10/6/25: Trump Tells Bibi Stop Bombing, Greta Tortured By Israel, Trump Portland Invasion Blocked, Dire Warning On Revenge Loop

24:34So can you break down some of how all of that went and how those Arab coalition partners are thinking about this? Yeah, I mean, this is sort of an astonishing story, Crystal. So what happened is over the past several weeks leading up to Trump and Netanyahu taking the podium and announcing this 20 point plan, Trump and his administration had a series of meetings with Egypt, with Qatar, with Turkey, with Pakistan, with Indonesia, with Saudi Arabia, with the United Arab Emirates. And they were going over drafts of what was originally going to be a 21 point plan from Donald Trump. And just to give an example, one of the things that was in an original draft shown to Arab countries was that there was going to be no Israeli annexation of the West Bank.

25:14That was removed then from the plan that was distributed by the White House last Monday when Trump and Netanyahu took the podium. But what I understand is that in the 48 hours leading up to Trump and Netanyahu coming out, Steve Whitcoff, Trump's special envoy, Jared Kushner, the president's son-in-law, and Ron Dermer, Netanyahu's top political advisor and the minister for strategic affairs, sat down and they started just plucking out various terms or changing the wording that the Arab and Muslim nations had signed off on. And then they also created a whole new map for Israeli withdrawal that would leave Israeli forces deep within Gaza, even after all of the captives were released.

25:58Trump did not inform any of those Arab countries ahead of time that these changes had been made. And so foreign ministers of all of those countries, you know, watched Trump and Netanyahu. And they said, wait a minute, this is not the text that we had been shown. But they didn't denounce Trump. They didn't say, oh, this was a lie. What they did is they sort of sat there and ate it. And they put out statements giving general statements of support for Trump's initiative. But privately, I'm told, Crystal, they told Hamas negotiators, this was not what we signed on for, but we can't do anything about it right now.

26:34So they encouraged Hamas, and I think more than encouraged. I think they were saying to them, this is really the last chance to make a deal. You cannot reject Trump's deal, no matter how disgusted you may be with some of the terms. And so I think what we see is Trump kind of saying he accepts the offer that Hamas didn't exactly make, and Hamas saying we accept your offer that you didn't exactly make. And so now it really does boil down to it. You know, there was this other thing that happened, which is that I think Netanyahu and Israel were stunned at how enthusiastic Trump was when he, you know, the white, something crazy that happened.

27:10I don't know if you guys caught this, but Trump puts out his statement saying, great, you know, Hamas has just given us a really good response. And then the White House posted a translation of Hamas's entire statement in full, including its characterization of what Israel is doing in Gaza as a genocide, referring to Israeli forces as occupation troops. So the White House posts this thing, and they said an important statement from Donald Trump. So they put that out, and then there's all these accusations. Well, now Trump is Hamas because, of course, the Israelis accuse everyone of being Hamas. The White House then – it was up for quite a while.

27:46They then deleted it. But what was happening is that the Israelis are spinning this, saying there were no surprises here. Everything has been fully coordinated. Axios, though, Barack Ravid reported that when Netanyahu did speak to Trump, he said to Trump, you know, this is a terrible deal and it's meaningless what Hamas has said. And then Trump says to him, why are you always so effing negative? That was the quote that was in Axios talking to Netanyahu. So I think what we have here is it's something a little bit more than these fake stories about, oh, there's trouble between Netanyahu and Trump.

28:17I think Trump, for his own reasons we've discussed on this show before, actually does want this done. He sees profit motivations in Gaza. He wants development there. And he wants the Nobel Peace Prize. So, you know, typically what happens is that the U.S. has something resembling a kerfuffle between, you know, whether it was Biden or Trump and Netanyahu, and then they get in line and then the genocide resumes. This time, there are other dynamics at play, including Trump's relationship with these Arab countries. Yes, this could be an elaborate setup. It's certainly possible that they're going to try to trick Hamas into giving all of the Israeli captives and then resume the genocide.

28:56But that would cause an earthquake in Trump's relationships with these Arab countries. And I think Trump genuinely does want he and his cronies to make a lot of money off of what he believes will come next in Gaza. The wild card, though, is the Palestinians are saying, we're not going to give up our weapons. We're not going to agree to disarmament. That's not for Hamas to decide. That's for the Palestinian people. So that's that I think is going to be the real serious sticking point this week to look for is the Israelis don't want any conditions given up to retrieve their 48 captives, 20 living, 28 deceased.

29:29And Hamas is saying, we're not going to link demilitarization of the Palestinian people to any of this. We need to negotiate an end to this war alone. Yeah. And see, that is the sticking point where I just can't seem to see resolution. But you seem a lot more optimistic than me, Jeremy, because when I look at it, it's very possible a hostage deal, swap, some sort of temporary ceasefire seems totally within the realm of possibility. Can you talk about how you said Hamas wants a Trump guarantee? From my eyes, though, why would you want necessarily a Trump guarantee when we were about to meet with the Iranians and then we bombed them the next day?

30:03I mean, that just seemed sure. I mean, they have no position necessarily to negotiate, but they have all those other Middle Eastern countries around them. They have all of these disparate forces, some which are acting on them saying, hey, as you just said, You can't just surrender armed liberation or armed resistance as a cause. How does that dynamic come into play here past the hostages? I mean, this has been true from the beginning where the, you know, the Palestinian negotiators understand that Trump doesn't keep his word, that he's an erratic guy. So they're not, you know, going into this blind.

30:34They understand what it is. But at the end of the day, they'll say, and I talked to them about this, what other choice do we have? We have to get as many countries as possible to encourage Trump to stay the course on this. We need Trump's guarantees. And they understand, and this is part of why they are not going to agree to any sort of disarmament, that at an instant, Trump could shift gears. And next thing you know, Netanyahu is massively bombing Gaza again. You know, I am not optimistic. I'm just pointing out that there are some different dynamics at play because of Trump's unique posture as the president of the United States and the fact that his family has massive business investments in Qatar, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates.

31:12they have a lot to gain from getting Netanyahu to end this war. From the Palestinian perspective, though, the way that they approached this was to say there are only a handful of issues that Hamas has a mandate to negotiate. Anything else must be negotiated among all Palestinian factions. And I think that there's going to be a lot of behind the scenes maneuvering. The Palestinian authority under Mahmoud Abbas is highly unpopular. Trump recently denied a visa to Mahmoud Abbas to come into the United States to speak at the United Nations. Palestinians don't trust the Palestinian authority. European countries are trying to bolster it.

31:50So the question is, like, what Palestinians are going to be in charge of running Gaza? And are they actually going to be in charge? Or is it going to be the former prime minister and unindicted war criminal Tony Blair that's presiding over this. This is gonna be a huge boondoggle if somehow Trump is able to move forward with these so-called development plans. And a lot of his cronies are gonna make a lot of money and those Gulf states are gonna make a lot of money. So I'm saying that in real political terms, it's not about the politics of this or the history of it. The motivation from Trump, I think, is to try to get the Nobel Prize and to try to set up a situation where a lot of Westerners and Arab Gulf states make a lot of money off of Gaza.

32:32Attempted money grab. And Jeremy, what's your sense of, is there any schism between the political leadership of Hamas and the battlefield commanders on the ground in Gaza? What's interesting is that part of what they had to do to deliver this response to Trump is to distribute drafts of this statement. And they did that among Palestinian factions. And then they had to get it to the commanders of the Qassan Brigades and Soraya Al-Quds, the armed forces that are holding the Israeli captives and the political leadership of Hamas on the ground. And my understanding was that it went very quickly, that there were minor discussions about language and questions that were asked, but that they came to an agreement very swiftly.

33:14You know, the New York Times, BBC, other news outlets in recent days had reported, oh, you know, the ground commanders are going to reject this thing. They're hardliners. My sources, I think, would tell me if there were such divisions. And the speed with which they did this, Trump gave them an ultimatum on Friday saying they had until Sunday at 6 p.m. They delivered their response within hours of Trump making that three-day window for them. So, no, I think there was debate of a different nature within Hamas and Islamic Jihad, which was, do we reject this deal or do we try to thread the needle?

33:50That was the real debate because a lot of Palestinians read this document and say, there's nothing good in here for us. And, you know, a lot of suspicion it was a trap. The camp of people that prevailed were the ones that said, we have to try to think strategically, to go into it with an open mind, to make ourselves appear to be the flexible party and Netanyahu, the obstructionist, and to appeal to Trump's ego and to embrace the idea that we recognize, and it's legitimate, he's the only one that can end this war. And that's what they did. I think they feel that they gave the best response they could have.

