bottom of the hour, David Bonson here in studio, the Bonsum Group, the CIO, founder, and managing. CIO, is that correct? Chief Investment Officer.

Okay. Managing partner and author of the book Full-Time Work and the Meaning of Life.

So, David, got an exciting day, isn't it? Lots going on. It's a big deal. And then you get all these announcements, appointments, and then at the same time, having this meeting of President Biden. I think it's surreal.

Right. To see it's going to happen, and they know he's going to go. I mean, he's basically got a shell of a staff left. Most of them left already and went to work for the failed campaign of Kamala Harris.

So he's got KJP as a chief advisor, Jeff Zeitz as chief of staff. And there's a lot of things hanging in the balance. What you heard today, where do you think the status of our economy is today? I know the market had a down day yesterday, but for the most part, it has surged since Trump won. Yeah, there's a really, really good fundamental backdrop.

And in terms of investors and people trying to think about the market, there's just two forces in a tug of war with each other. It's a big deal. It's going to be a big deal next year. One is the really good news: strong fundamentals. I think Trump is going to be successful with deregulation, with some degree of lower taxes.

And then I think that right now, unemployment is very low and earnings are at record highs. Corporate profits are very high. All that, and this is all at a time when the Fed's getting ready to be cutting interest rates. All that's very good. What's the downside?

Very high valuations. A lot of this stuff is already priced in. And so you're competing. Of high valuations in the market against good fundamentals. The worst kind of markets are valuations going lower and bad fundamentals.

We don't have that. You got good fundamentals against. stretched valuations. Um So we're looking at a market at least say besides the deficit, which is a problem. What I love about the Elon Musk Vivek Ramaswamy being assignment for government efficiency, normally when you hear about that, you think, okay.

There's going to be people spending out range of spending, but they have no answer. How do you feel about what you know about both men, their companies, their skill set? And what they're going to try to do. You know, Ramaswamy is a talented guy. One of the things I like about him on this, and I suspect it's why he's there with Elon, is the PR of it.

You have to really win the messaging battle here. People talk like everybody wants to cut spending and regulation. Guess what? Not everyone wants to. A lot of people benefit from some of the regulation.

Half of the problem with fraud, waste and corruption is overpayment.

Well, the people getting the overpayments are not going to like it when they come in and clean that up. But Ronaswamy is a very good communicator. He's an articulate guy. I think he's there on that front. And then obviously just the ability to look at this, take a sober assessment and come up with real specific ideas.

But I think some people are a little optimistic that everyone's just going to be really happy about this. They're not. People don't like having their bureaucratic fiefdom taken away from them. David Bonson, our guest. Here's it, David.

I'll take a step back. Aside from execution. Will they be able to identify the waste? Is it hard to identify the waste in a department and to really dig into it, especially if they don't want it exposed? Yes, they will be able to.

Some of it will be hard, but let me give you an example, Brian. The government bureau itself already said there was $200 billion of excess payments, primarily to states for unemployment, Medicaid, which also goes to states, and then the EITC, this earned income tax credit, which was a boondoggle, and Medicare. People getting too high a Medicare reimbursement are not very prone to want to give it back. And so that inefficiency has to be dealt with. But though that's 200 billion, they know about.

Now, to your point, there's a whole lot more if we knew about we could do something.

Someone's got to go discover it and get cooperation and looking into it.

So they're going to have to pick some battles. And I'll tell you what they're going to end up doing because they're very smart guys. They're going to take something that is low-hanging fruit that's outrageous to the public and go make hay of it and then get the public sentiment on their side, go find something. You remember the Pentagon toilet seat story back in the 80s? It wasn't a ton of money, but it just sort of created the outrage you need in the public.

And I think they'll do other things.

So say, look, I've identified this building. There's only like 20 people in a building that's six stories high. Oh, it's time to get rid of this building. You know, they do this. Washington owns these buildings that aren't even occupied.

So they look to get rid of it. And the people that push back on it, I could see them calling a press conference. Hey, Mr. President, can you get a press conference? Say, yeah, 12.

Today, Iliam Mussel is going to be here with Vivek Ramaswamy to identify agencies and divisions that are refusing to reform. And that pressure will be the first time these civil, these civil service, and I'm not saying everybody in civil service is lazy. I'm not saying that. But a lot of people are cashing in. Yeah, and they have different incentive structure.

Even good public servants, there is a law of self-preservation where what we need is productivity. Here's the low-hanging fruit, Brian, is DEI. Because see, notice he didn't call it the Department of Fraud, Waste and Corruption. The DEI money has been legally apportioned. But he called it government efficiency.

They can come in and identify: hey, here's $40 million that went to trying to get public education about monkeypox to a certain segment in one community. You're not kidding, it probably did. No, it's a real-life number.

So there's things like that all over the place. I'm not even getting in the Department of Education, where DEI is run amok. I mean, again, the state of California and UC Regions employs 800 diversity officers at hundreds of thousands of dollars per year per person. They can identify that stuff. It's not illegal, it's not fraud-waste corruption, but it's inefficiency.

And they can make public pay over it. In Musk's case, when you look at his companies, is he known as a cost cutter? Is he known as an efficiency guy? I think of him as an inventor. Yeah, it's different for companies that aren't hyper-levered, and that's a unique thing because we're so used to debt capital driving a lot of this, and he used equity.

And so, on one hand, you described to me for civilians like that. Yeah, sure. I'm sorry.

So, you borrow money, you got to pay it back, and you got to service the debt.

So, it's a cost to the Company with equity, the downside is the investors can make a lot of money. You've given away a lot of your company, but the good news is there's no cost to it along the way, right? You're not making a principal and interest payment for the debt. He funded it by continually selling more equity off to the public, so that was efficient. He had a more efficient capital structure in the way he ran the company, if that makes sense.

No, look, you can't be cheap running a space exploration company or running an electric vehicle car company. But I do believe that he was smart. He hired expensive people, but they were good people. See, we talk as if sometimes thrift and cutting cost and austerity is always a good thing.

Sometimes you got to invest into good people.

So I think he has a good instinct for where to press the gas and putting more investment and resources into things and when they're inefficient.

So there's this story. I remember Teddy Roosevelt just reading about it for Teddy and Booker T. And, you know, he helps. One of these presidents get elected, a Republican get elected. He goes, what do you want?

He goes, well, he had a job. They go, well, I want you here straighten out the civil service division. And his wife tells him, I don't want you to take it. This is good. I've got to move to Washington for this, live in a small apartment for that salary.

And he takes it. And he walks in. And from day one, he changed the whole complexion, got rid of the deadwood, motivated these people, changed the incentive structure to the point when they were. Democrat wins, they say, this guy, Terry Roosevelt, he's got to stay because he inspired people. And I know we've gotten so much bigger since then, but this is a bigger issue now.

But I'm hoping that that private sector, that incentive, don't vilify civil service workers unless you have to. But can you change the structure? Can you recommend a change even to the civil service union to maybe get your star workers more compensation? The hard part is that there's so many places you can go. There's so much inefficiency in the FDA and the EPA.

Where do you go? Because if you spread too thin, you risk not really moving the needle.

So you almost have to start with a couple winnable battles, go in and bank some wins, and then you can kind of spread throughout the rest of government. I understand.

So we'll see what's going on. We'll take a short time out, come back a little bit more with David Bonson. Bottom of the hour, Josh Rogan, The Washington Post. We're taking a look at some historic things. We know Donald Trump is getting set to meet with President Biden.

That's it about. At 11 o'clock Eastern Time, but you know who's not going to be there? Melania. And it's not because she's busy or Baron has a back-to-school night, it's because she's a little angry. very angry at the Bidens.

