The Glenn Beck Program - March 13, 2021


Ep 101 ｜ Ric Grenell Knows Too Much & This Is Why He Prays to God ｜ The Glenn Beck Podcast


Episode Stats


Length

1 hour and 11 minutes

Words per minute

148.3

Word count

10,624

Sentence count

730

Harmful content

Misogyny

3

sentences flagged

Toxicity

6

sentences flagged

Hate speech

17

sentences flagged


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

Richard Grinnell is the first openly gay man to serve as Director of National Intelligence (DNI) in the United States. He is also the only openly gay person to ever serve as a member of the U.S. Intelligence Community.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Misogyny classifications generated with MilaNLProc/bert-base-uncased-ear-misogyny .
Toxicity classifications generated with s-nlp/roberta_toxicity_classifier .
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
00:00:00.000 You know how the Biden administration has been bragging that they're the first to appoint an openly gay cabinet member.
00:00:07.240 Well, it's not true. It's not true. And it wasn't Obama either.
00:00:10.700 As much as the left hates it, the first president to appoint an openly gay cabinet member was Donald Trump.
00:00:19.920 Today's guest is that person. I have been trying to get an interview with him for a very long time.
00:00:25.820 I don't know if we're going to be able to get to half of the things I want to talk to him about.
00:00:30.960 The first openly gay cabinet member in the United States history is a guy that it cannot be reduced to that.
00:00:43.200 His accomplishments are astounding.
00:00:47.120 The guy has a master's degree in public administration from Harvard.
00:00:50.220 After that, he began his political career and it has been a roller coaster ride.
00:00:54.320 Shortly after the 9-11 terror attacks, he got his first confidential briefing in 2001.
00:01:01.620 He landed a position with the Bush administration as a State Department spokesman to the United Nations.
00:01:07.480 He remains the longest serving U.S. spokesman at the United Nations in New York.
00:01:12.500 From there, he founded an international media consultancy.
00:01:16.720 All the while, he was a Fox News contributor with articles and editorials just to almost every major outlet.
00:01:23.200 After that, he was a foreign policy spokesperson for Mitt Romney in his presidential campaign,
00:01:29.740 making him the first openly gay spokesperson for a Republican presidential candidate.
00:01:35.700 Then he had a cancer scare.
00:01:38.160 He beat it.
00:01:39.420 And it didn't slow him down because a few years later, Trump appointed him as the U.S. ambassador to Germany,
00:01:45.500 where he did remarkable things, ruffled a lot of feathers, and the left was terrified.
00:01:51.020 How could the first openly gay ambassador be a Republican?
00:01:56.000 Imagine their terror when Donald Trump appointed him director of national intelligence acting,
00:02:02.820 making him the top intelligence official in the country.
00:02:07.800 Since leaving office, he has hinted at a bid for governor of California
00:02:13.260 and taken over LGBT outreach for the Republican National Committee.
00:02:20.120 The left will never admit it.
00:02:22.660 But today's guest has done a lot of good for LGBT people.
00:02:28.960 And he doesn't have a chip on his shoulder.
00:02:31.660 He's remarkable.
00:02:33.340 He has completely shattered so many myths that the left has touted.
00:02:37.680 But unlike the left, his goal is not activism.
00:02:41.900 The left didn't like it when he called Trump the strongest ally that gay Americans ever had in the White House.
00:02:49.140 Today's guest is more than how he identifies himself.
00:02:54.400 And while he has done a lot for his fellow LGBT,
00:02:58.740 it's because he's done an incredible amount for all Americans.
00:03:03.140 All Americans, he has accomplished good for.
00:03:07.860 Today's podcast, Richard Grinnell.
00:03:22.920 Rick, I have wanted to talk to you for I don't know how long.
00:03:27.700 Welcome to the podcast.
00:03:29.860 Well, thanks for having me.
00:03:30.820 I'm honored.
00:03:31.920 I love these long formats.
00:03:33.480 Yeah, it's it's a pleasure.
00:03:35.600 So I I've got a bazillion questions for you on.
00:03:41.020 I don't know how many fronts, but I have to start with the one thing that if I don't ask you,
00:03:47.480 everyone is going to say, how did you not ask him?
00:03:50.400 You know what it is, right?
00:03:54.620 Harry and Megan.
00:03:59.360 No, and it's actually not about California.
00:04:01.700 I want to know you are the DNI.
00:04:03.920 Tell me everything you know about aliens.
00:04:08.380 Oh, so here's something really interesting.
00:04:11.660 I asked for that briefing when I was head of DNI because that's the number one question.
00:04:18.880 Right.
00:04:19.120 Actually, that you get from the public.
00:04:20.580 And I wanted to be able to say that, you know, I looked at everything we have and I looked at all of the data.
00:04:28.040 You know, it's a little bit like what is the definition of is because everybody has in their mind what it means to have life on another planet or an alien or.
00:04:42.020 And so I always say to people, definitely UFOs exist.
00:04:47.460 But remember the definition.
00:04:48.900 It's an unidentified flying object and we don't know what it is and it's flying.
00:04:52.620 So, but the latest videos that the Pentagon have confirmed that these ships are doing crazy things and then you're getting the, what do they call it?
00:05:06.620 The new patents that the Navy verified, but they're really sketchy.
00:05:11.640 You don't even know.
00:05:13.380 Is that technology that we think someone else may have or that we have and we're not saying it?
00:05:20.800 Or, or is it, do we think it's otherworldly?
00:05:27.800 So the one thing that I'll say is, is the United States of America and our, you know, great technologists are at the forefront.
00:05:38.500 So you can rest assured that we are winning.
00:05:42.760 I think there's a concern when it comes to this, the outer space satellites that there are some other countries, I'll keep it at that, that are making a lot of progress and beginning to muscle their way into areas that cause great concern for us as the leader.
00:06:04.380 And that was the idea of Space Force.
00:06:07.040 I think that you should always remember that what, what President Trump was presented in terms of intelligence and, and technology and kind of the current situation.
00:06:18.680 I have been in the room multiple times when he's been presented as to this is where we are in terms of being the leader on this technology.
00:06:25.960 This is who's coming close.
00:06:28.380 And every single time, I mean, he is a, he was a president that literally would say, ah, that's a little bit too close for my comfort.
00:06:35.960 Or let's, let's, let's beef it up.
00:06:37.940 Let's do more.
00:06:38.700 Let's make sure we're out front.
00:06:40.000 So it's a long answer to say, ah, we're still out front and you don't see everything that the intelligence community sees in terms of satellite technology.
00:06:50.500 I'll leave it at that.
00:06:51.840 Okay.
00:06:53.040 Let's talk about technology.
00:06:54.520 Cause as a director of national intelligence, um, uh, you saw everything.
00:07:01.720 Um, and from all accounts of people that I trust, you were really solid in that role.
00:07:09.440 And I worry about, um, our, how can I word this?
00:07:16.340 Um, I, I'm, I'm big into technology.
00:07:20.840 I'm big into AI, AGI and ASI.
00:07:24.860 And I am really concerned, uh, who, you know, we know whoever gets AGI first, uh, is going to probably rule the world and, and maybe for a very long time.
00:07:38.020 Uh, and you can't put that genie back in the bottle.
00:07:42.940 And I used to feel like I want America to be able to have that, but now I don't trust our own government as much as I used to.
00:07:53.240 In fact, I, I'm really skeptical of our government.
00:07:57.780 Are we close?
00:07:59.240 Is anybody close to AGI?
00:08:01.720 So I want to go back to the fact that I love these long formats.
00:08:08.560 So thank you for this question.
00:08:09.900 Cause it's a, it's a really good topic that we should have more conversations on.
