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Go to NobleGoldInvestments.com. Now, let's listen live in, but before we do, I want to welcome you guys to this broadcast. We will be going live for the next two hours as we cover all of the confirmation news live and in real time. President Trump's cabinet is continuing under the advise and consent of the U.S. Senate as the team is being assembled. One of the most important appointments for an incoming president is Treasury Secretary, the person who's going to help manage the economy and all of the headwinds. Let's listen to Scott Besant as he is taking questions right now.
Let's go to Scott Besant for Treasury Secretary. They actually extend current tax policy costs. Excuse me, that you agree that extending current tax policy actually costs money. Again, I think I don't understand the nuance of that question, but I will get back to you on it. Okay, I appreciate that. You have been supportive of many of President Trump's tariff plans, and I have heard the conversation there.
So I am not going to go into that. We've talked a little bit about it in my office, but let me jump back to these credits that were imposed that some of my colleagues are against. But they have benefited Nevada, and I want to talk to you a little bit about it. The 45X manufacturing tax credit supports thousands of jobs in the Reno area and billions in investment across my state. It also is key to reducing dependence on China for the critical minerals we need for our military and supports mining jobs in Nevada. We are a mining state. We are mining critical minerals. And so will you commit to opposing any effort to repeal or reduce the 45X tax credit, which is not just a benefit in Nevada.
It's a benefit in other states as well, including Alaska. So again, Senator, I am unfamiliar with that exact provision, but I do believe that it is important for us to mine, accumulate, and move to domestic production for rare earths and other vital minerals. So I will get back to you on my thoughts on that exact program, but on an atmospheric meta basis, I agree with the direction of travel. Thank you.
Let me ask you this. We also talked about this. President Trump has stated he thinks that the president should have influence over the decisions of the Federal Reserve.
And we discussed this in my office, and I appreciate that opportunity. Does it continue to be your view that the Federal Reserve should be independent of the president? Of course, and I actually believe that the notion that President Trump believes he should have influence, there was, I believe, a highly inaccurate Wall Street Journal article saying that he believed something to the effect that he should be in the room. President Trump is going to make his views known, as many senators did.
Three senators, including two on this committee, called for, there was a jumbo rate cut in September, 50 basis points. Two of the senators on this committee called for— I'm not asking my senator colleagues to get the politics on their side, I'm asking you. But let me just say, you don't deviate from our conversation that you think that there should be independence.
I think on monetary policy decisions, the FOMC should be independent. Thank you, I appreciate that. And then for the benefit of our colleagues, what you were referring to earlier, in our meeting I asked you if there are any regulations, Treasury regulations that currently exist that you disagree with. And in response, and continuing in response right now, you're saying you're going to look into it and get back to me, is that right?
Well, look, I believe, as we saw, I don't know if it's a regulation, but it's a policy, as we saw from the December 8th hack by some Chinese entities into the Treasury, which is very serious, that that was through a work-from-home software app. So one of the policies that I support, I intend to be in the building every day that I am in Washington, and I support a return to the office, which is against the current Treasury policy. Right, and I appreciate that.
If there are any others that you oppose and you can share with me, it doesn't have to be right now, get back to me, I appreciate that. Of course, I'm happy to provide that in writing. All right, thank you, thank you so much. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you, Senator Young. Mr. Besant, good to see you.
Congratulations again on your nomination in this important position, and thank you for your... Okay, so that is Scott Besant right now receiving questions. I want to listen in on the EPA right now, the Environmental Protection Agency. This is like March Madness, where you've got four games going on at once. You've got the round of 64, very contentious. Let's go to Lee Zeldin on the EPA.
I'm not sure the name of the committee. Let's listen live. Oil and gas leases and explore for additional production of oil and gas.
The EPA has written one-size-fits-all solutions. We are not the majors, and we are stripper well producers. And I just want your commitment to work with the industry, these small producers, to find right-sized regulations for the circumstances that they're in. Senator, I would welcome an opportunity to travel to your state to meet with them, whether it's at your office or elsewhere.
