Best of the Program ｜ Guests： Russell Vought & Douglas Murray ｜ 5⧸9⧸25
Episode Stats
Words per Minute
172.1609
Summary
John Henry Weston is a Catholic over in Rome who knows the ins and outs of this current Pope. Also, Russ Vogt from Washington D.C. as they are preparing the new bill, the big, beautiful bill for Congress, when is that going through? What is the status on it? And this talk about raising taxes on the rich? And one of the most important voices of our time, Douglas Murray, joins me on today s podcast.
Transcript
00:00:00.000
Bank more encores when you switch to a Scotiabank banking package.
00:00:07.200
Learn more at scotiabank.com slash banking packages.
00:00:15.000
Today's a podcast, so you need to hear all of it.
00:00:17.360
You can get the full podcast wherever you get your podcast.
00:00:20.500
This is the best of, and the best of today, we talk about the Pope.
00:00:27.760
He is a Catholic over in Rome who knows the ins and outs of this current Pope.
00:00:38.380
as they're preparing the new bill, the big, beautiful bill for Congress.
00:00:48.560
And this talk about raising the taxes on the rich.
00:00:52.460
And one of the most important voices, I believe, of our time, Douglas Murray,
00:01:04.540
That's what countless women in crisis are told every day,
00:01:14.700
A recent study from the Foundation for the Restoration of America
00:01:20.260
They found over 11% who took the abortion pill,
00:01:34.060
And the fact that no one is talking about it in the media,
00:01:46.040
and ongoing support for women who deserve to know the full truth.
00:01:53.700
could you consider writing a larger donation for a write-off this year?
00:02:01.280
$15,000 will sponsor an ultrasound machine for a needy clinic,
00:02:04.960
helping to save countless babies' lives for years to come.
00:02:16.160
Or find out all about it and donate at preborn.com slash beck.
00:02:21.160
That's preborn.com slash beck, sponsored by Pre-Born.
00:02:33.580
the nonsense of the mainstream media that they're trying to feed you.
00:02:36.820
We work tirelessly to bring you the unfiltered truth,
00:02:44.520
Right now, would you take a moment and rate and review the Glenn Beck podcast?
00:02:50.220
because every single review helps us break through Big Tech's algorithm
00:02:54.060
to reach more Americans who need to hear the truth.
00:02:58.340
This is a movement, and you're part of it, a big part of it.
00:03:01.820
So if you believe in what we're doing, you want more people to wake up,
00:03:12.860
You're listening to the best of the Glenn Beck program.
00:03:33.640
He is the co-founder and CEO of LifeSiteNews.com.
00:03:39.720
He was there when they announced the new pope, an American pope.
00:03:44.860
I don't know why that scares me just a little bit.
00:03:53.500
Anyway, maybe it's because I know all the elites in the United States.
00:04:01.980
But anyway, I don't know anything about this guy.
00:04:08.300
But the guy who does know is John Henry Weston, and he is here with us now.
00:04:17.440
I am literally standing in front of St. Peter's Basilica.
00:04:21.460
We're a sunny day, and it is unbelievable what just happened.
00:04:26.540
We're walking around while the announcement was being made, and the crush, like, to walk
00:04:31.720
around, you had to, like, excuse yourself through people.
00:04:34.420
You were in a crush of a crowd, kind of like a rock concert.
00:04:38.340
It was all the streets filled, and no one knew he was an American, because he didn't
00:04:41.800
speak a word of English during the announcement from the Logia Nato.
00:04:57.340
I mean, you know, Bishop Strickland would be good.
00:05:06.880
So in the Catholic world, Bishop Strickland was the bishop, the holiest bishop in the whole
00:05:15.180
The guy spent three hours of prayer a day in church.
00:05:20.000
In other words, the service that he himself says.
00:05:25.320
He got removed, though, because he was, well, he went up against the machine.
00:05:31.700
Francis was going anti-Catholic in his teaching on all sorts of issues, including, you know,
00:05:37.740
fooling around with abortion, contraception, homosexuality, divorce.
00:05:44.240
And Strickland was one of the only ones who spoke up.
00:05:47.300
And, you know, he is a, you know, a guy from Tyler, Texas, like middle of nowhere.
00:05:52.180
Even if you're in America, have you heard of Tyler?
00:05:56.000
And so, you know, the poor guy, he gets removed.