34:21And now their negotiators have arrived in Egypt. Khalil al-Hayah, the political leader of Hamas, he made his first public appearance since Israel tried to assassinate him in Doha, Qatar on September 9th. He gave a brief interview to an Arab TV network. He didn't talk about the ceasefire process or the agreement. He talked about the fact that Israel assassinated his son in that bombing. And he said, you know, we're not made of iron and stone. We agree. We grieve like everyone else. but I see their lives as worth no more than the lives of the other Palestinians who have died during this genocide.

34:54So that's the tone that Khalil al-Hayah is going into this with, having just lost his son, having his wife injured in the bombing, his daughter-in-law injured in the bombing, his grandchildren injured in the bombing. That's the guy who's leading the indirect negotiations now and is going to be sitting effectively in a room next to the Israeli negotiators who are going to do their best to try to make sure the Palestinians get nothing in return accept their own prisoners freed from Israeli prisons in return for all of their leverage, which is 48 Israeli captives, 20 living, 28 deceased. Welcome to the A-Building.

35:28I'm Hans Charles. I'm Menelik Lumumba. It's 1969. Malcolm X and Martin Luther King Jr. have both been assassinated, and Black America is at a breaking point. Rioting and protests broke out on an unprecedented scale. In Atlanta, Georgia, at Martin's Almormata, Morehouse College, The students had their own protest. It featured two prominent figures in Black history, Martin Luther King Sr. and a young student, Samuel L. Jackson. To be in what we really thought was a revolution, I mean, people were dying. 1968, the murder of Dr. King, which traumatized everyone. The FBI had a role in the murder of a Black Panther leader in Chicago.

36:12This story is about protest. It echoes in today's world far more than it should, and it will blow your mind. Listen to The A Building on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

36:30What do you do when the headlines don't explain what's happening inside of you? I'm Ben Higgins, and if you can hear me, it's where culture meets the soul, a place for real conversation. Each episode, I sit down with people from all walks of life, celebrities, thinkers, and everyday folks, and we go deeper than the polished story. We talk about what drives us, what shapes us, and what gives us hope. We get honest about the big stuff. Identity when you don't recognize yourself anymore. Loss that changes you. Purpose when success isn't enough. Peace when your mind won't slow down. Faith when it's complicated.

37:08Some guests have answers. Most are still figuring it out. If you've ever felt like there has to be more to the story, this show is for you. Listen to If You Can Hear Me on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

37:28China's Ministry of State Security is one of the most mysterious and powerful spy agencies in the world. But in 2017, the FBI got inside. This is Special Agent Regal, Special Agent Bradley Hall. This MSS officer has no idea the U.S. government is on to him. But the FBI has his chats, texts, emails, even his personal diary. Hear how they got it on the Sixth Bureau podcast. I now have several terabytes of an MSS officer, no doubt, no question, of his life. And that's a unicorn. No one had ever seen anything like that. It was unbelievable. This is a story of the inner workings of the MSS and how one man's ambition and mistakes opened its vault of secrets.

38:18Listen to The Sixth Bureau on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Jeremy, while we have you, we did want to get an update on the Summa Flotilla. we do have here a video of an Italian journalist who was on board who talked about the treatment that many of the captives, including Greta Thunberg, suffered after they were taken captive by the Israelis. Let's take a listen to that. We'll get your reaction. Greta Thunberg, a brave woman who is only 22 years old, she was humiliated and wrapped in an Israeli flag and exhibited like a trophy. I had the feeling of being in a really barbaric place, And I really hope that this barbarism might be over soon.

39:04So that was an update there from the Italian journalist. I know, Jeremy, as well, that one of your own journalists actually remains or was missing. I believe you don't have any update or status on it. So can you just give us your reaction as, you know, literally somebody with a direct connection here to the flotilla? Yeah, I mean, one of our editors, Alex Colston, was on one of the ships. and he was snatched along with the others by Israeli forces days ago. We got an initial update confirming that he had been taken to the port of Ashdod in Israel. And then we were told he was moved to this prison where they're also holding figures from the Hamas resistance that had been taken by Israel.

39:45But the Israeli government has given us no updates whatsoever on Alex's status. And there are also no updates on the status of a lot of others. Yes, many of them have been released. They're coming out and they're describing bed bug infested cells, forms of abuse and mistreatment. They were also subjected to a visit by Itamar Ben-Gavir, the interior security minister of Israel, who ran around saying that they're all going to be treated like terrorists. The way that Israel treats Palestinians, who it puts in its prisons, is to beat them, degrade them, torture them, subject them to other forms of abuse.

40:23We've heard some very disturbing reports about how these flotilla activists were treated, but we remain deeply concerned about the fate of one of our editors, Alex Colston. And I just want to say at the end of the day that while all of us should be paying attention to how they're treating these international activists, the fact is that there are as many as 15 ,000 Palestinians, including women and children, that remain in these Israeli facilities. And Israel is an entity that subjects children to military tribunal systems and denies them access to lawyers. We've seen prisoners being killed extrajudicially inside of Israeli prisons.

41:02So while we should focus on the fact that our colleague Alex, his status is unknown, and many of these people seem to be subjected to abuse, what Palestinians have endured in these Israeli facilities is unconscionable. And the world really should be focusing on that as an issue as well. And I know many of the flotilla activists have made that point themselves. Yeah, of course. And to your point there, the peace deal from Trump actually contains a number of admissions, including in the hostage exchange deal they talk about and all of the women and children are going to be released, which is an admission that Israel is, in fact, holding children hostage in their prison system, and then also allowing the free flow of aid, which is another admission that Israel is not allowing the free flow of aid, which is something that they have denied vociferously.

41:51Yeah, I mean, those are very important points, Crystal. And another thing in there is the formula is for each body of a deceased Israeli, they're going to hand over 15 bodies of Palestinians. Remember how Trump's been focusing on who holds dead bodies? Why do they have dead bodies there? Israel, for decades, has had a practice of holding the corpses of dead Palestinians in freezers or in graves marked only by numbers. They have hundreds of bodies of Palestinians, some that have been there for decades without returning them to their families. This is a matter of national policy in Israel. So, you know, what we see happening is that every allegation that is made by Israel against Palestinians, Israel is doing that on an industrial scale.

42:37And there are some rather interesting assertions in Trump's plan that if you just peel the layer back a little bit, you recognize that even Trump realizes that what Israel is doing very much can be categorized as genocide. and, you know, in some cases, extrajudicial torture. You're talking about children being in prison, and it references that in this. It's an admission, even though it's just a technical detail. The fact that they put it in there, it means they have to be accountable for having that knowledge. And, Jeremy, we also had some reporting here, and people are calling it the Barry Weiss buzzer beater from CBS News, about those initial attacks on the flotilla.

43:21Not that this will come as any sort of a surprise, but this is A-10, guys. we can put this up on the screen. They did learn that Netanyahu himself directly approved those military operations against two of the flotilla vessels early last month. Two American intelligence officials briefed on the matter, told CBS News Israeli forces on September 8th and 9th launched drones from a submarine, dropped incendiary devices onto those boats that were moored outside a Tunisian port. You know, I know with Israel, we just like these things happen. And it's just like, yeah, it's just what they do. Sort of like, you know, all sorts of insanity that Trump does that just, you know, no other president could get away with.

44:00But just speak a little bit to how extraordinary this is, how wild it is, what rogue kind of lawless behavior this is from our great ally Israel. Yeah. And remember that Israel also has a history of killing people on these flotillas. And this isn't new. I mean, this goes back in 2010. You had the Mavi Marmara, where Israeli special forces raided and they killed a number of international activists on a flotilla. And it's important to remember the context of this. Who are the people on the flotilla and what are they doing? It includes lawmakers from countries around the world, former ministers in governments, journalists, medical workers, activists, and they're trying to break an illegal blockade to bring infant formula, to bring food, to bring other humanitarian goods.

44:47And Israel uses high tech submarines to penetrate the waters of Tunisia, to launch a drone, to try to set the ships on fire, to try to prevent these people from going and breaking their illegal blockade so that their forced starvation campaign can continue on. This is the kind of entity that the world is dealing with. Most people's eyes are open right now and they see clearly what Israel is, especially under Benjamin Netanyahu. And the question is whether Trump's interests are going to align with this massive shift in public perception of what Israel is. The real question is if Donald Trump's business and ego interests are going to align with what clearly is a world that wants Israel to stop committing genocide and stop acting as a pariah state on the world stage.

