The StoneZONE with Roger Stone - The Stone Zone ｜ 05-30-25

00:00:00.000 The Stone Zone, on the Red Apple Podcast Network.

00:00:06.120 Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell refuses to cut interest rates despite the fact that

00:00:14.020 inflation is historically low. He says he's waiting for new data. We'll talk about that

00:00:21.140 in a minute. The President, unfortunately, does not have the authority to fire a Federal

00:00:26.320 Reserve Chairman. He can appoint a new chairman, which he will do next year. But he could, of

00:00:33.280 course, support a move in Congress to repeal the Federal Reserve Act. Perhaps it's time to shut

00:00:41.100 this bank down because they are trying to slow down the coming Trump boom. We've already seen the

00:00:48.860 drop in energy prices, the drop in interest rates, the drop in food prices. We've also seen the

00:00:56.300 surge in revenues from Trump's new tariff policy as much as $225 billion has poured into the country

00:01:06.860 with far more expected. In the meantime, President Trump has made a monumental announcement concerning

00:01:12.780 the Federal National Mortgage Association, commonly known as Fannie Mae, and the Federal

00:01:18.820 Home Loan Mortgage Corporation, informally known as Freddie Mac. This could not only bring the American

00:01:26.700 taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars, but it could also help lower interest rates and make housing

00:01:35.640 more affordable. What we need in this country are homes, affordable homes, Trump homes, if you will.

00:01:42.820 On True Social, President Trump wrote, our great mortgage agencies, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, provide a

00:01:49.560 vital service to our nation by helping hardworking Americans reach the American dream, home ownership. I am working

00:01:57.820 to make these amazing companies public. I will stay strong in my position on seeing them as president. These agencies are

00:02:07.660 doing a very good job. They're doing very well, and they will help us make America great again. In another post, the

00:02:14.660 president said, I'm giving various serious consideration to bringing Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac public. I'll be speaking to

00:02:21.820 Treasury Secretary Scott Besson, among the president's very best appointees, Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick, and the

00:02:30.580 director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, William Pulte, among others. And we're making a decision in the very near future.

00:02:37.860 Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are doing very well, throwing off a lot of cash, and the time would seem to be right. Now, it's very

00:02:45.740 important to recognize that the president also said that he would, let me use his exact words, our great

00:02:53.460 mortgage agencies, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, provide a vital service to our nation by helping hardworking

00:02:59.700 Americans reach the American dream of home ownership. I'm working on taking these amazing companies public,

00:03:05.660 but, and this is the key, I want to make clear that the U.S. government will continue its complicit

00:03:11.460 guarantees of all the mortgages, and I will stay strong in my position on seeing that that happens

00:03:16.960 as president. These agencies are doing very well, can help us make America great again. What this guarantees

00:03:23.860 is that the housing bond market will be unaffected by an effort to take them public. The president's ready

00:03:34.100 to make these major reforms, it seems to me. The breakaway establishment beltway politicians who have

00:03:41.220 maintained federal conservatorship of the two companies are going out of their minds. Trump is arguing that now

00:03:48.180 would be the time for the U.S. to monetize the companies for taxpayers and take both companies

00:03:53.420 public. It is important to note his guarantee. So it's interesting, Jim Parrott, owner of the housing

00:04:01.460 finance consultancy Parrott-Ryan Advisors and a former economic advisor, President Barack Obama,

00:04:07.700 said these comments represent a sea change in Republican thinking on Fannie and Freddie. These comments put on the

00:04:15.140 table for the first time in recent memory the possibility the government may retain control of

00:04:19.700 Fannie and Freddie, maybe permanently, and use their revenues to pay for other policy needs. Fannie Mae, 0.75

00:04:26.820 by the way, earned $17 billion in net income in 2024, while Freddie Mac netted $11.9 billion in profits.

00:04:36.820 If the government simply funneled these funds to Treasury, as it did from 2012 to 2019, these revenues

00:04:43.380 projected forward could yield $289 billion over the next 10 years. This is money that could be applied

00:04:51.620 to paying down our enormous deficit, which is, of course, unsustainable. Here is Bill Pote talking

00:05:00.660 about his prescription. This Biden inflation that we had the last four years, which created this housing

00:05:06.340 crisis. Now President Trump is coming in and fixing it, and he's turning around Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

00:05:11.540 You know, Bill, I don't know if you know this, and most Americans don't know this, but there's $7.8

00:05:15.780 trillion in Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac that we, as the American taxpayers, have many rights to.

