PBD Podcast - Iran Threatens Trump As Tariff Trade War RAGES | PBD Podcast | Ep. 572

Episode Date: April 8, 2025

Patrick Bet-David, Tom Ellsworth, Vincent Oshana, Brandon Aceto, and Adam Sosnick cover the Supreme Court ruling in favor of Venezuelan migrants under the Alien Enemies Act, Donald Trump doubling down on tariffs as China vows to 'fight to the end,' and a new book claims Barack Obama's greed destroyed the Democratic party. ------🐶 THE VT PET COLLECTION: https://bit.ly/3RGNANG👕 GET THE LATEST VT MERCH: ⁠⁠⁠https://bit.ly/3BZbD6l⁠⁠⁠📕 PBD'S BOOK "THE ACADEMY": ⁠⁠⁠https://bit.ly/41rtEV4⁠⁠⁠📰 VTNEWS.AI: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://bit.ly/3OExClZ⁠⁠⁠🎙️ FOLLOW THE PODCAST ON SPOTIFY: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://bit.ly/4g57zR2⁠⁠⁠🎙️ FOLLOW THE PODCAST ON ITUNES: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://bit.ly/4g1bXAh⁠⁠⁠🎙️ FOLLOW THE PODCAST ON ALL PLATFORMS: ⁠⁠⁠https://bit.ly/4eXQl6A⁠⁠⁠📱 CONNECT ON MINNECT: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://bit.ly/4ikyEkC⁠⁠⁠👔 BET-DAVID CONSULTING: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://bit.ly/3ZjWhB7⁠⁠⁠🎓 VALUETAINMENT UNIVERSITY: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://bit.ly/3BfA5Qw⁠⁠⁠📺 JOIN THE CHANNEL: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://bit.ly/4g5C6Or⁠⁠⁠💬 TEXT US: Text “PODCAST” to 310-340-1132 to get the latest updates in real-time!ABOUT US:Patrick Bet-David is the founder and CEO of Valuetainment Media. He is the author of the #1 Wall Street Journal Bestseller “Your Next Five Moves” (Simon & Schuster) and a father of 2 boys and 2 girls. He currently resides in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida.

Did you ever think you would make it? I feel I'm so close, like it takes sweet victory Know this life meant for me Adam, what's your point? The future looks bright My handshake is better than anything I ever signed, right here You are a 101? My son's right there

I think I've ever said this before I don't know, I may have done that well we'll figure it out folks how you doing we got a special guest here on the podcast you'll see him in a minute when he joins us but we also have a Brandon Assetto here with us by the way he's speaking on behalf of those in their 20s and he is sick and tired of what's going on with the market he wants a chance he's gonna give some data to you today. That's gonna be very interesting. I know what the numbers are I'm not gonna share it. I want him to tell you and what's happened what it takes the average salary I'm sure you have that data It takes the average salary of some other to buy one share of the SMP today versus 20 years ago 40 years ago 60

Years ago very very interesting and he's got a good point And we should listen to what he has to say. For the rest of us in our 30s, we have different perspectives in here, right? And we'll cover that. But we got a lot of stories to go through here. The tariffs is causing mayhem. Everybody thought Monday was going to be Black Monday.

It didn't end up becoming Black Monday, but that doesn't mean there's not a Black Tuesday or Black Friday or Black Thursday around the corner as they're going through this negotiation, especially after China said, we are going to the very end, we're not going to cave at all, so we're going to cover those stories. Number one, 2200 points Dow drops in a single day. $6.4 trillion is wiped out in a two-day bloodbath as China declares trade war over Trump tariffs. I cannot tell you how many Manettes I've gotten specifically asking about what should I do with my investment portfolio, etc., etc., and I have my own opinion on it.

So $6.4 trillion scares a lot of people. By the way, you know what $6.4 trillion is? That's like 6,400 people losing a billion dollars. That's 64,000 people losing a hundred million dollars. That's 640,000 people losing 10 million. That's six and a half million people losing a million. You're really showing your math skills. I'm just telling you.

No, what I'm trying to tell you is $6.4 trillion loss is a lot of money for a lot of people like that. So we'll cover that. China retaliates with 34% tariffs on U.S. imports. Italy warns against counter tariffs on U.S. calls for budget leeway. Tom's got a very, very good angle on that one he'll cover with you guys. Vietnam ready to remove U.S. import tariffs as it seeks to delay Trump's 46% levy. Trump urges Americans to hang on to tariffs plan as markets tumble. Legendary economist says Trump's tariffs could replay devastating history.

State-controlled Iranian newspaper calls for firing bullets into Trump's empty skull. This is Fox News story. We'd lose the war, Tucker Carlson wars against bombing Iran as terror for tanks markets. Trump calls for Fed's power to cut interest rates and stop playing politics. Jerome Powell predicts when Americans will feel ripple effects from Trump's global tariffs. Jerome Powell predicts when Americans will feel it. So not everybody's on the same page. Eric Adams ditches them primary to seek reelection as page. Eric Adams ditches them primary to seek reelection as independent.

Eric Adams had some interesting things to say. He was on the, what do you call it? The Andrew Schultz, the flagrant podcast. And it was actually a very good interview. Mark Cuban weighs in on transgender athlete and women's sports. Mark Cuban says, we're just not ready for it. People are just not ready for it.

I mean, people are not ready to have men compete with women. Maybe that's going to be forever, you know, that we're not going to be ready for it, but maybe Mark's got additional ideas we don't know about. He also warns that Trump's tariffs plan plus Doge cut cuts could lead the country to a far worse situation than 08. Musk breaks with Trump on tariffs as he distances from the White House And we got a few other stories if you guys are looking for a good podcast Michelle Obama's podcast is not doing that well But if you were interested you could check that one out Kamala Harris was completely shocked by election night loss to Trump's to Trump after she bought the hype

Can you imagine like she was convinced she was gonna win and she was upset at the people that told her that you were going to win. So whose fault is it? And then Barack Obama destroyed the Democratic Party by competing for power and money with his own organization. This new book that just came out is not holding back with those guys. And we've got a couple of other stories that we'll cover here as well. Supreme Court clears ways for Venezuelan deportations to resume resume South Korea ICE boosting energy import, to

cut surplus. Vinny's got some stuff he wants to say about what Bill Burr said, as well as Taylor Lorenz disappointed to learn Joe Biden didn't die on Saturday. It's pretty strange to say something like that. Scott Besson says up to 70 nations are wanting to negotiate and there's some nuclear talks that's going on here as well. Now for those of you that are watching this, we'll cover all these stories here. We've got a some nuclear talks that's going on here as well. Now, for those of you that are watching this, we'll cover all these stories here,

we got a lot of stuff that's going on. Are you a dog person or a cat person? We know this guy's a cat person, Adam. I have a special guest here today, if you can bring him over here. This is my number one therapist for the last 16 years next month. This is our buddy Jimbo.

Jimbo! Jimbo's gonna be 16 years old next month and he's wearing, Jimbo can we show off what you got on? He's got a future looks bright shirt back here and because it is, it is, what is it, the national pet day Rob? Can you pull that out? Yes, Friday, national pet day. National pet day is Friday. We got this gear for you that our merch team thought it was a good idea.

Okay, I want to show you this. So if you guys, honestly, if this sells out, I'm going to personally give credit to the merch team to come up with these ideas and I will say this is their idea if it goes lights out. Okay? Now, what do we have here? A few different things for you to pick from with Future Looks Bright. Frisbee Rope Toy, this is one.

We have this tennis ball, what does it say? Tennis ball sling toy. We have this other one. This is sick actually, if you look at it. This is the biting, you know, the dog toy and what the leash is that we got with Future Looks Bright on it and Vitaemon on it. This is the gangster if you're from LA, New York,

maybe Elton Mour picked this up. We got some of this stuff. And on top of that, if you go, by the way, look at that Yeti one. Can you zoom into that Yeti one. Can you zoom into that Yeti one? Is that like a Yeti like a, Yeti dog bowl?

Yeah, look how sick that is with future looks right. Every day your dog will be excited when he's going through this. Go back Rob. So let's place an order on one of the things so they can kind of see. Let's place an order on this, hypothetically. If you buy this, watch what happens, okay?

So you buy this 15 bucks, you add it to the cart, then it says to you, are you team wolf or team meow? Okay? So you're gonna get a value team and mug that says meow or wolf, depending on if you're a dog person or cat person. Obviously Adam goes with meow and Vinny would go with wolf, but some of us like dogs and cats.

But anyways, if you got animals, if you got dogs, go place an order for National Pet Day, Future Looks Bright. I'll never forget one of the shows I watched cartoons that it said, All Dogs Go to Heaven, with the character of Charlie. You remember that? What a great movie, right? If you love dogs, you got dogs, place an order, Future Looks Bright, not only for us humans, but also for dogs.

Okay. All right, Jimmy, can you? You want me to take this guy now? Yeah, but also for dogs. Okay, all right Jimmy, can you? You want me to take this guy now? Yeah, take him out because he's got strong opinions about tariffs right now. Yeah, but you don't wanna hear him. These items were a lot cheaper two months ago than now. Shout out to Kelly in the house.

We actually had a very big debate. We were not on the same page with tariffs. He's not happy about it. No? No, he's not. He wasn't happy about it. Really? Yeah, he wasn't happy about it.

You know what was his biggest turn when he no longer longer supported with Trump? What scared him? What? Kristi Noem, what happened? One of the stories where she shot down he was kind of like, I can't, he was afraid, he was shaking.

I'm like, she's a good lady, but she's a hunter. Like you don't have to worry about that, but he's gonna be okay. He's gonna be okay. Yeah, that's right. All right, so let's go through the stories here on what we got.

I think it's fair to say, Rob, we start off with the market and tariffs. What do you think? All right, let's go through this. Dow is down 2,200 points as $6.4 trillion is wiped out in a two-day bloodbath as China declares trade war over Trump's tariffs. This is an April 4th story from New York Post. Okay, so let's go through this here. Is this on page, it says page, okay, it's page three. Let me read this to you.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average plummeted more than 2,200 points on Friday following 1679, previous drop, marking its worst session since the start of COVID 2020, as Wall Street's bloodbath erased $6.4 trillion in market value just in two days due to China's retaliatory 34% levy on U.S. imports starting April 10th. In response to Trump's reciprocal tariff plan imposing a 54% tax effect on April 9th, the tech-heavy Nasdaq fell 962.5%, entering bear market territory

with a drop exceeding 20% from its December peak while S&P 500 declined 322.0 or 5.97 amid global stock market descent, driven by fears that Trump's 10% baseline tariff would harsher rates for many nations could stoke inflation and trigger a recession as noted by Federal Reserve Jerome Powell, who warned of a potential persistent risk in inflation. Brandon, your thoughts on this story. Yeah, so a lot to cover here. So I mean, first and foremost, I'm super happy that the market's starting to go down. I think, honestly, people are going to hate this, but I think the best case scenario for the most people would be if the market goes down by something like 50% because 50% yeah, because I mean 10% of people own 90% of the stock market

So like the vast majority of people who own the stock market are you know, the top 10% and you know 50 years ago, I looked this up So like what would you guys imagine it took for a mile amount of hours worked to buy a share of the SP 500? Save 1970. What would you guess? 20 hours yeah no exactly right is it really you know what it is today 60 170 to what to do by one share of the SP 500 to work 170 hours today to buy one share of the SP 500 but you have to work 20 hours 50 years ago yeah to buy a share of SP 500 have my opinions, but I want to hear keep going

Yeah, no So I mean we've this goes into what we do with China like, you know So when we got off the gold standard when we started off showing our jobs to China We that's where the wealth gap really widened between the working class of America and you know The people who run companies in America like because profit margins got bigger and then wages didn't keep up with the stock market growth so we've essentially like decimate our middle class and you, you know, for young people to like I've been waiting to buy the dip for 15 years now and there hasn't been a dip to buy. You know, some people might say like COVID but that we just pumped money into the economy right away. Some people might say

2008 but we did quanta easing right away after that. So we have how old are you? How do you just turn 30 just done 30. So 15 years was 15 years ago. Yeah, but waiting to really feel like I could buy the dip for 15 years and it hasn't come. At 15 years old you were looking at investing. Good for you. I was thinking about it, yeah. So okay, so a part of what you're saying is the gap between the poor, middle, upper, and the rich

keeps getting wider and wider and wider, okay? And you wanted to see a massive market crash taking place, maybe a correction, for you to get in so you wanted to see a massive market crash taking place, maybe a correction for you to get in so you can get at a decent price. That's kind of what you're talking about. Yeah. And so that everybody could and keep in mind too, the market is way higher than it should be. Like essentially the boomers and gets higher than what it should be. Yeah. The boomers and Gen X have essentially stolen the future from the millennials and Gen Z

by pulling wealth forward to themselves that belong to the future right so you know it's 36 trillion like the all the Deficits mainly do that's been pulled from the future away from people who haven't even been born yet and put into the stock market essentially What do you think about this? Well, I think whenever you have an equation like this and thank you for doing the research. That's yeah, that's good So the number of hours was 50 years ago, right was 20 hours to buy one share of S&P Today with S&P at what 520 or 490 or whatever we are floating around right now, takes 170 hours. So that's 8.5X, right?

What was the P-E ratio of the S&P going back then? It's usually in the ballpark of what, 20 to 30? Okay, well actually under Jimmy Carter it was 7 to to 9 and under Ronald Reagan it was 10 to 13 That was a PE ratio if we want to go back that same time this in January the PE was 29 and right now the PE And I'm saying of the S&P is 24 so Wages is the problem yeah, because it's 8.5 X and a number of hours Is the problem yeah, because it's a point five X in a number of hours But the PE ratio is barely 3x and actually 2x if you just go from Reagan from like 10 to 13 That would be 20 to 26. Well right now it's 24 and it was 29 beginning of this year. You go back to

2016 it was 22 24 25 the three years going into kovat Yeah, so I think you make a point but it's not that the market is too expensive. It's that over all that time, wage growth for the middle class did not keep up. And as a result, an 8.5 difference in the middle class, number of hours when the PE ratio is really only doubled plus. Yeah, yeah, because that revenue has gone to corporations that have offshored their jobs and saved a ton of money on

production costs instead of going to, you know, decent paying jobs. So I think like that the tariffs are gonna solve two problems at once. It's gonna bring the market down to a reasonable level and it's gonna bring better jobs back to America and pull some money away from corporations because, you know, they've essentially like taken money from the workers to themselves by offshoring these jobs. Let me ask you, when you did 50 years ago was 20 hours was that 1970 or 1975? Because that's a big difference. 1970 and then it eventually goes to 40 hours worked and then by the 90s gets to 66 hours to buy the S&P. So okay if we go

1970 obviously a couple major events took place we've talked about this multiple times we went off the gold standard with Nixon, we allowed China to come in, gradually the whole ping pong, and then in the World Trade Organization, China gets involved, and then for us right now, like the supplies that we have, if you go on Trump's store, all this stuff is not made in US, you'll see made in China, made in Singapore, made in this, made in that, why?