She claimed ransacked her house in Mar a Lago, went through her drawers, which everybody knows was excessive, and the FBI, he she believes, got their orders from the Bidens.

So she's not going. Brian Kilmead Show. Diving deep into today's top stories, it's Brian Kilmead. Breaking news, unique opinions. Hear it all on the Brian Kill Me Show.

Hey, welcome back. David Bonson here from the Bonson Group. We're looking right now at the economy. Donald Trump is speaking. He's going to be meeting with the president, the president in 35 minutes.

There's a bit of a mutiny in the House, and Trump is going to try to squelch it. He is very tight with Speaker Johnson. And for people just out there, I don't want to go through this again, and I know most of you understand it. You could be the most conservative, the most moderate. You could be a rhino, whatever you want to say.

If you are Speaker, you're rounding up people, you're getting a coherent message. You have a very slight majority. You could say, I need someone more conservative.

Well, you're going to lose half your caucus. That's what happened with Kevin McCarthy. And if they put him up there and then a Mac Gates is going to stick up again, it's going to hurt the whole country, let alone the cause. And Donald Trump has no time to waste. David, when you see that inflation is the number one factor, perhaps, in deciding this election, and now we understand it went up 0.2%.

Is that true, the inflation rate? Month over month. It came in exactly as projected, 2.6 year over year, but again, 5% of that is in rents, which are not up 5%.

So it's a funky thing. But I mean, the biggest issue that the President can do to get prices lower is produce more goods and services, right? Inflation is too much money chasing too few goods. We need more supply side. He can help on the energy side, and he can certainly just buy it with greater economic activity, generate more production, which I think pushes prices.

How do you do that? How do you generate more production?

Well, you lower tax rates and lower regulation. That's it. I mean, that's what Reagan did. A marginal tax rate reduction. This is basic supply-side economics that I think works not just to promote growth, but to push inflation lower.

Especially auto manufacturers, I imagine, too. Absolutely.

So do you think these auto companies are probably on the phone already? Go, where are we heading? Because they know their life changed dramatically when Joe Biden won.

Well, I think that the auto companies right now face a really interesting opportunity because they were pivoting into a very expensive and unprofitable venture around EV mandates. Bailing on it at a record rate. Bailing on it because it wasn't working, but now they don't have to bail on it if they don't have to do it and they can get back to what they normally do. It's funny. Boeing came out, the new CEO, saying, We are not looking at getting rid of some of our DEI stuff because we want to focus on whether or not the things we do help us build planes.

The cars, they don't want to go through all these EV mandates. They want to build cars, sell cars. That's what they do. That's what you need. That's anti-inflationary and pro-growth.

Get businesses doing business. When you make those statements. And you know it's coming, but nothing actually happens, but you know it's heading in that direction. That's enough, correct? If there's always a sincere move, I'm going to start drilling.

We didn't drill today, but already it would start changing things. And that's what I understand. Lee Zeldin made it pretty clear. His goal was to get those pipelines going and to release the ban.

So right now we're in a pause on natural gas. On exporting natural gas, which is not just environmentally stupid and geopolitically stupid. Asia and Europe want to buy liquefied natural gas from us, but it's a growth industry. I've said this over and over again. Barack Obama would have had negative GDP growth in his presidency if it wasn't for fracking.

Okay, so which he had nothing to do with, by the way.

Well, of course he didn't, but he was there and to his credit behind this. Didn't stop it. He didn't stop it. He didn't want to take credit for not stopping it until it came time to a second debate with Mitt Romney. But for the most part, he kind of was stuck in the weird position of allowing it to go, but not really being able to brag about it because of the far left environmental species.

Movement. I think that in this case, the export LNG ban was a terrible thing for Harris's campaign because she wanted to get past her old stupid statement of saying I want to ban fracking, and yet this thing was lingering out there.

Well, this wasn't four years ago. This was eight months ago. Your administration put a freeze on approving new terminals. It takes years to build them. We need these things.

It employs tens of thousands of people and not just basic jobs. good paying jobs. Good jobs for people who don't have to have college degrees, but can make six figures with special skills. It's an advanced engineering, manufacturing. It's just a really important construction aspect of jobs.

And Biden, for whatever reason, killed it, even though prior to that, they were doing a lot with export LNG after Russia invaded Ukraine. Which is crazy because he was asked by Speaker Johnson, why did you pause? With excavation, he says, I have it. We're discussing. He goes, No, you've paused it.

And he had nothing to say. Yeah, he put it in.

Somebody in his administration did it and didn't inform, or he forgot. Yeah.

And government speak, when someone says we're appointing a commission, that's the way they kill things. When they say we're pausing or we're having a discussion, you know, like when I have something I have to discuss with my people about our company, we discuss it that day and make a decision that day or the next day and start our new plan of attack the day after that. We go very quickly. The government, when they talk about pausing to have a conversation, that's a year. Two years.

They were trying to kill it. The same thing they did with nuclear. Yeah, we didn't ever end nuclear. We just haven't done it for 30 years. It's government inefficiency.

I want you to hear what Kevin Walling said, a Democratic campaign consultant, and tell me how this ripples down to the economy, Cut 28. Voters send an overwhelming message oftentimes that they want to see Democrats and Republicans working together. This is going to be a very slim majority for the Republicans, and the House getting slimmer by the day every time Donald Trump appoints a new House member to his cabinet, and certainly a 53, 47 majority in the Senate.

So do you think Wall Street or do you think the economic experts want to see cooperation between the two?

Well, I know that they do. And in this particular case, I just want to point out the Republicans are probably going to end up with three, four or five seat majority. If it wasn't for some of the shenanigans that have happened of division within the party, we could have a 30-seat majority. We could have 20, 30 seats very easily.

So, yeah, you get a lot more done when you have more leverage because the margin matters, the committees matter, and they need to be able to get along and not play performative games with one another.

So, I think President Trump is going to be reinforcing that message loud and clear today. And by the way, we were talking to David Bonson.

So, David, who's the right Treasury Secretary? What will be the right message that gives you an idea that the President's on the right track? Who do you want to see name? Of the names that are real seriously being considered, I really like Scott Besson a lot. I think he's a very philosophical person.

He has a deep understanding of what makes markets work and what the dollar is about and what needs to happen in America's financial system. David Malpas' name has not been getting a lot of play. He was President Trump's choice for head of the World Bank, and he's someone I like a great deal. I think he's a real senior statesman. He has served in three presidents' administrations in the Treasury Department already.

So, either Scott Besant or David Malpas. There were a couple other names I didn't like, but I think Scott's going to get the name. David Goodman. I would love Jamie, and I think Jamie would take it, but I don't think President Trump's going to go there. Because he didn't really support him, right?

That's not the reason. I think he right now wants people that are more ideological, not that kind of Wall Street background. But sometimes a good Wall Street background can help too, Brian. David Bonson, thanks so much. Coming up, we talk about the world, the challenges that Trump faces with Josh Rogan, the Washington Post.

The fastest three hours in radio. You're with Brian Kilmead. So, this isn't a big shock. Look, we've been in a resource economic supply chain and cyber warfare with China for over 20 plus years. And for too long, we've ignored the fact that they're not competitors on the economic field.

They're actually adversaries. We're looking at removing the PNTR, which is the preferred normal trade relations. I think that this holds them accountable and brings them to the table to start having true negotiations. But we know they steal billions upon billions of dollars in intellectual property from American businesses every single year. And so, we have to protect American jobs, American businesses, and the American cybersecurity has to be increased to ensure that we can thwart a lot of these efforts that are going on today when it comes to this type of thing.

