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July 8, 2025 - Bannon's War Room
53:47
Episode 4616: Defunding The War In Ukraine; Trump Cabinet Meeting
Participants
Main voices
k
kristi noem
07:23
s
steve bannon
25:16
Appearances
b
ben baker
04:07
b
brooke rollins
01:18
c
chris hoar
01:57
d
donald j trump
02:02
j
joe herring-jr
01:49
j
jonathan lamb
01:22
s
sheriff larry leitha
02:13
Clips
j
jonathan lemire
00:40
| Copy link to current segment

Speaker Time Text
steve bannon
Okay, we don't want to have enough time for the do the long open because so much going on.
A press conference is supposed to start in Texas.
We're going to pick that up.
President's going to start his cabinet meeting, supposedly at 11 o'clock.
We're going to pick that up.
Once we pick up the cabinet meeting, Grace and Mo are going to put on our other streaming devices so you can watch the Texas press conference, et cetera.
I've got Chris Horton.
Chris, particularly everything on AI of what can happen, how they can change things up, the susceptibility to the grid, and particularly the situation in Texas.
We did have the young CEO from Raymaker was scheduled to come on here today.
His travel and this cabinet meeting is changing things up.
So we're going to get him on the next couple of days.
But with everything going on, Chris Hoare, we need more than ever to make sure we can stay in communication with each other.
What do you got for us?
chris hoar
Well, Steve, you're absolutely right.
I mean, one of the things that really hampered the rescue operations in Kerr, Texas this last week was the fact that cell towers were washed away and so were fiber lines.
So unless you had satellite phones, you couldn't communicate.
And so it's like, look, Steve, you don't wait until your house is on fire to buy a fire extinguisher.
So get a satellite phone today while they're still free.
We have free satellite phones with activation at sat123.com.
And we're also including this week for Warroom users only, the free Faraday bag, a free satellite phone Faraday bag.
But Steve, these phones are the only things that work during this devastating flooding in Kerr, Texas.
They work anywhere, everywhere, no matter what's going on on the ground.
And the satellite phones, normally around $1,000, they are free right now at set123.com.
Or Steve, call 941-841-0844.
That's 941-841-0844.
But again, this is the only thing that's going to work when you have a devastating situation like this.
The same thing happened in Hurricane Barron, and we've got a busy hurricane season coming up, it looks like.
So these outages are going to be happening more and more.
And certainly, the other big threat, you're absolutely right with AI, is these attacks on the infrastructure.
We know full well that the Russians, the Chinese, the North Koreans, the Iranians are hard at work trying to take out our infrastructure wherever and whenever they can.
They were successful doing so over in Spain and Portugal just a few months back, taking the entire country offline of Spain for 24 hours plus.
You know, that did happen and that certainly can happen here, Steve.
steve bannon
Chris, one more time.
These are all specials.
I've televised posse, they're gone like very quickly.
Chris comes in with us and says, hey, I got this.
I want to do this.
We go, bang, let's hit it.
One more time, where do people go?
chris hoar
They can go to sat123.com.
That's S-A-T123.com.
Or they can call us at 941-841-0844.
It's 941-841-0844.
Get a free sat phone and a free satellite phone Faraday bag with activation, just $85 a month, Steve.
steve bannon
Thank you, brother.
Appreciate you.
chris hoar
Thanks, mate.
steve bannon
A blockbuster story just came out now in The Guardian.
I don't think we're going to be able to get Dr. Bradley Thayer up.
I'll do it this afternoon.
This gets back to my whole concern about where our real enemies are, where we should be focused for the United States of America.
We must put America first.
There are too many other people in this country that purport to be patriots and report to be worried about the United States of America that either put the Ukraine first or put Israel first.
I'm sorry.
That's just the way it is, dude, guys.
This report in The Guardian that just dropped says that the United States has used 75% of its Patriot missile inventory.
Let's go to Texas.
We'll pick this up until the president starts.
sheriff larry leitha
Okay, all ready?
Okay, thank y'all for being here again today.
Larry Leitha, Kirk County Sheriff.
I'm going to kind of go over some brief notes with y'all real quick, then I'm going to pass it on to the mayor.
Hundreds of first responders remain along the Guadalupe River in Kirk County working to reunite families.
The large search and rescue effort, including local, state, federal, and volunteer agencies, continue.
As of 8 a.m. Central Time, 87 deceased have been recovered in Kirk County, including 56 adults and 30 children.
Identification is pending for 19 adults and 7 children, with one additional person still unidentified.
At present, five camp Mystic Campers and one counselor still remain unaccounted for.
We asked private boats to stay off the Guadalupe River to allow search and rescue teams to operate without any interference.
This is a tragic time for us.
We're so grateful and thankful for all the resources that have been provided to us to do this job.
And I can assure you we will not stop until this mission is complete.
At this time, I'm going to turn it over to the city mayor.
unidentified
Thank you.
joe herring-jr
Thank you for being here.
I'm Joe Herring Jr.
I'm Mayor of the City of Kerrville.
