The Stone Zone dissects rural hospitals’ funding crisis while exposing Trey Gowdy’s hypocrisy—his Benghazi hearings yielded no prosecutions, yet he now criticizes DOJ inaction on "Russia Gate" and January 6th. New York’s "Quick Recognition Act" forces ICE to wear QR codes, sparking backlash amid surging attacks on officers, while Biden’s Afghan parole program admitted 30,000 without ID, including suspected terrorists. Canada’s tariff cuts on Chinese EVs threaten North American auto jobs, and Philadelphia’s far-left leaders vow to arrest federal agents enforcing immigration laws. Trump’s Gaza plan demands Hamas disarm before reconstruction, contrasting with Democrats’ 2026 election struggles as his border crackdown slashed illegal crossings, easing housing costs—Brookings reports net U.S. emigration for the first time in decades. His economic policies, paired with Fed reforms, could fuel a Republican wave. [Automatically generated summary]
Rural Americans deserve access to the best of what our country has to offer, especially health care.
Across every state, every community, America's rural hospitals are the first line of defense protecting our families, neighbors, and loved ones.
No matter where you live, hospital care doesn't clock out.
They're there 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year.
Each year, America's over 5,000 hospitals care for millions of patients, providing 24-7 emergency care, delivering babies, cancer treatments, and other life-saving care that patients rely on.
Behind every one of those patients are doctors, nurses, and caregivers working tirelessly to keep people healthy and safe.
Hospitals are our community's lifelines.
They employ our neighbors and keep our families healthy.
But now, some in Congress are threatening access to care.
Tell Congress, protect patient care to keep America strong.
Don't cut rural health care.
The Stone Zone.
Entertaining and informative.
On the Red Apple Podcast Network.
You are now entering the Stone Zone, where you can always get the inside skinny on American politics.
A persistent rumor has been circulating on social media in recent weeks that former South Carolina Congressman Trey Gowdy will be taking over for Attorney General Pam Bondi.
Now, many Trump supporters, myself included, are understandably frustrated by the lack of progress made by the Department of Justice to indict the deep state spooks for crimes committed in the Russia Gate scandal, the January 6th Fed surrection, and the 2020 stolen election, as well as many other treasonous acts that I believe have occurred.
But I have continued to maintain my support for Attorney General Pam Bondi.
I've known her for decades, and I understand her to be a diligent patriot.
I, too, am frustrated by the Department of Justice's inactivity regarding crucial prosecutions.
But folks do have to remember there's a tremendous amount of institutional rot that is keeping these well-protected men and women who are high up in our intelligence agencies and elsewhere in our government from being brought to justice.
That is being churned out under Bondi and it will be done faster, I hope.
But one thing is clear: Trey Gowdy is not the man for this crucial job.
See, Gowdy is well known for giving strongly worded speeches, throwing sending strongly worded letters, and when he was leading the investigation into the Benghazi scandal as a congressman, but in hearing after hearing, Trey Gowdy would pound the podium and threw lots of red meat at the angry Tea Party base.
He amassed quite the following as a result of his theatrics.
But then, no accountability ever occurred.
No prosecutions or real answers came as a result of the Benghazi hearings.
You remember Benghazi?
That's when Secretary of State Hillary Clinton insisted that our diplomats and other Foreign Service officers have been brutally murdered as a result of a video that was shown in a country where virtually no one is online.
Gowdy refused to assign any blame to Hillary Clinton or any other Obama administration official in the aftermath of the lengthy, expensive public investigation.
It was classic Republican establishment theater, with political hacks playing beat the clock until the issue could sadly be swept under the rug.
When President Trump came to power and came down that golden escalator, that, in my mind, changed the face of politics forever.
Trey Gowdy's tough guy facade cracked almost immediately.
In fact, he joined the chorus of anti-Trumpers hoping to keep Donald Trump on the outs.
When their gatekeeping attempts failed, they then attempted to subvert him while he was in office.
In 2018, then-Congressman Trey Gowdy, along with former House Speaker Paul Ryan, were the loudest defenders of the Russian collusion hoax.
That's when the deep state got caught red-handed spying on President Donald Trump.
They were arguing that the FBI was perfectly correct in their use of informants to infiltrate President Trump's inner circle as part of their expansive phishing expedition based on falsy intelligence.
