The StoneZONE with Roger Stone - The Stone Zone ｜ 04-17-25

00:00:00.200 The Stone Zone, entertaining and informative on the Red Apple Podcast Network.

00:00:07.360 Welcome. You are entering the Stone Zone.

00:00:11.400 And with breaking news, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard,

00:00:17.360 along with Vice President J.D. Vance, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth,

00:00:23.000 and White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles worked together to persuade the president

00:00:29.400 to block a push for an attack on Iran that could have precipitated a new world war.

00:00:37.120 In a reported meeting only days ago concerning Israeli military plans,

00:00:43.960 Tulsi Gabbard, the former Democrat congresswoman turned Republican from Hawaii,

00:00:50.320 now the Director of National Intelligence, presented a new intelligence assessment

00:00:56.020 that said that the buildup of American weaponry could potentially spark a wider conflict with Iran

00:01:02.380 that the United States did not want.

00:01:05.680 A range of officials echoed Tulsi Gabbard's concerns in the various meetings,

00:01:10.140 including the first woman White House Chief of Staff, Susie Wiles,

00:01:14.260 the White House, pardon me, the Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth,

00:01:20.220 as well as Vice President J.D. Vance, all voiced their own doubts about the attack,

00:01:26.800 according to my sources.

00:01:29.300 In the aftermath of this meeting, President Donald Trump blocked a planned Israeli strike

00:01:35.080 on Iranian nuclear sites in favor of negotiating a deal with Iran to limit its nuclear program.

00:01:43.520 Actually, the New York Times confirmed this, citing administration officials and others.

00:01:49.320 Israel had developed plans to attack the sites as far back as may,

00:01:54.020 with the goal to set back Iran's capability to develop a nuclear weapon within a year or more.

00:02:01.580 U.S. assistance was sought not just to defend Israel from Iranian retaliation,

00:02:08.120 but also ensure that the attack was successful.

00:02:12.080 After months of internal debate, Trump made the decision, the right one in my opinion,

00:02:17.600 to seek negotiations with Iran rather than support this military action.

00:02:22.940 There are serious questions whether Israel has the technology or the military capability

00:02:28.080 to hit Iran other than nuclearly and would have required U.S. support in order to do so.

00:02:36.240 Now, assuming that all of my sources are accurate, and I believe they are,

00:02:40.580 Tulsi Gabbard, Pete Hegseth, Susie Wiles, and J.D. Vance worked closely together in a block

00:02:46.620 to push against immediate war with Iran,

00:02:50.120 and then they have completely vindicated the trust put in them by the New American people.

00:02:55.460 Would John Bolton or Mad Dog Mattis or even former Vice President Mike Pence

00:03:01.280 ever stop a war with Iran?

00:03:03.100 I doubt it.

00:03:04.420 It's clear that President Donald Trump has a worthy support staff in his new administration

00:03:09.600 and that he is the peacemaker that we elected him to be.

00:03:15.940 The fight continues over this illegal immigrant that Democrats want to return from El Salvador

00:03:24.320 to the United States.

00:03:26.640 There's a couple problems with this entire narrative.

00:03:30.540 First of all, the gentleman in question, Kilmar Abrego Garcia,

00:03:36.580 is not a U.S. citizen.

00:03:39.580 He's a citizen of El Salvador.

00:03:42.520 He is an MS-13 gang member deported to El Salvador that Democrats claim was deported by mistake.

00:03:52.460 He is suspected of engaging in human trafficking by the Tennessee Highway Patrol officer

00:03:58.300 who detained him back in December of 2022,

00:04:01.340 leading the Tennessee Highway Patrol to contact the FBI for guidance.

00:04:08.340 There are also serious and, I think, credible allegations that he is both a wife-beater

00:04:13.560 and a human trafficker.

00:04:16.820 The officer responsible for the stop in Tennessee immediately discovered that Garcia

00:04:21.660 was transporting seven passengers and was operating a vehicle without a valid driver's license.

00:04:28.340 He then began searching for information about Garcia.

00:04:33.160 Within two hours, Biden's FBI requested the Tennessee Highway Patrol release Garcia

00:04:39.640 and the passengers in his vehicle,

00:04:42.720 and they complied with that request from the Biden administration.

00:04:47.120 So it's amazing to me how Americans go to jail for driving without a license, 0.99

00:04:51.340 let alone with a car full of illegal immigrants, 1.00

00:04:55.020 but Garcia was set free to go on his way.

00:04:57.520 There it is, folks, the hallmark of the Biden administration.

00:05:02.280 Garcia has also been exposed, as I say, as a wife-beater. 1.00

00:05:06.320 The wife of this deported Salvadoran migrant, Albergo Garcia,

00:05:11.020 accused him of violently beating her several times in a 2021 court filing under oath.