I want to reassure our community and those families that the city, the county, the state, and the federal experts are working together, not separately, but as one team.
If you go inside the Emergency Operations Center, you don't see silos.
You see one team.
I want to talk briefly about in-kind donations.
The outpouring of generosity has been tremendous, and we are grateful.
We are working on a new system to accept donations.
And when those plans are complete, we will post them online on the city's Facebook page.
We are grateful.
We need a new system to handle the generosity of the world.
Financial donations can still go to communityfoundation.net.
That's the community foundation of the Texas Hill Country.
Again, we are grateful for the generosity of the world.
Over and over I've asked you to pray.
It occurred to me that I haven't asked you for what to pray specifically.
Please pray for those who mourn, for those who wait, and for those who help.
now i'd like to call on lieutenant colonel ben baker Good morning, everyone.
ben baker
Thank you for being here.
My name is Ben Baker, Lieutenant Colonel for Texas Gay Wardens.
I'd like to start out by thanking the Mayor, the Sheriff, the Chief, our local state partners, the Texas Department of Public Safety, and the many others that have responded to this tragic event.
We as Texas are strong, and together we face adversity.
Your Texas game wardens responded in the early mornings of Friday to this tragic event, along with many other local and state partners.
Since the early mornings of Friday, your Texas Gamers have had over 300 game wardens in the area serving the people of the state of Texas and the citizens of Kirk County.
Among that, we've searched 26 river miles since this tragic event has started.
We've had approximately 444 rescues, 30 recoveries.
Some of our resources and assets we have dedicated to this tragic event include two helicopters with hoist teams, 12 drone teams, 10 canine units, 9 swiftwater boat crews, 15 airboats, 16 UTVs, and 169 four-wheel drive vehicles.
Your Texas Gabornes will remain here and serving the community.
We just ask you to continue to pray for the victims, for the families, for your first responders, for everyone involved.
We'll open it up now to questions.
Anybody has any?
unidentified
Can you talk about how challenging it is for the guys in the mud, the big trees?
What's been like the difference around you to make this difference?
ben baker
No, thank you for that question.
Extremely challenging.
You know, we've got, of course, your Texas Gayborns out there, your local, your state partners, Texas Task Force 1, we've got the National Forest Service out there, we've got A ⁇ M Forest Service.
We've got numerous responders with specialized capabilities where we've got these large piles of debris.
And with our canines and, you know, when we're trying to make these recoveries, these large piles can be very obstructive.
And to get deep into these piles, it's very hazardous.
And those specialized teams have to go in there layer by layer because our first responders, also the safety of them is concerned.
So it's extremely treacherous, time consuming, it's dirty work, the water is still there.
So we're having to go layer by layer peeling these off to make those recoveries.
unidentified
So we're...
Like when you guys stumble across someone made disease, how do you process that?
ben baker
Absolutely.
We process it the best we can.
We have professionals in place, our crisis intervention team.
All the agencies have some members representing there.
And officer wellness is a first responder wellness is a key component to these operations.
So we're maintaining and monitoring our officer wellness, our first responder wellness.
We're making sure they have the support.
It's very tragic whenever you see human life.
But to see a child and that loss of life is extremely tragic.
unidentified
More rain is expected to come down west of us and it's eventually as they hit down to the Guadalupe River.
Is that going to put a halt to the searches?
And if not, how are you going to change the trajectory of the search and rescue operations?
ben baker
So with the water coming down, that is always a concern.
And I'm sure you've been monitoring the last couple of days where we've had some reports of maybe some additional water coming in.
Obviously, that's going to impact the search and recovery efforts.
You know, us with numerous other agencies do have air capabilities, drone capabilities.
We've got numerous fixed ring rotary helicopters here.
So it will alter our patrol patterns and alter our searches, but it won't deter them.
unidentified
Can you outline what specific discussions and actions were taken between the time the first flood emergency alert came in at 1.14 a.m. and then when the river first started flooding those hours later?
What were the specific actions and discussions that happened in those hours?
sheriff larry leitha
Can you repeat that again, please?
unidentified
Absolutely.
I would like to know, if you could outline, please, what the specific actions and discussions were that local officials took between 1.14 a.m.
That's when the first flood emergency alert came out, and hours later when the river first started flooding.
What happened in those hours?
sheriff larry leitha
What I can tell you, when I was first notified, it was around the 4 to 5 area.
One of my sergeants was in dispatch when the first calls started coming in, the X0911 calls come in.
It was between 4-5 when I got notified.
Okay.
But prior to that, in that 3-4 area, my understanding is, and we're in the process of trying to put a timeline.
You know, that's going to take a little bit of time.
As I've told you several times, that is not my priority this time.
There's three priorities.
That's locating, locating the people out there, identifying, notifying the next of kin.
That is what I'm taking as my job as sheriff here to do.
Okay.
unidentified
With all due respect sir, I think that the community here is asking these questions.
What happened?
When did it happen?
Was the emergency manager awake at the time?