00:08:13.980 And you just don't get this when you've got like, you've got four minutes and there's a producer in your ear saying, wrap it up.
00:08:19.420 And I'm like, I haven't even gotten to the point yet.
00:08:22.840 I know the feel.
00:08:25.520 Yeah.
00:08:26.040 And so I'm so relaxed and I, and it feels good.
00:08:28.280 Um, so let me just go back a little bit when I was ambassador to Germany and by all accounts, you know, the media kept saying, oh, he's Trump's guy in Europe.
00:08:37.400 And so many problems came to me as kind of Trump's guy in Europe.
00:08:42.020 And I would put Kosovo and Serbia. 0.99
00:08:44.300 Uh, the reason I became the envoy there is because both of them, both of the presidents of Kosovo and Serbia came to me to say, you know, we're not getting enough attention.
00:08:53.020 Can we, can we get your help?
00:08:54.620 And so a lot of different problems came my way and I would bring them to the president.
00:09:00.520 I would put the Chinese technology in that category, especially on Huawei.
00:09:05.860 And I, many times would speak to the president about how Chinese technology and intelligence, um, were, were kind of clashing.
00:09:18.360 And since I was getting a daily intelligence briefing and would spend a lot of time going into these issues on what the Europeans were doing with the Chinese,
00:09:27.620 I would bring these issues to the president pretty regularly.
00:09:31.340 He would call and want to kind of bounce things off.
00:09:36.020 I became one of the leaders on Huawei.
00:09:39.740 I would say anti-Huawei and telling our European allies not to use that technology.
00:09:46.380 Um, because I was very comfortable with president Trump telling me, you were not going to be able to share intelligence if they use this system.
00:09:54.340 Um, I think our allies, let me just say in Europe, I think our European allies totally understand the danger.
00:10:03.180 Mm-hmm.
00:10:03.840 For instance, the German intelligence services will warn German travelers, whether you're business or personal travel, doing business or personal travel to China.
00:10:14.080 China, the German intelligence services warns you not to bring your phone into China.
00:10:20.040 Now, if our European allies are warning their own people, don't bring your phone into China, it's because they steal data. 0.94
00:10:27.940 So, we have European allies who absolutely understand that.
00:10:32.940 But, but a country like Germany, which is the largest economy in Europe, also has the pressure of the BMWs, the VWs, the Daimler's, the world's, you know, car leader, who need a new, you know, market.
00:10:48.500 And they, they want to be in China.
00:10:51.600 And so, they're constantly, they were pushing back on me to say, we don't want to use Huawei.
00:10:58.300 We don't want to use the Chinese technology, but what's the alternative? 1.00
00:11:01.800 And so, we would, I would go back to the American government and say, guys, this is pretty empty when we're pushing, uh, countries to not accept the Huawei technology.
00:11:13.120 We need to have an alternative and we don't.
00:11:16.800 That is a long answer to say, we got behind the eight ball on technology during the Obama presidency because we allowed government agencies to think that you could engage with China and still kind of make progress on, on your market, um, and protect our intelligence.
00:11:37.640 And I don't think you can do both.
00:11:39.340 So, there's this new idea, and I think it's a bipartisan view, actually.
00:11:42.760 I don't think it's a partisan thing.
00:11:44.660 There's this new idea developing that companies, American companies need to choose.
00:11:50.920 Either they're going to work for DOD and they're going to be at the forefront of developing these incredible technologies for, for America and for national, U.S. national security.
00:12:02.200 Or, you're going to do what the Chinese want you to do, which is to form a joint partnership with a Chinese firm, which is under obligations of the communist Chinese party to turn over the data at any point that they want it.
00:12:18.000 So, the idea that Apple or Daumler or take any company.
00:12:25.240 I mean, we had national security meetings on chip makers who were trying to cut deals with Chinese companies that we knew were working with the Chinese government.
00:12:37.980 I don't think that we should allow, and this is a big statement, maybe I'm making a little news here.
00:12:45.620 I don't think that we should allow U.S. companies who form joint partnerships with China or Chinese companies to have U.S. national security contracts.
00:12:57.200 I don't think you can do both, and I think it's really dangerous to think that you can do both.
00:13:02.200 I agree with you.
00:13:03.000 I'm not for tariffs.
00:13:05.140 I just don't believe I'm a free market guy.
00:13:09.140 But I was on vacation when I saw the Huawei announcement, and I think I was alone, and I think I applauded when I heard it.
00:13:19.700 But I was grateful that somebody understood the coming technology, because I don't think people either don't get it on how rapidly things are going to change.
00:13:35.200 I mean, all aspects of our lives are going to change, and how rapidly we could become a China in all that that means if we're not paying attention to technology. 0.67
00:13:53.380 Well, you said it best just a little bit ago.
00:13:55.940 You said you can't put it back in the bottle.
00:13:57.640 You can't.
00:13:58.500 You can't.
00:13:59.400 So can I go back to the AGI or AI question?
00:14:05.200 Is anybody close?
00:14:06.360 You don't have to tell, you know, obviously.
00:14:08.120 But is anybody close?
00:14:09.980 When do we think, Kurzweil says 2030.
00:14:14.940 Some people say we're closer.
00:14:16.220 Some people will say we're never going to get there.
00:14:18.400 Are we close to any kind of artificial general intelligence?
00:14:22.160 So what I will say, because we do get into kind of TS stuff, I would say that you can have total confidence that the American entrepreneurs and technologists are at the forefront and understand what needs to be done.
00:14:44.200 That hasn't always been the case.
00:14:45.440 And in certain markets, we're not at the total front, but we now have an understanding that we can't be caught like we were on 5G.
00:14:58.780 I'll give you an example.
00:14:59.740 So there's an artificial intelligence company called Clearview.
00:15:05.900 And in full disclosure, I do some work for them.
00:15:09.400 I help them.
00:15:10.960 They are the leading U.S. artificial intelligence facial recognition company.
00:15:16.400 Their competitor is a Chinese firm called Face Plus Plus.
00:15:22.000 And the Chinese sell their facial recognition technology to other countries with no strings attached.
00:15:30.900 So you can use it.
00:15:32.180 You can say you're using it for law enforcement, but then you can do reckless things with it.
00:15:36.480 And it can be very dangerous.
00:15:38.320 Like what reckless things could you do with it?
00:15:40.680 Give me an example.
00:15:41.560 Well, if it's in the hands of an individual, you can start scanning a crowd and, you know, just picking up people who aren't committing crimes.
00:15:53.180 And you can use it for your own information or leverage.
00:15:58.280 Okay.
00:15:59.200 And there's a zillion things that you could do with that.
00:16:02.080 Okay.
00:16:03.500 The Chinese are selling this technology.
00:16:06.220 And I have been raising this from long before I started working with any U.S. companies that this is a real concern because like Huawei, like TikTok, where we lost out on TikTok, we need to have American companies that American legislators and American tax dollars support in some way so that we don't get behind.
00:16:31.700 We're the responsible version of many of these technologies if we don't get left behind.
00:16:37.080 And so a company like Clearview, which was, I think, really pushed on many issues from the left to say this is a reckless, you know, technology.
00:16:50.260 I think that has changed now.
00:16:52.020 When even the left sees that China is so irresponsible with many of these technologies, they want a responsible version.