00:05:18.620 In November of 2020, Albergo Garcia hit Jennifer Vasquez with his work boots. 0.81

00:05:26.300 That was in August of 22.

00:05:28.000 He hit her in the face again, causing her to get a black eye. 1.00

00:05:31.080 And in May of 2021, after an argument at a gas station,

00:05:34.580 the El Salvadorian illegal immigrant punched and scratched his wife,

00:05:39.320 leaving her bleeding, according to the court filings that I examined.

00:05:43.060 While Democrats are crying over this illegal immigrant that El Salvador has labeled a terrorist,

00:05:50.140 and they have imprisoned as soon as he was returned to his home country,

00:05:54.060 another illegal immigrant from El Salvador, Victor Martinez Hernandez,

00:05:58.860 was convicted of murder on Monday.

00:06:02.500 Martinez Hernandez murdered a woman named Rachel Morin,

00:06:06.080 a mother of five, on a hiking trail in Maryland in August of 2023.

00:06:12.460 Patty Morin, the mother of the late Rachel Morin,

00:06:16.260 slammed Democrat Senator Chris Van Hollen on Wednesday

00:06:20.160 for focusing on the deportation of a criminal migrant

00:06:23.200 instead of the brutal death of her daughter.

00:06:25.900 To have a senator from Maryland who didn't even acknowledge or barely acknowledge my daughter

00:06:32.320 and the brutal death that she endured,

00:06:34.560 leaving her five children without a mother and now a grandbaby without a grandmother,

00:06:39.380 so that he can use my taxpayer money to fly to El Salvador

00:06:43.420 to bring back someone who's not an American citizen and has no right to be here, 0.99

00:06:48.140 someone who is in fact an illegal, violent terrorist, it is outrageous.

00:06:55.520 Why does this person have more rights than I do, Patty Morin said.

00:06:59.640 That's my daughter or my grandchildren.

00:07:01.740 I don't understand any of this.

00:07:04.620 Meanwhile, Border Czar Tom Homan said on Tuesday

00:07:08.260 that criminal charges are coming for a sanctuary state and city leaders

00:07:12.880 that facilitate the illegal entry of and harboring of illegal aliens.

00:07:18.140 This is a message echoed by the new U.S. attorney in California.

00:07:23.460 President Trump has also signed an order authorizing the military

00:07:27.040 to take control of public lands along the border,

00:07:29.780 known as the Roosevelt Reservation, to secure our southern border.

00:07:34.240 This is a 60-foot-wide swath that stretches from California all the way to New Mexico,

00:07:39.460 initially set up by President Teddy Roosevelt in 1905,

00:07:43.800 designed to secure America's border.

00:07:46.080 It's taken over 100 years, but President Donald Trump is finally doing that.

00:07:51.080 Illegal border crossings down 93%.

00:07:55.180 Remember when Joe Biden told us he needed a new law in order to seal our border?

00:08:01.080 President Trump is demonstrating that there was no new law needed.

00:08:05.460 What we needed was the will, the courage to enforce the law.

00:08:10.800 That's exactly what Donald Trump is doing.

00:08:12.620 More good news, Donald Trump is set to cut funding to national public radio, Harvard,

00:08:19.980 some deep cuts into foreign aid, including cuts for the United Nations and for the NATO headquarters.

00:08:28.380 The Trump administration took its first steps Monday towards ending federal funding for national public radio,

00:08:35.420 also known as NPR, as well as public broadcast casting services, you know it as PBS,

00:08:42.880 informing key members of Congress that it's asking them to eliminate all such spending,

00:08:48.160 while also codifying foreign aid cuts identified by Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE.

00:08:57.560 In essence, NPR and the public broadcast system, these were not unbiased journalistic enterprises or news outlets.

00:09:06.300 These were the propaganda fronts for the extreme left and the Democrat Party.

00:09:12.900 Why should you and I subsidize this with our tax dollars?

00:09:17.340 These requests of Congress are contained in rescission plans that pitches a clawback of $1.1 billion already appropriated for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting

00:09:29.320 and another $8.3 billion from USAID.

00:09:35.080 Who would listen to either one of them when you could be listening to the Red Apple Audio Networks?

00:09:41.820 And nobody's giving us billions of dollars.

00:09:44.720 A memo drafted by the White House Budget Director, Russ Vaught, also requested by Congressional Republican leaders,

00:09:52.600 accuses the Corporation for Public Broadcasting of a lengthy history of anti-conservative bias

00:10:00.000 and cites the waste, fraud, and abuse at USAID.