Did they push the button to issue an emergency alert?
sheriff larry leitha
Sir, it's not that easy.
You Just push a button.
Okay, there's a lot more to that.
And we've told you several times.
unidentified
So did it happen to him?
sheriff larry leitha
I can't tell you at this time.
unidentified
You can't tell me if the emergency manager of the sheriff actually issued an emergency.
Okay, Sheriff, who came on the emergency operations center.
Who runs?
Let me answer the question.
The emergency operations center.
sheriff larry leitha
I'll come back to you.
I'm going nowhere.
jonathan lemire
Appreciate it.
unidentified
Who runs the emergency operations center?
sheriff larry leitha
We have a communications center, a dispatch.
Okay.
We have a communication center.
That's where the calls actually go to the police department, then they're forwarded to us.
unidentified
But leading up to this, in monitoring the weather, in any large city, in any state, there's an Office of Emergency Management that is monitoring the weather, that is watching and listening and getting briefings.
Who was getting those briefings in this city, in this county?
Who was receiving that information?
And who would have ultimately made the decision to evacuate hearing what was coming in from the weather service in all the ways?
sheriff larry leitha
Okay, well, we would have done when we get notified.
Okay, I'm going to tell you.
unidentified
You're not emergency management, though, right?
The sheriff's not EOC.
sheriff larry leitha
No, there is no emergency.
That's the city.
ben baker
So we understand you have many questions.
unidentified
No, I understand, but you're not going to answer the question because that's up to the city manager and the mayor to answer the question.
ben baker
We understand you have many questions.
unidentified
The judge is not here.
ben baker
We understand that.
But right now, this team up here is focused on bringing people home.
That's our focus.
All those questions will be answered.
The priority right now is bringing people home.
unidentified
We totally understand that, and we value the incredible work that is being done by the first responders.
We're seeing them out there muddy and sweaty and grinding it out day after day.
But your community is asking these questions.
And we will get answers.
Right now, all of our resources are focused to recovery.
Who was in charge of the emergency operations center at the time that was getting any breach?
ben baker
Do we have another question?
unidentified
I think I'd like to focus on what local people can be looking for.
We're looking at some erosion in roads and safety and then traveling.
What can we tell people who live here right now and what they can do in their daily lives?
Should they worry about traveling on roads?
Do we know anything about that infrastructure?
jonathan lamb
Sure, absolutely.
Donathan Lamb, Kerrville Police Department.
So we know that there's substantial road damage.
Some roads have been closed for safety.
We've got crews out there in the county shoring them up and making sure that people can travel to and from.
What we're asking for the public to do to assist us is if they believe that they have seen someone, a victim, notify emergency services.
Call 911, let us know, or use our non-emergency numbers.
There are ACODE 830-257-8181.
Contact our dispatch team and we will send officers out there.
We also ask folks to limit their travel.
Our first responders have had a very difficult time getting to where they need to go because of the amount of people who are flooding our roadways.
We understand there's natural curiosity.
People want to come here and see the flood damage.
Now is not the time for sightseeing.
This operation is ongoing and continuous, and it will continue.
I've got time for one more question.
unidentified
Tell us in your last live number of the people who are in the middle of the day.
jonathan lamb
Last question.
As far as I know, the last live rescue, unless there's new information, and I don't believe there is, was made on Friday.
All right, I'm afraid that's going to have to do it for this morning.
unidentified
Can someone answer if the bodies have been released to the families?
Sure.
Excuse me.
Have the bodies been released to the families?
sheriff larry leitha
Some.
Some.
I mean, they're an autopsy.
unidentified
You're still mingling.
Do we have an estimate among the general population, not just the girls who are Mystic, even just credible reports?
Is it hundreds still?
Is there any estimate among the general population of how many people who know Mystic?
sheriff larry leitha
I've told y'all several times, it's hard to know that number that we know.
I know the numbers that we have found, and that's all I know.
unidentified
You said no one.
jonathan lamb
All right, so we're going to continue our operations.
The next time that we're going to be in front of y'all will be at 5 p.m. right back here.
If there is a critical update, again, we'll provide that information to you through the contact list that you have provided to us.
Thank you all.
We appreciate it.
steve bannon
Okay, you're seeing, as we predicted, it is getting a little contentious there, some basic, you know, now it's actually full attack mode.
I'm not saying some of the things that the media are asking there are out of line.
There are a ton of questions here about the chain of command, tons of questions about how it was, you know, the evolutions of not just the warning of the National Weather Center, which those questions are trying to pin something on President Trump.
The question you just saw there, and you saw the media not backing down and saying, hey, the community is asking these questions.
What, given the reporting that you had, what was the chain of command?
How did this happen?
And clearly, people don't want to answer here.
One of the reasons people don't want to answer is that, look, just the way things are, the civil lawsuits here are going to be quite enormous.
And I'm sure a lot of people will be very hesitant about going on the record or speaking at a press conference and saying something that they might have to eat later.
Buried lead right there, ladies and gentlemen.
The question was asked, when was the last live rescue that you had?
