Morning Wire - Trump Frees Captive in Russia & Socialists Regroup From Loss | 8.13.26

Episode Date: August 13, 2026

Democratic socialists are regrouping after a shock loss in Wisconsin while Republicans see a real opportunity there and in Minnesota, a U.S. Marine Veteran is freed after four years in a Russian prison following intervention by President Trump, and the WNBA debate gets racially charged – and has Sophie Cunningham’s coach playing defense. Reporting from Cabot Phillips, Mary Margaret Olohan & Lynden Blake. Get the facts first with Morning Wire.- - -Ep. 3036- - -Wake up with new Morning Wire merch: https://bit.ly/4lIubt3- - -Today's Sponsors:Lean - Get 20% off when you enter code WIRE at https://TakeLean.com Shopify - Stop waiting for permission to build something. Your next revenue stream starts free at https://shopify.com/morningwire Vanta - Whether you’re a fast-growing startup or a global enterprise, Vanta is here to help you automate your security and compliance, and earn and prove trust. Get started today at https://vanta.com/morningwire - - -Privacy Policy: https://www.dailywire.com/privacymorning wire,morning wire podcast,the morning wire podcast,Georgia Howe,John Bickley,daily wire podcast,podcast,news podcast Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What if a few minutes with God could change the direction of your entire day? With pray.com, you can begin each morning with powerful daily prayers, inspiring Bible stories, and messages created to strengthen your faith. Whether you need peace, encouragement, or a fresh start, pray.com helps you make prayer part of your everyday life. Download the pray.com app today. Democratic socialists are regrouping after a shock loss in Wisconsin, while Republicans see a real opportunity there and in Minnesota. I'm looking forward to working with every single candidate in every all walks of life, no matter where you fall on the political spectrum,

to make sure that we can defeat the MAGA extremism. I'm Georgia Howe with Daily Wire Executive Editor John Bickley. It's Thursday, August 13th, and this is Morning Wire. A U.S. Marine Veteran is, is freed after four years in a Russian prison following intervention by President Trump. And the WNBA debate gets racially charged and has Sophie Cunningham's coach playing defense. The stuff that's trying to hijack our league will not win. Thanks for waking up with Morning Wire. Stay tuned. We have the news you need to know.

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Visit takeleen.com and enter Wire for your discount. That's promo code wire at takelein.com. The dust is now settled from a significant series of primaries held Tuesday. marquee result came out of Wisconsin, which saw a shock upset that could have broader implications. Here to tell us more is Wired-in host, Cabot Phillips. So Cabot, let's start with the race that everyone is buzzing about. This is the Democrat primary for governor in Wisconsin. There, we saw David Crowley, who was behind in the polls, actually have a very late and narrow upset against Francesca Wong. What happened in that race? Yeah, this was no doubt one of the most shocking results we've seen this

entire primary season. So before election day, polls had Hong leading Crowley 44 to 22, and she was a 20 to one favorite on the betting markets, but she ended up losing by a little over 3,000 votes. Now, just a few weeks ago, everyone considered this primary a more or less coronation for Hong, considering that Crowley had actually dropped out of this race just a few weeks ago after failing to gain any traction in the polls. But he jumped back in less than two weeks ago with massive support from establishment Democrats, and also the endorsement of the state's powerful Democratic Governor Tony Evers. Hong really fits the bill of a lot of these new era Democratic socialists that we talked

about yesterday, who were dominating state primaries. But she came with a lot of baggage, especially for a purple state like Wisconsin. And Democrat leaders there were terrified at her prospects of actually winning in November, and that is why they jumped in late to try and rally the troops around Crowley. Hong has in the past called for canceling Thanksgiving, defunding the police, abolishing the Senate, whiteness, despite the fact that her own son is half white. She said that that made her uncomfortable. And in the end, she ultimately underperformed in white working class areas of Wisconsin and did not make up enough ground in college towns like Madison.