I want to know about all of your priorities, including this one, but also to make sure that anyone who could provide any type of insight that can make me better informed, to make better decisions, that I welcome any of those opportunities for conversations and collaboration. I think that's a wonderful offer on your part, and I'm very grateful for it. I sometimes am reluctant to ask every nominee that comes before me, would you please come visit Kansas? And you volunteered, so I'm appreciative of that. And I would tell you, I can't imagine the excitement, the opportunity that people in that industry would see to have the capability of talking to somebody like you directly in a state like Kansas. So thank you, and we'll get on your schedule, although you have to say once confirmed.
So I look forward to that. In a different vein of energy production, I've created with my colleague Senator Bozeman and others a Sustainable Aviation Fuel Caucus. Kansas, and Wichita in particular, is the air capital of the world. We produce many more general aviation aircraft than anybody we manufacture with thousands of employees working in aviation and aerospace. And I want to bring together the opportunity to bring the agricultural aspects of Kansas together with the aviation aspects and pursue the development of SAF, Sustainable Aviation Fuel.
I wanted to know, I guess the question would be, we need your help in pursuing opportunities. Okay, let's go back. I was told it was really contentious. Maybe the Democrats are, the Republicans seem to just kind of be going through established order there. So we have Scott Besant, we have Dick Durbin doing something that looks like Mr. Rish from Idaho, and then we have Senator Moran from Kansas basically talking about how he wants people to visit Kansas. Email us as always freedom at charliekirk.com.
And as always, subscribe to the Charlie Kirk Show podcast. We have January Madness that is underway right now. Not sure what nominee Dick Durbin is grilling. Maybe it's a representative.
Is this a Pam Bondi thing? Not exactly sure what's going on there right now. That's Lee Zeldin taking questions. Scott Besant taking questions.
Pam was not there since she had someone sit on our behalf. How does that work exactly? I don't understand.
So they take questions on behalf of Pam. I didn't even know you could do that. January is here.
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Let's watch. More wealth from the bottom half of American society when these people have enormous influence over the media, when they spend huge amounts of money in both political parties to elect candidates. What Biden said last night is we're moving toward an oligarchy.
I'm asking you that question. Do you think, forget how they made their money. Do you think that when so few people have so much wealth and so much economic and political power that that is an oligarchy form of society? Well, I wouldn't note that the President Biden gave the Presidential Medal of Freedom to two people who I think would qualify for his oligarchs. So this is not a condemnation of any one individual. I'm just asking you would so few people have so much wealth and power. But do you think that that is an oligarchy form of society? Senator, I think it depends on the ability to move up and down the No, that's not really the answer.
I mean, even if you had the mobility, no matter who those individuals might be. All right. But let me ask you another question. Right now in America, we have over 22 million workers who are making less than $15 an hour and nearly 40 million people in our country earning less than $17 an hour. Shamefully, the federal minimum wage, despite the efforts of myself and other people here, have not been raised since 2009. It remains an unbelievable $7.25 an hour. Will you work with those of us who want to raise the federal minimum wage to a living wage to take millions of Americans out of poverty? Senator, I believe that the minimum wage is more of a statewide and regional issue. So you don't think we should change the federal minimum wage of $7.25 an hour? No, sir.
Okay. Mr. Besant, millions of working class Americans who are struggling to keep their heads above water are paying outrageously high interest rates on their credit cards. Over half the American people who take out new credit cards are being charged interest rates of over 24%. During his campaign, President-elect Trump promised that he was going to cap credit card interest rates at 10%. I happen to think that that is a very good idea, and I will soon be introducing legislation to do just that. Will you, if you are confirmed, be supportive of what President-elect Trump said and what I want to see happen, and that is to cap credit card interest rates at 10%? Senator, I think we can both agree that many credit card companies have been bad actors throughout history, and I will get back to you.