He said Friday.
So, and today they use the subtle term, search and recovery.
Search and recovery.
So the search and rescue is over.
It's search and recovery.
But today is Tuesday.
You've not had a live recovery from since Friday.
It shows you the power, really the unrelenting power of the storm.
And there's so many questions that have to be answered, including the fact, was this just purely an act of God?
Or is this an act of God with man's hand in it?
Or was this an act of that had much more about, I don't know, geoengineering or manipulation or whatever.
Those have all got to be answered.
And we're going to hope to work to get the answers to that.
Clearly, there's an effort going underway to make sure they recover the bodies.
Now, I do think that the folks down at Kerrville or some state level, and you notice at some of these tough press conferences, you're not seeing the politicians anymore.
They want to be there when there's good news.
Not a lot of good news coming out of Kerrville right now in intense scrutiny, as they're just going to have to understand that's going to happen.
So, you know, our prayers go out to all the victims, but also the folks down at Kerrville that are going to come under some intense, intense pressure.
The cabinet meeting, I don't have a feed yet.
The cabinet meeting has not started.
I'm not saying this was spur of the moment.
I think this might have been planned, but there's so much going on.
Let's just go back.
Can I get teed up the Brooks Rollins thing on the CCP about the whole purpose of this?
And I'm going to go back to the Amnesty.
unidentified
Folks, you have it?
steve bannon
You have both of them?
Hang on for a second.
Just hang on for both.
I'll tell you what.
Let's play the Amnesty one first.
I want to, because this has been the big controversy Charlie Kirk brought up.
A lot of people thought even the Epstein thing might have been a misdirection play on this.
The War Room, Charlie Kirk, led by Charlie Kirk.
We went crazy on this yesterday.
Jack Pasovic, all of us on this very issue.
Our mantra here is mass deportations now, amnesty never.
You cannot have amnesty.
It's inconceivable.
It would break down the entire thought process that drove the populist nationalist movement.
Let's go ahead and play Brooks Rollins from earlier this morning.
brooke rollins
The first thing I'll say is the President has been unequivocal that there will be no amnesty.
And I think that's very, very important.
I and the rest of our cabinet certainly support that, effectuate that, and make sure that happens every single day.
The second thing, to your question about mass deportations, the President and I have spoken about that once or twice, and he has always been of the mindset that at the end of the day, the promise to America to ensure that we have a 100% American workforce stand, but we must be strategic in how we are implementing the mass deportations so as not to compromise our food supply.
Ultimately, the answer on this is automation, some reform within the current governing structure.
And then also when you think about there are 34 million able-bodied adults in our Medicaid program, there are plenty of workers in America, but we just have to make sure we're not compromising today, especially in the context of everything we're thinking about right now.
So no amnesty under any circumstances.
Mass deportations continue, but in a strategic and intentional way as we move our workforce toward more automation and toward a 100% American workforce.
And ultimately, it's the wonderful members of Congress behind me who are taking this on on the fixing the current immigration system.
So thank you so much.
steve bannon
They may talk about it in the cabinet meeting today, but I want to make sure she said later about the Labor Department and Secretary of Labor and the H-2As, which are the H-1B visas.
The H-2As are for agriculture and things like that.
So we'll make sure they're talking about some executive order.
We'll make sure they're not slipping an amnesty there.
But no amnesty, no way, from Brooke Rollins, the Secretary of Agriculture.
The entire purpose of this today was about the Chinese Communist Party.
And here you see the convergence of the show today about energy, about agriculture, about advanced technology.
What is interweaving all of it?
Artificial intelligence and also things like, you know, there's still this madness on this climate change hoax, right?
The decarbonization myth still pervades in much of this.
You also had, we had Eric Teesa on here.
The codification of this, what Brooks just talked about as far as immigration goes and amnesty and all that, it goes back.
You need it codified into Congress.
This is the whole thing with the woke nature of what's happening in the Defense Department.
We're not going to get these things out of here until we get it codified into law.
The other thing you see going on is that, and I hope Russ does the quick march on these rescissions.
You're in another appropriations process right now.
Write this down.
Take your number two parental out and write down 30 September of 2025.
What is that?
August, September.
So we're 75 days away from that, I think.
So write this down at midnight on the 30th of September of 2025.
You're going to be sucking on a CR, okay?
unidentified
A big, ugly CR.
steve bannon
Because as sure as the turning of the earth, these folks, they got out of town as soon as they got the big, beautiful bill done.
They're going to come back.
They're going to mess around for a couple of weeks with the appropriations process and the committee, the 12 individual appropriations bills that we wanted and to fight about.
And they're going to skip out of town here for the August recess in August.
And you ain't going to see them again until after Labor Day.
And when they get back after Labor Day, you're going to have three and a half weeks to go, well, we don't have enough time to actually pass a bill.
So we're just going to have, and it's just going to be a small CR, and it's only going to be, you know, we just need, we're just going to do it to, I don't know, a random date, December 15th.
And you're going to get down in December.
