Congressman Fine Fights the Left’s Antisemitism, Congressman Patronis Investigates the Biden Lie
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Welcome to another episode of Breaking Battlegrounds with your host Chuck Warren. I'm Sam Stone. It has been a whopper of a news week out there, Chuck. Oh my goodness. I mean, it's like every single thing that could have happened this week happened. One thing after another. Unbelievable. And we have some fantastic guests coming on the program today to help talk about that and guide listeners through this.

The insanity that is enveloping the world right now, some of it for good, some of it not so good. Our first guest up today, Congressman Randy Fine, represents Florida's 6th Congressional District, third-generation Floridian and self-made businessman, built a strong reputation for delivering results as a state representative and state senator in a state that has delivered real results in its state legislature. And so welcome to the program, Congressman Randy Fine.

Thank you for having me. Happy to be here. So Israel did a preemptive attack on Iran. What are your thoughts on this?

Well, I don't know that I would call it a preemptive attack. I mean, Iran's been attacking attacking Israel for years. Every time Hamas shoots a rocket, that's Iran. They're the ones who pay for it. But what I think Israel did is they reached the point where it was clear it was time to take care of the nuclear threat that Iran poses, because make no mistake, Iran.

Iran is very clear that if they were to get that nuclear weapon, they would use it to take out Israel. And when they were done with Israel, they would use it to take out us. We're dealing with the leadership of Iran, with religious fanatics.

who desire a worldwide caliphate that makes women wear burqas, throws gay people off buildings and all kinds of other horrific things. And we just can't allow that to happen. So I'm very grateful that Israel, you know, America is always accused of being the world's policeman. Well, it looks like we got somebody else who's willing to help out with those duties. And I'm glad that they're stepping up and doing what needs to be done.

One of the – I mean this was really – from what we're seeing coming out, this was an incredibly complex operation. It was a combination of air power on the ground, special forces, all these things. One of the things they appear to be doing is targeting some of that hardline leadership, which is standing over a country that is more secular and more pro-Western than most of that region –

Do they have a chance to destabilize the regime and create regime change there?

Well, let's hope. I mean, I think we should start handing out hats in Iran that say, make Persia great again. You know, you know, look, this was an amazing, thriving culture and that has been ruined by insane Muslim terror advocates. And so I think the people of Iran are an extraordinary people and hopefully they can get rid of these lunatics and and.

be the kind of country they used to be, which was a bulwark of civilization. And so I'm but, you know, I think we should we should get those signs out there, make Persia great again. Underneath the surface of Islam is a historically great merchant culture, a very world, you know, frankly, a great culture that could benefit the world if radical Islam could be taken out of the way. It would change everything on this planet.

Well, sure. I mean, it's look, it's it's the single largest force for evil in the world today is Muslim terror. I mean, because it's everywhere. Thousands and thousands of attacks from from America just in the last few weeks to the UK to obviously the Middle East, all over the world. And the problem is, is it's.

It's not radical. That's one of the mistakes we make. Radical is what the left does to say 1% of Muslims want to kill us all. The other 99% love us. And that's not true. Now, the reverse isn't true either. It's not 99% want to kill us and 1% don't.

I don't know whether it's 30 percent or 50 percent or 70 percent, but it's a it's a large percentage of people. Well, even 10 percent, 100 million plus people. I mean, it's just it's a lot more than. Yeah. Oh, I agree. I agree that percent. And so we and so part of the problem we refuse to do in this world is to acknowledge we have a Muslim problem.

And there's a problem with the faith. The radicals are the ones who believe in peace. Three million Muslims on the planet. I'm willing to say it. I hope more people will as well. Yes. Three billion Muslims on the planet. If a third, you're low number, which there's a Pew data for to back this up.

That's a billion people who are radicalized to the point of being willing to subjugate and kill in the name of their faith. That is insanity. Yeah, the example I like to use for America is there's this Hamas front terror group called CARE. They're no fans of mine. The feeling is mutual. They parade themselves as basically the NAACP of Muslims. Right, right. And yet they're a terrorist group who said they were happy when October 7th happened.

Where's the NAACP for Muslims who don't want to kill everybody? The fact that that doesn't really exist is

says that the primary, the dominant view is the one advocated by. That is such a great. So I think it's a problem. Again, I don't believe all Muslim. I have Muslim supporters. I have one of my first meetings after I got elected with Muslims. I did a meeting with me with, you know, with with peace loving Muslims just this week. They're not all terrorists, but they're not. They're also not all not terrorists. And I think we have been unwilling to call it out for what it is.

Why is the Muslim Brotherhood not designated as a terrorist organization? No idea, but I'm all in on helping Ted Cruz and Mario Diaz-Balart making that happen. Remember, I just got here two months ago. I just discovered this week there was like a place in the Capitol that I could eat lunch. I mean, like it's – I'm still – I was lost on the first floor, and I wandered into the members' dining room. They're like, oh, yeah, you can eat. I was like, no, I didn't know.

So I'm new and I can't answer why things are. I will tell you in general, my observations after being here two months is people really love to talk in these buildings. There's a lot less interest in actually doing. And I didn't come here to write strongly worded letters. So I'll be doing what I can to make that happen. Why do you feel that is?

You've only been there two months, but why do you feel there are some, I'm not going to say all, but there's quite a few that are more interested in talking and wording a strong letter versus just actually getting things done?

I don't know. I think one, it's hard. You know, I mean, doing things are hard. Look, I'm I have my greatest strength and my greatest weakness is I am not a politician. You know, I was a software entrepreneur for 22 years. I only ended up in the Florida legislature because I got mad about what my kid was learning in school. I was stupid enough to realize that when politics

make promises. I didn't realize they don't generally keep them. I made three promises. I got all three done. I've ended up, I'm only, I'm an accidental congressman that's only here in Washington because President Trump wanted me to be here. But I think most people just, doing things is hard. You also get a lot of grief for standing up and doing things. So,

So and I think more people are probably focused on winning reelection than than other things. I don't fear the judgment of the voters. I fear the judgment of my children. My kids will forgive me if I lose an election. They won't forgive me if I let America come crashing down. So I don't know. I'm still trying to figure that out. But as bad as I thought it was going to be.

