Latest / The Hugh Hewitt Show: Highly Concentrated / Israel Elections, Updates on key U.S. Senate races

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Israel Elections, Updates on key U.S. Senate races · The Hugh Hewitt Show: Highly Concentrated

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  Speaker 1: Welcome to today's podcast sponsored by Hillsdale College. All things
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: Hillsdale at hillsdale.edu. I encourage you to take advantage of
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: the many free online courses there. And of course, a
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  Speaker 1: listen to the Hillsdale Dialogues, all of them at Q
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  Speaker 1: for hillsdale.com or just Google Apple, iTunes and Hillsdale. Good
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: morning and grace America. Good Monday to you. It is
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  Speaker 1: eight days until election 2026 is over. And if you're
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  Speaker 1: like me, you're looking forward to election night. Early reminder,
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  Speaker 1: Salem News Channel will be on very late in the evening.
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  Speaker 1: I'm taking the last shift from 11 to 1 a.m.
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  Speaker 1: on election night. We should have everything buttoned up except,
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  Speaker 1: of course, California, which takes three weeks to vote. And
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  Speaker 1: so you won't know that for three weeks. But everything
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  Speaker 1: else we'll know. We'll know who's won in Maine. I
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  Speaker 1: think it's going to be Susan Collins, who's won in Ohio.
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  Speaker 1: I think it's going to be John Husted, who's won
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  Speaker 1: in Michigan. I think and I'm hoping and praying that
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  Speaker 1: it's Mike Rogers. We'll find out if, in fact, Michelle
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  Speaker 1: Tafoya pulls off the episode of the year in Minnesota
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  Speaker 1: over the wacky, flaky Peggy Flanagan. And then we'll have
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  Speaker 1: Texas results in, I expect, before I go off the
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  Speaker 1: air on election night on the Salem News Channel at
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  Speaker 1: 1 p.m. But I hope you join us that night
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  Speaker 1: for wall-to-wall election coverage. My colleagues will be taking the
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  Speaker 1: earlier shifts. I'll be in at 11 p.m. to wrap
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  Speaker 1: up the night with the late-breaking results. President Trump is
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  Speaker 1: in overdrive. And for those who wonder why is he
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  Speaker 1: doing this, Byron York has a terrific piece reported today
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  Speaker 1: in the Washington Examiner on why a president goes to
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  Speaker 1: races that are apparently safe. Why is he going to
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  Speaker 1: states that are deep red, like Ohio? Because he's got
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  Speaker 1: to get the base vote out. He's not trying to
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  Speaker 1: convert someone with TDS to vote for him. He's not
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  Speaker 1: trying to get independents. They are going to be sold,
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  Speaker 1: independents are going to be sold on the quality of
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  Speaker 1: the candidate. It always comes down to that. But there
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  Speaker 1: are a percentage of voters, and it's a large percentage
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  Speaker 1: of voters, who are uniquely pro-President Trump. And they have
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  Speaker 1: to be asked by the president, and he is doing
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  Speaker 1: the asking, to get out and vote. Now, I'm going
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  Speaker 1: to cover some of his remarks Sunday in Georgia, some
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  Speaker 1: of them in Detroit. He's doing at least two rallies
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  Speaker 1: a day. And he's traveling. I have asked the question online.
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  Speaker 1: No one's argued with me. Does anyone ever remember any
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  Speaker 1: president in a midterm working this hard as President Trump has?
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  Speaker 1: And the metrics are number of appearances in person rally
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  Speaker 1: or studio side by side with a candidate in their
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  Speaker 1: home state and miles traveled. He went to Alaska, for
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  Speaker 1: goodness sake, last week. To help out Dan Sullivan, the
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  Speaker 1: real Dan Sullivan, Democrat Dirty Trick Dan Sullivan, who is
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  Speaker 1: also a decoy Dan Sullivan, is not kosher, but we
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  Speaker 1: all know that the Republican incumbent line is under Dan Sullivan.
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  Speaker 1: And Dan Sullivan came up with a great closing message,
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  Speaker 1: which is rank whoever you want, second or third. Vote
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  Speaker 1: for me, the real Dan Sullivan, but rank whoever you
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  Speaker 1: want for second or third. Just don't rank Mary Peltola.
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  Speaker 1: Don't rank her at all. I think that's a fabulous message.
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  Speaker 2: It works.
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  Speaker 1: Don't rank Mary Teltola at all, even in fourth place.
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  Speaker 1: Leave her off your ballot. Mark one, two, and three.
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  Speaker 1: But don't mark her. Don't give your vote away because
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  Speaker 1: she's a radical Democrat. We don't want radical Democrats from
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  Speaker 1: Alaska ruining the sweet deal that Alaska gets from the
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  Speaker 1: federal government because they deserve it. They power the country
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  Speaker 1: with their exports, their oil and natural gas exports. So
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  Speaker 1: let's go to the rally, find out some of the
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  Speaker 1: greatest hits that President Trump is hitting. Georgia. talking about
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  Speaker 1: France on Saturday cut number one.
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  Speaker 3: They're not going to be met with a couple of
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  Speaker 3: guys standing there saying, please don't, did you see where the... Look,
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  Speaker 3: and they have good police in France, but they're not
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  Speaker 3: allowed to do their job. So France is right now
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  Speaker 3: burning down because it opens its borders to people who
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  Speaker 3: hate it. These are people who hate it. They hate France.
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  Speaker 4: They hate the people of France. They move there. They
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  Speaker 4: don't like the buildings. They don't like the monuments. They
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  Speaker 4: don't like the paintings. They don't like anything about France.
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  Speaker 4: And you know what you do with those people? Never
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  Speaker 4: let them come into your country. And that's what we do.
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  Speaker 1: And then he went on to call on Speaker Johnson
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  Speaker 1: to boot Ilhan Omar, the congresswoman under investigation by the
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  Speaker 1: Department of Justice for what we do not know. Cut
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  Speaker 1: number two.
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  Speaker 3: Hear ye, hear ye, please inform. the Speaker of the
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  Speaker 3: House of Representatives, James Michael Johnson, that the Democrat Party
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  Speaker 3: has just conceded her seat, Ilhan Noor Saeed Elmi, her
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  Speaker 3: real name, has openly admitted to fraud and she will
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  Speaker 3: not be legally allowed to be a member of this
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  Speaker 3: august body.
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  Speaker 1: So President Trump was in Georgia stumping for Rick Jackson
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  Speaker 1: for governor and Mike Collins for senator. And we'll see
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  Speaker 1: if it worked in turning out the vote. Then he
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  Speaker 1: went up to Detroit on Sunday. He had a pre-rally
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  Speaker 1: interview with Fox 2 in Detroit. Here's what he had
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  Speaker 1: to say about Space Force and the Iranian Revolutionary Guard.
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  Speaker 1: Cut number three.
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  Speaker 2: What about the underground uranium?
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  Speaker 5: Are you concerned that it will take a matter of
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  Speaker 5: months if you pull out that they can go back
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  Speaker 5: and start again?
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  Speaker 3: No, I'm not, because it's thousands of tons of rock
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  Speaker 3: on top of it.
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  Speaker 2: But over a period of time, I guess they could.
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  Speaker 3: Right now, there are only two countries that could do that,
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  Speaker 3: China and the United States. We're the only ones with
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  Speaker 3: the kind of equipment to do it. But, no, I
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  Speaker 3: wouldn't be concerned. Don't forget, we have Space Force because
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  Speaker 3: of me. So we have Space Force, and Space Force
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  Speaker 3: can see everything. I could read if you had a
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  Speaker 3: badge on your jacket and your first name was Mohammed,
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  Speaker 3: I could read that name beautifully right on your jacket.
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  Speaker 2: So from space, it's amazing. So we have every site
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  Speaker 2: under watch.
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  Speaker 3: If there's any movement at the site, we know exactly
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  Speaker 3: what to do, but there won't be.
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  Speaker 2: First name's Roop, R-O-O-P, just so you know. I thought so.
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  Speaker 2: I wanted to ask you a question about AI data centers.
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  Speaker 3: I was only referring to if you were over there,
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  Speaker 3: because the fact is we have such unbelievable equipment that
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  Speaker 3: we literally can read the name tag on a jacket.
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  Speaker 1: Then the president went on in that interview with Channel 2,
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  Speaker 1: Fox and Detroit, cut number two, talking about the trade
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  Speaker 1: deal with Canada that's coming.
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  Speaker 3: You want to see problems? You want to see not
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  Speaker 3: only energy problems but death problems? Let them have a
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  Speaker 3: nuclear weapon because they would use it. And I have
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  Speaker 3: to do that first. I knew when I did it, look,
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  Speaker 3: we blew the hell out of their nuclear capacity. You
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  Speaker 3: know that?
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  Speaker 2: Far greater than anyone even thought.
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  Speaker 3: It's gone.
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  Speaker 2: But I knew that.
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  Speaker 3: That was going to raise the prices a little bit. Now,
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  Speaker 3: if you take a look, the oil, just on the
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  Speaker 3: front page of the Wall Street Journal yesterday, Oil coming
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  Speaker 3: out of the Strait of Hormuz is now topping what
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  Speaker 3: it was before the war. Because we have a blockade,
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  Speaker 3: and our military, but our Navy has been incredible. We
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  Speaker 3: have a naval blockade, and we have more oil coming
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  Speaker 3: right now out of the Strait of Hormuz than it
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  Speaker 3: was before the war started.
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  Speaker 1: And then he went to the rally in Detroit and
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  Speaker 1: said this about, don't forget what Joe Biden and the
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  Speaker 1: Democrats did at the border, cut number six.
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  Speaker 3: They will open the floodgates and invite hordes of jihadists
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  Speaker 3: to our shores, creating a nightmare of violence and terror
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  Speaker 3: until you cannot even have a Christmas.
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  Speaker 1: And then he went on to say to the rally
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  Speaker 1: in Detroit that we have not rejected extremism for no
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  Speaker 1: reason whatsoever. Cut number seven.
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  Speaker 3: Americans did not spend all these years fighting communists and
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  Speaker 3: terrorists in order to Look and just watch it all
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  Speaker 3: burn down and come down to the ground. And we're
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  Speaker 3: not going to surrender America to communists, jihadists.
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  Speaker 1: We're not going to do it here.
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  Speaker 3: We're not going to do it in this state.
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  Speaker 1: And then Mike Rogers ran a brand new ad, cut
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  Speaker 1: number 10.
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  Speaker 6: Alberta doctors say emergency departments across our province are in
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  Speaker 6: crisis mode.
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  Speaker 7: We're 130% over capacity.
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  Speaker 8: Our entire province's health care system is in crisis.
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  Speaker 5: When Canada was able to build itself a single-payer health system,
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  Speaker 5: it started in the provinces.
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  Speaker 3: Hospital wait times and wait times for special treatment, screening,
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  Speaker 3: and diagnosis are an ongoing challenge.
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  Speaker 5: One in ten patients spend over 48 hours in the
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  Speaker 5: emergency room.
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  Speaker 1: In survey after survey, they're happier with their health care system.
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  Speaker 7: This is a growing phenomenon.
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  Speaker 9: The Canadian health care system is letting patients down. So
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  Speaker 9: they're getting up and going elsewhere.
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  Speaker 5: They don't want to wait.
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  Speaker 10: We would all pay a tax system that would cover.
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  Speaker 2: All of us. You're just paying a bit more to bike.
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  Speaker 11: Up.
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  Speaker 5: What Medicare for All does is it does away with
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  Speaker 5: the private insurance market.
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  Speaker 1: What you have is the state operating as your insurance company.
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  Speaker 1: That's what we want. Great ad from Mike Rogers because
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  Speaker 1: we do not want Medicare for all that Abdo El-Sayed
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  Speaker 1: is selling. I'll be right back with more tape from
• 9:31
  Speaker 1: the weekend and some remarks on the Browns. Big win
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  Speaker 1: over the Titans next on the Hugh Hewitt Show. Welcome back, America.
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  Speaker 1: I'm Hugh Hewitt. After four governments in four years, four
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  Speaker 1: years ago, the Israelis elected a government led by Prime
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  Speaker 1: Minister Netanyahu that has served out its full four-year term.
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  Speaker 1: and tomorrow they vote on a new government. I'm joined
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  Speaker 1: by Dr. Michael Oren, former Israeli ambassador to the United States,
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  Speaker 1: to tell us what will happen. It is, I believe,
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  Speaker 1: 941 in Tel Aviv in the night. Dr. Oren, right now,
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  Speaker 1: polls open at 7 a.m.
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  Speaker 9: Tomorrow.
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  Speaker 1: By this time tomorrow, who's going to be the next
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  Speaker 1: prime minister?
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  Speaker 10: I'd love to be able to tell you I knew.
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  Speaker 10: You know, I love prophecy, and I'm usually pretty good
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  Speaker 10: at it, but this is a hard one.
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  Speaker 6: I still think that Gadi Azenkot is going to pull
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  Speaker 6: this out at some level, but he'll fall short of
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  Speaker 6: the 61 he needs. And there's been a question of
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  Speaker 6: horse trading. Can the Change Coalition, can they agree on
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  Speaker 6: a leadership? Not quite sure they'll agree on Gadi Azenkot.
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  Speaker 6: And then can that Change leadership then peel off members
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  Speaker 6: of the Likud, the former government, by offering them various incentives,
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  Speaker 6: various ministries, hey, a car, and a create a 61-majority government.
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  Speaker 6: By the way, that's precisely how the Naftali Bennett government fell,
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  Speaker 6: because Likud was able to peel away members of his
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  Speaker 6: coalition through various ministerial inducements. Nobody knows. I just watched
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  Speaker 6: two hours of Israeli news, and even the Israeli news
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  Speaker 6: doesn't know who's going to win tomorrow.
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  Speaker 1: Okay, Michael Oren, four years ago, or actually the Naftali
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  Speaker 1: Bennett election before that, Everyone promises not to sit with
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  Speaker 1: the Arab parties. Do we believe, Gotti Isingkot, that he
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  Speaker 1: won't sit with the Arab parties?
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  Speaker 10: We believe anybody in politics.
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  Speaker 6: I think that the major issue here is not who's
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  Speaker 6: going to win, but to what degree and to what
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  Speaker 6: extent who's going to lie. Because everyone says, you know,
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  Speaker 6: certainly the coalition says they won't sit with the Arabs.
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  Speaker 6: The opposition says they won't sit with the Arabs for
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  Speaker 6: the most part. But the opposition also says they won't
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  Speaker 6: serve with the ultra-Orthodox. And they also say they won't
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  Speaker 6: serve in a government with Benjamin Netanyahu, which leaves, you know,
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  Speaker 6: like three seats left in Knesset if you tell.
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  Speaker 10: The people you're not going to sit with, right? So
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  Speaker 10: somebody's not telling the truth.
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  Speaker 6: And whoever is not telling the truth, I think most persuasively,
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  Speaker 6: has a good chance of being the next prime minister
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  Speaker 6: of Israel.
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  Speaker 1: All right, let me phrase a broader question to you, Dr. Oren.
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  Speaker 1: What do you expect to be the biggest surprise tomorrow night?
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  Speaker 1: It'll be, I might still be on the air at
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  Speaker 1: six o'clock at night when the Israeli elections are called.
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  Speaker 1: What might be the biggest surprise?