00:17:01.820 And so there's a bipartisan support now to make sure that on technology we don't get behind and that China doesn't beat us.
00:17:09.360 Because when China does beat us and they sell to the rest of the world, it's a reckless version that will be abused. 0.79
00:17:16.560 So, see, every time I go to the airport, I stand in line and I look at that Clearview where there's no lines and I'm like, never.
00:17:27.920 Well, that's a different company, FYI.
00:17:29.160 Oh, it is? It is?
00:17:31.060 Yeah, that's a different company.
00:17:33.080 Okay. All right.
00:17:34.500 So what does the company.
00:17:35.760 But I see, but they're doing something, you know, that's interesting.
00:17:41.640 So, you know, they also have, but they are the airport.
00:17:46.760 Right.
00:17:46.920 They are, they are, you know, recognizing your iris and, and, and saying you are who you are.
00:17:54.580 And I look at that and I think I remember the days when we wouldn't give anybody our fingerprint.
00:18:02.720 And now we're just like, ah, Apple, go ahead and take it.
00:18:06.080 Now you're getting to the iris scan.
00:18:08.000 And when we talk about things, I mean, I, I think you were talking about a public private partnership with some of these tech companies.
00:18:16.860 And that bothers me.
00:18:20.220 That scares me because we're supposed to view government like a fire.
00:18:25.120 If it's out of control, it burns everything down and we all die.
00:18:29.340 We have to make sure that we control it.
00:18:32.520 And I'm not sure.
00:18:34.160 And you would know because you live through it.
00:18:36.960 I'm not sure our government is in control.
00:18:40.980 Yeah, look, I think that's a really good question.
00:18:43.620 And I'm not sure I was talking about public private partnerships as much as I was talking about joint ventures with China.
00:18:51.600 And, and, and making sure that the U.S. government does things.
00:18:58.040 And it's not really, you know, a check or, or, you know, corporate welfare, so to speak, to American companies.
00:19:05.920 But to just make sure that they support the technology and understand that we're the better version.
00:19:11.740 And I don't mean anything specific like a, like a check, but I do mean, you know, recognizing, say, on a foreign policy level at the State Department or in our intelligence agencies that we make clear to our allies that, that there are certain versions of technology that the Chinese push that are irresponsible. 0.69
00:19:33.700 And, you know, we, we need our European allies and for any Western ally to understand that they do have a responsibility to make sure that technology doesn't overtake the situation and it's out of control because technology can be reckless.
00:19:53.180 And I think government is there to say, this is the non-reckless version and, and responsible nations should support that non-reckless version.
00:20:02.380 So, um, help me out because I'm trying to, I really am trying to figure out Silicon Valley, uh, friend or foe and, and all indications are foe, uh, at this point.
00:20:13.360 Um, how do you convince those companies when you just use the example of, let's just say for an example, BMW and Daimler, they need that market of China.
00:20:25.320 How do you talk to these companies that also need the market of China and have already demonstrated that they'll do really insidious stuff and help China, you know?
00:20:38.500 Yeah.
00:20:39.160 Apple.
00:20:39.740 Yeah.
00:20:39.980 We're talking about Apple.
00:20:41.240 Um, it's such a great question.
00:20:43.960 I think that you just hit the heart of what the, the balance is.
00:20:48.260 I actually think in life, the answer to every question is always balance, right?
00:20:52.260 It's not black and white, but we read in, in color in the middle.
00:20:55.740 Um, uh, it's a difficult question, but it's one of the reasons why I think we should be able to take a, a, a firm stance that American companies who decide to work in China and China demands that you have a Chinese partner.
00:21:12.800 And so now you're suddenly, that's their back door.
00:21:15.960 That's how they get in as the Chinese companies have to turn over the data to the communist party.
00:21:23.040 So if an American company forms a joint partnership with a Chinese company, then I believe they're going down the path of an expanded market.
00:21:31.080 Great.
00:21:31.780 Go do that. 0.52
00:21:33.020 You are going to now have to live and die by the sword of expanding your market into communist China. 0.92
00:21:40.040 And I, and I'm not somebody who would say you can't do that.
00:21:43.680 I just think you have to be honest about what you're doing.
00:21:46.920 And when you do that, I, I think that you should not be able to then also supply sensitive U.S. national security technology.
00:21:56.240 I don't think that you can separate them.
00:21:58.740 So pick your path.
00:22:00.400 What do you want to do?
00:22:01.360 Do you want to go down the path of, of, you know, having a great market and make a lot of money in China and in other places?
00:22:11.360 And you can find your moral line, but you won't get to also then pretend like you can have a Chinese wall against that information to, to bid on, you know, U.S. national security contracts.
00:22:29.360 I think that that's okay to make that decision.
00:22:31.780 Currently, we're not making that decision.
00:22:33.960 Lots of companies are dealing with China and having joint ventures and then also pretending that they can supply this sensitive U.S. national security technology.
00:22:44.680 And I don't believe that they can.
00:22:46.120 Well, I think it's the same decision that we didn't make companies like IBM.
00:22:50.260 We didn't make them make that decision in World War II.
00:22:55.220 And they assisted with their punch card system, even sending repairmen to the death camps to repair those new computers.
00:23:05.400 And they were working both sides.
00:23:08.000 And now, with the way technology is, you know, it's not good.
00:23:14.160 The most nefarious will win in the end because of the technology.
00:23:20.260 I do want to, I do want to leave our viewers with, with one thing just to say that on this subject is that there are companies like Oracle who just do that.
00:23:29.180 There's no rule, but Oracle has taken a strong stance to say we're going to supply U.S. national security technology and they're not going to be in China.
00:23:38.060 I think that there are companies that just morally say I can't do it.
00:23:42.000 I don't know about you, but I, I feel like I'm either always looking at a screen or somebody I'm with is always looking at a screen and I hate it.
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00:25:30.340 I was talking to the author of the book, Freedom's Forge, and he studied and it's a great book.
00:25:37.300 I recommend it to you if you're into history.
00:25:39.560 It is how industry went to work for the federal government after the bombing or after 1939, the invasion into Poland.
00:25:49.760 We knew we were behind FDR was against the buildup of war against war.
00:25:56.480 And he saw the writing on the wall and realized we have got to go.
00:26:00.980 And it was people who disagreed with FDR, people that really FDR had gone after in the Great Depression.
00:26:08.720 But they they all came together and we were producing Liberty ships and airplanes unlike anybody else.
00:26:15.160 And he asked me because he didn't have an answer and I don't have an answer either.
00:26:21.720 Could we even do that in today's America?
00:26:25.120 Would the corporations rally around and say this is a common enemy of freedom and we have to win this?
00:26:36.080 Asking that question makes me sad because because it really should not have to be asked.
00:26:46.840 You should know it.
00:26:47.480 We are the greatest country.
00:26:48.940 We are the greatest country in the world.
00:26:50.520 I've traveled the world and I can tell you we are not perfect.
00:26:54.760 But what makes us the greatest country is that we know we're not perfect and we immediately try to figure out a way to get better.
00:27:00.860 And I think we're going through something right now where we're realizing that the last 20 years we've been on a slide and we haven't done what many warned before us, which was that each generation has to fight to make sure that America is great.
