Thursday Afternoon Breaking News Updates with Ben - 4/23/2026

25:01Ben Meiselas:Then we got video footage of that. That's exactly what happened. And so you sent a Navy ship to play chicken with the Iranian Navy. And then when the Iranian Navy, which you claim is obliterated, said, save my Navy, turn around, our Navy turned around. I don't like that as the result. You think I'm rooting for that as the result right now? You think I want to see our proud Navy looking like this? By the way, as Donald Trump fired the US Navy Secretary, one of the things that Donald Trump was upset with the Navy Secretary about was that Trump wanted Trump battleships built. And the Trump ships were not being built quick enough.

25:50Ben Meiselas:You see, Donald Trump doesn't like aircraft carriers. He doesn't like stealth ships. And he doesn't like the smaller, more mobile ships. Donald Trump likes the ships that were used in World War I, the big kind of tank-looking steel, whatever those ships were made of. That's what he likes. And so he wants Trump-class battleships that look like World War I ships and early World War II ships. That's what he wants. And those weren't being built quick enough. And you're like, well, Ben, you're making this up. I've done so many videos on this. So go watch the other videos that I do if you want. And then Donald Trump posts this.

26:31Ben Meiselas:Let's kill the negotiators or let's kill the ones who don't want to deal. Let's kill them. Let's kill them. Look, bottom line, I said this before. If your view, Donald, is let's kill them and you want to be a war criminal, and you already are, but if you want to go in the direction of escalation, our generals and admirals and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs and others, they've given you the plan of if you want to escalate. you'll destroy the markets you'll put the united states in a great depression more significantly you'll cause deaths of at least tens of thousands of american soldiers maybe hundreds of thousands or maybe even more than that but if you want to talk killed kill killed okay there's a path there's a kill path for you okay there's a kill path for you but you saw the direction the war was going you begged for the ceasefire with iran you agreed to their 10-point framework that's why we are where we are now.

27:30Ben Meiselas:And they're not moving off of their 10-point framework. I'm sure that if you remove the naval blockade and you agreed to concede some things that Iran wants, I would be willing to bet that Iran would move away from some of those 10 points. I believe they would move away. Which ones? I mean, I think they definitely want permanent security guarantees for themselves in Hezbollah, as well as the Houthis and their Shiite groups in Iraq. I think that's one. I think that they would agree to not enrich uranium to weapons grade in a very similar way they did with Obama. Maybe Obama's would be slightly stronger than what they would agree to now because they feel that they won on the battlefield.

28:20Ben Meiselas:They feel that they now, they have something they didn't have with Obama. They controlled the strait of Hormuz. But I think they'd probably be willing to do a deal that looks like a weaker version of Obama's JCPOA, but something similar. So I think you'd get that. My gut would be that they would, here's my suspicion, that they would give up control over the Strait of Hormuz if you agreed that they could get paid reparations for the war in the form of either attacks on the ships until they reach a certain threshold, and then it gets transferred back to international control. But until they get, I think they claim their damages are$267 billion.

29:05Ben Meiselas:So maybe you would meet somewhere in the middle. You would say, okay, Iran will, I'm not suggesting this should be, but this is where a negotiation would work, would I think net out. $75 billion, which you can recover based on ship traffic through the Strait of Hormuz. Either the ships pay you or we pay you. And by the way, how humiliating would that be? It'd be very humiliating, but I'm trying to describe what I actually think a workable resolution is. Then you'd open up the Strait of Hormuz. We would then want an international coalition to make sure it doesn't get closed again. So we would say, okay, as long as we make these payments, we're going to now work with our former NATO allies, I guess, European countries, Arab nations, and we need to let those ships in so that we have other militaries in there to prevent Iran from closing the Strait of the Moon after Iran gets paid what it wants to get paid.

30:04Ben Meiselas:Iran, you can, I mean, you'd probably have to let them keep their ballistic missiles and Shahid drones, and you'd probably have to lift sanctions. What I described is probably the deal that is workable. There'll have to be technical details, obviously, with the Atomic Energy Commission to iron out dilution of nuclear material, very specific stuff that Whitcoff, Kushner, and J.D. Vance know nothing about. But that's ultimately how a resolution to me would look. And if you're going, Ben, Ben, that's a sellout, man. You're selling out. I'm a patriot, 250th anniversary, man. You're selling out the great country, man.

