The Daily Signal - Despicable Response to Texas Flash Floods, and Elon Musk's "America Party" | July 7, 2025

Starting point is 00:00:00 Horrific flash flooding in Texas with casualties still rising. Legacy media and Democrat officials attempt to blame the floods on the Trump administration, and Elon Musk announces a third political party to a very mixed reception. I'm Tony Kinnett, host of the Daily Signals Tony Kinnett cast, syndicated nationally at 7 p.m. Eastern. It is Monday, July 7, 2025. This is the Daily Signal's top news in 10. Over the weekend, the central Texas region experienced a serious amount of, of flash flooding along the Guadalupe River.

Starting point is 00:00:37 As of the evening of July 6th, the death toll had reached to at least 80 across Central Texas. A significant number of these deaths, including at least 28 children, occurred in Care County. One of the particular sites of devastation was Camp Mystic and all girls' summer camp on the Guadalupe River, with at least 11 campers and one counselor still missing. So far, there have been over 850 people rescued, including five. 520 of those by the Texas National Guard, including 361 air evacuations by UH60 Blackhawks and 159 rescues with ground assets. Other aid teams and rescue efforts, both official and unofficial, have also shown incredible acts of heroism. According to Secretary Christie Noem of Homeland Security, the United States Coast Guard rescue swimmer and petty officer Scott Ruskin directly saved and astonishing 165 victims.

Starting point is 00:01:34 in the devastating flooding in central Texas. This was the first rescue mission of his career, and he was the only triage coordinator at the scene. One of these incredible heroes was Camp Mystics Dick Eastland, the founder of the camp, who gave his life in an attempt to save over 70 of the campers. Unfortunately, the response from many in the journalistic sphere, especially on Sunday shows,

Starting point is 00:01:57 began saying a lot of things that were not only overtly political. They attempted to paint the tragedy as a responsibility of the Trump administration and essentially reported blatantly false information in an attempt to make some kind of political smear. And there's no other way to put this any more nicely, folks. George Stephanopoulos over on ABC this week blatantly lied. Maria, we're also learning that there were significant staffing shortfalls of the National Weather Services offices in the region. You know, George, as of right now, the local county officials really didn't want to address that just yet. What they are telling us is they expected between four and six inches of rain.

Starting point is 00:02:38 That is what weather experts told them, the National Weather Service as well. They also knew that in remote locations, they might get anywhere from 8 to 10 inches. But this amount of rain, in such a short amount of time, it was very difficult to navigate. And when the Department of Homeland Security Secretary was here just yesterday, she acknowledged this was an issue. She was going to take these concerns to the White House as well and try and see if there was anything they could do to revamp the system. She says the president is committed to it. According to the Associated Press, this is not only untrue. The office actually had extra staffers. According to the Associated Press,

Starting point is 00:03:15 quote, the National Weather Service Office in New Braunfels, which delivers forecasts for Austin, San Antonio and the surrounding areas had extra staff on duty during the storms, Renyon said. Where the office would typically have two forecasters on duty during clear weather, they had up to five on staff. This type of grossly dishonest reporting was, not only on ABC's Sunday show, but also on CNN's Face the Nation Sunday with Dana Bash. Check it out. How much do you think the changing climate is part of what we are seeing go on here, not just what we're seeing in the pictures that we're showing on the screen,

Starting point is 00:03:52 but even the flood that you talked about in San Antonio in June? No, I think climate change is obviously a part of it. These floods are happening more often in more parts of the country, and really all over the world. And so we have to face that reality and be better prepared for it and combat it. And just talking about the federal government and even the local government,

Starting point is 00:04:19 two Texas National Weather Service offices involved in forecasting and warning about flooding on the Guadalupe River are missing some key staff members, a director of the NWS union, told CNN that the U.S. Union, that the Austin San Antonio office is missing a warning coordination meteorologist due to the Trump administration's buyouts. Do you have any indication whether those or other cuts helped play a role

Starting point is 00:04:47 in the fact that the people in the flood zone were not prepared and certainly not evacuated? No, I can't say that conclusively, but I do think that it should be. and I don't think it's helpful to have missing key personnel from the National Weather Service not in place to help prevent these tragedies. And, you know, when I say that we ought to do everything possible to help prevent a tragedy like again, that's part of what I mean. You know, that's why there's an incredible value to the National Weather Service is because, you know, on most days, obviously, you're not going to have a tragedy like this. but when you have flash flooding, you know, there's a risk that you won't have the personnel to make that, do that analysis, do the predictions in the best way, and it could lead to tragedy. So I don't want to sit here and say conclusively that that was the case, but I do think that

Starting point is 00:05:46 it should be investigated and having, you know, not having enough personnel is never helpful. At Desjardin, we speak business. We speak startup funding and comprehensive game plans. We've mastered made to measure growth and expansion advice, and we can talk your ear off about transferring your business when the time comes. Because at Desjardin Business, we speak the same language you do, business. So join the more than 400,000 Canadian entrepreneurs who already count on us and contact Desjardin today.

