Why Democrats Can’t Stop Trump’s Nominees
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We mentioned the Hegseth thing. You had Ratcliffe for CIA. Rubio was up there for Secretary of State. Bondi for DOJ. Chris Wright at Energy. Duffy at Transportation. Russ Vought for OMB. All of them had hearings.

They're not laying a glove on any of these guys. What you didn't bank on entirely was just how broken the Democratic Party ultimately is. Like they are a rudderless ship. They have only capability of understanding what provokes their own progressive left. Yep. It became crystal clear, especially if you looked on social media,

You saw on conservative, you know, people who are live tweeting what was happening at the confirmation that they were like, oh, man, look, Pete just nailed the Tim Sheehy clip. I mean, that was just like an alley-oop dunk. And everything you saw with the Democrats was just an angry, unhinged senator screaming.

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Well, we're edging ever closer to a new day here in Washington, D.C. and across the country with the end, thank God, of the Biden administration and a new beginning of the inauguration of Donald J. Trump. Welcome to the Ruthless Variety Program. I am Josh Holmes, along with Comfortably Smug, Michael Duncan, John Ashbrook, left to right across your radio dial. A full dais here today. Yeah. I mean, the whole team is here and everything

you really are starting to not just feel the excitement for Trump coming back to the White House, you're starting to see it. All the security gates are going all over. I hope to God, I know they are taking security very seriously because these left-wing lunatics have made many attempts on President Trump

I have a feeling they're going to have the situation under control this time. They've got a lot to work through if they want to do something, because, man, oh, man. The security situation is tight as a drum. Hard to go anywhere. Also, it's cold as shit. Yeah, yeah. It's way too cold to be trying nonsense. But that hasn't stopped the faithful. I don't know if you guys have noticed, but a lot of MAGA hats around this town showed up early because they want to make sure they're ready for all the parties and everything this weekend. They're at full celebration mode. Yeah, and, you know, listener, viewer out there,

You wonder why we're so excited about that. It's you got to understand D.C. is like 95 percent Democrats on any other week. Yeah. You know, so we we're an enemy territory constantly. Like that's just sort of something we've internalized in our professional career.

And so we really look forward to moments like this where we finally get to be among our people. Oh, totally. And, you know, here's the thing. If you haven't spent any time in D.C., the town takes the shape of an incoming administration relatively quickly. And it took me a while to figure that out. When I first moved to D.C., George W. Bush was president.

And I was like, everybody's walking around with cowboy boots and stuff. I remember that. And I was like, what is... I thought... I definitely didn't think it was a southern state or a midwestern or western state.

And I was like, well, what's up with all that? And I didn't really come to grips with it until all the Chicago people from Obama moved in here. Oh, yuck. And then all of a sudden it was nothing but tight-rolled jeans and U Street up there. You know what I mean? And they were like, yeah, real gritty urban stuff going on. And then Trump comes to office and Navy Yard is the young, vibrant part of town. Yeah. And then Biden comes to office and becomes the criminal part of town where people get quarterbacked and shot. Yeah.

No, seriously. I mean, that's kind of maybe like COVID played a role into that. But Biden, because they're such a creature of D.C., it like reverted back to it's like Mary and Barry days. It's like, no, this is the most primal form of just crime and fear. Right.

This is the real D.C. With a handful of CCP lobbyists and Ukrainians in nice suits rolling around. Yeah, that's about right. So Trump's coming back, and we couldn't be happier. It's going to improve morale, shall we say, with the Variety program and everybody else around here. We're going to answer some serious questions that you've got today. I'm sure everybody's been watching the nominees that President Trump has put forward through all of his various cabinet positions and

They're all getting a hearing now in the Senate. Remember that Senator Thune, majority leader, his endeavor was to try to get as many of these to a point of confirmation at the day of inauguration as he can, starting with the security apparatus and then moving beyond that. They've done a pretty good job of lining these things up. It's been like rapid fire, almost red zone like TV with all the various hearings going on over the last two days.

And it seems like there was a lot of huffing and puffing when he was making all these announcements from Democrats. Well, this person can't get him. Well, listen. Oh, they're going to have a lot of trouble. They're coming up short on this one.

We're going to tell you why it is that all of those things have absolutely not come to fruition. And it really was punctuated to begin with, with Pete Hegseth's hearings on Tuesday. This is what Democrats thought was the lowest hanging fruit.

This was the guy who didn't have the typical Pentagon credential, meaning he hadn't managed a big bureaucracy or sold arms, basically. Yeah. Right? Or been a part of the defense industrial complex. Yeah. So he came outside of the typical secretary of defense. And so that coupled with them unearthing all the salacious allegations, many of which were just made up of whole cloth. Absolutely.

And so we read all that for like two months. Everybody's like, whoa, this is going to become a real problem. What you didn't bank on entirely was just how broken the Democratic Party ultimately is. Oh, yeah. Like they are a rudderless ship. They have...

only capability of understanding what provokes their own, the progressive left. Yep. It became crystal clear, especially if you looked on social media, you saw on conservative people who are live tweeting what was happening at the confirmation that they were like,

Oh, man, look, Pete just nailed the Tim Sheehy clip. I mean, that was just like an alley-oop dunk. And everything he saw with the Democrats was just an angry, unhinged senator screaming. Yeah. Mm-hmm.

It could not be more clear. They took no lessons from Election Day because they ran on the Democrat is like, no, no, no, we're the hall monitors. We're going to lecture you and tell you how you have to be and no, no, no. And they're continuing that. That's the whole image Americans have of the Democrat Party. We saw it at the Pete Hegseth hearing. Poor guy had to sit through that, but he nailed it. And meanwhile, you saw the Republicans. Tim Sheehy's questions specifically.

Where it was just like, what ammunition is being used by the military? Oh, those were great. And he hacks up nails every single one. That's what you want to look for. Someone who has experience in the military at that granular level because they've been there. I think also for the Democrats and, you know, I mean, this always existed, but especially in the Trump era, it's like they can't help themselves. Like they just beclown themselves in these hearings because they're looking for their 15 minutes of fame. Everybody wants to be the nominee in 2028. That's it. You know, you've got...

Senator Blumenthal, the guy who lied about serving in Vietnam up there, questioning the credentials of Pete Hegseth. Are you kidding me? Yeah. You know, you got Elizabeth Warren, who like I think is one of the chief messengers of this, like the Democrats whole ploy of like, you know, Donald Trump, there's for the rich and it's corruption and all this sort of stuff. And so she goes on the stem winder about like,

will you promise to not serve, you know, after your term, you know, with a defense contractor, yada, yada, yada. And it's like Lloyd Austin was on the board of Raytheon before he got that job. He needed a waiver. Like what? He needed a waiver. Required a Senate waiver. He needed a waiver. Yeah. Right. And it's like-

When you really see a party off its moorings, for those of us who've done this for a living for a lot of years, it's the inability to understand what a strategy for victory would even look like. And, like, Johnny and I spent, you know, better part of a decade...

putting together strategies and plans to try to win these confirmation votes against, you know, Obama nominees. Like, what would you need to do, you know, whatever your majority or minority position was to cleave off the Democrats that would ultimately threaten a nomination to the point where they wouldn't even maybe vote on it. And it like it was very obvious in watching the Hegseth hearing in particular that

is that they couldn't come to a conclusion of what that might look like. They thought reading into the record allegations that have been proven false would embarrass him. I'm sure it wasn't the most delightful thing to hear. It did absolutely nothing to threaten his confirmation prospects, right? No, that's exactly right, and it's such an important point. You know something that the run-up to the Pete Hegseth confirmation reminded me of was the run-up to J.D. Vance's debate performance with Tim Walz.

If you look at all of the stories the Democrats put out there ahead of J.D.'s debate, it was all crazy cat lady. Oh, this guy can't hold his own. And then, of course, J.D. shows up and he surprises everybody. Oh, he's a normal guy. Very normal. Same thing with Pete Hegseth. They're saying, oh, he's so terrible because of this research story or this lie or whatever. And then he shows up and he answers every single one of their questions.

And it reminds me of this old saying that to be underestimated is an incredible gift. And I think that Democrats wholly underestimate all of these Trump nominees because they believe their own bullshit that is printed in the New York Times. No question about it. And they have this sort of elite...