00:27:20.400 We are always one generation away from losing that.
00:27:24.240 And roughly 250 years marks the completion of every great civilization.
00:27:32.160 They've lasted roughly 250 years and they've always imploded, not from a massive war attacking them, but from the inside.
00:27:41.280 And I think that what I want to do is be very hopeful that in this time, I believe that we are seeing the mistakes of the last 20 years in the, say, for instance, in the education system.
00:27:55.060 The Wall Street Journal has done a good job of highlighting Chinese, you know, academics who work for the Chinese Communist Party and who have infiltrated into our academic institutions.
00:28:12.480 I have to say that I think that our academic institutions, institutions of higher learning are really the ground zero problem.
00:28:21.300 It's why organizations like Turning Point that Charlie Kirk does is an amazing organization because they recognize, look, we got to go in on these college campuses and we got to fight because we're losing that battle.
00:28:34.840 And it's also why I think in Northern California, San Francisco area, you've got not only Gavin Newsom, but Nancy Pelosi and Eric Swalwell, Barbara Boxer, Dianne Feinstein.
00:28:48.700 They've all been caught doing pro-China stuff, every one of them.
00:28:53.540 And you ask yourself why, and it's because the Chinese spies and the Chinese Communist Party infiltrated institutions in San Francisco a long time ago.
00:29:05.280 I know that's a controversial statement and people are going to not like it, but it is true. 0.99
00:29:08.940 Well, I believe Donald Trump passed a or had an executive order drawn up about our institutions and not doing business with these these Chinese educational partnerships that have really infiltrated our our universities. 1.00
00:29:25.320 And Joe Biden came in and one of the first things he did was reverse that.
00:29:29.140 Do we have I mean, I would hate to be you in some ways to have the knowledge and the insight that you have and not be able to talk about it, because I feel that way and I don't have any inside information.
00:29:45.840 We just have our own research.
00:29:47.380 We were doing work on Hunter Biden two and a half, three years ago, and there is no doubt in my mind that this is a family bought and paid for by Chinese operatives. 0.93
00:30:03.800 Do you feel that way?
00:30:05.380 Yeah, there's there's there's no there's no question.
00:30:07.980 Let me first just say, I don't think that you can be the director of national intelligence or the acting director of national intelligence or maybe the head of I was going to say the CIA, but but maybe I maybe that's not true.
00:30:25.540 But the president of the United States or vice president of the United States and not believe in God, because after you see this information, you quickly just realize, OK, we are humans and we have to look to the creator for the solutions, because this is pretty overwhelming.
00:30:42.580 The information that you do see does create sleepless nights.
00:30:47.600 There's no question about that.
00:30:48.980 And thank God that every morning there are new mercies that I can give up control to the creator.
00:30:56.300 So let me start by saying that on.
00:31:00.520 By the way, thank you.
00:31:01.840 Specific question.
00:31:02.520 Thank you for saying that, by the way.
00:31:04.280 You don't hear that enough.
00:31:06.280 Sincerely.
00:31:06.800 And we'll get into this later.
00:31:08.580 You had a crisis of faith and I just love the resolution of it.
00:31:13.140 So we'll we'll talk about that later.
00:31:14.620 But go ahead.
00:31:15.220 On the specific issue of the Hunter Biden laptop, I and I have to be careful here.
00:31:24.700 I was very troubled the two or three weeks before the election in November 2020, when 50 former intelligence officials signed a letter.
00:31:39.040 And released it publicly designed to tell the public what they believe.
00:31:47.320 And the letter said that we shouldn't look at Hunter Biden's laptop because it was Russian disinformation.
00:31:54.580 And I want to be clear about something is that those 50 former intelligence officials never, ever, ever saw any report on that.
00:32:02.440 There was nothing.
00:32:03.060 They didn't have any classified information.
00:32:06.800 They didn't have any extra information that the public didn't have.
00:32:10.420 Nothing.
00:32:11.900 And yet they went out and they said that that was Russian disinformation.
00:32:17.660 They did that before an election to say, don't look at that Hunter Biden laptop.
00:32:23.540 Now, separate from that, and I'm not accusing them of being part of China's plan.
00:32:32.440 Right.
00:32:32.800 But separate from that, that is the exact Chinese line.
00:32:37.220 What Beijing wants you to do is keep looking at these phony Russian narratives.
00:32:42.100 Right.
00:32:42.320 Because they have their spies all over our politicians.
00:32:47.540 And we have had so many defensive briefings for politicians who were caught, basically, most of them, and this is an important point, most of them not knowing that they were caught in this strategy, but were nevertheless caught.
00:33:07.500 And we had to tell them what was going on.
00:33:09.380 And my point in saying this is that China is a crisis.
00:33:15.580 Russia is a problem. 0.98
00:33:17.340 And the crisis at hand is being ignored.
00:33:22.540 And the excuse many times is Russian disinformation.
00:33:25.300 Let's talk about, you know, a guy who I think kind of played your role before the collapse of the Soviet Union in some ways.
00:33:37.620 He was an intelligence chief.
00:33:41.640 He said the United States, he came out and said this openly, I think, in 1998 or 99, the United States was about to go into a moral and financial collapse and that Americans would start to be pitted against each other.
00:33:59.640 And we would break up into five or six regions.
00:34:03.800 And I remember specifically reading this back in the 90s and talking about it at the time.
00:34:11.280 And now here we are and you're hearing much of the same kind of talk here in our own country of of breaking up and and being at each other's throat.
00:34:22.320 There's a moral collapse.
00:34:23.680 There's a collapse of faith in everything.
00:34:25.900 What do you make?
00:34:28.420 I mean, you came on the scene really with with Bush and you saw 9-11 and what happened there.
00:34:35.720 Where are we now?
00:34:37.280 What is happening to us in the last even 12 months?
00:34:41.960 What's happened to us?
00:34:43.420 Where are we headed?
00:34:45.740 Yeah, it's a really good question.
00:34:47.360 And let me just start with a little bit of hope and positive message, because I think what the question you're asking is very serious and very heavy.
00:34:55.120 And can maybe be viewed as as giving people depression.
00:35:05.040 Yeah.
00:35:05.940 Yeah.
00:35:06.360 So in this last election, you have never seen more first and second generation Americans supporting conservatives like you just saw.
00:35:16.720 It was something that I think that in my lifetime, I've really wanted to see as a president be more like Ronald Reagan and that he appealed to the working class.
00:35:29.120 Right.
00:35:29.260 We called them Reagan Democrats at the time.
00:35:31.460 And regular working class union members, middle class Americans were voting for the Republican.
00:35:39.420 And then we went through this period where we just became the party of the old rich white guy.
00:35:44.220 And I think that what President Trump did was was radically transform that.
00:35:53.260 I went to a lot of the rallies, the Trump rallies.
00:35:56.660 And when you look out across that crowd, it was America.
00:36:00.800 It was white, black, every color, every ethnicity.
00:36:06.900 It was amazing.
00:36:07.860 And I one of the reasons why I jumped on and and supported President Trump the way I did was because of that, because I saw it as real America.
00:36:20.940 And so I leave with that hope of the future is better for the conservative movement because we are transforming the party and it's becoming a party of real America.