And you're going to say, it's got to be Christmas holidays.
We just need another one.
Let's just kick it into, you know, we'll just kick it into March.
And so it goes.
Rust Vote, I think what you're going to see in the interim, and really what we must see in the interim, is Rust Vote and OMB, kind of the adults in the room.
We need now to see real rescissions packages.
You ran the test case with the PBS and a couple others, you know, $7 billion, others, $9.3 billion.
We need to see rescissions.
I think there are going to be pocket rescissions, impoundments.
They'd rather go the rescission route, which is go back to Congress.
I'm much more, let's just have the president impound it, go to court, take on these radical judges, as we must.
There's all types of things now going on about immigration, his ability to, they're hammering that nonstop.
We're going to get some clarity to that probably tomorrow.
It's too much going on today.
But so, on this all-at-war, on the spending cuts, the essential deal that was made is, hey, let's vote for this.
It ain't pretty.
In fact, some of it is quite ugly.
But there are other means that we can get to the objective.
Your objective is to cut.
The president has an Article 2 power to cut.
So let's get on with it.
Let's start cutting now.
You know, Doge did not find, Doge really didn't find the waste, fraud, and abuse.
I would love the departments to come back and say, what is actually happening in Social Security?
Okay.
What is actually happening in Medicaid?
If we're to get this thing right sized, the first thing you got to do is cut out the fraud.
You have to cut out the abuse.
And you've got to cut out the waste.
Those things should be low-hanging fruit.
To date, when you really talk about hard numbers, you're not seeing a lot.
And that's where I think go back to OMB, which is really the adult and really apparatus runs most of this as far as the apparatus goes.
And that has to be done.
I think they ought to be put up now as we're into this appropriations process for 2026.
If you think of the Big Beautiful Bill, what the argument that Russ Vogt and these people made, Bessant made it on the economic side.
It's a supply-side tax cut, and this will turbocharge the economy to get us to and beyond a 3% GDP growth rate.
Because once you do that, the math, you start to solve a lot of problems.
Russ Vogt argued another aspect of this, of major structural changes of taking out permits.
This is the $1.5 trillion.
Now it's $1.5 trillion over 10 years where the spending, I think, is $90 trillion.
So it's not big, but he said it's structural and would lead to better things.
In the interim, you're going to have $2 trillion deficits.
I'm telling you right now, the deficit I think by September 30th, the end of the country's fiscal year, will be close to $2.5 trillion.
And that will be counted as President Trump's first year.
That's just the way the math works out.
To cut that interim deficit, because remember, they got a lift of $5 trillion to the debt ceiling.
To get that, the only way you got, you know, you can get into this appropriation for 26, but to do it now, you have to have impoundments, rescissions, pocket rescission, and they got to be real numbers.
And when I say real numbers, I mean real, big numbers.
Not the test case of 9.2, but real big numbers.
And somebody's got to go back to Social Security, to Medicaid, to Medicare, immediately and get into the, hey, there's leakage in the system.
We know that.
Let's identify it and get the plumbers in and seal the leaks.
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Short break, waiting for the cabinet meeting next.
unidentified
Here's your host, Stephen K. Man.
steve bannon
You know, you see what's going on in Texas right now, that horrible, horrible tragedy down there.
Make sure that you're prepared in case anything hits, because nowadays you just don't know.
I grid out through artificial intelligence, one of these, and I happen to be in North Carolina over the weekend and for biblical type rains in central North Carolina and the Pinehurst, Southern Pines, Chapel Hill, all of it, just absolutely biblical on Sunday, incredible, out of nowhere.
And the flooding and the damage and people, you just, you need to be prepared.
My Patriot Supply is the best company in this for preparation.
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They've still got a huge 4th of July sale going on through today.
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Just look at what's happened over the last 72 hours, 90 hours.
You can never be too prepared.
Not in today's time.
With so many different threats, so many, particularly the more interconnected that the world gets, the more dangerous it is.
unidentified
Just a fact.
steve bannon
You heard Noor bin Laden and Joe from the Artificial Intelligence Conference in Geneva.
We don't have them over there to hang out.
Those folks are working 24-7.
That's why you need to actually think downrange of the possibility of what could happen.
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MyPatriot Supply.
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Okay.
A lot of things are happening.
I think that's why it's quite advisable to have a board meeting or a cabinet meeting because that's kind of the board of directors of the U.S. government.
It's supposed to happen at 11 o'clock.
It's been, I guess, slightly delayed as often as what happens.
We will pick that up in its entirety because normally, if it's open to the press, and it's supposed to be, at least for a while, President Trump always has some sort of opening remarks and then goes around the table.
I got a clip on Ukraine.
We must talk about Ukraine.
Let's go ahead and talk about it.
unidentified
Are you planning to send more weapons to Ukraine?
donald j trump
We're going to send some more weapons.
They have to be able to defend themselves.
They're getting hit very hard now.
They're getting hit very hard.
We're going to have to send more weapons.
You're defensive weapons, primarily.
But they're getting hit very, very hard.