They're always smarter than all of us. They wouldn't have the kind of governing view that they do unless they have. But look, I mean, we mentioned the Hegseth thing. You had Ratcliffe for CIA. Rubio was up there for Secretary of State. Bondi for DOJ. Chris Wright at Energy. Duffy at Transportation. Russ Vought for OMB. All of them had hearings. They're not laying a glove on any of these guys. And the Hegseth one is instructive to me.

I don't know if everyone's going to get through or not, but I am much more confident in that today than I ever was at any point before the Hegseth hearings because of this lack of strategic vision.

The one grind that a nominee from President Trump's administration has when facing a Republican Senate, and let's be honest, that's what it is. Democrats are going to vote no on everybody. You know, it's not like it used to be where they actually felt like we should govern the country after an election. Like they'll vote no no matter what. But this is about 53 Republican senators. And there is a huge rift in a outlook on foreign policy between your conservative defense hawks and your more libertarian strain.

And then you've got Trump, who's sort of like crafting sort of in the middle of all of that. And depending on the issue, picks up a little more and a little less. Everybody thinks they know exactly what it is that he's doing and they claim that he's doing their thing. But he does his own thing, as we know. But there are a lot of things. If you were to question, I don't know, military presence in the South Pacific, where we're at in the Middle East, soldiers in Korea,

Start talking about what your defensive posture would be for Taiwan. What's the future of Ukraine?

All of those things, I'm sure he had a great first and secondary answer towards, but it gets a lot more complicated for like 10, 15 members of that dais up there. Not to mention that the entirety of the Republican conference, once you get a level deeper, because all of them are engaged in this stuff and they know it. And there are things that they don't like about the Trump administration's posture, at least as it's been rhetorically put in front of them.

History is your guide on this. The rhetoric sometimes doesn't match exactly what it is that the president is doing. But that being said, you could have gotten this guy into big trouble had you wedged that very significant difference of opinion and then tried to drive deeper. Because, look, unless you spend your entire lifetime doing this stuff—

You're not going to have the answers that are perfect for everybody. Even if you do, you're not going to have the answers. But that's the area where you would do it with Hex. You wouldn't talk about what happened in 2017 in a hotel room at the Republican Federation of Women conference.

annual event. Nobody gives a shit. Like that's what they did is run a 1989 John tower confirmation hearing in 2025. Yeah. They just can't help themselves. It's like crabs in a barrel. Like each Democrat is clawing over the other Democrats to get attention for one specific thing. It's all this ancillary stuff, right? Like there was no cohesive plan.

You go Democrat to Democrat to Democrat across the entire confirmation hearing. And it was all different things. It was this grab bag. Yeah. And they just couldn't land a glove on them. No cohesiveness. It's because they have one speed. And like you said, it's like from the 80s.

This was like the Clarence Thomas smear. And then they run that smear back on Kavanaugh. They have one speed where they're like, well, we can't make any arguments on our side. Clearly, they don't know how to convince the American people, given that election. All they know how to do is try to smear.

Yeah. Well, in the 1980s, you could have Kennedy and Dodd at the at the restaurant on top of the tables with the waitresses. And then they'd walk in and say, you're a philanderer and like your nomination to be in trouble. Turns out we have access to a little more information these days in 2025. We've been desensitized a bit. And so this kind of things just don't work. I was just shocked that if you have three months to basically prepare for a moment where you've got you have to there's a mandate from a Democratic side.

to try to take a scalp here.

given the names that were floated and their antithesis to the beliefs of your base. There's a mandate. And if they couldn't figure out the basics of how to prosecute a case against Pete, and Pete did a wonderful job. He nailed it. This is not just saying they screwed up. He crushed everything that he needed to crush and made it, it kept coming back to the fixture of the fighting men and women. And you could clearly tell that was his home base, delivered that message clearly to the point where even CNN,

has to have an article that says why Pete Hegseth is a perfect fit to be Trump's Pentagon chief. Oh, wow.

I mean, he didn't just convince enough Republicans. He's convincing CNN that he's the right person. That's nailing it. That's just like from the left. That's not just a strikeout. That's three fastballs down the middle and you got caught looking at all three. That's exactly right, dude. And it exposes Democrats as morons. Like Kamala Harris maybe isn't the only complete idiot on their side.

It extends all the way down their bench. And they really have to do a lot of soul searching and how to like break out of this like fantasy land caricature mold of like,

This is what we're arguing about Republicans and get back to reality. But they can't. Look, I don't think they can. And we've talked about this in so many issues since Election Day of like, do they wake up? Does the fever break on the left? You know? And there was evidence that some people got the joke. Yeah. But certainly not all. But it's not it's just not going to happen. It's become a shirts versus skins exercise. And behind all of these questions are well-funded left wing dark money special interest groups.

who are trying to try to get a scalp, to your point earlier, Holmes. I'm thinking about like the, you know, what is it, Code Pink or whatever the fuck it's, what's it called? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Code Pink, yeah. Funded by China. Yeah, and, you know, all these other interest groups who are interested in specific nominees and taking them down. It's like, you know, those are their ultimate paymasters. Which, by the way, I was told, and this has been reported nowhere, I was in a green room with an Army Ranger last night who was at the whole hearing in support of Pete. Pete's good friend of his.

And he was saying that there's a row of reserved seats in front that the members can reserve like a couple of seats or whatever. And so, you know, he like he was, I don't know, maybe just behind these seats and they were empty and people were starting to fill it in. And all of a sudden, a code pinker dressed in a white linen. Come on, suit. This dude comes in and sits down in the reserved seats, meaning like one of the members of the Democratic Senate conference was reserved.

reserving that seat for this asshole white linen suit in January exactly 20 degrees you're clearly not local you've been bust in here or flown in here

And like the moment Pete started talking, got up and started making a ruckus and was promptly hauled out. Like that's what somebody in that one of those Senate Democratic offices were like, make sure that guy's got a seat up front. Yeah. And it gives you a good indication. This is not a serious party right now. Not serious. And like they're going to get their asses kicked by Donald J. Trump. Yes, they are. Like they are really going to get their ass. They don't have any idea if they can't put up if their whole.

ideas that like, oh, I don't know, we'll wait a couple months and we'll find another phone call and we'll try to impeach him again. Like, shit's not going to work this time. Republicans are not of the view that many Republicans were in 2017 that this is some kind of like a, you know, off its moorings type administration. It's not. It's been elected popularly. I would love to know what Senate Democrat reserved that seat for a code pink activist. Would love to know. You know, because, I mean, I'm old enough to remember January 6th and it would...

For me, that would be aiding and abetting the obstruction of official proceeding of the United States Senate, which I'm told is a problem. Well, they said that. Yeah. They have said that. But it doesn't appear like maybe it is for, you know, it wasn't during Kavanaugh. They have their own rules. They have their own. It's like they have their own rules. Huh. That's weird. They might be able to see some of our own rules in the next few days, in the upcoming days. We've got a bunch of highlights from these hearings to get you caught up. We're going to get to right after this.

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All right, so we start with Pete. We'll start with Pete. Listen, there was a lot of moments in there. Too many to play on a variety program like this, but a couple of them that we selected I think were nice little gemstones for us to pull out and for all of you. Let's go to clip one, please, Spaghetts.

There's been no accountability for the disaster of the withdrawal in Afghanistan. And that's precisely why we're here today. Is that leadership has been unwilling to take accountability. It's the time to restore that to our most senior ranks. There it is. We've been saying it for years. We've had an entire class of members of Congress come in here as candidates to say, I'll tell you the reason I'm running.

And they were elected. And the reason they were running is just articulated by Pete Hegs. Wins the accountability on it.

It's like Duncan pointed out in our last episode that that disastrous, horrific Afghanistan withdrawal was where Biden's poll numbers sank and never recovered. And they have not learned from that. And the voters have told the country, the Democrats, now twice that that was unacceptable. And Pete's just bringing it right back to light. How has this not gotten into their skulls? It's unbelievable. They just think time and a compliant media system

Cures all ills. Every mistake that they make, if they wait long enough, nobody's going to report on it and people will forget. Nobody's going to forget any of this. Certainly not Pete Hegseth, which he's articulated. Let's go to one more of these in clip two, please, Spaghetti. In other words, you're quite sure that every general who serves should not go directly into the defense industry for 10 years. You're not willing to make that same pledge?