Labor has to compete for us to bring a lot of the stuff here You know you're like what am I gonna do am I gonna have to compete because in? America is not known for a lot of the products to manufacture we've went away from that We need to get back into that so somebody needs to sit there and say how do I make that competitive in America? We've missed the mark there And on this at the same time the one thing once we went off of the gold standard, what happened? Debt became so easy. So people could raise debt and take a business and grow it.

So if somebody has access to debt, somebody leverages debt, somebody risks with debt, the other person doesn't, the disparity of the wealth is going to get wider and wider and wider. The part that they haven't yet figured out is what to do with the median income because that's definitely not growing. and that should be a concern Because some of these guys cannot afford houses so either Income needs to go up correction needs to happen or people need to go and live in a rural You know in a place that no one knows about and turn it into a next Frisco turn it into a next Palmdale turn it into

Next whatever city that may be and that's a valid concern Do you think that we have to compete with labor though? because I almost think that tariffs have to protect us against this cheap slave labor from other countries because you know we could compete with other countries in terms of putting tariffs on them when they have tariffs against us about labor how are we ever gonna compete with like Cambodia and China for labor because they could you know essentially make people work at slave wages but we're not gonna do that here so well

once you open to my opinion once we open that up and we went into that space, do you know what would happen? So think about it this way. When everybody says Trump's for the rich, okay? You said something earlier. You said 90% of the what? Equities is owned by what? 10%. 10%.

So who is Trump really hurting? Yeah, he's hurting the rich. He's not hurting, he's hurting the rich. Yeah. So the rich are being, the rich are the ones, even Musk is a little bit like, hey, you know, I don't know if you have that clip Rob. Yeah, he has like, you know, let me read this and then, you know, Musk breaks with Trump on tariffs as he distances from the White House. Now, whether there's truth on this or not, who knows? But Rob, can you play this clip? Go for it.

Can you play this clip? Go for it. I hope that the United States and Europe can establish a very close partnership. We obviously are, there's an alliance already, but I'm hopeful that there can be a very close relationship with America and Europe. And I'm hopeful, for example, with the tariffs that at the end of the day I hope it is agreed that both Europe and the United States should move ideally in my view to a zero tariff situation, effectively creating a free trade zone between Europe and North America. And that would be my, that's what I hope occurs.

And also more freedom of people to move between Europe and North America, if they wish. If they wish to work in Europe or wish to work in America. They should be allowed to do so. Rob, can you do me a favor, Rob? Go online, type in Tesla sales by different markets. Tesla sales by different regions and then just go to news. Go to Tesla sales by different, go to news, go to the third story. Okay look at this here. Go a little bit lower Rob. So just right there. Tesla sold 45%

fewer cars in Europe last month compared to January of last year. So that's, you understand, 45% fewer? That's not 4% fewer. That's not 10% fewer. So let's just say the stock does bad, but your sales are high, you're fine. It's not that the stock's down, it's the sales are down 45% fewer in Europe than last month. Then BEV sales grew by 37%.

That's the China car. That's like a $9,000 car. Reaching a market share of 16.7%. And self-charging hybrids are Europe's favorite power train type with a 34.9%. So Musk is sitting here. I think sales in China is down 29%. If I'm not mistaken. Europe is down 45%. And he's down in the US as well.

So this is affecting a lot of people that are actual big businesses. They're concerned about what this is going to do with the tariffs. But even Musk, I'll read this. Elon Musk publicly diverts from President Trump on terrified advocating at a virtual rally for Italy's Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini. I hope that the United States and Europe can establish a very close relationship. Both Europe and the US should move ideally in my view to a zero-tariff situation, which is what he just talked about here.

So we'll see what's going to happen there." And then he continues talking about possibility of, you know, Peter Navarro on next writing, a PhD in Econ from Harvard is a bad thing, not a good thing. And he aimed to build shit after Navarro defended the tariffs on CNN saying, we're trying to do under the principle that the president wants to charge those countries what they charge us. So there's a little bit of a rift here with this situation. So we're going to see what's going to happen there. Adam, you want to say something?

I just want to get back to one point that Brandon made Because you're a young guy. You're a smart guy I was sort of a little bit younger than you when I really started investing in the stock market So are you saying that you have not started investing yet because you're just waiting for the dip You said I've been waiting 15 years. So you just haven't started investing yet No, so I mostly have done day trading type of stuff off for the last 15 years And I'm like I may have small investments here and there but Like just straight up putting money in the S&P every week. I haven't done that How have you done by day trading? How's it done for you?

Um, I the biggest benefit from is I've learned a lot like I can't say that I've done like insanely well day trading It's a tough thing to do I think you're a sharp guy, but here's where I'll tell you that more is caught than taught So what you're doing is sort of acting on hypotheticals. What I've been able to do and what Pat and Tom Zander will do is actually invest in the market. Yeah. So actually experience the ins and outs, the ups and downs, the reds and greens of the

market. I started in 2008. Oh, perfect. Yes. Exactly. It's a little bit different. Well, no, because it's not timinging the market it's time in the market if you're sitting around and just waiting to buy the dip waiting to buy the dip You've had opportunities buddy. You could have done it in you said you started investing in 2009 to 15 years ago

You said 2010 market was down then you could have done it in 2020 So if you're trying to time the market, you're gonna be waiting for the perfect time forever So it's not about timing the market. It's about time in the market So, you know, you said something pretty shocking like you're you're praying for 50% downturn in the market Well, there's gonna be older people out there that are like, are you kidding me, bro? You want your grandma to go poor? We don't want that but they stole from us though. All right Well, you sound like a victim and I've heard that before on the show. No, just the numbers. But at what

point are you going to just buckle down and just say I'm a smart guy, let me play the long game and just start investing? Because I've seen so many people do what you're doing and like I'm going to wait for the perfect time. I'm going to wait for the there's no perfect time. There's no perfect moment. If you generally started investing 15 years ago and gave up the day trade nonsense and just decade trade, you'd probably have tens if not hundreds of thousands of dollars right now. So for someone like you, buy the dip now

and let's see where it is in 10 years. That's how you invest. You think this is a dip? Here's what I know about the market. If you pan out, the American economy, S&P 500 always wins. If you follow day, America, the American economy, S&P 500 always wins. If you follow day to day, here's what I guarantee, just because I've seen this a thousand times. Go Macs. Here's what I've seen a thousand times.

Go Mac or Trans Rock. It was Bloodbath a couple days ago. I guarantee you today is gonna be green. It's up and bounce back 1300. There we go. Just because I've seen this before. More is caught than taught. I used to look at the market every day and when it's actually your money and not Hypothetical woozies and floozies and woozies you actually notice. Oh my god. I made 20 grand today Oh, I'm down 18 grand today. I made 50 grand today. I'm down seven grand today It's actual money and you actually learn how to invest in the marketplace without that You're just talking about What ifs what ifs what ifs so my advice to you is put some money where your mouth is put some money in the market

And watch it grow would you agree that are we've prevented ourselves from having a legitimate recession or even a legitimate downturn for? Here's the challenge that I have Everyone you're you're trying to solve for what the American economy should do. Don't worry about the American economy. You know what economy should worry about? Your economy. I am. That's what I'm trying to buy in the top. Okay but you've been waiting 15 years. Well I mean you're realistically I should have like yeah got in during COVID but I yeah I didn't know. What was Dow Jones at 15 years ago Rob? Just go with that. Mac is trends is a good chart. It shows 90 years go to my macro trends macro trends So, where do you want them to go? There's a 90 year chart. So just go to Dow Jones

Just go back where you're at Rob, I mean the way you're going is gonna take you minutes Just go back to what you were doing you you were fine where you were at. Yeah, okay So 15 years ago, does it go 15 years yeah 2006 go to 2000 now 15 as 2010 where was the market at 2010 it was probably at 15000 right there it's grown 300% brand yeah yeah from that point on yet so I guess maybe like 10 years is a better to say but um okay 10 years go to 2015 even 2015 it's 2x more than 2x the whole. The whole time that we're pumping QE into the market, so it felt fragile at the time.

So sorry for being skeptical when we're just propping it up through a quaint of easing. Just to be clear, I'm not trying to rip you one. I'm trying to encourage you. You're solving for macro trends. Just put your damn money in it and figure it out. One last point, Pat, you'll remember this. COVID happens, March, you'll remember this. COVID happens.

March, you talked about this. You're on Jesse Waters yesterday. I've seen incredible takes. Rudy Gobert, NBA canceled, NHL canceled. What's going down? Everyone's freaking out. The market's going down. What do we do?

I think the market was maybe at 25,000, 20,000 cut in half. Everyone is like, I should have sold. Oh my God. What should I do? Six months later, I'm in the beautiful city of Addison, cut in half. Everyone is like I should have sold oh my god what should I do? Six months later I'm in the beautiful city of Addison Texas talking about Dow just reached all-time highs 30,000 and six months later it bounced back. So it's going to bounce back if you play the long game. Let's do this Rob. Go back to the

and I'm gonna make the point here with Brandon for him to consider. Go back to the tweet you have with Peter Navarro and Musk which I was reading earlier if we can go to that. Okay, so watch this Insurrection Barbie. I don't know who that is. Here's Peter Navarro explaining the tariffs and contrary to the fake experts class That is usually on corporate media. Peter Navarro has a PhD in economics from Harvard He also is not going to lie to you about what is happening to globalist agenda. Notice how he uses specific details instead of blank statements like chaos agent and destroying America. Do you have the clip?

I do. Yes. Let's see what he says and then watch Elon Musk's response on the bottom and this kind of ties into what you're saying, Brandon. Go for it. The economist tools because it's based on concepts like export and import demand, elasticities, currency adjustments and things like that. But here's the analytical issue we're trying to do under the principle that the president

wants to charge those countries what they charge us. As you pointed out, Vietnam has a tariff, applied tariff rate that's much larger than ours, but doesn't come near the tariff we've charged them. So question is, how do you value the following, Phil? So let me count the ways. You've got to value currency manipulation. You've got to value the VAT tax distortions, dumping, export subsidies, technical barriers to trade, agricultural barriers to trade, quotas, bans, counterfeiting, intellectual property theft, and all of that. So here's the punch line. If you look at the trade deficit, which every country runs from us, the first thing economists

should tell you, ask the next one you have on your show, should the U.S. have chronic and sustained trade deficits? No, there's a belief that they should not equilibrate. They should not. So what the trade deficit does for any given country, it's the sum of all cheating. It's the sum of all unfair trade practices. And in a national emergency, where the trade deficit itself is the national emergency and security threat because it takes our factories, our jobs and transfers wealth abroad that the reciprocal tariff is that which... That's a good story.

Watch this. We can pause it right there. Okay, so you see this. Go back to it. You know who disagrees? Elon Musk. He says the PhD in econ from Harvard is a bad thing, not a good thing, result in the ego brains versus one problem, right?

So now, who's right, who's wrong, when you see this here? Sometimes to get, like for example, you and I talk regularly, every day, and I know who the guys are that you admire, the economists and all these other guys that are in that space. Sometimes when you are so, so, so, so, so well read, what ends up happening is, what is that phrase?

Paralysis by analysis? That you eventually just don't take any action and you're arrested. You don't even know it, you're living in a prison. That you don't even wanna know, for some it's marriage, because you have so much experience. For some it's finances, for some it's exercising. For some it's buying real estate, for some it's marriage because you have so much experience. For some it's finances. For some it's exercising. For some it's buying real estate. For some it's

having a kid. For everybody it's something, right? Because we have so much information here that we're worried about taking action. But Tom, question. So I'm gonna transition into this next one. I thought that was a great exchange and I think Brandon, probably a lot of people feel like the way you do and I actually really like what Adam had to say on what to do with this. But let's go to the next story with tariffs. So we'll come back to this. China retaliates with 34% tariff on U.S. imports. So this kind of goes in with what we just saw here.

So the 34% imports, that's what caused the market to tank, right? And while that is taking place, Trump comes back. Rob, is that story today? So Vietnam is ready to remove U.S. import tariffs as it seeks delay to Trump's 46% levy. So Vietnam comes out and says, we're ready to negotiate. What do you guys want to do? Right? That's that story. And then Trump comes out and says, Rob, do you have the story of him putting the, going

even stronger on... Yes, that's addendum page six. China says it'll fight to the end. Right, there you go. China says it'll fight till the end after Trump threatens 50% additional tariffs. This is from yesterday, okay? So yesterday, they're saying we're not gonna back down

and we're gonna be negotiating with it till the very end. Okay, cool. China's Commerce Ministry vowed to fight to the end after Trump threatened an additional 50% tariff on U.S. imports from China, set for Wednesday on less Beijing, withdraws the 34% tariffs from last Friday. The ministry said the U.S. threat to escalate tariffs on China is a mistake on top of a mistake and China will never accept it following Trump's 34% levy on top of 20% duties since February, pushing US tariffs on China to 65% per Morgan Stanley. The People's Bank of China set the Yuan's midpoint rate at 7.2 per dollar Tuesday, the weakest since September 2023, signaling strain

with Robin Brooks telling CNBC, this is Beijing politely saying this is getting a little too much. We are putting you on notice China's 34 percent retaliatory tariffs after Trump's moves Noting since China already faces more than 60 percent in tariff rate It doesn't really matter if it goes up 50 percent or 500 percent hinting at the readiness for a full trade war Saying 500 percent is this in responding to it Rob. This is Donald Trump yesterday with war. Same 500%. Is this him responding to it, Rob? This is Donald Trump yesterday with Bibi Netanyahu from the White House. Okay, and they're talking about tariffs? Yes, the 50% tariff.

Go for it. As you know, against my statement, they put a 34% tariff on above what their ridiculous tariffs were already. And I said if that tariff isn't removed by tomorrow at 12 o'clock, we're putting a 50% tariff on above the tariffs that we put on. So they've gone for years. They've become a rich country because of people, again, that were in the White House that allowed this to happen. Hundreds of billions of dollars a year they've making us on trade, and it shouldn't be that

way. And have a great relationship with- Rob, can you do me a favor? Go find a clip, and this is the part where a lot of this stuff is kind of coming together. Do you have the clip from Pelosi on China with tariffs? This is in 1996. Folks, if you've never seen this, you have to see this. Pelosi is talking about tariffs on how China, this is it Rob, watch this,

it's 5 minutes and 42 seconds. I'll find a shorter one. There's a shorter one Rob. How long is that one? That's the same thing. Is it the same thing? Well let's see how quickly she gets into it. Let's see how quickly, oh I found one that is, let me see if this is the one.

You want to go over, she's at the chart. Do you have the chart? I think if you click like a minute into it, it shows her at the chart. How far does China's- That's it. Go back a little bit. Perfect. Go for it.

Watch this, folks. On the status quo that the business community is asking each and every one of you, each and every one of us to endorse today. Right now we have a $34 billion trade deficit with China, the 1999-95 figure. It will be over $40 billion for 1996. Since the Tiananmen Square massacre, this figure has increased 1000% from $3.5 billion then to about $34 billion now. In terms of tariffs, I think it's interesting to note that the average US MFM tariff on Chinese goods

coming into the United States is 2%. Whereas the average Chinese MFM tariff on US goods going into China is 35%. Is that reciprocal? On exports, China only allows certain industries into China of US industries into China and Therefore only 2% of US exports are allowed into China on the other hand the US allows China to flood our markets With 30 a third of their exports and that'll probably go over 40% And and it's limitless because we have not placed any restriction.

