Navy Families Confront Top Officials Over Trump's War

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2:27Ben Meiselas:It is finally happening. Our courageous Navy sailors are revolting against Donald Trump and his unlawful war. That's right. Our Navy sailors aboard those super carriers in the Middle East have been telling their family members how atrocious their conditions are, how they hate being complicit in war crimes, how they fear they are going to die on these super carriers. And these are carriers that have been out at sea on deployments for record setting times as morale is at an all time low. You see, this past week in San Diego at the Naval Air Station North Island at an area in there called the Island Club, there were 200 family members who had family on the USS Abraham Lincoln, which has now been deployed for, as of that day, about 258 days, now about 262 days.

3:35Ben Meiselas:or so it's been deployed. Now that deployment is very long, but then there was also the USS Gerald Ford that was deployed 326 days and that left mid to late May from its deployment and came back. Then you had the George HW Bush, which has been deployed for about 108, 109 days or so. and because the U.S. has lost all control in the war and is unable to even guarantee its own safety, the George H.W. Bush supercarrier had to go down past the tip of Africa rather than go through the Red Sea because it feared that it would be hit by the Houthis. Isn't that a sign as well that the U.S. has completely lost the war?

4:27Ben Meiselas:So you had these family members show up at the island club in San Diego on Thursday for an in-person meeting. You had the acting secretary of the Navy, Hung Kao, was there, and he was there along with other top Navy people. We'll talk about what went down. And these family members confronted the head of our Navy and saying, you know, we know that our family members are suffering from serious mental health issues. They're unable to really even eat appropriate food to get basic nutrition. The showers are all moldy. The living conditions are rancid. The plumbing doesn't work. The toilets don't work.

5:11Ben Meiselas:The basic day-to-day living has been awful. By the way, do you remember back several months ago on the Midas Touch Network, we were showing you the food that they were being served on the Abraham Lincoln and the Gerald Ford. Remember we were covering that and it was like these pieces of meat, like just little tiny nuggets of meat that were hard to even decipher what it was. And then you had Hegseth and everybody in the Trump regime saying, no, that's not true. That's a lie. As though our sailors were lying to their family members. I mean, you had the Trump regime defaming our sailors who have been deployed for these massive periods of time.

5:53Ben Meiselas:Remember early on too in the Gerald Ford, they had all that issue with the plumbing, the plumbing backed up and the sewage spilled. You had feces everywhere. And then on top of that, there was the fire from the laundry room. Although some people believe it's possible that the USS Ford was struck by Iran, but the official story, I don't know, maybe even worse, that there was a laundry fire because just the basic nuts and bolts don't work in our Navy anymore under Hegseth and Trump and Hong Kong and all of these idiots. And it spread and there was like 600 to 1 ,000 beds were destroyed. People had to sleep on the floor and remember it had to dock in Crete, like in Greece to get fixed.

6:38And then the story came out how close it was for all of our sailors dying, like they almost all got killed. And then this was covered up. We were covering it right when it happened, that massive fire on the Gerald Ford. And so you had the Gerald Ford deployed for 326 days, which is unheard of. I mean, that's a post-Vietnam record. Now you have the Abraham Lincoln, 259, 262 days or so. And the people, our sailors are suffering. And that's what their family members were saying. And they were saying that their family member sailors who were on these ships are saying, we don't want to be involved in these war crimes.

7:19We know that the Trump regime is killing the little girls in Manab. We don't want to be associated with these war crimes of Trump and Netanyahu. That's been a kind of consistent, and people were clapping in the room and they were yelling at the top naval officers and the acting secretary of Navy. Then on Thursday night, there was also a digital, there was like a virtual meeting and virtual call as well. So there was the in-person call, in-person meeting at the Island Club at that San Diego base. Then there was a virtual meeting. And at the virtual meeting, you had family members of the 5 ,000 or so service members, sailors on the Abraham Lincoln, again, reiterating the horrific putrid conditions.

8:07And then there was like this gimmick that the Navy tried to run, that the Trump regime ran. So the family members have very specific issues. Look, the showers don't work. The plumbing doesn't work. They're not getting the mail because the fifth fleet port in Bahrain has been destroyed by Iran. So our mail isn't even getting to them. and it's very hard for them to reach out to us. And when we do hear from them, we hear how horrible it is. And then the stunt that the Trump regime tried to pull at these meetings and in the virtual

8:38Ben Meiselas:meetings, they were like, okay, we're going to text somebody aboard the ship right now. Oh, they say everything's fine. And that what you're hearing from your family members is false. Can you believe that shit? Can you, excuse my language? Can you believe them? I mean, I guess you can, cause it's the Trump regime and they're absolutely horrific. MS, you know, and then what they're trying to dangle over these family members, they're like, well, you know, we are getting ready the USS Theodore Roosevelt, the USS Teddy Roosevelt, that carrier. We're preparing that. We can't tell you when that's going to replace the Abraham Lincoln, but we're working on it.