I'm not a general, Senator. You'll be the one. Let us just be clear. In charge of the generals? Expert. Expert in the military. Glad she's there. Speechless. They were like, yeah, boss, you're going to land that dunk and then it's going to stop everything. Yeah.

She's so bad. She's so bad on all of this stuff. It's just like the whole dais on that Armed Services Committee on the Democratic side, they are not sending their best. No, they're not. I mean, they don't have a lot of great ones left anyway. Like, there's no Ted Kennedy's roaming around that side of the dais. But, like, it would be nice if they had somebody of, like, alderman status. I think, you know, Elizabeth Warren hasn't had a good hit since she sent out that one amazing tweet where she was like,

Donald Trump, how dare you slut shame Kirsten Gillibrand? And I wonder if Gillibrand has ever let that go because I wouldn't let that go. And they're sitting right there. She's like, I'm sorry, what? What were you? I mean, also like for Pete to not have, you know, because I'm a scumbag. I'd have been like, hold on, Senator Warren.

Do you remember when you called Senator Jill Brown a slut? Do you remember this? I have the tweet right here, and I'm going to read it for the official record. She's had so many bangers. You remember when she, like, as a precursor to running for president, she was like, the results are in. Like, I'm 164th Native American. She is, like, fact-checked, you know? The full Pocahontas.

Or the one that Smug always talks about, which is when she was doing the Instagram live and she was cooking in her kitchen. And like her husband shows up. She's like, I'm going to grab a beer. Thanks for being here, honey. Yeah, yeah. Trump went in on her. He's like, where is he supposed to be? Of course he's going to be there. It's his house. Thanks, Trump. I'm going to...

Enjoy this cold beer. All she does. Like I always do. All she does is embarrass herself. She never should have left academia. Never. It's a crime that she's in the sun. Well, here's another genius. Let me just say, the next time that Maisie Hirono says something insightful, it will be the first time. Because it has not happened yet. Let's see clip number three, please. By people who worked with you at Fox News. Do you know that being drunk at work is prohibited for service members under the UCMJ?

Senator, those are multiple false anonymous reports peddled by NBC News that run directly contradictory to the dozens of men and women at Fox News Channel who I work with who came on the record and said they never see that. In your opening statement, Mr. Hicks, that you commit to holding leaders accountable at all levels. That includes you, of course. Is that a question? Yes, Secretary. You will be on the job 24-7.

There you go. Got to read that. There's a sharp talker. I mean, that is... What I'm looking for is someone who will fail an eighth audit. Will you fail the eighth audit? Just like Lloyd Austin failed the seventh. She... I don't say this a lot. I don't do a lot of ad hominems.

She's the dumbest member of Congress. Yeah. And I don't think it's particularly close. That's not an easy title. It's not. It's not. Like everybody, there are a whole host of them that are competing. I mean, there's people who thought that if you have too many people on a corner of Guam, it would tip over.

So we're talking about you've got serious competition for the title of dumbest. Well, and you remember, like, I usually hold the Senate in a higher regard. She's long been the dumbest senator. I just included the entire House of Representatives. Which is also, you know, that's stiff competition. That's just for—that's a self-admission. That's a big deal around here. I mean, for her to not even, like—

It's also tough for her staff because clearly they're like, ask this and then try to dunk with this question, then this question. She can't even read it in the form of a question. She just keeps blowing past the question mark. She's like, oh, do I just keep reading up and down the sheet of paper? Yeah. Like there were four questions that she's just reading one after the other while he's still answering the first question perfectly. Imagine doing all that. You're on the armed service. Like you are literally in charge of this situation. Yeah.

And your goal is to make a cogent argument. You can't do it without somebody typing up a talking point that says you're on the job 24 hours a day. Yeah. Like that's your talker that you need to read. You can't remember that. Can't recall that. But you also then, because of your assisted notes, don't ever get into like serious defense policy issues. No. Don't get into like military procurement. Don't get into like...

I don't know, bases around the world, you know, manpower, like what's his thought on this? Like all very important pieces of information. None of it. They don't give a shit about that, dude. They're looking for a clip for social media, which is the only reason you would frame the question. Do you know you're not allowed to get drunk if you get this job? Yeah. You know? Oh, thanks. Oh, thanks. That's awesome. All right, cool. Waste of your time, waste of my time. I wish Lloyd Austin was drunk. We probably would have had better outcomes. Yeah. I mean...

Anyway, let's go to the next clip. Clip four, please. The senator from Virginia starts bringing up the fact that what if you showed up drunk to your job? How many senators have showed up drunk to vote at night? Have any of you guys asked him to step down and resign from their job? And don't tell me you haven't seen it because I know you have. And then how many senators do you know have got a divorce before cheating on their wives?

Did you ask them to step down? No, but it's for show. You guys make sure you make a big show and point out the hypocrisy because a man's made a mistake and you want to sit there and say that he's not qualified. Give me a joke. It is so ridiculous that you guys hold yourself as this higher standard and you forget you got a big plank in your eye. We've all made mistakes. I've made mistakes. And Jennifer, thank you for loving him through that mistake.

Because the only reason why I'm here and not in prison is because my wife loved me too. I mean, it's just, first of all, Senator Mark Flayn Mullen, a friend of the program, was on last week. I'm sorry I missed that one. I ran into him last night. Yeah? Yeah. And I was like, he was like, man, I got here early this morning. I was planning on being in bed. And he's like, now I could do all these interviews. And I was like, what?

well, you just got to talk about your talking, I guess. But what I found amazing about it, I was like, did you know that you were going to get involved? He's like, no plans for that at all. No script. He's like, I just sat there and I got so pissed. I listened to these guys and I was like, ah, someone's got to say something. And so that was all totally extemporaneous. So you could tell. Also, for our listeners, number one, subscribe on YouTube so you could see it. But if you see that video, when he says that like,

Also, how many of you senators have showed up here drunk and then it goes to a split screen with Tim Kaine? Yeah, they're like, Tim Kaine! And he looks drunk there. His hair's like come back and he's like tipping over in his seat. Tim Kaine's got to look at the camera and be like, get that shit off me, man. Don't talk about cheating on my wife. Right.

Why am I getting roped into this? So it's not confined to Hegseth. Like we talked about, this was a seminal moment in my view of the confirmation process and why I like the chances of most nominees. But it extended into the next day. Yesterday, we saw Pam Bondi just absolutely wreck anybody coming at her. Here's a clip of Sheldon Whitehouse, the worst. Clip five. You have said that Department of Justice prosecutors will be prosecuted.

in the Trump administration. What Department of Justice prosecutors will be prosecuted and why? I said that on TV. I said prosecutors will be prosecuted to finish the quote, if bad. Investigators will be investigated.

You know, we all take an oath, Senator, to uphold the law. None of us are above the law. Let me give you a really good example of a bad lawyer within the Justice Department, a guy named Klein Smith, who altered a FISA warrant, one of the most important things we can do in this country. So will everyone be held to an equal footing?

Equal, fair system of justice if I am the next attorney general? Absolutely. And no one is above the law. That's how you do it. Just jammed it. Can I say specifically when it comes to Sheldon Whitehouse, who is quite possibly, and this is again a tough title, the most corrupt member of Congress ever.

It's a known fact that he sold a judge ship to his donor, Jack Reed, in Rhode Island. It's a known fact that his wife works for one of these left-wing dark money climate groups that directly try to lobby on environmental issues that he puts into bills. That's cash and carry government right there. And for him to try to talk about justice, he should be in jail. He's also the most slimy... Just a scumbag. ...a feat.

scumbag Northeasterner that you could ever lay eyes on. You just look at him, you hear his voice, and you just want to give him a swirly. I mean, dying to put him in a locker. And then you hear the Sheldon White Club stuff. But then everybody's been a racist during his career. Anybody who opposes anything he does has been a racist, but then he's a member of an all-white operation. Two. Two all-white operations? Two.

