Aug. 26, 2021 - Sean Hannity Show
17:04
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| This is an iHeart Podcast. | |
| All right, day twelve, Americans trapped behind enemy lines. | |
| Americans basically held hostage to the whims of the terrorist group, the Taliban. | |
| This hour we'll check in with Mark Meadows, former Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo. | |
| We expect Joe Biden to speak at five. | |
| Who knows if it'll be another four hours late, like earlier in the week? | |
| Donald Trump on Hannity tonight, the former president weighs in on the events of today. | |
| If you're just joining us, it is now confirmed, sadly, the deadliest day for American troops in Afghanistan in ten years, as we've lost over a dozen service members, fifteen injured. | |
| Fifty people have been killed, all told in these suicide bomb attacks at the airport. | |
| There was reports about 15 minutes ago that there might have been another explosion. | |
| We're working to confirm that. | |
| First joining us is the governor of the great state of South Dakota, Christy Gnome, who herself uh has been to Afghanistan. | |
| She served on the House Armed Services Committee before she was governor. | |
| She's the commander in chief of the South Dakota National Guard. | |
| Uh it's a sad day, Governor. | |
| I'll tell you that. | |
| Uh I know you serve with these people, and they are the best of the best. | |
| And watching this unfold and seeing how preventable it is, it is heart wrenching. | |
| It's absolutely tragic. | |
| I can't imagine what these families are going through right now that are getting these phone calls and seeing these reports all over the national news. | |
| My heart and my prayers go out to them. | |
| I just the amount of loss and how avoidable it was just absolutely tragic. | |
| I have confirmed with numerous sources that the CIA pulled out weeks ago. | |
| I have confirmed with numerous sources that everybody gave urgent warnings to the White House. | |
| We we've been running this time elapsed map on my TV show showing the Taliban on the march uh all the way from March through April, May, June, July, taking over huge geographical portions of the country. | |
| And so we knew that they were on their way and that the Afghan forces were collapsing, even as Joe Biden was telling us just the opposite. | |
| Why didn't they see this coming and immediately speed up the evacuation when we had control? | |
| Sean, that's a question we have to be asking ourselves. | |
| I've been saying this for days now, that we really have to evaluate how much of this was a purposeful decision and how much of it was just being inept at their jobs. | |
| Because there's protocols and standard operating procedure in the Department of Defense within the Pentagon. | |
| When these decisions were being made for how this withdrawal was going to happen, they had to have known that there was a better path, a proven path than what Joe Biden was deciding and putting forward. | |
| President Trump gave us the blueprint for how to pull out of these countries when he came out of Iraq, and he made sure that that we came out in a position of strength and that we came out in a safe manner that protected our warriors. | |
| They go over there and defend our freedom. | |
| So this to me is something we absolutely have to be looking at with eyes wide open, that some of these decisions could have been decisions that were made knowing full well the consequences and what they could be today. | |
| Joe Biden and Tony Blinken have both said that this August 31st deadline will be adhered to, but Blinken went further to say that doesn't mean the evacuations of Americans will stop. | |
| Um we will use our diplomatic and economic um channels as a means of bringing home any Americans they leave behind. | |
| Why does the thought of leaving a single American behind why is that so unacceptable to be? | |
| How about we just go fight the bad guys? | |
| I mean, that's what I don't understand. | |
| We've been fighting these guys and at war with them. | |
| They've been killing our our citizens, they've been killing our allies for years, and now they're basically setting the parameters for which the United States can leave a country. | |
| It's insane to me that we are now decided that this is acceptable. | |
| And the discussions, every time the news comes on, and I I hear from friends of mine on the intelligence committee that we're having discussions on the parameters for how we do a withdrawal with the Taliban. | |
| I just feel like I'm living in another world, Sean. | |
| This is unprecedented. | |
| And the acknowledgement of of how this is happening, people need to know this has never happened before that we have given This kind of standing to a group of individuals that are not a government and they are not good actors and they do not have a good history, and we are just falling in line to what their directions are for how we withdraw our troops and and protect our people. | |
| I think it's unacceptable. | |
| Do you see any options good? | |
| I don't see a good option. | |
| There are options, there are military options, but we also have Americans. | |
| We don't even know how many. | |
| We don't know where they are. | |
| We're telling them now to not go to the airport. | |
| The deadline is fast approaching. | |
| Um do you have any options that you would be considering if you were in charge? | |
| We know we now have found out that the Taliban is controlling who's going into the airport and who would get on airplanes and leave. | |