00:06:00.400
Now, the problem is, when you're a holy bishop like that, you attract people.
00:06:08.840
And it's wonderful, you know, Hodunk Town, middle of nowhere.
00:06:12.620
And they built trains to it because they sent this holy priest there.
00:06:17.760
700 families moved to Tyler, Texas, if you can believe it.
00:06:23.000
And they, you know, and there was all sorts of priests, all sorts of religious orders moved there.
00:06:33.500
But, unfortunately, and much more so even now, it was done with the cooperation of our current pope.
00:06:41.880
The reason being is our current pope was then the head of the Congregation for Bishops
00:06:46.240
and was involved in doing an investigation on Strickland and in removing him.
00:06:53.520
And you might think, oh, was there anything really wrong with Strickland?
00:06:56.760
He had the best numbers in terms of per capita seminarians.
00:07:00.440
His financial situation was in great shape, like the rest of them aren't.
00:07:04.760
And, you know, there was just great things going on in the diocese.
00:07:09.660
Unlike most places, they don't have any sexual abuse scandal or anything like that.
00:07:15.120
But he was a holy one, and those holy ones are used to making noise sometimes.
00:07:19.000
So, my podcast, Tomorrow That Comes Out Everywhere, is with Bishop Strickland.
00:07:24.120
And we were talking during, when the smoke started, and we were recording this podcast.
00:07:30.300
And so, he asked, when we get the name, he's like, what was the name, what's the name, what's the name?
00:07:36.160
And I told him, and he said, oh, he was the head of the Council of Bishops.
00:07:42.400
And he said, well, you know, there's some things that he's done that I don't necessarily agree with.
00:07:48.620
I mean, honestly, I got the impression he really didn't know much about him.
00:07:52.500
There's no way he didn't know about this guy, right?
00:08:00.100
He would regard it, true, and he would regard it as worse than him.
00:08:04.960
He wouldn't even think of himself in this scenario.
00:08:07.760
But what's worse, well, from his perspective, is that he elevated, that Francis elevated Cardinal McCarrick.
00:08:26.820
That also had to be done with the current Pope.
00:08:30.560
So, now there's going to be a excuse, because he sees right away, look, that is Pope Francis' will.
00:08:37.300
If you object, you're just going to get turfed anyway.
00:08:46.080
That's why the number one sign all of America, in fact, all the world, should be looking for is the restoration of Bishop Strickland.
00:09:08.300
If you want the true signal, the one sign that will indicate where Pope Leo XIV is coming from, watch Tyler, Texas, or wherever he's put.
00:09:19.100
Because if that man is not reinstated, there's something really wrong.
00:09:26.660
I mean, are there any good signs that maybe he's going to be different?
00:09:36.300
Okay, so when – if you look up in history, there is a pope called Pius IX.
00:09:45.840
Once he got elected, he – and there was a bit of trefuffle in the world, especially in Italy.
00:09:57.520
He became – in fact, he became one of the most Orthodox popes.
00:10:06.760
Is that Pius – is that Pope – is that the Pope Pius IX?
00:10:20.100
But what – what that tells us is the grace of the office can change the man, because literally all the world's Catholics pray for the pope.
00:10:29.560
So, you know, he gets bestowed on him this huge responsibility in office and position, if you will.
00:10:40.320
It's a position established by Jesus, and he said – Jesus said to the first pope, to Peter, you know, I will pray for you.
00:10:51.060
So there's a great hope when it comes to the pope and the possibility of change, even for a weak man, because all men are weak.
00:10:59.280
And yet he's called to fulfill almost a supernatural task, you know, to be the vicar of Christ on earth, the representative of Jesus for Jesus' church.
00:11:09.740
He's not – he's not some kind of alter Jesus.
00:11:13.240
He is just the representative of Jesus' church.
00:11:16.700
And so he's – that's why the pope is not about making his own rules.
00:11:20.540
He can't change anything to do with the religion at all.
00:11:24.160
He's just there to enforce it, to bring unity in the faith, and that – there's only unity in the truth.
00:11:32.280
So he's there to basically uphold the truth of the faith.
00:11:34.640
Well, but you do know – I mean, you know this, you're Catholic, and so you know this, but, I mean, look at the change that John Paul made in the world.
00:11:46.060
I mean, it was Margaret Thatcher, Ronald Reagan, and Pope John Paul that ended communism.