One wasn't enough. One wasn't enough. Yeah, it's just unbelievable. So anyway, that'll give you a little flavor for how things are going. Look, there are challenges ahead. And, you know, I think you look at the RFK nomination, whether Democrats or our Democrats will support, you know, given his previous, you know, work in the Democratic Party. I don't know. I kind of doubt it.

But there's challenges there. Tulsi Gabbard, somebody who's been pretty outspoken on a bunch of Intel stuff that when you're ahead of Intel, she's going to have to answer some tough questions. Like, I don't know. But if the game plan was to do with them what they have done with the first batch...

I don't think we got any problems, boys. Yeah, it's becoming crystal clear. These are number one, they're strong candidates for these cabinet positions. Number two, they have done their homework. And the teams around them who have been prepping them, these guys have been showing up ready to roll and the Democrats haven't. And it's clear as day. Yeah, I think also like it's important. I mean, obviously, you know, senators have an advising consent role. I respect that.

But like you also have to recognize that I'm speaking specifically to the Republican senators out there is like RFK

Tulsi, they represent parts of this coalition that won on election day. That's right. Like Donald Trump brought them into the fold of this movement for a reason. And they represent a constituency as well. So they deserve a fair shake. And I ask all the questions you want, but they deserve a fair shake. Yeah, I think I think that that much is guaranteed. And what I've seen out of this first batch of hearings, Republicans are holding up their end of the bargain by making sure all these folks are getting fair hearings and then

You know, shouting down their Democratic colleagues when they're being unfair about stuff. Yeah. So far, so good. We'll see how it goes from here. Big news. We mentioned this a couple of times. The inauguration, obviously, Monday. Big day around here. Big day for our country. And the Ruthless Variety Program will be a part of it. We're very excited. And we've already announced that we are going to do our game day set. Yep.

We're going to be down there. Do we talk about the specifics of where we're sitting at this point, or do we leave that out? Is that a security concern? I think it's a security concern.

Yeah, we're at Freedom Plaza. Big time. So you know where that is. We're right on Pennsylvania Avenue there. Clean look at where all the festivities will be going on at the Capitol with the inauguration, the big speech. I know there's going to be hundreds of thousands of people out there cheering on. And then we're right on the parade route. You recall part of the procession after inauguration is the president, vice president. There are all teams and families and bands and all kinds of people.

pomp and circumstance to follow. We'll be right there for all of it. And we hope you join us if you come to our YouTube page slash Ruthless Podcast. You can find us there live. We'll send out a couple of alerts, won't we? Yeah, sure we will. And you can also see us at the main page at the inauguration where we'll be the entertainment. Yeah, it's like...

Kick straight from the... It's noon from 2, right? That's our, like, immediately following the president's speech. Yeah. I mean, that's the best possible time slot. And kick it from Carrie Underwood right to the Rizal's right. Yeah, that's right. She sets up the acts for us. Well, it's important that you set the mood. Yeah. And further, for listeners of the program, we've got tickets. If you want to be there and get a seat and see it all live and be right there at Freedom Plaza...

What's the URL for that one? Ruthlesspodcast.com, and then you'll see in the navigation it just says Parade. Click there, fill out the form. Do it as soon as you possibly can. As soon as possible, please. And we apologize. We got all this stuff late, too. Everybody's getting this late because everybody is trying to get this thing put together in the safest possible manner. We're just getting this stuff, but we wanted to provide you the opportunity. Remember, if you do want to take us up on that, go to Ruthlesspodcast.com, click the Parade link. That'll give you to an outsourced...

Not us. It's the inaugural committee that deals with it. And if you're going to come, plan ahead. It ain't easy to get around in this town. And it's going to be cold. And if you think you're just driving into D.C. and parking curbside, you're crazy. Yeah. It's not going to work. It's not going to happen. But, you know, you can always just watch on YouTube. Yeah. YouTube.com backslash Ruthless Podcast. It's basically for those who don't know where Freedom Plaza is.

If this was like a football game, you're at the 50-yard line. Our YouTube stream is going to be the 50-yard line. The entire parade is going to be coming towards us from the Capitol. The Capitol's in the background.

A lot of pomp, a lot of circumstance, the pageantry. I can't wait. Yeah, it's going to be fantastic. It's a tremendous honor. Big thanks to the inaugural committee, Trump administration, all of them for thinking about us to be a part of this because we are certainly overjoyed at the opportunity. Brings us to our question of the day, fellas. What's your plan for Inauguration Day? I know, I know that it includes tuning into the Ruthless Variety program. But like what else you got going?

I want to make sure you're drinking some beers or something. Like it's a celebration. You know, hard work starts Tuesday morning for everybody. You got to let out a little steam. It's like putting a bow on everything that 2024 was for electoral success and everything else. All the hard work that all of you have done, talking to friends and neighbors and getting out there, making sure everybody votes. Tomorrow's your, or Monday's your day to celebrate it. And we'd love to know how. It's a double celebration. It's not just...

The Trump administration is back. It's the end of the Biden administration. That's a lot to celebrate. Yeah, if you're inclined to celebrate negatively, that is two celebrations in one. It's like a wedding and a funeral on the same day. Funeral of an enemy. Yeah. No, it's fantastic. So when we come back, we're going to get your comments from last episode. Recall this is about Gavin Newsom.

the ever running next challenger that Democrats are attempting to put up and his efforts to make a bad situation much worse in California. Did he destroy his chances or not? We're going to get to your comments right after this. I don't have to tell you Americans are ready for what's next. Moving beyond the hardships of inflation and economic anxiety towards building a future, a better future for our families.

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All right, fellas, we're going to get to the comments. Remember, you've got to like and subscribe here on the YouTube page to get these things into ringing. And we go through every single one of them. Great comments. Once again, a lot of smart stuff out there. To do this, we always start with a voice. Okay, this first one comes from Lady Elaine Fairchild. And straight from Mr. Rogers. Lady Elaine writes, Agree, Newsom is going to pull the ultimate RICO scheme benefiting from protecting from the violence he caused.

He's going to recreate himself as the rebuild savior, cutting all the rags he put in place in the first place, villainizing anyone who makes any common sense objections, and acting like he's the reason L.A. rises from the ashes and hope with enough media spin in four years people forget he caused the fires in the first place. Tough stuff from Lady Elaine Fairchild. I love the little flourish. Yeah.

He's so good at it. All right, Dex, what do we got? This one's from Plausible Deniability. Looking forward to this one. Question of the day answer. Newsom will be completely unfazed for 2028. It is so far away that no one will remember. If his performance were going to be a factor, his nosedive of California would have eliminated him years ago. Great point. Not to mention, the other options for the Dems will also boost him.

I call it the Biden effect. That's really good. Again, typically smart. Yeah. Probably sharp listeners. All right. Smuggle. What do we got? This comment comes from Christine Clausen and Christine writes, if Newsom gets the Dem nomination for president in 2028, JD Vance, the presumptive Republican candidate will make mincemeat out of him. Even before the first presidential debate pointing out Newsom Newsom's total ineptitude as the governor of California. And that's the thing is, uh,

like we discussed earlier, man, did they underestimate J.D. If he is a nominee and Newsom is the Democrat nominee, that's going to be just absolute destruction. I could not enjoy that more. But also at the same time, I think Trump is well within his rights to run again. Oh, 100%. A third Trump term is exactly what we need in this country. You're rigging his belt. The other thing is, I don't think Republicans will underestimate Gavin Newsom. He is an accomplished liar. Yep.

And I think we'll be ready to prosecute the case that he has done nothing to prevent fires in California. In fact, Smokey the Bear, who's a cartoon, has done a lot more in this country to prevent fires than Gavin Newsom ever could in his entire career. A nice Smokey name check. That's good. Well, we all remember Smokey the Bear. Yeah. Yogi and Boo Boo and the rest. Okay.

Appreciate all of that. When we come back here, there's absolutely huge news out of Israel. We've been covering this since day one, October 7th.

And, you know, some good news. Also want to just put some context to a lot of it. But we're going to get to all of that right after we hear from our terrific sponsor, one that this program holds very near and dear to our hearts, Z Bionics. That's right. Z Bionics. Look.

