The Dan Bongino Show - President Trump Found Oil In The Ocean! | Episode 186

Episode Date: December 11, 2025

The US seizes oil tanker near Venezuela; Trump and Vance set forth on the campaign trail; and the effects of the “Seditious Six” continue to play out Watch VINCE Live on Rumble - Mon-Fri 10AM ET ⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠https://rumble.com/vince⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ US Seizes Oil Tanker Off Venezuelan Coast, President Trump Confirms https://dailycaller.com/2025/12/10/us-seizes-oil-tanker-off-venezuelan-coast-trump-confirms/ Trump escalates Venezuela standoff with oil tanker seizure https://www.axios.com/2025/12/10/venezuela-oil-tanker-seized-trump Victim recounts moment he tried to stop accused stabber on Charlotte light rail https://www.wral.com/news/local/stabbing-cats-blue-line-charlotte-december-2025/ Sponsors: American Financing - https://AmericanFinancing.net/Vince - NMLS 182334, nmlsconsumeraccess.org. APR for rates in the 5s start at 6.196% for well qualified borrowers. Call 888-879-6460, for details about credit costs and terms. Birch Gold - Text VINCE to the number 989898 Blackout Coffee - https://BlackoutCoffee.com/Vince First Liberty Institute - https://firstliberty.org/vince Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Good morning, everybody. Welcome to Vince on a Thursday. Great to have you with us. The best audience anywhere. Holy cow, we just seized the ship. I'm going to talk about what happened as an oil tanker has been taken into custody by the United States military off the coast of Venezuela. What that all means, why it had even happened in the first place. We've got a lot to get to today. We're also going to get to what's going on with Indiana Republicans right now. We're trying to win back. some seats all across the country through some redistricting and some Indiana Republicans don't want to play ball right now? What's that about? Don't they realize we have a country to save? We have so much to get to today. It's all ahead on this edition of Vince. Hey, let me start here, though. I want to ask you, what if you could delay your next two mortgage payments? That's right. Imagine putting those two payments in your pocket and finally getting a little bit of breathing room ahead of the holidays. It's possible when you call American financing today. If you're feeling stretched by everyday expenses, groceries, gas, bills piling up, you're not alone.

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That's like a $10,000 raise without having to change jobs. So call now, before it's too late, American financing, 888-879-646. That's 888-879-640, Americanfinancing.comnet slash vance. All right, let me begin to. by taking a look at the breaking news this morning out of the president of the United States. Yesterday, and basically all the time, I'm constantly talking to you about the insanity of blue slips in the United States Senate, preventing the president from getting his U.S. attorneys into position to prosecute bad guys.

And as I said yesterday in a clip that went viral thanks to Maga Kitty on X, you should follow Maga Kitty. That clip goes viral and it shows me ranting about the fact that Chuck Grassley, a guy who spent all this time telling everybody, oh, there's all this criminality going on in the government is now the signature obstruction in the United States Senate for the president to get his prosecutors through. That's just true.

It's unfortunate and it's true, which is why I brought it to you. Chuck Grassley is the signature impediment. He's keeping the blue slip alive, which is a barrier to prosecution, and it's a gift to criminals. no more. And the president of the United States has weighed in on this this morning. Thank goodness. Perhaps we count President Trump among our viewers. I know he cares about this. We've been covering it a lot this week. Here's the president and what he had to say. Blue slips are making it

impossible to get great Republican judges and U.S. attorneys approved to serve in any state where there's even a single Democrat senator. If they say no, then it's over for that very well-qualified Republican candidate. Only a really far left Democrat can even be approved. It is shocking that Republicans under Senator Chuck Grassley allow this scam to continue. He says Chuck G is how he describes him. So unfair to Republicans and not constitutional. I'm hereby asking Senate Majority Leader John Thune, a fantastic guy, to get something done. Ideally, the termination of blue slips. Too many great Republicans are being sent packing. None. are getting approved president dj t all right so president trump says get this done i'm asking john

soon to get it done and he says quote ideally the termination of blue slips now i think president trump's kind of tipping his hand is something going on behind the scenes here uh that that john soon is suggesting perhaps that maybe they'll have some sort of creative work around but they don't don't want to get rid of the blue slips. Let me be a voice of encouragement for the president of the United States. It shouldn't be ideally the termination of blue slips. You should be demanding the termination of blue slips. No more blue slips. No, we don't have any more time to waste. These people need to be prosecuted. And the impediment to doing that are Republicans who are still playing by the old rules who are keeping their gloves on and saying, why should I have to take