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  Speaker 6: Well, the biggest surprise will actually be the failure of
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  Speaker 6: a number of small parties to pass the threshold, the
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  Speaker 6: 3.25 percent of the vote you need to actually get
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  Speaker 6: a seat in Knesset. And there have been some very
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  Speaker 6: interesting politicians running, former Major General Winter, Yoaz Hendel, a
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  Speaker 6: popular figure in Israel who's leading a party of reservists
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  Speaker 6: who have served hundreds of days in Gaza, that type
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  Speaker 6: of group. The biggest surprise, many people will not be
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  Speaker 6: happy with this. I expect a very large showing for
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  Speaker 6: Itamar Ben-Gvir. A lot of young people have come out
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  Speaker 6: of Gaza now. Over a half a million new voters
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  Speaker 6: in Israel, an immense amount of new voters in Israel,
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  Speaker 6: who have come out of.
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  Speaker 10: Gaza, and they're coming out angry.
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  Speaker 6: They're coming out swinging, and they look for a person
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  Speaker 6: who knows how to swing, and that's Ben-Gvir.
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  Speaker 1: Now, you mean, when you say come out of Gaza,
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  Speaker 1: you mean they served in the IDF during the long war?
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  Speaker 6: They served in the IDF starting October 7th. Some of
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  Speaker 6: them have served, you know, 500 days or more in combat.
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  Speaker 6: And what they've seen is a war which is not concluded,
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  Speaker 6: which the government said we're going to seek total victory.
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  Speaker 6: We don't see total victory in Gaza. We don't see
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  Speaker 6: total victory in Lebanon. Certainly not in Iran. We most
• 13:19
  Speaker 6: probably will be facing another round of fighting with Iran.
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  Speaker 10: It's just a question of when.
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  Speaker 6: And so many people, after wars, soldiers come out of
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  Speaker 6: wars rather hardened and sometimes very angry if that war
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  Speaker 6: was not entirely successful.
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  Speaker 1: Now, Dr. Warren, I have two questions. One, I'm used
• 13:36
  Speaker 1: to day of electioneering and Israel's always kind of fun.
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  Speaker 1: Various people are out in their various strongholds saying, you've
• 13:44
  Speaker 1: got to go vote, you've got to go vote. It's
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: a national holiday in Israel so that everyone can vote.
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  Speaker 1: But they'll go to the beach, they'll go to the marketplace.
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  Speaker 1: I mean, they'll go wherever they need to go to
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  Speaker 1: get their votes. And then second question is, No matter
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  Speaker 1: who is the prime minister, will they stand shoulder to
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  Speaker 1: shoulder and tell the IDF to fly wing to wing
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  Speaker 1: with America if there is another round coming with Iran?
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  Speaker 10: Well, the second question is sort of a no-brainer. Yes,
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  Speaker 10: of course he will.
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  Speaker 6: And I think the general impression here is that Netanyahu
• 14:10
  Speaker 6: wanted to do this before the election, and both his
• 14:14
  Speaker 6: chief of staff, General Zemir, and President Trump said, not
• 14:18
  Speaker 6: so fast.
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  Speaker 10: I've got my own elections to worry about.
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  Speaker 12: And there's a certain sense here that maybe the very warm,
• 14:24
  Speaker 12: even effusive endorsement by Trump of Netanyahu's candidacy was sort
• 14:29
  Speaker 12: of a quid pro quo saying, you know, hey, don't
• 14:31
  Speaker 12: interfere with my elections.
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  Speaker 6: I won't interfere with your elections. And let's just keep
• 14:34
  Speaker 6: the lid on it until after November 3rd. So that's
• 14:38
  Speaker 6: an obvious one. Whoever the prime minister is going to
• 14:39
  Speaker 6: stand shoulder to shoulder with the United States of America.
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  Speaker 10: No question about that.
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  Speaker 6: The other question is, you know, can that candidate then
• 14:48
  Speaker 6: sort of heal the state of Israel?
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  Speaker 10: That is a very, very difficult hurdle to overcome.
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  Speaker 1: How about Election Day? I'm always fascinated by seeing Bibi
• 14:58
  Speaker 1: Netanyahu out at the beach with a handheld bullhorn saying,
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: you've got to go vote. The Arabs are voting. Is
• 15:04
  Speaker 1: that going to happen again?
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  Speaker 9: No.
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  Speaker 10: Well, listen, I loved my election period.
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  Speaker 6: It's a small country, but you sort of crisscross it north, south, east, west.
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  Speaker 6: You don't sleep for weeks on end. You know, America
• 15:17
  Speaker 6: has something to learn from Israel in this way. Our
• 15:19
  Speaker 6: election period cycle is literally three months. It's not four years.
• 15:23
  Speaker 6: And there's no fundraising, by the way. We don't have
• 15:25
  Speaker 6: to raise a single shekel. It's all provided by the government.
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  Speaker 6: So we can actually focus on policy and not have
• 15:30
  Speaker 6: to worry about, you know, philanthropy. which is very, it's
• 15:33
  Speaker 6: a great, I think, a great asset for Israeli politics.
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  Speaker 10: But people are out.
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  Speaker 6: And, you know, if you're a politician who actually likes people,
• 15:40
  Speaker 6: and not many politicians, I must say, actually like people,
• 15:43
  Speaker 6: this is the place to do it.
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  Speaker 10: And all of them are out there all day long.
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  Speaker 6: I'm sitting up here in my apartment in Jaffa, and
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  Speaker 6: I can hear the megaphones of various political rallies going
• 15:53
  Speaker 6: on outside.
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  Speaker 1: Well, okay, let me close this way. Will Israel come together,
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  Speaker 1: no matter who is the prime minister, after this is over?
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  Speaker 6: It depends on the government. Netanyahu would have to have
• 16:07
  Speaker 6: a very different government in order to be that bridge.
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  Speaker 6: But what's fascinating here is the deep, deep commitment which
• 16:12
  Speaker 6: Israelis feel toward their country. We have over 70 percent
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  Speaker 6: of people coming out to vote. It's sort of like
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  Speaker 6: a world record. And something in the order of 100,000
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  Speaker 6: Israelis have paid thousands of dollars to get on a
• 16:24
  Speaker 6: plane and come back to vote. I mean, what country
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  Speaker 6: in the world has a population that the people, you know,
• 16:29
  Speaker 6: the expats, come back and pay that money to vote
• 16:32
  Speaker 6: because they so care, so ardently, so deeply, so passionately
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  Speaker 6: about the future of their country.
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  Speaker 10: It says a lot about Israel.
• 16:38
  Speaker 1: I look forward to talking with you when the dust
• 16:40
  Speaker 1: settles and we know what's going to happen. Follow Ambassador
• 16:44
  Speaker 1: Oren on X at DR, Dr. Michael Oren, DR Michael Oren,
• 16:48
  Speaker 1: and follow me to the next segment, America. Israel always
• 16:51
  Speaker 1: has fascinating elections and they have incredible ramification for America
• 16:56
  Speaker 1: because they are our most important strategic ally in the world.
• 17:01
  Speaker 1: There is no second place. Israel is first place. Stay tuned.
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: I'm Hugh Hewitt. Morning, glory, evening, grace, America. Welcome to
• 17:08
  Speaker 1: the second hour of today's Hugh Hewitt Show. I'm beginning
• 17:11
  Speaker 1: with a non-political subject, even though the elections are a
• 17:14
  Speaker 1: week and a day away, because it actually goes to
• 17:16
  Speaker 1: the health of our country and the virulent rise of
• 17:19
  Speaker 1: anti-Semitism from east to west. And it's a tragic story,
• 17:22
  Speaker 1: and I bring it to you with grief in my heart,
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: on a guy named Diwood Faisal, 22 years old, living
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: in New York. On May 15th and again on May 23rd,
• 17:33
  Speaker 1: he vandalized a Jewish deli in his Queens neighborhood, a
• 17:37
  Speaker 1: deli called Bagels and Company, and he's been now charged
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: with hate crimes for those actions. Two days after the
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: second vandalism, on May 25th, he sped through a Union
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: Parkway intersection and he struck my next guest, Michael Traeger,
• 17:52
  Speaker 1: and his wife, killing her. And I'm so sorry to
• 17:56
  Speaker 1: bring you under these circumstances, Michael Traeger, First of all,
• 17:59
  Speaker 1: tell us about your wife, and then we'll come back
• 18:01
  Speaker 1: to the charging decision on Daewoo Faisal.
• 18:05
  Speaker 7: Well, first of all, thank you for having me. And
• 18:08
  Speaker 7: I just wanted to correct something. It's not Union Parkway.
• 18:10
  Speaker 7: It's Union Turnpike.
• 18:12
  Speaker 1: Union Turnpike.
• 18:12
  Speaker 7: In Queens.
• 18:13
  Speaker 1: Okay.
• 18:15
  Speaker 9: Not a problem.
• 18:16
  Speaker 7: Anyway, it was Memorial Day, and we were leaving a restaurant,
• 18:23
  Speaker 7: and my wife insisted on walking to the restaurant. back
• 18:27
  Speaker 7: home to get to 10,000 steps. We were returning home
• 18:30
  Speaker 7: to watch a movie. And while we were on the
• 18:34
  Speaker 7: intersection of Union Turnpike and Francis Lewis Boulevard, our light
• 18:37
  Speaker 7: turned green and we began to walk to go home.
• 18:42
  Speaker 7: Unbeknownst to the two of us, there was a person speeding,
• 18:47
  Speaker 7: first of all doing donuts on Francis Lewis Boulevard and
• 18:51
  Speaker 7: then accelerating his car going at a speed of 75
• 18:55
  Speaker 7: miles an hour in a 35-mile zone.
• 18:58
  Speaker 2: Wow.
• 18:59
  Speaker 7: He passed a red light. He sped right through the
• 19:01
  Speaker 7: red light. He had two cars going west to east,
• 19:05
  Speaker 7: driving normally, and creamed into the first car. The first
• 19:10
  Speaker 7: car creamed into the second car, and the second car
• 19:13
  Speaker 7: struck my poor wife, Cara, and struck me as well.
• 19:17
  Speaker 7: I had a separated shoulder, and she was... killed in
• 19:21
  Speaker 7: reality instantaneously upon impact. When the perpetrator, Caldwell, became incapacitated
• 19:32
  Speaker 7: and he ran from his car and he was trying
• 19:36
  Speaker 7: to escape from Union Turnpike to Hillside Avenue. While he
• 19:40
  Speaker 7: was doing that, he grabbed a tree branch and he
• 19:43
  Speaker 7: was using it as a weapon to fend off any
• 19:46
  Speaker 7: individuals who were trying to contain him and bring him
• 19:49
  Speaker 7: to justice.
• 19:50
  Speaker 1: Michael, I'm very sorry for your laugh. You and your
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: late wife are the age of me and my wife,
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: and I know you've got kids and grandkids, and I
• 19:59
  Speaker 1: cannot imagine what I would be incapable of doing an interview,
• 20:03
  Speaker 1: so my hat is off to you for that. Why
• 20:06
  Speaker 1: did the DA not charge this man with a hate
• 20:10
  Speaker 1: crime in the attack on you and your wife? And
• 20:12
  Speaker 1: it's assault. It's an assault. And I guess he's been
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: charged with manslaughter, but not with a hate crime, even
• 20:17
  Speaker 1: though it's a Jewish neighborhood. And he attacked a Jewish
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: deli twice in the preceding week.
• 20:23
  Speaker 6: Why?
• 20:23
  Speaker 7: Well, this is living in New York City in Queens
• 20:28
  Speaker 7: in 2026. And the world is upside down. You know,
• 20:30
  Speaker 7: north is south, east is west, up is down. Right
• 20:33
  Speaker 7: is wrong. Wrong is right. So it's messed up. So why?
• 20:37
  Speaker 7: I can't answer the question. You'd have to ask, you know,
• 20:41
  Speaker 7: the DA, the grand jury, et cetera, who came up,
• 20:44
  Speaker 7: you know, with their conclusions. So I obviously disagree with
• 20:48
  Speaker 7: those findings. But it's a crazy world, as I know
• 20:52
  Speaker 7: you know.
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: Well, Michael, there is a Department of Justice Office of
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: Civil Rights. It's run by Harmeet Dhillon, and she's a
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: very aggressive attorney. And from the days when I was
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: actively practicing law, if a local jurisdiction dropped the ball
• 21:06
  Speaker 1: on a hate crime, like Rodney King, the department, the
• 21:08
  Speaker 1: division of civil rights would step in with a civil
• 21:10
  Speaker 1: rights case. Have you heard from the United States department
• 21:13
  Speaker 1: of justice yet?
• 21:14
  Speaker 7: I have not. I've been told that they're looking into it,
• 21:16
  Speaker 7: but I have not got anything. I have not received
• 21:19
  Speaker 7: any word that, that, that they have, you know, corrected
• 21:23
  Speaker 7: the wrong.
• 21:23
  Speaker 2: All right.
• 21:24
  Speaker 1: So let me ask you a little bit about the neighborhood. If, uh, Faisal, um,
• 21:30
  Speaker 1: had intended to go hunting for a Jew, would he
• 21:33
  Speaker 1: have gone to your neighborhood? Is that a heavily Jewish neighborhood?
• 21:37
  Speaker 7: A hundred percent. So let me just let me just
• 21:39
  Speaker 7: tell you. So the question I think that that that
• 21:42
  Speaker 7: that the D.A. had was he was he was the
• 21:46
  Speaker 7: perpetrator looking to kill Kara Trager or or injure or
• 21:50
  Speaker 7: kill Michael Trager. So the answer is no, because there
• 21:55
  Speaker 7: was nothing. We had no religious guard. I wasn't wearing
• 21:59
  Speaker 7: what's called a yarmulke on my head. She wasn't wearing
• 22:02
  Speaker 7: a head covering that would show that she was Jewish, etc. But, but, but,
• 22:08
  Speaker 7: in the area itself, it's a very heavily Ukrainian area.
• 22:13
  Speaker 7: And the car that he hit, the first car that
• 22:17
  Speaker 7: he hit, was owned by a Jew. The second car
• 22:20
  Speaker 7: that he hit was owned by a Jew. Kara Trager
• 22:23
  Speaker 7: was Jewish.
• 22:24
  Speaker 2: I am Jewish.
• 22:25
  Speaker 7: The person that brought Faisal to justice was Jewish. The
• 22:30
  Speaker 7: ambulance company that took Kara and myself to the hospital
• 22:34
  Speaker 7: was a Jewish ambulance company. So it's like seven for
• 22:38
  Speaker 7: seven or eight for eight. Everybody there was Jewish. So
• 22:41
  Speaker 7: if you're looking to hurt or destroy or kill a Jew,
• 22:44
  Speaker 7: that was a perfect location to do it. And lastly,
• 22:47
  Speaker 7: You know, he, as you correctly said, he held up,
• 22:51
  Speaker 7: he tried to destroy the bagel store. And it was
• 22:57
  Speaker 7: 10 days and then two days of my wife's death.
• 23:00
  Speaker 7: And our family's contention is, if you try to do that,
• 23:04
  Speaker 7: you obviously hate, you don't like Jewish people. And suddenly,
• 23:08
  Speaker 7: two days later, that desperation does not dissipate in two days.