45:35Very possible. We do have a bit of information here. Maybe we can add this in post-production. The Israeli foreign ministry has just released this. 171 additional provocateurs from the Hamas flotilla, including Greta Thunberg, were deported today from Israel to Greece and Slovakia. Deportees are citizens, and they list the various countries. They say, quote, all the legal rights of the participants in this PR stunt were and will continue to be fully upheld. The lies they are spreading are part of their preplanned fake news campaign. So that fits largely what we've seen, Jeremy. I did note that they call it the Hamas Sumud flotilla, but that's kind of what they've been saying from the beginning.

46:11Yeah. And again, remember that this is accusation number one that Israel always makes against anyone that dares to be a doctor or a medical worker or an activist or a journalist. It's their Hamas. So, you know, Israel has used that so much that it just is void of any meaning. But the fact is that Israel violently took custody of activists who were trying to break their illegal siege and is trying to cover it up by just bombarding the space with its own lies. It's a pattern we've seen for the past two years, in fact, for many decades. All right. Well, we will continue to monitor the drop site reporter, Alex, and we hope for a safe return.

46:50So thank you very much for joining us, Jeremy. We appreciate your analysis. Thank you. Welcome to the A-Building. I'm Hans Charles. I'm Menelik Lumumba. It's 1969. Malcolm X and Martin Luther King Jr. have both been assassinated. And Black America was at a breaking point. Writing and protests broke out on an unprecedented scale. In Atlanta, Georgia, at Martin's alma mater, Morehouse College, the students had their own protest. It featured two prominent figures in Black history, Martin Luther King Sr. and a young student, Samuel L. Jackson. To be in what we really thought was a revolution, I mean, people were dying.

47:291968, the murder of Dr. King, which traumatized everyone. The FBI had a role in the murder of a Black Panther leader in Chicago. This story is about protest. It echoes in today's world far more than it should. And it will blow your mind. Listen to The A-Building on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

47:58What do you do when the headlines don't explain what's happening inside of you? I'm Ben Higgins, and if you can hear me, it's where culture meets the soul. A place for real conversation. Each episode, I sit down with people from all walks of life. Celebrities, thinkers, and everyday folks. And we go deeper than the polished story. We talk about what drives us, what shapes us, and what gives us hope. We get honest about the big stuff. Identity when you don't recognize yourself anymore. Loss that changes you. Purpose when success isn't enough. Peace when your mind won't slow down. Faith when it's complicated.

48:36Some guests have answers. Most are still figuring it out. If you've ever felt like there has to be more to the story, this show is for you. Listen to If You Can Hear Me on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

48:56China's Ministry of State Security is one of the most mysterious and powerful spy agencies in the world. But in 2017, the FBI got inside. This is Special Agent Regal, Special Agent Bradley Hall. This MSS officer has no idea the U.S. government is on to him. But the FBI has his chats, texts, emails, even his personal diary. Hear how they got it on the Sixth Bureau podcast. I now have several terabytes of an MSS officer, no doubt, no question, of his life. And that's a unicorn. No one had ever seen anything like that. It was unbelievable. This is a story of the inner workings of the MSS and how one man's ambition and mistakes opened its vault of secrets.

49:47Listen to the Sixth Bureau on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

50:19issuing a temporary restraining order. Then Trump said, OK, well, since we can't send in the Oregon National Guard, we've already federalized the California National Guard. We'll just send some of them in. So this judge had an emergency hearing last night and said, no, you cannot send any National Guard, whether it's from Oregon, California, Texas has also been floated. You cannot send the National Guard into this state on issuing a temporary restraining order while the process plays out and the case is decided on the merits. California's attorney general weighed in and sort of explained the legal process yesterday evening.

50:54Let's go ahead and take a listen to that. A judge had already said yesterday that the conditions on the ground absolutely do not justify the federalization of National Guard. They don't justify the federalization of Oregon National Guard. And so the federal government, in its ingenious thinking, said, well, her order, though it said there were no conditions to bring the National Guard, Federalized National Guard to Oregon, applied to the Oregon National Guard. How about we bring in California National Guard? Maybe that would work. And she was completely miffed. I just listened in on the entire hearing.

51:34First of all, thank you to my incredible team, the incredible teams in Oregon and Portland. It was a team effort, folks working overtime. Obviously, today's a Sunday, and democracy needs to be protected every day, and the rule of law does as well. And she was really miffed. Her first set of questions of the federal government were, how does this not violate my order from yesterday? And I think she's right, you know, that this sort of super technical approach to try to bring National Guard in that's from another state. state, and just minutes before the hearing commenced, we got word through a memorandum from Secretary Hegseth that the Texas National Guard has been federalized, 2 ,000 of them, with 400 of them being deployed to both Portland and Chicago.

52:23So it is clear that it's a sort of whack-a-mole approach from the federal government. You stop the Oregon National Guard from being federalized, we'll bring in the California National Guard. You stop the California National Guard from being brought up north, we'll bring in the Texas National Guard. You stop them, we got, you know, who's got next? You know, we got a bunch of others we can bring in. And so we asked her, the judge, to issue a broad order that says, that applies to every National Guard in every state and the District of Columbia, and that none of them can be deployed, can be federalized and deployed to Oregon.

52:59And she issued that order from the bench. She's going to back it up with a written order as well. But she was concerned based on the behavior of the federal government about what the scope of her order should be and believed, and I agree, that a broad order that is broad in scope is appropriate. So that's the nuts and bolts of what happened here. I did go and look at the judge's original order, Sarah, because, you know, there's a lot of talk about, oh, Portland, this, an insurrection, blah, blah, blah. And so, okay, what's the reality of what's been going on here? And this is all focused around this one ICE facility in the city of Portland.

53:32And even what the government claimed in order to justify federalizing the National Guard, which is an extraordinary action which requires something on the level of like a rebellion or an insurrection, the most they could point to were a few incidents from like June and July where you had protesters shining lights in people's eyes, those sorts of things. And in recent weeks leading up to the federalization of the National Guard, they said that the typical nightlife in downtown Portland required more law enforcement resources than what was happening outside of this ICE facility. You were talking about, you know, eight to 20 protesters who would be there just sort of like sitting around in lawn chairs.

54:12And so that's why she said that this, you know, even with granting a lot of latitude to the federal government, that they were they were likely that Oregon was likely to succeed in their case because there was nothing approaching insurrection or rebellion that even the government could point to that was happening here. There was an interesting line. One of my friends combed through the decision. He's a legal analyst and he flagged this line from the judge's ruling, quote, Quote, on the night, September 28th, 2025, National Guard mobilization was announced. The size of protests increased substantially, ballooning to around 200 with the second protest at a different location, including a, quote, few hundred.

54:48Moreover, this court notes that in Los Angeles, the National Guard mobilization's, quote, inflamed protests, spawned unrest at new locations and required additional resources from California Highway Patrol. I thought it was actually kind of an interesting flag from the judge's ruling about the practicality, about what they're claiming to quash. And, yes, I also have been honestly mystified at where Portland came from because, I mean, Chicago made sense in the Trump narrative, right, about crime. I mean, look, no one's going to deny that Chicago is a huge crime problem or even in respect to Washington, D.C.

55:22They'd also talked about Memphis. But Portland honestly came out of nowhere. And so I had to do some digging. It seems to me that quite a lot of this is retcon revenge for 2017 to 2020, which I mean, to be fair, Portland was genuinely out of control under the first Trump administration. There were huge ICE protests. You'll remember there was there was like some conflict or my memory is escaping me. And I forget exactly who the mayor was. This was like a big thing with Antifa. And there were nightly protests. And then their BLM with Portland was insane. And so anyway, from what I have been able to tell, most of this is revenge on Portland for 2017 to 2020.

56:05And 20. Yeah. And so I think that's kind of the context through which I have been able to see this because it's like you said, I looked at the protests. I was like, OK, I mean, is protests. The administration's argument is that the Portland police are refusing to do any backup of ICE, which, I mean, I guess is technically within their rights. Right. I mean, if you have a city and a police department, I don't know. I don't really know how it all works in terms of whether you have like an obligation to back up federal law enforcement if that's what the police chief and the mayor are telling you not to do.