them off? Because the other side already took them off and they're holding knives. So what are you going to do? What are you going to do? Now's the time. President Trump, I'm glad to see him jump in on this again this week, say get rid of these blue slips. But again, with all the force in the world, we've got to get rid of these things. You want big Republican gains going into the midterms? Demonstrate you deserve them, Republican Party. Please, I beg of you. I can't believe we're even here doing this. President Trump's got to keep pushing and hard to get this done. But John Thune, look, he's being nice to Dune. Thune's resisting.

Thune's the reason the blue slips stick around. Chuck Rassely continues to also be the reason the blue slips stick around. And a lot of other Republican senators who don't want the heat of you being aware that they're all in on this protection racket for criminals. It's enough. And we know about it. And we're talking about it. And you're talking about it. I'm telling you, yesterday I saw that John Thune's office and Chuck Rassley's office just publicly.

They had a lot of incoming from you. That is us, the American people, pointing out that this has to end. Now, please keep that alive. It shouldn't just be President Trump alone. Let's keep helping him along here to get rid of these blues slips. So that's a big one today. Now, on this thing about these Republicans who refuse to take their gloves off, we've got this problem in Indiana too right now. And the reason I'm talking about Indiana today is because today,

the Indiana Senate is set to take up the vote on whether or not to redistrict their congressional districts in the state. As it stands right now, Democrats have just two of the districts in Indiana, just two. And Republicans at the moment are attempting to, MAGA Republicans who do know what time it is, are trying to redraw the districts in the state to make it so that those two districts go away. Instead, we've got Republican-leaning districts in the state. Now, why are they doing this? And this is not happening in a vacuum. This is happening in a world where Democrats keep on rigging elections all across the country. Let me remind you about something really simple. Democrats do not have a message that voters are generally interested in. So as a result, because they can't

actually get majorities of the American people to support them, they have to rig elections in order to secure and hold power. And that's definitely true in the United States House of Representatives. The idea that Democrats even have a shot at reclaiming the majority in the United States House is the product of them rigging, redistricting all across our country. We know that as a product of the last census, for instance, that Democrat states were overcounted in terms of their congressional seats, and Republican states were undercounted in terms of their congressional seats. It's not a secret that's public knowledge. And that's election rigging.

If you get more members of Congress than you deserve, you're trying to rig the election, which is what Democrats did. Additionally, states like Illinois don't represent in any way the actual population of the state. So, for instance, in Illinois, it's about even, actually. It's about 50% of people vote for Republicans, 50% of people vote for Democrats. But how is it that Democrats run the entire state of Illinois practically? In fact, among the 17 total congressional seats, 14 of those seats are held by Democrats. Does that sound like a 50-50 split to you?

No, it's not a 50-50 split. It's a completely rigged state designed to disenfranchise half of the state's voters as aggressively as possible. That's what Democrats have done in Illinois. Those are ill-gotten seats. and they have them because Democrat politics in Illinois are about as corrupted as it comes. Maryland is another example of this. In Maryland, Democrats are 65% of the vote in the state, 65%. So they have a majority.

But that doesn't stand a reason that they would get seven of the eight total seats then. It doesn't add up at all. Seven of the seats? There's only one Republican Andy Harris right now. And at the moment, Maryland's governor is trying to get rid of that seat to make it so that Democrats have all eight seats and not just seven. In New Jersey, there are 12 total congressional seats. Nine of them are held by Democrats, despite the fact that 57% of that population is Democrat. 57%.

Well, that doesn't stand to reason at all. New Mexico, they've got three total seats, and there's three Democrats in them. 58% of the population votes for Democrats there. And in Oregon, six total seats with five Democrats and you have 56% of the population they're voting for Democrats. People think of Oregon as a Democrat state because you think of Portland for sure and the craziness that's going on there and the crazy Democrats who run the state. But their congressional seats are rigged.