And we just break. There's a bunch of stuff that they want you to see. Yeah, we don't need a script for this. I don't need a script. Because it's the truth. It's just three-quarters of the truth on this one. Yeah. This stuff, you get a lot of things out there like, oh, you take this, your hangover's gone. False advertising, basically. And I thought, you know, when I first heard about Z Biotics, I was like, okay, here's another one of these deals. They gave us an opportunity to try some at the convention.

I'm sure it'll violate every rule they have when I say it's magic. So I'm not going to say that, but know that my thought, my internal thoughts,

thought process is, is close to magic. I don't care if it breaks a rule. I think it goes beyond science. Yes, PhDs developed it, but it 100% is some sort of magic. Touched by the hand of God. We have really put it through the test. We've stress tested this thing. It always works. Every time. It's a tiny little bottle, tasteless, and you just have one of them right before you go out, you start drinking, and it breaks down all

all the toxic byproducts that the alcohol has in your gut. Because it's not about like, if I drink a Pedialyte before I go to sleep, I'm good to go the next day. If I have three glasses of water before I go to sleep, I'm good to go the next day. No. The only thing that actually works is Z-biotics. And you better believe I'm going to have like four of those in my pocket when I'm going to these inauguration events. Well, yeah, right. Like you don't have to take it from us. When you watch our live stream from Freedom Plaza for the inauguration,

and were bright-eyed and bushy-tailed after a whole night the night before partying, it's because of Z-Biotics. And that's why we always say there is no tomorrow without Z-Biotics today. That's exactly right.

You've got to just remember to make Z-Biotics your first drink of the night. Drink responsibly. You'll feel the best tomorrow if you do. So you go to Z-Biotics.com backslash Ruthless to learn more and get 15% off your first order when you use Ruthless at the checkout. Z-Biotics is backed with 100% money-back guarantee. So if you're unsatisfied for any reason, they'll refund your money, no questions asked.

you won't be unsatisfied. Let me just tell you, you're not going to be. Remember to head to zbiotics.com slash ruthless and use the code ruthless at the checkout for 15% off. Thank you very, very much. Okay. This Israel situation we got to get to. So it's been 15 months since a horrible terrorist attacks, October 7 in Israel, Hamas terrorist organization, worst people on the planet.

carried out unspeakable acts. In doing so, they also took a ton of, killed a bunch of people and took a ton of hostages. And what we saw out of the Biden administration were an administration that initially sort of got it and were like, look, we stand with our ally, Israel. These are terrorist attacks. And then quickly found out that their base constituency of progressive leftists wanted Hamas to be Israel.

Unbelievable. Yeah. But the actions spoke to what they did next, which is basically spend a hell of a lot more time trying to figure out how to provide aid and comfort to the enemy.

building a pier a pier that's not a pier that sinks or dropping off food and supplies that immediately just go right to Hamas stolen from Palestinian people that Hamas then steals to buy more arms yeah to buy more arms and do all this you know and like that was their priority and they kept doing it meanwhile the hostages just sat there right and

And American ostriches as well, by the way. Yeah. I mean, unbelievable. The Biden administration leaves them behind. So Trump shortly after he's elected said they better call be back here by the time I take office or they'll be held to pay. Yeah. And he meant it. Well, very quickly, everybody starts getting around to negotiating. And as I said on Fox last night, my one big lament is that there's anybody left in Hamas to negotiate with. That's the real first thing.

failure of leadership in my view is the fact that there is still anybody drawing breath over there because that was a real opportunity to get rid of a whole lot of bad people but we are where we are it's good that people are coming home they've made they announced yesterday that a deal had been made a three-step process to begin returning people back to israel

It's been widely celebrated, which it always should be when innocent people go back to their homes. But the circumstances, I don't think, are worth glossing over. I don't want to put lipstick on this pig. The fact that it took 15 months is unspeakable to me. I grew up in an era in America where if there was one hair harmed on an American's head, you knew you had...

a serious military problem coming your way. And there was no negotiation with terrorists. You know, remember that? Hell, it wasn't even that long ago. Under Trump, he literally sent a dog to kill a terrorist who hurt an American. Not only are you going to die, but a dog and a robot are getting you. It's not going to be nice. So look, I think it seems like the incoming Trump administration was supportive of these talks. They're obviously hugely supportive of people coming home.

But there's a bunch of stuff here that is like sort of unbelievable to me in many ways where they've got – they're going to – the first round of this, apparently there are hundreds of Palestinians in Israel that are being detained for one reason or another. Israel doesn't take hostages, right? This is a democratic country. This is a fierce ally. They have a moral compass. This is – but for whatever reason, they have these folks.

They're all out and they're all going back. And it's like, you know, three to one, the number that was committed to by Hamas to release back to Israel. So in and of itself, I'm like, okay, so the value proposition seems off a touch given what these folks have done, but be that as may. The second piece of it was that they were going to release 50 more. When they released 50 of our hostages, it included, um,

a number of women who are serving in the Israel armed forces and five in particular. And those five are being released in exchange for 50 Palestinian prisoners. And let's just call that what they're terrorists, including 30 militants who are serving and already been convicted to life sentences. So they're breaking, like they're doing the essential, essentially taking people off the equivalent of death row and,

violent offenders already convicted in a court of law, 30 of them, and sending them back to Hamas in exchange for our people. Like, I don't know, man. Like, it's a win that our people are coming home, no question. But does that feel that great? Yeah, but it's always going to be asymmetrical because, like, Hamas is a terrorist organization, so the people in Israel's possession are terrorists. Yeah.

And the people that Hamas has are Israelis or Americans who've been hostages now for a year and a half.

And so this is always a situation you're going to be put in because, I mean, in Hamas's own words, they love death more than we love life. That's just the reality. It's true. I just don't care for the antiseptic way in which it's all being described. And, you know, I heard yesterday in a newscast or like a 33, they hope that 22 of them are still alive. Jesus. Yeah. They hope that. OK, so you've negotiated the release of 11 dead people, which it's important to return to.

the bodies, no question about that. But like, this is what we're talking about here. Well, and then you got to also think about the future security, you know, for Israel and allies like the United States. I mean, the mastermind of the October 7th attack was released in a previous prisoner exchange at Israel. He was in prison. Yeah.

Yeah, no, I mean, this is what I'm talking about. I mean, look, you don't have to actually be a diplomat to figure out that when you are paying a heavy price for hostages taken of your country, there will be an incentive structure built for people to take more hostages. There just is. Now, I understand. I don't blame Netanyahu or anybody in Israel for wanting their people back. They've had a long history of, like you said, having to pay an asymmetrical price to hostages.

get their people back but in the end with american leadership i feel like we could have done better than this and it started on october 8th to be honest with you and again the fact that there's anybody still drawing breath within hamas is a problem from my standpoint but like you know they have two more steps i'll bet you dollars the donuts that the second step is like

You know, where they're going to try to get more people out in exchange for, you know, all kinds of other things. And then that third step was something about basically setting up their own government in Gaza. Okay. Well, I'll tell you what that looks like. I know who they're going to elect. Yeah.

The ballot just says Hamas. Right? And the guy at the ballot box is wearing a ski mask and a bomb. Yeah, yeah. Make sure you vote the right way. He knows how you're going to vote. And he has your dinner for that evening. Yeah. Because he took it from Joe Biden. True. Yeah. I mean, we laugh because it's ridiculous. But anyway, they're all acting as though...

Again, Monday cannot come soon enough. It cannot come soon enough. Hopefully this resets the dial a little bit and it's the end of people getting killed for a while. That's our hope. But then just this overarching strategy that we've heard from Hegseth this week and what Trump has talked about needs something to sort of like calm the waves and know that there are real consequences in this world again. You can't just run over us. Anyway.

Wanted to touch on that quickly. Another thing that is really going to hurt the Democrat, I think, hearing strategy and maybe electoral strategy is TikTok. TikTok's going away. We've talked a lot about this. You know our views on it. It's good riddance to this outfit. But since Congress passed its divestiture or a close, meaning it has to entirely be sold out of

the hands of people who are tied to the CCP. There's been a lot of court cases and everything else. All this has settled down, and now the rubber's hitting the road. As of Monday, the whole thing needs to be done. And they announced, TikTok announced Sunday, the power switch is getting flipped. And that's the thing. It's very telling to me because the bill states divestiture.