00:11:55.240
And this particular now pope has been railing against Donald Trump.
00:12:01.400
So it's not exactly, like, he's friendly to Donald Trump or what Donald Trump is doing.
00:12:08.720
And it's funny because he's a registered Republican in Chicago.
00:12:21.260
It didn't strike me as healthy, particularly because – hey, if you look at his last tweet before he became pope,
00:12:27.380
it was from, like, April 15th, you'll see it's bashing Trump's immigration policy.
00:12:32.920
It's a retweet of somebody else bashing Trump's immigration policy.
00:12:39.940
And, you know, most of the bishops in the U.S. are – they either don't get it or choose not to get it,
00:12:44.840
or they want to show favor with Francis, who knows?
00:12:49.480
Also, when it comes to things like COVID, there was very few people, honestly, Glenn, though,
00:12:55.240
who were on the right side of the COVID thing, which is now plain and clear, but back then wasn't.
00:13:01.340
So, you know, he was fully masked, talking to the media.
00:13:04.300
He was back and forth about how you should receive Holy Communion in the hand,
00:13:08.640
which actually should be disastrous for Catholics.
00:13:12.020
He wanted confession by phone call, which doesn't even work.
00:13:22.720
So when he got out there on the loggia for the first time,
00:13:26.360
Francis was like in his liturgical underwear relative to what this guy did.
00:13:30.480
This guy went back to the traditional vestments of a pope when you get out there,
00:13:35.200
because these are thousand-year-old traditions.
00:13:37.940
Francis basically threw them out and just said, no, I'm going to do my own thing.
00:13:49.000
So you know how in the Bible it says, at the name of Jesus, every knee shall bow and every head shall bend?
00:13:56.440
He was praying, and at the name of Jesus, you could see, if you look at the camera close, you'll see,
00:14:03.440
And I thought, wow, that's the highest practice of many, many Catholics and Christians,
00:14:08.700
a scriptural understanding where they literally do what the scriptures say,
00:14:13.760
And then he did something else that I thought was really neat.
00:14:20.540
And, you know, it's in Latin because there's every country in the world standing out here,
00:14:24.820
and Latin's the one language that everybody understands.
00:14:26.620
And he gives him his blessing, and he starts to tear up as he gives him the blessing.
00:14:32.160
I thought, you know, signs of hope and hopefully signs of conversion and whatnot.
00:14:42.120
And there's other things that you could say he was not nearly as far left as my son.
00:14:54.500
Well, the mood in Rome, what was it like when everybody realized, oh, crap, he's an American?
00:15:04.880
I don't think that happened until today when everybody went home and realized.
00:15:21.160
Today, in his first mass as pope, all the way through, going through the mass,
00:15:27.160
And so for your American audience, for most of the audiences, it'll look like a Latin mass.
00:15:33.140
It was an Italian mass with a lot of Latin in it, which was kind of cool.
00:15:37.900
But at the start of the hobbling, out comes perfect English.
00:15:43.440
And you're like, oh, my gosh, because this is the first time we have an American pope.
00:15:47.880
So we've never had this kind of an English that we could all inherently not only understand,
00:15:54.540
So that's going to be something new, because the American church is going to be reached
00:16:01.280
in a way that it never has been, because you're going to have absolute clarity of language.
00:16:08.940
And we'll find out, for good or for ill, what that's going to mean.
00:16:12.940
But, you know, despite all of what I know, and I know a lot, unfortunately, that it's not great,
00:16:19.440
We're called to be a people of hope, and I believe in conversions.
00:16:26.240
And if it's, you know what, if it's another Francis, if it's a Francis 2.0,
00:16:30.880
the one great thing is, our Lord said, I will be with you to the end of time.
00:16:37.140
And I will never give you a cross too heavy for you to bear.
00:16:40.660
And it always works out to his advantage, you know, and which is always our advantage as well.
00:16:49.600
So I am hopeful, and I pray for not only this new pope, but also for all of the leadership
00:17:03.820
Against the, there's no other force against the woke mob that has a chance.
00:17:30.320
You know, we've gotten used to thinking of parasites as a third world problem.
00:17:39.480
I mean, really, I mean, I don't want to think that there are things living inside of us, but
00:17:45.280
It's actually more common than anybody realized.