They're rigged in order to disenfranchise Republican voters. So we're watching this happen all across the country. Democrats have rigged all sorts of seats. In addition, they're trying to do more of it. California just passed something called Prop 50, as you know. They just had the Prop 50 election. What's that going to do? Estimates say it's going to eliminate approximately five Republican seats in a state

that doesn't have that many Republicans to begin with. Five. I told you about Maryland. They're trying to eliminate the only Republican seat there. Virginia is targeting Republican seats now as an incoming Democrat trifecta is about to take over as governor and as lieutenant governor and the attorney general of the state and in the state houses, they want to go for broke here. They're going to use all their powers they arrive in 2026 to target congressional districting. And they want to take away Republican

seats. In Illinois, which I just told you is totally unfair, they have three Republican seats right now. J.B. Pritzker is now trying to eliminate all three of those seats as well. And in New York, the Democrat legislature is pushing a constitutional amendment to redistrict away six Republican seats. So this fight right now that we're watching happen in Indiana, they're talking about how many? Two. Republicans are talking about redrawing districts in such a way as two more Republicans will arrive in the United States House of Representatives. Two. Compare that to the 20 or 30 seats that I just talked about where Democrats have either already secured ill-gotten gains or are pursuing more. This is insanity that any Republican would even hesitate on this.

If you care about our country, you need to care about the fact that what's happening right now nationwide is Democrats are rigging elections. I said it, and I'll say it again, they are rigging elections. And I'm not just talking about election integrity concerns, of which we have many. I'm talking explicitly today about the way that they steal congressional seats, whether it's overcounting in the census or redrawing maps to try and get rid of Republicans or importing millions of illegal aliens into their states in order to pad the human body total and get more ill-gotten members of Congress. Democrats rig elections. They don't have anything useful for the voter. So in the absence of convincing a voter to support them, they just rig elections so that they can get power.

We're witnessing it right now. So why are we fighting over two seats in Indiana? This should be open and shut. Come on, Indiana, Republicans. Get this thing across the finish line. And yet they don't. And the reason that there's even a fight today about this is because, as the reports are indicating, the old guard in Indiana,

old Republican guard, the old Mitch Daniels guard in Indiana, wants to keep their gloves on. They say it's about a, quote, innate sense of fair play and a distaste for being ordered and told what to do by people on the outside. This is, that's true. That's actually what they're saying. Look at this. This comes to us from the New York Times today as they summarize the fights that are going on side of the state. They said Republican leaders, some of whom have held office before the emergence of Mr. Trump as a political force, see the landscape very differently than MAGA does. Mitch Daniels, the governor from 2005 to 2013, whom many credit with ushering in Indiana's era of Republican dominance, described the proposed map as grotesque. He attributed pushback from

Republicans to an innate sense of fair play and a distaste for being ordered and told what to do by people outside. Fair play. What in the hell are you talking about? There's nothing fair going on at all right now. The American voter and what we desire is being shit all over by Democrats who are rigging elections across the country. In Indiana, you have some Republicans who are aware of what time it is. They know what time it is. But if you're a part of the Mitch Daniels coalition, in Indiana, you don't even want to watch right now. You have no idea the battle that the rest of us are cognizant enough. So grow up and understand what we're up against because all you're doing is serving the corruption, the rigging, and the establishment. President Trump hates this.

And he is threatening today to wage MAGA primaries on any Indiana Republican who falls for the garbage, who doesn't have the tisticular fortitude to fight for their country. Here's the president. He says, I love the state of Indiana. I've won it, including primaries, six times, all by massive majorities. And now it has a chance to make a huge difference in Washington, D.C., he says, in regard to the number of house seats that we have that are necessary to hold the majority against the radical left. Every other state has done redistricting, willingly, openly, easily. There was never a question in their mind that contributing to a win in the midterms for the Republicans is a great thing to do for the party

and for America. In all fairness, the Democrats have been redistricting for years, the president rightfully points out, and they continue to do it. Unfortunately, Indiana Senate leader Rod Bray enjoys being the only person in the United States of America who's against Republicans picking up extra seats. In Indiana's case, two of them, just two. Why are we fighting about two? This is insane. Just two. Come on, let's get this done. he's putting every ounce of his limited strength into asking his soon to be very vulnerable friends to vote with him by doing so he's putting the majority in the house at risk we don't have it guys we have like the smallest margins imaginable and they're growing smaller by the day anybody in indiana who votes

against this is at risk the people of indiana don't want the party of sleepy joe biden kamala harris Ilhan Omar are the rest to succeed in Washington. Bray doesn't care, says Trump. He's either a bad guy or a very stupid one. That's the game we play all the time. Malice or moron? In any event, he and a couple of his friends will partner with the radical left Democrats. They found some Republican suckers and they couldn't be happier that they did.