It is worse. And as I said on a speech on the floor, I'm so frustrated here. I have two choices. I can get a psychiatrist or I can just go give speeches on the House floor. And the good news for me is I don't plan what I'm going to say. I don't write my speeches. I stood up yesterday in front of everyone and I said, guys, Rome is burning. And all most of you want to do is roast marshmallows in the fire. So, you know, it's it's it's a it's a mess up here.

I want to circle back real quick because you've said something. You got yourself in a little bit of hot water with Tucker Carlson and Glenn Greenwald on this. When you said we should – Israel should just nuke Gaza. I got to be honest. I'm Jewish also, but I have been on that page since day one, that after October 7th, they should have just carpet bombed that entire mess out of existence and moved on. Right.

It's the single greatest barrier. Getting called a deviant by Glenn Greenwald is probably kind of a badge of honor that I should embrace. So, you know, that's OK. You know, the funny thing is, I didn't actually say that. It was published. A media outlet called Ynet quoted me saying Randy Fine said, quote, quote, they should nuke Gaza, end quote.

And I actually didn't say it. And then they had to retract it and they had to apologize publicly for saying so. What I did say is the Palestinian movement is modern day Nazism and it's modern day heroism in Japan. In World War Two, we didn't negotiate with the Nazis and we didn't negotiate with, you know, we said we want unconditional surrender. And in the case of Japan, it took us nuking them twice.

for them to get the message and to surrender. And Israel needs to be able to do the same. They need to do whatever is necessary in order to get that unconditional surrender. I didn't say they should nuke Gaza. Honestly, nuking Gaza would be a bad idea because A, it would kill all the hostages, and B, the fallout would drift into Israel. And you'd lose a fantastic future beach resort. They need to do whatever is necessary to win. What's ironic about all the people upset about me saying

allegedly saying Israel should nuke Gaza. Iran has been very clear they will nuke Israel and they will nuke us if they get a nuclear weapon. So why don't we focus on that, which is actually real and a much bigger threat? Let's talk about anti-Semitism. There's a story about your oldest son got in a fight at school since October 7th for being Jewish. Can you explain to our audience what he's facing in Florida?

Well, look, he I'm very proud of my son, but he's got a tough gig. I mean, he has he is he was in first grade when I first ran for office and his whole life has been growing up having to deal with a dad who's an elected official. And I mean, I'm new to you and new to your listeners, but I was pretty outspoken for my eight and a half years in Florida. I got the nickname the Hebrew Hammer because I punch and I punch hard. And Jacob had to deal with that.

And so after October 7th is the son of the only Jewish Republican in the Florida legislature, a guy who unambiguously is pro-Israel and is unambiguously anti-Muslim terror and will call Palestinians

for what it is, fake and evil. He had to deal with that. And look, unfortunately, people are shocked, but my son's not the only one. Jews in America are scared today. It feels like open season today.

against Jewish Americans. And that's just what we live with. And that's why if you have Jewish friends, tell them that you care because a lot of them are scared right now. But my son's a tough kid. He's 6'2". He's a varsity rower. And I'll put it to you this way. When the fight was over, it was Jacob won, everybody else zero. So it turned out okay for him. We have only about a minute left in this segment, but I think that open season thing is worthwhile.

Maybe a little more consideration for most people because we've seen in Europe what's happened. 100%. Where it has become a really hostile, dangerous environment for Jewish people. And now we're seeing the roots of that creeping into this country. It's creeped into Canada. We have to be the bulwark, don't we? We do. I mean, look at what's going on in New York. They may elect a 33-year-old Muslim terrorist to be their mayor. He's not only a Muslim terrorist, he's like a communist.

I don't know where this is coming from. Maybe this is why they want illegals to vote so much. But we've got real problems. And by the way, let me be clear. The problems you see in Europe aren't just for Jews. The problems in Europe are for everybody. Jews are just first. That's all it is. Every society that's targeted Jews has collapsed. We're the low-hanging fruit because there aren't that many of us and we're different because we're Jewish. But when they're done with us, they're coming for everybody else.

And I think that's why people need to be concerned. The yarmulke wearing canaries in the coal mine. We're coming back more with Randy Fine here in just a moment. Stay tuned.

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Welcome back to Breaking Battlegrounds. We're continuing on now with Congressman Randy Fine, representing Florida's 6th Congressional District. Folks can follow him on X at RepFine. Congressman Fine, so we had within the last 48 hours Senior District Judge Charles Breyer, the brother of former Supreme Court Justice Justice Breyer, take basically the National Guard away from Donald Trump in California. And fortunately, an appeal last night came back

Look, these judge I've never seen so many injunctions in my life. What are we going to do about it? I mean, the judicial system's there for a reason, but this is just out of hand now.

Well, look, this is deep state part two. So in Trump 1.0 from 2016 to 2020, the deep state exerted itself through the bureaucracy. That's how they fought what he was going to do. President Trump figured that out. Part of the reason he's doing such an amazing job is he had four years to think about how he would do things differently. So now they've had to find a new a new method. And the method is judicial coup.

And so you've got, you know, individual judges sitting in some little part of the country. There's lots of circuits. They're just doing their judge shopping and they're finding this insanity. And these judges are making these decisions that aren't based in the law or the Constitution. Well, there are checks and balances in this world. And one of the checks and balances is the power of impeachment. And it's time to go after these judges and throw them out.