A very simple question. Trump said he wants to cap credit card interest rates at 10%. I agree with him. Will you be supportive of what Trump and I would like to do?
When President Trump takes office, and if I am confirmed, I will follow what President Trump wants to do. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. Thank you very much. Next is Senator Smith.
Thank you very much. Okay, let's come back here for just a second here, guys, as we are split into those three. I think we have four screens now. So what's going on in the Pam Bondi hearing is that people are testifying pro and con on her behalf. We have the Lee Zeldin situation going on at Shelley Moore Capital.
We have the Governor Burgum situation. And let me just tell you the difference of worldview between Bernie Sanders and Scott Besant. Bernie Sanders is correct. We are getting closer and closer to an oligarchy. We've been saying that on this program for quite some time, but it's not the type of oligarchy that he thinks. It's an oligarchy of people that have centralized government type control with corporate friendly power on the outside.
And we see this kind of inside out relationship. And the difference between Bernie Sanders and Scott Besant is Bernie Sanders believes in a fixed pie theory, that just because somebody gets rich, he thinks somebody gets poor. And Bernie Sanders is grilling Scott Besant saying, should we not be able to take this wealth away?
But you could always make the pie bigger. The thing about a market is markets work in that people get richer simultaneously through voluntary transaction, through the price system, to the profit motive, the ability to make and take risks in a market economy. We know what the horrors of socialism have done for so many people. Email us freedom at Charlie Kirk dot com.
And I will add one more thing. We are going to kind of go through Joe Biden's farewell address last evening that he gave. We're very interestingly, if Joe Biden and the Democrats would have actually mentioned this rising fixture and consolidation of wealth, it would have been a much easier political strategy for them than whatever they ran on this last year. But Scott Besant, I thought, handled that beautifully and masterfully against Mr. Bernie Sanders, who he does not care about the poor. He hates the rich.
And those are two very, very different things. Reform. We've had lots of stops and starts over the last probably two to three years on this very issue. And it's holding up construction of critical energy, manufacturing, infrastructure, transportation, doesn't matter what kind of energy, renewable energy, pipelines, whatever. So we need to make it easier to build in America. I believe that's President Trump's vision as well, by modernizing and streamlining our environmental review and permitting processes. Congressman Zeldin, what opportunities do you see for EPA to be able to establish more efficient and predictable permitting processes, in addition to working with all the other agencies that play a part in these vital decisions?
And Chairman Capito, that last part of your question is key for different agencies to be able to work with each other, collaborating with each other, and also for agencies to be able to collaborate with Congress on any opportunities that Congress sees to pursue permitting reform as well. As far as EPA jurisdiction goes, we see a role of the EPA, for example, as it relates to environmental impact statements. There are different issues where there will be opportunities for the EPA to follow its obligations under the law. There's a possibility that Congress might choose to make changes to the law on items that are under EPA jurisdiction. I would look forward to doing my part to make sure that the EPA is not holding up any opportunities to be able to pursue sound applications that otherwise would be and should be approved. I think a lot of times in the public domain, permitting reform means to certain people skirting the rules or breezing through environmental reviews without really taking them seriously or actually having them science-based, as we've talked a lot about today. That's not what permitting reform means. Permitting reform means to make these environmental, clean air, clean water rules and others and other agencies work together and work so that we are getting the right result of clean air, clean water, but we're able to move forward.
I look forward to that. Here's another West Virginia issue very quickly. It's the Muddy Creek Restoration Project. It's 19 miles of waterways that has acid mine drainage. West Virginia went about in coordination with the past Trump administration, and it was initially championed by the Biden administration to deliver real results in cleaning up this area of our state.