Guys like failed Senate candidate Mitch Daniels, who I opposed in his race against Jim Banks, and Cam Savage, whoever that is, are fighting against the Republican Party all the way. Bray and his friends are the favorite Republicans of Hakeem Jeffries, crazy Nancy Pelosi, and crying Chuck Schumer. The president goes on to say, hey, if you vote against this, then you are going to be met with, I'm sure, a MAGA primary in the sprint. A MAGA primary. So primary threat from the president of the United States saying, stick with us or you will be out of a job and I will see to it. insanity you know it really it's that one of the um one of the most frustrating things about the moment that you and i are all living through is we can see very clearly where all of this is headed

where the threats really lie and there are still people who call themselves republicans who are completely asleep at the switch there was one indiana state legislator this past week who said he's voting against the redistricting because trump called tim walls retarded What? Your rationale is that Trump called Tampon Tim retarded so now you can't vote to save our country? You shouldn't have that job. You shouldn't be in office at all. You're too emotionally incontinent to be a Republican legislator. Leave. Give somebody else the job who wants to actually serve the people of Indiana and help this country. And that's the key point, by the way. This is a great opportunity. If you're a Republican in the state senate

in Indiana right now, you have a perhaps once in a lifetime opportunity to save your country, to serve your country. The margins are that small. We're talking two seats, but those two seats could make all the difference. And if you end up becoming responsible for Democrats taking over the United States House of Representatives by one or two, or even more, If you end up becoming responsible for that, what are you going to tell your children? What are you going to tell your grandchildren? When Democrats use that power to continue to loot America, to rob us blind of what made us great, and to bear down on us in the most tyrannical ways imaginable, what are you going to tell your kids?

Now's the moment. You have a moral obligation to fight for your country. These guys, you take oaths to off in your, into office. Serve your country. Now's your chance. It's a big deal. We got to fight. We have to fight back against the incursions of the left.

And this is the way to do it. This is a big story. So we'll keep our eyes on what's happening in Indiana today. President Trump obviously concerned about this. And we'll bring you updates as we get them. Coming up, the president of the United States was the first to break the news. yesterday that the American military has seized a Venezuelan oil tanker just off the coast of Venezuela. We'll talk about that. And what it all means? What's actually going on with the

Maduro regime and why President Trump is so concerned right now? It's all ahead on this edition of Vince. This program is brought to you by our great sponsors. That includes Birch Gold. You know, there are a lot of politicians out there who you know should be getting coal in their stocking for Christmas. But Birch Gold thinks that as a smart planner, you actually deserve silver. That's why for every $5,000 you purchase between now and December 22nd, Burch Gold will send you an ounce of silver, which is up over 60% this year. You see, smart people diversify. They have a hedge with the rate cuts from the Fed in 2026. The dollar, yeah, it's going to change in value. And what happens if the AI bubble bursts diversify? Let Birch Gold Group help you convert an existing IRA or for

one kind, into a tax sheltered IRA and physical gold. And for every $5,000 you buy, you'll get an ounce of silver for your stocking or for your kids. It's a great way to teach them about saving smartly. Just text my name Vince to 9-8-9-8-9-9-8 to claim your eligibility for this offer. Again, text Vince to the number 9-8-9-9-8 today. Because Birchgold's free silver with qualifying purchase promotion ends on December 22nd. Text Vince to 9-8-9-8-9-8 right now. Message and data rates may apply. So we get breaking news from the president of the United States yesterday

that the United States military has just seized a massive oil tanker near Venezuela. Take a look. Got one. An interesting day from the standpoint of news. As you probably know, we've just. just seized a tanker on the coast of Venezuela. Large tanker, very large. Largest one ever seized actually.