I mean, the president is the commander in chief of the United States. There is rioting and insurrection going on in California. He had every right to call up the National Guard and any judge that doesn't believe that has no business being a judge. So I am filing as soon as I can articles of impeachment on that judge to get him off the bench. I loved the line that the DOJ put in the initial contest to this judge saying there is no rioters veto to federal law.

Yeah, no, but if you listen to the left, they would say there's no rioters. I mean, it's insane. We are living in 1984 from that book. I mean, like you can see people burning cars and hitting ICE agents and then they'll look at you and they'll say it's

It's peaceful or mostly peaceful. I just made a tweet on exit my account that you mentioned rep fine where I congratulated Israel on their mostly peaceful bombing of Iran. I mean, that's the sort of lunacy that we're getting from the left today. That's a great tweet. Well, let's let's switch over real quick here to the national debt. Yeah.

Boy, I'm not hopeful that – because I don't think the Democrats are going to be helpful at all in anything about trying to get our financial house in order. I just – I don't think they have any plan. I mean, so, you know, for example, David Rubenstein of Carlyle Group came out this week and said, look, there's five ways that we can tackle this. One, you can make spending cuts. There doesn't seem to be an appetite for that.

Which, you know, I can blame Democrats all I want, but there's also lots of Republicans and independents who feel that way. Tax cuts, we don't like raising taxes. He said we can go to the IMF, but, you know, who knows how that would turn out. We can just tell our creditors take a hike, which would be horrible. The fifth way is to grow out of it.

You have a Harvard MBA. You've ran three businesses. You've had to balance your books. If you were in charge of this, what is the plan that you feel you would push that you would think has a chance of passing and getting us on a proper trajectory of balancing our books?

So I will tell you, so I've only been here for two months, and one of my goals over the next six months is to come up with my own detailed plan to balance the budget. I don't know that I could actually get anyone to vote for it, but I feel obligated to come up with a way to get us to zero.

And pay this back detailed, a detailed that I was an appropriator in Florida. So I know how to do this where we did balance the budget. And that's going to be my project when we get to the August recess. I will tell you, it needs to be a combination of a couple of a number of these things. Growth is key. We can grow our way out of it if the economy booms.

But we also have to cut spending. Well, let me stop you there for a minute. What's that growth rate have to be? Is it 3 percent? It depends on what spending is. The higher the spending, the higher it has to be. So but but growth. I don't know that growth. I don't know that growth can solve the problem entirely. I'm saying I think that's the most. But growth is part of it. Absolutely. And then I think another thing is we have to cut spending. Look, we should we had it. This is it.

Yesterday, we voted on the first set of rescissions from the president. It was $10 billion, which is a huge amount of money, but not when you're borrowing $2 trillion a year. And literally all that $10 billion did was cut was NPR, PBS, and like idiotic foreign aid decisions, like $6 million to fund Hamas media in Gaza, like lunacy stuff. And we could barely pass that.

And I got so upset. I've decided here I need to either, you know, get therapy or go give speeches on the floor. And I stood up in front of my colleagues and I said, Rome is burning and all you guys want to do is roast marshmallows in the fire. And if we can't cut this sort of stuff, we're done. So but it's a combination. We're going to have to cut things. We should not be giving welfare to 25 year old men who do not want to work.

We should not be we should not be giving anything to illegal immigrants. We should be rounding them up and we should be sending them home. We need to look at the Florida model. This is how screwed up this country is. You know, more people live in Florida than there are in New York.

Yet our budget is half the size of the New York state budget to the New Yorkers who say give us salt tax cuts. I say move to Florida. You don't have to pay state and local taxes in Florida. So we have got to cut and it is hard to do and people don't want to do it.

But the other alternative is in the lives of our children. America will collapse. People need to understand this. We are on the road to the destruction of our country. And I'm laying awake at night worried about this. Yes. Because the problems that I've talked about my whole life, now I'm actually elected. I should be able to do something about it. And when I talk about people being willing to talk but not do anything, that's exactly what I'm talking about.

And the people driving the left actually want the destruction of this country. Well, they do. They want to bankrupt it. Absolutely. I remember years ago – not years ago. It was four years ago. I was talking to a friend who's the chief of staff for Republican Assemblyman in California. And I'm asking about their debt and pensions. I go, well, how do you solve it? He goes, we just let it go bankrupt and a judge handles it. That was literally the plan, right? And I don't want that to be a plan for my country. But here's the one question I have about this budget. So we have over 60 percent of it is entitlements, which means it's mandatory spending.

And that's a big part of it. You guys only vote on a third of this budget, really. So if you were going to tackle one entitlement in your first two terms to get it back on a path of solvency, which entitlement do you think is the easiest one? And none of it's easy, but the easiest one to tackle? Medicaid. Medicaid? Yeah, Medicaid. I mean, look, we didn't expand Medicaid in Florida and the state's doing just fine. We need to have a discussion about that.

We also need to have a discussion about how money is spent. Look, when you're given something from the government for free, it's not yours.

And one of the things that makes me the angriest at Democrats when talking about we're going to take away people's health care. It isn't theirs. They didn't pay for it. They're being given it by other taxpayers. And we need to have a discussion about using that gift efficiently. If you're on free government health care because you have no ability to support your own family, then you have an obligation to be grateful to the people who gave it to you.

And that means you don't go to the ER if you can go to an urgent care. It means you don't go to the urgent care if you can go to a neighborhood doctor. It means being efficient. It means taking care of yourself in order to not run up the bill on taxpayers. I mean, Medicaid is supposed to be for the super vulnerable. I don't have a problem with the government providing health care to a kid with autism. That's not their fault. But a lot of adults make bad decisions, and it's not the rest of us.

problem to solve for that. And that's the one I would tackle. And one of the dirty secrets is that adjacent to that under Obamacare, it's the middle class who are stuck in the market without subsidies who are paying the freight on this. I don't know anybody who's on an Obamacare plan who likes it. I had this conversation with my employees all the time. They hate it.