It was a true win-win. The Biden administration, for some reason, which we can't figure out, flip-flopped on this, and they just started putting more burdensome, costly, and a much, much slower cleanup process, so you're still having your acid mine drainage while we're getting hung up here. It threatens projects like Muddy Creek and discourages other communities from pursuing similar efforts to achieve real environmental remediation and benefits. Will you commit to me working with me in the state to try to reverse these counterproductive changes and cut the red tape and restore this for more cost effective, but also better environmental results? Yes, Chairman Capito. I know how much of a priority this is. You've been outspoken on this issue. It's my commitment to work with you as soon as, if confirmed, as soon as I'm in that position, I'd welcome that opportunity. Thank you. Senator Whitehouse?
Thank you again, Chairman. Mr. Zeldin, I have something of a life experience PhD in fossil fuel pressure politics, and they'll be coming after you hard, and they'll be feeling very entitled based on their political spending toward a Trump victory. I have two questions when you're faced with that. The first is that prominent voices in Trump world have been saying that it is important to traumatize EPA's workforce to drive them out. They've been saying that it's important to cut EPA's workforce by two-thirds or more, not just Washington, but the field, the entire organization. And they've been saying that it's important to destroy the professional civil service protections of EPA's workforce.
How do you respond to those three threats? Senator Whitehouse, as I've stated earlier, my desire, if confirmed as EPA administrator, is to increase productivity of the EPA. I want to be able to help lead this agency in a way that all of you on both sides of the aisle can be proud of for us to be accountable and transparent. I want maximum collaboration, not just with Congress, but internally within the EPA. I've been hugely impressed with the level of talent stepping up to serve at EPA. And that is the pressure that I am feeling at this moment is to bring out the best of EPA to make sure that we are fulfilling our mission of protecting public health.
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That is 833-850-2229. Preborn banner at CharlieKirk.com. I have a lot to add here. Let's go to Senator Wyden, who I think is asking Besson a question. Let's listen in to Senator Wyden from Oregon.
I think it's a burden. Let's listen to – he's over. Barrasso has the mic now. Let's actually go to Sheldon Whitehouse asking Lee Zeldin questions. He is a very significant player in the fossil fuel funded climate denial armada, the successor to that Texas Public Policy Foundation CEO, and a third individual called the chief of intelligence and research at that same, in my view, climate denial front group. In your political work, you've taken nearly $300,000 from the oil and gas industry back to 2007. You've had large campaign support from Koch Incorporated, which gave a total of about $60,000 when you count up all the contributions to PACS and campaign funds.
David Koch himself maxed out to you, and Koch PAC gave $20,000 to your Lee PAC. In the wake of being so surrounded with so much corporate and fossil fuel influence, I want to give you two opportunities. One is to answer to me now, how is it that you'll be able to separate yourself from the influence of these people and these interests when they come demanding things that they think they've earned politically?
And I'll also turn that into a QFR so that you can, with a little bit more basis for reflection, make a more complete answer. So with that, over to you for your response, sir. Senator, I don't need any extra time for reflection on that one.
There is no person who has ever provided any level of support to me or anyone else who has any special influence with me. When I was in the Army, I wore around my dog tags, the seven Army values. The acronym is leadership, loyalty, duty, respect, selfless service, honor, integrity, and personal courage. It is important for me to have always been able to approach this position with a clear conscience to make decisions that I can live with for my entire life. There is no dollar, large or small, that can influence the decisions that I make, who has access to me, and how I am ruling in my obligations under the law. Senator, I'm happy to enthusiastically answer that question on any day on the spot, and I would never need any extra amount of time of reflection.
Well, good luck standing up to these guys because they're going to come at you. Thank you. I understand that a five-minute break would be in our best interest.
Would you like to do that now or do you want to keep going? I'll take five, I guess. Thank you, sir. Thank you, Chairman. Let's throw it back here as the great Lee Zeldin takes a five-minute break.
Scott Besson is continuing as we are here with January Madness as the Cabinet is being assembled. Lee Zeldin is interviewing to become the EPA chief, which is the Employment Prevention Agency. I'm kidding, Environmental Protection Agency. There are more nonsensical regulations that come from EPA than almost any other agency. You would think – you have Doug Burgum there for Interior. Yesterday was Chris Wright. You would think that Chris Wright being in charge of energy actually has the most with oil, natural gas, and fossil fuel production.
