Feb. 20, 2025 - Bannon's War Room
56:26
Participants
| 
| Speaker | Time | Text |
|---|---|---|
|
unidentified
|
Thank you. | |
| Moments away, President Trump will be landing behind me. | ||
| Real America's Voice and Brian Glenn, because of Greg reporting, has been invited specially to go. | ||
| This has been totally abandoned. | ||
| This is the forgotten man and woman. | ||
| Completely abandoned. | ||
|
unidentified
|
If you want to know what President Trump is up to, just turn on Real America's Voice. | |
| The communications staff understands the power of streaming and the power of things like Real America's Voice. | ||
|
unidentified
|
This media landscaping is changing now. | |
| The First Lady's first trip is with her husband, the President of the United States, showing how much... | ||
| She cares about this. | ||
| This is Real America's Voice has been invited by the White House communications team. | ||
|
unidentified
|
I think it's just a wonderful thing that he's here today. | |
| I'm stopping in North Carolina first because they've been abused. | ||
| By what's happened. | ||
| I mean, it's terrible. | ||
| A lot of Americans think that this is symbolic of what your campaign was all about. | ||
| America first, being your priorities to Americans. | ||
| Even going to California, where their policies might have been more of the biggest reasons why they've had these problems. | ||
| But you're putting American people first. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Your thoughts on that? | |
| We are. | ||
| Thank you. | ||
| I like that question. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Boy, I want more questions like that. | |
| That's even a statement. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thank you very much. | |
| He's a good man, that guy. | ||
| He's also a very professional reporter, I have to say. | ||
| Thank you very much. | ||
| Yeah, we're putting America first. | ||
| - Thank you, thank you. - When the mainstream media is like, how did Trump come back? | ||
| How they came back was pick-and-shovel work every day by these new media outlets and people like yourself that bet your career, people like Robin Parker-Sig that bet everything and put all the chips in the middle of the table and say, hey, we back this guy, we back this movement, and today is the payoff, Branglin. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Hey, Real America's Voice family. | |
| Are you on Getter yet? | ||
| No. | ||
| What are you waiting for? | ||
| It's free. | ||
| It's uncensored. | ||
| And it's where all the biggest voices in conservative media are speaking out. | ||
| Download the Getter app right now. | ||
| It's totally free. | ||
| It's where I put up exclusively all of my content. | ||
| 24 hours a day. | ||
| You want to know what Steve Bannon's thinking? | ||
| Go to Getter. | ||
|
unidentified
|
That's right. | |
| You can follow all of your favorites. | ||
| Steve Bannon, Charlie Kirk, Jack Posoby. | ||
| And so many more. | ||
| And the best part? | ||
| You can watch Real America's Voice right there on Getter. | ||
| Live. | ||
| So join the conversation. | ||
| Hop on the Getter chat room. | ||
| Engage with patriots who are just like you. | ||
| Good morning, Getter friends. | ||
| We're breaking news, we're delivering the truth, and we're doing it on Getter every single day. | ||
| So don't wait. | ||
| Download the Getter app now. | ||
| Sign up for free and be part of the movement. | ||
| It isn't just an app. | ||
| It isn't just a social media platform. | ||
| It's a community. | ||
| The very few people in MAGA world who will speak out against Elon Musk. | ||
| Why do you think that is? | ||
| I don't know, but Elon's doing some great work. | ||
| You know, I'm a huge supporter of the Deconstruction Administrative State and what Elon's doing in Doge. | ||
| I'm a big supporter of that. | ||
| I hope and my prayer is that these cuts are real. | ||
|
unidentified
|
I wish him a lot of luck, but I am not a transhumanist. | |
| I'm very anti-oligarch. | ||
| There's certain things about the oligarchs, not just Elon, but also the oligarchs that, you know... | ||
| The Bezos and Zuckerberg particularly, all these guys don't support us. | ||
|
unidentified
|
And people have to understand, the CNN audience don't understand, they don't support MAGA. Zuckerberg went on Joe Rogan, said how big a Trump fan he was. | |
| You're not convinced. | ||
| No, he's a criminal. | ||
| What are you talking about? | ||
|
unidentified
|
He put up $500 million to steal the election in 2020. And, of course, Mark Zuckerberg has not been charged nor convicted with any crimes, and certainly nothing to do with the imagined steal of the 2020 election, although it is a conspiracy theory that's often repeated in MAGA circles. | |
| Yeah, well, it used to be part of what Trump pushed until he and Zuckerberg formed this detente, I guess, done on Zuckerberg's part, really. | ||
| But what he said there, they're not MAGA. They don't understand MAGA. That's interesting to me in terms of what this movement looks like. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah, and look, I mean one of the fascinating things I think about Steve Bannon is he has this show that broadcasts for four hours live every day. | |
| I don't know if you want to try that. | ||
| It's tough going. | ||
| And it's everywhere. | ||
| I mean, it comes preloaded. | ||
| The channel comes preloaded on many televisions that are sold in this country today. | ||
| Any smart TV, basically. | ||
| So he's reaching hundreds of thousands, potentially millions of people. | ||
| And he didn't hold back as he was talking about what he describes as oligarchs here in the U.S. You can tell President Trump doesn't totally trust the oligarchs. | ||
| We're putting in very tough antitrust people into the Justice Department and to the alphabet agencies. | ||
| And they have, on War Room, we're a huge platform. | ||
| Look, I'm not a conservative, right? | ||
| I'm a Republican because I've registered a Republican. | ||
| I'm really a populist nationalist. | ||
| So as you see here today, these are working class and middle class people, and they don't want the concentration of power. | ||
| And by the way, those oligarchs, and people at CNN are saying that, just like they've turned on you now? | ||
| Right? | ||
| They've abandoned the progressive left. | ||
| They will abandon us in the same thing. | ||
| They seek power. | ||
| Right now, their feeling is they can see the math, and they see that we have a building coalition. | ||
| So they're with us, but only temporarily. | ||
| I gotta go. | ||
| That's fascinating to me, because just to hear that from someone who is... | ||
| At the White House on day one of Trump's last term. | ||
| And today, you know, Mark Zuckerberg was here in Washington today. | ||
| At the inauguration, we saw all of the CEOs sitting by Trump as he was taking the oath of office. | ||
|
unidentified
|
He's super skeptical. | |
| And I mean, one thing does ring true there that it just occurred to me as he was speaking that... | ||
| Zuckerberg and Twitter at the time, they all banned Trump. | ||
| They kicked Trump off their platforms, and many would say rightfully so after January 6th in 2021, just as Biden was coming to office. | ||
| If you look at the dates, last month when Trump was about to come into office, it was almost around the exact same date that Zuckerberg announced that they were getting rid of fact checks. | ||
| So when you see this point of these companies trying to adjust to whatever administration is coming in, He does have a point there. | ||
| Yeah, and it's something we've seen other CEOs do as well. | ||
| I mean, they announced the changes on Facebook on Fox. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yes, very intentional, yeah. | |
| And certainly not on the Steve Bannon show. | ||