Now, about Crowley, he's being billed by the legacy media as a moderate. But is that actually true? Yeah, to be fair, when you're compared to someone like Francesca Hong, anyone would look like a moderate. That's not too much of an exaggeration. But the term moderate does require a little bit of a closer look here. Crowley has his own fair share of far-left skeletons in the closet, despite his moderate billing on the ballot. During the unrest of 2020, post-Torz Floyd, for example, he went all in supporting the Black Lives Matter movement,

calling racism the, quote, real public health crisis. After George Floyd's death, he praised Colin Kaepernick's national anthem protest. He suggested that professional sports should shut down nationwide until the country achieved racial justice. He's also said that defunding the police was a, quote, conversation we're going to have to have. He's advocated for driver's licenses and free college tuition for illegal immigrants. He said that law enforcement should be banned from asking about immigration status. And more recently on the campaign trail, he said that referring to him as an

establishment candidate was a, quote, racial slur. Have a listen. When people try to call me the establishment, I look at that as a slur, particularly as an African-American candidate. But perhaps most importantly, Crowley clearly does not see himself as a moderate. While on the campaign trail, he pretty frequently downplayed the ideological distance between himself and Francesca Hong, saying that they shared most of the same goals, even if, quote, we may not use the same labels. So this November race is really going to be a test of whether voters see Crowley as a moderate or just a Francesca Hong copy with better packaging. Now, let's talk about the Minnesota Senate race. The Republican primary winner is someone that listeners of this show will recognize Michelle Tafoya.

How competitive is that seat actually? Yeah, Michelle Tofoya is a legendary NFL sideline reporter and also a legend of sorts here at Daily Wire. She filled in for you, Georgia, hosting this program while you were on maternity leave. But she's now won the Republican nomination for Minnesota's open Senate seat. She dominated a nine-person field, taking 52% of the vote and actually beating the state parties endorsed candidate very easily. DeFoyer is now going to face off against Democratic nominee Lieutenant Governor Peggy Flanagan in November. Flanagan for herself beat the moderate Congresswoman, Angie Craig by 20 points. Now, the odds are stacked against Defoea. Republicans have not won a

statewide race in Minnesota since 06, so that's 28 consecutive statewide losses. But she certainly has a lot of ammunition heading into November. Flanagan is very far left. She was a top figure also in Governor Tim Walz's administration, which has overseen scandal after scandal and an increase in crime and living costs, which ultimately led to Wall's not seeking re-election himself. A lot of Republicans think all of that will put this seat in play and give them the best shot in decades. There's also no incumbency advantage for the Democrats. They chose the Sanders-endorsed candidate in the primary. That's Peggy Flanagan.

And Tofoya, again, has the name recognition and national backing to potentially make the race interesting. And she also is a more moderate Republican. She, I wouldn't necessarily say, is a America-first MAGA type. She definitely has moderated on a few issues, including abortion. Now, there's also what some see as a surprising outcome. for the Minnesota governor primary for Republican. What happened there? Yeah, a wild race.

So state house speaker, Lisa Dumuth, beat my pillow founder, Mike Lindell, who was on track to lose by double digits. And that is despite President Trump's endorsement. There was pretty limited polling in this race, but Republicans have been hammering Lindell for weeks about his electability, given previous and other numerous failed campaigns. And in the end, it looks like President Trump's endorsement was not enough to get him across the finish line. Lendell has so far refused to concede.

He's saying that there are some irregularities with the vote totals, but it's going to be pretty difficult to imagine a way that he makes up the 45,000 vote deficit he's facing right now. DeMuth is going to face off with Democrat Senator Amy Klobuchar in November. She won with about 95% of the votes. It's going to be a very tough race on the gubernatorial side for Republicans. Well, and it'll be just really interesting to see where independence break in all of these races. Cabot, thanks for reporting. Absolutely.