It's not. It's actually Interior and EPA, EPA especially, that oversees that the most. Let's go to Scott Besson here, who is currently being asked a question from a senator I do not know the name of. Scott Besson, who is going to be managing the economy and whatever comes next. Let's listen to that.
Let's listen in. Dollars worth of goods out of our state versus importing $1 billion, but this is a big part of it. In the aviation sector, I think I sent you an article about the fact that we think increasing our manufacturing innovation to continue to have markets and sell to those markets is a good economic strategy. Senator Cantwell, as I discussed in your office, in my hometown of Charleston, South Carolina, Boeing is also the largest employer, so I view aviation as very important. Great.
So now I want to, this is, and believe me, I would have the same conversation with Joe Biden or Barack Obama or whoever. So I want to focus on innovation, not the tariffs. I'm worried that the tariffs are going to increase supply chain products. They're going to increase prices on our farmers. They're going to increase prices on Americans. And so I want to ask you, what do you, don't you think we are in an environment where exporting products and growing markets outside the United States is a big economic opportunity? And what are you going to do to build coalitions to help us be able to achieve opening up those markets as opposed to just the retaliatory tariff environment, which may raise costs on Americans and not resolve these issues?
Senator Cantwell, thank you for that. And after our discussion in your office, I actually went back and looked at some older data. In 2000, in terms of the labor share of aggregate income in the US, 69% accrued to labor.
Today, that number is 60. And you could see a sharp drop after what is called the China shock. So I agree with you that opening markets is good, but the free trade must be also balanced against fair trade.
And clearly what has happened is the trade has not been fair. That has fallen on the American workers. And we cannot allow, as I think I mentioned to you, China is the most imbalanced, unbalanced economy in the history of the world. They are in a severe recession slash depression. They may have minus 4% disinflation. And they are attempting to export their way out of that as opposed to doing the much needed internal rebalance.
So I am with you on the need to open markets, but we cannot allow a player like this to flood our markets or to flood the world. Well, I'm saying I believe in coalitions. We just discussed a technology NATO.
I think you thought that was a good idea. The notion though, I mean, I can get upset with my colleagues on the other aisle all the time and object, but that doesn't move me forward. And so I hope that you will look at what we're going to do to build allies. I mean, these numbers that basically are talking about just the tariff and what it would do to the price of gasoline given Canada is concerning. And so I want to know that the Trump administration is going to focus as much on innovating our way to success as we are on the tariffs. Because I do think we're going to see retaliatory tariffs.
We saw them in our state in our agriculture. That is Senator Maria Cantwell from Washington asking about tariffs. Let me tell you why. Does she really care about tariffs?
No, no, no. She is a proxy for Boeing, one of the biggest, most inefficient companies in America that has not made a good airplane for 20 years, by the way. Of course, Boeing is headquartered in Seattle, Washington, used to actually have its corporate headquarters in Chicago, or at least a very big office in Chicago. I'm not exactly sure where they're headquartered.
It doesn't matter. The point is their biggest base of operation is in Seattle, Washington. And she is a proxy for Boeing. She is very worried that Boeing is no longer going to be able to get cheap Chinese parts to be able to build their 787 Max's that fall out of the sky and can't land correctly.
So that's why she's asking that question. Let's now go to Governor Burgum, who wants to become Secretary of Interior. He'd do a great job at this. By the way, of all the jobs in the federal government, that is one of the few that I would love. I would love to be the Secretary of Interior.
Say, why would you want to be? I love nature. I love the national parks. All right, let's go to Governor Burgum. Let's listen in.