I'm even more convinced that the FBI did exactly what my fellow citizens would want them to do, Trey Gowdy said on Fox News regarding the Russian collusion hoax.
It has nothing to do with Donald Trump.
Well, now, thanks to the brave and courageous actions of the director of national intelligence, Telsey Gabbard, who has declassified all of the relevant public documents, we know that there was no Russian collusion and that this was the greatest single dirty trick in American political history.
It was an abuse of power in which the full authority of the U.S. government was utilized to remove a duly elected president utilizing two pieces of completely falsified evidence, the so-called steel dossier.
That's a secret report that was actually illegally paid for by Hillary Clinton's campaign that claimed falsely that President Donald Trump had dallied with Russian prostitutes while visiting Moscow as a private businessman.
It was and is a quote total and complete fabrication.
And then there was the second leg of this duel.
That's in which they claimed that the Democrat National Committee had been the target of an online hack by Russian intelligence, a claim for which there is no forensic evidence whatsoever.
Gowdy incredibly claimed the FBI was actually working to clear President Trump's name during the Russian collusion farce, which is at this point a laughable notion.
And it's been proven abjectly false as more documents have come out exposing the depths of this incredible conspiracy.
It was President Trump himself who said, number one, I didn't collude with Russia, but if anyone connected with my campaign, I want the FBI to find that out.
Gowdy said, it looks to me like the FBI is doing what President Subb said he wanted them to do, find it out.
This alone, in my opinion, is disqualifying as it shows that Gowdy is imbecilic and naive at best, but more likely was running cover for the deep state the whole time, as indicated by his desire to suppress the full Mueller report that cleared both President Trump of any Russian collusion claims, but also cleared me.
You see on page 178, the long-redacted, long-hidden, long-suppressed Mueller investigation's final report concluded that Mueller himself had found no evidence on my part of Russian collusion, WikiLeaps collaboration, or any other crime.
Trey Gowdy's comments about CIA Director John Brennan years later further exposed Gowdy's true colors, calling Brenner a liar, but saying that he should be shamed rather than charged for his capital offenses.
This shows how Gowdy uses weasel words and tactics to protect these federal crooks.
Handcuffs are not the only way to met out accountability.
There's shame.
There's history.
It's not just prison.
There's other ways we need to met out accountability.
And the fact that somebody's not wearing handcuffs does not mean to me, It does not mean that I think that it's okay because he wasn't.
Wow, that's really tough.
After bailing out from Congress amidst an exodus of rhinos in 2019, Trey Gowdy took a well-paying job over at Fox News, reinventing himself as a moderate pundit and adopting a similar look and style to Rachel Madcow.
Gowdy's transition did not serve him well in terms of rebuilding his waning credibility, to put it mildly.
When Gowdy was hawking his book, Doesn't Hurt to Ask, he did an anti-Trump media tour, even appearing on the show of reviled Trump hater and vaccine pusher Stephen Colbert to trash President Trump's impact on the Republican Party.
It's not the Republican Party I grew up with, Gowdy said.
Conservatism tells people what they ought to hear.
Populism tells people what they want to hear.
I'm a conservative, and you know, sometimes it gets difficult to see what the party platform really is, Gowdy said on the late show with Stephen Colbert.
In that same interview with Colbert, Trey Gowdy was criticizing President Trump for not forcing face diapers onto the faces of Americans when the COVID hysteria reached a fevered pitch.
We now know, based on extensive scientific research, that the masks protected no one.
I do wear a mask, said Trey Gowdy.
I would have liked it for President Trump Toven braced the goodness, the propriety of wearing masks sooner, Gowdy told Colbert.
Just last year, Trey Gowdy came out forcefully against the Second Amendment, claiming that jettison fundamental rights, including the right to own a firearm, was necessary for, quote, protecting children, following a mass shooting of kids by a transgendered maniac in a Catholic church in Minnesota.
The only way to stop it is to identify the shooter ahead of time and keep weapons out of their hands, he said.
So we're going to have a conversation of freedom versus protecting children.
I mean, how many school shootings does it take before we're going to have a conversation about keeping the firearms out of the hands of people?
Adding, it's always a young white male to add some revolting wokeness to Gowdy's unconstitutional rant.