So many people are dying.
I'm not happy with President Putin at all.
This is something that would have never happened about President Putin.
I'm disappointed, frankly, that President Putin had just been happy about it.
jonathan lemire
A couple of days ago, we had DOD paws weapons shipments to Ukraine from Defense Secretary Henry.
That's a call from him, Richard.
President Trump then said, no, no, we want to continue it.
And then late last night, the DOD did announce that they would be sending more.
I am told that they'd rather outsource this.
They'd rather have European partners step up with defensive missiles, even like the Germans buying Patriot batteries from the U.S. and then ship them into Ukraine than a direct assistant.
So this is the question here is, to Joe's point, is there a moment where, do you see a moment coming, people you've talked to in the community, where President Trump might actually get tough with Putin?
What would that look like?
unidentified
We've been waiting for it for his entire first term.
steve bannon
We're now been waiting for it for these months.
unidentified
Yesterday was a rare piece, a sliver of good news.
jonathan lemire
Look, the devil will be in the details.
unidentified
What kind of arms, how much of arms, for how long?
donald j trump
I find it hard.
steve bannon
It's not just this pro-regional picture.
Look, if you look at the path in the Israel situation, you arm them, and some they buy, and most you just kind of give or you give on loans that are forgiven or direct assistance.
Then they're so dependent upon that.
And this is my problem with Netanyahu.
They started a war, which they knew they couldn't defend themselves, number one.
Foreign Policy Magazine does the analysis, backs that up 100%.
And on offense, they couldn't take out which is the prime objective, which is the nuclear bomb-making capability, weaponization of their nuclear program.
And all of a sudden, we're drawn as a combatant immediately.
If you're providing defense for somebody in an open kinetic war, you're a combatant.
You can parse that as much as you want, but you're a combatant.
unidentified
You're providing defense.
steve bannon
And what happened in the Persian situation?
Inexorably, we got brought in, particularly since our quote-unquote ally or our protectorate couldn't finish the job, couldn't even come close to finishing the job.
We had the most sophisticated, lethal, bold strike by the American armed forces, the Navy with 30 tomahawked missiles in the Air Force, obviously with the B-2s and others, that eradicated for total obliteration the nuclear program.
Write this down, folks.
The same thing's going to happen in Ukraine.
If we don't force, because remember, for the NATO guys saying 5%, that was all great.
President Trump was very touch.
We thought it's a huge win because they used to say we weren't going to do the 2%.
But the 5% doesn't totally finalize or kick.
It's not finally kicked in until 2034.
It's going to take them that long to convince their population of their economy.
You can hold it.
Don't think they're all going to live up to it.
Right now, I don't think any of them are going to live up to it.
Maybe the Germans.
So that's why this whole thing right now should be Europe.
You guys talk a big game in Ukraine.
The EU drove this.
NATO drove this.
Where are you?
Mersheimer said you weren't going to be there.
Where are you?
Now, and why did President Trump and the guys at the Pentagon stop it last week?
They stopped it last week because we are severely drawn down for our own defense and particularly for the defense of things we think are very important, like in the Pacific.
We are field-stripping Korea and we are field-stripping the potential defense of Taiwan to first supply the Middle East, right?
And number two, to now supply Ukraine.
We're down.
The Guardian's reporting we're down.
This is why they shut it down last week.
We're down 75% on the Patriot batteries, which is still the principal kind of front line for surface-to-air defense.
And then you've got the Thayad missile system, which I think we're drawn down 25%, basically defending Israel.
If the United States gets sucked in to directly doing this and we take down the thing, you're just teeing up Taiwan.
You're teeing up Taiwan.
So God help the 7th Fleet.
You got to reinforce the 7th Fleet.
We got to be on patrol.
You ought to take an aircraft carrier through the Straits of Taiwan.
Put them on notice that you're ready for this.
Because unlike Ukraine and unlike Iran, we lose Taiwan.
You're going to see a big direct impact on your life.
I go back to the singularity to quantum computing and advanced chip design, the advanced chip design coming out of Taiwan and still produced in Taiwan at the capacities we need to run an advanced industrial economy, ours.
You saw already, let's be blunt, on the whole trade war, China's been preparing for this for a long time.
Where do you know that?
You know that from the war room.
Why?
Because in unrestricted warfare, folks, that they wrote the manual in the 90s, one of the big parts of it is supply chains and economic warfare.
It's one of their biggest branches.
They knew that if the United States ever woke up with a guy like Trump and confronted them, that they needed to be ready.
How were they ready?
Back, I don't know, in 2012, 2013, they bought basically a processing plant.
I think it was in Ohio.
CFIS didn't stop them under The Biden, excuse me, under the Obama administration.
And one of the reasons was Joe Biden was supposed to be on top of it.
And who knows whose payroll he was on?
And that processing is where the magnets and some of the ball bearings come from.
When we did this and threw down hard, the Chinese go, how about this?
No rare earths.
And they had some leverage.
They definitely had some leverage.
Think of what would happen in a flat-out war with Taiwan.