• 23:14
  Speaker 7: So we think that's a really continuation of of what
• 23:17
  Speaker 7: he was all about.
• 23:18
  Speaker 2: Sure.
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: It's been a long time since I took crimes, and
• 23:21
  Speaker 1: I've only been to defense counsel twice, but that goes
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: to state of mind, right? The prior offense goes to
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: state of mind. Did he make any contemporaneous utterances to
• 23:31
  Speaker 1: your knowledge? You had been struck. You were probably in shock,
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: and your wife had been badly injured. No, no.
• 23:37
  Speaker 7: When he was vandalizing the restaurant, he was dressed in
• 23:42
  Speaker 7: his ethnic garb, And there's tapes to show how he
• 23:47
  Speaker 7: was behaving himself. But if I just can say something,
• 23:50
  Speaker 7: you know, that was frustrating to me is it's quite clear,
• 23:55
  Speaker 7: you know, and there's tapes and there's videos to show
• 23:58
  Speaker 7: that exactly what happened during Cara's death and what occurred
• 24:02
  Speaker 7: when he was vandalizing the bagel store. So there's reasonable cause, certainly.
• 24:07
  Speaker 7: So part of our frustration is that there's been a
• 24:10
  Speaker 7: lot of hate crimes and a lot of anti-Semitic acts
• 24:14
  Speaker 7: you know, in the area and in New York City,
• 24:17
  Speaker 7: as we all know. And I'm so frustrated in the ability,
• 24:22
  Speaker 7: in the inability of the police, the DA, whomever, to
• 24:26
  Speaker 7: look at past crimes that occurred. You know, there's been,
• 24:30
  Speaker 7: there was a killing in Casino Park, there was vandalism
• 24:33
  Speaker 7: in synagogues all over the place. There's stabbings here, stabbings there,
• 24:38
  Speaker 7: and they have not been able to To look at
• 24:40
  Speaker 7: his cell phone, what's going on in the mosque, what's
• 24:44
  Speaker 7: happening with his Facebook page, Instagram page, etc. And I
• 24:52
  Speaker 7: just don't understand.
• 24:53
  Speaker 1: I would have thought state of mind evidence like his
• 24:57
  Speaker 1: Facebook page, anything he posts on X. What he shout,
• 25:01
  Speaker 1: contemporaneous exclamation, excited exclamation. They would all go to state
• 25:04
  Speaker 1: of mind. Now, he might not be mentally well. In fact,
• 25:07
  Speaker 1: anyone who wants to kill people because of their ethnic
• 25:09
  Speaker 1: or religious identity is not mentally well. But that doesn't
• 25:12
  Speaker 1: make him unfit to be. He's obviously being tried on
• 25:15
  Speaker 1: manslaughter charges.
• 25:16
  Speaker 9: Right.
• 25:16
  Speaker 1: But not for hate crimes.
• 25:19
  Speaker 7: In regard to killing my wife. Yes, he is being charged.
• 25:24
  Speaker 7: Grand jury decided for initially. And in regard to the restaurant,
• 25:28
  Speaker 7: it was not a hate crime, and now it is
• 25:30
  Speaker 7: a hate crime. So I think it's, at least from
• 25:32
  Speaker 7: the restaurant's point of view, it's moving in the right direction.
• 25:35
  Speaker 7: But the tone, the tone by the mayor in particular,
• 25:39
  Speaker 7: is a very bad tone that's being said, and it
• 25:43
  Speaker 7: gives lunatics like this individual a license to do what
• 25:48
  Speaker 7: he's doing. And I just would like the tone to
• 25:50
  Speaker 7: be generally toned down and to show respect for anti-Semitism,
• 25:57
  Speaker 7: and victims of crime.
• 25:58
  Speaker 1: I couldn't agree with you more, Michael. Uh, a last
• 26:00
  Speaker 1: question for you. When will you, when will he go
• 26:03
  Speaker 1: to trial? And does, it's a double question. When does
• 26:06
  Speaker 1: he go for the manslaughter and assault? And is there
• 26:09
  Speaker 1: still a chance to upcharge him in Queens before DOJ
• 26:13
  Speaker 1: gets involved?
• 26:14
  Speaker 7: Well, there's a lot of pressure in regard to that,
• 26:17
  Speaker 7: but so far, nothing. The next court date is, is, um, October. Uh,
• 26:22
  Speaker 7: Oh my God. I believe it's October. The, uh, Sorry, November, November.
• 26:29
  Speaker 7: Sometime in November. Can I just say one thing, please,
• 26:32
  Speaker 7: that's important? Just add it to it. So I have
• 26:36
  Speaker 7: reached out to the mayor of New York to attempt
• 26:40
  Speaker 7: to meet with him to lower the temperature. The mayor
• 26:42
  Speaker 7: of New York felt that it was a good political
• 26:45
  Speaker 7: move to watch the World Cup in Rikers Island. My
• 26:49
  Speaker 7: wife's killer is in Rikers Island currently. So it's very
• 26:53
  Speaker 7: possible that that the mayor of New York was watching
• 26:56
  Speaker 7: the World Cup with Faisal.
• 27:00
  Speaker 13: Wow.
• 27:01
  Speaker 7: So I have suggested to him and his deputy mayor
• 27:03
  Speaker 7: and the assistant police commissioner, et cetera, none of them
• 27:06
  Speaker 7: reached out to me, of course, to say, you know what,
• 27:09
  Speaker 7: if it's good enough for him to meet in Rackers Island,
• 27:13
  Speaker 7: he can come to my house with other victims of anti-Semitism,
• 27:18
  Speaker 7: and I'll host it.
• 27:19
  Speaker 1: That is a great idea. And I hope Harmeet Dhillon
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: Someone sends this YouTube video where he's listening to the
• 27:27
  Speaker 1: program or watching the program and sends it to Harmeet Dhillon.
• 27:30
  Speaker 1: Because if New York City won't act, then the Department
• 27:33
  Speaker 1: of Justice should. Michael Traeger, our condolences. Thank you for
• 27:37
  Speaker 1: joining us. Welcome back, America. I'm Hugh Hewitt. Next hour,
• 27:49
  Speaker 1: I'll be joined by Noah C. Rothman of National Review
• 27:51
  Speaker 1: to run through every particular race. But I've got Charles C.W. Cook,
• 27:55
  Speaker 1: also of National Review and of his podcast, Charles C.W.
• 27:58
  Speaker 1: Cook Podcast, also a contributor to the editors with me now. Charles,
• 28:02
  Speaker 1: I wanted to check in with you a week and
• 28:04
  Speaker 1: a day before the election, especially on Michigan and Minnesota.
• 28:08
  Speaker 1: I'll go through every race with Noah. I've got more
• 28:10
  Speaker 1: time with him. But I wanted to get your sense
• 28:12
  Speaker 1: of the stakes in Michigan and the stakes in Minnesota,
• 28:16
  Speaker 1: because we're on in both places right now. What do
• 28:18
  Speaker 1: you think about those two races?
• 28:23
  Speaker 14: I think they're probably both toss-ups. As I said last time,
• 28:28
  Speaker 14: I'm a little bit astonished that Al Sayed is a
• 28:31
  Speaker 14: viable candidate, but it seems to be a pretty blue year.
• 28:34
  Speaker 7: I think it is telling.
• 28:37
  Speaker 14: That President Obama felt the need to go to Michigan.
• 28:42
  Speaker 14: And a lot of analysts have said they did that
• 28:46
  Speaker 14: to shore up the black vote. I think al-Sayed is
• 28:48
  Speaker 14: less attractive, perhaps, to African Americans in Michigan than many
• 28:53
  Speaker 14: other Democrats would be. A lot of weird campaign stops
• 28:57
  Speaker 14: this time around. President Trump is in Mississippi today. So
• 29:02
  Speaker 14: it's an odd one. In Minnesota... That's a funny state
• 29:07
  Speaker 14: because obviously it's trended left recently. But I think a
• 29:13
  Speaker 14: couple of things seem to be happening there to make
• 29:15
  Speaker 14: it competitive. One is that the Democrats' candidate for Senate
• 29:21
  Speaker 14: is crazy and is also associated with many of the
• 29:24
  Speaker 14: excesses of the state over the last few years. The
• 29:28
  Speaker 14: other thing is, if you're in a state that just
• 29:30
  Speaker 14: always elects Democrats, then sometimes you get a magnetic reaction
• 29:34
  Speaker 14: in the other way. And Michelle Tafoya seems pretty reasonable
• 29:37
  Speaker 14: and centrist. So a bit like how there have been
• 29:42
  Speaker 14: wave elections where New York was more red than the average.
• 29:47
  Speaker 14: That could happen in Minnesota, but I'm not holding my
• 29:50
  Speaker 14: breath in either case.
• 29:51
  Speaker 1: Now, the reason I really wanted to talk to you
• 29:53
  Speaker 1: today is because you are a child of the United Kingdom.
• 29:57
  Speaker 1: You grew up with the National Health Service, NHS. And
• 30:00
  Speaker 1: Democrats have made a decision in Maine, in Minnesota, in Michigan,
• 30:04
  Speaker 1: in Texas to run on Medicare for all. And so
• 30:08
  Speaker 1: we've done this before, but I want to do it again.
• 30:10
  Speaker 1: I think Medicare all is a recipe for destroying Medicare
• 30:14
  Speaker 1: and American health care. What do you think about it?
• 30:18
  Speaker 7: Well, I think that's right.
• 30:19
  Speaker 14: I mean, the most interesting polling on this shows that
• 30:21
  Speaker 14: when Americans say, as they do sometimes, depending on how
• 30:25
  Speaker 14: the question is phrased, that they are enthusiastic about this idea,
• 30:29
  Speaker 14: they don't actually know what it means. What they seem
• 30:31
  Speaker 14: to think it means is that they would get to
• 30:33
  Speaker 14: keep their private health insurance and the status quo, but
• 30:36
  Speaker 14: that other people would get Medicare for all. I think
• 30:40
  Speaker 14: they think it's sort of a stand-in for universal coverage.
• 30:44
  Speaker 7: But of course it's.
• 30:45
  Speaker 14: Not, and that's not at all what its architects mean.
• 30:50
  Speaker 14: As a political question, that is, aside from polling, it's
• 30:55
  Speaker 14: a disaster and Americans should resist it at all costs.
• 30:57
  Speaker 14: It doesn't work very well, but it also completely corrupts
• 31:00
  Speaker 14: your culture. It ends any chance at having a low-tax
• 31:05
  Speaker 14: and competitive business culture. Most countries that have it add
• 31:08
  Speaker 14: a massive VAT, up to 20%. Britain's is 20%. But
• 31:12
  Speaker 14: it also inverts the relationship between the citizen and the state.
• 31:15
  Speaker 14: And if you look at Britain... If the British government
• 31:18
  Speaker 14: wants the public to do something, then it says to it,
• 31:23
  Speaker 14: you need to do this to protect the National Health Service,
• 31:26
  Speaker 14: which is bizarre because the health service is supposed to
• 31:29
  Speaker 14: be there for them. And this was the most obvious
• 31:31
  Speaker 14: in COVID, where all of those draconian restrictions, and we
• 31:34
  Speaker 14: think we had it bad here. Look at Britain, including
• 31:37
  Speaker 14: basically people who are.
• 31:38
  Speaker 7: Locked in their homes.
• 31:39
  Speaker 14: We're told you have to do this for the National
• 31:42
  Speaker 14: Health Service.
• 31:42
  Speaker 1: Well, hang on a minute.
• 31:43
  Speaker 14: Isn't it a government department?
• 31:46
  Speaker 1: It should be working for us. So let me ask
• 31:48
  Speaker 1: you about the fact that El-Sayed, when asked about Medicare
• 31:52
  Speaker 1: for All, deftly and sometimes not so deftly said, the
• 31:56
  Speaker 1: cost of your medicine won't go up. And that's in
• 31:59
  Speaker 1: response to a question about will it cost more in taxes.
• 32:01
  Speaker 1: He doesn't want to answer that question. He says the
• 32:03
  Speaker 1: price of your medicine won't go up. Will taxes inevitably
• 32:06
  Speaker 1: go up with Medicare for All?
• 32:10
  Speaker 14: Yeah, and especially in America, because Americans have a really
• 32:13
  Speaker 14: high standard of living across the board and they have
• 32:15
  Speaker 14: really good medical care, which means that the one problem
• 32:18
  Speaker 14: that we have in America is access. Some people struggle
• 32:23
  Speaker 14: to get access to very good medical care. But Americans
• 32:26
  Speaker 14: are not going to accept the quality of something like
• 32:30
  Speaker 14: the British National Health Service, which is very low. So
• 32:33
  Speaker 14: despite the high taxes in Britain... The British National Health
• 32:36
  Speaker 14: Service is poor quality, and there's an incredible amount of rationing.
• 32:40
  Speaker 14: I think I told you last time, my dad's in
• 32:42
  Speaker 14: his late 70s, and he was told that to get
• 32:44
  Speaker 14: a hip replacement, it would take three years. Now, Americans
• 32:48
  Speaker 14: won't put up with that, which means there are only
• 32:50
  Speaker 14: two choices, Hugh. One is that you don't do it,
• 32:52
  Speaker 14: which is my preference. Two is that you do it,
• 32:54
  Speaker 14: but to keep the standard of care that people are
• 32:57
  Speaker 14: accustomed to, taxes would have to go up through the roof.
• 33:00
  Speaker 14: I mean, I'm talking doubled at the federal level. So
• 33:03
  Speaker 14: it's a very bad idea that should not be entertained.
• 33:07
  Speaker 1: So last question has to do with El-Sayed's inability to
• 33:12
  Speaker 1: mobilize traditional black support in Detroit and its environs like
• 33:16
  Speaker 1: Pontiac and Flint. What do you attribute that to? I've
• 33:20
  Speaker 1: always said, even back to when I went to law
• 33:22
  Speaker 1: school at Michigan, there was tension between the Arab American
• 33:24
  Speaker 1: and African American community. I think El-Sayed has done a
• 33:28
  Speaker 1: lot to exacerbate that. What do you think?
• 33:32
  Speaker 14: Well, this is complicated, and as an immigrant, I'm aware
• 33:34
  Speaker 14: this is a sensitive issue, so I don't claim to
• 33:36
  Speaker 14: be an expert. But one of the things that I
• 33:38
  Speaker 14: think this highlights is that for a very long time
• 33:41
  Speaker 14: in American politics, and for good reason, since the Civil War,
• 33:45
  Speaker 14: really there were two groups. There were blacks and there
• 33:47
  Speaker 14: were whites. And often, especially in the South, those groups
• 33:51
  Speaker 14: were in tension. But America doesn't really look like that now.
• 33:54
  Speaker 14: We still have blacks, we still have whites, but we
• 33:56
  Speaker 14: also have a lot of other minorities. And in fact,
• 33:59
  Speaker 14: over time, white people are becoming less of a share
• 34:01
  Speaker 14: of the population. And I think the focus on all
• 34:05
  Speaker 14: of those other groups can crowd out African Americans who
• 34:10
  Speaker 14: really do have a unique historical experience in America in
• 34:12
  Speaker 14: a way a lot of other people who aren't white don't.