00:17:57.960
But Jace has a parasite use case now, which is an emergency kit specifically designed to
00:18:10.000
It contains ivermectin and other powerful medicines that I can't name because I'm not
00:18:19.820
Enter the promo code BECK at checkout for a discount on your order.
00:18:39.260
So, I mean, I hate to get into this because it's been talked about for so long, but I
00:18:45.400
just, I think I agree with you, Douglas, and I just want to make sure that we're saying
00:18:52.640
Can you lay out the controversy that you've been embroiled in here recently?
00:18:56.640
Do you mean, sorry, because I tend to be embroiled in quite a lot of controversy.
00:19:04.240
The one where you're accused of saying, don't listen to anybody unless they have an Oxford
00:19:18.300
I think this is the controversy that came up from my recent appearance on Joe Rogan podcast.
00:19:24.180
Now, the simple thing I said, which has been, I think, misrepresented by a very large number
00:19:30.980
of people deliberately, is that everybody has the right to say anything they like about
00:19:35.560
anything, but that doesn't mean that all opinions should be regarded as being equal.
00:19:41.980
And when I was brought on to debate, and it's not often in Joe Rogan's podcast that he
00:19:50.080
He normally has people on to just give their opinion, and you can take it or leave it.
00:19:55.740
But he felt that, clearly, that a pro-Israel voice like mine had to be countered on air.
00:20:04.320
And when I was talking about my recent book, the recent bestseller on democracies and death,
00:20:11.120
cults, Israel and the Future of Civilization, I got into the weeds of what has been happening
00:20:20.220
I got into it because, not just because I've written about it, but because I've seen it
00:20:24.940
I've spent the last couple of years mainly living in Israel and being embedded with the
00:20:30.260
Israeli Defense Forces in Gaza and in Lebanon and elsewhere.
00:20:36.360
And I discovered that the person I was being pitched against, who was wildly, wildly uninformed
00:20:41.920
on issue after issue, was just spouting and spouting and spouting, turned out never to
00:20:50.180
And I said, this is like if we were to discover that Chinese state media had somebody on all
00:20:58.120
the time talking about America, claiming that America was a racist country, claiming that
00:21:03.900
black Americans are currently being lynched and sold into slavery, if we discovered that
00:21:09.320
that person was rampaging across the Chinese media, but he had never been to America, didn't
00:21:14.600
speak English, and obviously so, because he's so wildly misinformed, we would regard that person
00:21:21.920
as being almost comical in their ignorance, certainly malevolent.
00:21:25.480
So why should it be that when there are people at home here in America who are also just not
00:21:33.520
informed, just as many British people are not informed, about big situations in the world
00:21:38.680
that they're talking about, why should their opinion be regarded as being somehow sacrosanct?
00:21:53.760
Experts have let us down badly, but it doesn't mean there is no such thing as expertise or
00:22:05.040
And if people don't understand that and don't understand that, for instance, a journalist who
00:22:11.140
goes and reports firsthand may well get things wrong, but it's a darn sight better than somebody
00:22:18.480
who's never left their bedroom and thinks they know the world.
00:22:21.920
You know, I just read a quote, I think it was from Jefferson, and I've adapted it to modern
00:22:31.980
The man who reads nothing at all is better educated than the man who reads nothing but
00:22:40.300
But I think that's the kind of expert we have now that are running around.
00:22:45.680
And I don't believe in you have to be credentialed or anything like that.
00:22:50.500
I don't think you have to have a formal education.
00:22:54.540
But I think serious people can do serious study on their own, especially in today's world,
00:23:04.620
But, you know, you also have to have enough humility to go, look, I'm not an expert in
00:23:14.640
I've just done a lot of homework, and I'm open to different opinions, but here's what
00:23:21.940
And there's a lot of good that can come from that, and we all do that to some extent.
00:23:26.320
But that is, as you say, the ignorance that social media in particular is able to push
00:23:32.580
on people is extraordinary, not least because of the lack of humility.
00:23:37.240
And one of the things in that debate, it was really me against Joe and the comedian he'd
00:23:44.160
One of the things that was startling about it was the sheer lack of humility of the guy
00:23:50.160
I mean, he seemed to think that he knew everything about Israel and the IDF, despite never having
00:23:56.400
been there or met anyone or spoken with anyone on the ground in the IDF.