Our nation's progress. And so I agree with you clearly. And you mentioned the New York Times. If that article was someplace else, you know, but the fact that the New York Times wrote that article, I found also be remarkable admission of at least one case where there was the abuse of the Endangered Species Act relative to its intended use.
So yes, you can count. Thank you. I appreciate that.
Because also, I think not unlike just to this public admission, but also the West Virginia case and the Loper Bright case, there could be legal infirmity in a lot of our federal bureaucracies past decisions. So I appreciate your willingness to take a look at that once you're on the job. Thank you very much. That concludes round one. We're going to do a quick round two with some follow ups that a few members have asked. I want to talk to you briefly about the fact that public lands represent a massive public asset and yet a lack of an accurate valuation is something that we don't have and that undermines informed decision making about their use and their management. What steps would you take if confirmed as Secretary to improve the transparency in this area and ensure federal land valuations reflect their value to the American people? Well, I would just say on this idea that what I'll call America's balance sheet is something that the Trump administration has quite a bit of enthusiasm in discussions with Treasury nominee Scott Besant, Commerce nominee Howard Lutnick, and even Speaker Mike Johnson called me a few weeks ago and said, hey, what's this American balance sheet idea?
I think for for our standing in the world, for us to talk nonstop about what our liabilities are. Making America great again starts with making America healthy again. Charlie Kirk here. I lost 40 pounds with the Ph.D. weight loss and nutrition program. And two years later, I haven't gained a pound back. I started the Ph.D. weight loss program because I need to be healthy to keep up with my crazy schedule. Most people start a weight loss program to get healthier. So why is Big Pharma spending millions to convince you to use their weight loss injections that do just the opposite? They have harmful side effects and lifelong dependency. Take a natural approach that isn't connected to a Big Pharma bottom line. Ph.D. changes the way you think about food.
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That is my Ph.D. weight loss dot com eight six four six four four one nine zero zero. Hundreds of millions of offshore subsurface out of leasing and then and that's viewed as a costless event. At least we could have the trade off and say, yes, it was. Some people thought it was important to take that off the table. But what did it mean for the American people? Did we just take trillions of dollars of future revenue out of the pockets of our future generations?
And so I think, again, creating creating a financial understanding that is where we can have an honest discussion about some of these executive actions that are happening at the end of the end of this term, for example, would be useful for all Americans to understand. Thank you. I appreciate that. I've got another question that I was going to ask regarding PILT in the interest of time. I'm going to forego that.
I'll just conclude it with a very brief statement. PILT payment in lieu of taxes. The federal government came up with it. Congress came up with about 50 years ago to help offset the burden states carry states with a lot of public land because they don't receive any property tax revenue from it.
So it's supposed to offset that. In some parts of the country where there's a lot of public land, this works out OK. In other parts, it's pennies on the dollar compared to what they would get if they could tax the land even at its lowest valuation and lowest rate. So I would love to talk to you about PILT reforms and making PILT generally a priority because a lot of these communities rely on it for fire, search and rescue, schools, safety and so forth. Senator Heinrich. Governor, Senator Daines mentioned a very specific challenge with the Endangered Species Act. But as governor, you know that one of the best ways to head off those complexes is to prevent species from ever being listed by recovering them through proactive voluntary conservation at the state level. Senator Tillis and nine of his Republican colleagues and I have a highly bipartisan bill called the Recovering America's Wildlife Act that helps states do exactly that. And in fact, North Dakota's former Game and Fish director, Terry Steinwand, was one of the architects of that legislation. It's got strong support from the Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies for many of the conservation groups that that you mentioned in your exchange with Senator Justice. Does that sound like the kind of approach that you could work with Senator Tillis and I on? Absolutely, Senator Heinrich. I think that, again, super sound principle there, which is to do the work to keep it off of the any kind of federal designation, working collaboratively with the states. I had the pleasure of working with our Game and Fish commissioner, Terry Steinwand, for six of my eight years as governor.
He had almost a 40 year career in wildlife management. It's people like that that I know and respect across all the states. I know you've got them in New Mexico.