| It is fascinating. | ||
| Tony O'Sullivan, on the ground reporting. | ||
| I'd love to see it. | ||
| This is the primal scream of a dying regime. | ||
| Pray for our enemies, because we're going medieval on these people. | ||
| I got a free shot at all these networks lying about the people. | ||
| The people have had a belly full of it. | ||
| I know you don't like hearing that. | ||
| I know you've tried to do everything in the world to stop that, but you're not going to stop it. | ||
| It's going to happen. | ||
| And where do people like that go to share the big lie? | ||
|
unidentified
|
MAGA Media. | |
| I wish in my soul, I wish that any of these people had a conscience. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Ask yourself, what is my task and what is my purpose? | |
| If that answer is to save my country, this country will be saved. | ||
|
unidentified
|
War Room. | |
| Here's your host, Stephen K. Vance. | ||
| Yo, it's Thursday, February, Euroveloid 2025. | ||
| We're live at CPAC. | ||
| Dave Brass, my wingman. | ||
| Got a big crowd here for the start. | ||
| We're going to go live to the main stage of Vice President J.D. Vance here momentarily. | ||
| It's going to be interviewed by Mercy Schlapp to start this off, to start off CPAC. | ||
| We'll have Ben Burquam. | ||
| So this year, because, I don't know, war room calls so much noise, we have a different location. | ||
| We're in isolation. | ||
| We're in a soundproof room. | ||
| No, our crowd is very rowdy. | ||
| I want to thank everybody yesterday and thank everybody that came to the Force Multiplier Academy. | ||
| I think we had 500 or 600 people. | ||
| It was amazing. | ||
| Jane Zirko. | ||
| In fact, Jane, let me talk to you down there. | ||
| We got Ben Burkwam upstairs outside of the main hall. | ||
| We got our own Jane Zirko. | ||
| Calamity Jane's here. | ||
| Dave Brett. | ||
| Jane, let's talk to some of these good war room posse folks before they go up to hear the vice president. | ||
| Your name and what brings you here today? | ||
|
unidentified
|
I'm Gordon White, and I came here to say Trump 2028. Oh, yeah. | |
| All right. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Hold on, hold on, hold on. | |
| Hang on, hang on, hang on. | ||
| What do we have to do to get Trump 2028? | ||
|
unidentified
|
We just got to keep... | |
| We've got to show up and stay loud. | ||
| Exactly. | ||
| We've got to maybe work the Constitution, too. | ||
| Although, I think there's a way to slip through there, but you never know. | ||
| You've got to keep repeating it over and over. | ||
|
unidentified
|
You've got to desensitize them to it until they get used to it. | |
| I like that. | ||
| That's a sigh-up. | ||
| You're in a sigh-up right now. | ||
| Jane, who else we've got? | ||
| Your name and what brings you here today? | ||
|
unidentified
|
My name's Joe Biggs. | |
| I was one of the Proud Boy leaders charged with seditious conspiracy and recently led out of prison by Trump on January 20th. | ||
| We're here trying to get some help. | ||
| To get our military rights back that we've lost in some of our lives. | ||
| Joe, talk about that. | ||
| You're a veteran, right, sir? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah, I'm a veteran of the U.S. Army, 82nd Airborne. | |
| Did two years in Iraq, two years in Afghanistan. | ||
| And I tried to go to the VA the other day to get help, and I was kicked out, and they threatened to call the cops on me. | ||
| Hold it, hang on. | ||
| You went to a VA, and what did they say? | ||
|
unidentified
|
They said I had to leave. | |
| They said that while I was in jail that I was court-martialed for subversive acts against the United States of America. | ||
| Hold it, they said you were what? | ||
|
unidentified
|
I was court-martialed for subversive acts against the U.S. And this happened apparently while I was in solitary confinement. | |
| Were you ever notified of that? | ||
|
unidentified
|
No. | |
| Never? | ||
|
unidentified
|
So I did four years in prison, two years of those I stayed by myself in a room. | |
| I was in solitary confinement every day. | ||
| And what prison do they have you in? | ||
|
unidentified
|
How much time do you have? | |
| I was all over the country. | ||
| Oh, they gave you what's called diesel therapy just to break you to send you around different prisons? | ||
| Were you guys in lows or were you in mediums? | ||
|
unidentified
|
I had nine points, which means I should have been at a camp. | |
| I was at a medium high. | ||
| Oh, you had nine points. | ||
| I got the points wrong. | ||
| You were below ten, so you should have been in a camp. | ||
| Why were you not in a camp? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Because... | |
| Hold it, hold it, hold it. | ||
| You had points to send you to a camp and they sent you to a medium high. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yes. | |
| Ladies and gentlemen, let me tell you, I was in a low. | ||
| A medium is gladiator school. | ||
| A medium high is like next level. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Some mediums are worse than the penitentiaries. | |
| Some mediums are worse than penitentiaries. | ||
| And medium highs are worse than penitentiaries. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah, I mean, every day was a fight to stay alive. | |
| Are you saying that the Justice Department and the Bureau of Prisons, because, you know, we're very involved in trying to claim the Bureau of Prisons. | ||
| We'd love to have you guys participate. | ||
| Are you saying the Justice Department and the Bureau of Prisons specifically targeted J-6, J-6ers? | ||
| For worse treatment than they normally would prisoners at the same point rating? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yes, I handed someone a copy of the Constitution and they said that I was handing out right-wing propaganda and trying to radicalize the inmates. | |
| I handed someone a signed copy of a Dinesh D'Souza book and they pulled me inside and interrogated me and threw me in the hole. | ||
| Wow. | ||
| How long are you in solitary? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Two years straight. | |
| Two years straight. | ||
| Wow. | ||
| And we've got a special event tomorrow. | ||
| You want to tell people about it now? | ||
| We'll tee them up with what you guys... | ||
| There's a collection of you guys tomorrow going to go to Capitol Hill? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah, so myself, Enrique Tarrio, Stuart Rhodes at the Oath Keepers, and Zachary right here. | |
| We're going to be going to the Capitol and talking about our future plans and what it looks like we're going to be doing. | ||
| Jane, who are our other colleagues right here? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Zachary Real. | |
| We love getting convicts on War Room. | ||
| We're convict friendly. | ||
| By the way, I'm not a convict. | ||
| I'm an inmate. | ||
| You guys are convicts, right? | ||
| No, seriously, there's a difference in prison. | ||
|
unidentified
|
We actually got hit with terrorism, so we're terrorists. | |
| We're actually terrorists. | ||
| No, but did they... | ||
| The thing with the U.S. Army, has anybody notified you officially that the U.S. Army court-martialed you? | ||
|
unidentified
|
No, so when I went to the VA to go be seen, they didn't know who I was. | |
| So they said, what's your social security number and your date of birth? | ||
| They gave them that. | ||
| The computer came up and flashed. | ||
| He looks at me and goes, I've never seen that before. | ||
| And then his system shut down, locked him out of the computer, and he said the last thing he saw was that I had been court-martialed for subversive acts. | ||
| And you were never notified of any UCMJ activity. | ||
| We obviously got to talk to your lawyers about all that. | ||