00:36:36.040 What conservatives lost and therefore I think is the problem of of America right now are those Americans that have been here for a very long time, whose families have been around for a very long time.
00:36:50.940 And they're really comfortable in America and they've probably done really well and they have the system that works for them and they have become very vocal in favor of identity politics because of their guilt and because they support this cancel culture.
00:37:15.000 They are creating and they are creating and teaching children a sense that America isn't good and you've got to change it dramatically and you've got to, you know, upend the entire system.
00:37:29.260 And I think that that goes to the heart of who we are.
00:37:35.540 Most people in this country really love America.
00:37:39.320 Most people in Washington, D.C., don't like America and they want to change it.
00:37:45.960 And it's this you see it in foreign policy where Donald Trump said America first and everybody said that's racist.
00:37:52.880 Everybody in Washington, I should say.
00:37:55.600 And I see I spent eight years at the U.N., you know, one hundred and ninety three countries.
00:38:01.040 I see every country, every single one doing what's best for them.
00:38:06.840 They're not worried about other countries.
00:38:09.040 I mean, Chancellor Merkel is a great leader for Germany.
00:38:12.900 You know, she's buying Russian gas.
00:38:15.000 She's not paying her NATO bill.
00:38:17.300 They've got a surplus.
00:38:18.720 Think about that.
00:38:19.240 They've got a surplus and they have almost 50,000 troops, American troops there when you count the rotational troops.
00:38:25.900 So why have a big defense?
00:38:28.500 Why spend money in defense?
00:38:29.600 They've got an opera on every corner.
00:38:31.680 They've got massive infrastructure programs.
00:38:34.260 Their their highways and roads are amazing.
00:38:37.800 They fund all sorts of, you know, free health care, free college programs.
00:38:43.820 So why should blame her?
00:38:45.720 And I've actually.
00:38:46.900 Why should we be paying for that?
00:38:49.140 Why at this point?
00:38:50.980 Why should we be all over the world?
00:38:54.480 We shouldn't be.
00:38:55.520 But it goes back to my point about what what's happening in Washington is a whole bunch of people.
00:39:01.660 Right.
00:39:01.980 Who love consensus.
00:39:04.560 They love the global world.
00:39:07.880 Joe Biden, absolutely.
00:39:09.080 His entire life of 40 plus years in politics knows world leaders.
00:39:14.200 They they probably have his cell phone and he's been talking to them and he knows their birthday.
00:39:18.500 And he can remember when their daughter got married.
00:39:22.080 And so that's his crowd.
00:39:23.900 And when that's your crowd and you care about that, you don't want them to say bad things about you.
00:39:28.780 You you want to give them the ability to water down our policies so that it's consensus.
00:39:35.140 Now, I'm going to get in trouble for saying this, but consensus should never be the goal.
00:39:42.660 The goal is for our American policy to be potent and protect Americans.
00:39:49.640 Americans and we utilize consensus as a tactic when needed.
00:39:55.580 But if if all foreign policy was to have an American show up and say, this is our policy and a German diplomat show up and say, this is our policy.
00:40:05.640 And then we meet in the middle.
00:40:08.420 That, to me, can be done by a third grader.
00:40:13.100 You don't need really good diplomats to go in.
00:40:16.780 The art of diplomacy is to have somebody at that table who says, no, no, we're not backing down.
00:40:21.760 This is the policy that's good for us.
00:40:23.580 And here's why it's good for you.
00:40:25.240 And to convince them that our policy is good for them.
00:40:30.360 In many cases, it is, actually.
00:40:33.860 And then let me just on the subject finish with this point.
00:40:37.160 I have never been and I have been in tens of thousands of diplomatic meetings.
00:40:42.160 I've never been in a single one where the other side doesn't ask America to do something.
00:40:47.100 And it's usually paying for something.
00:40:48.680 And so the idea that they're not asking us to help them is is laughable.
00:40:56.320 Of course, they are.
00:40:58.040 And when we show up and we say, this is what we think you should do, it's it's very rare that we ask others to do something.
00:41:05.900 And it always leaks.
00:41:07.200 And then it's always America is leveraging its power against so and so.
00:41:11.700 And so I think we need diplomats who just say, no, this is our policy.
00:41:15.680 And, you know, by the way, that's our job.
00:41:18.680 Well, it's to push American policy.
00:41:20.780 But I think that's I mean, it was really refreshing because I think common sense in America says, you know, what we've been doing for the last hundred years is not working.
00:41:30.700 You know, hey, we don't torture, but we'll ghost plane you over to Saudi Arabia, you know, or to to Egypt where they'll interrogate you and use every tactic.
00:41:40.720 Getting involved in everybody's war, trying to I don't know, trying to be dad at the table all the time.
00:41:49.900 It doesn't work.
00:41:51.520 And it seems to make things much worse where, you know, we had countries, you know, we had Germany painting the crossing of the Delaware and we had France giving us the the Statue of Liberty.
00:42:04.580 Now everybody hates us because we're in their stuff and in their faces all the time.
00:42:10.480 And I think people know that and they know this isn't working.
00:42:16.000 But the State Department doesn't care.
00:42:19.280 And I don't even think I think we got close to a place with Trump where they didn't even care.
00:42:25.040 I don't even think I shouldn't say close. 0.97
00:42:27.360 We arrived for the first time that I am aware of at a place to where the establishment or deep state, if you will, the State Department didn't give a flying crap who the president was. 0.54
00:42:40.800 They were just going to do their thing. 0.88
00:42:43.380 That can't stand.
00:42:47.100 We should do a whole hour on the State Department.
00:42:49.840 Oh, I would love to go on.
00:42:52.640 I could go on and on and on.
00:42:54.400 I think that the place is ripe for transformation.
00:42:56.540 I have spent 11 years there and I love it.
00:42:59.900 I have to tell you, I love the people there.
00:43:02.040 But they should all be escorted.
00:43:04.000 I'm not saying everybody is a problem.
00:43:06.560 They should fire everyone and start over.
00:43:10.700 It's just a nightmare.
00:43:14.660 So I need to go on record here and say I don't think everybody should be fired and start over.
00:43:20.160 But I do think that we need transformational change at the State Department.
00:43:25.780 And what would that look like?
00:43:26.660 I have written on this.
00:43:29.960 It's a boring subject for many.
00:43:31.740 But I have written on this and thrown out some ideas of how to transform the State Department.
00:43:37.620 I think our embassies should become mini USA branded institutions.
00:43:43.600 I don't think that we should have, we call them political officers, but they're anything but political.
00:43:48.400 The political officers at the State Department who are employed around the world will go into each country that they're assigned and they will go to the conventions of the local parties and then come back and write long reports on who did what and this political analysis of the situation.
00:44:08.820 I think it's a waste because most of that you can read in the newspaper two or three days later.
00:44:14.800 You don't need a cable for that.
00:44:16.840 And yet we spend a lot of money to employ these foreign service officers to go do that in most every country.
00:44:24.240 They bring their families.
00:44:25.440 We pay for their housing and their kids' schooling.
00:44:29.680 It's a very expensive endeavor.
00:44:31.400 And many foreign service officers like to live overseas.
00:44:35.120 They enjoy it.
00:44:37.480 And it's more lucrative than coming home and having to pay for your apartment in Washington, D.C.
00:44:43.200 So we have a problem.
00:44:44.840 And Condi actually, Condi Rice tried to solve this by asking people to go to more danger posts.
