Bonus： Daily Review with Clay and Buck - Feb 25 2026
Episode Stats
Length
1 hour and 2 minutes
Words per Minute
171.33327
Summary
Trump's State of the Union speech was the best I've ever seen, and it's a marker of what a great first term we've had under President Trump. Clay and Buck break down what they loved and didn't like about the speech, the Democratic response, and the overall impact of the speech.
Transcript
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Welcome, everybody, to the Wednesday edition of the Clay and Buck Show.
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My friends, it was the best State of the Union speech I've ever seen.
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A little bit of a mea culpa, actually, because I'm a little salty about State of the Unions.
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Most of them are boring because they go too long.
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I watched every minute of this one, as I tend to always do, because this is our job,
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I could not say enough good things about Trump's State of the Union.
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He was absolutely dialed in, locked in, en fuego, all of the above.
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Now, we will dive into some of the policy, of course, as well as the very well-deserved
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victory lap that was the bulk of the opening, certainly, of the speech.
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In fact, I think one of the most powerful moments, Clay, of the entire—now, look, before
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I get into the Democrats, actually, I want to focus on the positive here, because many
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of you are probably familiar with Internet terminology, and, for example, the red pill,
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which comes from The Matrix, which I've been saying for a long time.
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Actually, I used to say this on my show, Clay, when I was doing a Saturday show for, like,
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I would say, guys, you know, we've got to take the red pill here.
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And it became very popular because of the movie The Matrix.
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But now there are different pills with corresponding colors.
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And there are people on the right—there are people that will say you're taking a—a white
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pill means you're seeing things in a very sort of benevolent light.
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Blue pill is you're part of the normies, or you still have the world sort of shrouded and
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presented to you without seeing with clarity, which is from The Matrix.
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And then the black pill is I'm just—everything is bad.
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There's some black pilling that happens sometimes on the right, where people just want to get
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And I saw a little of this in the commentary of, but what about this?
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Clay, I just want to set this marker, because I don't know—I don't say that every State
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In fact, most of them, I think, are a waste of time.
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Not only was this the best State of the Union speech, that was a marker, a high point, I
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think, for looking back at what has been, in its totality, an unbelievable first year
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And I'm somebody who was there in the trenches with the fighting back against the Russia collusion
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stuff, which was totally messing Trump up in the first term, and sandbagging, and undermining
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everything he was doing, and dealing with the bad picks that he had in that first administration.
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Clay, before we get into anything else, I just—I think it's worth taking this moment
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of this administration has delivered enormously on securing the border, on bringing down the
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crime rate nationally, on a booming economy, we can go through this piece by piece.
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He might not even have the House for more than another year.
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Well, I mean, I think that, to me, is everything comes down to a couple of moments, even more
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It would have been better if it were an hour 15 instead of nearly two hours.
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I was also doing what a lot of other people are doing, probably.
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I was watching a basketball game simultaneously on a second screen.
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Usually you're the one that loved the movie, so to speak, and I trash it.
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You're not trashing it, but you're saying it was too long, which is what I was worried
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I actually sat through the whole thing and thought that he really pulled the whole thing
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I mean, look, I think all city unions should be 30 minutes, but that's me.
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Um, I thought that, uh, it went on too long with that in, uh, as my criticism, because
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I thought it was the most optimistic patriotic speech that Trump may have ever given.
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And if you were just a reasonable person, right, not someone who is a Trump deranged psychopath
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and you just watch that, I think the results would be somewhat similar to what, uh, CNN
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actually showed, which was 64% of the speech viewers really liked it.
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Trump could have come out last night and said, I cured cancer.
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Uh, all of your grandmas and grandpas are now going to be resurrected because of, uh,
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And you're going to get to hang out with your family again.
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Whatever the greatest thing, and I balanced the budget and, uh, whatever the greatest accomplishment
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that you think a president could render, there's about 35% of the population that would hate
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And I thought there were two things that really stood out, Buck.
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And the second one was when they're not willing to stand for things that are completely non-political
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And I think this is going to bounce back in Democrats, uh, disfavor in a fairly substantial
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way because being retro, uh, sort of retroactively opposed to whatever Trump is in favor of, it
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And I thought Trump did a good job of making a case.
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If I were giving advice, I would have said, do it in one 15 instead of one 45.
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I think 30 minutes of that speech could have been cleaned up, but so much of it was just
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a spectacularly optimistic story about America and how our lives intersect with the 250 year
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And in that way, I thought it was very well done in the most optimistic, probable speech
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that Trump has maybe ever given in his presidency.
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You noted two of the most important policy, uh, which I think pretty universally people
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felt like the, uh, Democrats not standing for, we want to put citizens above foreigners,
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basically like Americans matter more to the American government.
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Their, their, their future and their wellbeing matters more to the American government than
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Democrats just fundamentally don't believe that actually Democrats view anyone from anywhere
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in the world, no matter what their, uh, their, their background, their language, their
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politics, their, their credo, whatever, as well, maybe that could be a voter, you know,
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well, just start giving them welfare and turn them into a voter.
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That's how they view that anyone from anywhere, anyone is as American as any of you, as long
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as that person is going to be on the government, uh, dole and vote Democrat.
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That is truly how they feel and how they, uh, think of this country, which I think is a
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It should be, or else we're just on a slow glide path into the side of the mountain and
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Uh, but Clay, the two moments for me that were particularly just powerful, the USA hockey
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team thing, uh, that I'm not, I'm not a hockey guy.
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I've got so many, I got so many thoughts on this too, that we can dive into eventually.
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It, it was, it was, you know, Ronald Reagan high-fiving Hulk Hogan on the back of a triceratops
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with, with American flags fluttering in the backgrounds, you know, flanked by eagles.
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It was an absolutely beautiful moment, uh, for, for the country.
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All those young guys there, you know, the big win and it really is about America.
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And I think I, I, I would hope that even somebody that despises every aspect of Trump's policy,
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at least had their, had their moment, you know, their, they, they smiled and looked at
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those guys and said, they are, there are boys and they did a great job and our gals, they
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weren't, uh, they weren't there last night, but you know, the gals team did a great job
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And I just think that that national pride is something that I'd want to see in everybody,
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Unfortunately, Democrats, a lot of them, not all of them, it's not fair to say all of them,
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And Clay, the other moment for me was when he told the story of the pilot, uh, chief
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warrant officer Slover going into Venezuela, getting his legs.