Yeah, no. And look, but Obamacare, the big evil of Obamacare, and I chaired health care in Florida for two years, so I worked on this stuff a lot. And the big problem in Obamacare is Obamacare outlawed health insurance in America. See, the problem is, is that insurance is supposed to be the pooling of risk to deal with a problem that you can't deal with on your own. And the competition is now gone. Congressman Randy Fine, thank you so much for being on the program today. We love having you. Look forward to having you back here in the near future. Breaking Battlegrounds coming right back.

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Welcome back to Breaking Battlegrounds. Thank you to Congressman Randy Fine, who you just heard on the program. And stay tuned. We've got Congressman Jimmy Petronas coming up. You know, what's really interesting about him is you heard during the campaign, based on the national media, that he was sort of a lump on the log, a poor campaigner. I have a hard time believing that. Yeah, I do too. I mean, he's fiery. Yeah, he's fiery and...

And entertaining and well-versed. So again, we get a lot of political news, and I just kept seeing how he runs his lackluster campaign. He's not an exciting candidate. I don't believe that. I don't buy it. No, again, I just...

I'm just telling you, I really don't know until you talk to these folks, but he is fiery. He is smart. I'm interested to see what he comes up with the budget. I tend to think our format brings that out of the more intelligent members. True, true. I mean, I do think that our sort of open approach to these interviews creates a better conversation than a lot of other programs might have. Well, if that side of him did not come out in his campaign, it needs to come out.

Then his consultants and his media people need to be fired. So a good friend of our show, former CNN White House correspondent Chris Aliza had a thing on his sub stack this week, which I sent to you that I found was fascinating. And he the title was why you absolutely should take Mark Cuban seriously.

And he said, here's the case for Cuban as a Democrat nominee. And I thought he'd make some good cases. I want to talk about him. My one pitfall for this is I just think he's – look, I'm not a Mark Cuban fan. I've never been a Mark Cuban fan. Right.

But I think even as much as I don't care for him, he's way too moderate to be a Democrat in 2028. He does have, as Eliza points out in the article, he does have a key great central issue that he can run on with his – is it cost plus drugs? Is that the name of it? Yeah, yeah, yeah. He just started that now and it seems to be doing well I think.

Yeah, very, very low-cost way to get a wide range of generic prescription medications without insurance, frankly, generally for less than your copay. And look, part of that is they went back to the manufacturers and really got into the whole supply chain. And he did a great job with that. It appears to be a tremendous endeavor that is beneficial. But you're right. Yeah.

The base is so far out there on the left. He's well-known. I don't know if he's ever as well-known as Trump because Trump had this 30-year presence. And Cuban's been out there a long time as the owner, but still, I don't think he quite has the name of the— He's done some of the shows and things. Yeah, 15 years on—what's it called? Shark Tank. Shark Tank, yeah. You watch Shark Tank, Brennan? Do you like it? Yeah. I think it's great. Yeah, I think he has the platform.

He's wealthy. He's worth over $5 billion. Now, I always, when people have that, wonder how much they're willing to put in. I mean, if I was running for president, I would do the Bloomberg thing. Here's $200 million. I'm just, I mean, if I'm going to do this, I'm going to do this, right? And you see a lot of these very wealthy guys sort of nickel and dime it. I mean, yeah, someone say $5 million, so it's not nickel and dime it. It is when you're worth $5.7 billion. Well, in his case, I think I would say not nickel and diming a presidential would be a 10%, like $500, $570 million.

And look, he does have a signature issue with his company, Cost Plus Drugs. Yeah. I mean, now, I don't think Republicans are going to fix it by the time the presidency comes around again. But that is an issue that affects everyone. Yes.

I mean, it's crazy. What's interesting about that is his solution is sort of the opposite of where Democrats go with everything. Right. His solution is a very, very straightforward free market solution outside of the government marketplace. Transparency. And it's been successful. Do you know anybody using it? I use it.

Oh, do you? Yeah. Well, tell us about it. How's that work? I mean, look, for – I get – a year – two years ago, whatever, I got prescribed blood pressure medications. They're the old school. Like, it's not a big problem. So it's the old school stuff. Right.

If I go with my insurance to get those, the copay is $105 for the two prescriptions for a 90-day supply. If I go to Cost Plus Drugs to get them, it's $20. And why is that? So here's the interesting thing. If my pharmacy did not have my insurance on file – they have it on file, so they're required to use it –

If they didn't have it on file, it would cost like 50 bucks through my pharmacy. Wow. It's literally more expensive because I have a insurance plan that dictates what I have to pay for each of those things. Well, I think one other thing that benefits him and Chris talked about this in his article is, you know, Mark Cuban's a character.

I think people are just sort of used to it now as well. It's sort of like the Trump tweet this morning. I said, oh, my goodness. Talking about the Iranian generals who will not be showing up at the meetings because, well, they didn't die of the flu and they didn't die of COVID. Right.

That was genius. He's had some brilliant tweets so far in this second term. He has. Those were really good. His ones last night, this morning on that were fantastic. Folks, watch for Mark Cuban. I don't know. Maybe he runs as an independent.

And there would be a path for somebody like him, I believe. But he would have to go out and start setting up, getting approved for the states and so forth. And you'd have to pull in that big network that Elon Musk pulled in of high dollar tech people. You'd have to be able to raise another billion from them. Yeah, I just never got the hint they like him that much.

They clearly do not. All right, folks, stay tuned. We're going to be coming back with more from Breaking Battlegrounds in just a moment. And friend of the program, Jimmy Patronus, is up next. And you're going to want to stay tuned for the podcast after that, because as always, we have great content coming for you. Make sure you're downloading BreakingBattlegrounds.vote. We're coming right back.