• 34:16
  Speaker 14: So I think that Barack Obama, you know, went to Michigan,
• 34:20
  Speaker 14: as I say, and he made this weird statement. He said,
• 34:22
  Speaker 14: imagine a Jew and a Muslim in the Senate. Imagine
• 34:26
  Speaker 14: what they could do And I don't really know what
• 34:28
  Speaker 14: the next step of that is. I mean, I have
• 34:30
  Speaker 14: nothing against either of those things, but why is that
• 34:33
  Speaker 14: more interesting than Episcopalian or Black Baptist? It's just a
• 34:38
  Speaker 14: weird thing to say. And so the Democrats have moved
• 34:40
  Speaker 14: into this kind of rainbow coalition view of the world,
• 34:45
  Speaker 14: where really all that matters is that we have lots
• 34:47
  Speaker 14: of different people from lots of different places. And I
• 34:50
  Speaker 14: think African-American voters are standing there thinking, well, hang on
• 34:53
  Speaker 14: a minute, what about us? so I don't really think
• 34:57
  Speaker 14: Al-Sayed has done much to be particularly appealing, whereas Mike
• 35:00
  Speaker 14: Rogers seems to me, I don't know if he'll win,
• 35:02
  Speaker 14: but he seems to me to just be a bit
• 35:04
  Speaker 14: more normal.
• 35:05
  Speaker 1: Oh, he's very much more normal.
• 35:06
  Speaker 14: He just seems to talk to people as if they're humans,
• 35:09
  Speaker 14: which is how all of our politics should be, in
• 35:11
  Speaker 14: my view.
• 35:12
  Speaker 1: Well, it's an election drenched in money, but I don't
• 35:16
  Speaker 1: think it helps to be arrogant, non-responsive, and rude. For example,
• 35:21
  Speaker 1: Brett Baer last week on Thursday night talking to Al-Sayed,
• 35:24
  Speaker 1: that Have you ever seen arrogant, non-responsive to questions and
• 35:27
  Speaker 1: rude work? We got a minute, Charlie.
• 35:32
  Speaker 14: No, and I think that that is a good example
• 35:35
  Speaker 14: of believing your own press clippings, is that he seems
• 35:38
  Speaker 14: to think that because he believes some questions are off limits,
• 35:42
  Speaker 14: which I don't, incidentally, he thinks that all questions are
• 35:46
  Speaker 14: off limits. He seemed irritated to have to account for himself. Again,
• 35:50
  Speaker 14: sometimes people like that slip through in blue years, but
• 35:53
  Speaker 14: I hope he doesn't because it would send the wrong message.
• 35:56
  Speaker 1: Oh, it would send a message that American politics are unmoored.
• 35:59
  Speaker 1: The Democratic Party is unmoored in a way that it
• 36:03
  Speaker 1: hasn't been since 1972. Maybe Bill Clinton brought it back,
• 36:08
  Speaker 1: but they'd slip the moorings again. Charles C.W. Cook, follow
• 36:11
  Speaker 1: him on X at Charles C.W.
• 36:13
  Speaker 2: Cook.
• 36:13
  Speaker 1: Listen to his podcast, Charles C.W. Cook, and of course
• 36:16
  Speaker 1: on the editors once a week as well. Thank you, Charles.
• 36:20
  Speaker 1: I'll be right back, America. Stay tuned to The Hugh
• 36:22
  Speaker 1: Hewitt Show. Welcome back, America. I'm Hugh Hewitt, joined by
• 36:26
  Speaker 1: Jonathan Williams. Jonathan is the president, chief economist at the
• 36:29
  Speaker 1: American Legislative Exchange Council, ALEC, alec.org slash Hugh, great sponsor
• 36:34
  Speaker 1: of our program. Jonathan, you were just in Nebraska, and
• 36:37
  Speaker 1: I'd love for you to, given the keynote address at
• 36:39
  Speaker 1: the Platt Institute's annual conference, please tell us how Nebraska rates,
• 36:44
  Speaker 1: you know, along with the other plain states that surround it.
• 36:49
  Speaker 8: Well, yeah, Hugh, it's great to be back with my
• 36:51
  Speaker 8: friends in Nebraska and friends at the Platt Institute. They
• 36:54
  Speaker 8: had 200 or so guests there to talk about what's
• 36:56
  Speaker 8: coming up in the next legislative session in Lincoln. And
• 37:00
  Speaker 8: obviously with the elections right around the corner, there's a
• 37:02
  Speaker 8: lot of speculation of what they might pursue next session.
• 37:06
  Speaker 8: But Nebraska is one of those states, Hugh, that's been
• 37:08
  Speaker 8: making some good gains in the right direction. That's a
• 37:10
  Speaker 8: very competitive region, as you know, when you're competing against
• 37:14
  Speaker 8: zero income tax on the personal and business side in
• 37:17
  Speaker 8: South Dakota, their neighbors to the north. There's not a
• 37:19
  Speaker 8: lot of room for error. And then you've had Iowa
• 37:22
  Speaker 8: under Kim Reynolds and Terry Branstad do some big things
• 37:25
  Speaker 8: in recent years and go to a flat tax. You've
• 37:27
  Speaker 8: had Missouri do some big moves in the right direction.
• 37:30
  Speaker 8: And I think, you know, if we have a potential governor,
• 37:32
  Speaker 8: Ty Masterson in Kansas, one of our board.
• 37:35
  Speaker 9: Members, you know, you've gotten to know Ty. You've had
• 37:37
  Speaker 9: him on the show.
• 37:38
  Speaker 8: He's got, I think, just a big vision for tax
• 37:41
  Speaker 8: cuts and maybe even getting rid of the personal income
• 37:44
  Speaker 8: tax tax.
• 37:44
  Speaker 9: In Kansas over the years.
• 37:46
  Speaker 8: And so given the context of the region, and you're
• 37:48
  Speaker 8: competing against Wyoming, another no-income tax state, you know, Governor
• 37:51
  Speaker 8: Pillen and the senators there, Speaker Arch and Chair Von
• 37:56
  Speaker 8: Gilleran in Nebraska have done an amazing job over the
• 37:59
  Speaker 8: years at continuing to chip down on the income tax.
• 38:02
  Speaker 8: More work to be done, but they've gotten themselves into
• 38:04
  Speaker 8: about middle of the pack, where Nebraska was always the
• 38:07
  Speaker 8: laggard for the region. And so I think the next
• 38:09
  Speaker 8: step is obviously how do you break into that next
• 38:12
  Speaker 8: tier of states? And there's a big issue in a
• 38:15
  Speaker 8: lot of the states. Kansas has faced it. Nebraska is
• 38:17
  Speaker 8: facing it. They've got a big out-migration problem. And as
• 38:20
  Speaker 8: you and I have talked about a ton, Hugh, is
• 38:22
  Speaker 8: you fix that through tax cuts, common sense economic policy,
• 38:26
  Speaker 8: and education freedom. And those are all things that I
• 38:29
  Speaker 8: know are on the minds of Nebraska senators going into
• 38:31
  Speaker 8: next year.
• 38:32
  Speaker 1: I agree with all that. I want to know about
• 38:34
  Speaker 1: Nebraska's death tax. Like Maine, I think it keeps people
• 38:37
  Speaker 1: from moving there and it's an incentive to leave. Is Nebraska,
• 38:41
  Speaker 1: is Maine, is everyone going to get rid of the
• 38:43
  Speaker 1: death tax? It really is, at the state level, a
• 38:46
  Speaker 1: deterrent to growth.
• 38:46
  Speaker 9: Well, it sure is.
• 38:49
  Speaker 8: I mean, it's that last thing that kicks people out
• 38:51
  Speaker 8: of the state and has them move to Florida or
• 38:54
  Speaker 8: Texas or some other state that they were considering otherwise.
• 38:57
  Speaker 8: And for me, you know, we talked about this at
• 39:00
  Speaker 8: the discussion in Lincoln last week. You look at the
• 39:03
  Speaker 8: Nebraska rich states, poor states resume, so to speak, and
• 39:06
  Speaker 8: one of the big outliers is they are one of
• 39:08
  Speaker 8: the only red states that still has a state-level death tax,
• 39:11
  Speaker 8: an inheritance tax that is a killer for those individuals
• 39:15
  Speaker 8: and families that want to keep their businesses, want to
• 39:18
  Speaker 8: keep their farms and their families, and they don't want
• 39:20
  Speaker 8: to leave the state in a lot of ways.
• 39:21
  Speaker 9: They love Nebraska.
• 39:22
  Speaker 8: They don't want to necessarily leave, but that's going to
• 39:25
  Speaker 8: kick people out. And it's just an economic malpractice for
• 39:27
  Speaker 8: any conservative state to still have a death tax on
• 39:31
  Speaker 8: the books today.
• 39:32
  Speaker 1: It absolutely is. And I hope we get a policy
• 39:35
  Speaker 1: position paper, a big, robust discussion of that at the
• 39:38
  Speaker 1: ALEC conference coming up. Let me talk about Indiana next.
• 39:42
  Speaker 1: You were just in Indiana as well. They've got a
• 39:43
  Speaker 1: great governor. We refer to it as Western Ohio here.
• 39:46
  Speaker 1: But Indiana is very proud of being a Hoosier state.
• 39:49
  Speaker 1: What did you find when you went there?
• 39:52
  Speaker 8: Well, I tell you what, Governor Braun's been a great
• 39:55
  Speaker 8: friend to us at ALEC for a long time from
• 39:57
  Speaker 8: his time.
• 39:57
  Speaker 5: In the U.S.
• 39:58
  Speaker 2: Senate.
• 39:59
  Speaker 1: Really was a leader.
• 40:00
  Speaker 8: And one of the things we worked with him on
• 40:01
  Speaker 8: in the U.S. Senate was his work on addressing our
• 40:04
  Speaker 8: national debt, now exceeding $ 40 trillion, as we've talked about
• 40:08
  Speaker 8: many times on this show.
• 40:09
  Speaker 9: And as governor, he's also.
• 40:11
  Speaker 8: Taken a leadership position on that, working the state comptroller,
• 40:14
  Speaker 8: Elise Nishala. and our great men and women ALEC members
• 40:17
  Speaker 8: serving in Indianapolis there in the legislature to really put
• 40:21
  Speaker 8: Indiana out front and center, calling for more really common
• 40:24
  Speaker 8: sense fiscal responsibility going forward when it comes to putting
• 40:28
  Speaker 8: the brakes on federal spending. We're seeing some great work
• 40:30
  Speaker 8: with the Fraud Task Force of the Vice President and,
• 40:33
  Speaker 8: of course, the Waste, Fraud, and Abuse Prevention of this administration.
• 40:37
  Speaker 8: But we all agree a lot more needs to be done.
• 40:39
  Speaker 8: And there's a great thing about this competitive federalism that
• 40:42
  Speaker 8: we always talk about at ALEC is that states lead
• 40:44
  Speaker 8: the way.
• 40:45
  Speaker 9: And we like to practice what we preach.
• 40:47
  Speaker 8: And Indiana is a perfect case in that they have
• 40:49
  Speaker 8: what I think is the gold standard model balanced budget
• 40:52
  Speaker 8: amendment that's become the ALEC model. And so we encourage
• 40:56
  Speaker 8: everybody to look at how your state balances this budget.
• 40:59
  Speaker 8: And if it's not as good as you'd like, hit Illinois, California,
• 41:02
  Speaker 8: other states that have it on the books but don't
• 41:04
  Speaker 8: really mean anything. Take a look what Indiana did. That
• 41:07
  Speaker 8: really is a meaningful way for Indiana to keep spending
• 41:10
  Speaker 8: under control. And there's no secret to why they continue
• 41:13
  Speaker 8: to be a top 10 state in rich states, poor states.
• 41:15
  Speaker 8: They get it right on the spending side and then
• 41:17
  Speaker 8: they can get it right on the tax side. And
• 41:19
  Speaker 8: Washington could learn a little bit from Indiana and states
• 41:22
  Speaker 8: that do get it right. And a lot of other
• 41:23
  Speaker 8: states could learn as well. And everyone can learn. And
• 41:27
  Speaker 8: Alec made a big deal out of it. My hat
• 41:29
  Speaker 8: is off to you, Jonathan.
• 41:30
  Speaker 1: From commemorating the 40th anniversary of the 1986 tax cuts
• 41:34
  Speaker 1: that Ronald Reagan pushed through, the Tax Reform Act of 1986.
• 41:37
  Speaker 1: I'll talk about it at the end of the hour
• 41:40
  Speaker 1: because I want to cover it. I didn't even realize
• 41:42
  Speaker 1: it was the 40th anniversary of that magnificent bill until
• 41:45
  Speaker 1: I got Jonathan's note this morning, and I appreciate your
• 41:48
  Speaker 1: doing that. Everyone should join ALEC, the American Legislative Exchange Council, A-L-E-C.
• 41:54
  Speaker 1: Go to alec.org slash hugh for more info, and don't
• 41:57
  Speaker 1: forget richstatespoorstates.com.
• 41:59
  Speaker 2: It's free.
• 42:01
  Speaker 1: Every state is ranked. RichStatesPoorStates.com. Stay tuned. Welcome back, America.
• 42:09
  Speaker 1: I'm Hugh Hewitt, joined by Selena Zito, columnist of the world.
• 42:12
  Speaker 1: She writes for The Washington Post, The Washington Examiner, The
• 42:15
  Speaker 1: New York Post, The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, On the Wall, wherever
• 42:18
  Speaker 1: she is. She also wrote the bestseller, Butler, and filming
• 42:22
  Speaker 1: just wrapped up on Butler. I saw you posted that, Selena.
• 42:25
  Speaker 1: When's the movie coming out?
• 42:27
  Speaker 15: It comes out in spring of next year, so somewhere
• 42:30
  Speaker 15: between May and June of next.
• 42:32
  Speaker 16: Year, ahead of the second anniversary or third anniversary.
• 42:36
  Speaker 1: We will promote. We will get that heavily in rotation,
• 42:41
  Speaker 1: as they used to say on the AM station. Selina,
• 42:44
  Speaker 1: I'd like to play for you a clip by Treasury
• 42:47
  Speaker 1: Secretary Scott Besson. Yesterday in Detroit or two days ago
• 42:51
  Speaker 1: in Detroit, President Obama took shots at people who like
• 42:55
  Speaker 1: to go to the Cheesecake Factory. Here's what Scott Besant
• 42:58
  Speaker 1: did today after dining at a Cheesecake Factory cut 25.
• 43:01
  Speaker 10: Hi, Mr.
• 43:03
  Speaker 17: Secretary.
• 43:04
  Speaker 11: It's an interesting lunch choice today.
• 43:06
  Speaker 7: What did you order for the Cheesecake Factory?
• 43:08
  Speaker 18: I have what I always have, the French dip cheeseburger.
• 43:12
  Speaker 2: Excellent.
• 43:12
  Speaker 11: And so, recent news, we've got former President Obama comparing
• 43:16
  Speaker 11: White House decorations or construction to the Cheesecake Factory, saying
• 43:20
  Speaker 11: it looks like Saddam Hussein opened the Cheesecake Factory.
• 43:23
  Speaker 2: Any reaction to that?
• 43:23
  Speaker 10: Well, two things.