30:49Ben Meiselas:Okay, well, then don't do a deal. Then go back to war. Go back to war. That's an option for you. Go to war and then ask them. But the reality is that we're in this strategic, non-strategic, but we're in this situation because of Donald Trump going it alone with Netanyahu. He screwed up. We lost. Okay, we lost based on what our objectives were. Regime change, people in the streets were supposed to greet Trump and Netanyahu like heroes. I mean, how ridiculous of a concept is that? And then we're going to obliterate this, obliterate all of their missile capabilities, all the things they said at the beginning.

31:30Ben Meiselas:We didn't do that. That's why we lost, right? It seems pretty basic. Those were the objectives. Win. Objectives of no. Loss. Very basic, very binary, right? Okay. So now we have to figure out what to do. If you want to win, okay. Treat it like it's the second quarter. Go to war again. Do a ground invasion of Karg Island. See what happens. I don't support that. It's war crimes. I'd be very clear where I said, that's your option. That's an option. The other option is negotiate. And the deal probably looks eerily similar to what I described. And again, just to be clear, I've never been in a negotiation regarding nuclear material in my life.

32:14Ben Meiselas:I haven't. I do teach negotiation at a prominent law school. I do, in my past as a litigator, I was involved in some of the most contentious and high-profile cases involving negotiations and settlements and resolutions before I started working at Midas. So I at least know in a very high-intensity business setting in front of the top mediators in the world, I've led mediations and settlements. So I think at least that experience gives me some insight. I am a rapacious student of the Middle East and Iran and what their people are saying, because in order for us to understand how to negotiate, you have to listen.

33:03Ben Meiselas:One of the things I teach my law students in negotiation, listen, ask, shut up. The worst negotiator is like a Trump.

33:15Ben Meiselas:Worst negotiator. The best negotiator, you ask a question and you fill the negotiation with silence. And you listen to what the other side is saying. Strategic silence. You hear them. And then you ask them questions. Well, it seems to me what you're saying is this. Listen, because people will start to say how they feel. And am I missing anything here? Who are the key decision makers? Should there be anyone else that I'm talking to? Well, what do you think about this? Gather the info. And the info is out there. That's why I know how to reach a resolution in this thing, because the info is out there.

34:03Ben Meiselas:I'll show you what the worst behavior is. Jeremy, do we have, first show that clip again for people just joining us of Donald Trump as the feed cuts off saying that he had to take a shit. Here, play this clip.

34:18He said, I could use a shit. I could use a shit. That's what goes on in the Oval Office. No, I'm not suggesting that presidents are impervious to taking shits.

34:28Ben Meiselas:I'll be very clear about that. But, I mean, is it such word vomit that you literally have to announce to your staff when you have to go do a number two? I mean, that's where we are. Does the guy walk around the White House just talking about taking shits? I mean, for real, is this what the White House, okay. And here he is talking about how he saved eight young women. It's a total made-up story. I've saved eight young, beautiful women. They're so young. Very young. I saved him. I saved him. False. Here, play this clip. Or the military operation, whatever you want to call it. And they're coming to us.

35:08The problem they have is they are very disorganized right now. Well, now yesterday, and I was very pleased with this, eight young women were going to be executed yesterday afternoon at six o 'clock. and I asked them, call it a favor, I call it just a moral request that they not be executed and they came back with an answer that they won't be executed. They're going to release, it was protesting, eight beautiful young women, very young women and they were, the picture's in the paper and it's been a story for a little while and I saw that and I said, let's see if we can save them and they were, it was very nice what happened.

35:48And so they're not going to be there. What they're doing is, as you know, they're releasing four of them very shortly. And they're going to keep four of them in jail for a period of one month and release them. So they won't be executed. So if you're asking for none of that's true, you're like, Ben, which part of it? None of it. The guy just makes it up. He invented a thing that maybe he saw somewhere online.