9:17We're working on it. Okay. The earliest, by the way, would be what, December? So it seems like our sailors who are aboard that Abraham Lincoln supercarrier that's right out there, that's part of like the blockade, right? That's the Abraham. When they talk about the blockade, you get it, right? Right now, it's the George H.W. Bush and it's the Abraham Lincoln. It used to be the Gerald Ford, but that was out 326 days. It had the fire, which almost killed all of our sailors. They had all the issues there. So now it's George H.W. Bush and Lincoln. So now they're saying, okay, well, the Lincoln may leave and it could be replaced by the Teddy Roosevelt, but the Teddy Roosevelt won't be ready.

9:55I think it's in Hawaii. I think so. That won't be ready at least until Christmas. So what, they're going

10:05Ben Meiselas:to be out there for 400 days? I mean, they're going to be out there for the better part of a year? I mean, this is some sick stuff. I want to give a hat tip to MS Now. They got the scoop. they got the audio leaked to them from the family members who attended the in-person meeting at the island club at the San Diego base and the virtual meeting that also happened Thursday night can I read from you just a little bit of it may I here's how it's described and had tip to MS now for this scoop in a combative face-to-face confrontation on Thursday night in San Diego angry military families challenged the acting Secretary of Navy, Hung Kao, over difficult conditions aboard the USS Lincoln.

10:50Ben Meiselas:Among the concerns brought up in this contentious meeting, there was that meeting, then the virtual meeting, the sailors' mental health, safety on deck, a lack of supplies, food shortages, water contamination, and disruptions in the mail system, which have caused many care packages en route to the ship to be lost in transit for months. The fact that family members aren't able to see their family and they've been gone so long, they've had children born and big life developments. You have lots of people, again, don't want to be associated with the war crimes that are taking place. And these are things that were raised to a hung cow.

11:32Ben Meiselas:200 families attended in person. Then there was many more on the virtual meeting. At times, spouses of sailors of the ships were in tears asking the Navy leaders what was being done to address mental health issues, exhaustion. One parent said her daughter feels that she is never going to come home and believe she's going to die on the ship. One woman questioned the mission and said she found it difficult to be proud of her sailor when she believed the military was killing innocent civilians. And her sailor, her husband, who was a sailor on the Abraham Lincoln supercarrier, expressed guilt about what he was doing.

12:12Ben Meiselas:Her comment was met with applause from the audience. You had Vice Admiral Joseph Cahill, Vice Admiral Douglas Verissimo, and top commanders for the Naval Surface Forces were there, and they were just making the family members feel even worse about it. And they were like, oh, well, you know what? This is what it means to be an American. This is what it means to be a patriot. This is what Donald Trump and Hegseth want them to do. So they got to do what Trump and Hegseth say they need to do. One spouse said they have a baby at home who was born during the USS Abraham Lincoln's deployment. My husband has gotten no time with her.

12:56Ben Meiselas:We have friends that are on this boat as well. They've yet to meet their children. And I just think like a lot of us are kind of confused and just frustrated right now. We're in limbo. We have no date about when they're going to come home. And then those commanders were like, I wish we could help you, but there's really nothing we can do right now. There's also issues about exhaustion, low morale, mental health of the sailors and Marines. As the war now reaches its 23rd week, many in the virtual town hall question what mental health resources are available. The military leaders at this meeting acknowledged that there had been a stubborn clog that caused many of the toilets in a certain zone of the ship not to work for an extended period of time, but maintained that sailors on the ship had been trained to address the plumbing issues, by the way, in the USS Gerald Ford, the one that has departed in May.

13:53Ben Meiselas:But remember all of those plumbing issues right around when the war was launched by Trump and Netanyahu, there was feces all over the floor. There was piss all over the floor and toilet water all over the floor. These supercarriers have not received the maintenance that they need under the Trump regime. It's really horrible stuff. Mold in the showers. It's not appealing for any of us. Difficult ventilation systems on the ship. Unique supply chain challenges taking place, which is causing food shortages because Iran has been striking those ports like Bahrain and other areas. So we can't get the food from the fifth fleet port onto the ships.