The rumor mail pushing Gowdy as Attorney General Campbell is likely an op to reroute the Department of Justice and the good work that is currently being done, particularly in the Southern District of Florida, where it appears that subpoenas have been unveiled, beginning to corral those like John Brennan, like James Comey, like Andrew McCabe in the Russian collusion hoax.
The notion of Trey Gowdy, who, by the way, is being pushed for Attorney General by Senator Lindsey Graham, is inspiring intense rage among MAGA partisans on social media, and for good reason.
Trey Gowdy is a Paul Ryan establishment Republican who was rightfully swept out of the party in the age of Trump to the betterment of mankind.
He must stay relegated to Fox News echo chamber, far away from any role in the Trump administration.
Meanwhile, the Trump administration is forcefully pushing back against a reckless and dangerous proposal from a New York congressional Democrat that would put federal immigration officers at risk.
New York Democrat Richie Torres has introduced what he calls the Quick Recognition Act, which would require immigration and customs enforcement and customs and border protection agents to wear uniforms with scannable QR codes revealing their names, badge numbers, and employing agency.
The White House immediately slammed that idea, warning it would fuel a nationwide doxing campaign and encourage activists to interfere with law enforcement operations during a time of widespread unrest.
America is at the brink, as I think we know.
The United States is once again facing a constitutional and civil crisis, not on some distant battlefield, but in the streets of Minnesota, for example, where violence has escalated and civil order has frayed.
What began as protest tied to federal immigration law enforcement has metastasized into a sustained unrest, exposing a deeper national question.
Who enforces the law when local and state officials refuse to do so?
Situation has deteriorated to such an extent that President Donald Trump has publicly warned that he may invoke the Insurrection Act of 1807 to restore order if Minnesota officials continue to abdicate their responsibility to protect life, property, and federal authority.
Trump administration spokeswoman Abigail Jackson said the bill by Congressman Torres is designed to intimidate officers and protect criminal illegal aliens, calling the proposal unserious and extraordinarily dangerous.
The administration cited the Department of Homeland Security data showing assaults on ICE officers have surged by 1,300%, driven by Democrats' irresponsible and inflammatory rhetoric.
Congressman Torres doubled down, calling ICE systematically corrupt and declaring he would oppose funding the agency beyond one single dollar.
His office dismissed safety concerns, claiming the administration fears transparency and accountability.
I find the whole thing disgraceful.
Who is opposed to the deportation of dangerous illegal gangbangers and criminals?
The answer should be no one, but unfortunately, the answer seems to be Democrats.
The Democrats are targeting federal officers, they're undermining border enforcement, and they're prioritizing partisanship and ideology over public safety.
Scott Adams' Legacy00:03:12
I'm Roger Stone.
You're listening to the Stone Zone right here on the Red Apple Audio Networks.
Then don't go away.
We'll be right back because my friend Scott Adams, who sadly passed away just the other day, his book has gone to number one.
He appeared here in the Stone Zone many times.
We're going to talk about Scott Adams when we return.
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The Stone Zone.
Entertaining and informative.
On the Red Apple Podcast Network.
I can't tell you how much I appreciate those warm words from Vice President JD Vance.
So, my late friend Scott Adams, the creator of the Dilbert comic strip and extraordinarily influential social commentators, final book is climbing the best-selling charts following his untimely death earlier this week.
Adams' final work, Reframe Your Brain, the User Interface for Happiness and Success, surged to the number one overall best-selling position on Amazon on Thursday, just days after his death.
The book now tops all categories on the platform, a reflection of the enduring impact that Scott Adams, who appeared here in the Stone Zone several times, had on millions of Americans.
Adams passed away Tuesday morning following a public battle with prostate cancer.
He disclosed his diagnosis in 2025 and continued hosting his popular Coffee with Scott Adams live stream show, even as his health declined.
In the final weeks, the show shifted to a call-in format as his health deteriorated, allowing Adams to speak directly with friends, colleagues, and long-time viewers.
Earlier this month, Adams candidly told his audience that recovery for him was no longer possible.
He entered hospice care this past Monday.
During Tuesday morning's broadcast, his ex-wife Shelley Miles announced his passing and read a final message Adams had prepared in it.
He shared the fact that he had accepted Christianity before his death, writing, I accept Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior, and I look forward to spending an eternity with him.