00:05:22.340 $7.8 trillion. And until President Trump showed up on the scene, nobody even really knew that they

00:05:27.780 were making this much money and that we had these as huge assets. So, like one of my friends said

00:05:33.620 recently, President Trump just finds money everywhere. And he found money at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac,

00:05:38.100 and we're going to use it for the benefit of the American people. Okay, so Bill, I heard that same

00:05:41.940 comment on another network from you yesterday. You said this is a business that could be worth

00:05:46.340 trillions of dollars. Trillions to whom? Trillions to the American people, trillions to the shareholders.

00:05:53.540 One day. I mean, you know, we've got to clean up the capital structure, and that's potentially

00:05:57.140 what the president is looking at. He will still be in control. It will still be a very,

00:06:02.420 very prominent company for the government. However, we are really focused on driving

00:06:06.660 operational improvements and really making these great American icons once again.

00:06:11.460 And Bill, the American economy is very robust. And under President Trump's leadership,

00:06:15.620 these two companies, I stand behind it, they're going to make over $30 billion a year in earnings.

00:06:21.220 I think that number will eventually be over $50 billion. These are huge assets, Bill,

00:06:25.540 and it's about time we have a president who actually knows that they are there.

00:06:28.420 Bill Pulte, the president's courageous director of the Federal Home Finance Agency. He's the same

00:06:37.380 man who sent a criminal referral regarding the serial mortgage fraud by New York Attorney General

00:06:44.420 Letitia James to the US Justice Department, has also called on the Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell

00:06:52.020 to lower interest rates. Let's listen to Bill Pulte once again.

00:06:55.300 From where you sit, what is the most convincing argument for the Fed to cut rates at a time

00:07:01.620 when the White House's tariffs threaten to reignite inflation?

00:07:05.780 Well, first and foremost, inflation is lower than it was the last time they cut. President Trump has

00:07:11.300 been very successful at reducing inflation. And so, therefore, it just only makes sense that if

00:07:16.980 inflation was higher and they did cuts then, why can't they do cuts now? But to your point,

00:07:21.540 for the last four years, at least as it pertains to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, inflation has been

00:07:25.860 totally out of control. Mortgage rates skyrocketed. And frankly, people are trapped in their homes with

00:07:31.220 these low interest rates. We need to get interest rates down. And President Trump, I believe,

00:07:35.460 deserves that because he's crushed this Biden inflation. President Trump and Treasury Secretary

00:07:41.780 Scott Besson have also called on Chairman Powell to lower rates. The chairman is demuring,

00:07:48.340 saying he doesn't have enough data. Well, a few thoughts on Jerome Powell. First of all,

00:07:53.620 he's not a lawyer. He's a lawyer. He's not a trained economist. He always says that he's data

00:07:58.660 dependent, but the data he's looking at is old and significantly lags what's actually going on in

00:08:04.020 the marketplace. This would be analogous to driving a car down the highway, but looking in the rearview

00:08:08.740 mirror. It's dangerous. And that's why we have these boom and bust cycles. The next Fed chair,

00:08:15.380 the president points, who I hope will be much better, will understand this. It is actually

00:08:21.300 Powell who is being political. He, of course, says the president, in demanding an interest rate cut

00:08:27.700 because inflation is historically low, is the one being political. The Fed has become like a bunch of

00:08:34.740 lemmings. If they disagree, they get ostracized. This does not allow for open debate and true thinking. 0.90

00:08:41.860 Perhaps this is because the Fed has become a collection of neo-Keynesian economists with no

00:08:47.140 opposing views. Contrast this, for example, with the United Kingdom, whose central bank often has votes

00:08:53.540 that are 5-4 instead of unanimous. The Fed has a habit of cherry-picking economic reports. For example,

00:09:02.180 the gross domestic product showed a negative reading in Q1 in the first quarter, but the Fed disregarded it

00:09:09.780 because the import calculation was quite high, which distracts from the gross domestic product since

00:09:16.420 it was front-running the tariffs, you see. However, the Fed forgot the offset of interventories that were

00:09:23.620 built from the increased imports, which adds to GDP. So you see how they are manipulating the data.