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your security and compliance and earn and prove trust. Get started today at vanta.com slash morningwire. That's V-a-N-T-A.com slash morningwire. U.S. Marine veteran Robert Gilman, who was held in a Russian prison for more than 1,600 days, was freed Tuesday after President Trump reached out to Vladimir Putin amid reports that Gilman was suffering severe medical crises. Joining us now with this story is our White House correspondent Mary Margaret Olaihan, who's right in front of the White House right now, actually. Great to see you. Great to be here. So this story dates back to 2022 when Gilman was first imprisoned in Russia under highly controversial charges to say. say the least. His name came up a lot when the Biden administration pushed for the release of

Brittany Griner. That was in December 2022, but Gilman was notably left there behind bars. So walk us through this first. How did Gilman become imprisoned and what kind of sentence was he facing? Yeah, so I learned a lot about this actually from reporting that Cassie Akiva, one of our colleagues did, describing how Gilman, who formerly served the United States military, was a teacher, had gone to Russia and was only there for a little while, actually, when he encountered some problems with his passport. So he had to stay in Moscow longer than he intended. He was very ill while he was there.

He came down with even more serious illness while he was trying to figure out his documentation. And unfortunately, according to the activist websites that have been created in his name, the story goes that he had gone to get his proper documentation, that he became very sick, that he was vomiting profusely. and unable to stand up and got into a tuffle with police

who didn't understand his situation and took him into custody and unfortunately were told that he bumped a police officer's leg while he was really just not able to support himself and was accused of assaulting a police officer and was then put into a very, very, you know, horrific situation in Russian imprisonment where he was tortured, he was treated really badly,

he was put in really extreme prison cells. And at one point, while he was undergoing this treatment, he was accused of attacking a prison guard, and that would have landed him in a very long prison sentence. So he was not doing well while he was over there and had begged for release, had begged for help from the president for multiple administrations, but didn't receive it until President Trump came to his aid.

And as you mentioned, so his sentence was extended, was it a full decade that he was facing? Yes, he was. And we have some really disturbing pictures of him going to different trials, which as we know are not the same sort of trials that you might face here in the United States of America, the land of the free and the home of the brave. So Gilman was really not doing well. He had some very serious health issues. And Cassie had reported earlier this month, actually, that he was so ill that there were fears that if he remained imprisoned longer, that he would die. He had a very severe case of pneumonia. And I believe,

it was Senator Ed Markey, who's a Democrat, who had been really pleading his case and bringing it to the attention of lawmakers and pushing this in front of the president. And so President Trump then brought it to Putin, and the president announced that he would be freed and that he was very grateful to Putin for this, partially because Putin didn't ask for a prisoner in exchange. And if you remember back to when Brittany Greiner was released, well, he did ask Biden to give him a prisoner in exchange, and he was given a notorious arms dealer. in exchange for Brittany Griner's freedom. So this was a win for the Trump presidency,

not only because they were able to bring Gillen back, but because they were able to do it, you know, as you might say, so easily. He was brought back on a plane with a number of White House staff, and the president said that he talked to him on the phone and that he asked, he said that he wanted a American cheeseburger as soon as he got back, which I think is a relatable ask.

But also, you know, after spending so much time in Russian prison, we can understand why he would want it just a good old American cheeseburger. Indeed. It always sounds good to me. I'm sure it sounds amazing for him. How is Gilman doing? Do we have any updates on his health status? Yeah, we've been told that he's doing all right, that he's with his family.

His mother was on the plane coming back, which is really amazing. And you can only imagine how touching that scene must have been for her to be reunited with her son after so much time. But we're told he is doing well, better than he was in prison, but he is still in need of are parents he's still recovering. And President Donald Trump has brought back a number of different high-profile American prisoners who have been stuck in Russia. Mark Fogle was one of them that Cassie reported on extensively last year as well. And he has brought back, obviously, all of many, if not all of the hostages that we had

seen in taken by Hamas and this horrific situation after October 7th. But there's still many more. I believe there's at least five more Americans held hostage in Russia. So State Department, Marco Rubio and the president have all said that they're going to do their best to bring them home as soon as possible. And they're very optimistic that they can accomplish this given their success thus far. Well, as you've laid out here, yes, very successful. And in the meantime, we're praying for all of those Americans. We want to come home as soon as possible.