I know, and China is a problem. And the president does come in with much more leverage now because China's economy is a lot worse than it was in 2016. A guy that knows as much about this. Regions, anyone you'll talk to is Josh Rogan, Washington Post columnist, author of Chaos Under Heaven. Josh, welcome back.

That was Corey Mills, by the way. Your thoughts of the China relations and the China economy and military. That Donald Trump will be confronting this time. Right. Well, you know, to be honest, you know, the the if you're sitting in Beijing right now, you've got to be pretty unhappy with the the list of canda of nominations that just came out of the Trump administration.

And that's good. I I'm happy that they're not happy that Trump has decided to appoint a team of China hawks so far. Marco Rubia, China Hawk, Mike Waltz, China Hawk, Pete Pete He Hegseth, China Hawk, JD Vance, China Hawk.

So, you know, we'll have to see who else fills out the administration. And to be sure, there are forces out there, Wall Street, in the business community, some in Congress, some in the bureaucracy, who will resist this. But what we're looking at is a return to the first term Trump presidency, which was a competitive, if not confrontational. Approach to dealing with the biggest threat to our freedom, democracy, our prosperity, and our public health, which is the expansion of the Chinese Communist Party.

So I think that this is a reset, a good one. That's not to say that the Biden administration's China policy was all bad. There were some good things about it, to be sure. And there were some things about the Trump administration's first term that weren't great. But the bottom line is that China's on notice now.

And I think life's going to be coming at them pretty fast in the next four years. And the way I understand it, I mean, economically, they can keep building their military, I understand, but their economy is still sucking wind. They got a huge unemployment issue with younger people.

Well, here's the thing, Brian, that I think a lot of Americans don't understand: is that the Chinese economy is not really, it doesn't operate like an economy like you and I think of. It's all controlled by the party. The state controls everything. The state-owned industries rule. They can do whatever they want.

So they can turn it up. They can turn it down. The money's worth something. It's not worth something. It's a shell game.

It's the back end of this system, which is sort of not focused on the things that we're focused on, like low unemployment and GDP growth. It's focused on building. The China dream, which is Xi Jinping's strategy to overtake us, to make China the most powerful and influential country in the world, to our disadvantage.

So I think focusing on the weakness of the Chinese economy is sort of how some people in Washington and Wall Street, frankly, say, like, oh, don't worry. They're not 10 feet tall. We don't really have to worry about them. Maybe the Chinese economy doing bad is bad for us because it'll pull down our economy. These are the things you hear a lot in Washington.

But the truth is that China's military is growing in what generals and admirals have told me is the largest military expansion in history. And they're spending three times as much as they admit. And they're harassing all of their neighbors. And they're building bases all over the world. And their Navy's bigger than ours already.

So, you know, yeah, they have some economic troubles, but it's not stopping them from their aggression and expansion, which means to do us harm. Right. They've wiped out so much of the incentive element of their economy that was starting to be built in in the 90s. Would you say that's correct? Yes, I mean their economic policy because you know we have this myth that oh because it's a you know dictatorship they can have really smart economic Policy that over decades.

But the truth is, they don't know what they're doing any more than anyone else.

So they have this huge real estate bubble that collapsed. Then they decided to crack down on their own tech industry and their own educational industry because for them, political control and the party's power is much more important than this industry or that industry having a good year or a bad year.

So, yeah, the good thing about the Chinese Communist Party is they make a lot of mistakes. And they're not really as smart as they think they are, as people give them credit for. But The fact is that it is the largest country in the world with the largest population in the world that is advancing. And especially in some critical technologies, they're competing or even doing better than us. They're ahead of us in hypersonics.

They're ahead of us in battery technology. These are big problems, you know. And when it comes to things like AI and quantum computing and semiconductors, we're fighting tooth and nail to maintain our advantage, but it's just a matter of time before they can direct enough resources at the thing to have build their own systems.

So that this is really the most important struggle in our lifetime. It's a systems battle. You can call it a Cold War. You can call it whatever you want, but. their goal is to overtake us, and our goal is to not not let that happen.

But they do need our market and they need their market to start buying their own products. Americans, you you write, American uh, by the way, they're still doing a lot of cyber hacking, right? Oh, man.

So this is the this is a crazy scandal that I think people are were just too sort of like distracted by the election to focus on. But the Chinese intelligence services hacked the phones of President Trump President Vice President-elect Vance and lots and lots of other people and listened to their phone calls and read their text messages in real time. And they're still in there. And they cracked the FBI's wiretapping system. And they can wiretap people like they're the FBI, except they don't even need a warrant because they're the Chinese spies.

And they could use that to wiretap basically any American who uses a cell phone. And that's, if you just think about what I just said, that's a huge scandal, a huge intelligence failure. I don't think the Biden administration wants to talk about it because it happened on their watch, so they're downplaying it. The telecom companies don't want to talk about it. But it's not really about Trump.

It's about them spying on everything. And this is just sort of like a big thing that eventually we're going to need to deal with, both as a government and as a society. You think, as in yesterday, we did deal with it. Yeah, you would think that.

So how is it? I know you used to be a Pentagon reporter. How's Pete's nomination playing? Because then.

So far. It's it surprised a lot of people, as you know. I mean, just yesterday, you know, everyone was saying, oh, well, maybe it's Tulsi, maybe it's Chris Miller, maybe it's Robert Herwood.

So it really came out of left field.

So I mean, I think, you know, you see what I see: the Democrats are not happy, the Republicans are happy, and, you know, it seems like there's nothing that's going to, I mean, he still has to go through the process, and I'm sure there'll be a hearing, and, you know, he'll have to. Defend his record, but it seems like he's going to get confirmed. And I think it's going to be a big culture change at the top of the Defense Department, for better or worse. I mean, it's unprecedented, really. We don't really know how it's all going to play out.

But, you know, he's a decorated officer, a China hawk. His position on Ukraine is strong. I'm against Russia and China, so assume me. And so I like what he has to say about the Ukraine war. And so, yeah, so I think that credential-wise, he's got the credentials.

He's a controversial guy, and that's kind of his brand. And, you know, that'll have to play out. But I think he's going to get confirmed. And I think that a lot of people in the Pentagon are going to wake up to a new style of leadership. Yeah, they read his book.

He does talk about that woke DEI stuff that's got to stop. And General, you know, ahead of SendCom saying, I'd like to find out about white privilege, General Milley, who I think is a disaster and has been a disaster for this country. He just said it because he wanted, he thought that's what. The right thing to say was, you know what I mean? Like, come on, Josh.

You know, you can't really know that he doesn't believe any of that stuff. You know, he's just trying to say what he's supposed to say. I don't know. I thought General was supposed to say what they think. But, um, So Josh.

On Ukraine, you write this column, and it's right on the money. That's my biggest worry about J.D. Vance. I appreciate his intellect, ability to defend Trump, and he ends up being a very strong pick. But you write in your column that J.D.

Vance basically said, Yeah, let Ukraine fail to be on Joe Biden's baseball card, not understanding, as smart as he is, that what that would mean. For our allies right after Afghanistan, and how that would be interpreted for Russia, and what that would mean for China, how it's all connected in Eastern Europe. I mean, that I don't think Trump is gonna go along with that. And you say if you explain to Trump That this will be a stain you can never shake because if Ukraine falls, it's now on you. They have proven for two and a half years they fight like warriors, like gladiators.

They deserve our backing. And this is much more than a Ukraine-Russia fight. I think it's bigger than that. Oh, of course. You know, and basically what I argued in the column is: listen, you know, the Ukraine war should end.