00:10:06.080 Now, formal transmission of the plan after the Easter recess will start a 45-day clock for the House and the Senate

00:10:13.720 to adopt or reject this blueprint, which the White House believes will pass with the required simple majority in each chamber,

00:10:22.220 unlike President Trump's 2018 rescission plan, which failed in the Senate by a mere two votes. 0.89

00:10:29.480 The White House memo also notes that National Public Radio CEO Catherine Marr once called President Trump a fascist and a deranged racist.

00:10:41.140 Statements that Marr told Congress last night she regrets making. 0.58

00:10:45.000 Aw, that's too bad.

00:10:46.900 And she cites two recent PBS programs featuring transgendered characters.

00:10:53.020 Last month on Two Social, President Trump himself wrote,

00:10:57.260 National Public Radio and the public broadcast system,

00:11:00.400 two horrible and completely biased platforms should be defunded by Congress immediately.

00:11:06.100 Amen.

00:11:06.780 I agree.

00:11:07.520 Votes' list of waste he found as cuts to USAID include

00:11:13.180 $9.4 million for championing transformative changes in gender norms,

00:11:19.980 $3 million for Iraqi Sesame Street programming,

00:11:24.160 $1 million for voter ID in Haiti, where they have no election planned,

00:11:30.360 and $3 million for circumcisions, vasectomies, and condoms in Zambia.

00:11:38.380 I'm sure that's how you want your tax dollars spent.

00:11:40.800 The Trump administration all announced that it is freezing $2.2 billion in grants

00:11:46.100 and another $60 million in contracts to Harvard after the university said it would not comply

00:11:52.720 with the Trump administration's demands to dismantle diversity programs and to limit student protests.

00:12:00.360 I also saw that they gave $140 million to Brown University.

00:12:05.140 These are allegedly private educational institutions.

00:12:08.940 Why are they receiving our federal tax dollars?

00:12:12.760 Two weeks ago, the Department of Education and Health and Human Services,

00:12:17.180 along with the GSA, the General Services Administration,

00:12:20.820 launched a review of approximately $9 billion in federal funding provided to Harvard.

00:12:27.860 Days later, the administration sent the university an initial list of areas of reform

00:12:32.900 that the government views as necessary for Harvard University's continued financial relationship

00:12:39.200 with the United States government.

00:12:40.620 Those steps include elimination of these DEI programs,

00:12:46.420 a ban on face covering during protests,

00:12:49.600 and reforms to admissions and hiring systems that prioritize merit-based criteria over race

00:12:55.560 or gender-based preferences.

00:12:59.380 Pardon me.

00:13:02.320 The letter also urged the university to fully cooperate with federal agencies,

00:13:05.900 including the Department of Homeland Security,

00:13:09.060 to pursue structural reforms and leadership changes to ensure that there is long-term compliance.

00:13:16.680 Everybody knows that Harvard has lost its way,

00:13:19.260 President Trump said on TwoSocial.

00:13:21.940 They hired from New York and Chicago at ridiculously high salaries, 0.62

00:13:27.740 two of the worst, most incompetent mayors in the history of our country, 0.66

00:13:31.220 to teach municipal management and government. 0.99

00:13:34.920 These two radical left fools left behind two cities 1.00

00:13:38.500 that will take years to recover from their incompetence and evil. 1.00

00:13:43.340 Harvard has been hiring almost all woke, radical leftists, idiots, and bird brains, 1.00

00:13:48.800 who are only capable of teaching failure to students and so-called future leaders. 1.00

00:13:54.880 Look just to the recent past at their plagiarizing president at Harvard,

00:13:58.820 who greatly embarrassed that institution before the United States Congress.

00:14:03.060 When it's gotten so bad that they couldn't take it anymore, 0.99

00:14:06.300 they just moved this grossly inept and incompetent woman into another position, 1.00

00:14:11.240 teaching rather than firing her on the spot as they should have. 0.99

00:14:15.880 Since then, much has been found out about her,

00:14:18.100 but she remains in place, still drawing a big salary. 1.00

00:14:21.760 Many others, like these leftists, are teaching at Harvard,

00:14:25.420 and because of that, Harvard can no longer be considered

00:14:28.120 even a decent place of learning

00:14:29.820 and should not be considered on any list of the world's great universities.

00:14:35.400 If you're just tuning in, I'm Roger Stone,

00:14:38.180 and this is The Stone Zone,

00:14:39.840 and we'll be right back with The Stone Cold Truth.

00:14:43.360 The Stone Zone, on the Red Apple Podcast Network.

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00:15:00.380 What about thickeners and added sugars?

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00:15:20.940 The Stone Zone.

00:15:22.860 Entertaining and informative.

00:15:25.000 On the Red Apple Podcast Network.

00:15:27.860 There's a massive scandal here in the Sunshine State.