00:09:30.500 The job numbers look good on the headline, but there is significant underlying weaknesses. The Fed

00:09:39.460 either does not understand it or refuses to accept it as they continually ignore the current solid

00:09:48.260 labor market. The job gains are coming from overstatements in the birth-death ratio and have been

00:09:54.180 consistently revised lower to the tune of 50% of the original reported headlines. This was done to

00:10:00.180 benefit Joe Biden's re-election. They would announce enormous job gains and then get huge headlines.

00:10:08.260 And then weeks later, they would quietly restate their findings and they would move all those numbers

00:10:14.420 down. Job openings have actually been plummeting and unemployment duration periods have been rising

00:10:20.020 significantly. I'm concerned the labor market will continue to weaken and the unemployment rate could

00:10:26.020 approach 5% if Jerome Powell does not cut rates. Powell is obsessed with 2% as his inflation target. After

00:10:35.300 all, they did such a horrific job of allowing inflation to rise over 9% that now suddenly they've gotten

00:10:42.580 religion on this topic. But the reason inflation rose to 9% was because the Fed was once again looking

00:10:49.460 through the rear-view mirror. They kept the quarters and zero interest rate policy for too long, which was

00:10:56.340 like pouring gasoline on Biden's profligate spending because they had covered due to the inflation readings,

00:11:02.900 which were still printing low numbers because, again, the lag in what is really happening in the marketplace.

00:11:10.180 The forward-looking data shows inflation was about to explode, yet the Fed refused to look ahead and made

00:11:16.340 terrible decisions by relying on the faulty lagging data. This is the mistake they made under Joe Biden.

00:11:23.060 It's not a mistake we want them to make under President Donald Trump.

00:11:27.300 The main culprit in this lag is the shelter component. That's housing. This is the largest

00:11:33.380 weighting in both in terms of the PCE and CPI inflation reports. In fact, it makes up over 44%

00:11:40.820 of the core CPI. The reason why shelter lags is because of the way it is calculated by the Bureau

00:11:48.980 of Labor Statistics. They divide the country into six parts and only look at the areas every six months,

00:11:55.380 which clearly creates the lag I've been talking about. Additionally, they're asking what the current

00:12:01.380 rent payment, which could be reflective of a lease that was signed months earlier. This creates

00:12:07.060 approximately a one-year lag when you look at shelter, housing, the most influential component

00:12:13.380 within the inflation reports. The Fed is making the same mistake again. What the housing market needs

00:12:20.980 is consistency and predictability. They need to know what interest rates are going to be. Chairman Pulte

00:12:28.820 and Secretary of Treasury Besson are absolutely right, as is the President. The time to cut rates is now. If,

00:12:38.580 however, the Chairman refuses to cut rates, there is no way around this. The President does not have the

00:12:46.180 constitutional authority to fire the Fed Chairman. Perhaps Congressman Ron Paul was right all along.

00:12:53.140 Perhaps it's time for the Congress to repeal the Federal Reserve Act. Remember when they told us they

00:12:59.780 were going to look at our gold that was held by the Federal Reserve and by the Federal Reserve in New

00:13:05.300 York and in Fort Knox? Whatever happened to that? How come nobody has seen the gold since 1974? Where is

00:13:13.620 the gold, I ask? We'll find out. Thanks for joining us here in the Stone Zone. Whatever you do,

00:13:19.860 don't touch that dial because we'll be right back with the latest in American politics, the news,

00:13:26.740 and well, some surprises. Gordon Chang is going to join us because the Chinese did exactly what he 1.00

00:13:33.460 predicted they would do on this show only about a week ago. They have double-crossed President Donald

00:13:38.820 Trump. The Stone Zone on the Red Apple Podcast Network.