You know what I mean? There's nobody saying that it shouldn't. And all wars ended in negotiation, but the details matter.

Okay. And there's two different camps sort of like vying for Trump's ear, President Trump's ear on this. One is saying that, okay, like Marco Rubio and Mike Waltz, they both said basically the same thing, which is, yes, let's negotiate an end to the war, but on good terms for Ukraine, not on good terms for Putin. It's really important because if you negotiate on good terms for Putin, he's just going to swallow his gains and keep going. But if you are able to sort of support Ukraine through this process rather than pull the aid, then you can get much better terms.

It'll be much safer for everybody involved, including us. And what the European leaders are telling me is that, look at what happened to President Biden in Afghanistan. It seemed like a good idea to pull out of Afghanistan. It probably was a good idea, but what happened was he did it so. Horrendously, that it was a stand on his legacy.

He lost 10 points in popularity, and it was a humiliation for America on the world stage, on his watch.

So, President Trump has an opportunity to end the war skillfully, or there's a risk that he could listen to some of his advisors who really don't care about Ukraine or just think it's all Zelensky's fault or whatever. And in that case, I think that would be a calamity for President Trump because it would look really bad on the world stage for Russia to just, you know. Turn that whole country into a slave state on his watch. And I'm sure he doesn't want that to happen. I don't think he wants that to happen.

And as much as he's skeptical of the effort, supporting Ukraine through a negotiation rather than abandoning them seems to me to be the much smarter thing to do for Ukraine and for us.

So Josh I know it's so hard to get accurate information out of Russia. But when you see that they're losing a thousand to seventeen hundred soldiers a day, when you see that they have their Navy wiped out by another country without a Navy, basically half their Navy has been sunk. When you see how much it's cost and how much isolation has resulted, do you believe that this is something that Vladimir Putin might be looking for an off ramp? Yes, no, I think he said as much. And I think honestly, he thinks he can deal better with President Trump than he could with President Biden.

He's probably right about that. Because so yes, there is a deal to be had. And by the way, the Ukrainians also suffering greatly and time is not on their side. And so so it seems like in a crazy way Trump's election makes the chances f for a deal between all of these sides much more possible. And it's a real opportunity, but again, only if we're on Ukraine's side and not making Concessions for them to Russia that are going to come back to bite us.

Have you seen this victory plan that. Zelensky's been pushing around, been giving to our our allies. I mean, does it does it end with him being part of NATO? What what is he's in the EU? What I mean, do we end up with missile defense on his border to stop any type of further invasion?

Yeah, I I would say like Zelensky's victory plan is something of a wish list, to be honest, you know, and it's not just directed at us, it's directed at the Europeans, because no matter what happens, it seems like the Europeans are gonna have to pick up more of the burden. On this thing, you know, especially considering what's coming in the next U.S. Congress. And so, you know, Zelensky's going to, of course, he's going to ask for the sun and the moon and the stars in the kitchen saying, you know, that's what he's got to do. He's trying to save his country, you know.

So he's not going to get all that stuff. And he's not going to get NATO membership. He could get EU membership. And these are the things that need to be worked out.

So I don't blame Zelensky for saying, hey, we need everything. And I just think, you know, as Americans, we should say to him, okay, either we're going to give you what you need or we're not. But what the Biden administration has been doing is been giving them just a little bit less than what they need, which all that does is allow them to lose slowly, which is really horrendous. I just think the last four years. has been such a such a bad foreign policy period in our lives.

At the same time, we need more defense spending. We need to widen the defense base, not to fight a war, but to intimidate people away from war. the whole peace through strength is not a joke, it's not a slogan. I think it's a philosophy we have to live by, but we can't the speed. We are not producing weapons like we should.

We're not producing missile defense for our allies who want to pay for it. I mean, we could have a major push to give missile defense to all our allies. They will write the checks for it. We replenish it. We mainten it.

It could be a for-profit thing for Donald Trump. And I think it's just got to be presented that way in reality, not sold, presented. Yeah, I mean, I agree with you. I think, you know, when you look at China and when you look at Taiwan specifically, you can see the results of our policy, which is that we talk loud and carry a small stick because we're promising all these things about Taiwan, and yet we can't get them the weapons that they've already purchased. Our pipelines are dry, and we don't have the capacity.

And, you know, you look at our adversaries, Russia, China, Iran, and North Korea, and some people say, oh, well, we can split off Russia or we can split off China. I don't believe that at all. I think they're. In a team, that team is against us. You know, the United States, our European friends, our Asian friends, Japan, South Korea, the Philippines, etc.

We got more. We have the high ground. The good news is we have much bigger. combined economy, much better capacity, much better system, a m a better way of life also for our people with freedom and the ability to to determine their own lives and that's people prefer that. But what we have to live up to what we say, we have to walk the walk, not just talk the talk.

And we're not doing that right now.

So it's you know, the Biden people, they're not I don't necessarily think I don't think they're bad people, Brian. I don't think they're they're trying to weaken America. They have this theory of the world, which is if we just do You know, manage these problems, you know, not too hot, not too cold. I call it a Goldilocks foreign policy. It's just kind of like right in the mushy middle, then everything will probably be fine, but everything is not fine.

The Middle East is on fire. Europe is on fire. You know, the pot is boiling in East Asia.

So we have to either act or get off the pot here. And, you know, there will always be some that say, oh, well, let's just put up the... pull up the drawbridge, build Fortress America, hide behind our walls. They can't get to us. I think that's really dangerous.

I think eventually, if you let the bad guys advance, they'll come to your door. It's much better to push back over there than over here. But in order to do that, we have to actually do it. And I think we have an opportunity to do it. And I hope the next administration will get it.

I hope they call you, man. You have great insight. I know you'll be covering it. Josh Rogan, the Washington Post. Thanks so much, Josh.

Always great. Anytime. Back in a moment. Giving you everything you need to know. You're with Brian Kilmead.

The talk show that's getting you talking. You're with Brian Kilmead. This is ride or die time. I mean, this is a time for witnesses to come forward and share information that they feel has been hidden from the American public. We have agencies like Arrow within the federal government that we don't know how much they're spending on these types of programs, these special access programs for unidentified arrhomena.

Why is that classified?

So I want to get to the bottom of it. That is Nancy Mays trying to find a UFO.

So there was a big hearing today. Michael Schellenberger, our guest from late last week, that's why this guy's got such a wide swath. He's studying the economy in Brazil. He's doing Twitter files here. He's doing Twitter files Brazil now.

And now he says, by the way, I'm also looking after UFOs.

So, it's just crazy. He's also from San Francisco trying to straighten out the homeless situation and talk about how ridiculous the giving needles and pipes to crack addicts is.

So, that is Michael Schellenberger testifying yesterday in front of Nancy May, saying that you guys got to just tell us when you see something from another planet. That's all we ask. And especially, let's find out if they're friendly. Eric, do you have any idea if we are to spot a UFO? Do you think they'll be friendly?

What would you look for to know if we should approach? I mean, it'll be round. We know that. It'll be a flying saucer.

So we know that for sure. Yeah.

I think the safest approach is to assume they don't have good intentions. Right. Just in case. I mean, do you swing, come out swinging? Like when they walk down the steps?

Just wait. I don't think we'll have that option. Right. I think you wait to see if they do the MAGA dance. Oh, the new MAGA dance.

Then, you know, if they're pro-Trump, then they'll probably be able to stay. They just cannot vote in this election. No, but they can do it in their UFOs. From the Fox News Radio Studios in Midtown Manhattan, it's the fastest-growing radio talk show. Brian Kilmead.

Hi, everyone. Welcome to the latest moments of the Brian Killmee show.

So glad you're here.