| Sir, where are you from and where did you spend your time incarcerated? | ||
|
unidentified
|
So, my name is Zachary Real. | |
| I was co-defendant with Joe Biggs here. | ||
| And, you know, same story with the charges edition. | ||
| I'm actually a Marine Corps veteran myself. | ||
| Where were you in the Corps? | ||
|
unidentified
|
I was in the Corps, yeah. | |
| I was stationed in Yuma, Arizona. | ||
| And I actually got out of the Marine Corps, got two degrees at Temple University, have a master's degree in everything. | ||
| What do you have a master's in? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Innovation Management and Entrepreneurship. | |
| So you're saying up until J-6, you were a solid citizen, right? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Absolutely, yeah. | |
| And you were 82nd Airborne and deployed directly. | ||
| So up until the day of J-6, you were a quote-unquote law-abiding citizen, served your country, patriots. | ||
| Education, entrepreneurs, all that, right? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Absolutely, yeah. | |
| And, you know, it's funny. | ||
| When I was going through trial, I was actually on the witness stand. | ||
| They actually tried to use my military service against me and saying that, like, because I was in the Marine Corps that I was more likely to, you know, have plotted some sort of ridiculous plan to, like, overthrow the government. | ||
| Are you glad that what President Trump's doing and Ed Martin's doing over in D.C. at cleaning out that rat's nest of U.S. Attorneys off, did those U.S. Attorneys treat you guys? | ||
| Fairly like veterans? | ||
|
unidentified
|
I mean, it depends. | |
| I absolutely love what President Trump is doing with the cleaning house. | ||
| I mean, it needs to happen. | ||
| There's been a lot of... | ||
| Bad things going on in our justice system for a long time, and obviously we're going to get into all that. | ||
| Social media, real quickly, we've got to jump to break. | ||
| Social media? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah, at Zach Reels, Z-A-C-H-R-E-H-L. Social media? | |
| At Real Joe Biggs on X. Okay, let's give it up for the J6ers. | ||
| Big event tomorrow. | ||
| We're going to have them here. | ||
| We're going to have them here live at 11, and we're going to cover their press conference at 1 from Capitol Hill. | ||
| Short commercial break. | ||
| Birch Gold. | ||
| Just take your phone out. | ||
| Bannon, 989898. You know, the Bank of England can't deliver on their gold shipments. | ||
| Maybe he says something about central banks buying gold at record rates. | ||
| Go check it out today. | ||
| Bannon, 989898. Investing in gold in the era of Trump. | ||
| Short commercial break. | ||
| Back at CPAC. We're going to the main stage as soon as the vice president steps up. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Here's your host, Stephen K. Bannon. | |
| Yo! | ||
| Okay, Jane Zirkle, we've got some... | ||
| By the way, we're going to cut to the main stage at CPAC. We understand because of security, etc., the VP may be a little delayed, so we'll go. | ||
| By the way, our great friend from Hungary, Blaz Orban. | ||
| Now, I want to make sure everybody understands you're not actually related. | ||
| To the great Prime Minister, correct? | ||
|
unidentified
|
No, I'm not. | |
| But I'm working with him. | ||
| Yes, you're his strategist, correct? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Somehow. | |
| Somehow. | ||
| Hang on for one second. | ||
| I want to go. | ||
| Jane Zirkle. | ||
| Jane, I think we've given you combat duty today. | ||
| This is the second group of J6ers, but this is the original. | ||
| You guys are the guys originally in the Gulag in Washington, D.C., correct? | ||
|
unidentified
|
That's right. | |
| Tell us who you are, what you were charged with, and were you treated fairly? | ||
| By the Justice Department and BOP. Go ahead. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Not at all. | |
| My name is Pete Schwartz. | ||
| I went to the maximum security penitentiaries. | ||
| I got sentenced to 14 years. | ||
| Never set foot in the Capitol building, but they went ahead and charged me anyhow. | ||
| And then right before, three days before Trump's pardons... | ||
| My case got completely overturned, but they wouldn't let me speak to my lawyers or anything like that. | ||
| So I still sat in prison until the day Trump pardoned us. | ||
| And I'm so glad to be out. | ||
| Was that a pretty bold and heroic move of President Trump? | ||
| Because the pressure, even in the Republican Party, was to not do any J6ers at all. | ||
| He did everybody. | ||
|
unidentified
|
It was the right thing to do. | |
| I mean, it was absolutely the right thing to do. | ||
| Why was it the right thing to do? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Because, number one, promises made, promises kept. | |
| Number two, we were unfairly charged. | ||
| Even the people who, there's been this left-wing narrative talking about violent, non-violent, and that's all a false narrative. | ||
| It's left-wing stuff, because a lot of the people charged with violence weren't guilty of violence. | ||
| I mean, when you go to D.C. and you're charged with something, and you're a Trump supporter, you're getting convicted. | ||
| It doesn't matter what you're charged with. | ||
| It doesn't matter who you are. | ||
| You are going down. | ||
| So it's absolutely the right thing to do. | ||
| Because the judges and the juries, it's all federal court, and all the juries are 97% people, 98% people that not just voted against Trump, but hate Trump, hate MAGA, right? | ||
|
unidentified
|
They hate us. | |
| I mean, absolutely hate us. | ||
| It's insane. | ||
| They're disconnected from reality. | ||
| That Trump derangement syndrome is 100% real. | ||
| Jane, let's try to get everybody in. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Your name and your experience. | |
| Michael Thomas Curzio. | ||
| Full-blood, red-blooded American patriot. | ||
| Showed up at the Capitol on January 6th to protest. | ||
| Got charged for picketing, parading, and demonstrating. | ||
| Maxed out six months. | ||
| I didn't get no game time or anything. | ||
| They painted me as this nasty person. | ||
| Used all my background against me. | ||
| Hey, we went to have our voices heard. | ||
| We were set up. | ||
| Nobody should have been a... | ||
| When you say you were set up, what do you mean by that, sir? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Well, it comes out... | |
| Are you a conspiracy theorist? | ||
| Or do you think this... | ||
|
unidentified
|
I'm a fact theorist. | |
| Okay, the fact... | ||
| You think this was a... | ||
| You're saying, you're implying this was a Fedsurrection? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Oh, yeah, 100%. | |
| What do you mean by that? | ||
|
unidentified
|
It came out that there was federal informants and confidential human resources in the crowd, and it turns out that at least three or four of them actually broke the law by entering the Capitol. | |
| We know that the FBI has said, the former FBI director, by the way, Cash Patel today at 1 o'clock. | ||
| Everybody, 202-224-3121, right? | ||
| And Cash has been one of those. | ||
| What is his recommendation to Kash Patel? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Help us investigate everyone that had anything to do with J6, from the FBI down to the way the D.C. jail treated us, down to the way the U.S. Marshals treated us and everything. | |
| A lot of us here, we've seen the underbelly of the BOP and the legal industry and all that, and a lot of us here would like to work on prison reform. | ||
| No, no, we're going to get you guys. | ||
| So Peter Navarro, myself, and Jared are working on prison reform, and I will include you guys. | ||