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I mean, I'm assuming it was probably getting hit by seven, six, two rounds.
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They didn't talk about this, but getting hit by, uh, you know, getting hit the legs and then
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a hip and continuing as a Chinook pilot to make sure that that, that bird came down and
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And that guy, uh, you could tell he's still recovering.
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There's still probably a lot of pain he's dealing with and, and immobility issues from,
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you know, you, you, you get, you get hit with those kinds of routes, especially talking
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That's very point is man, that guy's just an American hero and American badass and be able
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I know there are other medal of honor winners too, and they had amazing stories, but this
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How can, how can you be an American and not say, you know, this is one of the best of ours
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This guy who put it on the line and got the mission done.
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Eric Slover is his name and what, first of all, he looked uncomfortable being there
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because I guarantee you, if they had given him a mic, he would say, well, I was just
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That's how those guys are at the highest level of the operators.
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Uh, but as he stood there and he was still, as you said, recovering, he had a aid, I think
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a crutches basically to help him walk, he looked like an American bad-ass monster in
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I don't know how many reps on three 15 that guy can do, but I would go for a high number.
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I mean, he looks like a guy who had committed his heart and soul to defending America, America
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to touch it, such an extent that he was there to get the utmost of his body and give the
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And that, to your point, they had 200 year old, a world war two veteran, a guy who, uh,
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I think they said in world war two, Korea and Vietnam.
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I thought it was the most patriotic pro American speech that Trump may have ever given.
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And I've got so many thoughts on a deep level about this.
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You can argue, as we have said on this program, about what the tax rate should be on corporations.
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And you can argue about what policy should be in place when it comes to, uh, ice raids and
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But really what I think president Trump distilled with this address is there is one party that
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is proud of this country and proud of the United States and feels intense patriotic loyalty
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And then there is a party that is ashamed of America and everything that it's represents.
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And that is a big major issue writ large that doesn't have anything to do direct with policy.
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And I thought Trump's address was delivered right at that intersection of conflict over the
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existential and support and super important question of is America a good and, uh, and just
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country or not Republicans say, yes, Democrats say no.
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And I think that goes to the very essence of our political battles in this day and age.
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And I thought that address really focused on it.
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Cause there was a lot of stuff that really was about the country and that was, it was beautiful.
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And, and all of the victory laps that he started out with are just, they're just factual too.
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This isn't when Biden says things like, we were American jobs, we brought back the economy.
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It's like, you mean you Democrat maniacs allowed people to go back to work because they had
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already gotten a nasty cold that they weren't going to die from in the first place because
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Like that's your great economic contribution to stop ruining everything and spending us into
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oblivion. Um, the accomplishments that Trump was laying out last night are just that they're
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accomplishments. No matter how you slice it, the reality is he's done incredible things.
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But the other part of this clay is he's just a showman, man. I mean, when he goes out with
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the Democrats or, you know, Oh, they're, they're, they're shrieking and howling and they're all
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so upset and they're acting like really acting like the, uh, you know, the unruly children in
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the school auditorium at the Dean has to go and give a talking to, you know, Trump is
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just like, yeah, you're crazy. You know, he's shouting them down. The guy just puts on a
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show. It's, there's nothing else like it. We've seen nothing else like it. And, uh, I thought
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it was, I thought it was phenomenal. Do I always think that a speech could be shorter? Sure.
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But I actually, last night was the first time that I wasn't like, this has gotten brutal.
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That was, that was kind of my meeting got, got way too long. Um, so overall I thought it
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was his best state of the union speech and I go into these things pretty, uh, with low
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expectations. So we'll talk about some of the Democrat stuff, some of the big policy moments.
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Also, I think worth discussing this, setting aside money for American children in accounts,
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understand like basically putting everybody in a place where they will benefit from the
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American economy and the financial system. There's some big things about this that I think
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really matter. And, and we should discuss, um, because this is, this is a way you want
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to deal with like the wealth gap and you want to deal with a quality of life and all these
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things. There's, there's a lot to this. Uh, by the way, we should have taken George W.
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Bush's advice a long time ago and index social security to S and P 500 index funds. If we had
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the country would be on much sounder financial shape instead of you giving all your money and
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getting back 3% returns or whatever the heck it is 40 years later, it's a social security.
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The way it's set up is just, it's a joke throughout the state of the union speech.
00:15:23.740
President Trump honored our military old and young frequently referenced this year's the
00:15:28.420
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Clay Travis and Buck Sexton. Mic drops. That never sounded so good.
00:16:45.360
Find them on the free iHeartRadio app or wherever you get your podcasts.
00:16:50.300
Canadian women are looking for more. More out of themselves, their businesses, their elected leaders,
00:16:55.120
and the world around them. And that's why we're thrilled to introduce the Honest Talk Podcast.
00:17:00.240
I'm Jennifer Stewart. And I'm Katherine Clark. And in this podcast, we interview Canada's most
00:17:05.080
inspiring women. Entrepreneurs, artists, athletes, politicians, and newsmakers,
00:17:09.980
all at different stages of their journey. So if you're looking to connect, then we hope you'll join us.
00:17:15.400
Listen to the Honest Talk Podcast on iHeartRadio or wherever you listen to your podcasts.
00:17:19.460
Welcome in. Hour number two. It's the day after a State of the Union that was spectacularly well
00:17:30.380
received as President Trump made the case that his policies have drastically improved life in America
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for many. And he ran through all of those arguments. I just come back to again, Buck,
00:17:46.820
he ran on EBC Economy Border Crime. After one year, the economy is very strong. Growth rate in the
00:17:56.900
third quarter, 4.4%. Inflation down to 2.4%. Mortgage rates just hit a four-year low. For those of you
00:18:05.040
out there in the housing market looking for 15 or 30 years, you are now getting lower rates than at
00:18:12.060
any time since 2022 before the Biden inflation took over. You've got record high stock prices at the
00:18:20.000
S&P 500, the Dow Jones effectively. You have, as we talked about, and I think it's such a huge deal,
00:18:27.400
the safest country from a murder perspective that any of us have ever lived in. You have
00:18:34.080
basically everything going really, really great. And by the way, 800-282-2882 if you want to weigh in.