In terms of jobs, this is the biggest and cruelest hoax of all. Not only do we not have market access, not only do they have prohibitive tariffs, not only are our exports not led in very specifically, but China benefits with at least 10 million jobs from US-China trade. We gave them those jobs. The president in his statement requesting this special waiver said that China trade supports 170,000 jobs in the United States. 170,000 jobs, whereas our imports from China support 10 million jobs at least. Fact is that that U.S.-China trade is a job loser.

And one of the reasons that it is, is because in order, well first let me just make another point and that is that our colleagues on the other side of this issue will say that trade with China, exports to China have increased three times in the last ten years. They have, but they failed to mention that exports imports from China have increased 11 times, thereby leading to this huge trade deficit. The other issue in addition, if intellectual... So, and then she gets into intellectual and a bunch of different things. This is Democrat Nancy Pelosi, 96, talking about what's going on with China. And if you go back and listen to what Trump

said on Oprah Winfrey in 1988, when he talked about tariffs, that's exactly what he's been talking about. Trump's been talking about this with Oprah Winfrey since 1988. Is this a clip on tariffs? Yes. Go for it, Rob. Is this a clip on tariffs? Yes. Go for it, Rob. Watch this, folks. ... foreign policy. What would you do differently, Donald?

Watch this. I'd make our allies, forgetting about the enemies, the enemies you can't talk to so easily. I'd make our allies pay their fair share. We're a debtor nation. Something's going to happen over the next number of years with this country, because you can't keep going on losing 200 billion, and yet we let Japan come in and dump everything right into our markets and everything.

It's not free trade. If you ever go to Japan right now and try to sell something, forget about it, Oprah. Just forget about it. It's almost impossible. They don't have laws against it. They just make it impossible. They come over here, they sell their cars, their VCRs, they knock the hell out of our companies and hey, I have tremendous respect for the Japanese people.

I mean, you can respect somebody that's beaten the hell out of you, but they are beating the hell out of this country. Kuwait, they live like kings. The poorest person in Kuwait, they live like kings. And yet they're not paying. We make it possible for them to sell their oil. Why aren't they paying us 25% of what they're making? It's a joke. This sounds like

a political presidential talk. So the people that say Trump is, you know, he's just doing this, he's doing hard, he's doing this, he's doing that, he's been on this position with tariffs since 1988. Tom, your thoughts here with what's going on with China, the tariffs, as well as the clip we played with Nancy Pelosi. Wow, there's a whole bunch of stuff. First of all, take the easy one.

The easy one is Nancy Pelosi. This is Nancy Pelosi in what I call PG mode, which I stand for as pre-globalist. As she moved to globalism, all of those positions you just say shifted away. This isn't Nancy in history, this is a different Nancy. This was Nancy truly looking out for the American worker and a lot of union dollars were in that gold necklace there. A lot of union support was in her campaigns there.

And when you move to a globalist agenda, you realize the truth that they subtly moved away from supporting America's unions and they took money from other things. So Nancy's easy. She moved to a globalist agenda. That sounds like Trump because it does sound like Trump. Now then, we go to China today. I find it very interesting that Vietnam, Taiwan, and Cambodia, the little tigers that were all wanting to help during COVID. I don't know if you remember, but they all spoke up and says, we'll help you with supply chains. We'll see what we could do. You know why? They wanted market share of that manufacturing. They're not saluting China, especially Taiwan. It's like, hey, we'll help you out.

We'll manufacture. So Vietnam, Taiwan, and Cambodia, and last night, Scott Besson told Fox News it wasn't 50 countries, it was 70 countries that were ready to discuss, and that Japan had raised its hand early, and so it was going to be one of the first to the table. You raised your hand first, you came in the first, guess what? You get to meet the teacher first. So I think there's a lot of international market share of manufacturing that's responding here.

Now the market likes that. Today the market's up 3%. Everything's up 3% across the board. And before the market even opened today, the VIX was from 49 down to 41 and right now I think somebody help me, I think the VIX is 38, meaning that the volatility as measured by the inside of the market of the intensity, there it is, 38, the intensity of the market trading and change has dropped 10 points overnight. Why?

Because the market loves what it heard from Vietnam, Taiwan, Cambodia, and the number 70 and the word Japan from Scott. Now then, that does not yet help the American worker. What will help the American worker is when the jobs come here. And that's a multifaceted issue that Trump is fighting. But the market likes it when we get back to some people

cooperating and by the way You know who Ursula von der Leyen is? she's the president of the EU Commission and she goes out and makes speeches when Macron and people don't want to make because remember they face the wrath of the media and the populace Don't want to make because remember they face the wrath of the media and the populace So McCrone comes out makes a statement supporting Trump on tariffs. Look out He's gonna get slaughtered in the press and the people are gonna be pissed But Ursula von der Leyen president EU Commission can say to China this morning She said it two and a half hours ago. I saw it

We had a phone call with China and I spoke to the premier and I cautioned them strongly on responding irrationally and too roughly to what President Trump is doing. So that is a very large trading market with China calling them on the phone through their president of the EU commission to say, hey man, easy does it, easy does it to just translate that so that's what I think is going on right now China's got to come to the bargaining table that there's multiple facets here that encourage me a lot Brandon oh yeah so you know this makes me think of you told me about the guy Morton Downey Jr. there today how is the fastest rise and fall ever of a person on TV I think

that's what China's gonna be if you look at China's GDP I think it's gonna be the fastest rise and fall of a country that we've ever seen before because their GDP explicitly rose because of what we gave them we gave them like the sweetest best setup ever to pump money into China You know with no conditions just hey here do our slave labor. We're getting off the gold standard So we want cheap labor so that inflation isn't super noticeable But I think this- And a fully manipulated currency. Exactly, yes, exactly. And they've stolen our technology and I think that this is the hill they're holding the

die on. So that is the one thing that makes me nervous. I think they're a paper tiger in a lot of regards, but I think they will take drastic measures to stop us from being successful with this because this will decimate them if we fall through with it. Brian, I'm dead serious and you could see I know you weren't looking but exactly what you were Saying was what hit me last night about China first of all there are adversary correct Well, I think personally adversary to be it's a it's an opponent in a contest conflict or dispute

I think it's deeper than that. I think they are our enemy because if you think about we're at war with them We're at war. It's not boots on the ground It's not bullets being shot but everything that they've done from trade from you know tick-tock and poisoning our youth brains and buying military you know land near our military bases Trump has to be careful this is what worries me he's threatening them to do something within 24 hours and then their Ministry of Commerce says we will fight to the end okay I think we need to listen because what scares me is they'll do whatever they have to do to protect their power and their control. Okay, they are a communist regime and it's funny

how Nancy Pelosi is over there talking crap but when COVID hit what was she doing? No, no, in Chinatown come come over here so we know who's really who's really really in control. Okay and then I definitely did this the last time Trump was doing this and having this attitude was in 2018 trying to stop their cheating their death manipulation What happened a virus? randomly leaked out of a lab that we kind of control and run and Nobody said meaning they still to this day are playing the whole game of it could have been a lab leak I think we have to be very he has to be very careful with them because I don't trust them one bit.

They've shown that they're capable of going that length to shut everything down if they have to. And I think we're playing games with a regime that's willing to do anything, Pat, anything to stop us. This is gonna get ugly and it's gonna get really ugly soon. So, I mean, Rob, if you can play this clip. This is Scott Besson, which by the way, I really like the way he speaks, the way he interviews, the things he says. He's actually a very good teacher because he can explain something in 30 seconds that

takes somebody else five minutes to explain. So the average person can also receive it. Can you play this clip on the number of people that have been calling, countries, that are wanting to negotiate with us with the tariffs? Go for it. number of people that have been calling countries that are wanting to negotiate with us with the tariffs. Go forward. Barry, I can tell you that there are 50, 60, maybe almost 70 countries now who have approached us. So it's going to be a busy April, May, maybe into June. And Japan is a very important military ally, they're a very important economic ally, and the U.S. has a lot of history with them.

So I would expect that Japan's going to get priority just because they came forward very quickly. But it's going to be very busy. And if President Trump, again, gave himself maximum negotiating leverage, and just when he achieved the maximum leverage, he's willing to start talking. Adam, love that. Well, all these countries are coming to do what they will turn to do one thing, cut a deal. Trump should probably make it so whoever gets in the top 10 to negotiate, we'll get a better deal. It's the order of the deal. So this is what it reminds me

of. So we were talking about China. The number one goal of Trump is to deal with China. It's the art of the deal. So this is what it reminds me of. So we're talking about China. The number one goal of Trump is to deal with China. It's not to deal with Bangladesh. It's not to deal with Vietnam, Canada's Mexico. It's all about China. So there's, you know, you know, I said you've done, you did a great breakdown when you shaved your head in it back years ago. You talk about those different levels to this.

There's different levels to this negotiation. So China is the end boss, right? So whether they're a paper tiger or a powerful dragon remains to be seen, but it's like you ever played Mike Tyson's punch out back in the day. What a game, right? And Mike Tyson was the final boss. So the guy who played in the game was what little Mac glass job. Well, exactly. So USA is like Big Mac. It's not like we're some wussy. We're the number one country So we're Big Mac and we're going through the ranks The first guy is glass Joe boom knock him out some, you know, fruity French guy done. Then you got Don Flamenco He's doing his little dance. He's got his rose in his mouth. Boom. Knock him out Vietnam Spain India

Boom, we're knocking these people out King hippo shows up. Here we go right here He's a fat guy sumo wrestler boom knock him out soda poppins key the drunk russian guy Maybe I played the game this week and who knows all of a sudden we're beating all these guys boom boom boom boom boom Then there's the final boss Mike Tyson. That's China So Trump's plan is to knock all these guys out. Bing, ding, bing, bing. Our allies. Okay, UK, we cut a deal.

Israel, we cut a deal. Japan, South Korea, cut a deal. Then we deal with India. We deal with this levels and levels and levels. And then we knock out China in the end. But what are they willing, what extent are they willing to go? Because guess what? Trump is going to be for us are you not worried at all because I mean if you think about it though there's a reason

I mean they're in control there's a reason Gavin Newsom cleans up the city of San Francisco when they show up there's a reason John Senna apologizes in Mandarin when he messes up there's a reason LeBron everybody bows down to them and it's like how far are we going to push them why do you think they bow down to them? Because they own them. They own all the money. So it's the money Well, yeah, it's the money love. Oh, and this is so what we're trying to do Yeah, but is figure out the money when you back up on Mike Tyson in a corner Mike Tyson It's gonna punch in your face these Mike Tyson's gonna do he's gonna bite your ear. Thank you. Thank you

And Trump got shot in the ears Thank you. That's the analogy. And Trump got shot in the ear, so there's an analogy. So no, he's going to bite you in the ear. No, but to me, you took the words out of my mouth. Everything they're saying right now, 50 people I've called, 60 people, 70. But there's one person that hasn't called. She.

China. The only one that hasn't called. Exactly. China hasn't called. So until China calls, they're the guy. Everybody else can say whatever they want to say. They hasn't called. So, you know, until China calls, they're the guy, right? Everybody else can say whatever they want to say. They're the guy. They're the ones you're going to want to negotiate with.

And it's going to be who can take the pain the longest? How nasty could it be? What other pains can you use against them? What other ways can you frustrate them? So imagine if all of a sudden you really want to irritate them? Imagine Trump takes a trip to Taiwan, okay? No, no, i'm being serious. Yeah, imagine news comes out. Hey, uh, president trump lands in taiwan Yeah, you don't want to do a deal. No problem We're down the street from you and takes a picture

Looking at china over the water. You know what i'm talking about, takes a picture right there and posts it. I think Trump's willing to go as far as possible to make this work, and I think China knows if they do a deal, let's actually go and process this, if China does do a deal with US, what could happen to them? Think about that. They need the money. What's gonna happen if China does a deal with US?

Say China says, okay, let's just say right now they're sitting there saying, all right, let's do reciprocal zero zero. Yeah. Well, if they do a deal with the US. They're gonna come way back down to earth. Well, forget about down to earth. Their vision and the dreams of becoming a reality

is gonna be what? Yeah, no, it's not gonna happen. They're not gonna be a superpower. So you know what's one of my biggest concerns? What's one of my biggest concerns that didn't happen that would have given us additional leverage is that Panama Canal the two ports didn't get done. Yeah, and there was a stop there. So it's not it's not done, but it's not completed yet, right? CK Hutchinson still owns those 43 ports. What's the latest? I think that's something he's used military force for though. Panama casts doubt on Black Rock Canal ports deal

touted by Trump. Top auditor CK Hutchinson owes $300 million in unpaid fees linked to two Panama Canal ports. Go a little bit lower Rob, so this is just this morning. Panama's top auditor says, Hong Kong CK Hutchinson owes hundreds of millions of dollars in unpaid fees and failed to necessary. Two ports of Panama blows up plans.

U.S. asset manager to buy the ports at 22. Black Rock's acquisition to the ports situated at the end. But is it done yet? Is it completed yet? It's supposed to be signed, but it doesn't sound like it was. It doesn't sound like it's completed. The reason why April 10th, BlackRock for signing the definitive documents for the deal passed with no announcement, but comments made late Monday by Panamanian Comptroller,

this is yesterday, General Anel Flores introduced the most serious hurdle yet to BlackRock, taking control of the two ports. Flores said he was presenting the findings of an audit that began after the deal between Hutchison and BlackRock Consortium was announced, go a little bit lower Rob, let's see, floors at Panama ports, Panjama, Panjama operates the ports and didn't get the necessary clearances when it extended the 25-year contract. Yeah, to me, all I'm thinking right now is the amount of leverage Trump and the U.S. has to go to China and say, if you don't do this, we're gonna do this.

Like you remember when China, what was the first company that Trump said, nope, you can't do business here in the States? Do you remember the big one? The 100 billion auto company? It was intense. No, it was the daughter that would know, the daughter was in China, was a CFO of the company,

doing a deal with Iran, and Trump said, you guys are all out of here. Oh, Huawei. That phone was blowing up in the US. Oh, Huawei. Huawei. That phone was blown up in the US. Huawei. That phone was coming up and it was something that was, with overnight they lost 50 billion dollars in valuation.

I think that was a number because of the daughter. So Trump has the ability to do some things here, but this would have been a very, very big piece to the negotiation, Tom. I don't think things are over yet and I think that China is being what people don't realize they are fighting a four-sided war. Now the big giant side is these tariffs. They're also they're also interfering with the tick-tock deal being they're saying oh it's because the tariffs no it's not you want that data and you want that path to power and look you see what's going on there Panama's auditor are saying that CK Hutchinson owes money and there's an audit

Yeah, so guess what US pressure on Panama declare them in default and take the ports you watch There is an angle there Administratively that China would flip out but now they're trying to protect the port deal They are trying to manipulate see CK Hutchinson on the port deal because that's a path to power So that's the second and the third one is any deal they make you have to remember They've never allowed their currency help me here Brandon Yeah to float with all the rest of the currencies on the world. The dollar, the currencies, there is one piece of free trade internationally.