Adams was best known as the creator of Dilbert, the iconic comic strip launched way back in 1989 that skewered corporate absurdity and became a defining voice of office culture.
Fake news media may claim that Adams was disgraced in their shameful obituaries of him, but the truth is, Scott Adams' bold truth-telling and unwillingness to bow to political correctness made him a legend in the eyes of millions of patriots.
Scott Adams, may you rest in peace.
Trump's Diplomatic Pressure00:16:12
Iran appears to be getting one more final repeat.
President Donald Trump has opted not to strike Iran, with reports emerging the United States has temporarily held off on military action among Tehran's brutal crackdown on human rights protesters.
According to multiple reports, President Trump conveyed to the Iranian regime that the U.S. would not launch a strike for now while demanding an immediate halt to the mass killings of peaceful protesters.
Officials from Qatar and Saudi Arabia, with reported involvement from Egypt, worked behind the scenes to try to ease tensions and prevent escalation, according to the Jerusalem Post.
President Trump said on Wednesday evening that he had received credible briefings indicating that executions and protest-related killings in Iran were slowing, but he made it clear that America will respond forcefully if the violence resumes.
There are up to reports of 800 protesters having lost their lives, pardon me, 800 protesters having their lives spared because of President Trump's tough negotiating.
Those lives have been spared, at least temporarily, because President Trump achieves peace through strength.
However, the Iranian regime cannot be trusted, and I believe their days are numbered.
President Trump has given a blunt message to Iranian citizens, urging them to keep protesting and warning regime enforcers that they will be held accountable for their crimes against humanity.
I'm Roger Stone.
You're listening to the Stone Zone.
Don't go away because we'll be right back with more hot politics.
The Stone Zone, entertaining and informative.
On the Red Apple Podcast Network.
Welcome back into the Stone Zone.
President Donald Trump is moving aggressively to shield American families from soaring electricity bills, and he's making big tech pay for the problem it helped create.
According to Bloomberg, President Trump and several Northeastern governors are set to announce an unprecedented emergency plan aimed squarely at runaway power costs driven by massive data center expansion.
Under the proposal, grid operator PGM Interconnection would be pushed to hold a special wholesale electricity auction, forcing large technology companies to fund new power plants through long-term contracts.
The goal here is very simple.
Cap residential electricity rates while ensuring enough power to fuel America's AI race without sticking households and small businesses with the bill.
Under this plan, tech giants would bid on 15-year contracts for new generation capacity, paying whether they use the electricity or not.
That guaranteed revenue would support roughly $15 billion in new power plant construction, which would ease supply shortages in a grid already operating well below critical reserve margins.
President Trump has been very blunt about the principle behind this move, saying that he never wants Americans to pay higher electricity bills because of these data centers.
The initiative has drawn support from governors of both parties, including Democrats, underscoring growing concerns that unchecked data center growth is distorting energy markets and driving up costs for average consumers.
This, to me, is a great example of President Trump using his power in a way that helps the little guy and stops the spread of unchecked corporate power.
Other Republican politicians would pay lip service to the notion of the free market while actually doing nothing, and of course, lining their pockets with big contributions from the tech firms on the back end.
Even though President Trump is pro-tech AI, he is making sure that the ordinary people do not suffer the burden of economic growth.
This is another example of the tremendous leadership we're getting from President Donald Trump.
Meanwhile, a new Arctic intelligence assessment from Denmark is showing that President Trump's warning about growing Russian and Chinese activity near Greenland are not false pretenses to justify intervention.
President Trump recently argued that Russian submarines and Chinese naval assets are increasingly active around Greenland, warning that the United States cannot allow strategic Arctic territory to fall under the influence of either Russia or China.
Fake news media dismiss the remarks as an exaggeration or outright lie, but Denmark's own 2025 intelligence outlook paints a more sobering long-term picture.
According to the Danish Defense Intelligence Service, Russia remains the dominant military power in the Arctic and continues to expand its submarine and surface fleet in the region.
The report notes that Russia's nuclear-armed submarines are based in Arctic waters, forming a core pillar of its deterrence strategy against the United States and NATO.
The assessment also warns that China is steadily building the capability for independent military operations in the Arctic, with long-term ambitions that include missile submarines operating beneath the polar ice and sustained engagement around Greenland through research and commercial ventures.