00:18:43.620
But I want to, you mentioned Buck, and I think you're right. And it seems to be the part that is
00:18:49.060
echoing very strongly today. The U.S. men and Trump basically calling Democrats crazy for refusing to
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stand when he asked them, hey, do you think you should try to improve the lives, I'm paraphrasing,
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of citizens more than illegals. And one of the angles that is being used to attack Trump and by
00:19:12.540
proxy, the U.S. men for visiting with Trump, who had won the gold medal for the first time in 46 years,
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these U.S. men are being attacked mercilessly by many in left-wing media. And I thought that we
00:19:30.700
should maybe dive into this. I think, do we have, Producer Greg, this clip ready now? Okay, so if
00:19:37.440
you're out there and you're wondering, okay, why are they getting attacked? Yes, they're getting
00:19:41.320
attacked because they went to the White House, because they're unapologetically pro-America. All those
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things are true. But if you push back on that and you point out what is indisputably true, which is
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people have always visited the president, president, Democrat, Republican, has always congratulated
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gold medal winners and had them visit the White House. What they circle back to, Buck, is Trump
00:20:04.760
insulted the U.S. women's hockey team. And this is a Laura Travis special, Buck. This is a Laura Travis
00:20:12.420
special because she's fired up about this because she said, I'm seeing this all over my
00:20:17.260
social media feeds. I don't know if you saw this story. A Canadian hockey player shared a photo of him
00:20:25.000
with his daughter at Disney World. He is a Canadian NHL hockey player. He was not on Team Canada. He was
00:20:32.260
not on Team USA. And he was attacked mercilessly on social media because people said, how dare you laugh at
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a joke about women's hockey players and then have a photo posted of you with your two-year-old
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daughter at Disney World talking about how you're a girl dad? This is real. I don't know if you saw
00:20:54.000
this story. I mean, they're insane, but how do they know he laughed at the joke? He didn't. He wasn't even
00:20:58.640
there. That's my point. They're just attacking. They're just attacking every hockey player right now because
00:21:05.480
they're saying, oh, he's a misogynist. He laughed at a joke. And so I wanted to play the joke because
00:21:11.880
it's much less significant. But this reminds me of the very fine people hoax when they spent years
00:21:19.060
telling you that Trump, Trump loves Nazis. He said they were very fine people and he did it. But they
00:21:25.040
so embedded the idea that what he had done was say that Nazis were very fine people and white
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supremacists. And in fact, he had done the opposite. He had actually condemned them.
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So usually when you go and deconstruct a joke, this is what losers do because you either laugh
00:21:43.380
or you don't laugh at a joke. And you don't go back and then say, oh, I'm so sorry. I didn't think
00:21:49.240
about the larger context of the joke and how it was going to impact the indigenous people whose land
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we stole. And I feel, oh, so please forgive me. This is what they're saying. They're saying they want
00:22:00.160
the U.S. men to apologize for laughing at a joke. So here is the joke. I want you to listen to it.
00:22:05.700
And then I'm going to do an actual deconstruction of the joke and show you how dishonest the coverage
00:22:11.180
of this has been. So, producer Greg, this was in the locker room. Cash Patel's holding up his phone.
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President Trump is congratulating the team. Listen.
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We'll get the cash and we'll get the military to get you guys over.
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What would really be cool, and we'll do the White House the next day, we'll just have some fun.
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We have medals for you guys. And we have to, I must tell you, we're going to have to bring
00:22:36.840
I do believe I probably would be impeached, okay?
00:22:44.440
Okay, so he's making a joke, but I want to deconstruct this. And by the way, if you couldn't
00:22:47.980
hear it, that men in the background are actually cheering and saying two for two, meaning they
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both won gold medals. But when he says that, he says, otherwise I'll be impeached. The joke
00:23:00.640
is at the expense of Democrats and anti-Trump deranged people who would attack him if he
00:23:09.140
had just invited the men and not the women. They would say, oh, you're super sexist.
00:23:14.460
Oh, you're misogynistic. So the joke is actually at the expense of his critics. Second part of
00:23:20.340
this, Buck. The women who are outraged by this, and it's everywhere on social media, the crazy
00:23:26.920
cat lady battalion is fired up because they're so outraged that people laughed at that joke,
00:23:33.440
which was actually at their expense. And they're not smart enough to see it, or they didn't actually
00:23:38.200
listen to the joke themselves. Here's the second part of this, Buck. If Trump had delivered the
00:23:44.500
most perfect invitation to the White House that has ever occurred to the U.S. women's gold medal
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hockey winning team, the same women who claim that they are offended by that joke that we just played
00:23:57.320
would actually immediately demand that the U.S. women's gold medal hockey team not go to the White
00:24:05.020
House because to go would be offensive to their politics and therefore the women can't go. So what
00:24:12.060
you have here is an entirely manufactured story, which has caught fire on the left that is not rooted
00:24:19.740
in the joke itself. And you also have primarily women complaining about the way an invitation was
00:24:27.440
conveyed when they would never want the invitation to be accepted in the first place. And Buck, I want to
00:24:33.640
play this. This is MSNBC. If you're out there, maybe you're like me. Maybe you voted Democrat in
00:24:39.740
the past and there's a ton of you out there listening. Maybe you weren't like Buck and at nine
00:24:43.260
years old you weren't reading William F. Buckley and convinced. Little bow tie. Yes. Drinking Earl Grey tea,
00:24:51.360
thinking about the future. Maybe you weren't like Buck. Maybe you're a little bit more like me.
00:24:56.200
And if you're looking around at the society, you think to yourself, I haven't really changed that much
00:25:02.060
and the world as President Trump said has just gone crazy around you. This is 2012. This is 2012
00:25:12.060
on MSNBC. A hockey player chose not to visit Barack Obama's White House. And this was how they covered
00:25:22.340
it on MSNBC. This was left-wing orthodoxy just a few short years ago. Listen.
00:25:29.340
Boston Bruins goalie Tim Thomas, RSVP. Thanks, but no thanks to a White House invitation.