Everybody's currency floats with each other in terms of relative value, correct? Yes. Except one big one. There's some little ones, but big one, and that is the renminbi. That's right. And that's where China refuses to let it float and manipulates the value of its China and lies to its own Banks about how much they're printing in the background, right? They don't they don't have a Fed but they have a balance sheet. They printed way more way more than us

They are they are stuck on they are stuck on tariffs big they are stuck on currency They're they're trying to hold power with tik-tok and they're trying to hold power with the the ports And I think that it's a very busy time They're trying to hold power with TikTok and they're trying to hold power with the ports. And I think that it's a very busy time. They are big and they are the one we have to talk to, but I like the fact that there is multiple fronts that Trump is pushing on against them. I said this last time on Jesse Waters,

if we get all the deals done, Trump needs to write order the deal too, because it's time and everybody's gonna want to know what how these deals got done. Brandon you were saying. Yeah, when it comes to leverage I think we have far more leverage than China does because the thing that made them valuable to us is going away like what made them valuable is cheap labor and their manufacturing capacity but you know with AI and with their labor being more expensive now that's no longer that much of an advantage for us and then what they need

us for is they need us for our customer our consumer base because our consumer base like feeds like probably the majority of their economy like we absorb what they make because like nobody else in the world could do that and you know they're extremely vulnerable in terms of what they have to import to feed their country so if you look at them they're pretty landlocked so and we have all of our allies around them so we have like Japan we have South Korea we have Taiwan so if we want to we'd easily blockade China and stop them from even importing food and oil. So hopefully we don't have to do that, but I think we could very easily cut them down.

Adam. Look, I think, you know, we talked about China being the end boss here. What's the definition of a good deal or a fair deal? The definition, in my opinion, is both sides kind of get what they want and both sides kind of give up stuff that they wanted, but they're willing to part with, right? That's a negotiation. I kind of wanted this.

We're going to have to do something with the Panama Canal. You want to tick tock. We'll meet you here. You know, supply, demand, trade, input. That's what it comes down to. But if we go back to what Trump believes, you know, people say that Trump doesn't really have an ideology. It's kind of clear. He has one thing that he definitely cares about, and that's dealing

with these unfair trade practices. He's been talking about it for 40 years, starting with Oprah in 88, and he loves America. So I think Trump sort of goes by the shock and all. He throws out something crazy out there. He's like, the whole world's getting tariffs. Bing, bing, ding, ding, ding. You're all getting these numbers. And then you see whose response.

Vietnam responds, Israel responds, India responds, all these countries responding. Basically, in my opinion, Trump looked at the world on the second term. He had four years to sit back and relax. And he goes, you know what I'm sick of? I'm just sick of kicking the can down the road. This needs to be dealt with at some point. I'm that mother effer who's gonna do it So rather than kick the can down the road, I'm gonna pick up the can I'm gonna spray-pranked it red white and blue and I'm gonna chuck it at China and say make my day mother sucker

And we're gonna see where this negotiation goes. It could go terribly good or terribly bad But Trump's willing to die on this hill. So you said TikTok, Tom. Play this clip on TikTok and then I'll give you some thoughts I have on this. Go for it, Rob. You're open to deals with these countries if you're calling them deals. Somebody said that we're going to give you something that's so phenomenal, as long as they're giving us something that's good. For instance, with TikTok as an example, we have a situation with TikTok where China will probably say, will approve a deal,

but will you do something on the tariffs? The tariffs give us great power to negotiate. We always have. I've used them very well in the first administration, as you saw. But now we're taking it to a whole new level because it's a worldwide situation. Oh my God. It's very exciting to see.

And what it's done is driven a lot of great companies to our country. And you can see construction starting all over. I already said, yeah. Sir, I follow up on your earlier comment about TikTok, you said that the Chinese might be willing to agree to approve that sale in exchange for tariff relief. Is that something that you floated to them or you've heard from them or...? No, no. I'm just using that as an example.

Let's say we had a problem with TikTok and let's say China wasn't going to approve. We could use tariffs in order to get it approved. You know? The deadline is 7. You can have something in return. What's the update on the deal negotiations with TikTok? We're very close to a deal with a very good group of people. I want TikTok.

Larry Ellison and Oracle? Is it multiple investors? Just this. Multiple. And then did the last minute kids kind of throw things into disarray for you? Or do you have your strategy completely locked up on what's going be on the board?

Which last minute? Which? On acquiring TikTok. No, I think that China maybe will call and say, well, we're upset with the tariffs and maybe they wanna get something a little bit in order to get TikTok approved, who knows? If you're positive.

Okay. TikTok versus tariffs in in the list of like if you were to put uh which is more important 60 40 tick tock or 60 40 tariffs or whatever how would you compare the two getting the tick tock deal deal done or tariffs hundred zero exactly cares about tick-tock Who cares about tick-tock? At any point if you want you can shut down tick-tock of course you're gonna lose a lot of the younger audience That's not happy with you and all this other stuff and tick-tock kind of Turned in his favor in the last election Charlatan killed it on tick-tock and a lot of the younger conservatives started using it But no this tariff thing is very big.

Very, very big. If they figure out a deal with the tariffs, could be some very interesting things going on here. By the way, Rob, can you pull up, let's just transition into the next story here. So with tariffs, we've covered a bunch of different things with tariffs. I wanna go to this next story that we have with,

let me see which one I wanna go to. Ah, dah, dah, dah, dah, dah. I got so many of them, but I'm gonna go to this next story that we have with Let me see which one I want to go to I got so many of them, but I'm gonna go to this let's go into the story Rob New York Post comes out with this article Okay, if you can go to the New York Post story in the in the notes Rob that I have it at Barack Obama Makes shockingly honest admission about the state of his marriage to Michelle. So here we go. Barack Obama shocking admission about the state of his marriage to Michelle.

Go a little bit lower Rob if you could. So everybody's wondering like you weren't there Jimmy Carter funeral, you weren't there Trump and Michelle I'm talking about and then you start a podcast with your brother. Barack Obama makes shock, Michelle Obama, I was in deep deficit with my wife. He told Tepper, conversation Thursday, so I've been trying to dig myself out of that hole by doing occasionally fun things. The former president of the United States has previously suggested that his back-to-back terms in office from 09 to 17 took a toll on his relationship with the former first

lady, go a little bit lower. And then let me say this, it sure helps to be out of the White House and to have a little more time with her. He said this in an interview on 23. And making sure to praise Michelle for being forgiving of the shortcomings at the age of 61. She revealed December 2022 that she couldn't stand her husband for a solid decade with their daughters.

Malia and Sasha were little, nothing, noting that she wasn't being catty by saying this. According to Michelle, marriage is 50-50, ever, ever. She explained at the time, there are times I'm 70, he's 30, and there are times he's 60, I'm 40, but guess what? Ten years, we've been married 30 years, I would take 10 bad years over 30, go a little bit lower Rob. So I've been trying to dig myself out of the hole. So you hear these stories and it's becoming more and more and more.

I guess here's the question. If they got a divorce, what's the big deal? Nothing. Absolutely nothing. So if they got a divorce and it didn't work out, Michelle's doing a podcast, I saw the numbers yesterday, their episodes keep getting fewer and fewer views according to some of the numbers. So the new podcast continues to tank, the viewership is down over 75% compared to her first episode. Her viewership has been dropping since her show on March 12th. So it went from episode one, 335,000, episode two, 194,000, episode three jumped back up, episode five, 141, episode six, 63,000 views. Can you just go to the channel, Rob? Let's see how it's doing.

So people are just not feeling it. It's ranked 34 on Spotify's top podcast. You know why I was looking it up? It's not fair like if you're an unhappy relationship I feel like when it comes to politics and these politicians you have to stay together because of your public image and it's like bro you're unhappy you keep saying that you're unhappy all the rumors are out there about certain people's decisions and their... Yeah, look at that. Zoom in a little bit.

5,000 views in four days. Yikes. That's not possible. Oh yeah. 63,000. Those are the shorts. This is on YouTube though, right? No, those are clips.

So is it mostly Spotify? Where's the clips from? 5,000 views with Jay Shetty? There's no way. Well, it's a six minute clip, but yeah, that's it. Jay Shetty? There's no way. Well, the six minute clip, yeah, that's it. Jay Shetty's got millions on top of millions of... Oh, the episode got 66,000 views. The short cut.

But do you hear what they... I know it's hard, but have you watched what they... They're just talking about childhood and just... It's just not appealing at all. Can you click on the Jay Shetty one? Let's see if they leave the comments open or they've closed it. That's all I want to see. But don't watch the video.

Can you pause the video Rob? Ain't nobody watching this. Wait, 57, thumbs up. Only here for the comments. Go a little bit lower Rob. Too much censorship in the comments section. I'd rather go to the dentist than to listen for some of this. What are the boys talking about?

What are the boys talking about? We are at the Martin's New Year. I think it's important to understand happiness just like the rest of the emotion your motion You are not okay, so that's a real one keep going Lord clown show Another one buying subscribers using comments to not make a popular part. I don't think they're buying it to Only what you love that doesn't intentionally hurt you 63,000 subs laugh of my ass off. So, you know This goes into this next story Okay, because the Democratic Party's trying to find, even the other day we had Sam Cederon,

we kept asking about a name, a name, a name, a name. I think we asked, Adam asked, I don't know, 10 times. And eventually, yeah. Give me one name, just give me one. So Barack Obama destroyed the Democratic Party by competing for power and money. This is a new book that came out, written by a person that usually writes books,

trashing Trump. So Rob, can you go to Amazon to show what the book is and what other books this author has written? If you go on Amazon and you just type up the name of the book, so it's not like it's written by Sean Hannity or Bill O'Reilly or Glenn Beck. Can you go to it and then go to the author, click on the author's name, Jonathan Allen, and zoom in a little bit to see the list of books. So, inside, who is this person, how Joe Biden

really was the president. So, okay, so fight, go to fight. The title is what? Inside the wildest battle, let's find out who's Jonathan Allen, by the way. Can you go a little bit lower, the description, it shows it on the bottom, who author is? I just want to know this guy's background. Jonathan has a political reporter at NBC News. Okay, he previously

worked at Washington Bureau for Chief Bloomberg News, White House you run political. Okay, every one of them liberal liberal liberal. He has co-authored three prior books with Ryan Bonsall, NHRC, Shattered New York Times bestseller, a senior political correspondent at the Hill. She previously ran some staff for Trump during the staff writer political. Was that CNN political analyst and he also appeared on CBS. Okay, alright so the article says the book fight inside the wildest battle for the White House claims the former president Barack Obama's weakened the Democratic Party by creating organizing for action in 2012 to push his legislative goals authors Jonathan Allen and Amy Parnas

Right though organizing for action never realized his vision it Competed with the party for power and money they add that Obama left the party far weaker than he found it Wow with one operative with the party for power and money. They add that Obama left the party far weaker than he found it. Wow. With one operative quoted as saying, Obama destroyed that shit. Unlike Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton, and Joe Biden, Obama relied on black professionals for his campaign rather than party loyalists. After Obama's 2016 exit, the Clintons, Biden, and Democratic National Committee Chair Donna Brazile worked to rebuild

the party's infrastructure and block far-left Democrats from taking over the book notes by helping install party loyalists at the national and state committees over the course of the years. These establishment Democrats keep progressive outsiders at bay. Tom, thoughts, one, on Obama with, you know, talking about his marriage as well as what this book is saying about Obama destroying the Democratic Party. Well, I'm gonna say something's gonna surprise you. You know, it's been, we're coming, we're coming nine years since he's been in office and in the election it

showed that he doesn't have a lot of mojo with the, with the voting blocks. He actually discovered how little he had and how it had gone away and he was countered in situations that you would never have imagined him being countered. And it's been a long time since since he was inaugurating and gave hope to every person in America regardless of your color because that moment, regardless of whether you agreed with this politics, you could say that it doesn't matter where you're from or what color you are, you could be President of the United States.

The same thing when Thurgood Marshall became Supreme Court Justice. That was an important moment. After the eight years of his policies, it was like, oh man, that was hard to take. Now it's been almost nine years that he's gone you know and it doesn't surprise me because what is the hardest thing to do why did Michael Schumacher come back from retirement why

do athletes come back for another two years why do they take another one-year contract because sometimes it's hard to say goodbye and sometimes it's hard to go to retirement. Are you going to sing? Maybe I could sing. 5,000 on Super Chat and I don't sing. No, but that's it. And so now you're in a situation, it doesn't surprise me that after the Hillary, remember, he was standing way off to the left and behind the trees and just when Hillary won her campaign,

there was no love there. Remember that? There was absolutely no love between the Clinton camps and the Obama camps. And then four years later, Biden's there and he's trying to influence the open convention and discovering how much little power he had. And so it doesn't surprise me now to see that what was going on behind the curtain, and it also doesn't surprise me to see how the Clintons, Bidens, and the DNC worked to rebuild in 2016. And you know what they did? they messed with Bernie Sanders in South Carolina And now we can see behind that that Bernie had a point that he was heading for a nomination prop

Probably but there were invisible hands that messed with them So you want to talk about the guys that are against democracy? It's them, but it's like I think for Barack Obama It is hard to go off into retirement and to really accept the fact that you don't have the athletic skills you once had and you got to hang up the cleats. Then he could be such a statesman right now, but now you see behind the curtain that this was there. Man, that's tough.

I imagine it's tough for him. You said it's like the worst year he had. And Pat, I think you're right. And now we're seeing just behind the curtain how much is going on Adam Look, there's only one president who just refused to go away after his term was done and that's Trump This guy didn't even need to run ever. He was a billionaire. He came and did his thing. Yes There's people that loved him. Yes, there's people that hated him. But after he lost in 2020, he could have just been done

that loved him. Yes, there's people that hated him, but after he lost in 2020, he could have just been done. But if you've ever seen that viral clip of Trump when he's like, you just can't quit, man, just straight up can't quit. Some people have seen it all the time. People quit, people quit. Trump is a unique person. He don't quit. If you look at every other president since Reagan, even Jimmy Carter, from Bush senior, Bush jr bill clinton like most of these guys just kind of go away clinton allowed hillary to be the the you know the catapult to the top bush do you ever see the bush bush jr out w w out never see him they just kind of go away barack obama's issue was that he kind of was doing like the hokey pokey He had one foot in he had one foot out is he leading the parties and now leading the party is Michelle gonna run she's not gonna run, you know anytime someone floated Michelle's name out there. I go she's not running

She's never given any indication. She's gonna run her thoughts here. So I think he's gonna Yeah, because you went first. I went to time I wanted to go to see what Vinny wanted to say with this one I'll come back to you go. Yeah, but just with the whole What was what was the main was the actual question? No Barack Obama the whole situation with Barack Obama marriage You know him destroying the Democratic Party the book. Oh, I think well just cuz I'm you're comparing him to Donald Trump I'm not comparing him to Donald Trump. We said the last guy that didn't want to leave every president But then the Trump is the only one who is sustainable.