56:35whatever, there's civilian control. But that seems to be the justification for some 300 National Guardsmen. All of it is really centered, like you said, around this ICE facility. But from what I could see, there was not a big protest around this. And if you look at it in the context of 2017 to 2020, it starts to make a lot more sense. Yeah. I mean, I just looked at it as Portland is kind of Portland and Seattle were both strongly associated with, quote unquote, Antifa. And since They're doing this big point. I mean, it was like it was crazy. Remember, Seattle had chopper. But not is. But that's what I'm saying.

57:08Like in terms of where this came from. Yeah. None of it has to make sense. Right. They'll just use any excuse. And so since they're making this big Antifa push and there's this association with Portland and Antifa, I think that's where it came from. But I actually have the piece from the from the judge's decision, which, again, this is a temporary restraining order. what they had to find is that Oregon is likely to succeed on the merits, but this will continue through the court system. There will be a final decision here. Again, worth noting, this is a Trump judge. This isn't some blib. And in California, what happened is the initial federal district judge ruled on Newsom's side.

57:45And then when it went to the appeals court, they ruled against Newsom. This judge went out of her way to separate this case from what was happening in California. And I think that is fair. Listen, I disagree with the appeals court decision there. But there were genuine, like there was stuff happening. We saw the cars on fire, like there were protests, there were arrests being made, there were violent incidents, etc. Do I think any of that came in close to justifying federal lives in the National Guard? No. But that was a different beast entirely than these like eight to 20 people who were sitting in lawn chairs outside of an ICE facility.

58:18Well, within their rights, by the way, you're allowed to protest the federal government. And so within this ruling from the judge, she cites what the government was even using to claim the power to federalize the National Guard. And two of the things were just like, well, things happen in other parts of the country and they could happen here. Or, you know, we have, yes, it's small now, but maybe in the future something bad could happen. So we got to be there just in case. And she's like, you can't do this just based on like your idea of something that might happen in the future. The specific incidents they point to, she says, defendants declarants describe only four incidents of protesters clashing with federal officers in the month of September preceding the federalization order on September 1st, 9th, 12th, and without further specification, the second week of September.

59:03First involved protesters setting up a makeshift guillotine to intimidate federal officials. That seems legal to me anyway. The second involved four people shining overpowered flashlights in the eyes of drivers. Third involved someone posting a photograph of an unmarked ICE vehicle online, and the last involved additional drivers having flashlights shown in their eyes. So that's the month of, that's the only thing that could even point to happening in the month of September. I think any reasonable person would look at that and be like, you probably don't need the National Guard to deal with that.

59:32But all of that being said, let's go ahead and take a listen to how Trump is characterizing what is going on in Portland, which apparently bears no relation to what reality was prior to their extraordinary sort of uptick in federal presence there. This is the first element in this block, guys. Let's go ahead and play it. We're going to look at that. It was amazing. Portland is burning to the ground. It's insurrectionists all over the place. It's Antifa. And yet the politicians who are petrified. Look, the politicians are afraid for their lives. That's the only reason that they say, like, there's nothing happening.

1:00:09And you've seen it. The place is burning down and they pretend like there's nothing happening. So we'll take a look at the order. We haven't seen the order yet. So I don't know what he saw on Fox News or whatever, or just invented or was told by Stephen Miller. But in his view, the place is burning to the ground. He called it war ravaged. Portland, completely absurd. And so anyway, that's where we are in terms of the legal system. We can also go ahead and play that in Chicago separately, there has been a major escalation in terms of federal agents. On Friday, we showed you that. Absolutely horrific.

1:00:44Apartment raid. Kids, adults pulled out of their beds. Middle of the night. American citizen, non-American citizen. Frickin' Blackhawk helicopters. People rappelling onto the roof. Little kids zip-tied naked, thrown into U-Haul vans. So that's all happening in Chicago. And according to Governor Pritzker and also according to Independent Reporting, Trump is now planning to try to federalize the Illinois National Guard to send into Chicago as well. Let's go ahead and play B2. This is Governor J.B. Pritzker responding to the Trump administration escalation there. Let me just say that the secretary doesn't know what she's talking about.

1:01:21She frankly says that people are clapping. They're not. They're booing her on the street and they're booing ICE and CBP. They're marching, CBP marching on a beautiful Sunday in Michigan Avenue in downtown Chicago. They're raiding neighborhoods where instead of going after the bad guys, they're just picking up people who are brown and black and then checking their credentials. Are you a U.S. citizen? I don't know about you, but I don't carry around papers that say I'm a U.S. citizen. So you can imagine people are getting detained. They're getting arrested. U.S. citizens. And they did this, of course, when they raided a building in the middle of the night in South Shore.

1:02:01130 people that were emptied out of this building. They were going after a few gang members. And instead, they broke windows. They broke down doors. They ransacked the place. And there were people that were held. I mean, elderly people and children zip tied. Elderly people held for three hours at a time. They are the ones that are making it a war zone. They need to get out of Chicago. If they're not going to focus on the worst of the worst, which is what the president said they were going to do, they need to get the heck out. And so that's all before the National Guard is brought in in Chicago.

1:02:35And, you know, Pritzker is planning a lawsuit also to prevent the federal government from federalizing the National Guard in his state. So we'll see what happens there. Stephen Miller can put B5 up on the screen posting just some absolutely wild stuff, especially in the wake of the initial decision from the, again, Trump-appointed judge who said you cannot federalize the National Guard and send them into Portland at this time. So he says in these separate posts, number one, our system is under attack from within. A Democrat federal judge is showing extreme leniency toward the monster who tried to assassinate justice in the highest court in our land.

1:03:11Consider the message this sends to left-wing terrorists. Understand what happening here. So that is about the person who death threats attempted to, I think, kill Brett Kavanaugh. And then in this other one, he says, legal insurrection. The president is the commander in chief of the armed forces, not an Oregon judge. Portland and Oregon law enforcement, the direction of local leaders have refused to aid ICE officers facing relentless terrorist assault and threats to life. There are more local law enforcement officers in Oregon than there are guns and badges in the FBI nationwide. This is an organized terrorist attack on the federal government and its officers and the deployment of troops is an absolute necessity to defend our personnel, our laws, our government, public order and the republic itself.

1:03:50And, you know, there have been a number of other posts from Stephen Miller just painting, you know, the country as already in a civil war, as Democrats being this well-organized terrorist network, as Portland being, you know, war ravaged in the words of the president, of this Trump appointed judge as this, you know, this temporary restraining order constituting legal insurrection. So and Stephen Miller, you know, and with regard to these deployments seems to be running the show. So this isn't just some random Trump official. This is a very powerful guy who is wielding a lot of power in the administration right now.

1:04:23And a lot of this plan seems to come directly from him. It does seem to come directly from him. And I've been actually thinking quite about it. I've been talking about with some friends. I'm like, what is the strategy here? I'll give you the cope. The COPE is basically that there are not that many people who are actually in federal protective service whose job it is to, quote, unquote, protect people who are federal employees, if that makes sense. As in most DHS, quote, cops are not cops in the traditional sense. That's why he notes the Portland thing. They're like, that's why we need 300 people to from the National Guard because we don't actually have that many people to protect our personnel.

1:04:57And if our personnel are not going to have any assistance from law enforcement, then that. So that's the official explanation. We're just talking about the personnel at the ICE building? The ICE building, exactly. Well, out on a raid, if they're saying, like, for example, there was videos of people like ICE who were in a raid or whatever, and they're getting run off by people around them. And it's like, well, if the cops aren't going to do anything about that, then you need somebody to do something if it's going to be a federal person. So that's their justification for why they're doing it. I also think a lot of it is to actually invite some of these fights with the blue states over federal authority and to force a lot of this to the Supreme Court.

1:05:30This term of the Supreme Court is one of the most extraordinary for executive power. The Supreme Court actually returned specifically to rule on a lot of these shadow docket decisions to official real rulings as, for example, the Federal Trade Commission, Lisa Cook. There are so many executive power decisions that are coming up there, and that's part of the decision there. I also think broadly they seem to think this is a winning political position. So you can disagree legal – trust me. Black Hawk helicopters in downtown Chicago. I don't know. I think is crazy. However, what they seem to believe is that some sort of like shock and awe approach on immigration seems to be like their winning message.