14:39And because our ships are sitting ducks out there and just doing the blockade, as Trump calls it, there's no way to get them. The Strait of Hormuz is closed. The Red Sea is closed, right? That's why the George H.W. Bush had to go around Africa. So that's why you can't get food to the ships because we don't have control over anything because Iran won the war. Like we all get that, right? There was this huge backlog of food.

15:12Ben Meiselas:So you have all of that taking place, okay? I showed you the photos going back to the issues with the Gerald Ford. I showed you the food issues, right, with the Abraham Lincoln. I mean, look at that. I don't even know what this is. And then our military had the audacity to say, no, that's not a real photo. Those are lies. Like, what, our sailors are liars? No, they're telling the truth. What are you talking about? Then there was the laundry room fire that required, basically, our service members to sleep on the floor. They all lost it. But even worse than the fact that they didn't have beds. They don't have sheets.

15:51It all got burned.

15:52Ben Meiselas:You saw the footage that our military was trying to cover up, right? I think we have the footage that came in from foreign governments had to post it like this came in from Russia and other places, but it's authentic, this photo. I wouldn't show you videos that aren't authentic. This is what it looked like, just so you can see. Now, a few points I want to bring up right now. You had Pete Hegseth. What is he repeatedly saying about how he's going to improve morale. He goes, those flyovers that we're doing, you know, when we fly our planes really low, you know how like they do like those jets that fly right over the water and like, looks like they're going to kill the people on the beach, which like they go, yeah, lethality.

16:35That's what Pete Hegg said. We're going to keep doing the flyovers until we improve morale. Here, play this clip. The warrior ethos of our department, again, spirit. And I will note that flyovers will indeed continue but that's also spirit brains 250 flyovers the american people seeing and feeling their military in ways they have not in the past that spirit and then you have hung cow who has the uh acting secretary of navy who says the president is always five steps ahead of the iranians no you you can't even get our sailors food. The toilet bowls are clogged with feces and there's feces all over the floor.

17:20Our sailors are suffering because you can't even give them the most basic supplies. There's mold, the showers don't work. So if you can't do the basics, right? No wonder you've run out of munitions, right? Like you've seen me do lots of coverage over the past several days about the munition issue, right? That the U S ran out of Patriot interceptors. It ran out of THAAD interceptors. We've run out of SM two, three and six, SM six anti-ballistics on the Navy destroyers. We don't have those. The attack comes the high Mars, the offensive weapons. We ran out of those, the Arab nations that we supply these weapons to, they've pretty much run out of those as well.

18:10And now you have the issue on the ships where morale is at an all-time low, where the sailors aren't even getting food. Think about that. And so I showed you what Hunkhouse said there. We love that. Secretary, I know you don't want to get ahead of the commander in chief and the secretary of war here, but there are a lot of Americans who watch the big weekend show and every weekend we say tensions are rising now there's a memorandum now there's a ceasefire maybe it's not a ceasefire we read some truth socials from the president and there are some americans who are a little confused as to where we are now they don't know if their gas prices are going to go up or go down what can you say to the american people who are watching they believe in the president but they're sometimes a little confused at all the steps and all the maneuvering going on well you know the enemy has a vote and but yeah here's the thing the president's always five steps ahead of him.

18:58And we can be the best friends in the world or the worst enemy. And look what's happening down in Venezuela. We're bringing aid and support to the people of Venezuela. And we're patrolling seas all around the world, including South China Sea, as well as, you know, in Europe, the Mediterranean, the Gulf. We're there. We're there to do whatever the president needs. And Hong Kong now says we need 350 more ships. That's why we are pushing for 1.5 trillion dollars because Donald Trump wants to now build Trump class battleships that'll cost close to a trillion dollars when all is said and done. The budget total for the military, Trump wants his 1.5 trillion.

19:39But in this day and age with drones, unmanned submersives, anti-drone technology, Trump wants to build battleships because he likes the aesthetic. He doesn't like the way stealth looks. He doesn't like the way aircraft carriers looks, but he likes the way battleships look between World War I and World War II. So he wants to spend like a trillion dollars on Trump battleships. This is where the money's going, by the way. And in addition to it's why our debt is skyrocketing and this could be going to like healthcare and things. This is what it's going to. And he can't even get food to our sailors in an active combat zone right now.

20:21So what the hell are you doing with your battleships? Here's what Hung Cao said. Here, play this clip. Before, we fought 20 years of war, and the Navy was very involved, but it wasn't always the boats that we were thinking about. Now, that's been the top line. You know, we're in littoral warfare, brown water warfare, using ships in ways that maybe we haven't in the last couple of decades. Where is the Navy when it comes to fighting a war like this? I mean, we're always ready. We're always on deployment all the time. But right now we need 350 ships. And that's exactly why the president is pushing for this$1.5 trillion budget so we can build the ships we need because ships like the USS, you know, Gerald Ford and the entire strike group was extended for till 11 months on deployment.