So much happening. I mean, we're watching so many things that are taking place today, let alone trying to find out who the majority leader in a secret ballot will be in the Senate. We're still waiting to see who's going to win the House. This hour, we're going to be joined by Carl Rove, who looks good, dressed up for me. If he had some time, I said, you can do some television if you want, but I just need you here at 11.

He said, fine.

So, Carl Rove, you're here. That's not what you said. You said, get your posterior up here, or you're in trouble. There were threats made by your staff. On my staff?

But they were speaking on your behalf. I like them to be the heavy. Let's get to the big three.

Now with the stories you need to know, it's Brian's big three. Number three. They're going to meet in the Oval Office at midday, and it's one of the few times these two men have met in person outside of the debates that they participated in this year and in 2020. The White House says that President Biden wants to take this opportunity to stress the importance of a peaceful and efficient transition. All right, good.

Jeff Zeit says he'll cooperate with the chief of staff. Awkward and necessary. The smooth transfer of power that didn't take place four years ago is hopefully going to take place today with future President Donald Trump and Lame Ducker Joe Biden, not President Kamala Harris and Melania. I'll talk about it. Number two.

I'm willing to sit down with this administration like I tried to sit down with the previous administrations in my 10 trips to Washington and say we have a problem that's overrunning cities. That is Mayor Eric Adams, and I think he sees a potential partner in Trump. I'll see. A lot of doubters. At least he's more cooperative than the Chicago mayor, the Los Angeles mayor.

A comprehensive attack plan on illegal immigration, zeroing in on sanctuary cities.

Some blue mayors dig in, and some put out their hands.

So far, Adams is saying the right thing. Number Mm-hmm. Trump just announcing that our own Pete Hagseff will be his Secretary of Defense. Trump team bulking up quick and taps box for talent. We look at the team and who is on deck.

And one of them is Ambassador Mike Huckabee in Israel. Carl Rove is here. I'm lucky enough to have him here. Carl, I love this stuff: the transfer of power. Only America does things like this.

You lose an election. Hey, I beat your vice president. Show me around the White House. Tell me what matters to you. How long do you think this meeting will last?

They have it down for an hour.

Well, given the loquaciousness of these two people, it will last at least an hour. They both like to talk. They both like to talk. You know, the. Yeah, this is an important symbol.

It's a symbolic moment. As a country, we like to have a circumstance where we have a tough election and after that tough election, people say, you know what, we're going to give the person who won a I may not have voted for him, but I'm going to give him a shot and give him a chance. And this is really important to that moment.

So far, I want to look at the Trump team as we see it so far, but I want to talk about this. I don't have to tell you that George Bush says Barack Obama has my support, you're not going to hear from me, and he didn't. I don't have to tell Carl Rove that Bill Clinton was very deferential to George H.W. Bush and friendly with George W. Bush and only got critical when his wife ran for president.

And Barack Obama was disparaging to George W. Bush, but behind the scenes. Gates picked it up and wrote about it in his book. He talked about the policies in Iraq and everything. Uh for the most part I hope these two decide.

No more personal attacks. I agree. I think that's good. Do you think they will?

Well, I hope so. I'm going to discuss that. I hope so. But frankly, I was a little. You know, I don't want to say but Jake Sullivan did not help last night with the comments basically, you know, lecturing the incoming President on what he needs to do.

That's not helpful. You mean the kissinger of this generation? That's what he calls himself. Yeah, well. Yet.

Anyway, the guy the guy. The Palestine situation is not a big deal. Yeah, not a big deal. Everything's okay. And, you know, Kabul was a great success, et cetera.

But look, that's the point. It's a transition. It is one administration giving way to a new administration. The question is: what do you need to do to help facilitate that transition? 43 Obama was rather critical of him during the campaign of 2008.

But what he said to everybody after the end of the campaign was: reach out to your opposite number as their name to invite them in, tell them what's been going on, ask them what they need from you. Do everything you can to facilitate a smooth transition. And as I said on the channel earlier today, I mean, think about it. At noon on January 20th, at the very moment the power is passing from one administration to another, two chiefs of staff are standing in an undisclosed location: the incoming chief of staff for Barack Obama, Rahm Emanuel, and the outgoing chief of staff for Josh Bolton, monitoring. Yep.

Security channels in a secure facility because there was a credible threat to the inaugural. And it was two men representing two different parties, two different administrations, and yet they were working hand in glove to make certain that there was a seamless transfer. I loved it.

So I just hope they both just say, listen. Whatever happened, happened. No more personal attacks. I think it helps the country. Number two is: I do remember they took the W's off the keyboard.

That was true. That was true. And they also poured gunk over my keyboard had a lot of obnoxious material on it, missing the W. And then they also, the worst thing they did was, though, some and look, this was not Clinton. This was some, you know, a few aides.

But every telephone in the West Wing is geared to a specific plug.

So what they did is they took some of the phones and moved them from office to office so that they were inoperative. And so you had to have the poor General Services Administration people taking all of these phones on trolleys and plug them into the outlet to make certain that they worked. And I mean, there was like 30 or so phones where they were plugging them into the outlet until they finally got one that actually worked in that outlet. Each phone was marked for a specific outlet.

So we have Marco Rubio is going to be Secretary of State. I talked to someone within the administration. They said the delay, don't read anything into the delay.

So that's great. Terrific. I love that, right? I love Susie Wiles as chief of staff. I think she's going to be fantastic.

And I love what you said about it. I'm not going to let the clown car come in. Because there's a lot of people on the extreme right, might be fine people and good hosts, but uh podcasters, but I think they're terrible for the president. And they they hurt him last time around. You know, I don't know Susie.

I've known of her for many years, but I have great friends who have worked with her and speak Unbelievably highly of her. People like working with her and for her. And that says a lot about her as an individual. Especially after two years of very tense campaign.

Well, and look, I mean, you know, and not only that, but it's over decades. I mean, people who worked for her for the last 20 years say it was one of the great experiences of their life. She's a great leader, and she's a great boss. And look, this will tax everybody who goes into the West Wing will wake up and realize no matter how much I thought I've prepared myself for this moment, this is more demanding than I thought. And look, Pete Hagsteth takes over.

He's got this military background. He's an officer in the military, in the National Guard. He's been in Iraq and Afghanistan and Gitmo. I think that's going to help. I thought also for two and a half years he's been studying what's going on inside the Pentagon, wrote that book about the woke culture inside.

He has some definite opinions. I think he's going to really help recruiting almost immediately. He recognizes the problem in the ranks. He understands what it's like to fight in wars. I think that's important.

And I think he could put people in charge, chief of staff, deputy. Understand the Pentagon to get his philosophy out there and get the president's philosophy out there. Yeah, look, first of all, he needs a strong deputy in the undersecretary slot. That's absolutely vital. That's generally been a person who's the strategic thinker.

The service chiefs, each one of the branches, the Army, the Navy, the Air Force, increasingly the Space Force, which now reports through the Air Force, each one of those needs to have a strong secretary, and he'll play a role in choosing those. I wish the President had rolled him out in a different way than simply an NX. I think it would have been better for the country to have seen Pete in this different role.

Next to the President.

Next to the President, with the President explaining to the American people why he chose him, because you and I both know him. You and I both know that he is a fantastic human being. We also know that he is a courageous patriot. This is a man who saw combat in Afghanistan and Iraq. He's a decorated combat veteran.

He led men and women in harm's way. I think it would have been better had the President done so in person. Use Congressman Jason Chaffetz on this, cut six. I think it was Rob O'Neill who said, you know, we're over here arguing about who should use which bathroom, and the Chinese are putting together a fighting force and building up their military. Pete understands this.