00:44:50.960 I think that our European embassies should drastically shrink.
00:44:55.300 We don't need big, huge imprints in places where we have great relations unless we need to create more U.S. jobs and we need our foreign service officers to be more business centric and trying to deliver on jobs.
00:45:15.800 I think the system that is the current system that was created many years ago is archaic and it's not useful.
00:45:23.160 We also need foreign service officers who are trained and comfortable to parachute into crisis situations.
00:45:33.260 For instance, on Syria, we should not have had boots on the ground as fast as we did.
00:45:40.420 And we shouldn't have ignored the political issues.
00:45:43.060 Many of those issues were things that the Europeans should have cared more about.
00:45:48.060 Our Arab allies should have cared more about.
00:45:50.960 And so why couldn't we have diplomats that parachute into crisis situations who go to the table and talk about solutions rather than, you know, send U.S. military?
00:46:04.600 We have created the world to be very comfortable with the United States military coming in with guns into every conflict and being there to solve it and to talk it through.
00:46:21.280 And everybody takes a step back because we're waiting for the Americans to come in. 0.97
00:46:25.000 And once they do, then they're in charge and they pay for everything.
00:46:27.420 And so we don't have people in other countries rising up to solve these problems because we've trained them that America is going to come in and do that.
00:46:36.220 I'll give you an example of just the peacekeeping operations at the U.N.
00:46:40.060 We have some peacekeeping operations that have been going on for 50 years.
00:46:44.200 I know.
00:46:44.640 We have some peacekeeping operations at the U.N. that roll over every year their budget and it increases and it's more than a billion dollars, which means the American taxpayer pays 26 percent of that.
00:46:59.880 So two hundred and sixty million dollars every single year rolled over, getting bigger and bigger that the Americans pay for in the Congo alone.
00:47:10.560 Holy cow. 0.89
00:47:13.100 Holy cow. 0.89
00:47:19.180 Let's talk a little bit about our spy agencies, the State Department clearly out of control.
00:47:26.640 Well, you know, as I was doing my investigative work on the the situation in Ukraine with Biden, it became very clear that there was a there was a group of American.
00:47:45.920 I don't know, operatives that were involved in that in the State Department level with the DNC.
00:47:52.740 There were just there were just there were many moving pieces and you couldn't quite put it all together.
00:47:58.220 But it didn't seem like everybody on our side was on the up and up.
00:48:05.520 The problems with our intelligence gathering services.
00:48:10.520 Is that a clean house or, you know, a radical change or is it not as bad as it seems it is?
00:48:19.060 We could do a whole nother hour on this one.
00:48:23.580 I know.
00:48:26.360 So I was only acting director of national intelligence for a couple of months.
00:48:31.480 But one of the things that I think that bothered me the most is the whole Washington narrative about, you know, what what I was coming into.
00:48:42.560 And the the Washington narrative was Rick Grinnell has zero experience.
00:48:49.300 And what is he doing to to run these these spy agencies?
00:48:53.420 And there were I don't think anyone that was able to to break out of that groupthink in Washington and say, wait a minute.
00:49:00.980 His first intelligence briefing was in 2001.
00:49:04.280 He's had tens of thousands of briefings since he's an expert at consuming intelligence and he's an expert at using intelligence in a public policy driven way with our allies.
00:49:19.780 Certainly at the U.N. I used it from issues, you know, North Korea to to Iran, to Iraq and Afghanistan on a weekly basis.
00:49:30.500 And then in Germany, of course, you know, using it to to further our policy in Hezbollah on a variety of different issues in Europe.
00:49:41.780 And I think who better to come into some of these intelligence agencies than somebody who has been a consumer of the product who can know its usefulness.
00:49:53.900 And so when I came in, I was and this was not it, it didn't leak out one of the rare things that I did that didn't leak out.
00:50:06.580 But I tried to put a stamp in my short time on exactly what you're saying, which is we got to get the intelligence right and we've got to stop the politics within intelligence.
00:50:19.160 And so I'll give you the example of the Russia team is very dramatic, very leaky, extremely political.
00:50:35.920 And we'll take every little piece of unverified intelligence and immediately prescribe analytical arguments on it that I think really push the limit and are not IC wide views.
00:50:58.380 And that's a very important thing.
00:51:00.020 Whenever you see a leak in The New York Times or The Washington Post, which you saw a lot, I'll give you the example of Kim Jong-un is brain dead, which went around for a very long time.
00:51:12.300 And we we were laughing because all these people that were saying we've got intelligence.
00:51:17.860 That was not an IC wide estimate.
00:51:21.540 I can't go into great details about that.
00:51:24.660 But the reality is, is we knew that that wasn't true.
00:51:27.540 And yet we didn't correct it because we couldn't.
00:51:32.660 And sources and methods were were a part of that analysis.
00:51:36.940 But but my point on the Russia team is that they leak everything and they they really push the boundaries.
00:51:43.020 The China team is very slow, thoughtful, doesn't leak, very judicious in trying to come to an analytical point.
00:51:52.640 And I think the comparative of the two is a problem.
00:51:57.380 And so I tried to make progress without having the criticism that, you know, the political appointee was beating up on the career people and changing it, which I actually think is your job to to change.
00:52:11.760 But they're highly sensitive about anything.
00:52:16.200 Right. So I tried to do that.
00:52:19.400 The one area that I also made some progress on is on the Israel team, because I told them it wasn't very popular position.
00:52:29.140 But I said, you know, from the standpoint of someone who consumes intelligence, you all get it wrong a lot of the time and you're kind of burning your credibility with public policy.
00:52:42.680 People, you know, let's just take, for example, you told us that there would be World War Three if we moved our embassy to Jerusalem.
00:52:49.880 Right. Not only was that not true, but I can show you the Abraham Accords, peace deals that were done when America takes a strong stance.
00:52:58.640 And so I think that we've got to do a better job on the analytical side.
00:53:04.860 And I give everybody this example.
00:53:07.720 Imagine opening up your newspaper, your local newspaper, to the editorial section.
00:53:15.080 And there's six editorials there, but they're all nameless.
00:53:20.160 You don't know who the author is.
00:53:21.960 And so you have no idea if you're reading Dr. Fauci or Dr. Seuss.
00:53:26.120 You don't know if it's Max Boot or, you know, Glenn Beck that's giving you their opinion.
00:53:34.180 And when that happens with experts in the intelligence field, it's a real problem because the analytical pieces don't have names on them.
00:53:43.260 And many times they cannot be IC-wide agreements, but they're one aspect.
00:53:50.780 But the public never sees the difference.
00:53:52.860 They just immediately say, oh, this is what the intelligence community says.
00:53:56.120 I can now look at pieces and tell you, well, that's one person's opinion and there's 17 agencies, right?
00:54:04.040 When you left, you did probably the ballsiest thing and I cheered for you.
00:54:09.000 You released the documents on the whole Russia nightmare with Flynn and with Trump, the collusion there.
00:54:23.040 Did you have to think twice?
00:54:25.240 Did you just release it with glee?
00:54:28.920 What went through your head when you made that move?
00:54:32.940 So really, it's a good question.
00:54:38.720 I came in as acting director and I knew, you know, this is another thing that the many in the public got wrong.