• 43:25
  Speaker 18: This is the man who built the museum, and it
• 43:28
  Speaker 18: looks like Darth Vader's tomb. And I would just tell the,
• 43:32
  Speaker 18: I eat a great meal, always have a great meal,
• 43:35
  Speaker 18: and I would tell the Martha's Vineyard set to give
• 43:38
  Speaker 18: it a try.
• 43:39
  Speaker 2: Okay. And what are your thoughts on the midterms thus far?
• 43:42
  Speaker 1: I don't care about that. All I care about, Selene,
• 43:44
  Speaker 1: is the Cheesecake Factory setup. What did you make of
• 43:47
  Speaker 1: President Obama's slam on the Cheesecake Factory and Secretary Besson's roteau?
• 43:54
  Speaker 15: Well, first of all, Bessette was spot on. He really
• 43:57
  Speaker 15: knew how to take on the issue. And really, you know,
• 44:02
  Speaker 15: if you look at President Obama's library, it is something that,
• 44:08
  Speaker 15: I'm not being insulting, but this is something that elitists
• 44:12
  Speaker 15: have complimented and showered praise on in its architecture.
• 44:17
  Speaker 16: Very modern, very gray, very dark.
• 44:21
  Speaker 15: It's not everybody's cup of tea. You walk into the
• 44:25
  Speaker 15: Cheesecake Factory, and it is pretty much middle America's cup
• 44:30
  Speaker 15: of tea. It's decorated lovely. There's ornate. There's lighting. There's
• 44:39
  Speaker 15: a menu the size of the old Yellow Pages. And
• 44:42
  Speaker 15: it's just like.
• 44:43
  Speaker 16: A big treat to go to the Cheesecake Factory.
• 44:47
  Speaker 15: And it's just that same thing. Where you make a
• 44:50
  Speaker 15: choice and then you make a choice and you make
• 44:54
  Speaker 15: a dig at the middle of the country. Because going
• 44:57
  Speaker 15: to the Cheesecake Factory for middle America is a little
• 45:01
  Speaker 15: on the expensive side, right? It's not like going to McDonald's.
• 45:06
  Speaker 15: That's something you can do more often. Cheesecake Factory is
• 45:09
  Speaker 15: a little more pricier. So something that is anticipatory, something
• 45:12
  Speaker 15: that people look forward to.
• 45:15
  Speaker 16: And to make fun of it.
• 45:17
  Speaker 15: Is it just shows sort of how out-toned, Jeff, that
• 45:20
  Speaker 15: President Obama continues to be.
• 45:23
  Speaker 1: Well, I love that Secretary Besson brought up the Martha's
• 45:26
  Speaker 1: Vineyard crowd, because, of course, you have to drag President
• 45:28
  Speaker 1: Obama and Mrs. Obama off of the island, off of
• 45:31
  Speaker 1: Martha's Vineyard, to get them to go anywhere, and usually,
• 45:34
  Speaker 1: not El Sayed, but usually you have to pay them
• 45:37
  Speaker 1: a million bucks or something like that. And the Cheesecake
• 45:39
  Speaker 1: Factory is 50 states, and I know it because when
• 45:43
  Speaker 1: my kids were pre-teens and young teens, that's where they
• 45:47
  Speaker 1: wanted to have their friends for a birthday lunch. We'd
• 45:49
  Speaker 1: always go to the Cheesecake Factory because of that menu
• 45:52
  Speaker 1: that you just talked about.
• 45:54
  Speaker 2: It's enormous. It is.
• 45:57
  Speaker 16: It satisfies everyone. There's everything on there.
• 45:59
  Speaker 15: And, oh, by the way, Secretary Besson's decision on the
• 46:02
  Speaker 15: French cheeseburger.
• 46:05
  Speaker 1: Thumbs up from Selena for our listeners.
• 46:08
  Speaker 16: Oh, yeah, it's really good.
• 46:10
  Speaker 1: So what do you think is going to happen in Michigan?
• 46:13
  Speaker 1: Because I think Abdul El-Sayed has been insulting, non-responsive, rude, deceptive.
• 46:20
  Speaker 1: I just don't think it's going to sell. But it's
• 46:22
  Speaker 1: a light blue state. What do you think?
• 46:26
  Speaker 16: Well, I think it all rests on the black voter.
• 46:28
  Speaker 16: Are they interested?
• 46:29
  Speaker 15: You know, President Obama was sent just for that reason.
• 46:35
  Speaker 15: But if you scan the crowd, he didn't exactly attract...
• 46:39
  Speaker 15: the black voter to come and hear him speak with
• 46:42
  Speaker 15: the exception of a handful behind him, right? I mean,
• 46:45
  Speaker 15: his job, if he was going to do his job
• 46:49
  Speaker 15: and draw people over the line, he needs to do
• 46:52
  Speaker 15: something that is more relatable other than speechifying at a rally.
• 46:58
  Speaker 15: He needs to get out there and talk to people
• 47:01
  Speaker 15: more importantly to listen to people. And if you listen
• 47:05
  Speaker 15: to voters in Detroit, There's always been this sort of
• 47:10
  Speaker 15: animosity between the Arab population and the black population that
• 47:16
  Speaker 15: goes back a very, very long time. And it's not
• 47:19
  Speaker 15: something that's been remedied. And it's something that could cause
• 47:23
  Speaker 15: them to just sit on their hands because they're thinking,
• 47:26
  Speaker 15: there's nothing in this for me.
• 47:28
  Speaker 16: I don't hear you talking to me.
• 47:30
  Speaker 15: I will say that Mike Rogers opened up a campaign
• 47:34
  Speaker 15: office in Detroit and he has made it like his
• 47:38
  Speaker 15: second zip code in Michigan.
• 47:40
  Speaker 16: So he understands the mission.
• 47:42
  Speaker 15: He understands that these voters are not being heard and
• 47:46
  Speaker 15: that the Democratic Party is ignoring them and instead telling
• 47:51
  Speaker 15: them what to do and not why they should vote
• 47:54
  Speaker 15: for him.
• 47:55
  Speaker 1: So I want to finish on Pennsylvania Congressman Salina. I
• 47:58
  Speaker 1: don't think Mike Kelly has any problem winning reelection. I'm
• 48:01
  Speaker 1: sure he's not taking it for granted. But Scott Perry,
• 48:04
  Speaker 1: Ryan McKenzie, Rob Bresnahan and Brian Fitzpatrick all have targets
• 48:09
  Speaker 1: on their back. What do you think about those four
• 48:12
  Speaker 1: and Mike Kelly just for good luck?
• 48:15
  Speaker 15: Well, I just did a Washington Post piece on that
• 48:17
  Speaker 15: about a month ago, went out across the state, went
• 48:20
  Speaker 15: to and talked to all eight candidates, Democrats and Republicans.
• 48:24
  Speaker 15: This in 2006, Republicans lost four seats in Pennsylvania, and
• 48:29
  Speaker 15: that's what Democrats mission was to do that this time.
• 48:32
  Speaker 15: I would say at least two of those seats, Bershinghan
• 48:37
  Speaker 15: and Fitzpatrick, those two have done an extraordinary job of
• 48:42
  Speaker 15: really just localizing the race. talking to the voters, not
• 48:49
  Speaker 15: at the voters, and really have done a very localized campaign,
• 48:56
  Speaker 15: which is what you should do when you run for Congress,
• 48:58
  Speaker 15: because that is the seat in Washington that is most
• 49:02
  Speaker 15: connected to you as a voter. Scott Perry, they have
• 49:06
  Speaker 15: been aiming for him forever. It was interesting to me
• 49:10
  Speaker 15: that of all the four seats in the New York
• 49:12
  Speaker 15: Times-Siena poll, That was the one that was tied.
• 49:15
  Speaker 16: He's running against a former anchor, Janelle, for Houston.
• 49:20
  Speaker 2: Seat.
• 49:20
  Speaker 16: That is tied.
• 49:22
  Speaker 15: And then McKenzie, he probably faces the hardest race.
• 49:26
  Speaker 1: Thank you, Selena. We will check in with you next
• 49:29
  Speaker 1: week to see what the results are. Follow Selena on
• 49:32
  Speaker 1: X at Zeto Selena and subscribe for her everything over
• 49:36
  Speaker 1: at selenazeto.com because you can't keep up unless you're subscribed, selenazito.com.
• 49:43
  Speaker 1: I'll be right back, America. Stay tuned. Hi, it's Hugh
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• 51:24
  Speaker 1: can mean rushed decisions, missed opportunities, and potentially paying more
• 51:28
  Speaker 1: than you needed to. John's team can review your situation now,
• 51:31
  Speaker 1: explain your options, Have you prepared when it's time to
• 51:34
  Speaker 1: make a decision? Don't wait until November to start making
• 51:37
  Speaker 1: a November decision. Call U.S. Medical Plan today at 877-410-4321.
• 51:40
  Speaker 2: That's 877-410-4321.
• 51:40
  Speaker 9: 877-410-4321.
• 51:40
  Speaker 1: Or visit usmedicalplan.com. Good morning, Gloria and even Grace America.
• 51:59
  Speaker 1: Welcome to Hour 3 of today's Hugh Hewitt Show. I
• 52:02
  Speaker 1: begin with Admiral Mark Montgomery. Admiral Montgomery is a retired
• 52:06
  Speaker 1: United States Navy, now Senior Fellow with the Foundation for
• 52:08
  Speaker 1: the Defense of Democracy. Admiral, good to have you back
• 52:11
  Speaker 1: as always. I want to start with your overview. We're
• 52:14
  Speaker 1: at about the 105th day of the blockade. How do
• 52:17
  Speaker 1: you see and how do you read the signs and
• 52:20
  Speaker 1: portents about what's coming in that region?
• 52:26
  Speaker 9: So, look, I think this has been a successful blockade.
• 52:29
  Speaker 9: You know, probably how we got here isn't how the U.S.
• 52:32
  Speaker 9: military would have wanted to get here, but the execution
• 52:34
  Speaker 9: of this and the patience and discipline of the president
• 52:38
  Speaker 9: and sticking to a blockade where we don't respond unnecessarily
• 52:44
  Speaker 9: to attacks by the IRGC. If it has no effect,
• 52:48
  Speaker 9: if it's not stopping us from getting, us getting our,
• 52:51
  Speaker 9: the Arab crude oil through the southern transit lane, and
• 52:56
  Speaker 9: fully blocking the Iranian crude oil to the degree that
• 52:59
  Speaker 9: they've stopped pumping, stopped filling ships inside the Arabian Gulf.
• 53:05
  Speaker 9: And they basically have now sold everything they had at
• 53:10
  Speaker 9: sea to teapot refineries. There is no money coming back.
• 53:14
  Speaker 9: This is a successful blockade executed by the US Navy
• 53:17
  Speaker 9: and the Treasury Department. And it will eventually pressure the
• 53:21
  Speaker 9: Iranian economy into what I think will be a reasonable discussion.
• 53:25
  Speaker 9: So I'm comfortable with where we are.
• 53:28
  Speaker 1: Now we have dispatched additional ships, including a Marine Expeditionary Force.
• 53:33
  Speaker 1: Do you read anything into that?
• 53:36
  Speaker 9: Well, I said I'm comfortable where we are. I suspect
• 53:39
  Speaker 9: the IRGC becomes less comfortable with where they are every day. Eventually,
• 53:44
  Speaker 9: they're going to lash out in a way that we
• 53:46
  Speaker 9: have to respond. And the president has two choices. He
• 53:49
  Speaker 9: can respond proportionately, you know, do the same thing where
• 53:52
  Speaker 9: we mow the grass, shoot all the radars on the
• 53:55
  Speaker 9: Bandar Abbas way, or shoot whatever launch points we saw
• 54:00
  Speaker 9: launching either ships or, when I say lash out, I
• 54:03
  Speaker 9: mean at our air partners. Or you could respond disproportionately,
• 54:06
  Speaker 9: which is you bring down the hammer for some select
• 54:09
  Speaker 9: period of time, 96 hours, 124 hours. And I would
• 54:12
  Speaker 9: support a disproportionate response since we've been professional up to
• 54:15
  Speaker 9: this point. We've been non-responsive. If they do a strike
• 54:20
  Speaker 9: against our air partners... We show support for our air
• 54:23
  Speaker 9: partners by disproportionately striking back and giving the Iranian regime
• 54:28
  Speaker 9: a message. We are going to hammer you. Our bases
• 54:31
  Speaker 9: are out of reach to you. Maybe you can hit
• 54:34
  Speaker 9: our air partners' critical infrastructure, but we know we can
• 54:37
  Speaker 9: beat yours. And we now have three carrier strike groups
• 54:39
  Speaker 9: in there. The important thing to me is the addition
• 54:42
  Speaker 9: of a third carrier strike group. We always have the
• 54:44
  Speaker 9: world's best strategic bombing force, our B-2s, B-52s, and B-1s.
• 54:50
  Speaker 9: And we can bring that hammer down on them. And
• 54:53
  Speaker 9: by the way, I would take advantage of this moment
• 54:55
  Speaker 9: to hit the Houthis in conjunction with our Saudi partners
• 55:00
  Speaker 9: to help bring that crisis to a conclusion.
• 55:03
  Speaker 1: So Admiral, I want to play for you Treasury Secretary
• 55:05
  Speaker 1: Besant yesterday talking about Iran's economy cut number 21. We
• 55:14
  Speaker 1: began a maximum pressure campaign in March of 2025.
• 55:17
  Speaker 13: Economic outcasts began about eight weeks ago, and it's been
• 55:24
  Speaker 13: very successful. I believe that the regime leadership is now
• 55:31
  Speaker 13: hiding the true value of the real. I think it's
• 55:36
  Speaker 13: through $ 3 million, and that's why they've stopped printing the price.
• 55:42
  Speaker 13: I would predict that from March of 26 until March
• 55:46
  Speaker 13: of 27, The economy would contract more than 25 percent,
• 55:52
  Speaker 13: which is more than the Soviet Union contracted after its collapse.
• 56:00
  Speaker 13: And the goal here is to pressure the regime, not
• 56:05
  Speaker 13: the Iranian people, and to either cause the regime for
• 56:12
  Speaker 13: them to turn on each other. And we're starting to
• 56:15
  Speaker 13: see that.
• 56:17
  Speaker 1: What do you make of that, Admiral Montgomery?
• 56:19
  Speaker 9: Well, from his lips to God's ears, I hope he's right.
• 56:24
  Speaker 9: I believe that's the strategy. I support that strategy. By
• 56:27
  Speaker 9: the way, the best strategy is to continue with patience
• 56:30
  Speaker 9: and discipline. I just think the IRGC is going to
• 56:33
  Speaker 9: vote here pretty soon. And when they vote, we have
• 56:35
  Speaker 9: to hit back. I'll pick up on something he said,
• 56:38
  Speaker 9: which is in our strike back, we need to specifically
• 56:41
  Speaker 9: target IRGC industry. They own about 40% of the economy.
• 56:46
  Speaker 9: We should declare that a legitimate military target because it
• 56:49
  Speaker 9: props up the IRGC. This is a lot of shipbuilding, construction,
• 56:53
  Speaker 9: communication systems. We should hit them, hit them hard and
• 56:56
  Speaker 9: say to the Iranian people, it's not about you. It's
• 56:59
  Speaker 9: about them, the IRGC. And tell the IRGC, we can
• 57:03
  Speaker 9: continue to apply pain to you in an unlimited basis.