And other things are happening. So you'll be seeing that later and you'll be talking about that later with some other people. The president breaks the news and says, hey, this is a big deal. We just seized this oil tanker. And in seizing it, you asked some obvious questions,

well, why? Why did we seize it? What was it about? And here's what the president said at first. It was for a very good reason, he said. Well, I'll let the people do it, but you see the result. And I guess they probably have released the pictures by now pretty soon. You'll discuss that with the appropriate people later on. But no, it was seized for a very good reason. It's a very good reason. Okay. We'll get to that. And what about the oil that's on board that ship? What are we going to do with that, Mr. President? Tell us. what happens to the oil on this ship well we keep it i guess when you have to follow the tanker you know you're a good disman just follow the tank you know what we're going to get a helicopter

follow the tanker is it sure he's going to i guess so we're going to keep the oil you see this is what happens you bring 90 000 somalis into minnesota and then all of a sudden now we're hijacking ships and stealing the oil. That's right. That's the contribution for Somali culture. Thank you very much. Now, look, we just grabbed this ship and there is a reason. There's a massive predicate for why this has happened. The reason for this, says the Attorney General of the United States and a couple of others pointed out yesterday, is that the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Homeland Security Investigations, and the United States Coast Guard with the support of the Department of war, just executed a seizure warrant for a crude oil tanker that's been used to transport

sanctioned oil from Venezuela and Iran. For multiple years, the oil tanker has been sanctioned by the United States, this particular one, due to its involvement in an illicit oil shipping network supporting foreign terrorist organizations. This seizure completed off the coast of Venezuela was conducted safely and securely. And our investigation alongside the Department of Homeland Security to prevent the transport of sanctioned oil continues. In other words, this is a part of a black market of oil, sanctioned oil coming out of Venezuela and going all across the planet, including, by the way, to China, to China.

And the Attorney General as well as other government officials, they shared this video, if we could put this up on screen. This is video of U.S. troops fast roping onto the tank, just imagine how excited they were when they got the call that they were going to do this fast roping onto the tanker and taking it into custody taking over this thing amazing footage to see as you can see it says unclassified rumble dot com slash vince for the video and uh these guys go up just imagine operating the ship in a bunch of a bunch of well-trained well-armed well-armed american troops arrive on deck and all of a sudden you're looking out the window and you're like what

the heck is going on hands up uh you better surrender pretty quickly so these guys take over the ship and what we know this is what we know as of today this is a very large crude carrier that we've grabbed that particular crude oil carrier that that tanker is capable of carrying 320 000 tons of crude 320 000 tons is a lot of crude oil. And it was apparently, according to some reports, destined for Cuba, Cuba, which is involved in this black market, illicit trade of Venezuelan energy. And then from there, it moves on, Havana, Cuba, and they end up selling that Venezuelan crude on the black market around the world. And it goes to places like Asia. It ultimately goes to China. Axios has some

decent reporting on this this morning. And what they do, what Cuba does is they split the profits of the oil that they have routed through Cuba, which is designed to try and evade these sanctions on Venezuela. That money, by the way, from all that purchasing of that illicit oil, that all ends up going in and feeding the narco-terror regime that's currently running Venezuela. In fact, Stephen Miller laid out the American interest here about what's going on. Here's cut six. Stephen Miller last night breaking down some more of the details. Watch.

So these regimes use these ghost fleets, these dark fleets to evade sanctions and to fund and finance and export terrorism, violence, and death. And President Trump has said, we will defend and protect American lives. And that's what's happened. Yeah. It is a deadly regime. It's an out of control regime. Remember, Maduro is not in office because he was popularly elected in Venezuela.

Maduro operates a lot like Democrats in this country wish they could, which is full-blown rigging of elections. All to stealing elections outright all the time. And in fact, it was like all observers of how the vans. Venezuelan election was conducted, have concluded that it is just completely rigged, just absolutely rigged. And Maduro, you know, rules with an iron fist in his own country. Really sad what's going on in Venezuela. You remember that's where they were eating the zoo animals because they ran out of food. And the drug trade has been a huge feature of Venezuela. And the Trump administration has been striking a lot of these boats that have been leaving, carrying drugs destined for the United

States and destroying these things in order to stop them. The effect on that has been pretty immense. We have slowed down boat traffic, drug traffic, illicit drug traffic dramatically into the United States. But the Maduro regime is powered by these narco proceeds, by drug proceeds. And in fact, recently the Trump administration actually designated the the narco terror operation that gives Maduro all of this money as a terrorist organization. It's called Cartel de los Solis, the Cartel of the Sun. And the Department of State, just about a month ago put this out, a terror designation for Cartel de los Solis. The Department of State designating that cartel, a foreign terrorist organization, effect of November 24th.