And you do that by putting on the uniform and actually being out there in the combat theater like Pete Hagseth has. I think he'll get easily confirmed. I dare any Republican senator to vote against him. That is not in their best interest. And we need to get him in place as soon as possible.

Relief is on the way. This is exactly what I think America was striving for.

So, I mean, we've got the team filling out. Do you like the pace in which people are being named? Yeah, I do. I think it's think about the contrast between today and eight years ago. I mean, we had sort of like it was almost comical.

I mean, Mitt Romney comes up to have dinner with the prospective employer, you know, that kind of thing. And now it is bang, bang, bang, bang, bang. We're not waiting until December. He's rolling these things out. It is a recognition that time is not on his side.

Everybody who has been in that office understand, well, and in fact, you understand it has to be the first year has to be very strong because he's got the House and the Senate for the next two years. He'll probably have the Senate after 2026. But midterm elections are not friendly generally to second-term presidents. And you've got to get off to a strong start. And he is, you know, think about all the things that are on his plate.

You've got a budget that is not in place for the fiscal year that we're now nearly three months into. You've got a debt ceiling vote. You've got the entire tax plan. Expires at the end of the year. You've got to get all these people confirmed.

You've got a bunch of judicial appointments that are going to be coming your way. And then you've got a robust agenda of doing three big things. Securing the border Making the economy grow and making people feel more prosperous and be more prosperous and strengthening our military in a dangerous world. And I think energy, right? You could do that right away.

Well, the energy thing is going to be, I mean, bang, the liquid natural the natural the ban on exporting liquid natural gas, gone. And yes, there will be a lot of administrative actions they can take. He does need a strong Interior Secretary and a strong Energy Secretary to make certain that these things have durability and that statutory changes that need to be made, like permitting, make it easier for these big infrastructure projects to be moved forward, which was bipartisan efforts in the Biden administration, not supported by the President or the Vice President, but conceivably done so now. All right. Back in a moment.

More with Karl Roev in just a second, as President Trump and President Biden are now in the Oval Office. Don't move. Politics, current events, and news that affects you. Brian's got a lot more to say. Stay with Brian Kilmead.

He's so busy, he'll make your head spin. It's Brian Kilmeade. Or Mr. President, elect and former president and college, congratulations, thank you, and uh looking forward to having a, like we said. smooth transition, do everything we can to make sure you're accommodating what you need.

We're going to get a chance to talk to us on that today. It's good. Welcome. Thank you very much. And politics is tough, and it's in many cases not a very nice world, but it is a nice world today, and I appreciate it very much.

A transition that's so smooth, it'll be. As smooth as it can get, and I very much appreciate that, Joe. You're welcome. Thank you all. And that's a wrap.

That was the exchange that we saw for the public behind closed doors. We'll find out later how it went. We never found out about the letter that everybody agrees was very nice, that Trump left for Biden. He says, I'm not going to make it public. And I guess I respect that.

Carl Rove is still here. Carl, anything come out of that for you? I thought it was a good moment. This is what we want to see. This is what the country needs.

You know, there needs to be a sense in this country that we can have our disagreements at the polls, and afterwards, Be find a commonality as Americans and move forward. And I thought that was really good on the part of President. Biden, and I thought President Trump's remarks were terrific. And so what was embarrassing was after President Biden said, you know, thank you, ladies and gentlemen, to the press, they started screaming at both men. I mean, please, let's have a little bit of, you know.

I always thought that would be a pool report of just one or two reporters. Isn't that the agreement on something like that?

Well, I don't know. They obviously had a large number of people in the room with them.

So a couple of things about Kamala Harris. Number one, it's come out that Oprah Winfrey's foundation, although it was written to Harpo Productions, got a million dollars for that interview with Kamala Harris, which was hideous and only hurt her. And now Harris gave $500,000 to Al Sharpton's group, $500,000 in donations to Al Sharpton's nonprofit organization just prior to a glowing interview with the candidate. What? Are you kidding me?

Well, and look, first of all, nonprofit, is it a 501c3? Because that's supposed to stay out of politics. A 501c4, which is not tax deductible, can participate in politics as long as most of its money is spent on its principal purpose and a minority of its money is spent on issue advocacy or what's called express advocacy, campaign, vote for X or tell Congressman Jones to do Y. What are they doing there? Look, I understand that Oprah's production company put on the show, and so you have to pay them for putting on that show.

Otherwise, it's an illegal campaign contribution. But it goes to show what modern politics is about. $1 million to do that show. That's about what it costs to put on a big rally for Trump, is $1 million. That's why we didn't see as many of them this time around as we, particularly early on, as we saw four years ago.

So I just do you wonder too.

So so you see someone interviewed? Uh or endorse. You would assume they endorse because they think he's a good candy he or she's a good candidate. But now all of a sudden I'm wondering to myself, wait a second, what did Beyonce get paid? That's going to come out.

You know, you've got to fly into Texas. You're not going to sing. You're just going to endorse because you get paid.

Now, you've got to pay for the plane. I got it. Your Beyoncé. She's not going to fly Delta. But how much are you wasting?

And if you're that person in Pennsylvania saying, honey, you know, do you have $75? I'd like to give it to Harris. I want Harris to win. Is this what you wanted Harris to spend the money on?

Now they're in debt asking for more money. Yeah.

Well, a couple of things. One is, obviously, they didn't have strict financial controls. Otherwise, they would not have ended up in the red. By how much? Is it $10 million?

We don't know. And they had a billion in 107 days. Yeah, well, and they spent $1,06 in the entire campaign.

So A, we don't know. B, we'll find out. And C, it's a sign that the main Was wrong because you have to plan for these things. You don't want to end up in the red. You remember in 2016, Donald Trump ended up with unspent monies at the end.

And people were being critical. You should have spent it all.

Well, no, you really want to hold on to something so that when the unexpected bills show up and when, as in his case, you won, you have to continue on.

So, but it really is a sign of a fundamental flaw in her campaign, in my opinion. Too many endorsements by too many big names. Senate 52, 53 senators, but McCormick's having trouble now. Casey will not concede. Cut 26.

Across our Commonwealth, close to seven million people can be a very important part of the world. casts their votes in a free and fair election. Our county election officials will finish counting those votes. just like they do in every election. The American Democratic process was born in Pennsylvania.

And that process will play out. The AP called it Pennsylvania has in McCormick's already taken orientation. Carl, what's the reality? The reality is that the number of military absentee ballots and provisional ballots and the likely number of late-arriving mail-in ballots are insufficient for Bob Casey to overturn the election. Dave McCormick leads by 35,000 votes in order for him to, and there are barely that many in terms of all of these other categories of provisional ballots, et cetera.

And look, this is peak on the part of Bob Casey, and maybe his lawyer, Mark Elias, wants to have another payday with a recount. But this is petty, this is small, and this is unworthy of him as he ends his political career. This man comes from a political family, was treasurer, U.S. Senator, and this is a bad way to go out. Information you want, truth you demand.

This is the Brian Kill Me Show. We know that today, a week after the election, President Biden and Vice President Harris had a private lunch. How awkward was that? I don't even understand. Why would it be awkward?

Because he got squeezed out for her and then she kept him at arm's length and then she lost and now she's. I'm not even going to take the premise of this the question. What I will say is The President and the Vice President. had lunch today. They've had lunch many times.

They have um they communicate with each other regularly.

So that was a very leading question, but of course, it had to be awkward. Of course, hey, I heard you ran for president. I heard you spent a billion dollars. I heard you lost $50. 30 states, including all the battleground states.