00:15:32.280 Governor Ron DeSantis and his wife, Casey DeSantis,

00:15:35.840 who's been quite open about the fact that she is thinking about running for governor

00:15:41.760 since her husband, Ron DeSantis, is term-limited by the state constitution,

00:15:46.940 and their newly appointed attorney general have been accused of illegally taking over $10 million

00:15:55.580 from Medicaid, money that was meant to pay for health care for the poor, the elderly, and the disabled,

00:16:04.600 and basically transferring it to a political slush fund,

00:16:09.760 where from there they transferred it into two campaigns against a proposition on the Florida ballot

00:16:18.960 that would have legalized marijuana. 1.00

00:16:22.180 Put aside where you stand on the question,

00:16:24.520 this is an illegal use of our Medicaid dollars.

00:16:29.900 I think it is a violation of the law for which somebody should be prosecuted.

00:16:34.900 Coming up next, the chairwoman of the Democrat Party of Florida, Nikki Freed, 0.98

00:16:40.840 joins me to break this all down in the Stone Zone.

00:16:44.820 This is, to us, a demonstration of the bipartisan nature of the Stone Zone.

00:16:50.420 We're going to break this entire scandal down to you, for you,

00:16:54.180 and figure out what comes next in this incredible, massive theft from the American people.

00:17:01.800 Whatever you do, don't touch that dial, because we'll be right back.

00:17:05.800 The Stone Zone.

00:17:07.640 On the Red Apple Podcast Network.

00:17:12.800 The Stone Zone.

00:17:14.220 Entertaining and informative.

00:17:16.360 On the Red Apple Podcast Network.

00:17:18.260 Welcome back.

00:17:20.480 You are entering, yet again, the Stone Zone.

00:17:23.360 Joining me now, Nikki Freed.

00:17:25.400 She is the chairwoman of the Florida Democrat Party,

00:17:28.820 a former Florida Agriculture Commissioner,

00:17:31.680 the only Democrat elected statewide in the Sunshine State from 2018 to 2022.

00:17:36.780 She's an attorney, a lifelong advocate for medical cannabis reform, consumer rights, and environmental protection.

00:17:46.160 People find this hard to believe.

00:17:47.900 She's also a longtime friend of mine, despite our energetic political disagreement.

00:17:53.080 And she's here to talk about what I think could be the greatest single corruption scandal in Florida history.

00:18:00.560 That is the scandal surrounding Governor Ron DeSantis, First Lady Casey DeSantis,

00:18:07.180 and our new temporary attorney general, Mr. James Uthmeyer.

00:18:12.980 Nikki, welcome into the Stone Zone.

00:18:15.860 Thanks, Roger, for having me today.

00:18:17.700 I think people are going to be surprised by our conversation.

00:18:20.860 Well, we agree on some things, and I think Governor DeSantis tends out to be one of them.

00:18:26.160 So let's try to recap this as best we can for our listeners.

00:18:29.920 It appears to me that Governor DeSantis and his wife, who aspires evidently to be governor,

00:18:38.000 diverted $10 million that should have been spent by Medicaid for health care for the elderly, the poor, and the disabled.

00:18:53.660 And they moved it first to a slush fund, a political slush fund, and from there into two campaigns to oppose a question on the ballot of constitutional amendment having to do with the legal status of cannabis.

00:19:11.040 Do I have that about right?

00:19:13.060 Yeah, that's about right.

00:19:14.400 You know, basically what happened, from my understanding, and again, as we're talking, Roger, this is all kind of coming out and subpoenas and questions to the governor's staff,

00:19:24.840 that there was, I guess, a lawsuit that had happened with one of the Medicaid providers.

00:19:29.360 And there was a settlement, a pre-lawsuit settlement that had happened where there was $67 million that was supposed to come back to the Medicaid program, to your point,

00:19:37.620 to go to, you know, children and families that are, you know, are really in need and help.

00:19:43.500 And they diverted $10 million of that to Casey's, I think they're calling it the Hope Foundation, with the lofty goal of taking people off of welfare.

00:19:55.060 But that's not what happened.

00:19:56.480 They took that money, and that was their slush fund, and they started to play around with it and to eventually get into some dark money PCs that James was overseeing on the direction of the governor.

00:20:06.620 And then that money was used to go after a legalization of cannabis.

00:20:11.500 It's really quite extraordinary, I guess, particularly because of the governor's reaction when members of his own party in the state legislature,

00:20:21.480 yesterday we had State Representative Andrade on, asking perfectly reasonable questions.

00:20:27.220 He seems to just go completely nuts, like the people of Florida have no right whatsoever to question him.