00:25:35.420
What do we make of that? Tim Thomas said, I exercise my free right and my right as a free citizen and did not visit
00:25:41.240
the White House. This is not about politics or party. As in my opinion, both parties are responsible for the situation
00:25:47.140
we are in as a country. I mean, I think this is kind of the hyper-partisanship that just irritates
00:25:51.940
everybody. It's like, just go to the White House. You don't have to run an ad or cut a commercial or
00:25:57.480
anything. Just go to the White House. Take part. Celebrate just like everybody else celebrates with
00:26:01.800
Republicans or Democratic presidents. Especially when you're getting honored. Obama made specific
00:26:06.620
mention of him during his six-minute address. Buck, not going to the White House was actually the
00:26:15.040
insult. Now, this is my position writ large. So if you want to clip this in 20 years and I've got a
00:26:20.080
different opinion, you can play it. For 20 years, I've been saying, if you're on a sports team and
00:26:25.760
you get invited to the White House, I think you should go. I don't see it as an endorsement of
00:26:30.260
the president. I see it as a celebration of you and your teammates' accomplishments.
00:26:35.340
Everybody in America, basically, had that opinion, Democrats, Republicans,
00:26:40.120
Republicans' independence until a few short years ago. And this is why this is important.
00:26:45.640
The U.S. men haven't said a single thing about politics. They haven't told us what they think
00:26:50.080
about any issue under the political sun. And during this entire attack that has been going on on them,
00:26:57.340
it's entirely based on the fact that they are patriotic, that they respect the office of the
00:27:02.940
presidency and that they are willing to celebrate the accomplishments of the country, which they think
00:27:10.420
is the best in the history of the world. Isn't this kind of, it's important to understand that
00:27:14.740
their very patriotism is being used against them by the left because the left, I really do believe
00:27:22.020
this is important to slam home, hates the country and the country's history. And they are using these U.S.
00:27:29.160
men who are super popular as a way to attack all of this. And I think it's important to put it into
00:27:34.660
context just how illegitimate and unfair all of this has been. I also think that it highlights,
00:27:40.980
Clay, when you have Spamburger. I know it's Spamburger, but I think Spamburger is more apropos.
00:27:49.600
When you have her, isn't it interesting also you have Slotkin and Spamburger, both former government
00:27:55.140
analysts like yours truly. So when I tell you guys, there are a lot of commies in the government,
00:28:01.140
that's for sure, you know, doing the civil servant thing. But when she's the one giving the response,
00:28:09.640
which I watched some of it, I honestly at some point turned it off. But when you're watching this
00:28:14.560
thing, Democrats to attain power have to pretend that the soul and the plan of their party is
00:28:24.640
something other than that, which it is. The problem Republicans run into is when they're in power,
00:28:30.140
they can't get everything done that they want to get done. And sometimes that's because of some
00:28:35.340
Republicans standing in the way. But it's not, oh, we're doing something totally different than what
00:28:39.760
we sold you on. Joe Biden ran as a calm unifier and then said, get the shot with your vaccine passport
00:28:48.240
or you can't go to work and you can't go to school and you can't do anything.
00:28:53.880
OK, these people run on a mountain of lies to get power. And then they just ran through as much
00:29:02.540
crazy left wing nonsense as they can as fast as they can and hope that through propaganda
00:29:07.920
and through manufactured delusions, they might be able to fool people or rather it will fool people,
00:29:15.800
but also make people forget what they've done in the past. The Democrats last night,
00:29:20.020
Clay, Rashida Tlaib had a profanity, you know, like sounds a bit like my name and then ice
00:29:30.220
on her button. And you're like, what? You're a member of Congress at a State of the Union address.
00:29:36.860
You're not part of the Marxist Student Alliance at at CUNY, at City University of New York or
00:29:44.760
stuff like what are you doing? But this is who they are. They're malcontents. And the ones at the
00:29:50.000
top, the ones that are like the more sort of elevated than the street communist types like
00:29:54.420
Nancy Pelosi, they're so corrupt and so venal and so self-dealing and just soulless.
00:30:03.840
This is who they are. Amen. And I do think that for people who watched last night with persuadable
00:30:15.880
minds, and I understand a lot of people, it doesn't matter what happens. I said Trump could
00:30:19.860
have come out and said he secured cancer and brought everybody's grandma and grandpa back
00:30:23.100
to life and there'd be people who are angry at him. But for the people who are persuadable,
00:30:27.260
the data reflects that there is still a substantial majority of Americans that believes
00:30:33.660
in the country's history and greatness and that this is the best country in the history
00:30:38.680
of the world. And that is the reality under which the Democrats are opposed. And I think
00:30:47.040
that's significant. And by the way, 800-282-2882. We'll take your calls, get your talkbacks.
00:30:53.140
We only have one guest today. Marsha Blackburn, Senator from Tennessee, is on next hour.
00:30:57.800
But that is the only guest so you guys can weigh in and tell us what you thought in addition to
00:31:03.120
everything that we have already broken down based on last night's State of the Union.
00:31:09.580
Indeed. So with that said, pure talk, my friends. Affordability is on the minds of all Americans.
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You don't know what you don't know, right? But you could on the Sunday Hang with Clay and Buck
00:32:18.860
podcast. The right place. Welcome back into Clay and Buck, and we got a bunch of calls,
00:32:24.980
a bunch of things to get to and discuss, talk about. If you want to talk for a second to Clay
00:32:28.680
about the book situation here. Oh yeah, I tease that. I think this is important. I appreciate him
00:32:33.880
calling. You might think, oh, what is the impact of distribution in bookstores? It's huge.
00:32:43.880
They don't put, by and large, conservative books in the front of bookstores. They intentionally
00:32:50.840
underbuy them. So, I mean, what did the guys say? They were two copies of your book and there
00:32:56.060
were three copies of your book in huge bookstores with a brand new release. That's been the case
00:33:02.320
with every one of my books too. They, which is why Amazon is actually where most of them get sold.
00:33:08.860
They said that 90% of conservative books are sold is the number that I've heard on Amazon
00:33:14.320
because you can go right to it. It gets shipped to your home and that's great, but it means that
00:33:20.440
only people who know you exist get exposed to your ideas, right? They don't put John Beecham in the
00:33:27.700
front and you walk in and you're just shopping and you think to yourself, oh, who is this guy?
00:33:32.900
What's the arguments that he or she is making? We don't get any of those opportunities in the
00:33:38.560
cultural landscape. They bury the book in new releases. They've got two copies or three copies.