But the one that but when you said they don't want to leave. Consistent persistent. This guy ain't stopping. But there was a difference. Every other president just was like, I'm out. Yeah, but Barack wanted to hang around. It wasn't as if and this Trump's words, if they didn't cheat and they didn't cheat them out of an election, he would have he would have easily by the way, he would have been

gone already this last year. He would have a couple months ago, he would have been gone. So there's a difference, I think, between him and Tom made a great point on him just not wanting to retire, but he also just, he spoke at some event, he was at a handbook, he was at some college and he was just up there saying like, we have to keep, I think it was a talk in New York, I believe, and he's like, we gotta keep fighting. It was basically saying, you know, Trump supporters are this, Trump supporters are that. And I think when it comes to Michelle and him,

you nailed it. If you guys wanna get a divorce, get a divorce. Why should you be forced to stay in a relationship that you are completely unhappy? Remember that photo that they took at dinner? They're hanging, barely touching each other's fingers on the end of the table, and it's like, and if any of that, what do you think they're actually happy at?

I remember after 2020, everyone was like, that's it. Melania is going to divorce Trump. It's done. Put a fork in this thing. Who said that though? Who said that? Everyone was saying this. I never heard that. Me? I never, look at that. How more distant can you be in a photo? I'm just letting you know one thing Vinny, just because you didn't hear it doesn't mean other people were saying it. I heard when she slapped her hand when they're walking and she still was everywhere

Yeah, there were stories about Melania, but of course, but so there's stories like this. There's stories about Melania I'm with you on the hand stuff. The difference is that I think there's something going on here it's it's almost like Will Smith and there's something going on here. It's almost like Will Smith and Jada. You know how Bezos did it? Bezos, they came out in 2019 and said stories about him and such and such girl. He says, yeah, it's true. And then they got a divorce and moved on and guess what? She went and married somebody a lot more chill, school teacher, Mackenzie, and then divorced 18 months later. She was bored out of her mind. Every night she's comparing comparing him to Bezos and then Bezos went and ended up with somebody with nice hands Yeah, but no he ended up with somebody he wants to be and guess what everybody moved on

No one cares about it on what happens people move on and have their own lives by the way Michael Jordan was married to a girl early on in his career that I Think he got her pregnant before they got married and then when they got married and he's in the NBA He's Michael Jordan. They're having a challenge in time and him boom She apparently hired somebody PI to come visit him. He said like listen, let's just finish up and move on they move on You've never seen her in media at all She kind of wanted to be to herself very minimal stuff that she wants to do The difference with this that there may be something going on here is you don't show up to Jimmy Carter's funeral

He's a Democrat. And you don't show up to the inauguration. And you start your own podcast with your brother, and you're saying the comments, and you're saying, if you want to go, all I'm saying is if a president gets a divorce, I wouldn't look at Obama one way or another. I would simply say I get it. It's tough. God bless.

And don't forget. They were young presidents They weren't old presidents. So it's a difference when you're a young president when you're a young president getting out and You have your star power like Netflix showing everywhere he goes and that's a different kind of a life So who knows quick question Obama spouses in the Democrat? I think they pick their spouses the same way they pick their candidates I think they're both arranged marriages You know you said that the other day when we were talking about how the super doll gets like are the gatekeepers of the Democrat party

I think there's a good chance that people in politics like the Clintons and Obama's like it could be an arranged marriage So I mean you think that's I think that's the biggest problem Democrats believe in arranged marriage Yeah, I believe literally and figure you don't you don't you don't believe that Adam and hold on in politics That somehow they could say listen guys. This guy's gonna be the president They've been back do they Obama was a work in progress for a while And what if they were just like you guys have to get married because listen about it Let's just talk about rumors cuz Adam what if what year did the clean show me data on this? Not just speculation what year did it bill and hillary get married?

I would guess 70s. Well, you're 71 what year to become president 92. All right guys. It's a 20-year plan What who on the Clintons? Arrange marriage for me is Meaning they pick the candidates The Democrats pick the candidates. They don't let you fight to win it. They can choose the camera We're talking about politics talking about the example that Brandon is given I also do think a bill and Hillary sit there and say hey one day we're gonna be president This is a good partnership. Oh, yeah go together rather than I love you. There could be a you think they did

71 it could be because listen, there's a picture of him meeting Kennedy very early. And he worked with Sky Ed. Look at that picture with her. Zooming on her picture to the left, zooming on the picture to the left Rob, the left one right there. Who's she meeting?

Barry Goldwater. There you go. That's her meeting Barry Goldwater. And then there's a, that's a 68, but look at Bill and the Bat. So they have similar interests and they're Similar circles. Yeah ambitious. Do you agree that want to be present? Hey, listen, we're gonna go to 20 year run if we do this partnership, we're gonna end up becoming president day

That is very hard to do. How is that hard to do? But after the CIA though allegedly they like there's the people say that sometimes you report threw the CIA though allegedly. People say that he reported to the CIA when he was in college. The answer is they got married, they started a life together, they're both politically ambitious and things happened. The speculators are out there like, there was a CIA meeting in the back of a room in Arkansas and they planned and plotted the White House. What about random things like a letter that you wrote to your girlfriend in 1982 saying I make love to men daily my imagination.

Then you have Larry Sinclair. You're talking about the Clintons now? No, no, no, I'm talking about Barack Obama. You're talking about Noah Ray's marriage. What if, let's just say figuratively speaking, and there's rumors out there, what if Barack Obama likes guys and this whole thing was set up because nobody's in a vote for a single guy president. So guess what? It could be possible. Here's the beautiful thing about podcasts. Everybody can hear what you have to say. Here's the ugly thing about podcasts. Everybody's going to hear every ridiculous thing.

How is it ridiculous? Is what I just said a fact? Is what I just said a fact? In 1982, penned a letter to his girlfriend, Alex McNair, former president Donald Trump wrote. No, no, no, former president Barack Obama said. Sorry. You see, I make love to men daily, but in my imagination. Adam, who says that? Adam, who says that?

Now I'm gonna defend the letter from 45 years ago. I don't care. I know you don't care. Stay on the point. Are you saying that in between all this, Barack and Michelle are arranged to become the president? I believe it must be fun to just be effort-dotted and just follow every rumor down the room. I believe the public is on my side more than you that and adamant showing they hate they don't like each other She's not happy same

Vinny, okay, that's the same crap. They were saying about Trump and monia. They're still together and stronger than ever So there's a difference. Oh, I don't think Trump ever wrote a letter or had a guy named Larry Larry Sinclair go well this guy would go with a limo and we would hook up into drugs here Here's come on man. That's generally the problem When you when you look at the other side as the enemy and you can't just actually actually look at things Genuinely like like you just make up stories in your head to go along with your now I go with a lie probably just fell in love and got married. I want to go with a light story Mark Cuban weighsing on transgender athletes

in women's sports saying people are just not ready for it. Can you play this clip Rob? Mark Cuban breaking it down with Stephen A. Smith that we should be ready for it. If we're progressive enough we should accept the fact that men should compete in women's sports. Go ahead Rob. The whole sports trans sports issue, you know, it's like the old Willie Horton thing. You know, my attitude is if there's a trans athlete, no matter what side, you let the opponent, whether it's an individual sport or a team sport, you let them decide if they wanted to compete against them or not. If they feel they can win, if they feel it's not fair, it's up to them. But to make it just a national issue so that if you weren't supporting the fewer than 10 trans athletes in the NCAA, then you know, you weren't a good person.

I just people aren't ready for that yet. And you've got to meet people where they are. We've gotten we've taken this country so far in race relationships and attitudes towards LGBTQ. It takes time. You can't just force it down people's throat. And instead of trying to get it where the people who are being disadvantaged and being discriminated against are helped, they wanted to make it a campaign issue. Focus on helping the people, not using them to campaign.

How does- All right, Vinny, thoughts. Actually, no, Tom, I'm gonna go to How does- All right, Vinny, thoughts. Actually, no, Tom, I'm gonna go to you first. Mark Cuban, he's got daughters, okay? So he's a family man. He's been married for a long time. He's a good father.

His kids love him. What do you say about what he had to say here? I think Mark really gave a tangled up answer there. And I think what was interesting is, oh, if you don't like it, you can forfeit. I think that's really terrible. We've seen the stronger athletes. I don't think I'm ready to see men spike volleyballs and knock my daughter unconscious.

I don't think I'm ready today. I don't think I'll be ready in 10 years. I don't think I'll ever be ready for that. And I think what Mark, I don't know what he was trying to say. It seems like he got a little tangled up around the point because I think that there is a common sense element to this. And it's been said by many people. They said, look, you know, we spend all of this time on steroid detection and blood doping detection in the Olympics. And there were East German, back when there were two Germanies, power lifters that were

blood doping for the Olympics. And we spend all this time, how do we stop this injustice? How do we find out about these steroids in the Olympics? How do we level the playing field? Remember that was the whole argument about steroids and what we got to do and the World Doping Association What it had to do because it's so unfair You know here you have countries like the United States and and East Germany with these big budgets and this guy from Cameroon That's trained all of his life and is losing out to a guy who's blood doping. That's not fair. What happened to that?

Where did that go now? you're all the way to Mark Cuban saying, well if you don't like it you can forfeit so you could just lose. So Riley Gaines could have said, well I'm not gonna get in the pool I'm just gonna forfeit. Really? It's just I don't think people are ready for that. I don't think people are ready for, I think people are ready for fairness and I think Mark gave a really tangled up answer there. People are ready for, I think people are ready for fairness, and I think Mark gave a really tangled up answer there. People are ready for fairness, people are ready to step back and say, wait a minute,

that's what people are ready for. People, it's not like, well if we just wait long enough, we'll sacrifice our daughters to men in sports. No, we spent all this time getting steroids out, and now we let the guy with built-in steroids in his testicles walk in. That's so unfair. Yeah, and does he have, by the way,

and it's always the people that, it doesn't affect their lives. Anytime people were open border, or anytime people were like, let them play, because you know what, none of, they're not getting affected. Their children are getting raped. Their children are getting murdered.

Their daughters aren't losing freaking scholarships. I think it's stupid. And you know what? I want people like Mark Cuban to keep talking, keep putting a mic in front of his face, keep letting him say dumb, ignorant stuff like that. Just like what was like Jasmine Crockett and all the who's the other one that have the trans the Neil deGrasse Tyson, like the dumbest sounding arguments and this the left these Democrats will not change the tune. It's like with all the stuff that's happening in the world, we're still talking about this.

We're still talking about men playing with women and this is from a party the most hypocrisy I've ever seen. They're so pro women. They, they're so, my body, it's like bro, you're competing against men and people are getting injured, women are losing their freaking scholarships, and all these feminists, they're such male feminists, but when it comes to this, they want men to compete with our freaking daughters and I think it's absolutely ridiculous. But let them keep talking. There goes, anytime that people are like, oh, you can maybe run for president, this is

always going to come back to bite him in the butt. By the way, you know what I like, and I don't want to spend a lot of time on this story, I'm going to go to the next story, but Stephen A. Smith finally says, you know, he's open to the idea of running for president. He's actually leaving the door open. And guess what? You know what at, Stephen A. Smith. And guess what? You know what at least Stephen A. is doing? At least he's given a different angle.

At least he has the audacity to disagree with the Democratic party. At least he has the guts to say, yeah, you guys screwed up royally. At least he has the audacity to do that. And guess what? Whether it's gonna work or not, it is what it is. I don't know if it's gonna work or not.

I do know they're gonna attack the hell out of him. Is this a drop with him saying he's open to the idea or not? I believe so. Play this clip real quick. Unfortunately, over the last few weeks, I've had no choice but to get a bit more serious about it. I've been approached by people on Capitol Hill. I've been approached by people

who are elected officials in office, whether it's governors or mayors or what have you, and people have legitimately and seriously asked me about that. I have no desire to be a politician. My life is pretty well, but I've decided I'm no longer going to close that door. I'm going to keep my options open. I'm going to entertain the possibility. And if the if it comes in 2020 late 2026 2027, where I look at this country and I think it's an absolute mess and there's legitimate reason to believe whether it's via exploratory committees or anything else that I indeed would have a legitimate shot to win the presidency of the United States. I am not going to rule it out. And I'm not playing. I just think that it's a mess right now. I'm not scared.

Big difference. Mark Cuban versus him. He'll call out BS and Mark Cuban is just gonna sit there and try to spin. I don't get a feel that Stephen A is spinning a lot. I think Stephen A was afraid to be a little bit more public about it. Maybe a year ago, maybe a couple years ago, maybe a few years ago. I think right now he's more open about it and he's still got the contract. He's with ESPN. He has the mic. Now he has his own show.

Now he has a bunch of stuff going on. You got to respect the difference between the two of them, Vinny. But how much of all, and this is all of the left, Chris Cuomo, him, the majority of the left now are just like, man, our party did this and our party did that, where were they for the past four years? I understand what you're saying, where they had to be kind of quiet and everything,

but like, we want, if you're gonna, if you just let all that slide, and now all of a sudden they're all like, yeah man, everybody's pointing that way and saying man, man, they messed up, okay? Everybody knew, nobody, and he voted, right? Did he say he voted for her? He voted. He voted. And he voted man, man, they messed up. Okay, everybody knew. And he voted, right? Did he say he voted for her?

He voted. He voted. And he voted for Kamala. He said it. I don't understand how anybody in their right mind, all of a sudden can make this flip, but you still voted for Kamala Harris. They couldn't name one thing that she was going to do positive, and yet now everybody's jumping ship.

Everybody, even Jake Tapper and all these guys are writing books talking about man they they lie to us about Biden as if as if we were all blind and we couldn't see what's happening. I just I just don't know how genuine all these things are because at the end of the day this four years Trump is going to be gone. What are you going to do different? Are they going to come in and reverse everything that he's done, that everything that he did for 2016, when he did all that he did with all the racism stuff, with all the COVID stuff, with all the, you know,

negative Russia collusion, he still busted his ass to try to get this country back in order, and then COVID hit. And then now he's just trying to build this all the way back. What are they gonna do when they come in? Because I'm telling you right now, I like Stephen A. Smith, I mean, I trust him way more than I trust Gavin, but those are the type of people once they come in, what are you going to do to reverse the country, especially for on the way to a brighter future?

Well, you know, Stephen A is getting a little bit more confidence now. Something happens to you guys when a hundred million dollar check hits your bank account. So your chest gets a little puffed up. You get a little more base in your voice. I get it. Steven A Smith shout out to you still voted for Kamala, but we love you anyway about Mark Cuban. So I don't know.

I don't know if this is something that he just worked hard for it. And I don't know if it's something where they just arranged a marriage for Mark Cuban because he met his wife. I think in 1997. They married in 2002. They got three kids. He was an entrepreneur.

He went to Indiana. He started these tech companies. He became a billionaire. He bought the Dallas Mavericks. All of a sudden he's doing Shark Tank. Next thing you know, he transforms into Rachel Maddow. All of a sudden he's doing these interviews. He's jumbling his words.