I know we've got them in Utah. I mean, I have the people that work in Game and Fish at the state level that are working on these things. I just I haven't met somebody from the federal level. The hearings are ongoing. A couple of thoughts I want to make here, the first of which is that the pace at which the Senate is operating here is remarkable. And the Democrats seem to lack a little bit of spunk. I mean, they're going through the motions, but this is not the type of resistance that we saw in 2017.
It is very clear that President Trump has a mandate. He won the popular vote and the resistance is just kind of shrugging their shoulders. They look fatigued.
They look tired. And it is a confirmation blitzkrieg that is ongoing right now. This is a very powerful indicator, harbinger, a canary in the coal mine for the type of pace that this administration is going to operate with. It is conceivable that we're going to have a Treasury secretary in a week. We're going to have Pete Hegseth as DOD secretary in a week. We're going to have an attorney general in a week. That is way ahead of schedule than we saw in 2017. Far ahead of where we were. Let's listen live in of Scott Besant, who is answering questions from some Senate Democrat.
Let's listen to that. The bad actors, especially Iran. I think I'm right, maybe not in the exact numbers, but in order of magnitude. I believe Iran was down to 100,000 barrels of oil exports when President Trump left office.
I believe that they are now exporting in excess or approximately 1.7 million. So through sanctions policy, I believe that we can, again, as I like to say, make Iran poor again. Not the Iranian people, the Iranian government. And then at the same time, they have our domestic producers push that up with the highest energy standards in the world.
We do it with the best stewards of the land, and I agree. And what we've also seen, as you mentioned, with Iran increasing the sales or selling it to China, China is buying at a discount, so they're getting cheap energy. Iran is getting tanker loads of cash back, essentially, and they're using that money for terrorism.
So in terms of our own national security. I have one last question in my time remaining, and this has to do with the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act that we passed in 2017. If that were to expire, we're talking about a massive tax hike of over $4 trillion. What would that kind of a tax hike mean for small businesses, for job creators, as well as our global competitiveness, if all of a sudden we put the heavy wet blanket of a $4 trillion tax increase on our nation?
Senator, I think it would be devastating, especially for small businesses. One of the things that, as someone who came from a very small town, lived in New York with a very big town, and came back to a small town, I believe Wall Street has done great the past few years, and that Main Street has suffered. I think it's Main Street's time. Wall Street can continue to do well, maybe not as well, and it's time to have a Main Street small business-led recovery, led by small banks, regional banks. Let's cut out here.
This is very important, what Scott Besson is saying. He's talking about another blue-collar boom. Wall Street has done extraordinarily well. Homeownership is out of grasp for most Americans.
The average home went from about $75,000 a year income that you could afford, and now over $140,000 a year it requires to own a home in this country. And we have seen it more and more out of grasp in these last couple of years. It is time for a muscular-class renaissance for an everyday American golden era. Look, we've been demoralized for years. This is very similar to watching a football game, and there's like this big interception that just galvanizes the team and sparks a change in momentum. You can sense that now. It's the Democrats who are getting demoralized. They've lost their spunk.
They've lost their spirit. And we are seeing the momentum build and build. And what Scott Besson was talking about there was incredibly important, that when President Trump was president, it was the lower-income earners that saw their incomes go up most dramatically versus these last four years.
Not the people at the top 1%, not the people at the top of the income ladder. It is January madness. And what is the agenda? Day one, it's going to be drill, baby, drill, no tax on tips.
It's going to be restart the American economy, protect the American worker, secure the southern border. And all of that starts in three days and 23 hours. We are three days and 23 hours out. We are about 95 hours out. You guys can set a clock to it. Ninety-five hours, and it is going to be shock and awe.
It is going to be thunder time and hit the ground running in a way that we have never seen before. Thanks so much for listening, everybody. Email us, as always, freedom at CharlieKirk.com. Thanks so much for listening, and God bless.
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