Starting point is 00:06:17 We'd love to talk, business. Now notably, Dana Bash did passionately defend the response by the former Biden administration to the North Carolina hurricane disaster last year, suggesting that anyone who would politicize a disaster like this was horribly cruel. The former president is falsely accusing federal relief agencies of maliciously withholding and misusing aid. Take a listen. We give foreign countries hundreds of billions of dollars and we're handing North Carolina

Starting point is 00:06:50 $750. If you want a president who won't even try to save you when the flood war, you. orders arising. Vote for Kamala. What you just heard is not true. They're rumors and their lies and they are hurting the very people that thousands of FEMA emergency responders

Starting point is 00:07:09 are trying to help. It's raw politics and dangerous politics. A lot of the people who are believing these lies are Trump voters. Why is he spreading misinformation in a crisis like that? And does that concern you about your fellow North Carolinians? You have migrants being housed

Starting point is 00:07:25 in luxury hotels, in York City. We have paid so much money from our tax dollars into the crisis that didn't need to happen. We could redirect money to help people immediately on the ground in North Carolina. They're saying that they have probably going to have a situation coming up in the next several days. That's a separate tranche of money. That's a separate tranche of Connecticut made similarly horrible statements over on X saying, quote, accurate whether forecasting helps avoid fatal disasters. There are consequences to Trump's brainless attacks on public work. like meteorologists, end quote.

Starting point is 00:08:00 Again, there were a series of weather warnings regarding the flash floods in place 12 hours before the storm and notifications went out prior to and during the flood. Chief political analyst David Axelrod over on CNN said something similar, quote, waste fraud and abuse, end quote, is a handy mantra.

Starting point is 00:08:20 And surely they exist in and out of government, but cutting vital services like the weather service has predictable, hazardous consequences, especially when catastrophic weather events are becoming more frequent. CNN's senior national security analyst Juliette Kayim said a lot of the same. MAGA and right-wing media seem very upset today as a chorus of us experts discuss the impact to cuts and weather forecasting. This is the world of disaster information wars.

Starting point is 00:08:48 I say this, a total tragedy in Texas and we owe those young girls the willingness to learn from it. There is nothing in being a national security. experts that would give you the ability to be some kind of forecasting and weather or disaster recovery expert. And using this particular tragedy as a way to hit the Trump administration over your perceived impact on national weather service cuts that didn't even affect the region of the flooding, who was properly warned before a once-in-a-century kind of flood, in which the water rose over 20 feet in under 45 minutes is ridiculous and it is insulting to the victims to somehow blame this on the Trump administration because Orange Man bad. And lastly, Elon Musk announced on Saturday his

Starting point is 00:09:35 launch of a new political party he dubs the American Party in response to the passage of the one big beautiful bill act that Trump signed into law. According to Lorenzo Preto over at the Daily Signal, on Independence Day, Musk started a poll on X asking users whether he should create a new party and run candidates against both Republicans and Democrats, whom he accused of belonging to the same uniparty. The final poll indicated that a great majority of followers, 65.4% voted yes, while 34.6% of followers said no. He responded, quote, by a factor of two to one, you want a new political party and you shall

Starting point is 00:10:12 have it, Musk stated on Saturday. When it comes to bankrupting our country with waste and graft, we live in a one-party system, not a democracy. Today, the America Party is formed to give you back your freedom. Now, President Trump did actually respond to the formation of this political party yesterday. Starting a third party. I think it's ridiculous to start a third party. We have a tremendous success with the Republican Party.

Starting point is 00:10:40 The Democrats have lost their way, but it's always been a two-party system. And I think starting a third party just adds to confusion. It really seems to have been developed for two-party. Third parties have never worked. So he can have fun with it, but I think it's ridiculous. Before you go, head down to the description and make sure you're subscribed to the Tony Kinnett cast. And join us tonight at 7 p.m. Eastern where we dig through more of the news and nonsense. I'm Tony Kinnett, and this has been The Daily Signal's Top News in 10.

Starting point is 00:11:10 Take care.

The Daily Signal - Despicable Response to Texas Flash Floods, and Elon Musk's "America Party" | July 7, 2025

There aren't comments yet for this episode. Click on any sentence in the transcript to leave a comment.