00:54:46.020 I knew I was temporary.
00:54:47.320 I did not want the job permanently.
00:54:48.960 I had been offered the job multiple times and I just wasn't something that I wanted.
00:54:54.020 But when the president called me in Berlin and asked me to step in as acting director right away, I could hear it in his voice that he needed me right away.
00:55:03.180 So I said yes.
00:55:04.140 And it was an acting job and I would be there for, you know, the term until they got somebody confirmed.
00:55:12.020 And I knew that that might take time, but I was hoping that it would be, you know, 60 days and it turned out to be around four and a half, five months.
00:55:20.720 But when I came in originally, I asked to see certain files and I wanted to see everything we had on the Russian collusion narrative.
00:55:31.500 So they brought me everything and I spent the weekend and I read it all.
00:55:36.120 I looked at everything that we had and all of the reports that were classified and not classified.
00:55:42.280 There were a lot of footnotes from reports that were classified, which was very puzzling to me of why footnotes would have to be would have to be classified.
00:55:50.660 But I looked at everything and then I did something on my own, which was I went to YouTube and watched some of the public interviews on CNN and MSNBC from some of the people that testified under oath.
00:56:08.180 And I would watch the interview publicly and then I would read the transcript and it made me very sad for our country because what was said under oath in the basement of the house with a lawyer sitting next to them was fundamentally different than what they said on CNN.
00:56:29.640 And that's outrageous to me.
00:56:32.300 That's so swampy.
00:56:33.500 That's so Washington, D.C.
00:56:34.820 It means that they think that they can lie to the public and make no mistake, these were lies.
00:56:42.400 They can lie to the public and get away with it.
00:56:45.400 And so I was morally outraged that this was happening in our government.
00:56:51.900 And so I had lots of meetings and looked people in the eye and said, I'm going to declassify as much as we can.
00:56:59.500 What what are you going to argue against?
00:57:01.520 And people would would make these kind of quick arguments about why not to do this.
00:57:09.100 And when I would look down and I would read it, I would say, you know, there's not a source or a method in this.
00:57:14.020 Why are you classifying this?
00:57:15.660 And ultimately it was because, oh, it might be embarrassing information or so and so messed up or we don't want this agency to look bad.
00:57:24.540 And I thought, that's not our position.
00:57:27.120 If you recognize right now that we have a credibility crisis with the public, they don't trust us.
00:57:35.140 The only way to fix this is to come clean and to say, look, we made mistakes.
00:57:40.400 I mean, Americans are very forgiving people.
00:57:43.040 And when you come clean and you say, look, I didn't do the best thing.
00:57:46.660 We're all human and we make mistakes.
00:57:49.380 I was trying to push a bureaucracy in an agency, not a person, to recognize that they needed to come clean.
00:57:56.540 And transparency is not political and it shouldn't be a partisan issue.
00:58:01.900 And so I pushed hard and pushed through many of the arguments.
00:58:05.480 I did listen to the career staff when they were adamant and when I said, they have a level of truth there that maybe this could be spun as a source or a method.
00:58:15.660 And so I gave in.
00:58:16.840 But most of the time I didn't give in.
00:58:18.420 And I said, no, we're going to release this.
00:58:21.180 And then I said, let's put them on.
00:58:23.900 First, I sent a letter to Adam Schiff and I said, you own these transcripts.
00:58:28.460 You have until Thursday to release them.
00:58:30.980 Otherwise, they're going up on the DNI website.
00:58:32.760 And he released them the day that we told him that we were going to release them.
00:58:38.920 And they all came out clean.
00:58:41.780 And they're still on the DNI website.
00:58:43.060 You can go to, you know, people can go look at them themselves.
00:58:45.960 The problem is, is that the information is now out there.
00:58:50.340 You know, the FBI changed information.
00:58:55.640 Didn't leave out, actually reversed the information from a positive to a negative or one way or the other and went to a FISA court, lied knowingly.
00:59:11.020 And there was a slap on the wrist.
00:59:13.000 I don't know.
00:59:14.980 I assume you know who the whistleblower was.
00:59:18.600 Why haven't we pursued any of these people?
00:59:21.780 Why hasn't Adam Schiff been pursued?
00:59:24.800 And and anyone paid a price for what the country went through on.
00:59:32.500 I'm sorry, but I don't believe they were mistakes.
00:59:35.860 This was an intentional takedown of the president.
00:59:42.360 There's no question it was.
00:59:44.380 There's there's just no question.
00:59:46.920 And this was developed with participation from some at the State Department.
00:59:55.020 You know, remember this whole dossier.
00:59:58.780 London.
01:00:02.060 Embassy.
01:00:02.700 You know, I'm going to try not to get in trouble.
01:00:05.960 No, anybody who's been watching me, they know the chalkboard.
01:00:09.740 They know the time.
01:00:10.600 You can put you can look you can look at the timeline.
01:00:14.020 You can look and see who is in charge and you can look and see what their jobs were later.
01:00:17.160 And you can put all this together.
01:00:18.840 Are you concerned that some of those people are back in office now?
01:00:22.320 Susan Rice.
01:00:23.640 Some of these people are.
01:00:24.640 Yeah, of course.
01:00:26.120 Of course, there's there's no question that this team knew
01:00:29.300 that because people warned them and they they classified the comments away so that the public
01:00:37.460 wouldn't see the warnings.
01:00:38.960 But from the very beginning, they were warned that the Steele dossier was known to be to be
01:00:48.500 in developed.
01:00:49.140 The Russians knew what was being developed and that the Russians were going to use misinformation
01:00:53.060 and that most of this stuff was going to be misinformation.
01:00:56.820 They knew that and they classified all of that away so that they could create this narrative
01:01:03.220 because Hillary Clinton had a lot of people that were loyal to her at the State Department
01:01:09.480 and in the intelligence agencies, and they were trying to help her become president.
01:01:15.160 And so when this narrative against Donald Trump was being developed as a Russian spy,
01:01:22.600 you had a whole bunch of Democrats and career people that were like,
01:01:27.000 yeah, let's let's fine tune this this this opposition research and package it as intel
01:01:35.420 and really, you know, create a narrative that was false and they knew it was false.
01:01:41.440 And so I do want to say I'm not quite convinced that they got away with it because the Durham report
01:01:48.600 is not out.
01:01:49.880 Do you think it will come out?
01:01:51.380 Still, I think that I have to at this point.
01:01:57.160 You have to believe.
01:01:58.100 I have to believe.
01:01:59.300 I have to believe that all of the information that we were given,
01:02:03.480 that we were turning over to the Durham investigators and, you know, Bill Barr, who I like,
01:02:12.060 and gave me his word that, you know, Durham is an honorable guy
01:02:18.040 and is using all of the information and is just being very thorough and is not political.
01:02:23.820 I knew from the beginning that it was not going to be, you know, a bombshell release right before the election unless it finished then.
01:02:33.900 And that was the the natural time for it to come out.
01:02:37.480 It was not going to be timed to politics on any end that Durham was going to go through a thorough investigation.
01:02:44.560 And so I have to believe at this point and I'm getting impatient that the Durham investigation is going to be thorough
01:02:53.560 and really people are going to see exactly who was participating to to lie to the American people about President Trump.