00:24:00.120
And he seemed to think that he knew better than the Israeli Defense Forces, how they should
00:24:04.440
protect their people from another massacre like October the 7th.
00:24:08.580
But maybe the generals in the Israeli army and the politicians and others who have been
00:24:15.680
losing family for the last 18 months fighting in Gaza, maybe they do know something more than
00:24:23.180
you have believed in different social media sitting in Austin, Texas.
00:24:30.000
I mean, people quite often say to me, you know, what would you what do you what would you tell
00:24:35.740
this politician or what would you tell this general when you meet them?
00:24:44.160
I listen because that's much, much more important because they know more about the proximate causes
00:24:53.620
of the conflict and what they're doing to prevent it.
00:24:56.780
And when I hear and see these people, there was a guy, one of Joe Rogan's friends who'd
00:25:01.980
been cropping up on social media recently, and he accepted this challenge that I put out,
00:25:06.520
which was, if you know, if you have a plan for how you would get 250 hostages back from
00:25:13.580
the densely built up and booby trapped area of Gaza, and if you know how to get 250 hostages
00:25:20.180
back and how to kill or capture all the leadership of Hamas, if you have a better plan than what
00:25:26.880
the Israelis have been doing from the last 18 months, let me know and I will pass it on
00:25:34.020
OK, and one of these comedians decided to take up this challenge.
00:25:40.580
He said, among other things, he said, why don't they fight like men?
00:25:49.000
And he said, I'm sorry, I've been to the funerals of young men who had no desire to have to ever
00:25:56.620
be in Gaza again, who lost their lives because they were fighting house to house with terrorists
00:26:03.300
embedded in mosques and in hospitals and in civilian homes and cropping up from tunnels
00:26:10.700
And if the IDF and the Israeli Air Force had wanted to level the place, they could have
00:26:16.320
But they didn't because they wanted to minimize casualties on their opponent's side and
00:26:22.740
And you have to put up with some doofus claiming that he's the real man.
00:26:29.340
And he knows because he's sitting in a podcast studio somewhere two continents away.
00:26:34.780
And I think that is just objectionable on every level and displays a lack of humility
00:26:45.500
I tell you, Douglas, I mean, I think I struggled from this a little bit.
00:26:49.640
I mean, I've done this job for almost 50 years now.
00:26:52.020
Um, but when I got into, uh, television, everything changes so rapidly that I was, I was pretty
00:27:00.800
I think we had a big, you know, I spent a lot of money on research and everything else
00:27:04.020
had really good, uh, you know, we, we were buttoned up, but when I left there and I was
00:27:09.240
reflecting on what I had done, um, I, I came to the understanding and, and I think this
00:27:22.040
And that is the only thing I'm certain of is that I'm not certain of anything.
00:27:36.140
I will voice what I do know, but that doesn't necessarily make it the absolute truth.
00:27:50.520
And, you know, one of the things going on is that, is that all of us who are, who I hope
00:27:56.220
are curious and want to learn more and know more and understand things better.
00:28:01.720
We, we, we, we, we have that instinct, but it also doesn't mean that on the things we know
00:28:08.300
about, including the things we've seen with our own eyes, that we should be lacking in
00:28:19.120
You have to have the confidence in what you do know, but you also have to have the humility
00:28:27.080
And one of the things that I do know is that having seen war up close, not just in this conflict,
00:28:35.220
but in others as well, I know what the difference is between an, a death cult, as I call Hamaz,
00:28:43.020
like a death cult, like Hamaz, that fights for death, fights to bring death to its enemies,
00:28:50.600
fights to bring death to its own side, even to its own children.
00:28:54.740
I know the difference between the death cult like that and the democracy like Israel or
00:29:00.480
the United States of America and our armies who fight for life, who fight to minimize casualties
00:29:08.220
on our own side and fight to minimize casualties on the enemy side.
00:29:13.860
And there is all the difference in the world between these two things.
00:29:17.740
So when I see people finding it complicated to tell the difference between a democracy
00:29:27.500
To hear more of this interview and others, download the full show podcasts wherever you
00:29:36.600
He is the director and, uh, and one of my personal heroes.
00:29:47.720
So I want to talk to you about the, the Republicans because I believe they're kind of a waste of
00:29:54.020
Um, they are not doing the things that I think the president promised, and that is cut the
00:30:04.820
And president Trump has been playing very, very nice with them, trying to get them to do what
00:30:10.780
I think is something by passing the big, beautiful bill.