• 57:06
  Speaker 9: And we'll go back to our discipline blockade and sanctioning
• 57:10
  Speaker 9: by Secretary Besset. Secretary Besset is doing an absolutely outstanding
• 57:14
  Speaker 9: job on this. And I think he should, this is
• 57:17
  Speaker 9: the proper path.
• 57:18
  Speaker 1: Now, do you expect when they lash out that they
• 57:21
  Speaker 1: will lash out at Israel or are they deterred from
• 57:23
  Speaker 1: attacking the Jewish state by virtue of the fact they
• 57:26
  Speaker 1: know what's coming if they do that again?
• 57:30
  Speaker 9: Well, I mean, if you, if you don't lash out
• 57:33
  Speaker 9: at them, you'll get 75% of your butt kicked. If
• 57:36
  Speaker 9: you lash out at them, it'll be a hundred percent.
• 57:38
  Speaker 2: So they're smart.
• 57:39
  Speaker 9: They'll lay off. Um, I'm more interested in whether I
• 57:43
  Speaker 9: think the Houthis don't have the discipline of the Iranians.
• 57:46
  Speaker 9: And when we begin to strike, when we join in
• 57:48
  Speaker 9: with the Saudis, invariably there'll be a Houthi launch on Israel,
• 57:52
  Speaker 9: at which point the Israelis will join us and the Saudis.
• 57:55
  Speaker 9: And that would be quite the attack platter, you know,
• 57:58
  Speaker 9: to hit the Houthis. If they're smart, they won't lash
• 58:02
  Speaker 9: out at Israel. If they're foolish, they'll, you know, you
• 58:05
  Speaker 9: can kind of you can increase the size of the
• 58:07
  Speaker 9: of the allied strike package by about 40 percent. by
• 58:11
  Speaker 9: having Israel join us.
• 58:13
  Speaker 1: Now, Admiral, I've never been to Yemen. I assume if
• 58:16
  Speaker 1: Aden was ever open to sailors, and you've been there.
• 58:19
  Speaker 1: But I do remember Robert Kaplan, not long after 9-11,
• 58:22
  Speaker 1: the great writer put out a book about Yemen. We
• 58:24
  Speaker 1: had special forces in Yemen. Are the Houthis just dug
• 58:28
  Speaker 1: in there forever, or are they an aberration like a
• 58:32
  Speaker 1: fascist regime that falls in, say, Romania?
• 58:37
  Speaker 9: So, you know, in fact, we had ships. USS Cole
• 58:39
  Speaker 9: kind of famously was in Yemen. when it was bombed. Um,
• 58:42
  Speaker 9: so we used to pull in there for refuelings, uh, uh,
• 58:46
  Speaker 9: probably longer than we should have based on the coal. Um,
• 58:50
  Speaker 9: so yes, we went in there, uh, the Houthis and Aberration.
• 58:53
  Speaker 9: I think the Houthis have been around a long time.
• 58:55
  Speaker 9: I think, I think they represent a legitimate gripe in the,
• 58:59
  Speaker 9: in the, uh, you know, uh, grievance, you know, uh,
• 59:01
  Speaker 9: among the, uh, Yemeni people. There's civil wars been going
• 59:05
  Speaker 9: on in Yemen since the early 1960s. And so possibly longer. Look,
• 59:11
  Speaker 9: so they're an aberration in the sense that they're a
• 59:15
  Speaker 9: group that is sponsored by the Iranians. They're not quite
• 59:19
  Speaker 9: the same level of allegiance to Iran that, say, Hezbollah has.
• 59:23
  Speaker 9: But they were brought to the to the Iranian cause
• 59:27
  Speaker 9: by Hezbollah back 25 years ago. So there's a connection.
• 59:34
  Speaker 9: Most of all, it's a technical connection and a pieces
• 59:38
  Speaker 9: and parts connection that allows them to build their missiles.
• 59:41
  Speaker 9: But I think that the Houthis are going to be
• 59:44
  Speaker 9: a real challenge to displace because this has been going
• 59:47
  Speaker 9: on for 50 years. It's not just about the United
• 59:50
  Speaker 9: States and Iran or Saudi Arabia and Iran. because there's
• 59:57
  Speaker 9: been Yemeni-Saudi confrontation since both countries were created.
• 1:00:01
  Speaker 1: All right, so let me move to a bigger question, Admiral,
• 1:00:03
  Speaker 1: drawing on not just your Navy experience, but your time
• 1:00:06
  Speaker 1: on the Hill and a variety of jobs. We are operating,
• 1:00:10
  Speaker 1: the Pentagon is operating on a continuing resolution right now.
• 1:00:13
  Speaker 1: Assume for a moment that the Republicans lose one or
• 1:00:16
  Speaker 1: both houses of Congress. Would you have encouraging words for
• 1:00:20
  Speaker 1: a a reconciliation 3.0 to get our defense spending done
• 1:00:24
  Speaker 1: through the next two and a half years? Because I
• 1:00:26
  Speaker 1: really do worry Democrats won't fund the military like they
• 1:00:29
  Speaker 1: traditionally don't fund the military.
• 1:00:32
  Speaker 9: Yeah, so let's be clear. The last Democratic budget was
• 1:00:34
  Speaker 9: for 2.9% of GDP on defense. That was Biden's last budget.
• 1:00:39
  Speaker 9: It might have been 2.88%. I mean, it's low. I
• 1:00:44
  Speaker 9: have lots of good Democratic friends. They love the military.
• 1:00:47
  Speaker 9: They love our service members. But they restrict defense spending
• 1:00:51
  Speaker 9: so that they can get increases in non-defense discretionary spending. Famously,
• 1:00:57
  Speaker 9: the Budget Control Act from President Obama took us down
• 1:01:00
  Speaker 9: from 4.8% spending to 3.3% spending over seven years. That's
• 1:01:04
  Speaker 9: why we have a munitions problem. So I'll tell you,
• 1:01:06
  Speaker 9: I'm very nervous. If I were the Republicans and I
• 1:01:10
  Speaker 9: lost one or both houses, I'd spend the next two
• 1:01:12
  Speaker 9: months jamming through a party line appropriations and reconciliation. budget,
• 1:01:20
  Speaker 9: including a reconciliation that gives a serious amount of funding
• 1:01:23
  Speaker 9: to addressing the munitions that were expended in Epic Fury,
• 1:01:29
  Speaker 9: which is only $ 40 to $ 60 billion, and have another
• 1:01:33
  Speaker 9: $ 300 billion on the military we want to have. By
• 1:01:37
  Speaker 9: the way, we cannot do this continuing resolution. It's killing
• 1:01:39
  Speaker 9: us because we don't have anomalies in it. Those are
• 1:01:42
  Speaker 9: the things that allow new starts. So all those new
• 1:01:44
  Speaker 9: weapon systems and arms packages and procurements that you read about,
• 1:01:49
  Speaker 9: aren't actually happening because they're not authorized to new start.
• 1:01:55
  Speaker 1: We're going to revisit this. I hope next time you
• 1:01:57
  Speaker 1: sit down on School of War with Aaron McLean, you
• 1:02:00
  Speaker 1: do the same thing, because I don't think Americans quite
• 1:02:02
  Speaker 1: understand what a Democratic House or Senate would mean for
• 1:02:06
  Speaker 1: defense spending in the Pentagon. It would be a nightmare.
• 1:02:10
  Speaker 1: Follow Admiral Montgomery on X at Mark C.
• 1:02:13
  Speaker 2: Montgomery.
• 1:02:14
  Speaker 1: And you can read about him over at the Foundation
• 1:02:16
  Speaker 1: for the Defense of Democracies. Thank you, Admiral. I'll be
• 1:02:19
  Speaker 1: right back with an update from Minnesota Cold with Lilacs.
• 1:02:23
  Speaker 1: Don't go anywhere. I'm Hugh Hewitt. Welcome back, America. I'm
• 1:02:29
  Speaker 1: Hugh Hewitt. Coming up, Noah Rothman, and we're going to
• 1:02:32
  Speaker 1: run through the whole map of the Senate races. But
• 1:02:34
  Speaker 1: I do believe you really don't know what's going on
• 1:02:36
  Speaker 1: in the state unless you live there, which is why
• 1:02:38
  Speaker 1: I'm going to ask Lilacs, as in jameslilacs.substack.com, as in lilacs.com.
• 1:02:44
  Speaker 1: about what's going on up in Minnesota. Hello, James. I'm
• 1:02:47
  Speaker 1: going to begin this way. We have house guests for
• 1:02:50
  Speaker 1: a couple of days. Sven and Lina from Minneapolis suburbs
• 1:02:53
  Speaker 1: are here. And they say that, don't you know, they
• 1:02:56
  Speaker 1: don't much like the Somali gang shootings in Edina and Minnetonka.
• 1:03:01
  Speaker 1: Does that mean Michel Tafoya has a shot?
• 1:03:05
  Speaker 5: Well, yeah, you know, it might there, because a lot
• 1:03:07
  Speaker 5: of people, God, no, they don't, they don't, oh, jeez, jeez,
• 1:03:10
  Speaker 5: it's just, it's a bad thing.
• 1:03:12
  Speaker 2: It does mean that she has a shot.
• 1:03:13
  Speaker 5: But as a matter of fact, the two races between
• 1:03:16
  Speaker 5: the Senate and the governor, the gubernatorial, I think that
• 1:03:18
  Speaker 5: the Senate is the one in which the Republicans have
• 1:03:21
  Speaker 5: the best chance of winning.
• 1:03:23
  Speaker 2: I'm not so on the governors.
• 1:03:24
  Speaker 5: But again, what can we do at the senatorial levels
• 1:03:27
  Speaker 5: to keep the rival clans from shooting it out at
• 1:03:30
  Speaker 5: the church parking lot?
• 1:03:31
  Speaker 2: I don't exactly know. That seems to be a.
• 1:03:35
  Speaker 5: Problem that requires local solutions, none of which probably will
• 1:03:38
  Speaker 5: be done.
• 1:03:40
  Speaker 1: I was also told by Lena and Sven that the
• 1:03:43
  Speaker 1: Somali-American community is actually fairly conservative, not their kids, not
• 1:03:50
  Speaker 1: the ones who want to blow up if indeed they
• 1:03:52
  Speaker 1: were the ones responsible for the plot on the Mall
• 1:03:54
  Speaker 1: of America, but that generally speaking, the Somali-American community is conservative.
• 1:03:59
  Speaker 2: Is that right? I.
• 1:04:03
  Speaker 5: I don't know if you can actually phrase it in
• 1:04:05
  Speaker 5: those terms, if you can use their culture, put it
• 1:04:08
  Speaker 5: over an overlay of Minnesota culture and have all of
• 1:04:11
  Speaker 5: the terms line up. I mean, how do we define this?
• 1:04:15
  Speaker 5: Do we define this in terms of religiosity? Do we
• 1:04:17
  Speaker 5: define this in terms of economics? Because we've had an
• 1:04:20
  Speaker 5: interesting approach to economics for many members of the Somali community.
• 1:04:24
  Speaker 5: Do you approach it as the role of the father.
• 1:04:27
  Speaker 2: In the household? I've heard conflicting terms there.
• 1:04:30
  Speaker 5: I'm not so sure. Does this mean that they're all DSA?
• 1:04:34
  Speaker 2: I don't know.
• 1:04:34
  Speaker 5: But would they probably align with the DSA if they
• 1:04:37
  Speaker 5: could get some political power out of it? That would
• 1:04:39
  Speaker 5: be the canny thing to do. We've seen it elsewhere.
• 1:04:41
  Speaker 5: So I'm not sure that exactly works. But I mean,
• 1:04:44
  Speaker 5: we have a first generation that came here, then we
• 1:04:45
  Speaker 5: have subsequent generations. And the problem right now is the kids.
• 1:04:49
  Speaker 5: And it's not gangs in the sense that they're swapping
• 1:04:51
  Speaker 5: drugs or that they're doing illicit things. From what I understand,
• 1:04:55
  Speaker 5: it's transplanting plant.
• 1:04:57
  Speaker 2: Culture back over here.
• 1:04:58
  Speaker 5: And it's mostly selling beefs from social media, which is nuts.
• 1:05:03
  Speaker 5: But they're not material. One of the police officials around
• 1:05:06
  Speaker 5: here said they're not materially deprived. It's not the case
• 1:05:08
  Speaker 5: of Like in West Side Story, I'm depraved on account
• 1:05:11
  Speaker 5: I'm deprived. They're coming to these things with nice cars
• 1:05:14
  Speaker 5: and money in their pocket. So it's not a matter
• 1:05:16
  Speaker 5: of the socioeconomic factors pushing them into gunfights in the
• 1:05:19
  Speaker 5: church parking lot. It's more a case of idiotic, feral
• 1:05:24
  Speaker 5: youth who are misbehaving in a society that doesn't seem
• 1:05:26
  Speaker 5: to hold them much to account.
• 1:05:28
  Speaker 1: Now, a question that requires that you actually be there
• 1:05:31
  Speaker 1: is the Ad Wars. I was in Maine in October
• 1:05:34
  Speaker 1: and in September. And I was deluged with very good
• 1:05:37
  Speaker 1: Susan Collins ads and terrible, I mean, just awful production
• 1:05:41
  Speaker 1: value Troy Jackson ads. How is it with Peggy Flanagan
• 1:05:45
  Speaker 1: and Michelle Tafoya?
• 1:05:48
  Speaker 5: Well, I found the Republican ads have been pretty good,
• 1:05:51
  Speaker 5: and the Democrat ads less convincing.
• 1:05:54
  Speaker 2: So, but then again, I would, wouldn't I?
• 1:05:56
  Speaker 5: Peggy Flanagan had a ridiculous commercial where she was standing
• 1:05:58
  Speaker 5: outside talking about this and fraud and the rest of it.
• 1:06:00
  Speaker 5: And she looks like she's wearing this oversized suit that
• 1:06:02
  Speaker 5: David Byrne wore and it stopped making sense to her.
• 1:06:05
  Speaker 5: with one lapel sticking out and a big clown-like tie.
• 1:06:08
  Speaker 5: It looked as ungubernatorial as you can possibly imagine. I
• 1:06:11
  Speaker 5: don't think that plays well out of state. But, I mean,
• 1:06:15
  Speaker 5: we were just watching football yesterday time and again, and
• 1:06:17
  Speaker 5: it's the same thing as with every ad. Here comes
• 1:06:20
  Speaker 5: our candidate, shiny, sunny, full of hope, well made up,
• 1:06:25
  Speaker 5: beautifully lit, looking at the camera, and then the next
• 1:06:28
  Speaker 5: one will be for her opponent, who will portray the
• 1:06:30
  Speaker 5: person we just saw in stark gray monochrome tones. with
• 1:06:35
  Speaker 5: a bleakness to it, like the wind blowing off the.
• 1:06:37
  Speaker 2: Prairie and all.
• 1:06:38
  Speaker 9: She's benching.
• 1:06:39
  Speaker 2: She's in Trump's pocket. She's on Trump's side.
• 1:06:42
  Speaker 5: You know, to some people, of course, that's going to say, well,
• 1:06:46
  Speaker 5: then I'm going to vote for her. Thank you for
• 1:06:47
  Speaker 5: telling me that. Again, I have never been particularly moved
• 1:06:52
  Speaker 5: by one political ad. There's a beautiful one, and I
• 1:06:54
  Speaker 5: can't unfortunately remember who it's for, that's essentially Morning in America,
• 1:06:58
  Speaker 5: Minnesota style.