1:06:10And this is one where I think they're really off the mark because what they don't seem to understand is that why did, to the extent, I think I would say immigration was the number two issue in the 2024 election. Number one was Biden's age. So, okay, that's most important. But number two, I think it was the border. I think were people outraged about in that situation. They were outraged at lawlessness and a chaos. And so the problem I think for them is that it seems to me as if they are leaning instead in the opposite direction where, look, they shut the border down, which I think is great. I think it's amazing.

1:06:44However, as the more they appear as the chaos agent, then they're the ones who are going to get the blame for all of the media stories, right? So Biden owned the chaos of the border and the attendant surge, let's say crime, chaos, whatever, right? All of that rightfully, I think, was put on Biden and on Kamala because they said, hey, look, some of these people would not be here raping and murdering people if you'd never let them in. You had a chaotic system. The Democrats don't have an answer other than legalizing them. And so we have to shut the border down. We need to do something about it. Most people actually were broadly on top of that message.

1:07:12When you start to see the Blackhawk and you see the federalization of troops, I think rightfully people start to go, hey, you know, this is a little weird here. And so if we start to see it all over the place and they start to get very squeamish at that idea as it extends. So I don't know. I mean, it's a very, it's bad. I have no other word for it. It's crazy. I don't think that in a reality that most people who voted for Trump specifically on the issue of immigration thought that this is what they were getting. I really don't. I mean, and I, people can go back and look, it's fine. I mean, we talked about alien, the alien enemies act.

1:07:43We knew something like that was coming on MS 13. We knew that deportation itself, ice, et cetera, but I don't quite think people understood, or I mean, it was never floated ever. And I read a lot of the documents, even Project 22 or anything, like straight up Black Hawk helicopters. And also there's just this weird, there's almost a 2025 azation. You sent this about all these cameras. Like why are all of these filmed and put out like a Michael Bay video? Right. So to me, I mean, it just is weird. Like you have the Theo Vaughn video, right. Where we're like playing around with Theo Vaughn videos and tweeting them out from the official DHS account.

1:08:22It's like, Hey bro, like this is not a meme, man. You know, it's like, it's not, it's not funny per se. You can support law and order, which I do. You can support it to be portation, which I do. Uh, should to revel in the memification of it seems to me like you're stepping things and over reading a mandate in very different ways. However, look at the, I hit this with them and they hit it back to me. Trump's got, still got a high approval on immigration. It's the number one issue. If we look like dramatically underwater, but it's higher, but it's higher. He's higher there than everybody else, right?

1:08:50I guess. His disapproved rating crystal is exactly the same as it was three months ago. Hasn't budged a single issue. Right. So like most people, if you talk to the Republican faithful, by the way, if we're talking about base, you're saying the base hates ice. Yeah. Let me tell you something. This is like pornography for boomers for a lot of these ice, you know, these ice videos and stuff. So I don't know. I mean, if I look at it generally, it seems more irreconcilable than ever, just purely on terms of the politics and where things are going. A lot of it also is shock and awe because they want self-deportation, which, I mean, you do have to say it did work.

1:09:23Some 1.2 million people left the country in the last, I think, in the last eight months. So that's part of the strategy. My fear is that they don't actually care about the politics, that it's all just about power and that this is about a war, truly a war. I mean, you have to call it that when you're talking about sending Texas National Guard into Oregon or into California or into Chicago or whatever, truly a war on blue states blue cities, Democrats in general, and not just like Antifa and the left, but they consider like Gavin Newsom to be some wild, radical terrorist insider, et cetera. And so when you put together this crackdown, I think some of the things they have done could genuinely be characterized as like terrorist attacks, like what they did to that apartment building, absolutely insane.

1:10:12Terrorizing these cities, crushing dissent on the media front, crushing dissent with the law firms, with the universities, with any sort of pro-Palestine speech. Across the board, it is a consolidation of power. Even the tariffs are that, you know, firing Lisa Cook, all of these things. The indictment of Comey, I don't like Comey, but, you know, clearly weaponization of the DOJ. There was reporting that came out. They wanted a whole perp walk with like burly FBI, just to pull him out, et cetera. This is all a theater and a show and a reality of a consolidation of power so that people are afraid.

1:10:46They're afraid to speak out. They're afraid to fight back. They're afraid that, you know, if they're the governor or the mayor who says something bad about Trump, that next it's going to be troops invading their town, et cetera. That's what I really think that this is ultimately about on the immigration front. You know, I think you're right about the sense that people get of like, first of all, this is just you're just like delighting in cruelty, which is horrible. Second of all, the blowback to American citizens is so apparent at this point. You know, again, in that apartment building. Like that was, you know, there were some undocumented immigrants there, according to the government.

1:11:20I'm sure there were. Apparently there were some Venezuelan migrants there. It was mostly, you know, black Americans who were in that apartment building, who did nothing wrong, who were pulled out in the middle of the night. Their kids traumatized all of these things. You can go through, you can watch, you know, there's a video of an American business owner in California, 79 years old, who was trying to show the ICE agents his papers for his workers. They throw him to the ground. They jump on him. They break his ribs. He had trauma. There was the woman, you know, who bereft woman whose husband was being taken by ICE for deportation at the courthouse in New York.

1:11:54She's grabbed by the hair, thrown to the ground again, head trauma. Initially, they come out. This was unacceptable. A week later, the agent who did that is right back on the job. There was a U.S. Army veteran. New York Times wrote up a story of a number of American citizens who have been brought in by ICE and detained by ICE in these really aggressive ways. U.S. Army veteran in California was trying to get to his job at a farm where he served as security. And there was some sort of protest. The ICE agent told them, I'm just trying to get to work here. They broke in the windshield of his car, shot pepper spray in his face and detained him with no lawyer, no call, no rights, no due process, no nothing for three days.

1:12:37So those are the sorts of things that people are increasingly seeing where, you know, for me, I don't think you should be comfortable with these things happening to immigrants either. But there is a large segment of society that's like, well, they came here illegal. What are you going to do now? Now it is undeniable the way that American citizens are having their lives turned upside down by this federal government. And like you said, I don't think they have like a plausible case that they're coming in to correct the chaos when they come in. It is stoking chaos. And then with the presence of the cameras in this, it's also very clear the way that it is all for it is a reality.

1:13:10But it's also for a show that they want to put on to intimidate people. For me, it's just about being you're totally out of control. Like in many of these places, you're like, dude, what are you guys doing? I don't know about everybody else. I grew up in a small town. A lot of these guys remind me of small town cops, right? Who, when they just stop somebody for weed, they're like, oh man, this is the biggest day of my life. Although, you know, stopping someone for weed may be a good thing. I actually have that experience with my small town cops. Oh, really? Were they good? Yeah. Well, they say they rescued my daughter when she was lost in the woods.

1:13:38Oh, okay. All right. Well, listen. And I know some of them personally. Here's my thing. We're not saying they're all bad. We're just saying like there is a specific archetype of the small town cop who wants to be a hero and wants to not even just to be a hero. He's on a power trip. He's on a power trip. Thinks he can get away with whatever. Works out at Planet Fitness. And he has been waiting for the day of his life to practice a YouTube jujitsu video. And we all know it. And that seems to be some of the energy. You know, again, I struggle with this because, look, I know this is part of like how did we all get here?

1:14:09Again, chaos, lawlessness at the border. There was no legitimate solution, democratic solution that was accepted by the American people for the democratic view of illegal immigration under the Biden administration. People agreed with deportation. I still think people agree with deportation. The question has to be about law and order. And this is also where, I mean, I don't know. I'm curious where you think things are going. Because let's be honest, abolish ICE in 2018 was a political disaster. It was a disaster. I think it's actually very interesting. I have not seen that sort of rhetoric reemerge, even in the midst of where we are.

1:14:44To be honest, you're probably more legitimate saying it today than before. I have seen it and I support it. OK, but let's all sit with that. That all seemed like the hot thing to do in 2018. And so what happened? Oh, ISIS, fascist, deportation, et cetera. So now let's flood the country with 10 to 15 million illegals and you're going to lose the election. So that's my question here is about like, what are legitimate law and order solutions to this? Because at the same time, let's be honest here, a huge amount of the left supports like actual violence against ICE. That doesn't mean that they should be wearing masks or acting totally out of control.

1:15:19You don't become the enemy of my enemy. You know, you don't become the mirror image of what we should criticize. But this kind of leads everybody to dig in and say, hey, let's be real. 2017 to 2020 was fucking crazy. BLM is burning shit down. You have ICE and Antifa literally throwing rocks and shit at ICE agents, which, again, let's be real. People actually, I would say by and large, it's like a leftist coalition that supports that. How do we get ourselves out of this? I mean, because what's the inverse? Abolish ICE? Like, OK, good luck. I mean, I don't see it. You know, kids in cages, crocodile tears, whenever Obama was doing the same thing.