00:13:45.700 If you're looking to create, grow, and sustain your wealth, download and subscribe to the Pain

00:13:54.340 Points of Wealth Podcast at BeBullish.com with Bob, Ryan, and Chris Payne. It's your podcast for market

00:14:01.300 insights, money tips, and real talk on the economy. Download and subscribe at BeBullish.com.

00:14:08.820 To me, Elon Musk is a hero. See, the left loved Elon Musk and they loved electric cars until he bought

00:14:24.580 Twitter and canceled their censorship policies and made it a free speech platform. I had 980,000

00:14:32.980 followers when I was banned for life in 2017. My crime, the rule I violated, supporting Donald Trump

00:14:42.020 for president. Suddenly, Elon Musk found himself the target of nine different federal investigations into

00:14:51.060 his various businesses. I think he woke up to the fact that they would target anyone who stood up for

00:14:57.140 free speech. He now has done an incredible job at his DOES, the Department of Government Efficiency,

00:15:04.340 uncovering not millions, not billions, but trillions of dollars in waste, fraud, and corruption.

00:15:12.020 Whether the Congress has the guts to follow through, Elon Musk is a hero, but he's right about one thing.

00:15:18.820 The president honored him in the ceremony in the Oval Office, and Musk took direct aim at the New York

00:15:25.780 Times. Let's listen to Elon Musk. You know, some of the media organizations in this room were the

00:15:32.180 Slingers. There is a New York Times report today that accuses you of blurring the line between...

00:15:39.860 Is the New York Times, is that the same publication that got a Pulitzer Prize for false reporting on

00:15:47.700 the Russiagate? Is it the same organization? I think it is. I think it is. I think the

00:15:56.260 judges ruled against the New York Times for their lies about the Russiagate hoax, and that they might

00:16:02.180 have to give back that Pulitzer Prize. That New York Times? Let's move on. Elon is exactly right. I had the

00:16:09.620 same exact experience with the New York Times when they covered the Soviet-style witch hunt that my

00:16:15.380 family and I were subjected to. This is one where we only learned after I was pardoned that the judge

00:16:22.260 withheld exculpatory evidence to prove that I had no knowledge of Russian collusion, WikiLeaks

00:16:27.540 collaboration, or any other crime. Now, I was prosecuted because I refused to offer false testimony

00:16:33.460 against President Donald Trump. And when BuzzFeed sued the U.S. Justice Department to get Robert

00:16:42.180 Mueller's full and complete final report unredacted and published and a federal judge ordered it,

00:16:50.340 we saw the graphic admission that Mueller had found no evidence of Russian collusion, WikiLeaks

00:16:56.740 collaboration, or any other crime against me. This information had been withheld from my defense

00:17:02.180 lawyers. Look it up in the New York Times, however. It was on November 3rd, 2020, at midnight, that the

00:17:09.300 Justice Department released this shocking admission that Roger Stone did nothing wrong, but the New York

00:17:15.620 Times never reported it. Don't go away. We'll be back with old China hand Gordon Chang, who's going to tell 0.99

00:17:22.660 us why he was accurate last week when he told us on the show that the Chinese would make a tariff

00:17:29.060 deal with President Donald Trump that they almost immediately would violate.

00:17:34.980 The Stone Zone. On the Red Apple Podcast Network.

00:17:46.980 The Stone Zone. On the Red Apple Podcast Network.

00:17:52.660 And we're back in the Stone Zone. Joining me now is old China hand Gordon G. Chang. Gordon Chang has

00:18:01.620 lived and worked in Shanghai and Hong Kong for almost two decades. He is a columnist, has written for

00:18:07.940 Newsweek, The Hill, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, National Review, Barron's, and elsewhere.

00:18:16.100 His most recent book, Plan Red, China's Project to Destroy America, now available on Amazon.