• 1:07:00
  Speaker 1: Oh, your secretary of state, Judd.
• 1:07:03
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's beautiful. It's absolutely beautiful. And the idea is
• 1:07:07
  Speaker 2: that beneath all of the changes that.
• 1:07:09
  Speaker 5: Have taken place in the state in the last 20 years,
• 1:07:12
  Speaker 5: all the ways in which we've Done away with a
• 1:07:14
  Speaker 5: social contract that we used to have that was basically understood.
• 1:07:17
  Speaker 2: It was a Scandian, maybe a model transplanted.
• 1:07:20
  Speaker 5: That's still there beneath the surface of the idiocy that's
• 1:07:23
  Speaker 5: been slathered over the state for the last 20 years.
• 1:07:26
  Speaker 2: So that's good. That's the best ad I've seen. But again,
• 1:07:29
  Speaker 2: I couldn't remember who it was.
• 1:07:31
  Speaker 7: For, which tells you.
• 1:07:31
  Speaker 1: It was for Judd.
• 1:07:32
  Speaker 2: All right.
• 1:07:33
  Speaker 1: It's Secretary of State Judd something. I can't remember his
• 1:07:35
  Speaker 1: last name. Last question. The last thing that Lena and
• 1:07:38
  Speaker 1: Sven told me is that after decades, I've been on
• 1:07:41
  Speaker 1: the air 27 years, and I think Tim Pawlenty began
• 1:07:44
  Speaker 1: warning 27 years ago, the Boundary Waters National Forest is
• 1:07:47
  Speaker 1: going to burn down someday. I am told by Sven
• 1:07:50
  Speaker 1: and Lena it burned down this year. I missed it.
• 1:07:53
  Speaker 1: I missed it.
• 1:07:54
  Speaker 2: Did you notice that? No, it's still there. I mean,
• 1:07:57
  Speaker 2: everything from Canada was burning.
• 1:07:59
  Speaker 5: And, of course, we had this wonderful smell of plastic
• 1:08:01
  Speaker 5: and maple that covered the entire city.
• 1:08:02
  Speaker 2: For a while. But, no, it's still there. It's still there.
• 1:08:05
  Speaker 5: The worry that people have is that the Trump administration
• 1:08:07
  Speaker 5: will allow mining and that all that copper that we
• 1:08:10
  Speaker 5: need for the huge, proud windmills, and we need a
• 1:08:14
  Speaker 5: lot of it, that they'll start getting it out of
• 1:08:15
  Speaker 5: that area of the country. So that's what a lot
• 1:08:18
  Speaker 5: of Minnesotans here who like to go up there every
• 1:08:20
  Speaker 5: other year and paddle around are freaking out about.
• 1:08:23
  Speaker 2: We'll see.
• 1:08:23
  Speaker 5: I'm calling it that it's going to be Klobuchar for
• 1:08:25
  Speaker 5: governor and Tafoya for senator.
• 1:08:27
  Speaker 1: Oh, oh, someone who's actually bold enough to make a
• 1:08:31
  Speaker 1: prediction of an upset. You know that political pundits always
• 1:08:34
  Speaker 1: have opinions, except in the last 10 days before an
• 1:08:37
  Speaker 1: election they inevitably retreat to. Well, you know, it's close
• 1:08:40
  Speaker 1: out there and it all comes down to turnout. If
• 1:08:43
  Speaker 1: I hear that one more time, I might.
• 1:08:46
  Speaker 5: Well, Hugh, let me tell you, I mean, it's close
• 1:08:48
  Speaker 5: out there, and I think a lot of it's going
• 1:08:49
  Speaker 5: to come down to turnout. But what I feel is
• 1:08:52
  Speaker 5: that Flanagan is going to get draped around her, everything
• 1:08:55
  Speaker 5: that everybody didn't like about the from the waltz administration
• 1:08:57
  Speaker 5: and klobuchar has just got a lot of goodwill and
• 1:09:00
  Speaker 5: she actually is one of those old style dfl politicians
• 1:09:05
  Speaker 5: uh that guided the state for many years until it
• 1:09:08
  Speaker 5: started to go crazy 10 20 years ago so that's
• 1:09:10
  Speaker 5: my call that's.
• 1:09:11
  Speaker 1: My democrats in minnesota throwing trump around the way that
• 1:09:14
  Speaker 1: steelers fans throw down beers.
• 1:09:16
  Speaker 2: Yeah Yep, absolutely so. Absolutely so.
• 1:09:19
  Speaker 5: The Antichrist himself, and all you have to do is
• 1:09:23
  Speaker 5: just taint somebody with that, and the next thing you
• 1:09:24
  Speaker 5: know that they're just as evil as he is.
• 1:09:26
  Speaker 2: But, you know, does it work in the Twin Cities?
• 1:09:28
  Speaker 2: The Twin Cities have already hated Trump ever since day one,
• 1:09:31
  Speaker 2: so that's not going to do it. Again, it's out-state.
• 1:09:34
  Speaker 5: And when I say out-state, I always feel like Winston
• 1:09:36
  Speaker 5: Smith and Julia in 1984 looking out the window in
• 1:09:40
  Speaker 5: their little room and saying, the proles will be the
• 1:09:42
  Speaker 5: salvation eventually. For all I know, the people in out-state
• 1:09:47
  Speaker 5: are just as peeved about the tariffs and the soybeans
• 1:09:50
  Speaker 5: and the boundary waters and everything as the people in
• 1:09:53
  Speaker 5: the metro, too, and that they'll peel away and probably
• 1:09:56
  Speaker 5: go Democrat.
• 1:09:56
  Speaker 1: It's a strange state, Hugh.
• 1:09:58
  Speaker 2: It's a strange state.
• 1:09:59
  Speaker 1: If you wake up and you're surrounded by yellow tractors...
• 1:10:02
  Speaker 1: and and uh bailers and other related farm equipment they
• 1:10:08
  Speaker 1: will have rebelled right.
• 1:10:09
  Speaker 5: Right unless of course they're minneapolis molines which means it's
• 1:10:14
  Speaker 5: a an antique display that's rolled into town and i'd
• 1:10:16
  Speaker 5: go see him uh but i don't think we're going
• 1:10:18
  Speaker 5: to see the equivalent of what we saw in canada
• 1:10:20
  Speaker 5: with the international harvesters in the case and the john
• 1:10:22
  Speaker 5: deere's coming down the road i don't think we'll get
• 1:10:24
  Speaker 5: to that point for a while here.
• 1:10:26
  Speaker 1: No Lilacs, thank you as always. Follow Lilacs at his Substack, jameslilacs.substack.com,
• 1:10:33
  Speaker 1: or visit his website for the Everything Lilacs Tour at lilacs.com.
• 1:10:39
  Speaker 1: That's in lilacs.com. Don't go anywhere, America. I'll be right back.
• 1:10:43
  Speaker 1: Noah C. Rothman from National Review joins me, and we'll
• 1:10:45
  Speaker 1: run through, and we'll talk Minnesota with him as well,
• 1:10:48
  Speaker 1: but also Maine, Ohio, Michigan, Texas, all of that with
• 1:10:53
  Speaker 1: Noah C. Rothman of National Review next on the Hugh
• 1:10:56
  Speaker 1: Hewitt Show. Welcome back, America. I'm Hugh Hewitt. Noah Rothman
• 1:11:08
  Speaker 1: of National Review. He's also part of the Editor's Podcast
• 1:11:11
  Speaker 1: almost weekly. You also see Noah on CNN often and
• 1:11:15
  Speaker 1: other places around. Noah is the senior writer for National Review,
• 1:11:18
  Speaker 1: and I wanted to run through the five big Senate
• 1:11:20
  Speaker 1: races with him. There might be one or two that
• 1:11:22
  Speaker 1: I forget, but I want to focus on the big five. Noah,
• 1:11:26
  Speaker 1: all politics is local. I think that's true of House races.
• 1:11:30
  Speaker 1: It certainly is not true of Senate races, all of
• 1:11:33
  Speaker 1: which are dripped and sheep dipped in money. Let's begin
• 1:11:37
  Speaker 1: in Maine. How do you see Susan Collins and Troy
• 1:11:40
  Speaker 1: Jackson shaking out in a week and a day?
• 1:11:44
  Speaker 17: Well, it seems like the conventional wisdom is now that
• 1:11:48
  Speaker 17: Susan Collins is in the poll position, which I think
• 1:11:50
  Speaker 17: is actually kind of surprising given her position in the polling.
• 1:11:53
  Speaker 17: It's not great, although she's performing better than she performed
• 1:11:56
  Speaker 17: in 2020 when she famously led in none of the polling.
• 1:12:01
  Speaker 17: It's not a great year to compare with this year
• 1:12:02
  Speaker 17: because of the COVID pandemic and how hard it was
• 1:12:04
  Speaker 17: to reach voters. Jackson, Troy Jackson, is an insufferable and
• 1:12:08
  Speaker 17: unimpressive candidate. So Collins has the lead in my book
• 1:12:12
  Speaker 17: when it comes to just her sterling personality. But my
• 1:12:15
  Speaker 17: big question is what the undecideds look like. There are
• 1:12:18
  Speaker 17: plenty of undecideds in this race, and a lot of
• 1:12:19
  Speaker 17: them are probably longtime Collins voters. But they've been holding
• 1:12:23
  Speaker 17: their nose because a lot of them also don't approve
• 1:12:25
  Speaker 17: of Donald Trump. So is this a referendum on Donald
• 1:12:28
  Speaker 17: Trump or a referendum on Susan Collins? I'm inclined to
• 1:12:30
  Speaker 17: think She's in the poll position. They're going to hold
• 1:12:33
  Speaker 17: their nose about Donald Trump and vote for her because
• 1:12:35
  Speaker 17: they want to retain her seniority, her head of the
• 1:12:38
  Speaker 17: Budget Committee in the Senate. I mean, this is a
• 1:12:40
  Speaker 17: really big senator to throw away for a backbencher.
• 1:12:43
  Speaker 1: But it's appropriation. Yeah, it's appropriation.
• 1:12:48
  Speaker 7: Appropriation, thank you.
• 1:12:49
  Speaker 1: I knew it was every single dollar.
• 1:12:51
  Speaker 17: That comes out of Congress. Yeah, it goes through her.
• 1:12:54
  Speaker 17: And that's really important. So I go with the conventional
• 1:12:57
  Speaker 17: wisdom that Collins has a very minor lead. but it's
• 1:13:00
  Speaker 17: minor and it's not something she can sleep on.
• 1:13:03
  Speaker 1: Okay, I want to ask you two questions about her.
• 1:13:05
  Speaker 1: Why is Troy Jackson insufferable in your book? I was
• 1:13:09
  Speaker 1: up there last week or the week after, the week
• 1:13:11
  Speaker 1: before that, when Susan Collins just crushed him in the
• 1:13:13
  Speaker 1: last debate. She won all four. But why is he insufferable? And, yeah,
• 1:13:17
  Speaker 1: it was difficult to poll in 2020, but we know
• 1:13:20
  Speaker 1: what the result was. She won by 8.6 points, having
• 1:13:23
  Speaker 1: been outspent $ 64 million to $ 20 million in 2020. I
• 1:13:27
  Speaker 1: think there's a deep, quiet Susan Collins vote. But why
• 1:13:30
  Speaker 1: is Troy Jackson insufferable?
• 1:13:33
  Speaker 17: There's a quiet Susan Collins vote. My question is just
• 1:13:35
  Speaker 17: how deep is it? And I do think that she
• 1:13:38
  Speaker 17: has the upper hand here, although it's a narrow one.
• 1:13:41
  Speaker 17: I have not seen Troy Collins perform in any interview,
• 1:13:44
  Speaker 17: in any debate, in which he doesn't come off as
• 1:13:47
  Speaker 17: completely unengaged with his own election and also kind of
• 1:13:50
  Speaker 17: perturbed that he has to be there. I watched most
• 1:13:55
  Speaker 17: recently this interview with Dana Bash, CNN's Dana Bash. where
• 1:13:58
  Speaker 17: she's asking really elementary policy questions, and he's just annoyed
• 1:14:01
  Speaker 17: that he has to even answer those policy questions. And
• 1:14:04
  Speaker 17: the whole dismissive, that remark on the debate stage, and
• 1:14:06
  Speaker 17: I guess the third debate, where she goes, ah, shut up,
• 1:14:09
  Speaker 17: where she was making a lighthearted joke about a heckler
• 1:14:12
  Speaker 17: in the audience being a Troy Jackson supporter, and he goes, ah,
• 1:14:14
  Speaker 17: shut up. And that seems to have been a sticky
• 1:14:16
  Speaker 17: moment for him, and it's not one he can navigate
• 1:14:18
  Speaker 17: a way out of.
• 1:14:19
  Speaker 1: Now, that was only eight days ago, nine days ago.
• 1:14:23
  Speaker 1: That's what that– I was up there to watch that one.
• 1:14:25
  Speaker 1: And he grunted, oh, shut up, into the microphone. And
• 1:14:28
  Speaker 1: it has stuck because Mainers are nice.
• 1:14:32
  Speaker 17: He's still answering questions about it, Hugh, and it doesn't
• 1:14:34
  Speaker 17: seem like a hard question to answer. It was a
• 1:14:37
  Speaker 17: high-tension moment, and it seemed to me kind of snide
• 1:14:41
  Speaker 17: and condescending. That's the word that he uses, and I
• 1:14:43
  Speaker 17: think that's fine. That's a word that you can use.
• 1:14:45
  Speaker 17: But then he goes off and is condescending himself.
• 1:14:48
  Speaker 1: His whole behavior, his.
• 1:14:49
  Speaker 17: Posture, his body language– is really perturbed and projecting his
• 1:14:53
  Speaker 17: own irritation, which is its own kind of patronizing.
• 1:14:56
  Speaker 7: So I just don't think it works for him.
• 1:14:57
  Speaker 17: I think he's a bad candidate. And also the whole
• 1:14:59
  Speaker 17: Graham Platner thing is hanging over his campaign.
• 1:15:01
  Speaker 1: So we got a minute to the break. I'm not Jewish.
• 1:15:04
  Speaker 2: Neither are you.
• 1:15:05
  Speaker 1: It's a Yiddish word, schlub. I think that Troy Jackson
• 1:15:08
  Speaker 1: is a schlub. He looks like he slept outside.
• 1:15:13
  Speaker 17: Yeah, he doesn't really put himself together for these things.
• 1:15:15
  Speaker 17: He's sort of half interested in the whole winning a
• 1:15:18
  Speaker 17: seat in the U.S.
• 1:15:19
  Speaker 7: Senate thing.
• 1:15:21
  Speaker 9: And that comes off.
• 1:15:21
  Speaker 17: You know, voters are serious about this. They want a
• 1:15:23
  Speaker 17: serious representative of their interests. And Troy Jackson is projecting
• 1:15:26
  Speaker 17: everything he can to say, I'm not that guy.
• 1:15:28
  Speaker 1: All right. A quick minute on Ohio, where Donald Trump
• 1:15:32
  Speaker 1: won by 11 and a half points two years ago.