| They're the ones doing the vetting process. | |
| So number one, the priority needs to be American citizens. | |
| Number one, we need to go find them wherever they are in that country and get them out safely. | |
| And I don't care what resources we have to use to make it happen. | |
| That should be the fact that America has always stood for never leaving us an American behind. | |
| We never do it, we shouldn't do it now, and that should be the number one goal on everybody's mind in this administration and in the Pentagon. | |
| Governor Christine Ohm, thank you. | |
| Thank you for your service as well. | |
| We appreciate you being with us joining us now, former chief of staff for President Donald Trump here, Melania have put out a statement saying Melani and I uh send our deepest condolences to the families of our brilliant and brave service members who were whose duty to the USA meant so much to them. | |
| Our thoughts are also with their families and the families of innocent civilians who died today in this savage Kabul attack. | |
| This tragedy never uh this tragedy should never have been allowed to happen, which makes our grief even deeper and more difficult to understand. | |
| May God always bless the USA. | |
| Uh Mark, you were chief of staff. | |
| Uh Biden kept saying I inherited this plan. | |
| Well, he also inherited secure borders and energy independence, and he had no trouble destroying those successful plans. | |
| So put that aside. | |
| Can you please describe in detail before any deal was ever struck with the Taliban, the conversation that you and Mike Pompeo and Donald Trump have confirmed for me uh with the Taliban leader? | |
| Well, I can I can tell you that it was uh it was a position of strength from President Trump, Secretary of Pompeo and I talked just the other day uh as we kind of recalled uh some of the things that went back and forth, but this was was a condition withdrawal. | |
| We we basically told the Taliban that if any harm came to U.S. uh soldiers or citizens, uh that we would use the full force and might of the U.S. military uh to not only respond, but respond personally. | |
| And and that was made very clear uh to the to the Taliban. | |
| And and yet here we are today under a Biden administration, uh, you know, begging the Taliban to to help us get citizens out uh of really uh uh of at best a very poor plan uh exit, and at worse, uh just a dereliction of duty. | |
| But I I can tell you the president was not only firm but very firm uh and and for the many who say that oh well this is just uh Biden implementing the Trump plan. | |
| Uh that's just not accurate. | |
| Uh there was there were conditions that were were put forth that the President, Secretary Pompeo put forth, and actually actions that we had to take within the last year or so to make sure that that uh the the Taliban uh respected and feared uh the the might of the the U.S. military. | |
| And for the last 18 months or around the last 18 months of the Trump administration, not a single American was killed in Afghanistan, and here we are today, the deadliest day for U.S. troops in Afghanistan in a decade. | |
| We now have twelve dead confirmed service members, fifteen injured. | |
| Uh we're now at the fifty people killed total with the suicide bombers. | |
| Um let me go back to this deal, though. | |
| So it was the threat of obliteration if you didn't follow every dotted I crossed T, and period. | |
| Also, it included, correct me if I'm wrong, uh, the U.S. would keep control of Bagrom Air Force Base, the threat of obliterations, uh, all based on conditions on the ground if they warranted the withdrawal at the time. | |
| And I played last night and on yesterday on this radio show, Donald Trump saying I slowed down the withdrawal for for these very specific reasons. | |
| Well he did. | |
| I mean I was there when uh when not only he challenged his military advisors to get out of Afghanistan, nobody wanted out of Afghanistan more than Donald Trump. | |
| But I was also there when he says well we can't leave Americans behind. | |
| And that's exactly what Biden has done. | |
| He's left Americans behind. | |
| And politically, would it have been best for us just to get out of Afghanistan? | |
| Yeah, politically, but it wouldn't have been best for America and American interest. | |
| And so the president made that decision to put America first and put American citizens first and essentially made our withdrawal condition. | |
| And I can tell you that we... | |
| know we had to to make sure that our military was there to augment the Afghan government whenever there seemed to be uh uh a threat of of wrongdoing uh they knew that the the U.S. military was not only there but that we weren't afraid to use it and uh and this uh this Biden appeasement is what I call it but it's worse than that is it shows fear from America uh and and they smell the fear and | |
| What happens is, sadly, is casualties have occurred, obviously, with the news. | |
| Hopefully, you know, the reports don't get any worse than they already are. | |
| I cannot believe when Tony Blinken said this week that the Taliban control Kabul. | |
| That means that Americans are trapped behind enemy lines. | |
| They're hostage to the whims of a terrorist organization. | |
| I'm not sure why when | |