00:33:44.040
They sell them out immediately. And then this guy's going in because he's a, you know, a book buyer
00:33:48.460
and he expects for the book to be widely distributed. And it's just not, it's not an even playing
00:33:54.480
field in that respect. If, if any of you see a copy of manufacturing delusion, if you're happening
00:33:59.640
to be going through an airport this week and you see it on display, please take a photo and tag me
00:34:03.980
and let me know in any of those. Cause that's another big thing, uh, is, is the airport book
00:34:10.480
by situation. But, but I'm, I'm wondering if, if any of those, uh, stores that carry those books,
00:34:16.680
whatever they're called, uh, the stores, if they have manufacturing delusion, if they're trying
00:34:20.380
to sell it, because yeah, to your point, Clay, you don't get the benefit of, I mean, can you imagine
00:34:24.880
if I walked into a Barnes and Noble and there was a big display of my book, maybe a dashing photo of
00:34:31.020
me with windswept hair and manufacturing delusion in both hands, you know, just like letting it go.
00:34:36.620
No, that's not what happens. They, they, and to be clear, it's not about money. They'd be making
00:34:41.920
more money. They don't want to make more money. They don't like us. That's what it comes down to.
00:34:47.580
Don't like us. Don't want to help. And, uh, unfortunately there are some of these industries
00:34:54.060
still where the grip, uh, the political grip on the throat of the business is very strong
00:35:01.060
advertising still overall and ad buyers, libs, lib dominated, totally lib dominated, uh, and,
00:35:10.280
and publishing. Now there are conservative imprints at big publishing houses. Obviously one of them
00:35:14.660
printed me, I'm not saying that it's entirely, but in terms of the distribution side of it,
00:35:20.400
like who's buying the books for the stores to put out totally lib dominated. And it's just,
00:35:26.860
you know, I, I just wish we could do something about this. I can't say have Elon buy Barnes and
00:35:33.620
Noble, but maybe he could probably get us. He could probably get it for a song.
00:35:36.720
It just matters a tremendous amount in the marketplace of ideas. You can mention bookstores,
00:35:41.220
and that's the perfect example because people theoretically going into bookstores are going
00:35:45.540
there to buy books. And one of the fun things about going to a bookstore is the serendipity
00:35:50.700
of finding a book that you did not anticipate or no existed. And you think, Oh, this would be a great
00:35:57.080
read book. Browsing is still a big deal. Here's the other one that I think is even more significant
00:36:01.160
buck airports. Well, that's what I was just saying. I want to see books in the airports. This is what
00:36:06.060
the last time you saw a conservative book walking through the terminals at a display where you would
00:36:12.460
see it when you're in an airport. How many people buy books in airports? Huge percentages.
00:36:16.860
They don't exist. They do not exist in that way. So the callers, right? I mean, this is a,
00:36:23.380
this is a significant issue and we've got a bunch of callers by the way. Yeah, we have a bunch of
00:36:30.020
callers as we will get to now. Um, Andrew in Kentucky, you're up. What's going on?
00:36:34.240
I love your show. Um, just wanted to call and mention my favorite moment from the state of the
00:36:41.960
union last night. Uh, it was when Trump was talking about the, uh, save act and he was talking about
00:36:48.020
the hypocrisy of the left and mentioning the communist mayor of, uh, New York Mondami and talking
00:36:55.400
about how he was asking for a snow shovelers, but those snow shovelers needed to bring in two forms of
00:37:02.140
ID and a social security guard. Yeah. It's, I mean, look, we hope everybody in a WOR land is doing well
00:37:09.860
out there and certainly on long Island where they got over two feet of snow. And if you're listening
00:37:15.420
to us in Rhode Island, I think they got three feet of snow. And by the way, mentioning mom, Donnie,
00:37:20.460
did you see the videos that have gone viral? The snow of the cops or the snow getting, I, I think
00:37:26.480
it is absolutely despicable. I don't think it's funny. Um, I wish that those cops could have caught
00:37:32.880
a few of those guys with a nice, uh, truncheon to, uh, you know, the side of the knee. Um, I, I think
00:37:38.560
it's, it's horrible because I know people look, Oh, it's a snowball fight. Actually, first of all,
00:37:43.240
if you don't want to be in a snowball fight and you're getting hit from multiple sides, it's just
00:37:46.160
assault. It's actually assault and battery. Um, and you know, there, some of these guys are throwing
00:37:50.840
things that are basically ice. So you're just throwing like a handful of ice at a cop from close range.
00:37:55.720
And there's so many people that they can't do it. You know, they're not able to do anything
00:37:59.020
about it. I thought it was grotesquely disrespectful. I hope people get arrested for
00:38:03.360
it. They won't get prosecuted in any meaningful way because it's brag, but it just goes to show
00:38:07.960
you how disrespectful the, um, some of the, unfortunately some of the residents of New York
00:38:13.500
city and just thought, you know, these are all leftists, the people that are saying it's not a
00:38:16.440
big deal. They're all leftists. They hate cops because cops force the reality of accountability
00:38:21.640
on people. And the whole game of the left is no one's ever accountable. It's always,
00:38:24.800
you're always a victim. It's always someone else's fault.
00:38:27.420
Also, I just can't even imagine if you are the kind of person who's going to run up and
00:38:32.520
some of these were, they've got some photos out of people they're trying to arrest. Some
00:38:36.920
people were running up with basically boulders of ice to throw at cops, smacking on the cops.
00:38:42.160
It was really, really nasty. I mean, they clearly were taking advantage of the situation. Um,
00:38:47.900
and look, these people deserve a good swift punch in the face. You know, uh, I don't know
00:38:52.080
what else to say. I mean, they, they deserve to get an ass kicking. And also to your point,
00:38:57.140
what do you think the odds are that people who have been completely law abiding their entire life
00:39:01.840
decide to attack police officers with snowballs? I would bet those people have records that are a
00:39:07.560
mile long, likely because it's such a moronic thing to even think to do for most people.
00:39:12.220
Look, and the cops have a, uh, a tough job day in and day out. They do all over the country.