| We've got to get the input, particularly you guys that went to mediums, medium highs, and penitentiaries. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah. | |
| Those have got to be addressed, right? | ||
|
unidentified
|
We know what's wrong and where it's wrong. | |
| Okay. | ||
| Let's go back here for a second. | ||
| I just want to know on the Fed's direction part. | ||
| Full, transparent, either the Congress does it, or the Justice Department does it, or FBI, but you want all the facts out there, public hearings, where you guys would testify, but you'd be cross-examined, things like that, where you have no fear of that. | ||
|
unidentified
|
No, sir. | |
| No fear of all the information coming out. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Let me tell you one thing, and this is how I feel and a lot of people feel, okay? | |
| For every corrupt person that was part of that, every J-6 that was released, their cell should be filled with anybody that had anything to do with it. | ||
| Accountability. | ||
| Accountability. | ||
| You want transparency and accountability. | ||
| What about people throughout the country or others, the people that were in President Trump's ear saying, hey, you had a jury trial, and it was a jury of your peers, and there was the guys that sentenced you. | ||
| What do you have to say? | ||
| What's your response? | ||
|
unidentified
|
A jury of your peers would be an unbiased jury of your peers. | |
| You have what's called a right to change a venue, and they denied every single one of us that. | ||
| They wouldn't let us... | ||
| Talk to our lawyers, get our proper discoveries. | ||
| They took the whole constitutional rights away from us because they said that everything that happened was unprecedented. | ||
| That doesn't mean that we're not American citizens and that we don't fall under the jurisdiction of the United States of America. | ||
| When you went through the system, did it shock you about how the judges in these certain cases, the judges, the law enforcement, and once you got into the Bureau of Prison, how corrupt it is and how crooked it is? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yes, sir. | |
| My name is Jessica Watkins. | ||
| I'm one of the Oath Keeper defendants. | ||
| They charge us with seditious conspiracy. | ||
| They charge us with destruction of government property. | ||
| I was found not guilty on those charges at trial. | ||
| I had obstruction of an official proceeding. | ||
| Well, hang on. | ||
| This under Fisher, that was a phony charge that was reversed by the Supreme Court later. | ||
| Were you released immediately after that was reversed by the Supreme Court? | ||
| Didn't the jail come and open up your cell and let you go that day? | ||
|
unidentified
|
No, not at all. | |
| Actually, we filed a motion and my judge denied it. | ||
| I was going to only have like a civil disorder charge. | ||
| And I've done four years, three days. | ||
| My judge refused to let me go even though we... | ||
| Were you in a camp or were you in a... | ||
|
unidentified
|
I was in a medium security women's facility. | |
| Hold it, hold it, hold it. | ||
| They sent you to a medium security prison? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yes, sir. | |
| How many points did you have? | ||
| People should know, under 10 points, about your background or your history, under 10 points, you automatically virtually go to a camp, correct? | ||
|
unidentified
|
It's supposed to be. | |
| My points were actually zero. | ||
| You had zero points. | ||
| You had a totally clean record on the day of J6. You had nothing. | ||
| Good citizen, nothing. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yes, sir. | |
| I'm a veteran. | ||
| I was a firefighter and an EMT. I was actually at January 6th to be a medic, sir. | ||
| I actually dragged people out. | ||
| Can you tell the nation right now what it's like being in a medium security prison as a woman? | ||
|
unidentified
|
It was pretty terrible, frankly. | |
| The facilities are terrible. | ||
| The staff... | ||
| Actually, four days before I was set free, I was commuted. | ||
| I had a lieutenant who jacked me against the fence and dragged me and she threw me in what's called the SHU, which is a special housing unit. | ||
| It's the hole. | ||
| Yeah. | ||
|
unidentified
|
And I hadn't done anything. | |
| Why did you go to the SHU? No reason. | ||
| Are you saying they selected out, am I hearing they selected out the J6 prisoners in the Bureau of Prison for worse treatment? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yes, sir. | |
| Yeah, she physically grabbed me. | ||
| She left bruises all over me. | ||
| Beat me against the fence and threw me in. | ||
| Oh, is JD on stage? | ||
| Okay, we're going to cut right now. | ||
| We're going to go live. | ||
| We'll come back to all you guys. | ||
| We're going to go live to the stage, the Vice President of the United States. | ||
| JD Vance is up there. | ||
| Going to be interviewed by Mercy Slap. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah, yeah. | |
| Are you a little jet-lagged or no? | ||
| You know, yes, I am a little jet-lagged. | ||
| So we did a trip where we went to France. | ||
| And then to Germany. | ||
| And then we went to San Diego for a family wedding. | ||
| And then back in D.C. And we did all that in like seven days. | ||
| So a little jet lag. | ||
| That's okay. | ||
| I'm in a good place right now. | ||
| I got some sleep last night. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Okay, good. | |
| Then we're ready. | ||
| We're ready. | ||
| But it's a real special day today. | ||
| You know what today is, guys? | ||
| It's February 20th. | ||
| That means our first 30 days. | ||
|
unidentified
|
The happy one-month anniversary of the Trump-Vance administration. | |
| I mean, how exciting is that? | ||
|
unidentified
|
It's very exciting. | |
| It's hard to believe we've only been in office for a month, because I think we've done more in a month than Biden did in about four years. | ||
| And thank God for that. | ||
| You know, the president keeps us on a pretty breakneck pace. | ||
| He always asks, what have we done today? | ||
| What are we going to do tomorrow? | ||
| What are we going to do next week? | ||
| Because I think he realizes this is a special moment in time. | ||
| And by the way, thank you. | ||
| Thanks to all of you for making it possible for us to do all the great work we've been doing in the administration. | ||
| I know we wouldn't have been here without you. | ||
| But I think the president is acutely aware that the American people gave us a window to save the country, and that's exactly what we're going to do. | ||
| And thank God for that, because it's been a hell of a lot of fun the past month. | ||
| Okay, so I don't even think we can keep track of all the things you all are doing. | ||
| In fact, I don't even think the press can keep track of all they're doing. | ||
| I mean, talk about the shock and awe strategy. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Seriously. | |
| So when you're looking at this list after list after list, what stands out? | ||
| Well, speaking of the press, I do think that we've had maybe more executive orders than CNN has viewers each night, so hello to our friends at CNN. I think, I actually think that their plan was they were going to go all in on anti-Trump and hope that he could save CNN. In the same way that he did, | ||
| frankly, in 2017, because nobody really watched the network until he became president in 2017. But that's maybe the one thing I think the president has been unable to do, unable to save CNN's ratings over the last few months. | ||
| But look, I think that what the president has tried to do is recognize that we have a historical mandate on a few issues. | ||
| We have to secure the southern border. | ||