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Don't wait. Head to GoDaddy.com or Name.com, type in your name.vote, and get started today. Because after all, every pet deserves a web address that's as special as they are. Welcome back to Breaking Battlegrounds. Returning to the program now, Congressman Jimmy Petronas. He joined us back in January when he was serving Florida as their chief financial officer, and now he's proudly representing Florida's 1st Congressional District. He was right in the middle of that campaign when he was on the show last time.

It has to be a heck of a journey, Chuck. Yes, it does. Welcome back, Congressman. Thanks for having me. God, I love doing this type of stuff. It's a real treat, especially now to call you after we've won. It makes a totally different type of excitement. That's exactly right. Hey, let's start right away. So David Rubenstein, people don't know, I'm sure you know the name. He's the Carlyle co-founder of

He was talking this week that there's five ways out of our national debt crisis. He says, you know, one, you can cut spending, which he's right. No one wants to seem to do. I mean, this is what's disappointing about people having a meltdown about Doge, right? They just don't seem to want to do it. Two, you can increase taxes, which people don't want to do. Three, you can go to the IMF for bailout. I don't think any of us see that as reality. Four, you can say to your creditors, look, we're sorry and default.

Who knows where that will take us? But number five is grow our way out of it with AI, energy independence, tax cuts, things of that nature. You can grow out of it. Which of these five options do you think is a reality or is there a mixture of two or three of them? Yeah, look, you're spot on. It's a mixture. Definitely what the president's vision is, is everybody wants to get back to

I don't think there's a single American that is listening to this show right now that does not remember what the economic times were like in 2019, even January of 2020. The prosperity, the low interest rates, the excitement, the affordability, the independence, the low fuel prices. So there was just so many things that I think the president still feels like we can get back to that point.

he gets on the campaign trail and he learns a lot. And, you know, as he sees, you know, what I think a lot of us have been advocating for, I learned a long time ago that, at least I used to say when I was in Florida full-time, that the citizens of Florida spend their money a hell of a lot better than Tallahassee does. And now you pivot it. You know, I know the citizens of CD1, in this case our nation, spend their money better than Washington, D.C. does. So this is why the Trump tax credits

are going to be important to put those back in place to make sure we don't lose those. But then we also, we look at the new tax cuts that he's talking about, no tax on tips, no tax on overtime. You know, he is going straight right after that middle-class worker and trying to help them as much as possible. Because, you know, the millionaires and billionaires, even in an inflationary environment, they're not being punished.

like the middle class is. - Correct. - So, you know, Trump sees it, he knows that that is the working class that has gotta feel like they've been given a hand up in order to find some way out and to get into a little more of a prosperous time. And I'm a big believer, when you give people money, they spend money. And this is exactly what the vision is that the president has by growing it out.

Cuts are in place. One thing with the big, beautiful bill, it is the largest cut of spending that we've had in the history of any piece of legislation ever in Congress. Is it enough? No. Would I like to do more? Absolutely. And we see some of that out of the Senate. But I think there is really an appetite. Look, let's just get the tax cuts out of the way.

Let's get the immigration border policy out of the way. And then let's go back and we take another swing at this thing and keep on trying to do better by those that elected us in office. Congressman, you touch on a point that I think is sort of important. For all the screaming of Democrats about oligarchy, Trump's actual political agenda so far has not been one that favors the wealth. Very targeted for people who are living paycheck to paycheck.

Yeah, I mean, it's 100%. You look at what has happened with inflation. Home prices right now are the highest they've ever been

in the country for the places that people want to live. Okay, look, if you want to go move to some of these more obscure blue states where people are fleeing from, yeah, you may be able to find a deal on a house there, but the debt and liability that is going to come along with that house is kind of scary. So, I mean, the migratory effect that we've had to Florida, 400,000 new net Floridians moved to the state of Florida last year alone. And they're moving because they want to keep their money.

They do not want to be in a high-tax environment. So now you think about that middle-class family that is trying to have the opportunity to buy their first home, maybe a two-income household, but they're not buying their first home until they're 38 and 40 years old.

And that's not the time to start a family. So, I mean, that's a lot of money that they put into rent in order to try to get to the point being really tough on holding their money. So that's why the no tax on tips and no tax on overtime is critical to give that group a hand up, give them more money, and give them an opportunity to live the American dream. Let's talk about the first bill that you have filed as a member of Congress, which was creating a select committee.

investigate the Biden big lie about his health and mental capacity. How's that going? What do

Do you want to see the action item out of that bean? Look, all I want is some transparency. I think there's been a lot of distrust in government over the last four years as you're starting to see the rats scurry off the Biden administration. They're selling their loyalty and their trust for books. They're changing their political affiliation. And with that much smoke, there's going to be some fire everywhere.

So let's clean this stuff up. Look, I'm not – look, if somebody needs to go to jail, fine. Let's make those arrests. But let's make sure we understand why some of the constitutional amendments that were in place that make sure we have a competent, strong leader of our nation in place in that office, and why weren't those actions acted upon when –

potentially President Biden was not fully cognizant of what was going on around him. The abuse and use of the auto pen is evident. You know, do we need to go revisit any of those executive actions, any of those pardons of really, truly did he have the wherewithal to know what took place there? So, look, I don't wish anything on the guy. You know, he's fighting for his life.

uh... dealing with cancer but my god you know what this country is going to continue to move for no matter what body condition of health is and we all went to the american public to make sure they have a transparent government that is responsible to the people and it wasn't for the last four years in my opinion that exactly about all the bill congressman uh... you know helps a personal matter for people but when someone becomes president i states have become sort of a public issue

So like every year I do an executive physical at Mayo. It's like a day and a half and they do every test in the world. Should we start saying if you are going to be president of the United States or vice president, you have to take this amount of tests and they have to be disclosed? I mean, do we just say you give up that freedom when you're president? Is that something that we need to do?