36:15Ben Meiselas:And he's like, I save these eight beautiful women. I did it. I had the conversation. They were so young and pretty, and I saved them. What are you talking about? I mean, all of the Iranian leaders are publicly posting that you're making this up. They're not talking to you, and they have no interest in having any conversation with you at all until the naval blockade is lifted. I'll show you this one over here. How long are you willing to wait for a response from Iran? So to be very clear, just so we can sequence the questions. The fact that this next question is even asked, right? How long are you willing to wait for a response from Iran?

36:53Ben Meiselas:I thought you just spoke with Iran and you saved the eight young, beautiful girls. Like, do we see some of just, that wasn't exactly the logic games that I needed to ace the LSATs, okay? But here's what he says here, play this clip. On the board with Iran, how long are you willing to wait until you get a unified response. Don't rush me, Jeff. You know, guys like you, you want to say, oh, so we were in Vietnam like for 18 years. We were in Iraq for many, many years. We were in for all the, I don't like to say World War II because that was a biggie, but we were four and a half, almost five years in World War II.

37:33We were in the Korean War for seven years. I've been doing this for six weeks and their military is totally defeated. They're outside of the little wise guy ships. I call them the wise guy ships, the little boats that they have running around with guns in them. We'll take them out too when we see them. But... Got it. Don't rush me. But I spoke to them. I saved the eight girls. These little ships, these little ships, the wise guys, I call them. The wise guy ships, I call them. in World War II was a biggie. That was a biggie. A biggie? A biggie? What the hell is going on here? How does anybody report on this and not respond like this?

38:27For real? How do you look at that and go, oh, you know, this is an Oval Office press conference and Donald Trump's and, you know, no biggie a biggie a biggie and he talked about pooping in the oval office then he talked about saving the lives of eight girls yeah took normal normal stuff normal stuff all right my producer saying we've got to take our first break of the show i know we were having a good conversation though jeremy with everybody in the chat i'm seeing everybody's messages we had a big crowd today 15 000 people watching it's a great convo 16 000 right now all right make sure you all hit subscribe.

39:04You may think you're subscribed, but you may not actually be subscribed. Double check. Also, if you can make sure you subscribe to Midas Touch on audio also. All right, let's take our first and only quick break of the show. We'll be right back. All right. I got to talk about Magic Spoon. Magic Spoon hits that perfect sweet spot of nostalgia and actually being something you want to keep stocked in your kitchen. It's basically the grownup version of the cereals you loved as a kid. Same fun Saturday morning vibe, but without that sugar crash that used to hit an hour later. What I like is that it actually delivers on the macros.

39:35You're getting around 12 to 14 grams of protein per serving, zero to just a couple grams of sugar, and it fits really well if you're carb conscious. Plus, it's certified gluten-free, so it's something you could grab anytime, breakfast, late night snack, even after a workout. And the flavors are exactly what you want. Fruity, frosted, cocoa, peanut butter, cinnamon crunch, like all the classics you remember. I love the cocoa and cinnamon crunch. I gotta say, those are my favorite, but I like them all. They also just dropped some newer flavors of marshmallows, which really lean into that childhood feel.

40:06There's now a classic marshmallow flavor that's super nostalgic, and a s'mores one that tastes like a campfire in a bowl. Those have a couple grams of sugar and aren't gluten-free, just to note, but they're a fun twist. And it's not just cereal, their Magic Spoon Treats are great too. They're these crispy, airy bars with 12 grams of protein, some fiber, no added sugar, and they are super easy to throw in your bag or keep in the car. Feels like a treat, but actually keeps you going. Look for Magic Spoon on Amazon or at your nearest grocery store, and if you want to try something new, check out Magic Spoon's protein pastries.

40:40They are packed with protein and taste like the nostalgic toaster pastries you grew up with, but without all the sugar. You can get$5 off your next order, including the protein pastries, at magicspoon.com slash Midas. That's magicspoon.com slash Midas, M-E-I-D-A-S for$5 off. All right, let me tell you something that's been bugging me for a while. I can't be the only one who's left a doctor's appointment thinking, what did I actually just learn? You go in, you try to ask questions, and you walk out with, you're fine, or drink more water, no real data, no plan, nothing actionable. I've had that happen more times than I can count, and it's frustrating because you actually want to take control over your health.