00:30:14.460
Can you tell me where we stand on this and what's in it?
00:30:21.040
The houses, um, has a, they're trying to meet their instructions.
00:30:24.940
They basically passed a budget that would have a hundred or 1.5 trillion in savings, uh, and
00:30:31.080
about four, four and a half trillion in tax relief.
00:30:34.140
And they are working through to get a bill that can pass.
00:30:37.620
And, uh, we're right there with them trying to get it done.
00:30:40.840
And, uh, I think it would be, you know, big savings.
00:30:45.140
Um, and I think that's the, that is the goal is to try to figure out how to make this a historic
00:30:50.820
opportunity to both extend the tax cuts, do the, the tax cuts the president wanted to
00:30:56.820
do on the, on the campaign, uh, no tax on overtime, some other things, no tax on social
00:31:02.100
security benefits, um, and then to really, uh, make sure that, you know, this is an opportunity
00:31:07.500
to have some of the highest reforms to mandatory spending since the 1990s.
00:31:14.780
And, um, I think that the house right now is, is trying to put these bills together.
00:31:19.760
Um, you know, we spent so much time debating whether you have a couple of bills or one bill.
00:31:25.660
We lost some time in that and we're trying to catch up.
00:31:28.300
And, um, I think they're hard at work and we just got to be right there by them to
00:31:33.500
So what are we expecting this to be voted on and possibly go through?
00:31:38.300
My hope is next week that they pass it out of committee, the two big committees of ways
00:31:42.960
and means and energy and commerce, uh, and then go to budget and set up a vote thereafter
00:31:51.500
Uh, I don't think they've noticed yet the committees, but, uh, that's, that's what we're
00:31:58.740
I mean, I'm sure you've done this to Congress, but I don't know the American people really
00:32:06.460
I mean, I got a letter from a family member who I just love dearly a couple of weeks ago.
00:32:13.540
And I said, well, what the president is doing is trying to save the country from the great
00:32:20.400
reset because a reset is coming and you want it to be towards shareholder capitalism, not
00:32:29.680
But with our debt, the way it is, the interest rates that we're now paying bigger than the
00:32:35.560
defense budget, no country has ever survived this.
00:32:39.560
Can you give us some idea on, on how serious, I mean, Congress needs to move a little quicker.
00:32:46.840
That's the, you know, look, we have $36 trillion in debt as you, you know, when I left office
00:32:51.820
the first time under president Trump, we had about $300 billion per year in interest costs.
00:32:56.220
And now it's above the defense spending at $900 billion, right?
00:33:01.680
So we've got this enormous interest cost as a result.
00:33:07.480
And it's one of the reasons why, you know, we've heard an emphasis from the administration
00:33:11.360
on balance, on taking dramatic actions through Doge.
00:33:15.460
Our budget that you referenced in the lead up is the lowest non-defense spending to $2,000
00:33:22.840
And so, and I think what we would try to do to deal with kind of the paralysis from Capitol
00:33:32.600
I mean, I think that's what Doge has done in a fundamental way.
00:33:35.820
And we're going to try to make those savings permanent through a couple of different ways.
00:33:39.480
But it's to force Congress to, if they want to be a part of the process, you know, come
00:33:46.620
alongside of us, but we're going to move in as much as we can within the parameters of
00:33:54.340
We're going to move as fast and aggressively as possible to change the reality on the ground
00:33:58.820
with reductions in force, with reorganizations, with doing a programmatic review of spending
00:34:05.120
that doesn't have to go out through the use of rescissions.
00:34:07.860
There's a whole set of tools in our box that we're going to use aggressively to get Congress
00:34:13.780
moving in our direction, because we cannot be in a normal situation as an administration
00:34:20.180
where we just kind of send bills up and wait on them.
00:34:23.320
You know, we have one big bill that needs to occur.
00:34:27.340
We've tried to put everything as we possibly can on that, because it has procedural protection
00:34:34.620
But even in that, it was, you know, part of our thinking was to make sure we limit the
00:34:41.140
number of things that we have to go to Congress for.