| And thanks to his actions, border crossings are down well over 90 percent. | ||
| And we're just getting started. | ||
| He recognizes that we have to really unlock the engine of American growth, which is the We've got to get back to having a growing economy that creates good jobs and high wages for the American people. | ||
| And a lot of that goes back to drill, baby, drill. | ||
| We've done more on energy. | ||
| Under President Trump's leadership than I think any administration in history, and that's not an exaggeration, and of course we're going to do more. | ||
| And then I think the third thing that he's tried to do, of course, with the help of Elon and all the great folks at Doge, is ask, what are we doing with all of the American taxpayers' money, and why are we wasting so much of it on garbage that the American people either aren't aware that we're spending it on or don't want to be spending it on in the first place? | ||
| Like, for example... | ||
| The stuff that we've figured out, Mercedes, is unbelievable. | ||
| Why are we spending money on progressive modern art projects centered around toilets in Afghanistan? | ||
| That's actually something that your tax dollars were funding until very recently. | ||
| And I think all of us are sitting around and asking, what the hell are we doing with the American people's money for the last four years? | ||
| Let's turn off the spigot and spend the American people's tax money on the American people's priority. | ||
| And that's, of course, been a big focus in the administration, too. | ||
| Let's dig deeper into the immigration issue. | ||
| We've seen and you've met. | ||
| Many of the victims, people who have family members who have died, have been tragically, tragically murdered. | ||
| Those angel families in the hands of these criminal illegal aliens. | ||
| Sure. | ||
| What's your message to these families? | ||
|
unidentified
|
And then, what is your message to these horrific drug cartels and human traffickers who have preyed on the most vulnerable in the world? | |
| Well, our message to the drug traffickers is get the hell out of our country. | ||
| Your free ride is over because President Trump is back in the Oval Office. | ||
| That is... | ||
| You're not welcome. | ||
| You were never welcome, according to the American people. | ||
| But unfortunately, you had President Joe Biden who allowed you to run free over the United States of America. | ||
| And Donald Trump has said, you're terrorist organizations. | ||
| We're going to go after you. | ||
| We're going to wage war on you. | ||
| And certainly, we want you... | ||
| Out of the United States of America. | ||
| And that's an important message, of course. | ||
| But our message, and you know this, Mercedes, our message to the families is President Trump cares about you. | ||
| He thinks that it's disgraceful what your own government let happen to your children, to your grandchildren. | ||
| And it's got to stop. | ||
| And of course, we mourn with people, we pray for people, but we're also asking, as their government, why did this happen to your child in the first place? | ||
| And the answer is that under Joe Biden, your government didn't do its job. | ||
| Under Donald Trump, it is. | ||
| Thank God for that. | ||
| On the economy, and I'm getting this question all the time, it's this question of affordability, right? | ||
| There's a lot of stress on our families, something that I think Joe Biden could not manage in terms of really helping lower that cost of living and making things just simply more affordable. | ||
| Sure. | ||
| We talked about energy independence being a critical component of this, of ensuring... | ||
|
unidentified
|
And making things just simply more affordable. | |
| Sure. | ||
| We talked about energy independence being a critical component of this, of ensuring that we unleash this economic prosperity. | ||
| What more needs to be done? | ||
| Yeah, so one of the first interviews I did, it was I think six or seven days after the inauguration. | ||
| And somebody asked me, well, it's been six days. | ||
| What have you done to fix the inflation crisis created by Joe Biden? | ||
| I'm like, well, first of all, it's been six days. | ||
| We've done a lot in six days. | ||
| But it's going to take some time to fix what Joe Biden broke over four years. | ||
| And we know... | ||
| It is easy, unfortunately, to burn the house down. | ||
| It takes a little bit of time to build it back up. | ||
| And here's what we have to do. | ||
| Because, look, the fundamental goal of our immigration policy, of our border policy, of Doge saving taxpayer money, the fundamental goal is we want your children and grandchildren to be able to raise a family in security and comfort in the country that we all love. | ||
| That is the whole goal of President Trump's agenda. | ||
| Safety and prosperity, right? | ||
| It's pretty common sense stuff. | ||
| And we know that to do that, we have to, first of all, unleash American energy. | ||
| Now, why is that so important? | ||
| Because, look, we all know grocery prices got too high under Joe Biden's leadership. | ||
| Well, one of the main drivers of groceries is energy. | ||
| Because if the farmers are paying more for energy, then we're all paying more for what the farmers grow. | ||
| And if the truck drivers who are delivering the groceries are paying more for fuel, then we're all paying more for what the truck drivers are delivering to the grocery store. | ||
| If we unleash American energy, that will do more than anything to drive down the cost for the American people. | ||
| The second thing, Mercedes, is we have got to stop spending the American people's money on garbage. | ||
| Every dollar. | ||
| Every dollar. | ||
| That we take in and spend, you have to pay for, either through taxes or through inflation. | ||
| And if we spend the American people's money more wisely, if we stop taxing and spending the American people to death, that's also going to bring relief to all of the pricing pressures that are out there. | ||
| We're going to make it affordable to live in this country again. | ||
| That's our mandate. | ||
| That's our goal. | ||
| And you're right. | ||
| There's a lot more that we can do, but I think we've got a pretty good start after 30 days. | ||
| We've got a pretty good start. | ||
|
unidentified
|
But we've got this big, beautiful, one-bill budget reconciliation scenario. | |
| How is that working? | ||
| What are the dynamics that are happening right now in Congress and what the administration is doing to ensure that a lot of what the president is wanting to do in terms of really pushing forward with economic prosperity and his tax... | ||
| Relief initiatives gets done in these bills. | ||
| Yeah, it's really important. | ||
| So the Senate obviously has its own approach, and the President has been very clear that his preference is to put everything in one bill. | ||
| And part of that is just simple legislative strategy. | ||
| I think the President has learned a lot about how D.C. works, and I actually talked to the President about this yesterday, and he said to me, look, it's very rare that you can get two reconciliation bills done in one Congress, which is why he thinks we've got to do a lot. | ||
| With that one big, beautiful bill, that first reconciliation package that we're going to get through the House and the Senate. | ||
| It's going well. | ||
| It's early, right? | ||
| This stuff takes time to put together. | ||
| I think if you had a record-paced reconciliation bill, we would get this thing done in May or in June. | ||
| I think we're on track to do that. | ||
| But we've got to do some basic things, Mercedes. | ||
| One, like I said, we've got to continue to unleash American energy. | ||
| That's part of the reconciliation bill. | ||
| We've got to make sure that other countries stop taking advantage of us. | ||