Yeah, I'm familiar with that exact same test you're talking about. I don't know if the president goes through that same type of battery. You would think they probably do. But, you know, it's one of those things. I'm the president of the United States. You know what? I feel fine. Why do I need to do it?

I'm sorry, to your point exactly, there's got to be a level of transparency and the public deserves it. And I understand it's a freedom of speech. Look, I voted for the guy, and I know he was sick or ill or whatnot, and that was my right to vote. So, I mean, you're going to get into some finger-pointing of is this some type of a violation or a filter of who can actually be the President of the United States.

But you know what? I still think those reports ought to be clear and transparent, as should the actions of this administration over the last four years. And I get it. Look,

the finger point that he may have already known about the cancer and it was conveniently released. You know what? It's personal. You nailed it. It's personal. And it came out when it did, and it came out when it did. Wish him well, but I still want to get to this transparency of understanding what the hell is going on. Congressman, the cancer is one thing, and I think we can all have sympathy for a man dealing with late-stage cancer. I mean, that obviously is not something –

You would wish on your worst enemy or should wish on your worst enemy. But the mental health issues are something totally different because if the allegations about his lack of mental health are correct, we were in – I mean essentially, tell me if I'm wrong, we were in a four-year, three-year at least constitutional crisis where we did not have a president of the United States in any effective capacity. That is –

I mean, for all again, Democrats scream constitutional crisis every day with Trump. But the reality is that man is in charge. He's running the West Wing. It does not appear that that was the case for most of the term of his predecessor. No. And there was complacency and the mainstream was complicit. And what do you call it? A full blown cover up. I just know this.

Until I got to Washington, D.C., it didn't really hit me about the news day being driven about what happens up here every single day. And these reporters and these producers have to create content in order to drive clicks, in order to get ad buys, in order to allow these news sources to do their job. Well, you know what? If you get on the wrong side of Kareem Jean-Pierre, you may not get that access. Well, now you're not going to get content. Now you're going to be...

seen as inept at doing your job. So, yeah, they did not bite the hand that was feeding them. And, unfortunately, this all contributes to a very, you know, just whether you want to call it cover-up or not, it was definitely not being disclosed to the level of concern we all should have had. And this is where the checks and balances of our media really failed.

Okay, I got to shift gears here a little bit. You've just made this transition from Florida CFO to member of Congress. How's it going? What's the experience like? It's more fun than I thought it was going to be. Look, I was running an agency of 3,000 employees.

And we were doing right by the citizens of the state of Florida. We left the state of Florida in the best financial health that had been in the history of its state. Now, look, it didn't happen solely on my watch. We had great governors, between Governor Scott and Governor Sanis. They were amazing in seizing opportunities of policy, taxation, you name it.

and then we created this migration movement to Florida. So I'm proud to be from that state. I'm honored to be able to represent them. And now I get up here, and you know what I've found is the members of Congress I've engaged with, they're nice people. They care. They love their districts. They're up here for the right reasons.

There's different levels of intensity of fire in the belly, but they all are in love with this country. They want to see this country succeed. You know, yeah, the votes are tight, but you know what? The only reason why the votes are tight is because they're fighting for better policy.

They're not fighting. We don't see a bunch of boondoggles in any of the legislative packages that we've been contemplating. Speaker Mike Johnson has his hands full. But you know what? Thank God, you know, he was tapped to do the role that he's doing right now. And it helps because he and the president, they communicate, you know, dozens of times every single day. So we're moving the needle in the right direction.

Is it as fast as I'd want to see it happen? No, but when you have something good in the future, you're going to put a lot of work into it, and that's what we're doing. Talking about putting a lot of work into something, you got another bill that Chuck and I both took a personal interest in here. We're laughingly calling it Justice for Minor League Baseball.

We've got two minutes left, but tell us about that one. So, you know, I'm on the Small Business Committee. Our chairman used to play. Our chairman played with Hank Aaron. So, you know, there's definitely a love for baseball in Washington, D.C., but, you know, minor league baseball is actually a pretty good economic engine in these communities that don't have access. It creates a sense of community. And so now we did a little deep dive into it.

of how these minor league programs all over the country are being leveraged for other economic opportunities, whether it be concerts, festivals, you name it, using these facilities, sharing of ideas, but also just getting families out and enjoying America's pastime. And Chuck, you were there in Utah. The Salt Lake Bees made an enormous impact for Salt Lake City. 100%.

100%. And they do all the small communities. Yeah. Yeah, that's a big deal. And they bring communities together. And, you know, this is kind of funny. They were talking about, you know, the crazy giveaways they do that they can't do at Major League Baseball, like Asparagus Day and all these other ways to get people out of the games. But, you know, that's okay. That's okay. You know what? Whatever we can do to get a good distraction where you're Democrats, Independents, Republicans, no matter what, you're there enjoying America's pastime.

I worked for the Tucson Sidewinders for a while. We did Christmas in July, middle of July in Tucson, and it is in the biggest rainstorm monsoon in Arizona in the last 20 years. That did well. Congressman, how does everybody follow you? How does everybody follow you?

Yeah, so at Jimmy Petronas, that's at J-I-M-M-Y-P-A-T-R-O-N-I-S. And my DMs are open. Please feel free to reach out to me. Thank you. It's always great to be with you. Thank you so much, Congressman. We love having you on the program. Looking forward to having you back here again in the near future. Folks, make sure you're downloading that podcast. We've got a great segment coming up for you today. As always, Breaking Battlegrounds back in the air next week. I say this every election cycle, and I'll say it again.