While fact-checkers, including the Associated Press, argue that Russia and China forces are not lurking directly off of Greenland's coastline, national security isn't waiting for a crisis to occur and then reacting after it's too late.
It's about recognizing strategic trends before they become threats.
That's what Trump is doing.
The Arctic is vast, contested, and increasingly central to global power competition.
President Trump has rightfully recognized that Greenland is essential for the Don Rowe doctrine.
That, of course, is a euphemism after the Monroe Doctrine, but it is a simple premise by Donald Trump that we must have control here in our own hemisphere.
Just as he opposes the brutal regimes in Venezuela, Honduras, and Cuba, we cannot have a colonial power in control of Greenland.
they would be much better off as an independent entity.
What we need, I think, is a popular vote of the people of Greenland.
Let them decide and let President Trump work his campaign, deal-making magic.
It's time for the EU and NATO to get out of the way of progress.
Ultimately, at a minimum, Greenland must be free and independent, and then they can, of course, receive American aid.
Meanwhile, a Senate hearing this week exposed another massive national security failure stemming from the Biden administration's reckless immigration policies.
On January 14th, a deputy inspector general testified that over 30,000 Afghan nationals were admitted into the United States without basic identification under a Biden-era parole program, and that more than 50 individuals with confirmed or suspected terrorist ties were allowed into the country.
The hearing, titled Biden's Afghan Parole Program, a Trojan horse with flawed vetting and deadly consequences, focused on Operation Allies Welcomes, launching after that Biden administration's chaotic 2021 withdrawal from Afghanistan.
So roughly 76,000 evacuees were flown into the U.S., many without verified names, dates of birth, or documentation.
According to the testimony in the hearing, 36,000 provided no identification at all, and up to 12,000 did not know their date of birth.
Kind of hard to believe.
Even more alarming, witnesses confirmed that the evacuees were not systematically interviewed, nor were mental health screenings conducted before their entry.
These failures directly endangered Americans, and the total overall number of Afghan nationals admitted to the United States may actually exceed over 200,000.
These are all now potential sleeper cells waiting to commit a terrorist act here on American soil.
The November 2025 terrorist shooting of two National Guardsmen in Washington, carried out by an Afghani let into America as part of this supposed humanitarian effort by the Biden regime is proof that these risks are real and it put the safety of Americans in jeopardy.
Intelligence officials have since acknowledged that at least 2,000 Afghan nationals in the United States have direct ties to terrorism.
Democrats predictably dismiss the hearing's framing, argue that the problem lies in counterterrorism enforcement, but not the vetting of those who were allowed to enter the country.
They're willing to look the other way because they believe they will get power from the demographic replacement of the American people.
That much is clear.
It's time to deport all these dangerous illegals and hostile foreigners and do so as quickly as possible in the interests of protecting national security.
Canada is rolling out the red carpet for Beijing's electric vehicle industry and potentially hurting North America's auto sector in the process.
Prime Minister Mark Carney has agreed to slash Canada's triple-digit tariffs on Chinese electric vehicles, opening the door to a surge of low-cost imports from China.
The move is an obvious rebuke of President Donald Trump's America First strategy to rebuild domestic manufacturing, the domestic auto industry, and protect U.S. workers.
Under the new Canadian policy, the 100% tariffs imposed by former Prime Minister Justin Trudeau will be replaced with just a 6.1% rate capped at nearly 49,000 Chinese electric vehicles every year.
China exported more than 41,000 electric vehicles to Canada in 2023 alone.
Kearney, the first Canadian prime minister to visit China since 2017, openly plays the Chinese communist leadership, lauding President Xi Jinping, signaling a major thaw in Canadian-Chinese relations.
To me, it's disgusting that Canada under its liberal government would prefer to work with repressive Chinese communists instead of partnering with proven North American innovators like Tesla, Rivian, or Lucid, not to mention Detroit's legacy automakers.
Prime Minister Carney insists that Chinese supply chains are essential to building Canada's electric vehicle future.
This myopic argument ignores Europe's hard-earned lesson, where markets are flooded with subsidized Chinese products devastated local manufacturers.
Conservative Canadian leaders are outraged by this news, of course.