21:03Yeah, because we didn't have enough ships to backfill them. And that's why we need these ships out there. But I tell you what, the strength of our Navy and Marine Corps is the sailors and Marines that are that are manning our ships and, you know, bases. And they're they're getting things done. I know it's absolutely horrific, right? Absolutely. And then on Wednesday, before this meeting took place, Hung Kao released the following memo. I kid you not, this is real. Acting Secretary of the Navy's warrior ethos. This went to all Navy. Everybody got this in the Navy. The bedrock of the Navy and Marine Corps is our warrior ethos and its direct relationship to good order and discipline, forge these principles into the foundation of our lethality as a naval force.

21:50What the hell word salad does that even mean? We must recognize the urgency for an immediate reevaluation of our attention to basic military standards, appearance, and professionalism across the department. So Hegseth, Hongkou, and Trump are now attacking our sailors and saying that they don't meet the basic standards and professionalism. Actually, they do. How dare you say that about our service members? You want to talk about basic professionalism? How about you get our service members food? How about you get them functioning toilets and functioning showers? How about you deliver their damn mail, you traitors?

22:32What the hell are you talking about? How about we start with getting food in their tummies. How about we start with the basics? And how about we have toilets that don't explode on these ships? I kid you not, this is the message. They're attacking our troops with everything going on. They're blaming our troops right now. Trump pegs it on cow. How else would you read this? The services must prioritize war fighters remaining physically and mentally fit and shall do so by allotting the time and resources for them to train accordingly. Navy and Marine Corps culture will drive the success of this outcome because it is the essence of how we fight, win, and accomplish a possible task.

23:15To build culture, it starts with physical appearance and personal comportment every single day. A squared-away Marine exudes discipline, preparedness, and lethality. A squared-away sailor displays confidence, focus, and precision. Service culture is where it starts. This includes how we act online or on social media. Effective immediately, every sailor and marine shall ensure their every action aligns towards these behaviors. We are in the business of warfighting, and we must get at this with urgency. You see what the veiled thread is right there? Don't post about how horrible we're treating you because that would be unprofessional, and you would not be showing the warrior ethos and lethality by telling your family members that you are suffering aboard these carriers.

24:06How else would you read them? This is what it says. Our nation relies on the Department of War to accomplish its mission of projecting power and deterring aggression. During my time serving as your undersecretary and now as acting secretary, I periodically observe departures from the expected high standards for our force or a lack of persistent vigilance. We must take a round turn in areas such as military bearing, physical fitness and appearance, deportment, haircuts, and wear of the uniform, atrophy of the little things, erodes our heritage and undermines our trust. you're not even giving them food.

24:50You're not giving our sailors working showers. You're not giving them working toilets. You're not delivering their damn mail. And you've kept them out on sea. In the Gerald Ford example, 326 days. In the example of the Lincoln, 262 days. How dare you attack their professionalism? You want to see Donald Trump at night doing drone port posts and AI images of himself with General MacArthur and Patton? And then you want to lecture about professionalism? No, our service members are damn professional. It's all of you in leadership who behave like buffoons. We must get back to the basics of professionalism.

25:35As iron sharpens iron, we need to hold each other accountable. This is the memo that was sent out. Our allies, adversaries, and the public can gauge our readiness within 10 seconds of an interaction. So we must strive to not only be the most lethal when preparing for comment, but also look the part every day. What's this weird obsession with look the, they look the part. I don't, you know, who doesn't look the part you all by saying, look the part y 'all look like a bunch of phonies. And you know, who can gauge our lack of professionalism in 10 seconds Iran our allies our enemies our adversaries they can all do it right they all can see it they all can see that that you all lack professionalism and how dare you attack our troops on the on the issue of professionalism awful people awful awful people anyway I hope I did that justice for our sailors and their families.

26:37Hit subscribe. Let's get to 7 million subscribers. Thanks so much for watching. Oh, did you get a copy of WTF America? The book I wrote with my brothers. Pre-order it now if you can. The publisher is saying it's really important that we keep the momentum going for those pre-orders. So pre-order it if you can. Thanks for watching.

26:56Ben Meiselas:Hey, if you want the full story, how democracy got here and how we take it back, Pre-order our new book, WTF America, today. Just scan the QR code or click the link in the description. Let's do this.