00:20:33.420 Yeah, like how dare us get to the bottom of the answers of why this nonprofit organization that was formed for Casey has never had a public meeting,

00:20:46.200 that the attorneys that represent this Hope Foundation and the same attorneys that are representing these PCs,

00:20:53.260 like why did all this happen, who is in charge of cutting these deals?

00:20:57.940 Those are pretty rational, transparent questions that, you know, I would think the governor should be okay if he has nothing to hide, being able to answer.

00:21:05.840 As far as I can see, based on my own research, the Hope Florida Foundation, this vehicle headed by Casey DeSantis,

00:21:13.800 hasn't fired the required audits, their tax returns, or any of the legally required ethics disclosures under Florida law.

00:21:23.440 It's almost as if Ron and Casey DeSantis think the law does not apply to them.

00:21:29.260 Yeah, that's right.

00:21:30.220 And even on a nonprofit, they didn't register at the Department of Agriculture, which we have to do, too, if you're a nonprofit organization in Florida.

00:21:37.780 They didn't do any of their IRS tax forms.

00:21:39.800 And this is something else that Representative Andrade was asking questions on.

00:21:43.120 Where are your tax forms?

00:21:44.260 Where is your information?

00:21:46.020 Every question that was being asked of the director, who, again, resigned after this testimony in the Florida House this week,

00:21:52.940 kept saying, well, at advice of counsel, advice of counsel, the same attorney that was representing, again, these PCs.

00:22:00.480 But, yeah, it looked like it was a flush fund.

00:22:02.360 And, unfortunately, he's been getting away with this kind of stuff for six years.

00:22:05.760 I've been, you know, bringing to light all of this corruption that Ron and Casey and his executive office has been doing for six years.

00:22:14.160 And it's good to see that the Republican legislature, specifically in the Florida House, is finally understanding that we all need to be, this is not partisan, you know, uncovering corruption

00:22:24.920 and making sure that we're holding our elected officials to some type of standards and no one's above the law.

00:22:30.860 You know, one of the things that I dislike the most about this administration is the way they have gutted the state's sunshine laws.

00:22:36.900 In Florida, it used to be capable of any Florida taxpayer could learn essentially anything about any public meeting or any public process or any expenditure of your tax dollars.

00:22:50.660 Now, unfortunately, it's almost completely opaque.

00:22:54.360 So, for example, you not only can't find out where the governor's going to take the state airplane, they argue that's a security issue, perhaps,

00:23:03.480 but you can't even find out where the state airplane has been.

00:23:06.540 And I don't see a security issue there.

00:23:08.700 What I see is potentially in the past the use of the state plane for political purposes.

00:23:14.600 And then Mr. Uthmeyer was actually raising money from the executive office of the governor.

00:23:21.840 That's against the law.

00:23:23.100 And using the governor's mansion for political fundraisers for the governor's presidential campaign. 0.78

00:23:28.000 That's also against the law.

00:23:30.820 These people really kind of have – and I'm a Republican, but these people have no shame.

00:23:35.140 No shame.

00:23:35.960 And I'll go even further than that, Roger.

00:23:38.200 It's not even just the manifest of where the plane has gone and where it's going, but who's on it.

00:23:44.580 You know, those are even more telling of where – you know, what conversations are happening not in the sunshine.

00:23:50.120 I know that over the course of the last six years, I mean, the taxpayers have spent so much money defending the governor when it comes to not fulfilling public records requests.

00:24:00.660 Everything has been taken out of the sunshine.

00:24:02.400 And going even to those dollars that have been raised, for anybody who doesn't remember, during this time period when he was between legislative session as well as before signing of the budget and signing of any of those bills,

00:24:18.400 James and other key leadership inside the governor's office were making phone calls to state representatives and lobbyists holding over their heads the budget and these bills to get endorsements for his presidential run,

00:24:32.880 and get money into the coffers for that presidential run. 0.78

00:24:35.960 I, in fact, as chair of the party, filed ethics complaints that year to kind of bring to light some of this.

00:24:43.440 And, of course, the ethics commission, which half of it is appointed by DeSantis, you know, just brushed it off because no one wanted to publicly come out and verify that that, in fact, had happened.

00:24:53.380 And we filed three criminal complaints last year, too.

00:24:56.460 We have three criminal complaints pending in three of our counties when James took six of the agencies that they oversee and also funneled money to take down legalization of cannabis.

00:25:08.500 The other thing they got away with that truly shocked me was to raise, I think it was $85 million more than they needed for his reelection as governor,

00:25:19.280 which was in a state PAC, which was in a state PAC, and then transfer that money to a federal PAC.

00:25:26.260 Now, there used to be a line on the Secretary of State's website that said that that was illegal, but that that wording suddenly disappeared.

00:25:35.220 Like, overnight, it was gone.

00:25:37.400 The Trump campaign, as I recall, filed a complaint with the Federal Election Commission about this illegal action.