I heard you lost the popular vote. Oh, that guy you went against? I beat him and I got the popular vote. Pass the salt.

Now One thing I would say. I have not heard that the Vice President was behind this move. For Joe Biden to be out. That was Joe Biden earned the right to be out because he he was failing. Physically, he was failing.

His policies weren't popular. LBJ like unpopular. He did not realize it. He says his numbers were good. And we know that Nancy Pelosi forced the whole thing because the guys, meaning Clinton and Obama, didn't step up so she did.

Where she double-crossed everybody, not double-crossed, better word. Where she outmaneuvered everybody. Was consolidating everything and stopping any type of massive runoff to have a jungle primary that has the best man or woman emerge. She would have been one of the masses. That's what I find unbelievable.

I also said this: I don't have the sound bite. But to see James Clyburn burn race and sexism for the reason why she didn't win, do you understand that Joe Biden was pretty white, according to reports? Going back in his history, the only thing we know for sure is that his uncle was shot down and eaten by cannibals. But that's the only thing we know in his background. Pretty white guy.

He was about to lose by double digits.

So she lost by about 80 electoral votes in about 10 states, and she got just hammered. And President Trump, who got 74 million votes last time, got more votes this time, set a new record. He's got the all-time mark of $82 million, which even beats Barack Obama and Bill Clinton. Bill Clinton never got a majority of the vote because the first time he got 40% because Ross Perot was in it.

So, having said all that, There's got to be tension in that lunch. We just told you a short time ago that, and currently, right now, President Trump and President-elect Trump and President Biden are meeting behind closed doors. Reportedly, it's not going to be a surprise to anybody that he is lobbying hard not to cut off Ukraine. He probably wants to get the president's point of view on this. And I think President Trump will probably ask some questions because General Keene had told me that he wants Trump during those days.

He goes, It's really good for the country for the leading contender, for the nominee, to get these briefings, get the presidential briefings on a daily basis. Trump's like, you know, they don't want to give it to me. You know, I got the, you know, if they want to pretend like I have felonies and I can't be trusted, whatever. It's not going to affect me, I don't need to do it. But now Trump's got to get it, and I hope they talk candidly about the threat.

And it's not hard to understand, too. Trump knows it. It's gotten worse. I mean you have now behind the scenes Russia and Iran working on an exchange, a type of money that they can use to start trading while avoiding the US dollar. All this stuff is happening.

Now Trump could come in there and they could realize this whole BRICS thing is not working. They have no military alliance and an economic alliance might look impressive to a degree when you have India, China and Russia and Brazil in one. and others, but I don't think that it's going to be anywhere close to what the G seven is and what the European Union has become and what these other alliances are with the US and the US dollar and our economy stronger than all of them. I think Trump could go in there and tell Modi, hey, listen, I don't know what problem you had before, But I'm the new guy. Enough with the bricks.

In Brazil, Lula, I like Balconero. I think you're corrupt. I think Castro's your hero. That bothers me. But if you want to do any trade with us, this is what you do, and maybe manipulate it in a different way.

And then with Russia. I think Russia probably wants to a degree an off-ramp, but they also want a lot in return. I want President Trump, and I thought this was great advice yesterday. I think it was Mark Deason that said it. That said, Trump should not be dealing with Russia alone.

Get the other countries involved along to Ukraine.

So it's not just you refereeing.

So the European Union can get in there and understand too? And Trump could say, Look, look at how determined they are. Look at the Ukrainians are not budging. You're losing 1,000 people a day minimum, 1,700 a couple of days ago. You don't want to do this anymore.

So let's start fresh, and you could save face. What does it take to save face? He's got a huge opportunity here. I think a lot of people, and I think. Biden to himself can't get out fast enough.

I think he's done. I think that he's done. I think his Secretary of State has been. I don't even know if you could say hardworking. But I think that for the most part, you have a situation Where in Joe Biden, he is out of ideas.

His influence didn't work. He brought stability. He's got some friends globally, but they didn't respect him enough to have many real gains. You know, fortifying NATO is not a big deal. That was already en route.

I heard he picked up the phone, and he had a lot to do with Finland coming aboard. If that was the case, I'm fine with that. Take credit. But NATO is stronger, they're more determined, but the people that galvanize NATO are the Russians and the Russian army. They no longer realize that it's not.

Uh it is not Hyperbolic to say that Russia is a threat. We got to combine and we've got to fully finance our Defense Department. It's not hyperbolic. Lastly, just on the Trump team that's coming together. Mike Huckabee, as ambassador, I love David Free, but as ambassador to Israel, loyal to the president.

Loves Prime Minister Netanyahu, loves Israel. Not Jewish, which is fine. But important to point out, loves Israel, understand who the good guys are. And also, it's a message to Hezbollah, Hamas, Syria, the militias in Iraq, and into Tehran. You have huge supporters of Israel now.

No one cares about the Columbia protesters. In fact, cops are going to be fortified to knock them back. Cut to. I think he's impacting that conflict before he's even sworn in. you're seeing a scrambling all over the Middle East of countries suddenly trying to behave differently because they know a new sheriff has come to town, and this isn't a one bullet Barney with a bullet in his shirt pocket.

This is the real deal. I mean, this is Donald Trump that they are afraid of. I think so too. Alina Haba, they say, could be the press secretary. I think she's fine.

I think she used to be a legal aide to the President in the White House. But as press secretary, I think Caroline Levitt earned it. And with Kayleigh McEnany, she worked for Payley McEnany's press shop. And she has stepped up. She reminds me a lot of Kaylee.

Here's Alina Haba on being mentioned last night with Sean. Cut three. President Trump has put together an amazing cabinet. I'm really proud of the work that him and his transition team have done. I think when we look at everybody, they are killing it on all fronts.

America is excited for a frankly sorry to use Mrs. Waltz's term, but turn a page. It's time to turn the page. It's time to have advocacy for America first. And whatever that looks like for President Trump and his team, I trust it.

It's a decision for all of them to make, not me. I am very loyal to President Trump. I would think about it. Very seriously. Oh, look, I mean, she'll be good, she'll be strong, she'll be well read, she's smart.

I just think that there's a there's a rhythm to taking a lot of these issues. Like we saw this with Kamala Harris. She didn't really know these issues. Her life is legal. She's always focused on the rules, the laws, the cases, the process.

A lot of this stuff is mood, anger, tone, policy, history. Carolyn Levitt's kind of lived the last four years, about the four years of Trump, wa uh reported on the four years and commented on the four years of Biden, and then watched the campaign rise up, know who the players are. I think she'll have no problem getting into the meetings, and I think it'll be important. They're going to get Treasury Secretary. Scott Bessett is a good friend of the show.

It'll be great for us to get in there. She's got the George Soros. He's got the George Soros backdrop. When Soros started going off the edge, he did his own thing, became a multi-millionaire in the process, maybe even more. Attorney General's got to be tough.

Interior is going to be key. Agriculture, I think people line up. Not the sexiest, but extremely important, especially when it comes to trade. HHS Secretary. I think that could be RFK Jr.

I would look to see Tulsi Gabbard get a key role. I'm not sure if it's energy, transportation, education. I look for Governor Bergham, who really was a finalist to be the VP, has totally impressed Trump. Him and his wife flew around the country with Trump on his campaign. They really bonded around New Hampshire.

Keep in mind, he tours Achilles when he was running for president, dealt with the president successfully his first four years, was critical a little during the debates. Trump is over that. They're about this, I think Trump's about 10 years younger, but they are close to the same bracket. I think that they're going to do something. He's going to do something international.

And I'm not sure that I thought initially it would be energy, but I think it's going to be something international. And I got some hints because he's been traveling a lot lately.