41:22That's why I've been so fascinated by what Superpower is doing. They basically flip the whole system. Superpower sends a licensed professional to your home, or you could go to a nearby lab, and it's one simple blood draw. But here's the difference. They test over 100 biomarkers, way more than a typical checkup. And it gives you a real detailed understanding of what's going on inside your body. I'm talking heart, liver, thyroid, hormones, metabolism, vitamin levels, even environmental toxins. So whether you're trying to prevent disease, fix brain fog, or just optimize your workouts, this gives you real answers.

41:55Because honestly, most of us are just guessing. What supplements should I take? Am I sleeping enough? Is my diet even right? Superpower actually gives you an actionable health plan based on your results. They even suggest supplements or prescriptions you could buy directly through them, plus nutrition guidance and lifestyle changes. And this part is wild. You get your true biological age, and you could track it over time. So it's not just a one-time snapshot. Every test, bills on the last, so you could actually see progress year after year instead of starting from scratch every January. They also have an on-demand clinician team, so you're not stuck waiting weeks for answers or Googling things at 2 a.m.

42:33And get this, Superpower used to cost$499, but right now it's just$199 for the full experience. That's honestly cheaper than most of the other services out there that sometimes charge $500,$1 ,000, and often more. So if you're serious about actually understanding your health this year, this is a no-brainer. Make this the year you stop guessing about your health with Superpower. Not only did Superpower reduce their price to just$199, but for a limited time, our listeners get an additional$20 off with code MIDAS. Head to superpower.com and use code MIDAS at checkout for$20 off your membership. That's M-E-I-D-A-S.

43:11After you sign up, they'll ask how you heard about them, so make sure to mention this podcast to support the show. Welcome back to Ben on Breaking News. I'm Ben Mycelis, and this is your Breaking News, showing you what was going on in the White House moments ago. Donald Trump, the feed cut off, talked about having to run to the bathroom, and then he talked about saving young, beautiful women in Iran. They're very young and very beautiful, which never happened. Then he called World War II a biggie, and that as long as this doesn't last longer than Vietnam, he's okay. And you'll notice as he goes through this press conference, he keeps on changing the duration of the war.

43:56And so we basically have been in this war for like two months now, about eight weeks, maybe seven or so. And so he just can never say a true number. So here he is when a reporter says, so how long are you willing to wait for, sorry, the next one goes, Trump says, we've been doing it for 5.5 weeks. And the reporter, fortunately, is like, sir, it's been eight weeks. Why are you saying 5.5 weeks? Why is every word a lie?

44:25Ben Meiselas:Why is every word a lie? I mean, you could say, look, it's eight weeks and we're going to try to end by 12 weeks, but now we're two months in. Here, play this clip. We have no pressure. It's only guys like you with a question like that about what's your time. We've been doing it for five and a half weeks. But sir, it's been eight weeks that the U.S. now has been involved with Iran. You had initially said it would be four to six weeks. Well, I hope that, but I also took a little break. I gave them a break. I took a break? I took a break so we don't count the war right now, even though the Strait of Hormuz is closed.

45:02That's how he gets his name. I took a break. I took a break? I mean, what a wild, yeah, he counts the ceasefire as we're not at war and I took a break all of a sudden. Okay, the Strait of Hormuz has closed, everybody. There ain't no commerce going through the Persian Gulf right now. That's a big problem. That's a big problem internationally. And I mean, you have a naval blockade in Iran, which isn't all that effective. They have full control of the Strait of Hormuz. So what are you going to do? We learned that at least 34 tankers with links to Iran have bypassed the U.S. blockade. Financial Times confirming this, both with ship tracking data as well as independent sources.

45:52because for those watching, here's how Iran does it. This is how they easily defeat the U.S. blockade. For those on audio, I'm showing people the path that Iran takes, and it basically takes its ships right through the coast of Iran, and then they stay in the territorial waters of Pakistan and India, and then they come right out because the U.S. naval blockade is not allowed in the territorial waters of Pakistan and India. So if you want to break the blockade, you just basically kind of hug the coastline as much as you can as a tanker. If you see CENTCOM and the US military bragging about interdicting ships, it's kind of more, it's not in this area.