00:25:43.300 By the way, a number of individuals who donated to Governor DeSantis against Donald Trump but didn't want to own up to it,

00:25:51.560 they basically laundered their contribution in this way so they could see the president and say to him with a straight face,

00:25:57.440 oh, I didn't give money to Ron DeSantis for president.

00:25:59.920 No, they gave it to Ron DeSantis for governor, and he just transferred the money over.

00:26:04.120 By the way, we would never have gotten away with that.

00:26:06.780 Neither you nor I.

00:26:08.260 Exactly, but he got away with it.

00:26:11.560 I guess because the FEC ties three to three on any question put before it,

00:26:18.000 and therefore you could never get any satisfaction there.

00:26:21.780 I do think it was really something when the governor essentially threw his wife over the side and said,

00:26:29.020 in this rambling diatribe in which he attacked everybody, the media, the Democrats, the Republicans,

00:26:35.240 you know, as if no one has the right to question him.

00:26:39.180 But he then basically said, look, it was her thing.

00:26:42.220 You know, I had no ownership of it.

00:26:43.780 I didn't devise it.

00:26:45.040 I didn't set the vision.

00:26:46.560 I didn't execute it.

00:26:47.720 As if it's like, hey, it's not me.

00:26:50.420 Ask my wife. 0.99

00:26:51.340 I'm going to go play golf.

00:26:52.240 Yeah, I mean, he does that on everything.

00:26:55.720 You know, whatever happened to the buck stops here, you know, in politics and in business,

00:27:01.020 that at the end of the day, as a leader, regardless of who does what underneath you,

00:27:05.300 you take ownership.

00:27:05.960 They're your people, and this is his life.

00:27:08.520 It's the fact that he has never owned up to any of these things

00:27:11.460 and always pushes on to somebody else and blames somebody else for it,

00:27:15.280 takes no responsibility for his actions.

00:27:17.840 And again, it's good that everybody else is starting to see it unfolding in front of our eyes

00:27:22.320 about the corruption and nepotism that has happened under DeSantis.

00:27:26.700 And it's good to see, finally, that the public is seeing this firsthand.

00:27:30.840 I mean, I think people need to drop back and see the broader question.

00:27:33.600 When I criticize the governor in colorful language on social media, his flying monkeys,

00:27:43.640 this little band of flying monkeys that he has online immediately attacked you.

00:27:49.260 But the facts are the facts.

00:27:51.100 Since Ron DeSantis took office, homeowner insurance premiums have tripled,

00:27:55.220 averaging $6,000 a year in Florida, the highest in the nation.

00:27:58.340 His reforms handed insurers $2 billion in taxpayer-funded bailouts

00:28:03.920 while letting them dodge lawsuits,

00:28:06.300 which leaves the average Floridian with zoaring rates and no recourse

00:28:10.080 when the company denies your hurricane claim.

00:28:13.480 He also greenlit utility rate hikes with Florida Power and Light

00:28:18.380 after they gave him $9.5 million directly and through their subsidiaries

00:28:22.760 for his presidential campaign,

00:28:24.720 jacking up our utility bills in Florida by 20%

00:28:27.980 since 2020.

00:28:29.240 It's the highest single increase in Florida history.

00:28:32.660 Of course, his public service commission,

00:28:35.160 stacked with DeSantis lawyers, DeSantoids, we call them, 1.00

00:28:39.080 rubber-stamped these increases,

00:28:41.720 hitting working families very hard while he ignores our pain.

00:28:45.920 Meanwhile, try buying or renting a house in Florida.

00:28:49.420 Medium home prices jumped 65% under Ron DeSantis

00:28:52.740 from an average of $254,000 in 2018 to $420,000 in 2024.

00:29:01.860 On the whole issue of housing,

00:29:03.640 his inaction when it comes to affordability

00:29:06.480 and his very cozy ties with developers,

00:29:09.600 prioritize profits over people.

00:29:12.300 They're pricing retirees and young people like my own daughter 0.86

00:29:15.560 who's trying to find someplace to live right now

00:29:17.400 completely out of the housing market.

00:29:20.960 So I always find that online,

00:29:23.420 the people who tell me he's the best governor in the country,

00:29:26.560 they never live in Florida.

00:29:28.080 They live someplace else.

00:29:30.420 Yeah, and I mean, I'm hearing it,

00:29:32.140 and I'm going to even go one step further,

00:29:34.260 that the property insurance in some areas in our state

00:29:37.080 has actually increased 405%.

00:29:39.680 People are, especially people that have come down here

00:29:42.840 and retired and even bought out their house

00:29:45.780 or have a small mortgage,

00:29:47.680 they can't afford the property insurance,

00:29:49.280 and it's just going to get worse

00:29:50.640 because they have had blank checks over to insurance companies.