Maybe that's just his career path or maybe the dark forces, the Democratic Party were arranging a marriage 25 years ago. I don't know the answer. I'll let the crowd speculate. But Mark Cuban, we're on to you, buddy. I have a sense you're being sarcastic, right? Is that what you're trying to do? I am, Vinny. Because some things are just what they are.

Did you just make any point? You just went on and were like, I'm waiting. This is some time where I watch him. Things are just what they are. Did you just make any point? I'm waiting. This is some time where I watch I'm like I I want to hear something but Can I show you how to make a point Regarding Stephen a Smith really really quick. I don't think it has any to do with this contract I don't think that I think he's got deep personal integrity and he was talking about looking at the country and looking at the party And saying I'm not gonna leave I'm gonna leave the door open because if I see things I don't I don't think are good there I'm gonna do it and I think that's integrity and by the way how many of us here at this table Cannot go to a drawer or a photo album that we have and look at pictures of ourselves and say, wow,

what was I thinking? Oh, and so why can't Steven A Smith look back? Why exactly? Why can't Steven A Smith look back over politics and things like this and going, wow, what are they thinking? And maybe I'm going to, maybe I'm evolving in the process. So we've been talking about a lot of things in terms of Stephen a I think it Takes a lot of guts what he's done And I think he's got personal integrity and I think it has Jack to do with how much he earns. I think that's him I love it. I'm going to the next story Kamala Harris was completely shocked by election night loss to Trump after she bought the house

Is this not the funniest thing Rob? Kamala Harris and her running mate Tim walt were blindsided by their loss to Donald Trump in 2024 as detailed in fight inside the wildest battle for the White House by the people that wrote it. Parnes told the podcast, somebody's gotta win with Tara Palmieri. She was completely shocked and Tim Walz was shocked. Walz was so stunned, he sat silently in his hotel room

with staffers explaining the defeat while Harris questioned, are you sure? Have we done a recount? Should we do a recount to the campaign? Victory was a short and Parnes noting they thought they were going to win. Harris confidence stemmed from misleading optimism within her team as Parnes reported that some stuff felt gas-lit by senior officials who claimed things were looking good. Harris bought the hype, swayed by crowd sizes, fundraising success, and boots on the ground, with Parnes saying she bought all of that,

she bought the hype, and so did a lot of people in the campaign. Tom? Well, Pat, I thank you for when you challenged us to say, hey, let's do, let's do a 16 week series and let's look at these polls and let's look at facts. Let's look at numbers and let's see what we can find. And we saw polls that we saw where they were going. We saw where the numbers were going. We also saw and talked to friends inside the polling industry. People that have come out and talked to us, that said that

a lot of these pollsters milked the Democrat campaign. Three million dollar a month polling contracts. Hey, you're doing well. You're doing great. You know what? More white men than you think. You look at what you're doing with a married Hispanics. It's better than you think. And how is it that people like Nancy Pelosi saw the car going over the cliff? It was like the last scene in Thelma and Louise, and you've got Kamala Harris and Tim Walz holding hands as the car's going over into the canyon.

That's what was going on. Everybody knew it, and I believe that Tim Walz, and I believe that Kamala relied to during the last lap of the campaign, where people said, it's looking good Because there was too much money to be made and do you remember what we all said? Remember when the audit came out the pre the audit at the end and how much money was spent? What did we say on this podcast? How the hell did they spend that much money? Remember this Vinny? We were all looking at that

Well, guess what? I'll tell you how they did it They paid a bunch of consultants that were looking at him and kissing him on the ear and saying everything's okay You got this thing locked up But they were cash in checks right up to the end and I believe that this shows along with the book We just looked at just how divorced the Kamala Harris Tim Walz campaign and the the bloodsuckers that were around it Just making money on it from the core Democrats, including Nancy Pelosi and Barack Obama, who were rubbing their temples, you know, sitting at their own kitchen table saying, man, this is going over the cliff.

They all knew it. And that's what's going on here. And it doesn't surprise me. By the way, Tim Walz just sitting in a room, just shocks, not talking, staring at nothing. That's a normal day. That's a day ending in why for Tim walls it's like you know so let's not be hard on Tim he's versatile tell you I was such a knucklehead yes I think knowledge genuinely hates people and being around people and interact with people that she considers regular people because yeah I think you have to like to

speak to people and be around people and be in front of people when you're running for president and if you want to like to speak to people and be around people and be in front of people when you're running for President and if you want to do something where you're serving people So I think that she was like so cut off and detached now touch with like the average person where she didn't interact with them Unless they were like pre-screened and like they had their pre approved questions and everything So I think she was so cut off from reality with like the average person that of course she was shocked She had no idea like no perception of what the average person was doing or thinking. And then yeah, the pollsters,

we know the pollsters are fake. I mean, like I've never been called by a pollster before. I don't know anybody who's been called by a pollster before. So I don't know like what kind of sample size these guys are getting stuff from. But yeah, it's not, I think both sides always think they're gonna win all the way down to the wire with any campaign.

So yeah, I'm not surprised that she was shocked. Oh Vinny. Well that's never underestimate the power of the mainstream media as well. Like you know she was watching and she's paying attention and people are like, we got this. And you have the backing of Barack Obama and their lovely marriage to Michelle Obama constantly saying, listen, we're going to go out there, we're going to tell, you know, we're going to rally up the troops and we're going to tell there we're gonna tell you know we're gonna rally up the troops we're gonna tell the African-American community you have to vote like if you don't then you know you're ruining the rate you're not

helping us and none of the everything fell flat and that's what you get when you have just people like you like you say it all the time the flattery it just killed people like you got you got this we're gonna win nothing you with what he's not gonna he's a racist he's Hitler oh we're all gonna say that he's Hitler we're all gonna say that he's gonna. We're all going to say that he's Hitler. We're all going to say that he's going to rule in the world. And that's it. And that's what you get when you listen to mainstream media and you have people patting you on the back all the time and you're not aware and you're not living in reality. That's what happens. That's exactly what the hell happens.

Adam, I mean, I'm picturing Tim Walz being like, what happened? I thought we had this in the bag. Knucklehead. Are you? What? This guy? Yeah. Gosh. Give me one of those tampons from the bathroom. It's unbelievable. So I mean, it just maybe just shows you how much politicians, maybe even on both sides, sort of live in echo chambers and you're being coddled and your handlers are kind of telling you what you want to hear. They're not necessarily telling what you need to hear. They're not necessarily telling what you need to hear. They're not telling, they're not speaking truth to power, and they're sort of insulated.

I'm not shocked. You know, nobody's shocked that they lost. You know, it's like when Walter Mondale, I think, lost to Reagan, I think 49 states to one, you know, Reagan just cleaned up in the electoral college, cleaned up across the board, and Walter Mondale just sitting there like, what? You're kidding me. Look at this map right here. And by the way, reference Tim Walz, governor of Minnesota, Walter Mondale, Minnesota. There's a Minnesota, they're drinking the Kool-Aid over there, but nobody was shocked

to see that Trump won. What we were shocked was that he ran the board. Every single swing state, popular vote. Now Kam were shocked was that he ran the board. Every single swing state popular vote. Now Kamala is a drunk person on the internet. All right, let's go to the next story. Supreme Court clears way for Venezuelan deportation to resume for now. Okay, so this Rob, if you got the clip on this one here, Supreme Court ruled Monday that the Trump administration can resume deporting Venezuelan migrants under the Alien Enemies Act overturning the lower court's pause.

The unsigned order stated that detainees are confined in Texas, so venue is improper. In the District of Columbia, directing the case to Texas, all justice-agreed migrants must get notice within a reasonable time to challenge removal per justice, Brett Kavanaugh. Concurrence through through is this a clip Rob?

It is. This is News Nation reporting on this late last night. Go for it. And the Trump administration can restart deportation flights under the Alien Enemies Act. The Supreme Court ruling in a narrow majority that the wartime law can be used to deport illegal immigrants. Those flights have been at the center of a legal firestorm between the administration and the Justice Department news nations Tom Dempsey has the latest from

Washington so Tom this wasn't a complete victory for the president was it. Yeah, but a temporary when you could say for the Trump administration and a good morning look these for now these deportation flights under the alien enemies acts can continue as this case makes its way through court. And as part of this Supreme Court decision, anyone ordered to be deported must have their day in court.

President Donald Trump, though, celebrated this decision when it came down, posting the truth social quote, saying that the Supreme Court upheld the rule of law and calling it a great day for justice in America. The Supreme Court did not rule on whether those Venezuelans on flights to El Salvador last month were improperly classified for deportation under the Alien Enemies Act. But the justices did determine that the court cases

challenging those deportations cannot be held in Washington, DC. They must take place where the detainees are being held. In this case, that was Texas. Liberal Justice Sonia Sotomayor led the dissenting opinion writing quote the government's conduct in this litigation poses an extraordinary threat to the rule of law. We as a nation in a court of law should be better than this and we will know to in this close 5 to 4 margin on the Supreme Court

conservative leading justice Amy Coney Barrett actually joined the three liberal leading justices in dissenting in the opinion and yeah, and Tom what about the Maryland man mistakenly deported to El Salvador do we know when he's coming home. Oh my God, yeah, we do not know when he's coming up look that case has gotten national attention Kilmore Abrego Garcia is the name of the man and right now he does not know

when he's going to be returning home after Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts issued an order pausing that official order for him to return home by midnight. The Trump team admits Abrego Garcia was mistakenly deposed. Tom thoughts? So first of all, I think we're seeing some of the true colors of Amy Coney Barrett and Vinny has talked about this. But I think what

we all have to do let's let's look at this you know somewhat objectively and what so what you know Justice Sotomayor said I think we look at that it says each and then also what Tom Dempsey the correspondent said each person has to have their day in court look all the crazies out there want you to believe that we're just going down the street, you, you, you, you, and you, and we're throwing you on a plane to send you back. No, you're going to detention centers,

public defenders look at who you are, what identification do you have, what have you done, what's going on, we check you out, and away you go. And with all that activity and all that stuff going on, we have one guy, one in all the activity, one that we have found a whoops. And guess what? Even John Roberts has said, hang on, he is going to come home, but hang on a second because

we have to do this right and let's get it right. And so when you see a 5-4 decision here, what I'm really seeing is, is Comey Barrett and Sotomayor saying, hey, we got to get the rule of law right and then we got other liberal justice That just don't want Trump to do anything. So the vote no one whatever but Remember this law goes back to help me out 1789 is when this law was started regarding foreign combatants and we are seeing new levels of foreign combatants And I believe the Trump administration is correctly categorizing these people as foreign combatants and so if that's

the way it's going to be then you're going to have an expedited ride home because you're causing issues here. But I also think, Vinny you probably got an opinion on this, we're kind of seeing that we maybe don't have an exact conservative justice Maybe we have like a moderate leaning right on big issue justice not the Not the support that I wanted to see from her like at the end of the day and you nailed it Tom out of all This situation one guy that they have like out of how many thousands that we made one mistake

I love how everybody thinks we're going to be perfect in this whole situation, but let's just ask ourselves who are we deporting and who are we... okay we're deporting illegal, there's the word, illegal people that are freaking gang members, okay. What do gang members do? They don't skip down the street holding hands, no they sell drugs, they beat up people, they shoot people. Look what Tenderajua was doing in freaking taking over apartment complexes in Colorado. It's like enough, like the left, they're sticking up for these people and I get this due process situation.

Maybe the process needs to change. When it's you are here and we have documentation that you are illegal and you're in a gang, there's no, what day in court? court what day in court get out of the country You don't belong here in the first place and Tom Mitch McConnell brought Amy Coney bear He rushed he brought Amy Coney bear to Trump and rushed the nomination Okay and some would argue that she's a freaking plant cuz look at look at the remember when she was at the his of what not the state of the Union Trump walked in, have you ever seen a Supreme Court justice look at a freaking president with that much disdain, Tom?

Have you ever seen that? Bush was tricked the same way Bush Sr. over David Souter. Okay, so exactly my point. And John Roberts maybe, too. Yeah, and John, yeah, but at the end of the day, Brandon, what are we fighting about? And I don't know if you saw this, it just drives me crazy. They're illegal gang members. Get them the hell out.

We made one mistake. Okay, they're going to fix it. They're not going to let the guy stay there forever. It just drives me bananas. Adam. Trendy agua. I love Trump saying the trendy agua. But look, there's something happening, by the way, in Venezuela.

I'm getting a lot more messages from people. Are you getting these messages on Manecta? Are you seeing these things about Venezuela and people, what's going on in Venezuela? There's something happening there. It's Maduro guy, no bueno. But obviously, we agree with getting these criminals and these gang members out of the country. But let's not just gloss over. There's this one dude.

What's his name? criminals and these gang members out of the country. But let's not just gloss over. There's this one dude. What's his name? Uh, kill mark Garcia. That's like, uh, guys, uh, you shit me out to El Salvador to a maximum security prison. And I guess when you go fast, things are going to break. I get it. And I agree with what Trump is doing, but just put yourself in this guy's shoes. They're like, he shows up to the prison, maximum security prison in El Salvador. They're like,

what's up, bro? What gang you training the Agua? He goes, no, I work for Zephyr Hills. Like I just like water. I'm working in the water industry. What gang you sending home? Like imagine this guy's experience. Just he's a citizen or he's married to an American citizen. He's not tatted up. He's not a gang member shows up to El Salvador can we just show an image of what it looks like in El Salvador when you show up there with MS 13 What is it? What do you imagine? Yes, but Adam is it you imagine what this guy is dealing with right now? What is it crazy that has to go to Supreme Court for them to fight? Better pictures than that.

Trump has to fight. There we go. Trump has to fight to keep the flights going because Adam, for four years, they came in here willy-nilly. They gave them the green light, but Biden and Elijah Mayorkas said, come on in. So I'm not harping on one guy. Be a comedian for one second. It's not funny.

But just imagine you're just a regular dude. You end up here because of an administrative error I feel like it's a Chappelle skin at this point. He's safe in there because guess what? They don't play games Everybody's head is down. I think he was a former gang member, too I don't think he was a citizen and um, but no like when it comes like 80 20 issues though You know what like why would somebody go out and try to argue against this? Like, you know, like what kind of argument you make to say like, oh, no, Shouldn't do it's not a good idea to deport gang members. I think everyone's on board with Yeah, clearly not though because they're not arguing about this one guy they're arguing about the concept of nasty partitions of gang members

Well, he got elected on this premise For sure I'm just saying like what's the pitch that people are making to say like oh, it's not a good idea to deport gang members They just don't like Trump Supreme Court's going five four it shouldn't be that close you know did you study the case Adam I'm studying what I'm just following what is happening anybody fighting for the other side this is the left and this is why they're gonna keep losing what are you standing on and then you have Adam Schiff and Jamie Rast you know they do that they're doing shadow hearings now but if you know that the left is doing so having shadow hearings because they're trying to circumvent what Trump is doing

This is what they're doing. I think it's a very you know simplistic answer to say Amy Comey Barrett who was Appointed by Trump now doesn't like Trump. So she's gonna vote. I guess you ever liked her. Oh, she votes against him It's a bit stronger. I mean say she looks like she doesn't like them But then but then you actually have to go do the work and find out maybe what she thinks on this She's going to vote against. Who says she ever liked Trump? Well, if she votes against him, it's a bit strong argument to say she looks like she doesn't like him. But then, but then you actually have to go do the work and find out maybe what she thinks on this.