• 1:15:35
  Speaker 1: John Huston, a very good senator, but maybe not the
• 1:15:37
  Speaker 1: most charismatic guy in the world against Sherrod Brown, an old,
• 1:15:40
  Speaker 1: old warhorse who's lost a step trying to get back
• 1:15:44
  Speaker 1: into the Senate. What's Noah Rothman see there? Yeah, certainly.
• 1:15:48
  Speaker 17: This is one of those pure toss-ups, which is also
• 1:15:52
  Speaker 17: very difficult for me to navigate. Ramaswamy is the governor's candidate.
• 1:15:55
  Speaker 17: He's going to be top of the ticket, and I
• 1:15:57
  Speaker 17: haven't seen him perform especially well against Amy Acton. I
• 1:15:59
  Speaker 17: don't think he's going to win. And my question is,
• 1:16:02
  Speaker 17: how much does he drag down the Republican ticket broadly?
• 1:16:04
  Speaker 17: Husted is the incumbent, but he doesn't really have an
• 1:16:07
  Speaker 17: incumbency advantage.
• 1:16:09
  Speaker 7: Brown might.
• 1:16:10
  Speaker 17: He was just ousted in the Senate last year. In 2024,
• 1:16:14
  Speaker 17: he lost his race. He left in January 2025, but
• 1:16:16
  Speaker 17: he had previously served— in the Senate from Ohio since 2007.
• 1:16:20
  Speaker 17: So he's got a lot of name recognition. And Houston
• 1:16:22
  Speaker 17: just is a lackluster candidate. So if Ohio really reverts
• 1:16:26
  Speaker 17: to form, to Obama-era form, Sherrod Brown is headed back
• 1:16:30
  Speaker 17: to Congress.
• 1:16:30
  Speaker 1: I'll be right back with Noah. I will tell you
• 1:16:33
  Speaker 1: that Donald Trump is going to Ohio for a reason.
• 1:16:35
  Speaker 1: He does turn out his base for John Houston. Stay tuned.
• 1:16:38
  Speaker 1: We'll talk El Sayed next. Welcome back.
• 1:16:48
  Speaker 10: I'm Hugh Hewitt.
• 1:16:48
  Speaker 1: Noah Rothman is still with me as we run down
• 1:16:51
  Speaker 1: on this Monday before next Tuesday's nationwide election. Three more
• 1:16:55
  Speaker 1: Senate races in Michigan, Minnesota, and Texas. I think Michigan, Noah,
• 1:16:59
  Speaker 1: is probably the most watched Senate race, probably the most expensive,
• 1:17:03
  Speaker 1: although Texas is expensive. How do you see Mike Rogers
• 1:17:07
  Speaker 1: versus Abdul El-Sayed? And I'm going with El-Sayed because I've
• 1:17:10
  Speaker 1: heard it more often than not.
• 1:17:12
  Speaker 17: It is my marquee race. It's the most important race,
• 1:17:14
  Speaker 17: in my view, in the country this year. And it
• 1:17:17
  Speaker 17: has no business being as competitive as it is for Republicans.
• 1:17:21
  Speaker 17: If this was purely an economic race with an economic message,
• 1:17:24
  Speaker 17: El-Sayed would not be in trouble.
• 1:17:25
  Speaker 7: He is in trouble.
• 1:17:26
  Speaker 17: And he's in trouble because he's a really bad candidate.
• 1:17:29
  Speaker 17: Not a poor campaigner, not a poor political figure. He's
• 1:17:33
  Speaker 17: a great political figure. He's a great political communicator. His message,
• 1:17:37
  Speaker 17: his views are noxious, are hostile to the American conception
• 1:17:41
  Speaker 17: of itself. And that's why he's been stuck.
• 1:17:43
  Speaker 10: And he is stuck.
• 1:17:44
  Speaker 17: He's been riding high in the mid-40s in a handful
• 1:17:46
  Speaker 17: of polls. That's his vote share. I've seen Marist and
• 1:17:48
  Speaker 17: Fox in September showing him over 50%, but that's not
• 1:17:51
  Speaker 17: a lot.
• 1:17:52
  Speaker 7: It's a competitive race.
• 1:17:53
  Speaker 17: Roger's vote share is growing, whereas El-Sayed's is staying flat
• 1:17:57
  Speaker 17: or declining, depending on the average that you look at.
• 1:17:59
  Speaker 17: My instinct is yours, that the environment is just too blue.
• 1:18:02
  Speaker 17: But it'll be a very close race. And El-Sayed is
• 1:18:05
  Speaker 17: struggling with the constituencies he needs. Older voters, suburban voters,
• 1:18:10
  Speaker 17: and minority voters. And like all Democrats, he's been doing
• 1:18:15
  Speaker 17: better in the anti-Trump camp. But that includes a lot
• 1:18:18
  Speaker 17: of unreliable voters, young Hispanics, et cetera. Those voters don't
• 1:18:22
  Speaker 17: necessarily turn out reliably. And I haven't seen him perform
• 1:18:25
  Speaker 17: very well. You know, it's unwise to go diving into
• 1:18:28
  Speaker 17: the crosstabs, but Elise Slotkin, when she won her narrowly,
• 1:18:33
  Speaker 17: less than a point, won in 2024, she earned about 85%
• 1:18:37
  Speaker 17: support among African-Americans. I haven't seen a poll that shows
• 1:18:41
  Speaker 17: El-Sayed doing better than 80% among African-American voters. Qantas, the
• 1:18:45
  Speaker 17: last that I looked at, had him at 79%. And
• 1:18:47
  Speaker 17: that matters in the margins. If this race goes down
• 1:18:50
  Speaker 17: to one point and it's because African-American turnout was soft,
• 1:18:53
  Speaker 17: that could cost El-Sayed this race.
• 1:18:54
  Speaker 1: Now, I have seen him in many, many different interview
• 1:18:57
  Speaker 1: settings now and in the debates with Mike Rogers last week.
• 1:19:01
  Speaker 1: He never fails to come off as arrogant, non-responsive to questions,
• 1:19:05
  Speaker 1: and sometimes rude as he was with Brett Baier on
• 1:19:07
  Speaker 1: Thursday night. Do you think– is that just hammering down
• 1:19:10
  Speaker 1: on his base vote and giving up on, for example,
• 1:19:13
  Speaker 1: supporters of Israel, Jewish and non-Jewish? Has he just abandoned
• 1:19:15
  Speaker 1: that appeal at all completely?
• 1:19:17
  Speaker 17: I don't know if he's abandoned– well, when it comes
• 1:19:19
  Speaker 17: to appealing to voters who prioritize the relationship between the
• 1:19:23
  Speaker 17: United States and Israel, yes, he's written them off. He
• 1:19:25
  Speaker 17: has no interest in persuading them. He's not written off
• 1:19:27
  Speaker 17: African-American voters, for example. As we speak, or rather earlier
• 1:19:31
  Speaker 17: this morning, today, Monday, I'll say it was in Detroit,
• 1:19:34
  Speaker 17: having an event with African-American leaders there. And that's because
• 1:19:38
  Speaker 17: he's very soft in that community. He needs to drum
• 1:19:40
  Speaker 17: up support there. So he is trying to stress that.
• 1:19:43
  Speaker 17: And by the way, creating this what I think is
• 1:19:45
  Speaker 17: probably a parodic message about how Republicans and Fox viewers
• 1:19:48
  Speaker 17: love him, including Tucker Carlson, which I don't think does
• 1:19:51
  Speaker 17: much to dissuade people who think that El-Said is very
• 1:19:54
  Speaker 17: confused about who America's enemies are and who their allies are.
• 1:19:57
  Speaker 17: But nevertheless, he's out there touting these messages, which are
• 1:20:00
  Speaker 17: designed to drum up appeal outside his base. So while
• 1:20:03
  Speaker 17: he is beating the drum on the base vote and
• 1:20:05
  Speaker 17: trying to get as many of his voters out there
• 1:20:07
  Speaker 17: as possible, he hasn't totally given up on persuasion. But
• 1:20:10
  Speaker 17: it is kind of hard to tell.
• 1:20:11
  Speaker 10: The message is not very persuasive.
• 1:20:13
  Speaker 1: All right, let's go next to Minnesota. Now, Michelle Tafoya
• 1:20:16
  Speaker 1: is going to win Ricky of the Year in politics
• 1:20:18
  Speaker 1: no matter whether she wins this race or not. Peggy
• 1:20:20
  Speaker 1: Flanagan is just weird. I asked from friends in Minnesota
• 1:20:23
  Speaker 1: who's worse, Tallarico or Flanagan. They said, oh, Flanagan is
• 1:20:27
  Speaker 1: off the charts weird. But it's a pretty blue state.
• 1:20:30
  Speaker 1: On the other hand, they're used to having giants in
• 1:20:32
  Speaker 1: the Senate, right? They're used to Walter Mondale and Hubert Humphrey.
• 1:20:35
  Speaker 1: They're not used to having weird people like Peggy Flanagan.
• 1:20:41
  Speaker 17: Yeah, I suspect they're going to have to get used
• 1:20:43
  Speaker 17: to it. Let's talk about all right. All politics is local. Again,
• 1:20:47
  Speaker 17: this is another race that wouldn't be as close as
• 1:20:49
  Speaker 17: it is without a very flawed candidate in the form
• 1:20:52
  Speaker 17: of Peggy Flanagan, who's a strange one. And be the
• 1:20:55
  Speaker 17: local political debacle that cost Tim Walz's political career. He
• 1:20:58
  Speaker 17: was going to run for reelection before the Somali scandal
• 1:21:01
  Speaker 17: ring collapsed. Democratic support in that state. But it is
• 1:21:06
  Speaker 17: an extremely blue year. Michelle Tafoya is a very gifted talent,
• 1:21:09
  Speaker 17: a talented candidate, rather. And she might have a political
• 1:21:12
  Speaker 17: future ahead of her if she continues to run for
• 1:21:15
  Speaker 17: a future for office. However, this is a tough year
• 1:21:19
  Speaker 17: for Republicans and in a state as dark blue as Minnesota.
• 1:21:21
  Speaker 17: I'm just giving it to the partisan advantage. There certainly
• 1:21:24
  Speaker 17: could be a surprise on election night and places like that.
• 1:21:27
  Speaker 17: But if Minnesota is going to is going to go Republican,
• 1:21:31
  Speaker 17: then I suspect the Democratic vote across the board is
• 1:21:34
  Speaker 17: a lot less than what it looks like in generic polling.
• 1:21:37
  Speaker 17: And that would open up a whole host of terrible polls.
• 1:21:40
  Speaker 17: results for a Democrat that I don't necessarily foresee.
• 1:21:43
  Speaker 1: You know, we have house guests right now from the
• 1:21:46
  Speaker 1: Twin Cities suburban area, and they have commented to us
• 1:21:49
  Speaker 1: that the Somali gang problem has upset even Somali voters.
• 1:21:54
  Speaker 1: And the gunfight at the Eden Prairie Minnetonka homecoming game
• 1:21:59
  Speaker 1: two weeks ago is resonating still across all different demographics
• 1:22:04
  Speaker 1: in Minnesota, including the Somali American demographic. They don't like
• 1:22:08
  Speaker 1: these kids with guns matching up, doing sharks and jet
• 1:22:11
  Speaker 1: stuff in the parking lot of the suburbs.
• 1:22:13
  Speaker 17: That doesn't surprise me. And you know what else might
• 1:22:16
  Speaker 17: be a sleeper issue? Something like Islamist terrorism. There was
• 1:22:19
  Speaker 17: an attempted attack on the Mall of America a couple
• 1:22:21
  Speaker 17: of weeks ago. We all forgot about it. But Minnesotans haven't.
• 1:22:25
  Speaker 17: It came up in an article I was reading about
• 1:22:27
  Speaker 17: a poll showing why this race is so close. So
• 1:22:30
  Speaker 17: the threat posed by radical Islamist militancy, including those who
• 1:22:34
  Speaker 17: are so-called self-radicalized militants, as this attacker was, is particularly
• 1:22:39
  Speaker 17: acute considering that just a couple of states over, terrorism
• 1:22:43
  Speaker 17: is front and center in the statewide race when it
• 1:22:46
  Speaker 17: comes to Michigan's Senate candidates. So yeah, these are issues
• 1:22:49
  Speaker 17: that could be resonating with voters at a sobrosa level,
• 1:22:53
  Speaker 17: below the press's focus.
• 1:22:55
  Speaker 1: All right, we've got one minute left for the lone
• 1:22:57
  Speaker 1: start date of Texas, where Ken Paxton, flawed but three-time
• 1:23:02
  Speaker 1: winner statewide candidate against James Tallarico. What says Noah Rothman?
• 1:23:07
  Speaker 17: So I was down there last week for a couple
• 1:23:09
  Speaker 17: of days in Dallas and Houston. I was surrounded by right-wingers,
• 1:23:12
  Speaker 17: so not a representative sample, and this is purely anecdotal.
• 1:23:15
  Speaker 17: But I'm looking for some Republican somewhere who has such
• 1:23:18
  Speaker 17: a bad taste in their mouth about Paxton, and they
• 1:23:20
  Speaker 17: all do, that they're willing to tell me that they're
• 1:23:22
  Speaker 17: voting for Tallarico.
• 1:23:23
  Speaker 9: And none did.
• 1:23:24
  Speaker 17: I couldn't find a single person who was not– even
• 1:23:26
  Speaker 17: if they're shy, they didn't seem particularly shy. Tallarico needs–
• 1:23:31
  Speaker 17: Right-wing voters, he needs Republican-leaning independents. He needs Republicans proper
• 1:23:35
  Speaker 17: to get him over the threshold. And I think it's 49%, 48%.
• 1:23:37
  Speaker 17: There's an independent candidate there who's going to draw 2%
• 1:23:40
  Speaker 17: or 4%. But I didn't find any shy voters. And
• 1:23:44
  Speaker 17: you would think I would find one. Maybe there's a
• 1:23:47
  Speaker 17: stigma around telling me this sort of thing. Nevertheless, I
• 1:23:49
  Speaker 17: was surprised. And we've seen Paxton's vote share beginning to
• 1:23:53
  Speaker 17: creep up.
• 1:23:54
  Speaker 2: A little bit.
• 1:23:54
  Speaker 17: And Tallarico is stable. So while he's over 50%, this
• 1:23:57
  Speaker 17: is pure toss-up. I would not be surprised to see
• 1:23:59
  Speaker 17: Tallarico win. But Ken Paxton's vote is a lot stickier
• 1:24:02
  Speaker 17: than people think, and a lot of Republicans are going
• 1:24:05
  Speaker 17: to hold their nose, not for him, but for the
• 1:24:07
  Speaker 17: Senate majority.
• 1:24:08
  Speaker 1: Noah C.
• 1:24:09
  Speaker 3: Rothman.
• 1:24:10
  Speaker 1: Follow him on X at Noah Rothman. Listen to him
• 1:24:12
  Speaker 1: on the National Review, the podcast, the editors, and, of course,
• 1:24:16
  Speaker 1: see him on CNN dueling most nights. Stay tuned, America.
• 1:24:20
  Speaker 1: Thank you, Noah. I'll be right back. Wrap up today's
• 1:24:22
  Speaker 1: You Do It show.