It's based in Venezuela, and the cartel is headed by Maduro. other high ranking individuals of the illegitimate Maduro regime, they've corrupted Venezuela's military, intelligence, legislature, and judiciary. Neither Maduro nor his cronies represent Venezuela's legitimate government. That gets back to the point that I was just making, which is the people did not elect this guy. They stole the election. Maduro nor his cronies represent that government, cartel de los Solis, by and with other terror organizations, including trend de Aragua, Venezuela, and Sinaloa cartel, Mexico, are responsible for terrorist violence throughout our hemisphere, as well as for trafficking drugs right into the United States and in

Europe. So you say the U.S. is going to continue to use all available tools to protect our national security interests and deny funding and resources to narco-terrorists. All right. So what do we have here? A couple things. One is the Venezuelan oil supply. which is currently sanctioned by the United States, not supposed to be going all over the plan. I'm not supposed to be going anywhere, is currently being used to underbid the sales of legitimate countries like the United States

and to use that oil on the black market for countries like China and Iran, adversaries. So the Trump administration's plan is, well, let's enforce our sanctions. We've imposed sanctions, and Venezuela thinks they can get around them by using these ghost shipments in order to do that, routed through Cuba, we're going to stop that. So what does that do? Well, it disempowers Venezuela, disempowers Cuba, disempowers China.

It kind of has a, you know, they're kind of hitting the sweet spot in disempowering all these various adversaries of the United States of America. That's a big deal. Another piece of this is stopping the drug trade, stopping the illicit drugs that are flowing into the United States and killing American citizens. Now, as you're thinking about this, you may be thinking, well, isn't Mexico very heavily involved in that as well? Yes, they are, which of course, leads to other questions, which is, well, are we going to be taking these kinds of military actions against Mexico and the opioid crisis that's flowing through Mexico, emanating ultimately from China? You see how all these things are tied together. What kind of steps are

we're going to take if we're going to use the military well damn it's about directly impacting the american interest that absolutely is the way that we should be using the military but we should obviously think very carefully before we use our military the other piece here that i'd like to see and i'll admit that just given the propensity for the united states to get involved in foreign conflicts in the end don't serve us very well one thing that i'd love to see the trump administration do right now is offer a very clear explainer. On top of all of the things that you and I can suss out about this, a very clear explainer about what is happening in Venezuela,

the extent to which we might find ourselves going in there. I know President Trump tries to keep his cards close to his vest. He doesn't want to roll out things, even though he probably doesn't intend to have a ground invasion. I'm not eager for any ground invasion anywhere. But regardless, make a very strong case to the American people, why this is directly in our interest, give us the brief, in other words. And I'll be sold. I'll be sold if you make a fantastic case for this. And it does appear like they've got some.

They've got some very good rationales for why we're tackling this. And what we just witnessed, by the way, Congress should be celebrating. Congress should be all over this. You know, the seditious six, which has spent all this time bitching about the fact that we're killing drug dealers coming to our country. Our troops didn't kill anybody. They landed on a ship that should not have been carrying oil away from Venezuela and towards our adversaries. And we've taken custody of it in order to enforce the sanctions that we've imposed on that illegitimate hostage-taking government. By the way, that is sort of what you are. If you try and if you run a country with an iron fist and you aren't the rightful leader of that country, well, it's a hostage crisis right now.

And the other piece here is to remember American history. We have something called the Monroe Dock. which was designed, as you probably know, from just a basic high school history class, that this was designed to make sure that the United States had territorial control over the Western Hemisphere, that we protected our sphere of influence on the Western Hemisphere. The reality is in South America, China and other and other adversaries who do not have good intentions for the United States have been exploiting both South and Central. America as a vehicle through which to diminish us as a country. And that includes through the drug crisis in our country right now. Killing over 100,000 Americans a year. Putting an end to that threat

is directly in the American interest. And again, I would think it would be very good for the White House to come out and give an address of some kind to help bring along as many Americans as possible with what the president is doing right now. This is a president who is obsessed with peace, deals and obsessed with the well-being of American citizens, I'm confident that he can make a strong case for what the hell's going on right now as we tackle this problem in Venezuela. All right. Let's, I've got more for you on this subject.