Maybe what she believes on this. I don't know what she thinks. So I'm not going to speculate. You guys are just going down the, well, she voted against it. She must hate Trump. So, you know, there it is. That's a simplistic answer. No, I'm going off of somebody staring at him.

That shows you haven't done any work on this. No, I'm going off of, there's no, Adam, you cannot explain to me how it's a 5-4 ruling on deporting illegal gang members out of the country period It should be 9-0 and then we we made a mistake on one freaking guy. So let's fix the mistake So the ruling the ruling Adam Ruling over art elite. Yeah Gavin Newsom. Let me do the hands We I don't want any illegal if you're an an illegal gang member, get the out of my country. Bye. Bye.

Bye. Next. Sorry. I'm just, I don't- That's very firm with this idea. Yeah. He's been partying with Venezuela. That's what it is.

Listen, I stand by one thing. Thick Latinas are able to stand. Just let you guys know right now. All right, here we go. Iran. This is getting a little bit interesting and dicey here. Stand by one thing. Thick Latinas are able to stand. Just so you guys know right now. Here we go. Iran. This is getting a little bit interesting and dicey here. So, state-controlled Iranian newspaper calls for firing bullets into Trump's empty skull. If you really want to get someone to like you, do something like this. So they do this. Perfect. Then Iran's currency plummets amid Trump's

maximum pressure plan. So obviously their economy is being affected by it. Rob, if you got the clip, Iran's currency plummet to record low on Saturday that each dollar equals 1,043,000 rials. That is insane, by the way. Worsened by the way. Worsome by the Persian New Year, closure of stores, and informant street trading as reported by the Associated Press, the Rial had already lost nearly half of its value since President Masoud Pesachian's July 2020 inauguration, per Reuters, emitting international sanctions, U.S. pressure on money exchanges, turning off electrical signs due to uncertainty over real value.

The White House February 4th announcement of President Trump's maximum pressure restoration via National Security Presidential memorandum aims to block Iran's nuclear weapon development and counter this influence abroad, intensifying economic strain. Rob, what's this one about? This is President Trump yesterday with Netanyahu from the White House where he talks about possibly meeting with Iran this Saturday for a nuclear deal. Go for it. We're having direct talks with Iran and they've started it'll go on Saturday.

We have a very big meeting and we'll see what can happen. And I think everybody agrees that doing a deal would be preferable to doing the obvious. And the obvious is not something that I want to be involved with or frankly that Israel wants to be involved with, if they can avoid it. So we're going to see if we can avoid it. But it's getting to be very dangerous territory, and hopefully those talks will be successful. And I think it would be Iran's best interest if they are successful We hope we hope that's going to happen

All right. So what's he talking about? Well, we don't want to happen US base and 4,000 troops at risk of destruction if Trump strikes Iran Iran warned via its armed forces run defra press on Wednesday that it certainly has sufficient weapons to attack Diego Garcia a us military base In the indian ocean threatening 4 000 american troops with risk of complete destruction if trump strikes iran The report suggested using shahad 136 drones with a 4000 kilometer range and

quorum shah's with a 4,000 kilometer range and Khurram Shah's missiles despite a depleted stockpile after Israeli airstrikes in April and October 2024. This follows U.S. airstrikes on Thursday against pro-Iranian targets with the Houthis reporting six deaths and additional casualties in Hodeidah and Sadr. The U.S US has ramped up its Middle East pressure with Defense Secretary Pete Hecset extending the US's Harry Truman deployment and redirecting the US's Carl Vinson to the Persian Gulf, creating a rare two carrier stance

as announced by Pentagon on April 2nd. Okay, so that's this. Tom, so far, what is your thoughts on what's going on? And by the way, this is the clip that he tweeted about if you want to press it click to play These hooties gathered for instructions on an attack. Oh, oops Just they will never sink our ships ever again Wow, and he post this on truth So that is click it again gangster. How many people How many people are there? What, 50 people? Done. Gone.

Wow. Thoughts on this. So the first thing that we read in that story was what's happening to their currency and their economy. This is what happens when your country is and has a currency of its own and it's allowed to trade on the world stage. Their economy is getting decimated because of the reaction in the financial markets and

it's hurting their people and their economy. This doesn't happen in China because they hold the currency back and it's all artificial and you don't know what they're printing. So point one, this is a tool in the toolbox that the West has to work with bad actors, is crush their economy. And by the way, they've turned off trading. They said they turned off the electronic signals that run around the country, Pat,

where you go to like an MX office or even just a store and it tells you what the trading rates are to Euro and dollar. They turned those off because it was fluctuating so wildly. They turned them off and they're like, hey, well right now we're frozen at this number. The second thing, Diego Garcia, you might as well be saying, Pearl Harbor,

that base is our most precious international naval base, Diego Garcia, and if they launch something there, I worry that we could be baited into something because of its location. We don't want to be baited into this fight. And now you've got the two carriers standing there in the are you sure position, right? Are you sure you want to do this? I don't want to get baited into this. I do not want to get baited into armed conflict with Iran I think there's people and hawks war hawks in the United States that would want us to

Because it's good for the economy money flows into a lot of companies blah blah blah But it's deficit spending and I just I don't think we want to be in an armed conflict with Iran They don't scare me as an adversary It just it's a distraction and it's it It's just really tough to get out of and now you've got their economy where you want it And now maybe you can get them to back down saying you know what you're talking up an awful lot here, man You're you're you're at a million dollars at a one right now. You want to go to two million your economy is about to collapse You're at a million dollars at a one right now. You want to go to two million your economy is about to collapse Brandon yeah, so I definitely don't want to get baited into this either or not What's scary about this is that in the 90s right before Netanyahu gone to office? There's a

Draft of something that came called a clean break which the plan was to overthrow Saddam Hussein overthrow the leadership in Syria and then overthrow the leadership in in Iran and overthrow the leadership in Syria and then overthrow the leadership in Iran. And Netanyahu is a big fan of this. And a lot of people say that Trump is being influenced by Netanyahu to some degree. Who knows if that's true? But I think if we do get baited into a full on war with Iran, then that's definitely going to support that argument because I don't see anything that's in our best interest in terms of going to war with Iran.

I think if we want to change the regime in Iran, I think the easiest thing to do is to help their population have revolution, because more than 50% of their population wants a new form of government. That's easy. That's confirmed. They've done studies on that. So we did it in the 50s. I'd say the best thing we could do if we want to change Iran

is to help them have revolution, help people have revolution. Because they've had a record amount of revolutions in the last 10 years. So I think they're primed and ready to overthrow their government if we help them. But do you think that like if our government, I mean every time the CIA or anybody was involved in changing regime change, it was always to make war and to have us keep fighting these people.

Do you think it would be in their best interest? Because I mean, from the looks of it, Brandon, from the outside looking in, we want a war. When JD Vance, JD Vance's first time speaking, he was yeah, we want a war right JD Vance look like JD JD Vance is first time speaking We're gonna bomb the hell out of Iran Here I know and it's like and I thought Tucker tweet yesterday too about that. I think like you said this is I The people I wish they had a bigger voice I mean cuz they're out there man

They're in the streets and they're doing the things especially when stuff comes up especially with the girl that had her hijab on right I forgot her name, but they the cops I think killed her beat her and killed her like streets and they're doing their things, especially when stuff comes up, especially with the girl that had her hijab on. I forgot her name, but the cops, I think, beat her and killed her. I don't think, you know? Massa Amin Yalou. Yeah, exactly. So I don't know, but it's scary because you nailed it. Bibi has a tendency, like if he wants something

and he pushes towards it, like with Saddam Hussein and all these, when he said, you know, going to war with Iraq would send positive reverberations around the region it did anything but that so I just I just hope nobody's in his ear I mean they're gonna be in his ear but he doesn't take the bait because a war whatever you think of tariffs it's clear that now is the worst possible time for the United States to participate in a military strike on Iran we can't afford it thousands of Americans would die we'd lose the war that follows nothing nothing would be

more destructive of our country and yet we'd lose the war that follows, nothing would be more destructive of our country, and yet we're closer than ever, and thanks to unrelenting pressure from neocons, this is suicidal. Anyone advocating for conflict with Iran is not an ally of the United States, but an enemy. Adam? Well, a lot to unpack here. First and foremost, the people of Iran deserve better than what they've had to suffer for the last 45 years. So let's just start with that. You know, they talk about, you know, free Gaza, free Palestine. Yeah, from Hamas, free Iran from the Ayatollahs. They deserve better.

You know, the whole concept of regime change is that you don't know what's on the other side. So when you get rid of ISIS, who's coming into power? When you get rid of Saddam Hussein, who's there, right? When you get rid of Bashar al-Assad, who's there? We know who's there in Iran. It's the people of Iran. It can't be worse than who the current leadership is now. So whether you put the Shah somehow back in there,

or whether they have an actual leader, an actual democratic leader, it can't be worse than the Ayatollahs. Now as far as Iran goes, you know how they say like, believe someone when they tell you who they are? When the regime of Iran is screaming death to America, when they're burning the American flag, when they're trying to get a nuclear weapon, you know what? I believe them. And at what point do we say, all right,

enough's enough here. Barack Obama and Joe Biden gave Iran how much money to appease Iran? What did that do? Trump is playing hardball and be like, no, dude, we're not playing this game. And, you know, people want to give Bibi Netanyahu a hard time. I get it because he's Israel. He prioritizes Israel not ending in a nuclear Holocaust because that's literally what Iran wants to do. There's a clock in Iran. Bibi, do you know what this is? A clock in Iran where it's like the death to Israel clock. So this is what their objective is. So real quick on Israel. Israel is feeling a little bit more powerful than ever because Iran's been basically, you know, that guy that just talks trash, you know, what's up where you want to go?

You want to go? You want to go? And then they go and you realize that wasn't tough at all. And then Israel punches back and knocks them out, took out their air defense capabilities, knocked out their military sites. And then last point here with Trump, it just came out, I think a few months ago, three Iranian backed men tried to assassinate the president. We've heard the story, right?

So you don't think that Trump has a little something, you know, up his sleeve for Iran? I don't think we need a war with Iran right now. But the bottom line is Iran is not as tough as they make believe that they are. That's my thoughts. You know what's gonna, by the way, if you look at the real, I just looked up right now what the real was to dollar when I left Iran and came here.

In 1979, the real was, for every US dollar, you could get 70 Iranian Rials, 70. Then in 89 when I left, I was born in 78 so I'm saying 79, when we left in 89, in 89 it was 90 Rials to a dollar, if you just type in 89. 89, yeah you got 90 to 100 Rials per dollar. And he said today in the story a million Rials to a dollar? That's the story we just read a minute ago. That's insane to see where it's at today. What is it today Rob? Today, Rials to dollar today. Yeah but you got to flip

it the other way around. So that would be 500,000 give or take right? So that's that's extremely devastating to the people that are living there. Okay, so there's a couple things here that's going on. Tucker in regards to war, who the hell wants war? Whoever wants war, period, nobody does. Should the president be able to, should the president be, 42,002, one,

should the president be able to, so Rob, I think the story said something about, if you go to page six, the story that we just read, the story says, let me go to it, about the Iran's currency plummeting to a record low on Saturday, it says $1 equals a million, 43,000 rials. That's the story. Look at that right there. So when I left it was 70. So if you go there with five thousand dollars, American dollars, you're chilling. You're a billionaire. Go to it. So let me ask you a question. Here's a question. So shouldn't Trump be able to use that threat? Should he be able to use that card? That if we do this we will destroy you? Should he use that? Do we want to go to war? No. Should he be able

to say if you do this we're gonna do this? Should they be able to do that? Is that a card he should use? Should he be like allowed to use it? He should be allowed to use it. Should he be using it right now? I think that's more questionable because last time it worked out I mean like when he when he took out Suleiman, he seemed to be quieted down pretty much. Nothing, they went and reacted to a base where nobody was there, they knew nobody was there, so nothing happened. But let me tell you what happened, where I'm going with this. There's two thoughts on this that I have. One is, I had DJ Shipley and Cole Fackler here last week

I think Rob if I'm not mistaken. Their podcast goes out tomorrow. Sick podcast. Cole told a story that he's never told before that has to do with Osama Bin Laden and the way he said it was very awkward and he says I've never said this before. Okay you'll have to hear what it is. He said it on the podcast. He said it on the podcast yeah. So but I asked him a question I said listen you, what do you think about threats? Like out of all the countries in the world, I asked DJ this question, who do you not believe? Whose threats have no weight, right?

Like, you know, I'm gonna do this, you're not gonna do shit. I'm gonna do that, holy shit, that guy's gonna do something. I'm going to kill you, believe him, right? I said, if you notice a lot of threats with Lately with Putin has been Ukraine nuclear nuclear nuclear three times. Nothing's happened. Ukraine has not backed down I said Trump hey if you don't release all the hostages Hamas, we're gonna do this two three times They still didn't do all of them right if I'm not mistaken all the hostages have not all done

I said, okay, so hey, we're gonna do this. Whose threats do you not believe? And I'm going to Iran when I'm asking this question. And he says, well, we definitely didn't take Osama bin Laden seriously all those years when they said they're gonna do something. And then we realized they did. So you know what we do now?

We take every threat seriously. Every threat seriously. We don't sit there and say whether we're gonna do it or not. That we don't have the ability, we can't do that. Meaning both of them are Navy SEAL Team 10, 17 years they both were in there now, they run a company together doing incredible things together, but the second part to me is the following.

So Trump's trying to change the comp plan So, Trump's trying to change the comp plan to a 250 year old company. This is what I mean by it. So, when you have a new insurance company, new company period, I changed the comp plan so many times because I could, we're small. And it was drastic changes I would make. Boom, I lost 28 guys. I lost 17 guys. I lost 28 guys. Jump, jump, jump, jump. I lost 17 guys. Jump, jump, jump, jump.

I gained 88 guys. And then you would kind of see which comp is producing what results, right? It's like changing the tax system. Trump is changing a comp plan with countries around the world with tariffs. Super disruptive, super, super disruptive. You're in the middle of doing that

and you want to deal with this Iran situation. I think here's what's gonna happen. I'm not one to sit there and, you know, I wrote a book called 25 Laws for Doing the Impossible, so I'm not one that's gonna be saying don't do it. But it's either going to cause every one of them to fall apart and none of the deals to get through, or they're all

gonna happen and sometimes it's about sequencing so I'm just wondering if we go into war right now while you're trying to change all the tariffs does that slow things down? Does that throw a wrench in the... does that get some of the people to be a little bit hesitant... Does that get some of the people to be a little bit hesitant? Does that get some of your own people that won't be on your side? Do you think a hundred percent of people on Trump's camp are for war? Do you think a hundred percent so... This is when all of a sudden,

it's been long enough where we're getting close to the first hundred days that some of the people even on his own camp are gonna be like, look man, I'm just not for what they're doing over here. Look, I'm glad that we what they're doing over here. Look, I'm glad that we won, but I'm not for this. And if you get about 40% that now disagrees with you internally, that were all aligned even behind closed doors, then you start worrying about who to trust. Is that person on my side?