The 2024 political field was intense, so don't get left behind in 2025. If you're running for office, the first thing on your to-do list should be securing your name on the web. With a yourname.votedomain from godaddy.com, you'll stand out and make your mark. Don't wait. Get yours today. Welcome to the podcast portion of Breaking Battlegrounds. There's Chuck Warren. I'm Sam Stone.

We have a new lovely young lady, and you might have even heard her voice before. She is the creator of the Kylie's Corner theme song. Hello. She did the dramatic hello. Thank you guys for having me.

That was a really well-tuned hello. I mean, you know. She is an artist. She's ready for the spotlight any moment. So, Brennan, thank you so much for taking the time to join us today. So, Brennan is subbing for Kylie, who is at a wedding in Italy. Boy, I feel terrible for her. That sounds awful.

Or Kylie. Well, the problem with Kylie's age group, they always have these destination weddings, which they all moan and groan about because they're always broke, right? And this did not help the checkbook at all. So we'll hear about that gripe when she's back next week. But she called Brennan. Brennan, like Batman, just popped up when the Bat-Lite came out. And since she is a part of the show, since we hear her voice every week,

We thought, why not have Brennan do Kylie's Corner this week? So, Brennan, what do you got? All right. So, we decided to... Yeah, you got to play the song first. Kylie's got a corner and she's going to start spilling out all the true crime in the world we're living in. So come and take a spin and listen in.

That's my song. So how long did, by the way, how long did that take you to write and come up with it? I mean, I remember emailing you or texting you saying, here's the words I wanted. You got to put mayhem in there, stuff like that. And you went with it. How long did it take? Honestly, it was one day. Getting it recorded, though, that was a whole other process. But the writing process of it probably took about a few hours.

Wow. Do you have to be in the right mood for it, though? Yeah. Honestly, with music, the inspiration you pull from different parts of your life. And when you're excited about something, too, and excited to be able to write a little something and something fun, too. Because music can be so emotional. So when you get a chance to write a fun jingle...

It doesn't take too long. And you are currently writing a song for us for a podcast we're introducing July 25th. Santa has a podcast. Oh, yeah. How's that coming along? It's coming along. It's almost done. It just needs some instrumental and we're good. Oh, that's wonderful. That's awesome. All right. So you're on tap. What's going on? So we decided to share a story today that's related to music. Timbaland, the producer, he launched a new AI entertainment company called Stage Zero.

with his first generated AI artist named Tata. And she's going to be releasing a debut single soon. And they have a whole...

a release plan strategized for it and all that. And the company was co-founded by Zayd Portillo and a film producer, Rocky Moodle-ar. My apologies if I just butchered that name. Well, they have three names to butcher all of them. Right? My bad, my bad, guys. But yeah, he started making generative AI platform music last year with a company called Suno.

And he got the idea to start making AI artists, which is a little alarming. So he just makes them up? Yeah. So he comes, the whole process starts where he goes to this platform called Suno. He gives it a demo cut, meaning like the very, very, very first version of a song. So sometimes it doesn't even have lyrics.

And they're taking human creativity and the team they've put together. And with those demos, they use whatever AI comes up with and then write some lyrics to it. You as a musician, how do you feel about that? I feel scared. I don't like that. I mean...

It's an emotional thing. Music is all about storytelling and emotions. And I think that when people hear a song that's from an AI platform, they're going to it's not going to hit the same because it's not from the heart. Unless it's just an instrumental type thing. Right. Yeah. Have you guys seen the it went viral this week, the Stormtrooper vlogs? It's a series that a guy used VO, the video generating AI to create. Right.

It is studio quality production in a long series of shorts. The growth of AI in one year to, I mean, remember a year ago, an AI video, when you saw it, you were like, oh, that's an AI video. Yeah, you knew, right? They've passed the point where you can tell now. Well, and again, because there's so much going on in the world from crisis in the Middle East to, you know,

illegal immigration and deportation and deficits and so forth, we're not paying enough attention to AI. And there has to be some Congress and committees are really focusing on this a lot. And that's the one thing I'd hope with Trump coming in with these big tech guys that they would start getting a handle on it.

Well, you'd hope so because you're heading down a road that has some potentially very serious consequences. Right. And the wrong mistake is going to be the wrong mistake for a long time. So anyway, they're doing this. Like you said, music storytelling. It's about a lot of personal experiences. Do you think Discovery can replace that?

I don't think so. I think, you know, a lot of artists and a lot of major labels like Warner, Universal Music Group, and Sony, they have lawsuits going right now with them because I don't think they're going to take it. But there's been some rumors that there might be, you know, some settlements happening. But

Billy Eilish, Stevie Wonder, Nicki Minaj, they've all released open statements that they have signed saying, hey, this is a concern. We need to pay attention to this. Wasn't the screenwriter strike part of it about AI as well? I think, yeah. Yeah. And I mean, just in terms of what worries me with the question you asked, Chuck.

Because these AI models, large learning models, language learning models have access to all of social media. Right. Right. They have access to and people share everything. They have access to the personal experience. They do. Billions of people around the globe to collate and draw material from. No human has that range of experience at their fingertips. No, no, no.

And what's alarming, too, is they have plans for this new artist, Tata. They have a whole social media plan going. They want to be able to make her an influencer. They even have had talk about TV shows and movies getting these AI people in those. And it's like, oh, okay. Well, it's like these AI companions now, you see. And there was a boy who committed suicide recently. And the parents are suing. Yeah.

Is it Facebook or Google? Google. It's Google's AI. Yeah. He was sort of created a dating situation or a relationship situation. With the dragon lady from Game of Thrones. From Game of Thrones. Yeah. Daenerys Targaryen. And she said join him in the afterworld or something like that.