| That's a big part of President Trump's tariff policy, is we've got to stop being taken advantage of. | ||
| You know, of course we want to make the President Trump tax cuts permanent and extend them into the future. | ||
| We want no taxes on tips. | ||
| We've got to do some of the things we talked about during the campaign. | ||
| That's got to be part of it. | ||
| And then finally, and this is really important, Everything the President has done on the border, we have got to empower him to do it, not just for a month, but for the next four years. | ||
| And we've got to hire more Border Patrol agents. | ||
| We've got to give Tom Homan and Stephen Miller and Kristi Noem the resources they need to secure the border. | ||
| And just not to return to the border, but I think so many of our issues come back to the border. | ||
| Because if you take 30, 40 million illegal aliens... | ||
| You take Medicare fraud. | ||
| Social security fraud. | ||
| Why are we taking the people's social security payments and giving it to illegal aliens? | ||
| We know that's happening in the United States of America today. | ||
| We've got to stop it. | ||
| If you get control of the border, Mercedes, you do more to control the fiscal problem, the financial problems that we have in this country than almost anything. | ||
| Get illegal aliens out of our country. | ||
| Make sure American tax dollars go to American people. | ||
| That is how you solve the fiscal crisis in the United States of America. | ||
| Shifting to your incredible speech at the Munich conference. | ||
| Did you all watch that? | ||
| I don't know. | ||
| I think they really liked it. | ||
| I'm glad you guys liked it. | ||
| Not everybody liked it. | ||
| You guys liked it. | ||
| Not everybody liked it. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thank you. | |
| Okay. | ||
| - Okay. - I'll take a standing ovation for a speech I already gave. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah, I was going to say, here's your speech to say it again. | |
| But it was fascinating because there was obviously some of these European leaders that were a little uptight about it. | ||
| It stressed them out just a little bit. | ||
| But you talked about the greatest threats in Europe. | ||
| Yeah. | ||
| So, look, the greatest threat in Europe... | ||
| And I'd say it was the greatest threat in the United States until about 30 days ago is that you've had the leaders of the West decide that they should send... | ||
| Millions and millions of unvetted foreign migrants into their countries. | ||
| That is the biggest threat to Europe. | ||
| And frankly, it remains, by the way, the biggest threat to the United States because, yes, we've got four years of President Trump's leadership, but I guarantee you, if the Democrats ever get power again, they're going to try to do it again. | ||
| We cannot rebuild Western civilization. | ||
| We cannot rebuild the United States of America or Europe by letting millions and millions of unvetted illegal migrants come into our country. | ||
| It has to stop. | ||
| Thank God it's stopped here, but it's got to stop there. | ||
| And a related issue, Mercedes, is... | ||
| You can't just stop it. | ||
| You have to allow European peoples, and of course the American people too, to raise issues about it. | ||
| You have to allow free speech to debate this stuff. | ||
| You have to stop doing things to the populations of the world. | ||
| You've got to give the populations of the world the opportunity to speak up and say, no more of this BS. We want borders. | ||
| We want sovereignty. | ||
| We want to be able to speak our own mind in our own country. | ||
| And I guarantee you, if we don't allow free speech, and of course the Biden administration, I made this point, Mercedes, the Biden administration did more to destroy I'm not even blaming the Europeans. | ||
| I'm actually saying you follow the lead of Joe Biden into censorship and mass migration. | ||
| Follow the lead of Donald J. Trump, and that's free speech, borders, and sovereignty. | ||
| That is the future for our shared civilization. | ||
| And I will tell you something that is really, truly remarkable that's happening at CPAC is, and we had our second CPAC International Summit yesterday, and we have many of these European, conservative European leaders with us today where we stand in solidarity because they have an opportunity to basically make Europe great again, make Asia great again, make Latin America great again. | ||
| And so, in essence, I think your message was very well received by many of those conservative leaders across the globe. | ||
| But what does this mean with the U.S.? Now that, you know, in giving that speech, what does this mean with the U.S.'s relationship with Europe? | ||
| Well, look, obviously, we're going to continue to have important alliances with Europe, but I really do think the strength of those alliances is going to depend on whether we take our societies... | ||
| Think about this. | ||
| Germany's entire defense is subsidized by the American taxpayer. | ||
| There are thousands upon thousands of American troops in Germany today. | ||
| Do you think that the American taxpayer is going to stand for that if you get thrown in jail in Germany for posting a mean tweet? | ||
| Of course they're not, right? | ||
| So the point that I try to make to our European friends, and I think that they're our friends. | ||
| I believe that. | ||
| I know President Trump does. | ||
| That friendship is based on shared values. | ||
| You do not have shared values if you're jailing people for saying we should close down our border. | ||
| You don't have shared values if you cancel elections because you don't like the result, and that happened in Romania. | ||
| You do not have shared values if you're so afraid of your own people that you silence them and shut them up. | ||
| So let's have shared values. | ||
| Let's defend democracy. | ||
| Let's have free expression, not just in the United States, but all over the Western world. | ||
| That is the path to strong alliances in Europe. | ||
|
unidentified
|
We had Ambassador Rick Riddell with us yesterday. | |
| He'll be on the CPAC stage during these conferences. | ||
| He has like three jobs, or four, or five. | ||
| Let me ask you this. | ||
| Where are we on basically the status of the Russia-Ukraine moving forward in terms of these negotiations in bringing peace to this endless war? | ||
| You know, it's early. | ||
| And I think what President Trump, what makes him such an effective negotiator, I've seen this in private, is that he doesn't take anything off the table. | ||
| When he walks into a negotiation, he says... | ||
| Everything is on the table. | ||
| And of course, that makes the heads explode in the American media because they say, why are you talking to Russia? | ||
| Well, how are you going to end the war unless you're talking to Russia? | ||
| You've got to talk to everybody involved in the fighting if you actually want to bring the conflict to a close. | ||
| And I know the president does. | ||
| But I'll tell you the goals that animate President Trump's policy. | ||
| It's really simple. | ||
| He wants the killing to stop. | ||
| He wants to bring lasting peace to Europe. | ||
| He doesn't just want to stop it now and have the war restart a month from now. | ||
| He wants to bring lasting peace to Europe because the president believes this and he's absolutely right. | ||
| Peace is in the interest of Russia. | ||
| It's in the interest of Ukraine. | ||
| It's in the interest of Europe. | ||
| But most importantly, peace is in the interest of the American people and he's going to fight for it for the remainder of his administration wherever war breaks out. | ||
| He's going to be the president of peace. | ||
| Now, he, of course, is a very good negotiator, a very good businessman. | ||
| He recognizes that a lot of these issues are tough. | ||