00:18:22.660 It's must reading. I highly recommend you. Gordon, welcome back into the Stone Zone. It was right

00:18:28.660 here on this show only days ago that you predicted that China would reach a tariff agreement with the

00:18:36.900 United States, but you also predicted that they would violate that agreement. And now, just as you

00:18:43.140 predicted, that is exactly what has happened. President Donald Trump on True Social said two weeks ago,

00:18:49.620 China was in grave economic danger. The very high tariffs I set made it virtually impossible for

00:18:56.180 China to trade into the United States marketplace, which is by far number one in the world. We went,

00:19:03.300 in effect, cold turkey with China, and it was devastating for them. Many factories closed,

00:19:09.060 and there was, to put it mildly, civil unrest. I saw what was happening. I didn't like it for them,

00:19:14.820 nor for us. I made a fast deal with China in order to save them from what I thought was going to be a 0.99

00:19:21.300 very bad situation, and I did not want to see that happen. Because of this deal, everything quickly

00:19:26.980 stabilized, and China got back to business as usual. Everybody was happy. That was the good news. The bad 0.99

00:19:34.660 news, however, is that China, perhaps surprising, not surprising to some, that would include Gordon

00:19:40.980 Chang, has totally violated its agreement with us, so much for being Mr. Nice Guy. Well, Gordon Chang,

00:19:48.340 I have to hand it to you. You called all this just days ago. Well, that was really easy, Roger. So it

00:19:54.420 didn't take very much in the way of powers of prediction. What we saw, especially after the May 12th

00:20:00.900 agreement was announced, was that China did not adhere to its main promise, which was to remove

00:20:08.340 non-tariff barriers that it had put in place after April 2nd, Liberation Day. This was a very easy thing

00:20:15.940 for Beijing to do. Specifically, this was the export ban on rare earths to the United States. It's important 1.00

00:20:23.940 to us. I don't know why China didn't do it. But clearly, we're now at a point, which was easy to

00:20:31.140 see. And that is, Beijing is in violation of the agreement, and the United States needs to do

00:20:36.100 something about it. Yeah, I think you're right. You would think that the Chinese would actually have 1.00

00:20:41.140 some sense of relief that we're not launching a nuclear attack on Iran, since they depend on their 1.00

00:20:47.780 Iranian puppet states for so much of their oil. What are the ways that China is violating the current

00:20:54.980 agreement? Yeah, the most important one is the failure to remove the export ban on rare earths.

00:21:04.580 This was specifically referred to when the May 12th agreement said all of the measures that

00:21:11.300 China had put in place after April 2nd. And that certainly included the rare earth ban, 0.72

00:21:16.580 which was actually discussed in Geneva, between the American and the Chinese negotiators.

00:21:22.740 So it was something that China knew that we expected them to do right away. You know, 0.97

00:21:27.620 the thing about this May 12th agreement was, as President Trump intimated in that posting,

00:21:33.220 this was a very favorable agreement for China. So it's in China's interest to make sure that it goes 0.79

00:21:39.460 forward and that we adhere to it. And so it really is, you know, a very short sighted decision on the

00:21:47.780 part of the Chinese to try to test President Trump by not adhering and complying with the agreement.

00:21:54.660 Yeah. And those who have tested Donald Trump in the past have found out that he has ice water in his

00:21:59.860 veins when it comes to negotiating, particularly when he's negotiating on behalf of the American

00:22:04.980 public. What do you think happens next in this Chinese American tariff minuet?

00:22:13.620 President Trump is going to impose some cost, and I think he's going to do it pretty soon.

00:22:18.580 He's made a marker for himself with the posting a few hours ago, which means that it will happen.

00:22:24.820 I don't know what form it'll take. Probably an increase in tariffs could be something else. We'll find out.

00:22:30.820 Yeah, I guess he could also use sanctions if he wanted to. He does. Of course, some federal court

00:22:37.780 has already attempted to tell him that he doesn't have the authority to do any of this. This was one

00:22:42.740 of the most incredible things I've seen in a 50 year career in American politics, where a federal judge

00:22:49.140 in Florida says that Donald Trump has the authority set by Congress to negotiate tariffs for reasons

00:22:57.380 beyond just revenue. The drugs pouring into our country, the trade imbalance, those are

00:23:04.340 legitimate reasons. Trump declared an economic emergency in order to give himself this executive

00:23:10.100 power as required by the Constitution. And then suddenly, out of nowhere, this incredibly obscure

00:23:15.860 international court of trade, which is located in Manhattan, of all places, rules the president doesn't

00:23:23.060 have this authority. Trump's lawyers appealed within hours, and a federal appeals court stayed the