No, apparently that was kind of misreported. But what it was, was that he kept saying, I'm going to do this to, you know, to join you. And the AI was like, oh, that's a great idea. Yeah, it's frightening. I remember I got the article and sent it to moms. I have teenage boys I know just said, you know, you need to pay attention to this. Yeah. You know, it's scary. Yeah. I even spoke with one of the producers I work with who's like in the industry actively working. And I was like, what are your thoughts about this? And

He said that it can't match human emotion like I stated earlier, but...

One day it might be able to. Who knows? I mean, in one year it's already blown up the way it has and they already have all these plans. Well, if I was a music industry, they have enough money, I would be on this in a heartbeat. All over it. Oh, yeah. And that's frightening. So do you have any murder mayhem for us this week? No. She didn't want you to take her slice of the pie, did she? No. Look, Kylie's got her niche, right? I mean, it's, you know.

It's her thing. Yeah. Well, folks, we're going to take a quick break, and we'll be back with Gary Gee talking about some financial advice for people like Brennan at 25, what you need to start saving on, and for people in their 50s who haven't saved. We'll be right back.

Welcome back to Breaking Battlegrounds. We have our financial segment, which we're going to have twice a month. Gary Gigi, he is the president of Gigi Capital Management. Folks, if you have questions or you want to know more about investing, I highly recommend you contact Gary Gigi. Gary, so here's my first question here. We've got Brennan in the studio today. She's 25 years old. She's not investing yet. Is 25 too young for her to be investing or should she be doing it?

Absolutely, it is not too young to be investing. This is a great question, Chuck. I really like talking about this. Brennan and anyone else in their 20s, even if it's a small amount, you really should be starting. If you have an employer and they have a 401k, then you should be participating in that 401k, even if it's a small amount each paycheck.

If you don't have an employer that has a 401k, you can set up either a traditional IRA if you need a deduction off your taxes or a Roth IRA, which doesn't give you a deduction off your taxes. However, when you retire and the money starts coming out, you won't be taxed on it. So I absolutely think that people in their 20s should be participating. If you wait until your 40s or 50s, it's almost impossible to catch up.

Well, that brings me to the next question. Okay. So we have listeners in their 40s or 50s here. I'm sure they don't want to admit this, but we know they have not been planning for retirement. Right. All right. It's hard to catch up. What should they be doing? Let's say they're 50 years old. What should they be doing and looking at investing so they can prepare when they're 70 to retire?

Great. So this is a different cohort and the approach needs to be different. So I don't think that they should be trying to pick the hottest stock or hottest option that they can to try and make up for that. I think that can make things even worse. What they do need to do is recognize that they have to make sacrifices at this point.

So they do need to start funding at a greater rate than a 20-year-old, 30-year-old. And so they definitely need to start participating, which means that the sacrifices have to come in other parts of their budget. Maybe they're going to have to cut back on certain discretionary type of expenses in order to more fully fund their retirement account. Now,

If the example that you gave is true, Chuck, which is that they're, say, in their 40s or early 50s, and they're going to wait until age 70, which makes sense because they can get full retirement plus a little bit more at age 70. And when I say retirement, I meant Social Security. So if they start in their 40s and 50s, they can do it, and they need to be in retirement

more stock funds than bond funds but then about two or three years before they actually retire so if they're going to retire at 70 at about 67 they need to be moving money out of all stock into some bond funds maybe some money markets but they should be diversifying a little bit more in the last three years of their working life than they have been in the prior 17 or so

Um, what would you say would be something that they, what's a target range they should be investing in a month if they're at 50 and have not done this before? And realize this is not people making $200,000, $300,000. What would you recommend? Just is it whatever you can do or say, try to do this amount every month? Yeah. So, um, that's a hard thing to, to answer, not knowing their situation, but getting to 10% of their, um, gross paycheck, um,

Is a good goal if they can't get there immediately then start with what you can but as you get pay raises that you get get advancements you should be pouring some of that pay raise into your 401k into your IRA or Roth IRA start with what you can but don't but don't stay with that because you really do need to play catch up you can't take the same approach

that someone in their 20s or 30s is taking, where there may be they're doing 5% in their 401k because their employer has a 5% match. So you got 10% that's going in there. Good thing is that if you're in your 40s or 50s, you're in a stable job, your employer has a 401k, they may be offering a match and that's free money.

If you stick around and work at that company, so that could help. So if you are able to put 10% of your own money in employers matching 5% of that, then that's a good start and just keep building towards it. But recognize you're going to have to make sacrifices in order to make this happen.

As you wrap up here, what's going on in the Middle East right now? Yeah. Anything we should be looking at? I know you can't give specific stock tips or anything, but what do you think people should be looking at the next month or so for investment opportunities? This is another question that I think is really important in light of what's going on in the Middle East today, which is that –

Don't overreact to events like this. Now, let's say that you're an investor and you have some IRAs or 401ks, but you also have some money sitting in savings and you're thinking, okay, today the market's down. I'm going to put everything I have into the market at this point.

Probably not a good approach. I would say that you judiciously put some money in because usually an event doesn't take place in one day. It's spread out over a week or two. So let's just say you put some money to work today. You wait another few days, there's another drop in the market. You put more money to work and you keep doing that. At some point,

the market's going to balance itself. And then at that point, it'll start moving up and start adding there as well. You're never going to get all of the money you want to invest in at the bottom of the market. You're never going to exit the market at the top. So you just have to pick good entry points, good exit points, and be happy with that, knowing that it's going to get you there. Well, that's great. Well, Gary, thank you so much for visiting us today. How do people get a hold of you if they have any questions?

Yeah, they can go to the website, geekycapital.com, or they can give us a call at 801-787-0342. Gary, thanks so much, my friend. Folks, thanks for joining us. You too, buddy. Take care. Folks, thanks for joining us this week on Breaking Battlegrounds. Please feel free to share the show with your friends and family. And of course, always give us a five-star rating. But you can visit us at breakingbattlegrounds.vote or wherever you get your podcasts. Have a great weekend.