It's not a ban on TikTok. It's that it can no longer be owned by the Chinese Communist Party to spy on Americans. That makes it impossible to do business. Yeah. They're like, what's the point, man? That's the stated purpose of the app. Because it would still function if you just move it to American servers and be like, okay, I say give the keys to Elon Musk. He's got the money to buy the damn thing. That's for sure. They're like, no, we're shutting it down. They're like, no, no.

What's the point of having this? If we can't hurt you and steal all your data, we don't want to run it anymore. It perfectly unmasks the whole charade. It's an American company. We have no ties to the CCP. They're like, all right, we'll just divest of that then. They're like,

Somebody, somebody, somebody on Twitter posted code from TikTok and it was all of these like backdoor lines of code. And they're like, hey, wait a minute. I thought there was no connection to the CCP in this. What is it? What's all this backdoor code? And,

And, you know, they tried this strategy last week. We talked about what a failure it was when this bill was first in Congress, TikTok did, of where they were like, they put a screen that when kids, because they're targeting kids, when kids would try to use the app first, it said, press this button to call your local congressman and tell them to save TikTok. So if you see an outrage following them shutting down when they could just sell their operations and make a ton of money,

You know, that'd be good for them anyways. And you see outrage from kids. It's because this app was designed to control the kids. It's working exactly the way that they intended it to. And now that it's going down Sunday, thank God. But there is a wrinkle into all of this that I think you made mention of a week or two ago. Your boy Mike Solana picked up on it this morning. So there's an alternative. In case you haven't had enough of the CCP-controlled social media apps...

They're building another one for you. So they have one already set to go. I think it's called like a, it's essentially, it's meant to say Little Red Book after Mao's Little Red Book of communism, just straight up like communism. So they're like, why don't we just name the app communism? Real mask off moment. You know? And like all these Americans are signing up and using this. It's crazy. You saw Taylor Lorenz.

pushing this app of being like, hey kids, sign up for this. Are we sure that she's not some kind of a spy? I mean, it would not surprise me. Because you can't be that morally bankrupt on

I think she could be for the right price. I don't think she is. I think she's just an ultimate edgelord now. Just like with the, you know, like Luigi, you know, who shot that, you know, healthcare CEO and she like, she pops up and says, good. I think he's onto it. I think she just likes attention. I think she's addicted to attention. And also like, she's like 50. So she's not really relatable to the influencers. So she's got to try to act like she's some edgy, you know, 18 year old. Yeah. Like, Hey kids,

How you doing? So, listen, Solana had a good... This was on PirateWire. He had a good takeaway to all this. It basically said, you know, why stop there? If you're going to get on the little red book because you can't have TikTok, why stop there? Just migrate to China and then let's run an experiment. Try protesting your new government. Let's see what happens. That's a great idea. Yeah, I mean, listen, this guy, he captured it, but it's true. And this is... Look, I'm not...

I've gotten to a point with Trump and I trust Trump and Trump's foreign policy because it worked. It's not about just trusting a politician, which I rarely do. Like I watched it over four years.

I'm not in one of those spaces where you're like, all right, entirely split. We're going to have parallel economies. Like, let's not even talk to them. Let's go Cold War with China. Like, I don't think that shit works. And I don't think it's actually possible in today's world. Like, I think that there are very significant American interests in China and vice versa. And if you can figure out how to talk together and make sure the economy works for both –

That's kind of an ideal way of handling it. So I'm not like, oh, go get the Reds. That's not my point of view. But stuff like this, it's so obvious. The fact that it took four or five years for everybody to be like, hey, did you know your kids are using a Chinese spy app? And everybody's like, yeah, but they like it. Remember they said that, literally. They literally said it. Yeah, but they like it.

Like, get rid of this shit. Like, we can deal with the big, Trump can deal with the big stuff. You know, it's not to be feared. He can deal with it. But this stuff, no brainer. Yeah. 100%. All right, let's play a game. Let's play a game. Yeah, it's Thursday. It's Thursday. And I feel like our listeners and viewers deserve King of the Hill. It's been so long. It has been so long. And I'm the reigning champion. Which makes it all the more important to play.

I'd like a dethroning. I feel like you've been there too long. I mean, you're the bailiff today, and I would humbly request that you remain impartial. I retract. I'll retract. I'm going to run a tight court, so I will retract. Yeah. Let's go ringside. Ladies and gentlemen, your

Attention, please. It's time for King of the Hill. In the blue corner, fighting out of Nancy Pelosi's kitchen pantry, Adam C-C-Cuttingsinger. And now, in the red corner, fighting from who knows where, and current champion of the world,

Ron Philippa. How do you say it anyway? Philipowski. Well done. Nice. Well done. And Smug, you bring in Kinzinger. Yeah. Wow. I came to play. I like it. I like it. All right. So, uh, we always start with the champion. Yeah. Hold on. Let me just pull up my. While he's doing that, I'll remind our listeners who haven't heard this game. Cause you just tuned in in the new year. It is about, uh,

social media personalities, media personalities, sometimes lawmakers in this case, but usually falls into all of the above category, who used to fashion themselves as conservatives that Trump basically broke the brains of. And so all the things that they cared about or said they cared about, they now run entirely opposite. It's kind of an ironic game, and these are the hottest takes. We choose two competitors, and here we go. Holmes is the bailiff, and your announcer is the judge. Ha ha!

You know, so we referenced this in the previous segment, the ceasefire deal with Israel in Hamas. And that's big, big news. Everyone's really excited about it. Well, everyone but like the never Trump, former Republican liberal left. What's the exhibit number? Exhibit number three, please. Spaghetts. So what you see there is a chyron from CNN. And the chyron says, did Trump's bombast lead to likely hostage deal with Hamas? Question mark.

Which is just like, you know, they're investigating a story. Donald Trump makes an ultimatum that all hell is going to break loose if you don't deliver these hostages back home where they belong. Yes. And so CNN has the gall in his mind to be talking about that. He quotes that and he says, what the fuck are we doing here with this bullshit? Right.

Like it couldn't possibly be. We are back. We are. We are so back, fellas, because we are returning to this era where all these left wing lunatics on the Internet police their liberal media every single day that they're normalizing Trump. They're trying to work. Trump is being normalized. You're doing it. You're participating in the normalization of Donald Trump, who's Hitler and he's a fascist.

So that is my submission for round one. Okay. Challenger? Math exhibit 10, please. Adam Kinzinger writes, Trump could easily stay quiet on these fires until he is president, but he is so weak he needs a misspelled villain and it needs to be the victim. Never have I seen a whinier child in my life. So I love this for so many reasons because it's

As a failed never Trumper, this guy can only have one speed if he wants to keep cashing those checks. And it's that Dems can't do wrong. We've got a Democrat mayor. We've got a Democrat governor and a Democrat president. And that's led to absolute disaster in California. And he's like, you know what? It's Trump. This is because Trump is saying these things. I can't even spell villain correctly, but it's Trump's fault too. Yeah.

Okay. Judge? For this first round, I was really taken by Filipowski's, as a former Republican, almost Republican, something like that, he is trying to say... He's a Republican lawyer. He's trying to say that CNN is too right-wing. And that always just goes right to my heart.

But the idea that Adam Kinzinger is like Trump could have stayed quiet on the fires. The biggest natural disaster in Southern California history. Incoming president. Incoming president is supposed to stay mum. Outrageous. It's like the biggest disaster since probably Hurricane Katrina in this country. Totally. Right. So for that reason, round one goes to Kinzinger. All right. 1-0 Kinzinger. And we lead off the second round.

I think I'm going to try to close it out here. Exhibit 11, please. Kinzinger writes, Trump isn't even president and he's already driving Europe and Latin America into the warm embrace of China. What? Mind you, this is right after we saw a picture of Hunter Biden and Joe Biden with Xi Jinping. And we've seen over the past years and lived through Biden essentially selling America to China, importing all their solar panels, their batteries.

And Kinzinger's take on all this is like, well, when Trump says he wants to expand America and take Greenland, that's just pushing them into China. Like, how do you—the math doesn't math. How do you come to this conclusion that somehow Trump, who is the largest hawk on China that we've probably ever had in the White House, is the problem here that, no, no, no, he's going to actually push them into the arms of China. And also the Panama Canal should belong to America. Yeah. All right. What do we got, Harnks?