| It's going to take a smart statesman to figure this stuff out. | ||
| But we've got that in the White House. | ||
| And I really believe that we're on the cusp of peace in Europe for the first time in three years because we have leadership from the Oval Office and we haven't had it in four years in this country. | ||
| Matt and I mentioned this right when we started the conference. | ||
| We're honored by the presence of two hostages that were freed after the Hamas atrocity, the tragedy that we've seen happen. | ||
| And we have several of the family members as well who are still there. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Their loved ones are still being detained by Hamas. | |
| What is your message to these hostage families and these survivors? | ||
| Our message is that President Trump loves you. | ||
| He hasn't forgotten your loved ones, and he's going to fight every single day to bring them home. | ||
| That is exactly what he's been doing, and that's what he'll keep on doing. | ||
| I was actually talking with one of my best friends about this a couple of days ago. | ||
| Can I be your best friend, too? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yes. | |
| I think we all want to be your best friend, right? | ||
| Okay, okay. | ||
| But I was talking with him, and he was asking me. | ||
| He was like, well, I don't understand. | ||
| Why was Biden unable to do this? | ||
| And then, like, the minute that Donald Trump won, we started to make progress in bringing the hostages home. | ||
| And I said, man, it's just a question of leadership. | ||
| You actually need a president who is willing to pick up the phone and say, you've got to bring these people home. | ||
| No, no, no, no. | ||
| We're not focused on that crap right now. | ||
| We're focused on bringing hostages home. | ||
| And then, when the negotiations hit a wall, because they always do, you need a president who picks up the phone and says, cut this crap out. | ||
| We've got to make progress. | ||
| And you've got to keep that pace going. | ||
| It's leadership. | ||
| It really is. | ||
| And I saw it behind the scenes. | ||
| And what the president did is he empowered, in particular, because this, remember, this was before we were inaugurated. | ||
| This was before we had our great Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, or any of the great people around us. | ||
| You know, the president sent his dear friend, and he's become my dear friend, Steve Witkoff. | ||
| As an emissary of the President of the United States, and he said, Steve, you speak for me, get it done, and if there are problems, pick up the phone and call me. | ||
| Steve Wyckoff, with the President's leadership, got it done, and it's amazing. | ||
| And of course, we've still got work to do. | ||
| We've got to finish the process. | ||
| But I really believe the President is as committed to this as any American leader in my lifetime. | ||
| We're going to keep on fighting for it. | ||
| One of the issues that's central to the CPAC community is the issue of pro-life. | ||
| Of course. | ||
| And what is the administration going to do to defend the unborn, to provide support for those mothers, those fathers that choose life? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Sure. | |
| Well, you know, one of the things, of course, the president... | ||
| And I think that it's why he is accurately called the most pro-life president in American history is he finally made it possible for the will of the people to speak on the life issue. | ||
| And that was the Dobbs decision. | ||
| What that did is it gave the abortion question back to the people. | ||
| It took it out of the hands of unelected bureaucrats and unelected judges and gave it back to the people. | ||
| And I think the most important thing that we can do, and as you know, Mercedes, I'm very pro-life, I'm a devout Christian, is that we have got to persuade our fellow Americans, because now we've got... | ||
| We've got the power of persuasion. | ||
| We've got to persuade our fellow citizens that unborn life is worthy of protecting. | ||
| It is sacred in the eyes of God and it should be sacred in the eyes of man too. | ||
| And we have to pick up the torch and fight for that every single day. | ||
| And I know you guys are up for the task. | ||
| I am too. | ||
| And I think on the administration side, what the president has said, and it's been consistent, it's going to be consistent in the rhetoric and in the policy, is we believe in the Trump administration that babies are good, that families are good, and we want to make it easier for young moms and young dads to choose life, to start families, and to bring new life into the world. | ||
| That's the whole point of our policy. | ||
| Now, some of that, of course, is supporting our great crisis pregnancy centers at the moment of these important health care decisions, encouraging young women to choose life at that important moment of choice. | ||
| Some of that is bringing costs down so that young moms and dads don't look to the future and a new baby and say, how can I afford this? | ||
| And if they're able to actually afford to raise a family, maybe they'll start thinking of babies as the blessings that we all know that they are. | ||
| And I think fundamentally this is going to take a lot of leadership. | ||
| From the President on down, but from every single person in this room, we've got to persuade our fellow citizens to stop thinking about babies as inconveniences to be discarded. | ||
| We've got to start thinking of them as blessings to cherish. | ||
| And that's exactly what I promised to do. | ||
|
unidentified
|
So now we're going to get personal. | |
| This is going to be so fun. | ||
| Your faith. | ||
| Why is it so important to you? | ||
| What does it mean to you? | ||
| Tell us why, when you go every single day to work, how faith is a part of who you are. | ||
| Well, I mean, first is, I believe the fundamental tenet of the Christian faith, it's not just a set of good moral principles, though it is that. | ||
| I think the fundamental tenet of our faith, Is that the Son of God became man, he died, and he raised himself from the dead. | ||
| That is the fundamental tenet of the Christian faith, and I think so much flows from that. | ||
| And I think one lesson that flows from that is that we shouldn't fear death. | ||
| Of course, death is a very bad thing, but there are much more terrible things than just losing one's life, and importantly, you could lose one's soul. | ||
| And I think whether it's fighting for the unborn or fighting for peace and security for our citizens, I want us to be the kind of society where my kids can grow up to be virtuous young people, can be good young Christians, of course, because that's what I'm trying to raise them to be, and that's what our public policy is trying to do. | ||
| Creating the space where moms and dads can raise their children in their faith to become good young people who believe the things that I do, That is what I'm trying to create, is the space for you, of course, to raise your children as you see fit, but the space for me to raise my kids to be the kind of young people that I think they ought to be. | ||
| And the other thing that I take from it, Mercedes, is if you look at the long history of the Christian faith, we've been around for about 2,000 years now, give or take a few years, and there have been really dark times in the history of the Christian faith. | ||
| There have been really good times in the history of the Christian faith. | ||
| And I just try to remind myself that we put our faith in God above. | ||
| We put our faith in the grace of God. | ||
| And we try the best to do His will, and we don't worry so much about whether we're going to have earthly rewards. | ||
| We worry about whether we're doing right by God Almighty above. | ||