01:03:04.880 At what point do you say time's up?
01:03:10.760 But what point do you have to stop saying after the Durham report comes out and I read it?
01:03:17.920 I would love to be a fly on the wall when you read that.
01:03:24.580 Rick, I have so many things to talk to you about.
01:03:27.620 I would love to have you back on again because I didn't get to your life is just fascinating.
01:03:33.480 Um, and especially your view of God and how important that is to you.
01:03:40.920 And I just think you have a an incredible story to tell.
01:03:45.180 And I would love to interview again and talk to you about that.
01:03:49.900 Would you be willing to come back?
01:03:52.020 I would love it.
01:03:53.000 I always love to talk about my faith.
01:03:54.580 OK, before I ask that last question, California.
01:03:59.120 You going to run?
01:03:59.700 Uh, look, we I'm not trying to be cute on this answer.
01:04:05.740 I really have not begun to think about this process.
01:04:10.040 We I I'm a grassroots guy.
01:04:12.740 Right.
01:04:13.040 I really think that it's important to listen to the grassroots.
01:04:16.680 We have 250,000 people that have been working since last summer to collect signatures.
01:04:21.280 Well, before the presidential race, when nobody in the national media was paying attention,
01:04:26.520 we had people out asking Californians to sign this petition.
01:04:30.860 And it's not a politics thing.
01:04:32.520 It is a purely mismanagement of the state.
01:04:35.560 I think that politicians may be able to be governor in states that are not so big.
01:04:42.520 But when you have a state like California, you can't promote a politician who hasn't had
01:04:48.600 the ability to manage people and manage big bureaucracies just all of a sudden to become
01:04:56.880 governor.
01:04:57.260 Because what we see with Gavin Newsom is that he's just a terrible manager and a decision
01:05:01.560 maker.
01:05:02.160 And it's not just COVID.
01:05:04.000 It's not just the schools being shut down.
01:05:06.500 And it's not that we in California still are not in restaurants yet inside.
01:05:13.620 It's you know, he he closed the beaches and he called it science.
01:05:18.100 We're having rolling blackouts.
01:05:20.080 We're telling people to not water their lawns.
01:05:22.400 And yet we live on the ocean.
01:05:24.380 This is just pure mismanagement of the state because it's politics and identity politics
01:05:30.380 and cancel culture at the top.
01:05:32.200 So I'm going to listen to the grassroots people, let them have their time, get these signatures.
01:05:39.660 We do not we don't even have the deadline yet.
01:05:42.020 And then they have 30 days, 30 business days to verify the signatures.
01:05:47.720 I'm not convinced we're there yet.
01:05:49.600 And let's talk once it actually qualifies.
01:05:52.680 And then we'll see what's needed.
01:05:55.000 One.
01:05:55.800 This is the one last question.
01:05:57.880 And I don't say this with any malice at all.
01:06:01.180 I really don't.
01:06:02.780 I think we're seeing a very sad chapter right now where I, you know, I remember when my
01:06:12.520 grandfather, we had to take his keys away from him and it was sad.
01:06:16.580 I worry about this president, especially lately where he's grasping for things.
01:06:23.320 It's sending.
01:06:24.880 I don't know, but you would.
01:06:28.120 Does a weakened president like this send a frightening message and to our allies and
01:06:35.380 another message to our enemies?
01:06:37.320 And is it normal for for the vice president to have so many one on ones with leaders of
01:06:45.100 countries?
01:06:45.620 I'm troubled by it.
01:06:50.300 I think that, first of all, world leaders want to talk, especially on their first encounter.
01:06:57.280 They want to talk to the president.
01:06:59.000 And this is a president that they actually know.
01:07:02.220 And so when they don't get to talk to him, it's even odder that, wait a minute, I talk
01:07:06.540 to you as vice president and a senator and as chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations
01:07:10.180 Committee regularly and now I'm I can't talk to you.
01:07:16.940 That's troublesome.
01:07:18.520 That that that is real troublesome.
01:07:19.900 I think our allies feel emboldened that America is now going to be, you know, having its policy
01:07:30.040 by consensus.
01:07:31.180 I mean, they get to decide, you know, Europeans, I would say, especially France and Germany and
01:07:38.840 the U.K., their leaders have never been more powerful with America because if they say
01:07:45.520 something that they don't like, it's going to have a huge impact on Joe Biden.
01:07:50.560 He wants to be liked.
01:07:52.380 And without consensus, you know, without all of us getting along and moving forward on
01:07:57.660 Iran issue or whatever.
01:07:59.220 Let me let me just say this.
01:08:01.180 I was extremely troubled by the Khashoggi incident because I had and I've written on
01:08:09.260 this just recently, I had multiple meetings with career intelligence officials about the
01:08:13.960 Khashoggi report and said, what can we release?
01:08:16.900 I'm the guy that loves transparency and was really pushing the envelope on all these issues.
01:08:21.640 And I would ask, what can we release to the public so that, you know, I sense that the
01:08:26.220 public didn't love what we had given them on the Khashoggi report.
01:08:30.100 They felt like we were holding things back.
01:08:32.640 And so I had a review and I didn't like the initial review.
01:08:36.140 So I asked for a second review and I said, I just I want to go back and I want to make
01:08:40.400 sure that a manager is looking at this to say, is there anything else that we can ask to
01:08:47.320 to declassify or share with the public on the Khashoggi incident and the killing and
01:08:52.720 everything that we know?
01:08:53.740 And the career intelligence officials said, no, there's nothing more because it will really
01:08:57.840 harm our national security if we do.
01:09:00.320 So I accepted that.
01:09:01.900 And then I see the Biden administration repackaged.
01:09:05.980 There's nothing new in that what they released on Khashoggi.
01:09:09.460 Nothing is new.
01:09:11.180 Glenn, what they did is they repackaged a hit on Saudi Arabia to make it good for the Iranians 1.00
01:09:20.960 because there are negotiations with the Iranians.
01:09:23.440 And so they thought and I'm sure that this was a request from the Europeans because they 0.95
01:09:27.480 always tell the Europeans constantly say to us, you know, you're you're too tough on
01:09:33.460 Iran and you're not tough enough on Saudi Arabia.
01:09:37.080 And for the Europeans, they just want to sell products inside of Iran.
01:09:40.780 They don't have the same threat level that we do.
01:09:43.180 They think, you know, that the Iranians are not going to pick on them. 1.00
01:09:48.080 And so we need to stand strong and convince the Europeans that they have an obligation to stand 0.51
01:09:54.080 with us as a Western alliance and not give in to this idea that we're going to repackage
01:10:00.840 intelligence just to do a hit on the Saudis.
01:10:04.500 Make no mistake.
01:10:05.220 The Saudi situation was very serious and we dealt with it in a very serious manner. 1.00
01:10:09.960 And the Saudi team knew exactly how we felt.
01:10:13.860 And there's a whole bunch that we did that we don't have to publicly announce because of
01:10:21.900 the very difficult policies that we are facing in that region.
01:10:24.860 I'm glad you were there during all of this.
01:10:29.600 You were a bright spot to at least me and everybody on the team that was really paying
01:10:36.240 attention to what was going on.
01:10:38.040 We always felt comfortable that you were someplace in the mix watching over things.
01:10:43.060 I appreciate your service and all the time.
01:10:46.260 And I do hope that we get a chance to come back and and just talk about you and the role
01:10:51.160 of faith in your life.
01:10:52.920 Let's do it.
01:10:53.580 Thank you so much, Rick.
01:11:00.300 Just a reminder, I'd love you to rate and subscribe to the podcast and pass this on to a friend
01:11:05.980 so it can be discovered by other people.
01:11:23.580 Thank you so much, guys.