Mary Margaret, thank you so much for joining us. Thank you for having me. The WNBA Sophie Cunningham saga just continues to dominate the sports world and has now added a racially charged accusation and some much scrutinized press conferences. Joining us now is That So Criminal host, Lyndon Blake. So, Lyndon, we've been tracking this story over the past couple of weeks. And the most recent drama on the court with the WNBA is Sophie Cunningham was playing her team. The Indiana Fever was playing a Chicago's team and a Chicago player. clotheslined Sophie, which is a term that everyone knows except me, I guess. And this other player

sort of decided to make it about race and things exploded from there. So please explain what happened. You know what's funny about all these WMBA stories is they're multi-day stories because you have one incident and then it just keeps building and building and building. So this story has even built more because the player that tweeted white privilege at Indiana Fever, which is Dijunet Karrington from the Chicago Sky, has continued to talk about her statement that she made on social media. So before she could even hit the showers in the locker room after she was ejected, she went on social media and all caps tweeted white privilege at Indiana fever, the official fever account. And this was because, as you mentioned, that hard, flagrant two foul on Sophie Cunningham,

you know, fouls happen in basketball. It is a part of the game. It is a very physical game. But this foul was too much. It was unnecessary. it was not a play on the ball at all. And so, flagrant to, the right call was made. She was ejected.

But then Dijanae makes it about race. And to that, she is essentially doubled down and said this. I've never once claimed the assessment of the foul was white privilege. That was your assumption. So she is basically saying that she was not claiming that that foul was white privilege. To that I ask, then what were you talking about? Well, and that actually wasn't even, that was just the entry point to the drama, which has since unfolded significantly more on a couple of levels.

So tell us about the Indiana Fever coach. Yeah, so originally Stephanie White, the Indiana Fever coach was asked about this, and she seemed to take up for Dijunay over Cunningham. And this has been a repeated pattern recently with Stephanie White, and you call it like you see it. I don't think that Dijanay intentionally came out to get her across the neck like she did. But it did happen, and I thought it was the right call. One of the things about Ney is that she's going to play her butt off, man.

She's going to compete. nobody's going to go walking in for a layup. And so I'm not, I don't oppose the hard foul. But I also don't think that she intentionally went for the net. But now, Stephanie White is kind of walking that back. I didn't see the play in real time. I went straight to a press conference. I take personally any suggestions that I don't 100% always have my players back.

I stand by them. I will always stand by them. Everybody else can go to hell. So a fiery response from Stephanie White, after getting that original pushback for not defending Cunningham. Now, we've laughed a lot about this story, frankly, but it keeps coming up, and it's actually amazing how much is dominating headlines in the sports world.

And there is a very serious couple of threads now to this. There's now a racially charged thread, and this has been running for a long time with Caitlin Clark. And we're also seeing, too, this divide in the media. You mentioned this, but a divide in the media about how they approach, particularly these players, Cunningham, Caitlin Clark, and now with the transgender issue added to it. It seems like there is a lot of ideological and political bias at work here. Would you agree?

I mean, 100%. I, as a lover of the game of basketball and as a lover of sports and someone that covers sports, I mean, you do not want to make a foul like that about race at all because it's not. Dijunet, getting ejected, that was not a lot. about being a black player. That was about a flagrant to foul. And when you have people that cover the sport, like Chris Williamson for CBS, he covers the WMBA.

When you have him tweeting out Dijanae was right, how can you do that? You are fueling this false narrative that there is this white privilege in the WMBA. That simply is not true. That does not exist. All right. Well, Lyndon, thank you so much for reporting.

Of course. Thanks for waking up with us. The reporting that fuels this show is only possible because you tune in every day and because of our Daily Wire subscribers. To enjoy the show, ad free and join our mission, become a member at DailyWire.com. Also, stick around after this for the trailer of Run Hide Fight Infidels. We'll be back this evening with more news you need to know. Your country is beneath contempt.

We who love and serve Allah fought back against the Americans and the Zionists from the scourge of secularism and the lands of unbelief. Listen to Captain Saunders tomorrow. The retired Delta Force soldier with a new book out. He's the polar opposite of those brain-dead protesters. Given the current climate, should place Saunders even be allowed on campus? Mr. Saunders is a close personal friend of Chancellor Friedman. This is a decision I cannot fly.

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