00:39:18.840
And, you know, it's often a thankless job. Not always, you know, they do sometimes perform the,
00:39:23.900
uh, Heimlich on a baby and save a life. I mean, you know, there's, there's obviously thanks with
00:39:28.360
it too. And, you know, I think a lot of communities, I said here in Miami beach,
00:39:31.800
we're very supportive of, of our cops and, you know, there's a very safe community. Cops are very
00:39:37.640
well-respected here, which I really liked that. And, you know, the NYPD went through a post nine
00:39:42.280
11 period where New Yorkers, I think were particularly, uh, prone to show gratitude
00:39:47.320
toward the NYPD. That's of course faded though. And when you, when you see this kind of disorder
00:39:53.140
where you have these people doing this, the police officers, like what, what is the mindset of somebody
00:39:57.860
who thinks that this is funny? Like that's someone's husband out there. Probably the, you know,
00:40:02.980
those cops probably married, probably have some kids and you're all smacking them with ice in the
00:40:07.620
face because they wear a uniform and they're trying to keep the streets safe and trying to keep bad
00:40:12.680
things from happening to people. What part of that is funny? What part of that is amusing?
00:40:17.680
So, you know, this, but this is Alvin Bragg's a scumbag. He's a bad person. He's immoral. He's a race
00:40:23.580
hustler. He clearly has a tremendous amount of animosity for certain people of certain backgrounds.
00:40:29.280
Uh, and he won't do anything about this guarantee you, even if they're arrested, he'll do the bare
00:40:33.880
minimum. And I think what you're going to see is Jessica Tish. Uh, and you know, I grew up knowing
00:40:39.200
the Tish family a little bit in New York and they're, they're good people and they love the city.
00:40:42.800
I think you're going to see Jesse Tish say I'm out because, because there's not the back. If you
00:40:47.840
don't have the, if you don't have the district attorney and the mayor catching your back as the
00:40:53.420
police commissioner and doing the right thing for law and order, your, your hands are tied.
00:40:57.520
It doesn't matter. This is one thing that Eric Adams got, right? The, uh, safety in New York
00:41:04.200
city got far better during his tenure than it was before. And I think the fact that he is a former
00:41:09.220
cop, it's not coincidental that that was the, uh, that was the outcome. He got it. I'm not saying
00:41:14.560
he was perfect. Clearly he wasn't an ideal leader, but you see the story. He had serious. Yeah. He,
00:41:21.560
Eric Adams Clay had serious managerial limitations. Like he just doesn't, he's not a guy you want
00:41:28.260
running a hundred billion dollar city budget operation and all the different, he's just not
00:41:34.460
up. He wasn't up for that task. He doesn't have the ability to experience, you know, but he was in
00:41:39.880
over his head, but he doesn't hate cops and he doesn't actually think that like criminals are good
00:41:45.100
people. And that was an improvement over to Blasio to be fair into what you're saying. That was an
00:41:49.560
improvement over to Blasio. Uh, you know, mom, Donnie is much more of the de Blasio mold.
00:41:56.000
And, and we're going to see, I think more and more of this and just wait until you have your
00:41:59.940
first major incident with a cop in New York. It will happen. It's inevitable at some point
00:42:04.020
and see which side of, of the equation mom, Donnie falls on. But you know, the, the statement,
00:42:09.920
I can guys pull the statement that mom, Donnie made about it. It was very, Oh, it's well,
00:42:16.200
here it is. We have it. Okay. Play cut 37. Here's mom, Donnie.
00:42:20.000
Speaking about these cops who were, they were being assaulted. I know people, Oh,
00:42:24.280
it's just snowballs. Okay. Uh, you can watch the video yourself and tell me if you think that the
00:42:29.700
cops were enjoying this play. I've said that what I saw was a snowball fight. It should be treated
00:42:33.800
accordingly. It was one that got out of hand, but that's what it was. I'm not going to be banning
00:42:38.200
snowball fights or organized snowball fights. Uh, I've, I've shared my, my thoughts with New Yorkers.
00:42:44.940
I mean, what, what if people just walked by cops and just, just smacked eggs in their faces? Is
00:42:50.520
that funny? Is that a joke? It's against the law. Mom, Donnie is also, unfortunately, and by the
00:42:56.500
way, Trump is too nice about him. He was too, and I know this is something that Trump is, he's funny
00:43:01.620
because they all say clay that Trump is, Trump's actually very nice. As long as you don't try to,
00:43:05.620
you know, go toe to toe with him. He's very charming. Mom, Donnie is a bad guy. He's a bad
00:43:11.240
guy. He's actually not a nice guy. He's a bad guy. He just smiles a lot and is, uh, you know,
00:43:18.960
smooth with people. The, yes, I agree with all of that. And he's falling rapidly on his face with a
00:43:28.100
lot of the different, um, uh, decisions that he's made. And one of them, you were talking about
00:43:34.960
Jessica Tisch is that New York city is basically deciding due to a budget crisis to not fund 5,000
00:43:43.740
police officers that they had previously anticipated and expected to fund. Um, that's going to
00:43:51.840
eventually blow up on them. There's no other way this is going to go. And believing that you can be
00:43:58.140
kind to criminals is a luxury of a low crime environment. And inevitably it leads to more
00:44:04.620
violence. And I would just come back. I mean, I guarantee you if they arrest the people who
00:44:09.920
were throwing cops, uh, throwing snowballs at cops aggressively, they will discover that those guys
00:44:16.140
have been arrested multiple times before, because I just don't buy, we're not talking about like a fun,
00:44:20.900
if the cops are actually engaged in the snowball fight too, that's a snowball fight running up to
00:44:26.980
somebody and pelting them constantly with snowballs because they're wearing uniforms is not a snowball fight.
00:44:33.460
To your point, if it were eggs, it would be an assault. Um, these guys should be charged.
00:44:38.080
And I think when they're charged, you will find out that they've been charged with multiple offenses
00:44:41.880
before. Right. I mean, I could walk up to someone and say, I'm patting them on the back and whack them
00:44:49.400
as hard as I can and do real damage and be like, Oh, he's just patting you on the back. I mean,
00:44:54.720
right. And we, we all know these games. We all know that. And this is of course a classic
00:44:59.380
leftist thing. But what mom Donnie said there is disgusting. I, what I saw was a snowball fight.
00:45:04.000
You sniveling little coward, someone. I don't want, I don't want to go. He's just the worst man.