00:23:32.180 the international trade court's decision so the president can get back to negotiating better trade

00:23:38.100 deals for the American people. We haven't seen a final ruling on that, but we presume, much like the

00:23:45.540 earlier federal court rulings that said that he didn't have the authority to deport violent illegal

00:23:52.660 immigrant criminals from the United States. It will end up before the U.S. Supreme Court, I imagine. 1.00

00:23:59.380 And my guess is that the International Trade Court, which threw out a hundred years of precedent,

00:24:06.100 allowed every other president to set tariffs unencumbered, will be overturned. In the meantime,

00:24:13.300 I think I want to focus on the part of the president's statement, Gordon, when he spoke of civil unrest

00:24:20.260 unfolding in China. The Chinese have an extraordinarily brutal regime. They rule with an iron fist. What is

00:24:28.420 the situation on the ground in China today? Well, there have been protests of workers, and indeed,

00:24:36.420 workers have been burning down their factories. A recent example was a worker who was not paid 800

00:24:44.100 renminbi, and basically a little bit more than 100 U.S. dollars. He burned down his factory. And that

00:24:53.220 could happen in any country, Roger. But 800 brother, as he is now known, has become a folk hero throughout

00:25:01.140 China. And that doesn't happen in countries. What it says is that China's people are extremely unhappy.

00:25:11.140 And whenever they get the opportunity, they will take to the streets as they have been. Also, we have

00:25:18.100 had hints that there are depositor protests in the eastern part of the country, big cities like Shanghai and

00:25:25.860 Beijing. And that really is an indication that the banks are being squeezed. Now, I'm sure that these

00:25:31.940 are the smaller financial institutions, because the big ones are flush with cash. But it shows that

00:25:38.980 the problems in the economy are now radiating into the banking system. And that's a really bad sign for

00:25:44.820 Beijing. The president, by his deft moods in the Middle East, is very clearly trying to isolate China.

00:25:52.820 He would like to get a solution to the Russian-Ukraine war. That's proving more difficult than perhaps

00:25:58.980 the president had thought. Whenever he gets one side lined up, the other side falls apart on him.

00:26:05.460 I was kind of surprised that he was unaware of the attempted assassination of Vladimir Putin,

00:26:12.340 where his helicopter was attacked by Ukrainian drones. I bet those drones, by the way, came from 1.00

00:26:18.500 the United States. It would explain Vladimir Putin's reticence to come to the table. I was hopeful

00:26:27.780 that Putin would show up in Turkey, where our ambassador, Tom Barrack, extraordinarily able

00:26:36.100 individual who the president not only appointed as ambassador to Turkey, but also special envoy to Syria,

00:26:43.220 Syria, where we are beginning the peacemaking process with the new Syrian leadership. I was hoping that

00:26:49.780 Putin would show up, and that since the president was already in the Middle East, that he might drop

00:26:55.620 in and broker the deal himself. See, I've read the art of the deal. Gordon, how stable is the government

00:27:05.300 of Chairman Xi? We Americans think that, you know, that they don't have their own internal politics,

00:27:12.740 but indeed they do. They certainly do. So for instance, there is credible information to suggest

00:27:20.100 that Xi Jinping has lost substantial influence, or maybe even total control over the Chinese military.

00:27:27.540 Recently, his loyalists have disappeared from public view. There are rumors that they were suicided.

00:27:33.540 I don't know if that's true or not, but we do know we haven't seen them. And when we also can see

00:27:40.020 other developments in the Chinese military that suggest that Xi Jinping did not, as many people believe,

00:27:46.740 he did not actually get rid of his own people. It's Xi Jinping's adversaries in the middle in the

00:27:53.620 military got rid of them. And that says that Xi Jinping's control and influence throughout the

00:28:00.980 Chinese political system, military and civilian has now been weakened. There are all sorts of

00:28:07.700 rumors that are flying around about the Chinese civilian leaders undermining Xi Jinping. I don't

00:28:15.380 know if those are true. We have no way of confirming them and very little in the way of information that

00:28:21.700 would lead us to one conclusion or another. But these rumors are there, Roger. And usually when you hear a lot

00:28:28.900 of rumors of this type, it means that people are trying to undermine whoever is the target of the

00:28:35.620 rumors, in this case, Xi Jinping. So yeah, I think the Chinese political system is really unstable right now.