1:15:57Like, it all reeks to me of the same kind of pushback narrative, and then we're just going to come right back here. Welcome to the A building. I'm Hans Charles. I'm Menelik Lumumba. It's 1969. Malcolm X and Martin Luther King Jr. had both been assassinated, and Black America was at a breaking point. Writing and protests broke out on an unprecedented scale. In Atlanta, Georgia, at Martin's alma mater, Morehouse College, the students had their own protest. It featured two prominent figures in Black history, Martin Luther King Sr. and a young student, Samuel L. Jackson. To be in what we really thought was a revolution.

1:16:36I mean, people were dying. 1968, the murder of Dr. King, which traumatized everyone. The FBI had a role in the murder of a Black Panther leader in Chicago. This story is about protest. It echoes in today's world far more than it should. And it will blow your mind. Listen to The A Building on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

1:17:29shapes us and what gives us hope. We get honest about the big stuff. Identity when you don't recognize yourself anymore. Loss that changes you. Purpose when success isn't enough. Peace when your mind won't slow down. Faith when it's complicated. Some guests have answers. Most are still figuring it out. If you've ever felt like there has to be more to the story, this show is for you. Listen to If You Can Hear Me on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

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1:18:54Listen to The Sixth Bureau on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Because that's what I would say. I would say we're here today because of the failures of the center, largely the center-left, and of the far-left's overreach on immigration. They are largely to blame for American public opinion shifting this far. Now, of course, there's agency in the Trump administration, etc. But as you just said, you need to grapple with the fact that a huge portion of the public is like, no, we're fucking done. All this empathy and all that got what? Mass illegals here in the country.

1:19:26We can't have that. Most people agree with that, I would say, broadly in saying like it was a totally out of control situation. I think the public opinion is wildly up for grabs on immigration. But to what extent? Like to under Biden? The swings that we've seen just since Trump was elected are truly wild. I mean, he is dramatically underwater on immigration now. And you're right. It was one of his strongest issues coming in. You know, my perspective is different in terms of how we got here. I mean, I see it zooming out. I see it more broadly as a failure of the center left to offer an alternative view of the world that is not about your problems are because of immigrants.

1:20:07I hear this stuff all the time. That is the truth. It is the reality. It's cult, man. Because the whole reason that this narrative has purchased is because you have people who feel like they are struggling in their lives. They feel like the world is past them. They feel like they're not able to get ahead. They feel like inflation is struggling. They're struggling to pay their bills. The grocery bills are health care is expensive. Like, I don't know that my kids are going to be able to even have the life that I have. What is it coming to? And they're looking for what went wrong. And Trump has a very clear and the right broadly, but specifically Trump has this very clear narrative.

1:20:40It's an immigrants are central to it. They're not the only scapegoat, but that's central to it. And if you don't offer an alternative explanation, then people are going to gravitate towards that solution. But, you know, when you say mass deportation, right, when I heard that, I'm not sure that I saw Black Hawk helicopters rappelling onto apartment buildings in Chicago, but I knew it would entail mass, yes, chaos. I knew it would entail infringement, not just on immigrants' rights, but on American citizens' rights, because it has to. because if you're going to sort the immigrant from the non-immigrant, it is going to require surveillance and, you know, it's going to require a heavy hand from the federal government.

1:21:18I think you would acknowledge that. So, like I said, I didn't envision kids naked zip tied together in U-Haul vans, but I knew it would be brutal. But I think for a lot of people, when they saw mass deportation, they thought like the criminals, right? And Trump consistently in this campaign, more than previously, portrayed undocumented immigrants as criminals. He talked about, Oh, they're emptying out the insane asylums. And so there was this image of the undocumented immigrant in general as being this criminal character. And we got to find them. We got to lock them up. We got to get them out of the country.

1:21:50And yes, people are on board with it. I'm on board with that. If you've got, you know, someone who's violent criminal, I don't want them in the country, you know, even in my most expansive immigration view. But as the rubber has met the road and people see what it actually means and you see actually Stephen Miller doesn't prioritize criminals. He prioritizes random dudes at Home Depot. He prioritizes random, you know, migrants in an apartment building that like some slumlord is trying to get evicted. He has overtly told his law enforcement, you know, whether it's ICE or or others, that they need to stop wasting their time doing these complicated gang cases, because that takes time to develop.

1:22:27And that's more difficult casework and just go for the numbers. So you have many fewer of the much smaller percentage of the immigrants who are in federal custody actually have any sort of criminal indictment than under prior administration. So in any case, it's a long way of saying that, you know, I think you're right, that when people actually see these images and grapple with what is being done in their cities and they put it together with the other, you know, crackdowns that are coming on speech and weaponization of the government and war on elected officials, Democratic elected officials in states and cities across the country, that they are broadly repulsed.

1:23:07Now, you're right. His approval rating, basically where it's been. It's exactly the same. Because people are so, it's not good. It's like 40, 42%, something like that. People are very locked in with their views of Trump. But I do want to get to, we have some of those images, just so people can see for themselves, some of the things that are unfolding. These are all from Chicago and Portland. So this is a sniper in an armored vehicle. So I think that's a pepper ball. That was the one thing. Oh, okay. That was in Broadview outside of Illinois. This is also, this is actually Portland. And this is really important.

1:23:40I want you to notice not only this like, you know, mass show of four hours all kitted up and look like stormtroopers. And then you've got these camera guys. Bunch of camera guys. There's a little too many cameras. You know, you've got the iPhone dude. You've got a couple of camera guys. This is Chicago PD that was actually tear gassed by ICE. So the local law enforcement, Chicago PD here, struggling after they were tear gassed by ICE. There was another incident where ICE tear gassed near an elementary school. The elementary school had to cancel recess, keep everybody inside because of the random ice tear gassing in their neighborhood.

1:24:18So it was incredibly heavy-handed tactics, even impacting elementary schools. and police officials as well. And we have more images here. This is still more Chicago Police Department recovering from being tear gas, which is just an insane situation. Actually, the Broadview, Illinois police chief says that they're getting fake 911 calls from ICE agents as well, and it's incredibly taxing to their resources. Here you have a confrontation from ICE and protesters. I believe this is in Chicago. I had to double check, but I believe this is in Chicago. These scenes that are occurring again, this is before the National Guard comes in.

1:24:59This is for sure Portland. Those are snipers stationed on the rooftop, you know, overlooking this area outside the ice building where these protests were occurring. So this is some of what's, you know, being done on city streets. My thing is, I don't think this was inherent to mass deportation. I think this is genuinely a Trump thing. Like, I don't think that this is necessarily how it would happen. It's like a Stephen Miller thing, to be honest with you. It is genuinely a vision for them about division, which, again, let's be very real here. It has worked to their political benefit. We can read a poll all we want.

1:25:32Who knows? I mean, New Jersey's looking kind of close to me. Have you been looking at that? The New Jersey race? Republican could win in the state of New Jersey. Again, listen, roll the tape and make fun of me. If he loses, it could be Gavin Newsom recall cope that I'm huffing right now. But it's possible. It's possible. So, like, let's be honest, you know, also about the political dynamics. But to return to kind of something you were saying earlier, and this is – I see it, Graham Plattner going viral for people are being lied to. Guys, we live in a country with finite amounts of resources. To say it's a lie that massive amounts of illegals are not going to tax the system is ridiculous.

1:26:06It's ridiculous to say you can allow 10 to 15 million people into a country over a four-year period, and it's not going to have some crazy effect, especially when the absolute vast majority of them are non-skilled, don't speak any English and are not going to integrate into our society on a very easy basis. If we just grant them all citizenship, every single one of them is going to be on welfare. And so the point is, it's like you can't just live in a world. Crystal, if 23 percent of the people if 23 percent of the people enter the country illegally, don't speak English and don't have a high school diploma, what's going to happen?

1:26:35They're going to end up on welfare. Look at the statistics of our own population in that group who end up on welfare. It's huge. That's listen, not saying they're bad people. We got to take care of our own first. It is actually a world of finite resources. I mean, I know there was this whole discussion about ERs. Yeah, it's crazy that you allow all these people here illegally and they get hit by a car, by the way, with no insurance. And then who's all footing the bill in these ER rooms? It's all of us. They don't deserve my health care dollars. Sorry. That's the reason why you need an actual system that works.