46:41They're interdicting Iranian ghost ship cargo ships in the Indo-Pacific. And they create these videos of our soldiers boarding these cargo ships like pirates and searching them. And that's like the big accomplishment of our Navy. Yay, we stopped a defenseless cargo ship. And that's why they're mocking us in Iran. I mean, they're just like America's ongoing piracy in international waters. The US Department of War announced the inspection and seizure of another tanker claiming it was carrying Iranian oil. The company that tracks oil cargo shipments, tanker trackers, has also claimed that this tanker is the same vessel Phoenix that has been assisting Iran in exporting 20 million barrels of oil since 2023.

47:33And so that's what the U.S. Navy is doing right now. And then Donald Trump goes, if we left Iran right now, things would be tremendous success. Like if we left right now, if we did nothing, we've already achieved victory.

47:49Ben Meiselas:So now I'm just hanging out there because I like it. I like to be there, basically. So we won. And if we left, we would win. But I still want to be there just because I like it. I like being there. It's nice. Nice waters. Look, if you're like Ben, did he really say that? Basically, basically, here's what he says. Let's play it. I'm a break and remember this. I want to make the best deal. I could make a deal right now. Do you know that if I left right now, we had a tremendous success. It would take them 20 years to rebuild, but I don't want to do that. I want to have it everlasting. I want to have it where they never get, they never have a chance to get it.

48:29I mean, the way you asked that question, I did say it. I thought it would take four to six weeks. And I was right, because at the end of six weeks at the end of four weeks their military was decimated but now what i'm doing i don't i can't tell you that i don't want to put that kind of a timetable on it but it'll go pretty quickly and uh we'll have the straight opened up now right now we have it closed we have total control of the straight and the fact that it slows you know they would have opened it up three days ago they came to us and they said we will agree to open the straight and all my people are happy Everybody was happy except me.

49:05I said, wait a minute, if we open the street, that means they're going to make$500 million a day. I don't want them to make$500 million a day until they settle this thing. So I'm the one that kept it closed. We have total control of it. And it'll open when they make a deal or something else happens that's very positive. Makes a lot of sense, right, everybody? Makes a great deal of sense, everybody. I mean, what in the world is he even talking about right there? I mean, by the way, if you look at what else is happening in this godforsaken regime, like you thought it was bad enough when this guy Thomas Fugate, this 22-year-old guy who's fresh out of college, who had no experience in national security, was named by the Trump regime as the main Department of Homeland Security official tasked with overseeing government extremism.

49:59He was the main counterintelligence official. Thomas Fugate III, a 22-year-old, no experience. But you want to know who the deputy was? Now we learned about the deputy counterintelligence official over at the Department of Homeland Security. There she is right there, Julia Varvaro. And she's a notorious sugar daddy person. What do you call it? A sugar daddy person?

50:29sugar, Jeremy, you were awfully quick. Jeremy says you call it a sugar baby. Okay. Sugar, I was going to go with sugar daddy person, but Jeremy tells me it's a sugar baby. And how can I do this segment seriously now? But this was the top count, the deputy assistant secretary for counterterrorism. And she would be on all of these like websites where she would talk about searching for a sugar daddy. And one of the sugar daddies, this divorcee who spent$40 ,000 bankrolling her, there's all these tech, the relationship went wrong. She wanted more money from him. Again, she's 29 years old on these sugar daddy sites.

51:14She found this sugar daddy. She wanted him to pay her more money while she's the deputy assistant secretary of counterterrorism. And then this guy, Robert Bianchi, is like, he then blows the whistle on his sugar baby. This is true. This is really what happened. Because he believes, and rightfully so, that this poses a national security threat. And it does, because this is compromising. As I've said before, let me be very clear. Like I said this also with Kristi Noem's husband on the bimboification, right? He was into Kristi Noem and her husband, they judge people, right? They attack people, they make people suffer.

51:56But behind closed doors, her husband was into bimboification, humiliation. So he would dress up as a woman and he would fill his chest with triple E or quadruple, whatever it is, triple E breasts, because that's what he was into. And then he would want women who look that way to humiliate and shame him on video. That's what he was into. And as I said before, it's not for me to, as long as what you do is safe and consensual, and I'm not going to pry into any family dynamics, but I obviously don't want situations where families are being broken apart and things are being hidden or concealed. But if you do things safe, consensual, and in private, and that's what you want to do, I'm not going to mock any of this.