00:28:41.220 If you're just tuning in, we're talking to Gordon Chang. You find him at Gordon G. Chang on X,

00:28:47.700 Gordon G. Chang on X. He has a very lively commentary there. He's also the author of a

00:28:54.660 terrific book, Plan Red, China's Project to Destroy America. That's available on Amazon. I've 0.99

00:29:02.020 read his previous books, China's Going to War, The Great U.S.-China Tech War, Losing South Korea, Nuclear

00:29:09.620 Showdown. And his analysis of the events in North Korea, as well as China, are always incisive and on

00:29:18.820 the money. I don't believe that Chairman Xi trusts his military. I also don't believe that he's confident

00:29:25.860 about the capabilities of his military. The last time you joined us, I asked you about the probability

00:29:34.340 of a move on Taiwan, something I thought was highly probable under the weak foreign policy of President

00:29:42.660 Joe Biden. I think Chairman Xi knew that if they grabbed nationalist China, Taiwan, the result would be

00:29:49.860 a strong letter of protest from Antony Blinken, the Secretary of State, because Joe was probably sleeping.

00:29:59.220 Do you still think it is unlikely that the Chinese attest President Donald Trump vis-a-vis Taiwan?

00:30:07.460 What I think is unlikely is that Xi Jinping would initiate hostilities with an attempt to take the main

00:30:15.140 island of Taiwan because, as you point out, I don't think Xi Jinping trusts his military.

00:30:22.020 You know, it's entirely possible. Two other things, though, are entirely possible and maybe even

00:30:27.060 probable. Taiwan has a lot of little islands that are just off the Chinese mainland, some of them as

00:30:33.620 close as three miles. Xi Jinping needing a quick victory could take one of those little ones because

00:30:39.940 that would be a fairly simple military exercise. The other thing that could happen is Xi has been

00:30:47.060 engaged in very provocative activity on his periphery against South Korea, Japan, Taiwan, Philippines,

00:30:54.660 Australia. One of those confrontations could go wrong. That could spiral down into a major conflict,

00:31:01.380 and Taiwan could get involved that way.

00:31:04.020 This is, of course, fascinating. Donald Trump prefers commerce over chaos, but you can see him

00:31:12.020 moving aggressively to try to isolate the Chinese. How successful do you think he can be at that? 1.00

00:31:19.860 He can be extremely successful because, as Trump mentioned in his posting, everybody needs the U.S.

00:31:25.220 market. U.S. consumers account for something like 38, 39 percent of global consumer spending. That's an

00:31:32.820 enormous percentage. And all of these countries need the United States. So, President Trump can use

00:31:40.900 that leverage. He's got to negotiate with some skill. It's been a little bit chaotic up to now,

00:31:49.780 but I'm sure that President Trump will be able to use the power of our market to accomplish what's

00:31:55.220 good for Americans.

00:31:58.180 I, again, if you're just tuning in, we're talking to Gordon Chang. Gordon, I want to thank you for

00:32:03.060 joining us in the Stone Zone today. You can follow Gordon at Gordon G. Chang in X. He also is the

00:32:11.140 author of a terrific new book, Plan Red China's Project to Destroy America, which you can find in

00:32:17.140 Amazon. If you want to know what's going to happen in China and in Chinese-American relations, follow

00:32:23.220 Gordon Chang on X. His analysis is excellent, and we're always glad to have him here in the Stone Zone.

00:32:30.340 Gordon, thank you, and God bless you.

00:32:33.220 Thank you so much, Roger.

00:32:35.300 Coming up, Dan Bongino, the deputy FBI director, says he's found an entire room of documents,

00:32:43.380 most of them pertaining or many of them pertaining to the so-called Russian collusion hoax,

00:32:49.140 and they're going to be releasing those documents. We'll be talking about it here in the Stone Zone

00:32:54.740 when we come back, so whatever you do, stick with us if you want to hear the latest on the

00:32:59.700 Russian collusion hoax and whether those who perpetrated it on America will ever face justice,

00:33:05.940 right here in the Stone Zone.