| we saw the Taliban on the march you you you were on last the the other night when we were talking about it and I kept showing that map and from March to April and April to May and May to June and June to July to where we are today they were taking over massive geographical areas the Afghan army was collapsing while Biden is telling us just the opposite and why didn't they they expedite the evacuation when we had control of Kabul. | |
| Well they could have listened this was not an intelligence failure. | |
| Much of the blame is trying to be put on the in the intelligence apparatus and by intelligence I mean our U.S. intelligence uh people not only here in the United States but certainly in Afghanistan and in the uh neighboring areas this was not a failure on their part this was a failure to make the right decision that came from the Oval Office. | |
| Let's be clear about that. | |
| And and when you started seeing the advances that were there, uh you had some decisions to make and they are tough decisions and I've been with President Trump when he's made those tough decisions. | |
| In fact, you know we have uh a couple of terrorist leaders that are no longer on the face of the globe because of a president and Donald Trump that made the right decisions at the right time to protect America and and sadly today is not it. | |
| You know we still have yet I I I don't know if if you can see anything differently than I've yet to hear from Joe Biden. | |
| I mean we hours have gone on marines have lost their lives and what do we have we have Joe Biden in his bunker again. | |
| I mean I it's just answered five questions since the beginning of this uh Mark Meadows um do you see I don't see any good options considering now that they have total control of of Kabul that we don't even know how many Americans are caught behind enemy lines. | |
| The idea that we're going to leave Americans behind enemy lines I I I can't fathom this well we we can't leave Americans behind and and obviously Governor Now was saying that right before I came on but more importantly than that is is we're America. | |
| We don't leave our citizens behind and even under a Biden administration the American people will rise up and and hold Joe Biden and his administration accountable because we don't leave Americans behind. | |
| In fact that's one of the interesting things is is President Trump doesn't get the the kind of credit he's due. | |
| I was I was there with him when he literally got more hostages out than any president in modern history. | |
| he would go in and use our military special forces to go in and get one American citizen, let alone a thousand uh or more. | |
| And and so we've we've got a real debacle. | |
| We've got people inside uh on airport uh facilities. | |
| We got them outside uh of the airport gates, and uh even with a counter strike, it becomes extremely difficult because you've got you know the potential for friendly fire and anything else, even if you try to engage. | |
| I mean, it puts our military at great risk. | |
| Uh strategically, this was uh nothing short of uh a major blunder. | |
| Mark Meadows was in the room. | |
| Thank you. | |
| Our thoughts and prayers are with our military families, oh civilians, everybody uh killed today, injured today. | |
| Now the deadliest day for U.S. troops in a decade in Afghanistan, twelve confirmed dead, fifteen injured, over fifty people killed in this uh this first attack. | |
| There's reports of uh another attack that might have taken place. | |
| Uh Mark Meadows, sir. | |
| Thank you as always for being with us. | |
| We appreciate it. | |
| Uh, we're told that Joe Biden is to speak at five, but that's always fluid with him. | |
| God only knows. | |
| Secretary of State Mike Pompeo will join us coming up next half hour. | |
| Thank you. | |
| W O R. Ninety-two degrees, four thirty. | |
| Good afternoon. | |
| I'm Jeff McKinney. | |
| The Pentagon says a suicide vest bomb attack at the Kabul Airport killed twelve U.S. service members, wounded fifteen others. | |
| The military says it's on high alert for follow-up attacks in Kabul, and they say that would fit a pattern. | |
| Local ISIS affiliate Isis K is now claimed responsibility for the twin explosion attack. | |
| There was a second bomb at a nearby hotel. | |
| And Governor Hokel is tapping State Senator Brian Benjamin as her choice for Lieutenant Governor. | |
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| Congress is close to making historic investments in America's infrastructure. | |
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| I'm Jeff McKinney. | |
| Here's Adrian Watson and WR Traffic Adrian. | |
| Jeff outbound Lincoln and Holland tunnels about 25 to 30 minutes apiece. | |
| Westbound Cross Bronx is loaded Westchester Avenue to the bridge. | |
| Southbound Bronx River Heavy from around the zoo down to the Cross Bronx. | |
| The Deegan heavy both ways. | |
| FDR Harlem River Drive heavy both ways between the RK Triborough and the 30s. | |
| And then Northbound also heavy to the Cross Bronx. | |
| West Side Highway stop and go northbound from the 80s all the way up to the Cross Bronx. | |
| Brooklyn Bridge heavy in both directions. | |
| Belt Parkway basically heavy both ways. | |
| Blackbush Avenue to the Verizano. | |
| Eastbound delays continue to cross Bay. | |
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| I'm Adrian Watson. | |
| Next traffic, five o'clock on 710 W O R. And tonight mostly clear skies down to about seventy-six degrees. | |
| Tomorrow, plenty of sun. | |
| Eighty eight's gonna do it for the high tomorrow. | |
| Not so high as today. |
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