00:29:54.700 And I always ask this question.

00:29:56.060 It's like, okay, so you pass all these reforms,

00:29:58.660 allegedly, in the last couple of years to reduce costs.

00:30:02.080 Roger, you've been involved in this a lot longer than I have.

00:30:04.280 I have never seen a time when an insurance company

00:30:07.000 or a corporation says, you know what,

00:30:08.580 I made too much money this year.

00:30:10.340 I'm going to cut my rates for next year.

00:30:12.480 That just doesn't happen.

00:30:13.920 And so there was no carrot and stick.

00:30:16.800 There was no, hey, when you finally get back to parity,

00:30:20.180 if in fact there were some losses along the way,

00:30:22.900 then at that point we'll start seeing reductions in costs

00:30:25.600 and you have to do this.

00:30:26.840 That didn't happen.

00:30:27.600 And so now the insurance companies continue to get away with it.

00:30:30.000 There's no recourse, as you just said.

00:30:32.200 Our condo market in South Florida

00:30:34.920 is about to completely crumble and put us into a crisis.

00:30:39.520 And we've got a lot of problems.

00:30:41.220 And don't forget the other thing that happened.

00:30:42.900 You know, as somebody who spends a lot of time in Key West,

00:30:46.360 the people of Key West voted to not have those cruise ships,

00:30:50.080 the big cruise ships that are destroying the environment down there

00:30:54.040 and are costing a lot of extra dollars for the local government.

00:30:57.560 And because he got a million-dollar campaign contribution

00:30:59.920 from the guys who are of the lease of that port,

00:31:03.640 they had a piece of legislation the last couple of years

00:31:06.080 that overrode that local bill.

00:31:09.060 Just a corruption on every single corner to get into bed

00:31:12.440 with the developers and the big-ticket item donors

00:31:15.780 and all at the expense of the people that live here in our state.

00:31:20.200 Yeah, for those who keep telling me what a great conservative Ron is,

00:31:24.240 the truth is he raised taxes in the state of Florida

00:31:27.180 by $1.5 billion since 2019,

00:31:30.900 including higher vehicle registrations, online sales tax,

00:31:35.800 really hitting small businesses and families.

00:31:38.300 He says there are no new taxes in his records,

00:31:40.760 but people who live here really feel the pinch

00:31:43.380 while he takes credit for tax cuts.

00:31:46.100 And then, of course, there's his so-called signature issue.

00:31:49.640 He brags about Florida's freedom during the COVID pandemic,

00:31:53.040 but he quietly signed laws shielding these big pharmaceutical outfits

00:31:58.960 from vaccine lawsuits.

00:32:01.080 So his tough talk hit a sellout once more to corporate interests,

00:32:05.420 betraying the people who trusted him to fight the system.

00:32:08.960 If you're just tuning in, this is The Stone Zone.

00:32:11.500 I'm talking to Nikki Freed.

00:32:12.920 She's the chairwoman of the Florida Democrat Party,

00:32:16.360 and we'll be right back with more.

00:32:19.020 So whatever you do, don't touch that dial.

00:32:21.860 The Stone Zone on the Red Apple Podcast Network.

00:32:28.860 At Desjardins, we speak business.

00:32:31.780 We speak startup funding and comprehensive game plans.

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00:32:53.520 We'd love to talk business.

00:32:58.600 The Stone Zone.

00:33:00.520 Entertaining and informative.

00:33:02.680 On the Red Apple Podcast Network.

00:33:05.300 Welcome back.

00:33:06.600 We're in The Stone Zone.

00:33:07.820 We're talking to Nikki Freed.

00:33:09.620 She is the chairwoman of the Florida Democrat Party.

00:33:12.580 She is the last, I think, statewide elected Democrat,

00:33:16.940 serving as Florida Commissioner of Agriculture,

00:33:19.640 the only Democrat elected statewide from 2018 to 2022.

00:33:24.460 She is a tough political operator who fights hard for her party

00:33:28.980 and her point of view.

00:33:30.000 She's also an attorney and a longtime advocate for medicinal cannabis reform.

00:33:37.600 We're very happy to have her on today's show.

00:33:39.860 Let's talk some politics.

00:33:41.480 Nikki, Congressman Byron Donalds of the Naples area

00:33:45.740 has announced his candidacy for governor.

00:33:48.520 He's already been warmly endorsed by the leader of our party,

00:33:52.260 President Donald Trump.

00:33:53.300 I've said for roughly two and a half years that Casey DeSantis would run for governor. 0.99

00:34:00.040 People have laughed at me.

00:34:01.240 Those are the same people who laughed at me when I said that Ron DeSantis would

00:34:04.300 challenge the man who made him governor.