Saskatchewan Premier Scott Mo visibly bristled after Prime Minister Carney spoke approvingly of the New World Order.
That phase, we are assured, is innocuous, but it seems to pop up everywhere for some strange reason.
This move shows that Canada is a hostile nation to America's interests, and after Greenland is acquired, perhaps President Trump can focus on our neighbors to the north.
At least two Canadian provinces, Saskatchewan and Alberta, are seriously considering declaring their independence from Canada.
Under their constitution, any province, by a simple vote of the people, may declare its independence from the Canadian state.
That movement is already underway in Saskatchewan, which, by the way, is one of the most conservative and smaller provinces of Canada, but it is also the richest when it comes to oil, gas, and rare earth minerals.
I have seen the polling, and if the people of Saskatchewan are given a vote, they will vote overwhelmingly to leave Canada.
That, of course, would make them eligible to apply to become American states.
Could Saskatchewan or the larger but no less conservative Alberta become the 51st and 52nd state?
I say it's entirely possible.
Meanwhile, Philadelphia's far-left leadership is escalating its open defiance of federal law enforcement.
District Attorney Larry Krasner, he was elected with massive financial support from George Soros, stood alongside local officials this week to denounce immigration and customs enforcement, even threatening prosecution of ICE agents simply for doing their jobs.
Krasner said, this is ultimately about good versus evil.
That's what it is.
It's about good versus evil.
Renee Nicole Good is just part of that good, and she's up against evil.
We will arrest you.
We will handcuff you.
We will close those cuffs.
We will put you in a cell.
We will set your bail, and I'm going to ask for it to be appropriately high.
We will take you to trial, and I'm going to do everything in my power to convict you.
We will make sure that you serve your entire sentence because Donald Trump, according to the Philly DA, has no power whatsoever to pardon you.
That's the way the law works.
Krasner is truly a disgrace.
Philadelphia Sheriff Rochelle Bilau went further, vowing to smoke out ICE agents and boasting that her office would arrest and jail them, an extraordinary threat against federal officers tasked with enforcing U.S. immigration law.
The hostility extends beyond the city of Philadelphia.
In neighboring Bucks County, Sheriff Danny Ceissler announced an end to his county's cooperation with immigration and custom enforcement.
So I think it's abundantly clear that Democrats are doubling down against the rule of law, hoping they can turn ICE agents into the bad guys for carrying out President Trump's mandate for mass deportations of illegal immigrant criminals.
This is nothing less than a war for the soul of our country, and we must win.
We cannot lose our resolve in this battle.
We must stand with the men of women of ICE fully and refuse to waver during these tumultuous and difficult times.
Meanwhile, federal prosecutors are cracking down on a massive Medicare fraud scheme operating out of Brooklyn, New York that has sipened tens of millions of dollars from taxpayers.
And two more defendants have now admitted to their role in the scam.
Manal Wassef and Elaine Antano, both 46, pleaded guilty in federal court to conspiring to commit health care fraud in a scheme that allegedly generated more than $68 million in bogus Medicare billings.
According to the U.S. Department of Justice, this pair acted as large-scale recruiters, steering Medicaid recipients to specific adult care centers and home health providers in exchange for illegal kickbacks, bribes, and laundered cash.
Assistant Attorney General A. Tyson Duva said that the defendants bribed patients with billed Medicare for services that were never actually provided, using our federal tax dollars as their own personal piggyback.
Prosecutors say the fraud spanned nearly seven years involved shell companies used to watch the illicit proceeds.
U.S. Attorney Joseph Nosella Jr. said the case reflects a broader crackdown on schemes that funnel patients for profit while draining public resources.
Investigators tied the fraud to multiple adult daycare centers and a home health intermediary with payments allegedly being made directly to patients to justify false claims.
So you see, it's not just in Minnesota.
And before it's over, this scandal will boil over into Michigan, into Ohio, into Washington State, into Oregon, into California, and yes, my friends, into the empire state of New York.
Phase 2 Of Trump's Gaza Plan00:04:00
I'm Roger Stone.
You're listening to the Stone Zone.
Whatever you do, don't touch that dial because we'll be right back.
The Stone Zone.
Entertaining and informative.
On the Red Apple Podcast Network.
Welcome back into the Stone Zone.
President Donald Trump is advancing on the most serious and structured peace effort Gaza has seen in decades.