00:45:09.400
He's just the worst. And it's a disgrace, a disgrace that New York has this guy calling the shots.
00:45:15.860
No doubt. If you visit Israel and its people, you will be impressed on the visit. I was there
00:45:22.340
about a year ago to see the work being done by the international fellowship of Christians and Jews.
00:45:27.660
It also provided me an opportunity to see the firsthand evidence of the attacks of October
00:45:32.780
7th, that what Hamas did to innocent Israelis because they were Jewish. I'm going to go to
00:45:39.220
Israel again. Uh, I was talking about this with my family recently. I want to take them. I want
00:45:43.440
them to be able to see the old city of Jerusalem. By the way, I'd like to go to Egypt. I like to travel
00:45:47.900
all over, uh, ancient civilizations areas that I haven't been to before. Um, as a nation,
00:45:54.800
the United States cares a great deal about Israel. Even if you don't get the chance to visit,
00:45:58.940
there are steadfast allies in the Middle East and the only country where true freedom in the
00:46:05.000
Middle East exists, regardless of what religion you are at a time when Jewish communities are
00:46:10.860
experiencing, experiencing more hostility, more threats, more violence than ever. Christians have a
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powerful opportunity to say, you're not alone. You can join us and support the IFCJ by going to
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IFCJ.org. You'll be amazed at all the work they do for people all over Israel. I have seen it.
00:46:33.000
They make a tremendous difference. IFCJ.org. That's IFCJ.org.
00:46:40.580
News and politics, but also a little comic relief. Clay Travis and Buck Sexton. Find them on the free
00:46:49.540
iHeartRadio app or wherever you get your podcasts. Canadian women are looking for more, more to
00:46:55.680
themselves, their businesses, their elected leaders, and the world around them. And that's
00:46:59.900
why we're thrilled to introduce the Honest Talk podcast. I'm Jennifer Stewart. And I'm Katherine
00:47:05.100
Clark. And in this podcast, we interview Canada's most inspiring women, entrepreneurs, artists,
00:47:10.800
athletes, politicians, and newsmakers, all at different stages of their journey. So if you're
00:47:15.960
looking to connect, then we hope you'll join us. Listen to the Honest Talk podcast on iHeartRadio or
00:47:21.020
wherever you listen to your podcasts. Welcome back into Clay and Buck. We are joined by Senator
00:47:26.900
Marsha Blackburn of the great state of Tennessee, which has given us both a fantastic senator and a
00:47:34.140
fantastic Clay Travis. So we have so much to be thankful for, Tennessee. And thank you for being
00:47:39.700
here, Senator. Well, I'm always so delighted to join you all. Thanks for having me back.
00:47:47.160
It really was an incredible State of the Union. And that comes, Senator Blackburn, from somebody who
00:47:52.640
thinks even his own team, State of the Unions, are usually kind of boring and go too long. I felt
00:47:57.380
last night was remarkable. I just wanted to get your top line thoughts on it. And how was it?
00:48:04.560
It was remarkable. And the two hours absolutely flew by because the president just kept rolling
00:48:13.000
right on through all the objections that the left side of the aisle was throwing their way.
00:48:19.480
I was so pleased. He laid out where we were a year and a half ago with 9% inflation with chaos in the
00:48:26.040
world. And then he drew it to today where we're at 2.4% inflation, the price of gas coming down,
00:48:34.320
the price of groceries beginning to normalize, wages going up and job opportunities increasing.
00:48:41.440
And our standing in the world is restored. Our allies are working with us. Our adversaries
00:48:48.920
enemies and enemies fear us. They know that President Trump means business and that he has
00:48:55.320
the backing of Republicans in the House and the Senate. Were you stunned, even as someone who has
00:49:03.440
been involved in politics for a long time, that when they had the mom of a murdered innocent woman
00:49:10.920
and they had her stand and when they had Charlie Kirk's wife, Erica stand and when even on a much less serious
00:49:18.760
front, they brought in the U.S. men's Olympic team that every Democrat didn't stand up and clap.
00:49:27.020
I wish there had been even more of a camera on the larger viewing area so you could see it.
00:49:34.300
But I got to admit, I was kind of staggered. I don't know who gave Democrats that advice,
00:49:39.480
but including, hey, do you think your job is to take care of citizens or illegal immigrants?
00:49:45.040
That's right. I couldn't believe the way they behaved.
00:49:48.440
Their behavior was appalling. And the fact that they would stay sitting in their seats
00:49:53.880
and not stand to honor these who have lost loved ones, to honor those that have served our country,
00:50:03.240
to honor the oath that they took to protect and defend and honor the people who voted for them
00:50:14.020
and elected them to make certain that they were there to serve the people. It was absolutely astounding.
00:50:22.260
But you know what? This is where the line of distinction is. What we have seen is the current
00:50:31.700
Democrat Party, which is led by the far left wing of the Democrat Party, the Democrat Socialists,
00:50:40.760
they would rather take care of illegal immigrants than they would take care of the people that voted for
00:50:49.220
them. They would rather provide for illegal immigrants than provide for the citizens of their states
00:50:59.780
and the citizens of this nation. It is astounding.
00:51:05.780
Senator Blackburn, you also wanted to talk to us today about this case currently with the courts
00:51:13.340
involving social media and there's the Kids Online Safety Act. There's a whole range of issues coming
00:51:20.380
together here. Can you just tell us first what is going on right now? We've got Mark Zuckerberg
00:51:27.500
recently had to show up in Los Angeles County Superior Court. He testified. He's the CEO of Meta.
00:51:34.940
There's this whole court case going on. It's with the jury right now. What are the items at issue
00:51:41.520
and what do you want to see from this case? Yes, indeed. This case, which I will say this,
00:51:48.600
Mark Zuckerberg being on the stand in this case, I don't know what the outcome, the legal ramifications
00:51:56.640
of the case are going to end up being. No one can tell us exactly because there's a jury involved.