Spaghetti, let's go to exhibit number four, please. Ron Filipowski writes, and I love this whole genre where they provide their consulting advice to Republicans as if they're still Republicans. One of the best. Repubs in the Senate and House just know that once you cross the Rubicon of politicizing aid to victims of natural disasters...

That is a road that you don't want to go down, especially since your states seem to have a lot more of them and you tend to lose your majorities quickly. Okay, so number one, I love the threat in all of this. You know, like, would be a shame if something was to happen to Florida, you know, something like that. But then also, like...

They're the first to politicize every disaster. You had to go back and look at COVID. The nominee of the Democratic Party politicizing a hurricane as it was coming on land in Florida just 60 days ago. Right. The hell is he talking about? He's like, you will be the first in the history of our democracy to politicize a natural disaster. It's like, what the fuck are you talking about? Wow.

Like, I'm old enough to remember Kanye West being like, George W. Bush doesn't care about black people. Oh, yeah, yeah. Yeah, I remember that. Katrina. That's my submission. All right, Judge, what do we got? Okay, as outrageous as that Filipowski take is and off the mark and everything else, the idea that Adam Kinzinger is going to change the narrative on Trump in China with just one tweet is Jen Rubin-esque brain worms. And for that reason...

Kinzinger wins round two and gets a two-round knockout. Huge win. It's probably the only W in that man's life. I will respect the will of the court. I just got to say, Filipowski had a good run. He did have a great run. Much better. When you first surfaced him, I thought, oh, he's a token opponent. He beat Sherry, my Sherry, and Jen Rupert. Never expected him to be a beast like that. No, it was like that Buster Douglas run back in the day. He just showed up, and you're like, what's he doing here? Mm-hmm.

There he goes. He played with the big boys and came out on top multiple times. All right. Thank you for joining us for the game, and thank you for doing all of this stuff. We've got one more deal that we've got to show. It's a graphic of the perfect crime. Yes. Can we get graphic one up, please? What you're looking at.

What you're looking at, in Canada, unknown activists have been adding drawings of penises to symbols of solidarity with Palestine. This has sparked a wave of outrage in the Arab segment of X. The graphic speaks for itself. It's the perfect crime in that if authorities are looking into this and looking for a graffiti artist who happened upon putting a phallus into the gripped Palestinian hand,

Well, the charge would likely be graffiti. And in order to do that, you'd certainly have to find the person to put the hand there in the first place, wouldn't you? Genius. It's genius. It is brilliant. What a hero. And if you're only listening, that, again, is a reason you need to subscribe on YouTube. I mean, that's just genius. Yeah, it's like there's some sort of conservative Banksy out there doing the Lord's work. So good. Let's get to our guest, Brent Gardner.

Well, we're just days away from turning the page from campaign 2024 to what the heck are we going to do about it? And that's been on the mind of all of our listeners, why we get engaged in these kind of things.

And so we figured, you know, what better to do than talk to somebody who's engaged in all sides of this stuff. And so where else to look? But AFP's Brent Gardner. How are you, sir? I'm doing great. How are you guys doing? It's great to see you again. It's great to be back in this new era. You're looking happy, smiley, optimistic. It feels like the world's looking a little bit more happy and optimistic everywhere I go. It does. Imagine that. It does. So look, we...

All of our previous conversations, clearly there was a heavy emphasis on the results of the election and the opportunity that that would bring. But you've stayed laser focused also on what you do if you get that opportunity. Yeah. And you all spent an enormous amount of time not only talking to grassroots and everybody, but then also in the Capitol, lawmakers, newly elected lawmakers, lawmakers.

about the critical issues that people ultimately cast a ballot over and how we can help bring some of that to fruition. Yeah. No, and I think this season that we're entering right now is about the promises made becoming promises kept.

And I think that's the exciting thing about where we are right now. We're on the precipice of all the things that drove people to the polls to care about this, to deliver to the U.S. Senate, to see the kind of change we've seen in Washington, you know, ultimately come to fruition. Members of Congress are excited about it, too. I mean, it's been a tough few years for folks involved in this game. No question. So I think the opportunity to go out there, roll up your sleeves and get stuff done, I think that's upon us. Yeah. Well, no question. But you also think about, I mean.

It really is an opportunity because this thing went the other way. There are a bunch of things here, and I know that are high on your agenda list, that are not only not attainable, but could slide backwards to a point you can't recognize your country.

Yeah. And we were headed that direction. I mean, and the good news about it was, you know, all the doors that we knocked and all the folks that we talked to last year, they were connected to the challenges that we all faced. And they were looking for people that wanted to be able to drive those solutions. But if you look at the challenges of the border, if you look at the expiration of the Trump tax cuts, which would actually mean a significant tax increase for every American family and business.

you know, these were the things people were aware of. They're already struggling coming out of the pandemic with the inflation. They were struggling, you know, with everything from the Bidenomics economy. And now is the chance for those folks to see those things addressed. So-

Yeah, things could have gone real bad real fast. I think people were connected to it. I want to ask you about the agenda that's coming up. Obviously, there's been a lot of back and forth about process. Is it one big beautiful bill? Is it two bills? What are you going to do? But I want to ask you about the meat and potatoes.

There are some things that have to be extended, and I'm thinking specifically about the Trump tax cuts from his first time around. And the economy is a really big deal right now. A lot of people out there struggling, and a lot of people are really hoping for these Trump tax cuts.

to either be extended or improved in some way. And I'm wondering what you guys are doing on tax. Yeah, so we just announced on Monday the launching of a new initiative. We've already committed about $20 million to this. Yeah, we talked about this on Tuesday. Yeah, I mean, it's really exciting. And the goal here for us is to be able to do, just as you said, extend and improve on what we saw from the 2017 bill.

And what we look at, you mentioned things could have gone the other way. This represented about a $1,500 tax cut for American families across the board. More in some places. In places like Nevada, it was more like 3,500 bucks. That's wild. So if this were not something we were able to deal with, I mean, ultimately, this would have represented a massive tax increase for folks. But I think the good news is it's not just one plan. It's two plans. Do we think that there's a better way to do it? Here's our perspective.

get it dealt with as soon as possible. Folks who voted last November wanted to see progress early. And so whether it's one bill or two, we think the best opportunity is to deal with it right away, to deal with it aggressively, and to be able to push forward with the members who talked about this in their elects or their reelects, you know, to get out there and get it done. It's really a smart perspective. We've talked about this a lot on the show. But ultimately, what the president's year one is going to be judged upon, and maybe the whole four years...

is what has he done to reverse the damage the Biden administration has done to the economy? How do we get back to that sort of optimism that we had from 2017, 2020, pre-COVID when everything was growing and felt like we were limitless in our economic capabilities? And all the other stuff, like we got to deal with the border. Something has to be done congressionally. A lot of stuff can be done on day one through executive orders. And we see Stephen Miller and others talking about doing that. But I think your point is really well made.

This is not something that can slip. No. Ultimately, markets react to certainty. And the certainty of getting something like this done will have a huge ramification economically across the globe, really. Yeah. No, absolutely. And I think that's why it's so important to make sure we deal with it early because...

companies are going to make their decisions on investments now. In many cases, these things are expiring throughout the year. It could affect their behavior. The sooner we do it, the sooner we have certainty, the sooner that companies can understand that they're entering a new economy, a Trump economy.

that they can make those types of investments. And that's going to matter. We don't want economic headwinds as we head into the midterms. We want the good policy that's out there that we're advocating for to have an impact for businesses and those businesses to be able to hire people and the growth of the American economy to kind of reverse a lot of the damage we've seen over the last four years. So sooner the better. And I think, you know, anytime that Congress can focus on efficiency and trying to pass it, that's probably a good thing.

No question about it. So I know that you've other things on the list, too. You mentioned border security. Absolutely. Extremely important to the folks that you've been talking to now for years. Yeah. No, the Libre Initiative has done trips with members of Congress down to the border. They've seen firsthand the challenges we have down there. We absolutely have to secure the border. We have to fix our broken immigration system. And it sounds like

what the American people talked about is making this a top tier issue during the election is something that both the president and Congress are focused on addressing early on. But, you know, I think from our perspective, we want to see that early work. We have to stop the flow. And then we have to do what's necessary to make sure ultimately that we have a system that allows the best and brightest to come, but that ultimately gives us an opportunity to have that kind of determination as a country. Yeah. And some sovereignty in the southern border wouldn't be a bad thing. Wouldn't be a bad thing. It'd be good. It'd be good.