Is that person not on my side? Then that can lead to a panicky type of a leading, which that's not the vibe he gives today. He seems like he's very that's not the vibe he gives today. He seems like he's very stable and confident in what he's doing. He seems like he has 100% of it all under control. He seems happy. But, I don't know, there's a part of me that says, Iran has to know, look, you keep doing this, here's what's possible.

But at the same time, you don't ever want to use that card. You want to avoid that card as much as possible. He just did, just so you know. That bomb on Houthi, say, you guys having a meeting? No problem. Boom, you don't ever want to use that card. You want to avoid that card as much as possible. He just did, just so you know. That bomb on Hootie, say, you guys having a meeting, no problem. Boom, you're dead. So he's already done it. So it's not like it hasn't happened yet. We've already played offense.

He's already shown that I'm ready for it. And the speculation about this and that, and is it this, is it allies, that, is it Israel, he's trying to do deals. I think he's at a is it Israel? He's trying to do deals. I think he's at a phase right now that he's trying to do all these deals and deals sometimes means what do you need from me? I'll do this, I'll give you this. He's transactionally looking at deals being done and he knows he's got to do something for you as well.

It's not going to be 100% of deals being done for you. That's kind of how I process this. I'm happy. Don't forget this one thing. You know, Trump's not just talking tough. He's already taken action. Soleimani killed the general, done. You know, he's behind closed doors,

been working with Bibi on whatever they're working on. But listen, Trump has a deep, deep vision, objective to get stuff done in not four years, not in two years. I want to get this, this, this, this and done tariffs, border immigration, doge taxation. What are we doing here? Russia, Ukraine, Israel, hostages, Iran. This is just one more thing on his list. So he's got, he wants to accomplish, hold on, Britain, accomplish all these things as soon as humanly possible. I love the reference you made 25 what is it 25 days doing the impossible?

We're doing a possible this guy's got 250 things of doing the impossible before America's 250th birthday So I think Trump is gonna get all this and that done before then How delicate do you think the regime is in Iran right now? Like how much assistance you think they need to topple those regime for the people? You know, there's what two or three revolutions in the last 80 years So like how close do you think this is something like that? How much help do you think they would need in executing that?

I asked him the question. It wasn't in his top priority I know it's not his top priority, but like I wonder if it would even require it like I can't do without the help of Trump Yeah, you're I can't do without the help of Trump. Mm-hmm like like, you know The camp even if they do let's just say they create a revolution in Iran. Yeah, they're gonna say Israel was behind them. Mm-hmm They're not you know, no matter what happens there and I I'll go back to when's the last time Iran was safe at peace, Middle East, no issues for decades. When? 78.

What happened pre 78? Shah was there. It's a very different way of living and running the world. They got along with Israel, things were good. No wars, people weren't getting killed. They had 3,000 political prisoners. They told us it was a lot more than that. Even the founder of the IRGC, Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, who started with Khomeini said,

no, that number was never accurate, it was really around 2,500 to 3,000 people. We exaggerated the number. Now you want to say it? Well, you toppled a great country, the people got along. I saw a concert yesterday. I texted to my dad. You know what concert I saw yesterday? I don't even know if we can play this or not.

But maybe, Rob, I'm going to send send it to you and don't play the music. Just play the clip. And you're going to be shocked when I send this to you. Rob, just play this clip here. This is 1975 in Iran. Okay? 1975 in Iran. Try to find a way, Rob, to mute the audio and just play the video

Don't play the audio just play the video even though. I don't think there's gonna be any issues with it I just want to make sure we get a no the artist. Yeah, you're gonna see right now. Here's what it is You ready? This is 1975 in Iran Get the video just go that's 1975 in Iran that's him. Okay, that's Iran. That's what Iran was like. Can you imagine right now Justin Bieber going to Iran? Can you imagine right now, you know, Adele going to Iran? Okay? Who's the other guy? All of these guys going to Iran and performing. They're not coming back. Look at this. Look at the beauty. Okay? Look at that. Music, enjoying, Frank Sinatra,

hero, being there, hanging out. That's Iran. That's the Iran most people today don't know. People were in suits and ties and dresses. They're some of the most incredible, math, intelligence, engineering. This was a beautiful place. The people have such a rich history. One of the most famous Iranian soccer players that played with Messi, he's a good friend, he messaged me on Instagram saying hey

I went to the Shaw's house in Iran. I want to ship send you clips He was sending me clips of what the place to look like. This is just last week the museum It's not the same of what it used to be but that was Iran for you. So to go back to that It requires a massive revolution. Yeah, but you need the help. Do they know that though the people there? Do they know that used to be this way or the people in the other kind of sensor they know that no of course they know that that's a bit of business It's not like this was hundreds of hundreds 49 years ago 46 years old in my lifetime that was Iran yeah, but besides this thing besides the security aspect

You know to make sure like no terrorism or stuff like that comes up What would be an incentive for Trump on top of that to go and help them to do something as drastic as like a revolution? Are you kidding me? Like take Iran out. Take Iran out. How many proxies do they control? All of them. Okay.

Hamas, the West, Hezbollah. What do you think Saudi wants? You think Saudi MBS likes what Iran's doing? No. What do you think? Because Saudi wants the Middle East to be peaceful so people wanna go there. They would like to see the Middle East

have traffic going in. Dubai, look what happened with Dubai. Dubai is doing a great job. Look what's going on with Dubai. Even Dubai had to make some adjustments with, outside with kissing a girl or some of that stuff. They even came a little bit more fluid with that. But no, I mean, to me, this is a very complicated situation where everybody can jump to conclusion

with different things to say, but the president's trying to handle and juggle all of them at the same time, and you're going to stumble every once in a while. So far, they've been able to get it under control, 80% of the stuff that they've been doing. But this is a delicate situation. And by the way, Iran is one of those things, like you know when you're controlling everything in the company and you look at what departments

it can go zero to nuclear, you score every department or every business that you're running. And you're like, that department's gonna be fine, that company's gonna be fine, that business unit's gonna be fine, that leader running that department's gonna be fine, that department's gonna create a lot of headaches. Iran is one that can go zero to nonstop headache overnight. That's how it can happen. And that's why I'm saying

that you have to be prepared for everything that could take place, but at the same time. I want to go to the last story and then wrap up. Jerome Powell, this is the only story that we haven't done that I do want to do. Powell predicts when Americans will feel ripple effects from Trump's global tariffs. Rob, if you got this clip, I think you got a clip on this, if you can play, because Trump calls for federal, Fed's power to cut interest rates and stop playing politics. That's what Trump said, okay? On the same exact day when Trump says this, okay, President Trump urged the Federal General General Powell to cut the rates on Friday on Truth Social.

This would be perfect time for Federal Powell, to cut the rates on Friday on Truth Social. This will be the perfect time for Federal General, Jerome Powell, to cut interest rates. Energy prices are down. Interest rates are down. Inflation is down. Even egg is down 69 percent, and jobs are up, urging a cut to interest rates, Jerome, and stop playing politics. That's Trump. And this is what Jerome Powell said.

Go ahead and play that clip, Rob. MR. BROOKS. We have stressed that it will be very difficult to assess the likely economic effects of higher tariffs until there is greater certainty about the details, such as what will be tariffed, at what level and for what duration, and the extent of any retaliation from our trading partners. While uncertainty remains elevated, it is now becoming clear that tariff increases will

be significantly larger than expected. And the same is likely to be true of the economic effects, which will include higher inflation and slower growth. The size and duration of these effects remains uncertain. While tariffs are highly likely to generate at least a temporary rise in inflation, it's also possible that the effects could be more persistent. Avoiding that outcome would depend on keeping longer-term inflation expectations well anchored, on the size of the effects, and on how long it takes for them to pass through fully to prices. Our obligation is to

keep longer-term inflation expectations well anchored, and to make certain that a one-time increase in the price level does not become an ongoing inflation problem. We'll continue to carefully monitor the incoming data, the evolving outlook, and the balance of risks. We're well positioned to wait for greater clarity before considering any adjustments to our policy stance.

It is too soon to say what will be the appropriate path for monetary policy. Tom. Excuse me. what will be the appropriate path for monetary policy. Tom. Excuse me. Tom, I just said your name. Brandon, go ahead. Tom's getting very emotional over Jerome Powell. Tom, you okay?

Yeah, yeah, so I got you. So with this, I think that we don't need to cut rates right now because I think we're gonna take care of the inflation just fine with what's gonna happen with the market. So I think just as a result of the market going down like oil is already below $60 a barrel so inflation is gonna go down I don't understand how people are trying to make the argument that tariffs are both gonna make the stock market go down and

cause inflation like no we're not gonna have inflation of the stock markets going down that's one thing too I don't like Trump telling the Fed to what to do with the rates and I absolutely despise the fact that the Fed controls the rates I think that's the most communist thing ever that we have this weird like company this weird private company controlling the price of money for our entire country I think that the 10-year Treasury should be what we base things off of in terms of interest rates because I think that's the market telling you what the rate is rather than some weird governing body

telling you what the price of money should be so so you don't like the fact that Trump's telling Fed but you also don't like the fact that Trump's telling Fed, but you also don't like the fact that they dictate it. So what would you like ideally to happen? So as I just said, ten-year Treasury should basically act as the Fed's federal funds rate, because that's the market telling you that the market buys and sells, the Treasury market's probably the smartest group of money in the world, so I think that's a better market-based way of saying what the price of money should be,

instead of Powell just going in and giving his opinion. Tom. Well, what was interesting was the last thing he said, it's too early to determine if these economic forces have impacted monetary policy. He's talking back to the president. The president is saying, you got to do this. You got to do this. He said, it's too early to do it.

Well, May 6th and 7th is what they're all aiming at. Write those down. May 6th and 7th, June 17th, 18th. Those are the next two meetings of the Fed. May 6th and 7th is coming up. We're less than a month away now. We're just under a month away. And what Trump wants is, hey, look at all this mayhem. Give me a quarter point. Better yet, give me a half point. That won't happen. But give me a quarter point. And the Fed Board of Governors, it ticked up yesterday where it suddenly was over 25% chance. Like they were all in sub voting, you know, they'll the dot chart. All of a sudden it was like a little bit high.

And so maybe there's a 30% chance in May. So what Trump is trying to do is put political pressure on the Fed to look at all of these other statistics and say, yep, let's give a quarter point. Because what does that do? That lets businesses borrow at a lower rate. That lets them borrow money more. And maybe that puts a little more pressure, deeper grock here, on the 10-year or the 30-year in the bond market, which will help mortgages go down because right now mortgages have got one of the highest spreads

They've had in a while in other words the bank on the 30 year fixed I think right now is six and a half depending what bank you look at right around and Trump wants to see five point eight seven five He wants to see a five because people say 5.875 is the mental that is the mental barrier that I'm getting a five rate And so take that and do it with what you will but the but Trump wants to get a cut on May 6 and 7th Definitely on June 17th 18th Adam. Well, you know, there's a song that goes, you can't always get what you want. But if you try sometime, you get what you need with Jerome Powell. Trump has met his match. Who appointed Jerome Powell, chairman of the Fed? Well, in 2018 Trump did. And for

seven years now, Trump's been trying to dictate, mandate, criticize, condemn Powell and Powell's just been like, nah, I'm good, bro. And just does what he wants. Now you can criticize Powell. You could say he's doing a good job. He's doing a bad job. In my opinion, he's doing a very steady Eddie job. So, uh, I love the fact that the president can't just control the chairman of the Fed.

So it's called polarity. You know, Trump is all gas. Jerome Powell might be the brakes, right? Thunder and lightning, logic and emotion, order and chaos. Trump wants to go, go, go, go, go. At some point, someone needs to be like, relax. I got this thing over here. We don't want Trump just dictating everything

that's going on in this country. We want someone saying, well, look, have you thought about this? I don't know about that. So I'm totally in favor of Jerome Powell doing what's best for America. And Trump will also think, do what's best for America. And hopefully the two meet in the middle.

But until then, I'm cool with Jerome Powell holding the line. Is the Fed, so they don't, who do they answer to? Because isn't it an unelected body? It's the banks. It's the bank. Like the city bank, JP Morgan Chase. So they're not, nobody, they're not elected, they're chosen but they answer to themselves.

They're nominated and then elected and then Jerome Powell has his own term and the President cannot fire him the same way he can fire all of the cabinet members is saying because most every cabinet member resigns before they're fired when you change presidents. Jerome Powell, he's not not that way. He has a term that he serves out. Gotcha. Why are you 10 year term? Because Brendan like Brendan makes a good points like Like, who are they answering to?

How do they have that much control? And I'm not saying I wish Trump could fire anybody or whatever, but if you're just on- Well, this goes all the way back to, you gotta read- Jekyll Island. Jekyll Island. The least at Jekyll Island.

We hosted an event at Jekyll Island in the room where the Federal Reserve got started. It's a compound, it's a very interesting, very weird place filled with trillions of mosquitoes. Oh, water you're gonna be bit from head to toe if you're at this property but there's a lot of history to this place anyways right the end of it guys a couple things this cigar lounge thing this weekend last weekend prior weekend it's been very very busy very interesting a lot of fun this last night, this place had a lot of interesting guests.

I've been showing up a lot. Rob, if you can pull up this clip here, this is a highlight from the last couple weeks. Go for it, Rob. Do we have audio? Right there, the audio is paused, Rob. Can you go back? Rob, can you go back? Go for it. people good conversation sports football players NBA players

producers people showing up business people all over the place. Wow. Members only guys. It's a it's very very exciting. Three tiers of membership. Silver, gold, and platinum. Rob, what is the website to go through to apply? Um you have the website to the boardroom. Is that the QR code right there? Yes, that's the QR code. Can you apply. You have the website to the boardroom. Is that the QR code right there? Yes, that's the QR code.

Can you check to see what the website is so I can say to the Spotify audience? Yep, it's boardroomscigarlounge.com. Boardroomscigarlounge.com. Boardroomscigarlounge.com. We had a person become a member the other day that's not even from the States, from Brazil. We have people internationally becoming members

of this place and to come and visit, there's benefits to platinum. We have an announcement to be made here soon for a live event there. But anyways, if you do wanna be a member, everybody, there's no phones allowed in this place when you get in. Nobody can have a phone.

No one's taking pictures. Everyone's asking and saying, hey, I wanna exchange numbers with this person. What do I do? Back in the 80s, you would write it down. So grab a paper and pen, it's really cool. And there's a lot of new surprises. Members know about this. If you want to find out more, apply. Everybody goes through a background check and then some of you guys will get a chance to be there. I'm there quite

often and we'll get a chance to have a conversation as well. Anyways, take care. God bless. We'll do it again on Thursday. Tomorrow, DJ Shipley and Cole Fackler. Take care.