00:34:47.000
I mean, I was hoping that we were going to get new tax cuts and not just the renewal of
00:34:54.840
the Trump tax cuts, but I was hoping Congress would be at serious and we'd go even deeper
00:34:59.580
Um, and now, uh, the White House last night, the president last night tweeted, you know,
00:35:05.940
uh, I know that Congress, you know, they're going to be wishy-washy on, you know, they're
00:35:11.740
going to get blamed if they raise any taxes on the, on the very rich, but I'll, I'll go
00:35:17.260
along with it if, if they want to do that, that, that, that's a little scary.
00:35:21.860
We should be going the other way, shouldn't we?
00:35:23.700
Well, I think the president ran on a set of tax proposals that he's been very excited
00:35:31.300
about, committed out, designed towards the working class, um, that we, from an economic
00:35:36.840
standpoint, also believe are really critical to getting, um, more and more of, of labor
00:35:43.660
force participation out of this part of the economy.
00:35:47.200
And we think it would be a huge boon to the, to the, uh, the, the impetus on the economy
00:35:55.460
Um, and so we are living in a, in a world where, you know, we don't, we don't have the, the
00:36:04.180
Uh, and, and I think that's what, is it, is it, you're seeing a lot of different navigation
00:36:09.180
Is it impossible to go back to the 2019 budget?
00:36:13.560
I mean, why can't we just reset and say, we're going back to that budget?
00:36:18.800
Now we are trying to do that with the, what you saw in the budget that we sent up, uh,
00:36:24.520
that's, that is essentially what that budget represents.
00:36:28.000
It's a, it's an effort to go back, um, you know, non-adjusted for inflation.
00:36:34.540
Uh, it's a 35% cut for most programs when we account for maintaining, uh, infrastructure
00:36:43.840
Do we do the entitlements, the mandatory spending, the interest, do those have an impact on our
00:36:55.240
And, and I, and I, and I do think that there's a newfound, uh, desire to cut spending, even
00:37:04.000
And you have a ton of members that are really trying to make sure this is either deficit neutral
00:37:09.760
or you have a, you know, this is a moment that can be used for significant mandatory
00:37:15.500
So to get there, are tax hikes on the rich part of that plan?
00:37:21.060
Well, the president, you know, put out a truth this morning.
00:37:24.420
Um, you know, he, he said, look, uh, I think he's of a couple of different minds.
00:37:28.740
He has always been very focused on the things he ran on.
00:37:32.860
He ran on, um, the, the, the no tax on overtime, right?
00:37:38.520
Uh, the no tax on tips, no tax on tips, all that kind of things.
00:37:43.020
And so that's, that's really what we've been trying to fit in to the amount that, that Congress
00:37:51.160
At the same time, we have to, you know, extend the tax cuts from, from his first term.
00:37:55.540
Um, I saw in the budget that we are increasing defense and homeland security.
00:38:04.400
On the border is like, we, we want to increase and really buy out all of our increases over
00:38:14.340
And we're doing that, that this is the paradigm shift.
00:38:18.900
We no longer want to be in a situation where we have to get Democrat votes for defense increases
00:38:25.960
that then they put us in a situation where they have to lever up and demand that non,
00:38:32.200
not only do our cuts not happen, but that we have to increase non-defense spending because
00:38:38.980
Secondly, they flat out oppose any border spending.
00:38:41.900
I mean, we, they put us on the precipice of a shutdown every single time we wanted to increase
00:38:48.460
And so our view is to, to actually look to how they did it under Joe Biden administration
00:38:55.400
and put those increases on the mandatory one big, beautiful reconciliation bill.
00:39:01.760
And then it puts us in a situation where we have united the Republican party.
00:39:06.400
So your defense hawks are not working against us in the appropriations process to actually
00:39:14.700
And then we've got Doge working overtime with Pete Hegseth to get reforms within DOD, because
00:39:23.320
And at least in this first year to make sure we reinvest those and let the new leaders there
00:39:31.760
So with all the Doge stuff, uh, I mean, a, this has nothing to do with Doge, but I was
00:39:36.280
glad to see, um, uh, cash Patel yesterday, come back out and say, no, no, no, I'll go with
00:39:42.680
Cause he was saying, no, I, we can't live on that.
00:39:45.520
We need more, uh, and you know, cut, cut, cut, cut, cut.
00:39:49.680
And I was glad to see that he kind of changed his position on that yesterday.