1:27:08where you have your system wants these people to have citizenship and i say no i do because that's my point exactly i mean we have gone around this a million times but that but exactly this is the fundamental question strength of our country they bet they are a net benefit this is just the american people like these people i do believe in the statue of liberty quote by the way so again overwhelmingly by the way the american people agree with me ask them even at the even at the peak of anti-immigrant hysteria, people still said that immigrants are a net benefit. Yes, because grouping all these people in together is preposterous.

1:27:45Is there a limit? Yes, to the number of people that can come in. Of course. I don't know what the limit is, but I can tell you that we have the capacity to absorb a large number of people into this country. And if you have people out of the shadows, they're not having their labor rights abused and violated. They're not being undercut in terms of their wages. they're able to pay. And by the way, most undocumented immigrants, at least until now, were paying taxes. Now they're afraid that they're going to be like swept up in a deportation raid because for is it enough for the government services that they consume?

1:28:16Yes, it is. No, no, no. Again, like, go look at the studies. Don't just make stuff up. I'm not. I mean, listen, it's true. They can do much more. There are endless numbers. Yes. Of pro forward.us studies to support many of these. There are also endless numbers of studies that show that you just dismiss out of it. I mean, same with you. No. I mean, but this is the frustration. This is, again, how we got here. If the only option is mass citizenship, a lot of people are going to say, fuck it then. Let's go with the Black Hawk helicopters. Because if we're just going to have 10 to 15 million coming in here and they get to vote, absolutely not.

1:28:49In the absence of an alternative vision where you're saying, you know what? The problem isn't the immigrant. It's the billionaire. It's the people who are robbing you blind and rigging the system and stealing your electricity and hiking up your electricity prices. Both of those can be true, you know. If you don't have that alternative vision, then yes, you're right. Then you do have a large number of people who say the problem is, you know, the Venezuelan migrant who came in and they're, you know, they're stealing the housing or whatever. They're eating the cats and the dogs. Yes, they will be open to that message.

1:29:17But it is not a correct message. And so if you actually have a vision on the other side that is compelling to people, that is the only way that you fight back against this. That's why I say that it is a center left failure. Yes. That led to this by offering no other explanation and broadly caving to the worldview of the Trumps. So that's how you end up with Stephen Miller and Trump and this truly fascist assault on cities and states and in communities and lawless chaos that is vastly more dangerous and more violent than anything that I've seen from any undocumented. I just think that it very much absolves much of the far left who's forced every candidate to raise their hand and say we should have health care for all illegals.

1:30:00That was health care for everyone. I mean, that's the other thing is that when you have a neoliberal system where, yes, not everybody has health care, that is also going to make people much more receptive to like see that person who's showing up in the emergency room. they're getting health care and you're not. Which is why I. Yeah. But that's why I support universal health care. That's why I support higher wages. That's why I support union rights. That's why I support universal pre-K. That's why I support affordable daycare so that people don't feel the sense of we're all you know, it's every man for himself and we're all scrapping against each other where people are doing fine and have the right to those resources themselves.

1:30:46then they are much more, much less likely to find the message of immigrant scapegoating to be appealing. Again, there is not a single social welfare state in the world that exists with a massive open border and illegalized population. All of the welfare systems that you're describing have very tight borders. Norway, Scandinavia, Denmark, they have massive assimilative programs, for example, in Denmark. I mean, if that's the type of society you want, fine. Like in Denmark, they literally ban you, I believe, as children from wearing a hijab because they're like, hey, that's not who you are. If you're going to come here and you're going to get our services and you're going to be a citizen, then that's going to come with a huge number of responsibilities.

1:31:22I don't think most people want to sign up for that. And so we live in a world of finite resources. You can't just have a system where everybody gets health care, including vast numbers of illegals. Like this is, again, I think that this message is deeply damaging. I see the grand platners of the world going for it. Maybe it'll work in Maine. I have no idea. But at the end of the day, the rubber will meet the road with the actual proposal. And if you're just going to mass legalize and grant mass numbers of social services to people, I mean, first of all, I mean, in an unironic way, somebody does have to pay for it, like for real.

1:31:55It can't just be, quote, tax billionaires or whatever, because, I mean, with the way that our taxation structure works, it will have to ultimately come from some middle, upper middle class and others. Like it quite literally could not actually tax the risk. It's not going to happen. Under 60 people in the United States Senate? What's the practicality of what it looks like? That would be wildly. Listen, in terms of politics, is it difficult? Of course. Of course. But is it wildly popular? Of course. Yes. If you ask people, should we cut the defense budget? Yes. Free money is obviously - No, that's not free money.

1:32:26That's cutting the defense department budget. And then, yes, we just had a massive tax cut for the rich. Just give that back as a starter. You can't tell me that every other developed nation around the world can afford universal health care and we can't for some reason. Oh, we absolutely can. I'm with you. But I say I said my vision for that society, the way that things are distributed is so wildly unequal. Even if we just did a little bit, we would be in such a better place. So in any case, to get back to the core of this thing, I mean, I think there is. Listen, do I know what the political fallout will be?

1:33:03I don't. But the thing that scares me the most is you think that they believe this is political win, I think they don't care because I think they feel like they are really going. They are going for it right now. Like they are going for labeling Democrats as domestic terrorists, crushing dissent, surveilling social media. There's a story about how they're putting together a social media surveillance team using Palantir, you know, scaring any sort of like comedian, installing Barry Weiss as editor in chief at CBS. I mean, they are going for it. And so in a sense, like obviously what's happening with ICE in these cities and with federal agents in these cities, obviously that is about immigration.

1:33:41But I also don't think it is mostly about is it is about more than immigration as well. I don't disagree. Because it's it really is a sort of all out assault on our rights, on our First Amendment rights, on our ability to protest of freedom of association, freedom from unreasonable search and seizure. Like all of those things are under attack right now. And it's by design. I know the producers are going, we're going to be mad because I'm dragging this on. But I think this is the fundamental question of our day. If you were the left, how are you going to handle, if the Democrats come in power, wouldn't you do the same thing at this point?

1:34:13What do you mean? So, I mean, look. Would I send in the National Guard to Texas? No, I mean, well, not that. But, I mean, isn't Stephen Miller going to be prosecuted? Well, he should be. But see, this is my point. No, but he's a criminal. For them, but yeah, but now we're feeding into the same culture of this is now a same, it's going to be the same law fair. If you are violating people's rights and you are breaking the law, do I think you should go to prison? Yeah, but that's how they saw it under Trump, right? Is he a January 6th prisoners? Listen, I'm representing a worldview where you have liberal institutions which are assaulting us.

1:34:44You're trying to plug our children full of hormones. You have an all-out takeover of our institutions. You've flooded our country with 10 to 15 million illegals. So fuck it. Let's go for it. I mean, isn't that what the next Democratic administration, aren't you going to do the exact same thing? That's my view. Trump, J.D., and all of them, all of their staff, good luck. You're going to be buried in the legal paperwork and probably much more because the libs are actually good at it. You know, if you're a red state, you're probably going to have your shit cut, right? This new popularization of— No, I wouldn't say so.

1:35:14Oh, I think so. I mean, if Gavin gets elected, for sure. I wish that I had the faith that you do, that Democrats are going to have the backbone to actually lock up the criminals that exist in this administration. I mean, these people who are pulling naked children out of their beds and being zip-tied, yes, I think they should be in prison. Yeah, come on. This works on the Republicans side. No, especially Stephen Miller. You let rapists into the country, you should be illegal. See, come on. This stuff does—this is the same mirror image. Soger had the Biden administration procedure. You may not have liked it, but it was done by—these were legal provisions that allowed undogumited immigrants.

1:35:51Most—many of the immigrants who came in were through temporary protective tests. Yeah, but they impeached myorkus over it. You can come up with any novel explanation you want. People have a right to apply for asylum. That is consistent with the law. You do not have a right to violate Americans, let alone immigrants, but Americans do process rights. You do not have a right to pull children with no warrant out of their beds in the middle of the night and zip tie them together and throw them in a U-Haul van. You do not have a right to hold American citizens three days, no lawyer, no warrant, no phone call, no nothing.