52:51The issue becomes public service, the hypocrisy, national security, and these types of issues. What I will certainly call out is the behavior of Donald Trump's Department of Labor secretary, Lori Chavez de Reamer, who was fired this past week as well. I mean, because her behavior, using our taxpayer dollars, it was alleged to go to strip clubs with other people in the Department of Labor. Her husband was accused of sexual misconduct within the Department of Labor building such that he was banned, I believe, from going into the department of those released allegations against him. And then all of these vacations on the taxpayer dime.

53:42While it should shock your conscience that this behavior is taking place, it also is not shocking that it's taking place because Donald Trump is a sexual predator. I mean, he's a real vile. He's a real vile thing, like his whole life he was. So the perversion, all of the things that you're seeing, that's what goes on in that guy's head. He's a sicko. I mean, he's like Epstein's closest friend. The guy's a sicko. We shouldn't forget they're covering up the Epstein files, right? I'll talk about that in a moment, but this guy's a sicko. And he wants to, this is what he attracts. And again, I'm not going to judge what you do in your private.

54:30I'm not shaming the underlying conduct. Again, if it's safe, if it's consensual, I don't, what do they call it? Like king shaming. I'm not going to shame your things, whatever you do. I really want to be, I think it's important. Everyone is into things that's not, the government shouldn't be prodding into this. No one should be. But when you become a public servant and you've now compromised the safety of my daughter, of my community, of my state, of my country, of the mightest mighty, of our friends and family and all the people you know, when that now is compromised with this mess right now, Yeah, you better believe I'm living and you better believe we should call it out right now.

55:18What the hell is going on here? Now, just pivoting for a moment to Epstein. You know the updates, right? Donald Trump is working with James Comer to get Ghislaine Maxwell a pardon. I know we knew that was coming, but it's very, very much coming. James Comer admits it. Politico writes, Politico writes, go back to that one again. Oversight chair James Comer told me members of his panel are open to a pardon for Ghislaine Maxwell so that she would share info with Congress. Do we have the specific quote from the Politico article? I think I highlighted it. I'm not sure if I gave you. Yeah, here it is.

56:02When asked whether he believed it was a favorable deal to issue a pardon in return for Maxwell's testimony. Comer said, a lot of people do. My committees split on that. He added, declining to name the people on his panel who support granting a pardon. I don't speak for my committee. You literally do speak for your committee. You're the chair of the committee. Your job is actually to speak on behalf of the committee. You're the chair of the oversight committee. Your job is you speak for the committee. Okay. And you went on the record and you said that there are, seems to be lots of members who believe Ghislaine Maxwell, a child sex trafficker, should get a pardon.

56:48Right. And now we also learned that the Republicans want to shut down all further hearings on Epstein and all further subpoenas and depositions. And Instead, they want to turn everything into so-called roundtables. They want to go from hearings, under oath, deposition, subpoenas, to roundtables. And the roundtables would be not under oath, and they would be basically just complete charades. Or as my younger brother Jordy says, charades. And it would just be total BS. That's what they want to turn it into. Jeremy, I'm not sure if I gave you the assets, though, here, but if I did, do we have any of the Lutnik clips of Lutnik being cross-examined on Epstein and what Lutnik's response was?

57:44Yeah, let's just play one of them for everybody. Let's play it. If President Trump has even a shred of concern about accountability for Jeffrey Epstein's enablers, he would fire you, too. Beyond ADFIN, what other financial ties do you have to Jeffrey Epstein?

58:05As I said, I'm going to answer all these. Beyond ADFIN, what other financial ties? You're the Commerce Secretary. We have a right to ask this question and get it answered. Again, I'm not going to spend the budget day discussing something I've set aside time to spend on this topic. I'm going to switch topics. Let me switch topics. Let's go cut to our Washington, D.C. Bureau Chief Scott McFarlane with an update on this all. Let's bring in Scott McFarlane, Jeremy. Let me tell you, this is going to be one of those days, one of those days in which we hear a lot about Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell and the political crisis the Epstein files are causing for the Trump administration.