So I'm going to keep my eye on that. Um Here's also the VA is going to be important. DNI will be great.

Now, we know that Radcliffe took over CIA. He was, John Radcliffe was DNI director. DNI technically above the FBI and all the other intelligence agencies, but they don't have the budget. The CIA needs to be reined in and overseen. We could see that, but I also think that Radcliffe wanted something new.

So to see DNI, I'd love to see somebody in there like Mike Rogers. Mike Rogers, who lost a heartbreaker for the Senate seat in Michigan. I'd love to see if there's going to be a new FBI director. I'd love to see if he would be running up the FBI. I think he'd be fantastic.

I also think that Eric Hovedy was really distinguished himself. He's a multi-billionaire. His family owns banks. They own his capital of finance, does major investing outdoors. This guy was already to go into the service business and serve his country.

He barely lost in a very purple state of Wisconsin that Trump won. He closed it within a half a point. I think that's very respectable. Or maybe he's director of Off uh OMB. which uh Mulvaney had for a while.

Here's Julie Manchester. She works a political reporter for The Hill. She talked about how the Cabinet's taking shape, Cut Nine. He's gotten praise for a number of these cabinet picks. Most notably, I would say recently from Secretary of State Marco Rubio, assuming that is made official at some point.

These are all people who have stayed loyal, who have defended him on television, on the campaign trail, and they also match up with his policies. I think we are certainly seeing through these cabinet picks a look at what his policy and his priorities will be: immigration and being a hardliner on immigration, obviously huge. Being tough on China, I think that's certainly reflected with Mike Waltz and Marco Rubio. And then, of course, this emphasis on combating anti-Semitism and being a hardliner on this issue of Israel, certainly reflected with Elise Stefanik being appointed to the UN ambassador role. Yeah, that'll be a key role.

Lastly, I just want to end with his Sanctuary Cities. When Trump initially brought up in 2017 huge pushback, you have no heart, Mr. President. Show some heart. I always believed that if you're here illegally, you need to get out and you can't have.

A sanctuary needs to be charged and then shipped out once you're convicted. Eric Adams looks like he wants to play ball, I hope, but fingers are crossed. Cut 19. I am willing to sit down with this administration like I tried to sit down with the previous administrations in my 10 trips to Washington and say, we have a problem that's overrunning cities. I'm hoping this administration would hear what I'm saying and listen to some of the ideas that I have been pushing for over a year now, or close to two years now.

Anything other than that? Uh you know, uh many of you already have your stories written already. Who am I kidding? You already you know, you already have you they they wrote already and you're going to spin it the way you want. Fix immigration.

Walk. His political situation, his legal situation is horrendous. I think more charges are coming down. But if there are no more charges coming down, They might be something legally he could survive. And number two is Biden did kick him to the curve.

And it's true that Trump does want to fix New York City. He loves it.

So, maybe there could be something that happens if there's no more charges coming down. But the good news is, Jack Smith is done. He's resigning before January 20th. Frank Hilmicho. More to know.

Sponsored by Previgen. Previgen is the most recommended memory support brand by pharmacists. What a lot of people are talking about is the age difference. You are 58. And Jake is 27.

And that is a big disparity. What say you about that? You see what you do for a living? Your guys, do you think a guy 30 years your your your your junior could do it better than you? Absolutely not.

You said you're gonna knock him out. Can you give us a round prediction?

Well, I'm not a psychic, but he's gonna be sleeping. What round? I just explained to you, I'm not a psychic. As soon as I hit him, he's gonna be sleeping.

So that is Mike Tyson. Get ready for his fight on Friday. Tyson will step into the ring against YouTuber, turn boxer. And by the way, all accounts, a good boxer, Jake Paul. Highly anticipate a unique match at ATT Stadium in Arlington.

It'll be broadcast on Netflix, one-of-a-kind opportunity, which makes it easily accessible to fans worldwide. Supposed to be 8 o'clock Eastern Time. I don't know what's in the undercard. I don't know. I know so little about this.

Here are the essential rules for the Tyson-Paul fight: both fighters will wear 14-ounce gloves instead of the 10-ounce gloves to make it a little bit easier on the head. These conditions are significant, they will influence the pace and strategy of the fight. How does that make it easier on the head? Or more cushion. Oh, I would think your hands.

Uh that's true. It's a good point. Uh but it also is easy to get hit with a uh it's easy to absorb a glove. Punch with a more paddle.

Okay, interesting. Additionally, each round will be two minutes. That's interesting.

So that means it's not a real fight. It's gotta be three minutes. And rather than usual, three minutes, the fight will consist of eight rounds instead of the Sander 10 or 12. See, the only thing is, with his best way of winning. Is Jake Paul has never felt this type of power?

Remember, Joe Frazier, and I am name-dropping, told me you take your punch to the grave. that you know you could be six years old you can hit just as hard you just can't hit as fast And I remember Joe Frazier was telling me my first big interview ever, right out of college, he said to me, Tyson was a phenomen. And he goes, I'd love to feel it. This is before his son fought him. I go, what do you mean?

He goes, because you take your punch to your grave, I would love to see if he could take my punch and I could take his punch. Only a boxer would think like that. You know, you want to get hit by Tyson to see what it feels like. That is very true. The average person is not thinking that.

Mike Strahan is opening up after he was criticized for the way he stood for the national anthem and didn't put his hand over his heart at the naval base in San Diego during the Star Spangled Battle. Let's listen. We had our national anthem. I didn't have my hand over my chest. Everyone thought he's protesting.

He's making a statement, which is so far from the truth. I have nothing to protest. I have no statement to be made. The only statement that should be made that I want to make is that I love the military. I do so many programs to help veterans and soldiers.

I grew up on a military base with a father who's a major in the army. My brother, my sister, my cousins, they all served in the military. I'm a military brat. And so the fact of somebody saying that, you know, I'm unpatriotic couldn't be any further from the truth. You know what?

I think it was you just forgot. You see, everybody with the handle that heart, sometimes you don't think about it. I mean, I thought it was just... It's a lot of most people do that out. You stand there respectfully, you take off your hat and all of that, but I.

You know, I feel like that's some more modern thing you always put your hand on. I remember when he was drafted because I was doing sports at that time. The number two pick, Mike Strahan. And the one thing they said, he's going to come in discipline. And I remember before anyone knew his name, because he's from a military family.

He spent most of his youth in Germany. Comes back to Texas, and his dad could see he's just big, big, phenomenal players. He goes, You want to play football? He says, I want to play football. Then he went to a smaller school, ends up being Hall of Famer.

Uh has the old time sack record.

So you believe him. I believe him, yeah. He just doesn't profile it. I mean, it's not like it's spike late. Spikely would absolutely be a protest.

He sees the backlash and tries to change his mind. Oh wow, is that it? I had so much more to say. You had me go caught up with these follow-up statements. But I think people now know more deeply than if we flew through them, right?

I mean, now you know about a heavier boxing globe. I don't know. Why was I told about this pressed availability of Mike Tyson? I would have flown down there. Maybe Tyson just knew he couldn't handle your questions.

True. Will Kane had you covered this election? Brett Baer joins us now. Former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy joining us on The Will Kane Show. Tommy Laren joins us now.

It's the new must-listen podcast in America. I think sanity, I'm hoping, is going to win today. What they did was the biggest miscarriage of democracy, I think, in my lifetime. I see a victory for Donald Trump. I see a victory for America.

The Will Kane Show. Listen and watch now at Will Kane Show.com. Listen to the show ad-free on Fox News Podcast Plus, on Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music with your Prime membership, or subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. Mm.