1:36:21You do not have a I mean, many of the like, you know, some of the things that happen under Doge continue to have been deemed illegal. So, yes, where criminal acts occurred, there should absolutely be accountability. There should absolutely be accountability. And I'm not going to buy this. Like, what about is I'm oh, well, the Democrats did thing. Republicans didn't like. Yes. If they were criminal. Yes. Prosecute. Fine. Prosecute. Well, you could come up with. Look, I mean, isn't that one of the lessons this admin is that the government can come. But let me ask you this. Do you really think there was anything under the Biden administration that was equivalent to Black Hawk helicopters raiding an apartment building in the middle of the night and pulling out people?

1:37:00And I mean, just the like lawlessness of this is the disagreement. I think that the border was actually just as lawless. They impeached Mayorkas over it. It was a genuine criminal act at a political level. I mean, look, I could hit it back. Kavanaugh stops are legal now under the Supreme Court. I don't agree with it, but it is. Kavanaugh stop means that you can briefly detain a U.S. citizen for whatever period of time. It's racial profiling. Yeah, but it's legal. It's under the U.S. Supreme Court. So is it illegal? Well, it was on the shadow docket. You can say it's bad, but I mean— I mean, it was on the shadow docket.

1:37:28It hasn't officially been ruled on the merits. But yes, it allowed them to proceed with overt racial profiling, which is insane and outrageous. Right, but that's my point. And so they can come up with a justification for anything, right? Oh, it was all asylum. It's like, well, you know, I don't say—not really. I'm only pointing out, though, that if that is going to be the posture of the Democratic base and probably the next Democratic administration, then it is kind of a mirror image of each other. And so for them, I mean, they're not dumb. They can see all of this. In their mind, it was go time anyways.

1:37:56But if you're a Democrat, why wouldn't you now believe the same thing? So it seems to me like an endless race to the bottom. Like if Gavin Newsom gets elected, wouldn't you deny funding to Texas in a hurricane? You'd be like, fuck it. You came after me. See, I think you would. I totally disagree with this. as much as I despise the Trump regime, as much as I despise Stephen Miller, as much as I disagree with people, individual people who voted for Trump this time around, I want them to have healthcare. I want them to have preschool. No, you do, for sure. I want them to have, you know, and this is the view of the left broadly, right?

1:38:30I don't, now do I see like, you know, it being an issue? Yes, Stephen Miller should be locked, that sort of stuff, yes. The, we're gonna go to war with Texas and deny people healthcare? No, I don't. I don't see that at all. I thoroughly reject that. I think that is anathema to any sort of politics that I would believe in whatsoever. And that is genuinely a race to the bottom. Now, you know, is no, I don't question your sincerity at all. I mean, listen, I don't disagree with half of this stuff, but the level of vindictiveness I'm watching bubble about truth and reconciliation post Trump. It almost makes me understand the Trump behavior more because for them, they're like, if we were already here, they have to go.

1:39:10Because to them, it's like - I think it's projection. I genuinely think that is projection of the way that this administration operates on the Democratic base and Democratic lawmakers. And I mean - So you think things will be back to relatively normal? They didn't even get their act together to charge Trump with a coup in time for the thing to go to court. Right. That's who we're talking about here. Yeah, but aren't you mad about that? Yes, I'm mad about that. Yes, I am mad about that. They wanted him to be prosecuted. Yes, and he should have been. He should have been. But that's a different thing.

1:39:42It gets all very sketchy. That Texas shouldn't get hurricane funding. Or they should, you know, the people of Oklahoma or wherever should be, like, screwed and, you know, and there should be retribution against them and their funding pulled, which is things that this administration has done because, for example, Janet Mills in Maine said something he didn't like about. transgender kids in sports. No, I don't. I see. I do. I can't say I see zero appetite for that, but that is not a widely held view whatsoever. And like I said, it's anathema to any sort of actual left kind of a policy. I agree. But you're talking about the left and not the Democrats, because, see, I don't know.

1:40:16I think people are mad. And I see with the base, with Gavin, the way that people are, quote, fighting back. I think a lot of vindictiveness is coming. I mean, look, Trump, for all of his faults, he broke the glass on a lot of longstanding norms in politics. I still think this is the central question because it informs so much of the way that our current government is behaving. To them, they thought that the glass was broken under Biden, where, yes, they incompetently indicted Trump or whatever, but they still indicted Trump. To them, that's like banana republic shit. So they're like, if we're going to open the door, then let's be banana republic, right?

1:40:47And so that's all starting to become the feedback. I'm sure they feel that way. I'm not even justifying this. I'm just talking about actual reality. Like Trump tried to coup the government. He should have been in prison. He should have been banned from running for election again. And so to equate that with like, I didn't like Biden's asylum policy. Well, you're minimizing it because you don't disagree with the policy, right? I can flip it around. I mean, look, at the end of the day, like I opposed the impeachment or whatever of Donald Trump. I said you should leave it up to the democratic process.

1:41:15And I mean, it's more of an indictment of the Democrats for being unable to beat him in the election. It's just a question to me about where once things are here, how can it possibly ever go back to normal? Because that's kind of what you're saying. I don't know if it can. That's part of the reason I feel so despondent. Once we're here, we are not going back to the days of Biden. Like red state, blue state. I'm not saying we're going to have a civil war, but we're definitely going to have a lot more like authoritarian power in the federal government. I mean, we're already at when you're talking about Trump trying to send Texas National Guard into California, Oregon, Chicago.

1:41:52I mean, And the only reason that's not a civil war is because the other side doesn't fight back. Yeah. That's how close to the edge we are. That's where we are. Right. So why wouldn't that? That's what I mean. Isn't the logical conclusion? It's like, oh, well, people are going to start fighting back. I'm like, that scares the shit out of me. That's part of what I'm afraid of. Yeah. With all of this, because everything is just getting dialed all the way up. And I don't possibly see an escape. Like, if Stephen Miller thinks he's going to get indicted under a future administration, I mean, do you even want there to be a future administration?

1:42:20No, but that's already what they're going. I mean, I think that's already what they're going for. And that's why I look at the, you know, I mean, I hope there's something approaching free and fair elections, et cetera. But I have no confidence that these people have any intention of giving up power. Like there's no reason why we should think that we already have Trump losing and trying to not give up power. So we have a track record. I could see how you would get there. I don't, I'm not there just because, I mean, at the end of the day, he did leave, right? And most of it was a LARP. Like 98, that's another thing that people vastly underestimate.

1:42:5098 % of this is a quote LARPing, despite the fact that, look, it has serious ramifications, obviously for norms and all that, et cetera. But I do think we should stick with this kind of debate and story because it's all I've been thinking about. I go, once we're here, can you possibly come back? I actually don't know. Can we come back from a world of like blue on red warfare? Like literally in terms of states and state power and indicting your other political opponents. Everyone can debate endlessly about who started it or whatever. Every side is going to see theirs as entirely legitimate even if you disagree.

1:43:25and it's honestly what scares me the most about where we are. Like with Illinois. We did literally have a civil war and managed to put the pieces back together. Oh, it took a long time. It did take a long time. Okay, so it's not, it was, the more you read about that, the more you should be afraid of ever possibly getting there in the first place. Okay, should we get to the economy? Are we done? Yes. All right. Well, to be continued.

1:43:57Over the last couple years, didn't we learn that the folding chair was invented by black people because of what happened in Alabama? This Black History Month, the podcast Selective Ignorance with Mandy B unpacks black history and culture with comedy, clarity and conversations that shake the status quo. The Crown Act in New York was signed in July of 2019, and that is a bill that was passed to prohibit discrimination based on hairstyles associated with race. To hear this and more, listen to Selective Ignorance with Mandy B from the Black Effect Podcast Network on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

1:44:31You can scroll the headlines all day and still feel empty. I'm Ben Higgins, and If You Can Hear Me is where culture meets the soul. Honest conversations about identity, loss, purpose, peace, faith, and everything in between. Celebrities, thinkers, everyday people, some have answers, most are still figuring it out. And if you've ever felt like there has to be more to the story, this show is for you. Listen to If You Can Hear Me on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Bowen Yang. And I'm Matt Rogers. During this season of the Two Guys Five Rings podcast, in the lead up to the Milan Cortina 2026 Winter Olympic Games, we've been joined by some of our friends.

1:45:12Hi, Bowen. Hi, Matt. Hey, Elmo. Hey, Matt. Hey, Bowen. Hi, Cookie. Hi. Now, the Winter Olympic Games are underway, and we are in Italy to give you experiences from our hearts to your ears. Listen to Two Guys, Five Rings on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. This is an iHeart Podcast. Guaranteed human.