Yeah, so what I'm curious of is like outside of Washington when you're talking to people about this agenda and everything, how are you translating the success of Trump's first tax cutback from 2017 to

You know, to make people understand why it's so important that we go ahead and we renew this and extend it. Yeah, we talk about the numbers. We give people an opportunity to look back and see kind of what was the impact. You know, I mentioned it was about fifteen hundred bucks across the board for all families. You know, those fifteen hundred dollars, they're a lot more important today than they were even back then because, you know, the money doesn't go as far.

And so I think from that perspective, people recognized the importance of it back then. But the opportunity to see a chance where it wouldn't ultimately happen, we wouldn't see them renewed this year, that's a real challenge. And the good news is, here's the best part that we found, is we've talked to folks across the country. They're connected to it. They're active on it.

That's why it's not just... I mean, it's encouraging. Because of organizations like yours, it's encouraging because, you know, I mean, look, there's a media filter here. It's so bad, I think, you know, post-2024, everybody's sort of like they got the joke. Clearly the election was an example of that with the full campaign they were running. But during those tax cuts, I mean, you couldn't go even read...

a supposed unbiased AP story without them calling like tax cuts for wealthy. Yeah. You know, I noticed that, but I also noticed that Joe Biden didn't repeal him. Yeah. You know, it turns out it didn't hit the wealthy at all. Yeah. Weird how that works, but you never heard the media go to anybody in the Biden administration and be like, Hey, about those tax cuts, you say is a huge, uh,

you know, windfall for billionaires. Why didn't you go ahead and repeal that? If that's the case. Right. And they didn't, they didn't touch it, but I think it's because of Brent's point, the good work that you all are doing and then others are doing is,

People understand it. It's not like you can just read it in the New York Times and be like, yeah, no, it's for somebody else. Like you actually see your bank statement. Yeah, no, for sure. And look, I think that that's true through an even bigger through line than that. People have realized the impact of the yoke of government on them and everything from the COVID shutdown to the impact that taxes play to the growth of the administrative state and the regulatory state. Yeah, the regulatory piece is a huge, huge part of what you guys are picking up steam here in the last few days of the Biden administration.

administration. It's crazy. It's crazy. They are the regs part. Yeah. Like, so obviously we talk about taxes a lot and the regs is something, you know, most voters don't really think about as much if you run a business or maybe you're a farmer and you're, you're dealing with, you know, the EPA a lot, then this is front of mind. But for our listeners and viewers, could you explain like what sort of

What is top of mind in those regs that Trump can go ahead and reverse on day one? Yeah, two things I'd say about this. There's an opportunity to utilize the Congressional Review Act and deal with a lot of the regs that are being done here at the end, these midnight regs. But on the regulatory state, this issue in particular is having a moment right now. Mm-hmm.

between the decision last year in the Loper-Bright case and the elimination of Chevron deference, Congress taking an interest. You've seen leaders like Steve Scalise go out there and talk about a need for Congress to do things differently, to not push this to the agencies, and Doge. Doge is one of those moments where you're recognizing that people, on the front end of this, they recognize the impact of government growth, the size of government, these programs intruding in their lives.

One of the most underreported things about Trump's first term that he did so well was his one in, two out. I don't remember the exact number, but it turned out to be like one in, seven out or something like that. It was incredible. Incredible. And so when you free up the power of the American economy and you don't put the boot on the neck of the American entrepreneur, the amount of growth that can come out of things like that is just unbelievable. It's wild how productive we can be when we're not acting.

Trying to reverse the economic ingenuity of this country. So I think there's a lot that can be done on day one. Congress, I think, is starting to put together the plans to go through the legislative practice. I'm hopeful that these agency heads that are moving in, they seem focused on how to be able to eliminate the bureaucratic red tape. And look, I think just ultimately the American people recognizing the need to right size government is a cultural moment in this country that can't be overlooked.

Yeah. So we talked about the border. We talked about the economy and what it means for taxes, what it means for regulations. But energy sector is a huge part of the American economy that the Biden administration has kept their thumb on for four years. I'm wondering what you think can be done about unleashing American energy on this economy. Yeah. I mean, a lot of people can say that whatever they're talking about is the most important issue for the next generation.

Energy is a very well defended perspective of what is the most important thing, you know, whether it's the baseload generation that we need to be able to have issues around transmission issues around permitting, you know, across the board. Our challenge is that the economy of the future requires more affordable and abundant energy. And so that's one of the reasons why some of the great of his domestic to it.

Yeah, it would. Ultimately, it has to be domestic. Everyone's excited about AI and what it could mean, but the growth and the cost of being able to service the type of compute you need to be able to do that is enormous. I was just told you plugged it into the wall. I heard that. I heard that. Yeah. Well, Tesla's self-generating in their electrics. But listen, I love every opportunity to be able to do that. The truth is our nation has an embarrassment of riches when it comes to the ability to

you know, produce energy. We lead the world in innovation when allowed to do so. And the barriers that we create artificially to that are the barriers that will keep us from leading the world when it comes to success. So energy has got to be a critical component of that. And good news is both members of Congress and the Trump administration seem focused on making that a day.

one. And it's also a huge national security component. For sure. Which is another thing that you guys have got your minds wrapped around. It's amazing. It's like you're involved in almost everything. I feel pretty good about where we're at.

We've got a lot to talk about in the next several years and hopefully beyond that. But look, I think from a national security perspective, you know, I'm also really optimistic. I think we've got some great folks that are going to be coming in in this new administration. We've got a Congress that seems to be dedicated to not making foolish investments in things that we shouldn't and focusing domestically on building strength at home. And I think if we follow through on those things, and I'm hopeful that we will, yeah,

Yeah, the world's going to be a safer place. What I like most about Brian is he's like clearly and concisely puts together in like four little boxes pretty much what all of us are thinking. Yeah, right. But then like, you know, you guys hear Trump knocking on doors and making sure people do this stuff. Hey, man, the great thing about our job is the energy we have comes from people out there who care and are doing great work.

We've done 30 million voter contacts in the last two years. I didn't do that by myself. That means there's some energy out there in the grassroots to go out and not just be active on your own, but spread that to other folks. And that is exciting. That's an opportunity for this country to not just take a step out of the dark, but really leap

forward. Yeah. Well, we thank you for everything that you've done up to this point and know that you're going to do here in the future. Stay in touch. You guys too. Let us know what you're up to, how we can help because it's a very important mission. Yeah. Thanks so much, guys. Really appreciate it. Thanks, Brent. All right. Man, I just love that guy. And you know, he is doing a ton of stuff ahead of this new agenda.

Yeah, I mean, look, they've been doing great work. And the fact that they just seamlessly transitioned to the governing part is in and of itself part of the promise that they keep to voters when they're mobilizing people to go out and do this. We're going to make a difference in this country. They're following through with it. We're going to keep up with them all the way through because they're really working hard. Yeah.

Recall, or question of the day, what are you going to do for Inauguration Day besides tuning in to the Ruthless Variety Program Inauguration Game Day special? Because that one you're not going to want to miss. We're going to have a bunch of special guests, too. People you probably haven't heard from before. So we're going to do all of that. We're going to suffer the cold for you, dear listener and viewer. It's projected to be 20 degrees. Yep. Yep. Are you going to bring the whites out? No. I'm going to be suited up. We've got to celebrate. Oh, my God.

Oh, my God. I'm doing this professional style. It's not every day you get Donald Trump back in the White House. Maybe we'll get a third time. I'm going to look like a snowman. You think so? Yeah, like a Michelin man. Maybe thermals underneath the suit. There is not a scintilla of professionalism happening on a Monday. So you might want to tune in for that, too. Anyway, that's what we want for your question. You can answer that if you like and subscribe on our YouTube channel. Check out some merch while you're there. We'd love it. And with all of that, fellas, I think we did it. I think so. Absolutely.

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