00:52:03.460
What I do know is this, that Mark Zuckerberg lost in the court of public opinion because he continued
00:52:12.060
to say that social media had nothing to do with the accelerated levels of anxiety and depression,
00:52:20.760
eating disorders, teen suicide, and this bucket of mental health issues. When the research that Meta has
00:52:31.400
and whistleblowers have given that research to us, and of course, it was presented in court,
00:52:37.860
and you know that they know what they are doing to kids. You know that they are designing programming
00:52:45.420
to capture younger kids. We all know that the valuation of Meta and Google and all of these
00:52:53.000
big tech companies. It is based on the number of eyeballs they draw to the page and the amount of
00:53:01.460
time they can keep those eyeballs focused on their platform. So I think he lost in the court of public
00:53:11.440
opinion. It has brought forward the need to pass the Kids Online Safety Act. That came out of the Senate
00:53:18.880
at 91 to 3. We have 75 Senate co-sponsors on it. It is significant. It would put in place a duty of
00:53:29.080
care, a product by design safety standard for the virtual space. That is something at this point we do
00:53:37.000
not have. Your grandkids, my sons, go to a similar school in the Nashville area that has a good technology
00:53:46.700
policy, which is, and I know they probably may be cheating right now, but they're not supposed to
00:53:53.080
have their phones. They're not supposed to be able to text message during school, and if they're caught
00:53:57.140
with cell phones during school hours, there are consequences. Shouldn't this be the standard for
00:54:03.000
every school basically in America? You're a grandma. Before that, you were a mom. As a dad, I think it's a
00:54:08.960
no-brainer, and I think it's super bipartisan. Are you in favor of this? More and more schools not
00:54:15.400
allowing kids to be on phones during the day. Oh, yes, indeed. Bell to bell, no cell. That is a very
00:54:24.660
good policy for kids, and you know, there's a growing body of research that shows that children
00:54:32.620
who do not have a cell phone on their desk, in their backpack, within reach, their test scores go up,
00:54:41.800
their achievement goes up, their participation in class increases, and the more you see this research,
00:54:50.120
the more you know that it does matter, and you realize what a massive distraction it is to have
00:54:57.380
that cell phone at the ready. I think one of the things that is so interesting about this also
00:55:03.180
is talking to parents, teachers, and principals. Most of the behavioral issues that take place
00:55:10.920
on school campuses find their nexus at the cell phone, and the bullying is 24-7. It never stops.
00:55:21.600
So putting those phones away for that period of the academic day forces kids to focus on what they
00:55:31.600
are studying. It means that kids that go to study hall are actually doing research work. They're writing
00:55:39.180
papers. They're pulling books out of the library shelves, and hearing from librarians about the
00:55:47.020
change in behavior during those study halls is something that has not been lost on me.
00:55:54.080
Speaking to Senator Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee, when you talk about, I just want to bring us back
00:55:59.260
to this for a second, the social media issues for kids and online duty of care. Are the social media
00:56:05.800
companies, are they just saying that that's impossible, it's too expensive, it's not necessary?
00:56:11.780
I mean, what's the counter-argument? Because usually, when it comes to any political issue
00:56:16.560
about children, everyone at least pretends that they care about the kids, right? I mean, even the
00:56:21.700
big companies pretend. So what are they saying in response to this? Why would they, you know,
00:56:28.540
will they go along with it? I mean, why does it even require an act by Congress?
00:56:34.840
They have proven they cannot police themselves. They have also proven that when kids are on those
00:56:40.420
phones, kids are the product. And, you know, one of the interesting things is that every industrial
00:56:46.700
sector in this country has product safety standards, whether it's an automobile, a toaster,
00:56:54.140
a mattress, a curling iron, everything has a safety standard. Everything except the virtual space.
00:57:04.080
And the reason for that, big tech has spent millions of dollars lobbying. Last year, fourth quarter of the
00:57:12.980
year, in order to take down the Kids Online Safety Act, META hired one lobbyist for every six members
00:57:22.020
of Congress and spent $20 million. I'm somebody that knows what it feels like to have big tech come
00:57:32.480
barreling after them with lots of lobbyist lawyers and millions of dollars because they do not want to
00:57:41.300
change their business model. They would have to change that business model if you put in place
00:57:48.860
a safety by design standard. If you de-link the algorithm so that the algorithm can be controlled
00:57:58.960
by the parents and the kids and not controlled by the platform. They don't want that.
00:58:09.000
Senator Blackburn, last night I was at a in the black is what it's called event about trying to balance
00:58:16.400
a budget. A bunch of people, you know, were there. It was awesome. I know you're running for governor.
00:58:23.100
But the federal government inability to remotely make decisions that have to do like, let's use as
00:58:32.880
an example right now, basic election integrity. You're going to be on the ballot in November.
00:58:37.820
Tennessee, thankfully, has really great election integrity. But the fact that white, black,
00:58:42.300
Asian, Hispanic people overwhelmingly believe that you should have to show a photo ID in order to vote
00:58:49.120
to prove you're who you are. What's going to happen with that in the Senate? I think there might be a
00:58:54.680
filibuster. How's that process going to play out? I still can't believe this is unpassable, basically,
00:59:02.500
You know, it's an 80 percent issue with the American people across all different demographic groups.
00:59:11.940
And that's the thing that is so interesting. The fact that it has such broad bipartisan support.
00:59:17.800
I mean, Zoran Mandami wants you to show two forms of ID in order to go shovel snow in New York.
00:59:25.580
But he doesn't want you to show an ID to vote. What they're trying to do is make it easy to cheat
00:59:32.400
and hard to vote. We want to make it easy to vote and hard to cheat. And we have got to have photo
00:59:42.520
ID in the Senate. We are going to push the Save America Act forward. I look forward to having a vote
00:59:49.360
on the floor. It should be common sense, standard practice that you have to be a citizen of the
00:59:57.700
United States in order to vote in our elections. And you have to show an ID and prove who you are.
01:00:06.600
When it comes to the issue of the balanced budget, and I have supported a balanced budget amendment for
01:00:14.540
the United States. We have that in Tennessee. We have to balance our budget. We can't borrow money or
01:00:22.060
print money. We have to be very careful about that and be a good fiscal steward. It means that some
01:00:29.800
years, the leaner years, you cannot do some projects you want to do. And then it means when you do have
01:00:36.920
years where you have a surplus, you have to be wise about where you place those dollars. The federal
01:00:42.780
government should do likewise, and they would be well served to do likewise.
01:00:51.220
Senator Blackburn, appreciate you being with us. You got it. Take care.
01:00:57.080
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