00:39:53.120
Um, but, uh, you know, with, with Doge, I'm seeing that Congress is like, well, we're not
00:40:03.560
I mean, I think that's the question that Congress needs to ask that we've, you know,
00:40:08.120
Number one, they say, send us all these rescission bills, rescission bills, and I'm willing to
00:40:14.320
Our administration is the Trump administration is, but we, man, we, they have to pass.
00:40:19.440
And so if they don't pass, it, it impacts our ability to, to use some of the tools that
00:40:25.900
we would have executively to spend less of that money.
00:40:32.180
That's why I haven't formally sent up the 9.3 first round of rescissions from Doge.
00:40:37.000
I am having great conversations surprisingly with the appropriations committee kind of
00:40:43.180
Uh, and they're trying to think through, okay, what's the version that we could do this a
00:40:47.820
little bit different, but hit the same amount of savings.
00:40:53.240
I think that in and of itself is a sign of this is a little bit different, Glenn.
00:40:57.840
I mean, this is, this is more like the 19 early 1980s when Reagan first came in, then, then
00:41:03.540
anything we've seen recently, um, Congress is saying we, instead of, we were going to
00:41:08.300
ignore your budget said, we want to hit your number.
00:41:13.040
I don't know if that, if that will materialize, but I am optimistic about it.
00:41:16.820
How, how optimistic are you that, I mean, cause you know, I've talked to the president
00:41:21.240
about this just a couple of weeks ago and I said, we are playing such a dangerous game
00:41:26.140
cause we have to, I mean, I think America, uh, no country's ever turned around from this
00:41:32.000
point and we have to, um, and it just requires some really big boy pants, uh, to do it.
00:41:38.900
Um, but I'm, I'm, I'm just so concerned about it.
00:41:43.300
Um, and I'm, you know, I'm, I'm hoping that we can get the, the reduction on the staff.
00:41:50.060
I know that you're, you know, you're doing a fantastic job on reducing the number of federal
00:41:55.080
employees, you believe we're going to be able to get these things actually codified.
00:42:01.720
So if things don't go well, or even if they do go well, but it's not president Trump the
00:42:07.800
next time that this remains, this path remains this direction.
00:42:14.820
I, I, so I think if you zoom out for a second, I think we're going to come away from this
00:42:20.060
year in particular, we've had no wins on spending in like two or three decades, you know, Paul
00:42:26.120
Ryan kind of put us in this cul-de-sac forever.
00:42:29.700
I think we're going to come away with this, this year with probably the largest mandatory
00:42:34.940
savings, um, ever or adjusted for inflation since the 1997 balanced budget agreement.
00:42:44.080
I think we're going to see the appropriations process fixed for the first time because of
00:42:50.460
our talking about executive tools like rescissions and impoundment.
00:42:56.920
It's going to cause the appropriations process, a return to separation of powers that Congress
00:43:02.720
actually listens to our cuts and we may not get all of them, but we'll get some of them.
00:43:07.560
And I think we're going to see something that is material progress on that front.
00:43:11.300
And third, I think in, I remember coming on your show in the first term and you just like
00:43:16.820
this, the extent to which the career bureaucracy is just impermeable, it's just totally unacceptable.
00:43:24.240
And I think, you know, many of us, the president, Elon have spent a ton of time thinking about
00:43:30.460
And I think that will be the, one of the biggest stories, the extent to which the things that
00:43:35.400
have been done, the, you know, the fork in the road has fundamentally changed the reality
00:43:41.100
And so we have a much small, we will have a much smaller bureaucracy as a result of it,
00:43:45.560
notwithstanding the laws that are on the books that, that have been a barrier thus far.
00:43:50.480
I have to tell you, I, I stay away from Washington, DC, you know, as, as much as I try to stay away
00:43:58.200
But next time I'm up, Russ, I'd love to sit down with you and do a long form interview with
00:44:02.580
Cause I, I, you're really one of the good guys and thank you for everything you're doing.
00:44:10.320
There's another great city that starts with a T, Tampa, Florida.
00:44:15.760
Fly to Tampa on Porter Airlines to see why it's so tea-rific.
00:44:20.220
On your way there, relax with free beer, wine, and snacks, free, fast streaming Wi-Fi, and
00:44:27.240
You've never flown to Florida like this before.
00:44:32.340
Visit flyporter.com and actually enjoy economy.