00:34:07.940 Remember, he was an indistinguished congressman with a bad suit and an even worse haircut,

00:34:13.980 running at about 8% in the polls.

00:34:16.000 When he was lifted out of obscurity with the endorsement of Donald Trump,

00:34:22.120 soared to an easy victory in the Republican primary over the agriculture commissioner, Adam Putnam.

00:34:28.220 But then in the last three weeks of that campaign,

00:34:31.600 President Trump had to change his schedule three times to return to Florida,

00:34:35.160 literally drag Ron DeSantis over the finish line by a mere 25,000 votes

00:34:40.140 out of 8 million plus cast.

00:34:43.060 So my question for you, just looking ahead,

00:34:47.520 what does the Democrat field look like in the next gubernatorial campaign?

00:34:53.580 You know, we certainly are looking through some of the candidates that have kind of popped up.

00:34:58.540 You know, I'm hearing the rumblings that we've got David Jolly,

00:35:02.520 who used to be a member of the Republican Party in Congress and CD13,

00:35:08.040 who has been an independent for the last five to ten years.

00:35:11.380 I'm not sure on the exact timing.

00:35:13.820 Hearing rumblings that he is going to be declaring sometime in the near future.

00:35:18.360 There's other people that are kind of in the mix.

00:35:20.220 But, you know, we are spending a lot of time here as chair of the party,

00:35:24.140 making sure that we are getting back to the basics and talking to donors

00:35:27.720 and talking to our voters and making sure that our message right.

00:35:30.940 You know, I think that one of the things that I know we've got obviously different party affiliations here,

00:35:35.560 but I think that what we have seen is when you have just complete domination from one party,

00:35:40.660 and it could be Democrat or Republican, government doesn't work. 0.86

00:35:43.420 There's no checks and balances.

00:35:44.940 That's always been my motto is to make sure that we get those checks and balances

00:35:48.900 and get, you know, some good leaders on both sides to be able to work together

00:35:53.220 to get some good legislation that affects and impacts everybody.

00:35:57.340 The legislature is asking legitimate questions of a Republican governor.

00:36:00.400 And I applaud the speaker, Danny Perez, as well as Representative Andrade,

00:36:06.700 for asking the tough questions.

00:36:10.080 To the extent that we have checks and balances, there it is.

00:36:13.460 Maybe it's because of the governor's epic abuse of the legislature when he was riding high.

00:36:18.860 I also am of the opinion, some of my Republican friends may not like this,

00:36:22.500 but I still think this is a purple state.

00:36:25.260 I don't, yes, I recognize that DeSantis won big,

00:36:29.100 but that, I think the hurricane had a lot to do with that.

00:36:32.100 Would he have won?

00:36:33.060 I believe he would have won, but I don't think he would have won by the kind of margin that he won.

00:36:36.860 He dominated all free media for the last three weeks of that campaign.

00:36:40.820 Of course, President Trump won in an epic comeback bid,

00:36:44.120 but anyone who thinks that Florida is no longer a competitive state,

00:36:47.740 I happen to think they are incorrect.

00:36:50.540 I think it's a question of the candidates.

00:36:54.000 And who knows what the atmosphere will be, you know, two years from now.

00:36:58.560 I personally am for Byron Donaldson.

00:37:00.480 I like him a lot, have a huge amount of confidence in him.

00:37:02.920 I think he'll be a great governor.

00:37:04.420 I want to see a spirited contest.

00:37:06.300 I want to see the Democrats nominate someone a little more, you know, to the center.

00:37:10.020 But, you know, I won't be voting the Democrat primary, so it's not up to me.

00:37:15.720 Anyway, this has been a great exchange.

00:37:17.580 I want to thank my guest, Nikki Freed.

00:37:19.640 She's the chairwoman of the Florida Democrat Party.

00:37:22.700 She's an accomplished attorney, the last statewide elected Democrat in the Florida,

00:37:29.840 and a real fighter for everything she believes in.

00:37:32.880 Thank you so much for joining us today in the Stone Zone.

00:37:35.640 And God bless you, and Godspeed.

00:37:37.700 Thanks for listening to The Stone Zone with Roger Stone.

00:37:44.340 You can hear The Stone Zone with Roger Stone weeknights at 8 on 77 WABC.

00:37:50.280 If you like the podcast, share it with your friends and listen anytime at wabcradio.com

00:37:56.500 and download the WABC Radio app.

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00:38:08.380 See you next time for a new episode so you never have to wonder.

00:38:12.060 What the heck is going on here?

00:38:14.060 What the heck is going on here?

The StoneZONE with Roger Stone - April 18, 2025

The Stone Zone ｜ 04-17-25

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