| That's what I try to do, and that's how I try to run my life in public. | ||
| You mentioned raising these children into good people and also into good citizens that can contribute to society and to the world. | ||
| We had so many young people come out and support Donald Trump and J.D. Vance this past election. | ||
| So what is your message? | ||
|
unidentified
|
What is your message to the young men? | |
| You know, I guess my message to young people generally is we're trying to make your life better. | ||
| And that is the simple thrust of President Trump's policy is we want you to be able to buy a home. | ||
| We want you to be able to work a good job. | ||
| We want you to be able to raise your kids, like I said, according to the values that you believe in. | ||
| And we want you to be able to build a nice life in this country that all of us love. | ||
| That is what we're trying to do. | ||
| And you guys, more than anybody, more than me, I'm talking about people under the age of 30 in particular, you guys are going to have to deal with the consequences of good policy. | ||
| I want you guys to think about the future and ask yourself, do you want safe communities? | ||
| Do you want a prosperous life? | ||
| Do you want to be able to work a good job? | ||
| Or do you want that job shipped off to China or somewhere else? | ||
| We're fighting for you every single day. | ||
| We want you to help fight for us because we've got to win. | ||
| Not just the policy battles of the next couple of months. | ||
| We've got to win the midterm elections in a couple of years. | ||
| We need you. | ||
| We recognize that we need you, and we're fighting for you every single day. | ||
| And I think, you know, you asked me, my message to young men is, I think that our culture sends a message to young men that you should suppress every masculine urge. | ||
|
unidentified
|
You should try to... | |
| Cast aside your family. | ||
| You should try to suppress what makes you a young man in the first place. | ||
| and I think that my message to young men is don't allow this broken culture to send you a message that you're a bad person because you're a man, because you like to tell a joke, because you like to have a beer with your friends or because you're competitive. | ||
| It's... | ||
|
unidentified
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It's... | |
| Our message... | ||
| The cultural message, and I think the president's and mine is the exact opposite, but our cultural message is, I think that it wants to turn everybody, whether male or female, into androgynous idiots who think the same... | ||
| talk the same, and act the same. | ||
| We actually think God made male and female for a purpose. | ||
| And we want you guys to thrive as young men and as young women, and we're going to help with our public policy to make it possible to do that. | ||
| And by the way, I actually think, Mercedes, this is the thing that President Trump, this is why the media went after him so hard, is because, you know, When I think about, like, what is the essence of masculinity? | ||
| You could answer this in so many different ways, but when I think about me and my guy friends, we really like to tell jokes to one another. | ||
| Like, we like to laugh. | ||
| You think of all the movies that were really popular. | ||
| Are you saying you're pretty funny? | ||
| I try to be. | ||
| Okay, President Trump, who's funnier? | ||
| Who's funnier? | ||
| President Trump. | ||
| All right, there you go. | ||
| Let's be honest. | ||
|
unidentified
|
There you go. | |
| He's got the best sense of humor of any American political figure, but I think this is why young men in particular are so, you know, they're so inspired by President Trump is because he doesn't allow the media to tell him he can't make a joke or he can't have an original thought. | ||
| President Trump just says what's on his mind. | ||
| That's a damn good thing, and it's a good example. | ||
| To set for young men in American culture. | ||
| You know, I always tell my five daughters, because I don't have any sons, but Matt and I, we have five beautiful daughters, and I always say, you know, the most important decision you'll ever make is who you marry. | ||
| That's right. | ||
| Always who you marry. | ||
| And you made a very important decision in marrying Usha. | ||
| I did. | ||
| I did. | ||
| I married up. | ||
| I married up. | ||
| She is a beautiful second lady, and I want to know, what is the best advice Usha has given you? | ||
| Well... | ||
| This is so fun! | ||
|
unidentified
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Okay. | |
| This is going to be very personal. | ||
| One piece of advice she gave me like a week ago was you should be nicer on social media. | ||
|
unidentified
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I don't know that I'll take that advice. | |
| Some advice is good. | ||
| Some advice, as you know, can be good, but you don't have to always take it. | ||
|
unidentified
|
You sound like my husband. | |
| The best advice Usha ever gave me, when it comes, I mean, she gave me so many good life advices. | ||
| Or a piece of advice, but the best advice she gave me when it came to politics is don't let them filter you. | ||
| And in politics, you know, you've got consultants and you've got media professionals, you've got pollsters, you've got a lot of people who try to tell you what to say or how to behave or, you know, what to do. | ||
| And Usha just said, just be yourself, be authentic. | ||
| Go out there and say what's actually on your mind, maybe a little nicer from time to time. | ||
| But I think that's the best advice that she gave me, and that's why we take our kids everywhere, and that's why I'm not afraid to make a joke on social media, even if it's sometimes a dad joke. | ||
| Forgive me all of you who don't like dad jokes, but you've just got to be yourself. | ||
| And I think that's President Trump's superpower in American politics, and that's probably the best advice she ever gave me, at least on politics. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Okay, last question. | |
| What inspires you every day? | ||
| Well, I mean, one is my family, right? | ||
| I mean, I'm blessed to have a seven-year-old, a five-year-old, and a three-year-old. | ||
| And I can't help but see the country through their eyes. | ||
| And when we were on the campaign in particular, and we would take our kids with us, all of my kids, when we were about to land in some new place, You know, they'd all rush to the window of the plane, and they'd look out, and they'd say, oh, Dad, this looks so cool. | ||
| Like, you know, the beauty of the Arizona cactuses and Arizona deserts. | ||
| Or, you know, we'd be in Texas for a fundraiser, and they'd be like, oh, my God, like, look at just all of that open space, right? | ||
| Or we'd be in North Carolina and say, oh, look how beautiful the green mountains, right? | ||
| This idea of these beautiful green mountains of Appalachian, North Carolina. | ||
| We love North Carolina. | ||
| And I guess... | ||
| I guess what inspires me is you can't help but be hopeful and energetic and optimistic about this country when you see it through the eyes of a child. | ||
| So I hope I never lose that perspective because it does inspire me every day. | ||
|
unidentified
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Well, Mr. Vice President, you inspire us every day. | |
| We are praying for you. | ||
| We are praying for your family. | ||
| We are praying for... | ||
| This incredible administration for, of course, President Donald Trump and we are honored that you are here with our CPAC family. | ||
| And I'm honored to be here. | ||
|
unidentified
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Thank you. | |
| Thank you so much. | ||
| Thank you all. | ||
|
unidentified
|
I love you guys. |
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