00:33:07.620 The Stone Zone on the Red Apple Podcast Network.

00:33:13.380 Yesterday, Deputy FBI Director Dan Bongino dropped a bombshell.

00:33:31.140 You will recall that both Bongino and FBI Director Cash Patel both said in an interview that they had

00:33:38.100 been persuaded based on the evidence that a sex trafficker convicted in Florida and facing federal

00:33:46.260 charges Jeffrey Epstein had indeed killed himself. This flies in the face of an examination of Epstein's

00:33:55.060 body by Michael Baden, the former New York medical examiner who is widely respected as

00:34:01.780 one of the most prominent pathologists in the country. Baden said that Epstein's neck was broken in three places,

00:34:14.420 that he's never in the hundreds of cases regarding strangulation that he had done autopsy,

00:34:21.940 and he had never seen that. He said that that indicates that Epstein was choked to death. His hyoid

00:34:30.100 bone was broken, which Baden said was widely uncommon in these cases. Now, add to that the fact that the

00:34:39.620 security cameras happened to the security cameras happened to be malfunctioning. The two guards who were

00:34:46.500 supposed to be monitoring Epstein fell asleep. And we know that Epstein retained a new criminal defense attorney,

00:34:56.740 David Schoen, only days before he allegedly killed himself.

00:35:02.820 He had Wired shown a down payment on his very large retainer, and they scheduled a conference for the

00:35:13.460 following week of all Epstein's lawyers to plot a legal strategy. Now, Bongino tells us that one of the cameras was

00:35:24.100 functioning, and it proves that Epstein was alone in his cell at the time that he died. I would

00:35:32.420 welcome that because it would show some clarity to the situation. I have the highest possible regard

00:35:40.740 for FBI Director Cash Patel and a high regard for Dan Bongino, who I don't know as well, but he's a

00:35:49.700 former New York City police officer, a former Secret Service agent. He's highly qualified for his job.

00:35:56.660 I had to chuckle when Connecticut Senator Richard Blumenthal criticized Bongino, saying that Bongino was

00:36:04.580 unqualified. This is the same U.S. Senator who lied about seeing action actually being in combat in Vietnam

00:36:13.700 when he'd never actually been to Vietnam at all. I would say that that disqualifies Richard Blumenthal

00:36:21.300 from holding office rather than Dan Bongino. The other interesting thing is Bongino announced that they had

00:36:28.020 found an entire room under the control of the FBI where documents had been hidden from the public. We have to

00:36:35.060 presume these documents were also hidden from Special Counsel John Durham, whose report proved that the Russian

00:36:43.060 collusion hoax was exactly that, a hoax cooked up by Joe Biden and Barack Obama, Susan Rice, the National Security

00:36:52.980 Advisor, James Comey, the FBI Director, John Brennan, the CIA Director, Andrew McCabe, the Deputy FBI Director. I want to

00:37:02.260 know what's in that room. I think we got a hint yesterday when they released a previously hidden

00:37:08.500 document document that proved that Nellie Orr, who was married to Bruce Orr, one of the orchestrators at the FBI of the

00:37:15.300 collusion hoax, had lied before Congress about her knowledge of the affair. So hope springs eternal that we will get

00:37:23.700 justice in the Russian collusion hoax, the greatest single abuse of power and dirty trick in the history of American

00:37:32.260 politics. Thanks for joining us today in the Stone Zone. We love to talk news, history, politics, food,

00:37:40.660 fashion, you name it. Until we meet again, I want to thank you for tuning in. God bless you and Godspeed.

00:37:49.460 Thanks for listening to The Stone Zone with Roger Stone. You can hear The Stone Zone with Roger Stone weeknights at 8 on 77 WABC.

00:37:59.460 If you like the podcast, share it with your friends and listen anytime at wabcradio.com and download the

00:38:06.660 WABC Radio app. Hit that subscribe button on all major podcast platforms. Plus, follow WABC on social,

00:38:14.180 on Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, and X. See you next time for a new episode so you never have to wonder.

00:38:21.180 What the heck is going on here?

The StoneZONE with Roger Stone - May 31, 2025

The Stone Zone ｜ 05-30-25

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