On January 14th, Presidential Peace Envoy Steve Witkoff announced the launch of Phase 2 of President Trump's Gaza peace plan, moving from a ceasefire into a full demilitarization and reconstruction.
According to Witkoff, the second phase will dismantle Hamas's military capabilities and replace terrorist control with a transitional non-partisan authority known as the National Committee for the Administration of Gaza.
The goal of this committee is to remove weapons, restore order, and begin rebuilding a territory devastating by years of conflict and Hamas terrorism.
Trump has referred to the interim governed body as the Board of Peace and made it clear that terrorism will no longer be tolerated as a governing model.
President Trump's 20-point plan offers conditional amnesty and safe passage for Hamas members who surrender their weapons, giving incentives for a lasting peace.
The first phase of the agreement focused on hostage recovery.
Hamas has now returned the remains of 27 or 28 deceased Israeli hostages.
We pray for them.
Witkoff issued a firm warning that failure to return the final hostage will result in serious consequences, underscoring this administration enforcing red lines and will not accept deviation from the agreed upon plan with Hamas.
The United States development program has estimated Gaza's damage at roughly $70 billion, cost borne because of Hamas terrorist aggression against Israel.
The initiation of President Trump's Phase 2 sends a very clear message.
There will be no reconstruction without disarmament and no peace without accountability.
Meanwhile, as Democrats head into the 2026 elections, their carefully crafted plan to reclaim suburban voters with the buzzword affordability is backfiring on them due to President Trump's success on immigration enforcement.
Under Trump, aggressive deportations and tighter border controls have sharply reduced the number of illegal immigrants entering the country, relieving the housing pressure that exploded during the open border years of Sleepy Joe Biden.
According to economists at the Brookings Institution, more immigrants left the United States and entered last year.
The first time that that has happened, actually, in five decades.
The effects are already showing up in real terms to help the American people.
In cities like San Antonio, for example, developers who built expecting a wave of migrant renters are now cutting prices to fill vacant units.
In Lancaster, Pennsylvania, once dubbed the refugee capital of America, landlords are advertising months of free rent as demand evaporates and mortgage rates have hit an all-time low.
This is simple supply and demand economics 101.
When fewer people compete for housing, rents fall.
And that's exactly what happened after years of record high prices that outpaced wages under Sleepy Joe Biden.
The Trump administration is now correctly framing border enforcement as an economic issue, not just a public safety issue.
Treasury Secretary Scott Besson, who to my mind is one of the president's very best appointees, recently said the connection between mass illegal immigration and skyrocketing rents is as clear as day.
Add in falling rents, rising wages, and tax relief through Trump's broader economic agenda.
The Republicans have flipped the script.
Thanks For Joining Us00:02:32
This is a winning message to Republicans in 2026's midterms, in my opinion.
President Trump's immigration policies have worked.
The administration is putting America first, and wages and right and prices, wages are rising while prices are falling.
Thanks for joining us today in the Stone Zone, where five days a week we talk politics, news, history, and style.
The 2026 election is not something that I can see.
Those pundits who insist Republicans will leave the House don't understand how the largest tax cut in American history, the regulatory cuts, and the coming cut in interest rates once we get a depoliticized Federal Reserve Board could cause the greatest single economic boom in American history.
And to my mind, that is the backdrop for a successful 2026 election.
I'm Roger Stone.
Thanks for joining us on the Stone Zone.
Until we meet again, God bless you and Godspeed.
Thanks for listening to the Stone Zone with Roger Stone.
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So you never have to wonder what the heck is going on here.
Rural Americans deserve access to the best of what our country has to offer, especially health care.
Across every state, every community, America's rural hospitals are the first line of defense protecting our families, neighbors, and loved ones.
No matter where you live, hospital care doesn't clock out.
They're there 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year.
Each year, America's over 5,000 hospitals care for millions of patients, providing 24/7 emergency care, delivering babies, cancer treatments, and other life-saving care that patients rely on.
Behind every one of those patients are doctors, nurses, and caregivers working tirelessly to keep people healthy and safe.
Hospitals are our community's lifelines.
They employ our neighbors and keep our families healthy.
But now, some in Congress are threatening access to care.
Tell Congress: protect patient care to keep America strong.