58:49The latest reports that Ghislaine Maxwell is trying to angle for a pardon or perhaps getting closer to securing a pardon and again trying to get a court to vacate her conviction and sentence for sex trafficking have raised the hackles again and raised the profile of this Epstein files crisis for the Trump administration. Raja Krishnamoorthy has asked the Department of Justice to hand over any records that they may have gotten from Ghislaine Maxwell or from her attorney in which they're discussing a pardon. I heard that Ghislaine Maxwell's attorney is now saying that she's going to be pardoned.

59:21Are you kidding me? That is absolutely insane. I've already introduced a resolution saying that she should never be given any form of clemency or leniency given that she perpetrated this ghastly sex trafficking ring with thousands of girls. She never admitted to it. She hasn't served any time showing no remorse. Absolutely no, no, no to any kind of pardon for her. And by the way, what the heck is the DOJ doing with regard to this particular investigation? They've had two arrests. They still have not produced all the Epstein files. 3.5 million pages are missing from the production. And they're now talking about pardoning Ghislaine Maxwell.

1:00:06This is crazy. And there was this report late on Wednesday that the House Oversight Committee was considering some clemency for Maxwell to get her to testify. It's been pushed back on by Republicans. I talked about it on CNN with Jake Tapper to explain why that thing is just a non-starter. Oh boy, try to find a Democrat to vote for that thing. It's like playing the Powerball. You could win, but you're not going to. You could find a Democrat to support giving her clemency. You will not. So let's start there. This thing is politically cancerous to all who touch it. I can't imagine they're going to find a critical mass to support that toxic idea.

1:00:41But again, they don't need that if it comes down to whether or not President Trump Yeah. And maybe it's maybe he's crazy. Maybe President Trump is thinking about doing it. And this is providing cover for him in some way. Like, oh, look, members of the House Oversight Committee want it. Although we should note, Chairman Comer did not say that he wants it one way or the other. But there are other issues, too. Pam Bondi was to show last week for a deposition under subpoena and did not. Members of Congress do not like being circumvented when they issue a subpoena. And Robert Garcia of California has said he believes both parties will support an effort to either get this thing back on the calendar to fight a contempt fighting against Pam Bondi.

1:01:22Expect to hear more about that. Well, we'll be reporting on that soon as well. I want to thank Scott McFarlane. Great report. And just everybody, throw up blue hearts if you are all subscribed to Scott McFarlane's YouTube channel. It's at Scott McFarlane News. Make sure you all subscribe there. I see 14 ,000, 15 ,000 people who are watching this concurrently live. So make sure you all subscribe to Scott's channel as well and get his updates throughout the day as the Midas Touch Network continues to expand. As you know, I do a live show with Brett and Jordy at 5 Pacific, 8 Eastern today. Look forward to seeing everybody who's here.

1:02:03Join me and my brothers this evening for more breaking news. Oh, we released a new video on the Midas Touch YouTube channel. A lot of work today. So as soon as this ends, go jump in and watch the latest video as well. So watch the latest video on the Midas Touch feed as soon as this ends. Just go and click to the main feed and watch the one that we just dropped during the show. And then go check out Scott McFarlane's YouTube channel. Thanks, everybody. I'll see you tonight with my brothers, 8 Eastern, 5 Pacific. Shout out Midas Mighty. Want to stay plugged in? Become a subscriber to our sub stack at MidasPlus.com.

1:02:37You'll get daily recaps from Ron Filipkowski, ad-free episodes of our podcast, and more exclusive content only available at MidasPlus.com.

1:02:55Ryan Reynolds here from Mint Mobile, with a message for everyone paying big wireless way too much. Please, for the love of everything good in this world, stop. With Mint, you can get premium wireless for just$15 a month. Of course, if you enjoy overpaying, no judgments, but that's weird. Okay, one judgment. Anyway, give it a try at mintmobile.com slash switch. Upfront payment of$45 for three-month plan, equivalent to$15 per month required. Intro rate first three months only, then full price plan options available. Taxes and fees extra. See full terms at mintmobile.com.