And they're not doing exercises.
They're doing rehearsals right now for Taiwan.
And that's the big enchilada.
What happens in Kiev has no vital national security implications to the United States of America at all.
Now, President Trump has tried to have a rapprochement with Putin.
We announced the limitations last week.
President Trump had a conversation, a two-hour conversation.
We know from what's been said and President Trump has said it did not go well.
Putin was not really open to, you know, President Trump and the Americans, we've been involved for a while trying to put, you know, try to get a ceasefire, try to put it to bed, cutting an economic deal with the Ukrainians, which, as you know in the war, I'm not a fan of that.
President Trump going out of his way to trying to get some put their guns down and let's get to a ceasefire and talk and talk about territory.
And Putin just basically said, thanks for the memories.
Axius reported, Putin was pretty adamant.
This is a bilateral negotiation.
We don't need the Americans.
That's what President Trump said.
Hey, Putin was very tough, and I'm not happy.
I think he said he's not happy 10 times.
That night, Putin lit up Kiev.
And the president was a lot less happy with that.
He considered that like one of Netanyahu's moves that when the ceasefire is announced, he went in and hammered the Persians one more time.
And President Trump said, hey, I'm really not happy now.
Ann Applebaum reported in the Atlantic.
I've got it up on Getter.
Everybody read it.
She's a Trump hater and a MAGA hater and a Steve Bannon hater.
It doesn't matter.
She had really good reporting.
Remember, her husband's a senior politician over in Poland.
Her scoop, I thought, was an army of ground forces, 675,000 man army by the Russians who were supposed to be defeated.
Remember that?
675,000 ready to go for summer operations.
And here's what's going to happen.
They're going to now start driving for real territory, and they may drive to Kiev and just tell the West, hey, put up or shut up.
That's how the United States gets inexorably drawn in as a combatant.
Number one, on the defense.
unidentified
Number two, the cry for help.
steve bannon
The cry for help.
Part of putting, remember, President Trump gave a two-week window for negotiations.
He couldn't find anybody to negotiate.
Ayatollah, smack talking, all of that.
But one of the aspects here is the Israelis couldn't take much more pounding.
The folks in Tel Aviv were getting crushed because of this overwhelming ballistic missile operation the Persians had.
You don't think that's going to happen in Ukraine?
We make this commitment and don't force the Europeans on it.
It's not like, oh, buy it from us and give it to us.
If we don't make the Europeans step up and step up now and understand that's their problem, we are inexorably going to get drawn into this war, just like we were drawn into the Persian War.
Thank God President Trump came up and shut it down as a 12-day war.
And now he's moving to shut down.
He shut down Gaza.
He said, I've seen enough of that.
President Trump's a man of peace trying to get everybody to lay down their weapons, and we're going to figure this out as far as the deal goes.
But once you start sending in weapons and defensive systems and they start coming to you and the emotion, it's going to be in the front page of every paper, Kiv getting pounded, kids getting killed, families being destroyed.
Because remember, when you talk about the 2 million casualties, the 1 million from the Russians are dead and wounded soldiers.
When you talk about the 1 million that President Trump talks about in Ukraine, that is soldiers, dead, wounded soldiers, and civilians.
The civilian population casualties have been massive.
Just look at what Ukraine looks like.
Parts of it look like the Western Front in World War I, and they fought like the Western Front in World War I. That level of brutality.
Short commercial break.
back in a moment.
unidentified
Let's take down the CCD.
They have all Here's your host, Stephen K. Mann.
steve bannon
Let's go to Mike Lindell.
Still no cabinet.
Netanyahu is going to go see Up to the Hill to Johnson work his charm there.
Standby, Cabinet.
Hang on.
Let's go right now into the cabinet room.
unidentified
It's gonna work.
donald j trump
Are you able to get them all in the room?
Are you okay?
Thank you very much.
We've had a tremendous six months, and we've had a tremendous two weeks, which now is, I guess, three weeks.
And we have a tremendous group of people here that have done a great, unified, beautiful job.
I wonder in particular, because of what she's gone through this last few days, done an incredible job.
Did she just say a few words about Texas?
The first person there was with the Governor, Mr. Griffith.
And you might want to tell us a little bit about the people.
steve bannon
Sure.
kristi noem
Well, thank you, Mr. President.
I want to thank you for your leadership.
unidentified
Texas is strong, and the people of Texas are incredibly strong.
kristi noem
They've gone through something that is absolutely horrific, and it is heartbreaking to watch these families suffer the way that they are.
As soon as this flash flooding event happened, the governor has activated his emergency responders.
Nim Kidd is his emergency management director who is incredible and has immediately worked with the local first responders to get help to individuals and get them evacuated, put requests in to me.
We deployed SIR right away, as you know, because you and I were talking a lot during this time that Coast Guard, we also had some assets out of customs and border protection.
Our Board TAC teams went in and helped with rescues and clearing debris so that we could get roads open and people get the help that they need.
I think when I got there the most, SIR that day, as soon as I arrived on site, was getting a briefing from all the emergency responders was just how unified they were in focusing on the fact that we're there to save lives.
They were there to rescue people, find people who were still alive, and to reunify them with their family members.
We as a federal government don't manage these disasters.
The state does.
We come in and support them, and that's exactly what we did here in this situation.
FEMA went to an enhanced level immediately, but as soon as you signed the major disaster declaration, we were able to get them resources and dollars right away, just like you envisioned through state block grants to help them with cleanup.
And we're still there in presence, and FEMA's been deployed, and we're cutting through the paperwork of the old FEMA, streamlining it, much like your vision of how FEMA should operate.
And it's been a much better response to help these families get through this terrible situation.
We still are looking for people.
We're still looking for a lot of little girls and other family members that were camping along that river.
And they will continue until they find every single person.
And we will continue to help them and assist in that.
I was surprised when I got there at the camp that day, right after this happened, the parents that were there, the parents that were looking for their children and picking up their daughter's stuffed animals out of the mud and finding their daughter's shoe that might be laying in the cabin and just hugging and comforting people matters a lot.
I'm extremely grateful for God's hand in that whole situation because hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of people were saved.
And this is a time for all of us in this country to remember that we were created to serve each other.
God created us to take care of each other and that when we do that, we are happier, we are more fulfilled, and we can walk alongside people on their worst day and help them get through it and come out the other side knowing that we can continue to live a life that God has purposed for us.
So they're grateful for you.
Several times the day after the flooding, you and Melania were on the phone with me and I want to thank you for that.
That meant the world.
I was able to tell many of those folks that I had been visiting with you and that you had said, whatever they need, Christy, let's deploy it and get it down there and be helpful.
And on Sunday, when the families were waiting at a church to identify their children's bodies, Franklin Graham and I called in and prayed with the families and read some scripture with them.
And he was incredible in making himself available to that as well.
We'll be back down there in a couple of days and continue to do all we can.
But this is an unprecedented event.
It really is.
There's been tragedies like this around the country, but everyone is unique in different situations.
And the response the federal government had supporting the state through this, I'm proud of the people that stepped up and immediately came.
The Coast Guard, when they came in, they had a difficult time even getting the aircraft in and landed.
They had to try several times in the weather to get it in and deploy.
And I think we've heard about our one Coast Guard member that was responsible for saving over 165 people.
But that entire crew did incredible work.
And all the first responders there did incredible work.
And I know people are getting tired now, but they're getting reinforcements and volunteers are showing up.
And I just want to commend the governor and his team for being the leaders.
And they're so thankful that you're letting them make the decisions and manage the response like it should be.
And then us supporting them with the resources of the federal government.
We've already deployed dollars to the state, much like the block grants that you've talked about.
So very grateful for that, sir.
donald j trump
There's never been a wave like this outside of the breaking of a dam.
This was almost a wave that ended up being 30 feet high more, actually.
Now, with the dam, you can understand it, but this approached almost with that speed.
When you see a dam break, it's not a pretty sight.
It wipes out everything.
And this is the kind of thing that built up so fast.
And it's happened two or three times before over the years, but not to this extent.
But tell them when you met the father who was picking up the daughter's clothing.
kristi noem
I had walked through the cabin where all the little girls died.
And I had kind of fallen apart in there, but I walked out of the cabin and a gentleman was standing there and he said, that man over there needs a hug.
And so I walked over to him and I hugged him and I said, do you work here?
And he said, no, my little girl was in that cabin.
And he said, and I just found her best friend about an hour and a half ago.
She had passed away.
And he just fell apart.
And so then we just hugged and talked for probably an hour about that.
But then there was another, the grandpa was there looking for his granddaughter as well.
There was a dad there of one of the counselors.
The counselor was alive, but she was dealing with the fact that she had hung on to some of these girls and was trying to keep them out of the floodwaters and had gotten hit by something and had lost two of the girls and wasn't able to hang on to them and was going to live the rest of her life thinking about that moment when she wasn't able to hang on to these girls.
But these parents were picking up their kids' belongings out of the mud and throughout the camp and putting them in bags.
And then one of the dads said, I knew 50 of these girls here.
So I knew that was her dress, my daughter's friend's dress.
So he was picking it up and putting it in a bag to return to her parents.
And then the director was there comforting everybody who had lost his father the night before too.
And he was still there trying to facilitate all of these parents grieving their children and find them.
So the strength of people is incredible.
One of the things that I asked that day was that they all have escorts or counselors when parents come in.
steve bannon
Steve Band in the war room, live cabinet meeting.
Charlie Kirk's going to pick it up from here.
We're back at 5 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time.
See you then in the warroom.
kristi noem
The strength of people is incredible.
One of the things that I asked that day was that they all have escorts or counselors when parents come in.
So from that point, that when they came into the camp, that they have somebody with them when they're going and looking for their children's belongings or looking for their children.
And so very emotional, but also just so tragic.
unidentified
The relationship with Texas and the governor has been obviously very good for years with me.
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