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even instant blackout has got your back real coffee no compromise blackout coffee.com slash vince get yours now black house blackout coffee is tremendous the chat loves blackout coffee by the way if you're if you're listening to the podcast you should know rumble dot com slash vins huge applause for blackout coffee every time we talk about it so good and you know the holidays are always full of surprises because of that let me share something that honestly has blown me away when it comes to religious freedom i was shocked to learn what states rank low on First Liberty Institute's religious liberty in the state's index. My friends of First Liberty Institute, one of the nation's leading law firms protecting religious

freedom, they just released their index. And it ranks all 50 of our states. That's right. We have 50 states, Obama, not 57. We have 50 states. And we're all ranked now. And they tell you how well each state protects your right to live out your faith. And the results, they're full of surprises. If you haven't heard of First Liberty, they're different. They've been on the front lines defending religious freedom for nearly 30 years now. Here's the absolute best part. When your faith comes under attack, they are often the very first in the fight. They really are. They do it without ever sending their clients a bill. That's right. They don't charge a dime. They have a win rate of over 90% on their cases, including a 90 record at the Supreme Court. That's huge.

They're committed to help protecting religious freedom, your religious freedom, which is why I believe this state-by-state report is very important. It's the religious liberty in the state's index. It's a peer-reviewed study. It can help you get a real picture of religious liberty all across the country. If you want to see where your state ranks, all you have to do is get your free copy today at firstliberty.org slash vince. That's first liberty.org slash v-in-C-E.

First liberty.org slash vans. Thank you. So let me see. You know, so we get this wildness in Venezuela. We seized a ship, which is really fun. That's a fun story. And in the process, you should know, Maduro, of course, is the corrupt, fake, rigged leader of the country.

But the opposition leader of the country is a woman called Maria Machado. Maria Machado. And there was a very interesting story this week about her because she was able to escape the country just a few hours before the United States seized this ship. Now, are those things connected? That very well may be the case, actually.

The Wall Street Journal reports that the move to seize the ship came just hours after the Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Carina Machado left the country. And she left in a really interesting, way. She left in disguise. She left in disguise. The Wall Street Journal reports that she was wearing a wig in a disguise, Maria Carino Machado began her escape from Venezuela Monday afternoon. She was trying to get to Norway because remember, she got the Nobel Peace Prize this year.

Should have gone to Trump. She gets the Nobel Peace Prize. It is what it is. But she won the prize for challenging Maduro. But she had to get out of the Caracas suburb where she's been hiding for a year to a coastal fishing village where a skiff awaited her. So over the course of 10 nerve-wracking hours, they say, Machado and two people helping her escape hit 10 different military checkpoints.

They avoided capture each time, and then she reached the coast, and she rested for a couple of hours, they say, and then they were able to get out on the ocean. They were trying to make a trip across the Caribbean to Curacao. she had almost completed that escape that had been in the works for two months and she was carried out by a Venezuelan network that helped her they actually got in touch with the United States

military before they set out to sea warning American forces in the region who she was because they didn't want the United States to think this was another drug shipment and for us to bomb them that's so that's it so they got her out of there and she ultimately made her way to receive the Nobel Prize. She did do that. And she talked about all this. She described the situation in Venezuela and how it's become a total disaster. Take a look at Cut 4. Here's Machado, the opposition leader describing what's happening with Maduro right now. Some people talk about invasion in Venezuela, the threat of an invasion in Venezuela. And I answered, Venezuela has been already invaded. We have the Russian agents. We have the Iranian agents. We have terrorist groups.

such as Hezbollah, Hamas, operating freely in accordance with the regime. We have the Colombian guerrilla, the drug cartels that have taken over 60% of our populations and not only involving drug trafficking, but in human trafficking, in networks of prostitution. So this has turned Venezuela into the criminal hub of the Americas. And what's sustained the regime is a very powerful and funded, strongly funded, repression system. Where does that funds come from? Well, from drug trafficking, from the black market of oil, from arms trafficking for human trafficking.

We need to cut those flows. And once it happens and repression is weakened, it's over because that's the only thing the regime has left, violence and terror. So we ask the international community to cut those sources because the other regimes that support Maduro and the criminal structure are very active and had turned Venezuela into the safe heaven for their operations into the rest of Latin America. Yeah, look, she loves Trump. She likes the United States intervening here.

She wants to see these illicit funding operations cut off so that the Maduro regime can stop its vile behavior. She said they've got all sorts of agents. They have Russian agents, Iranian agents, Hezbollah, Hamas, is a complete disaster. It's become an epicenter of criminality. She called it the criminal hub of the Americas. So right now, President Trump's doing something about this. What happens next is anybody's guess? Only President Trump and I would guess some people in the United States military know right now.

But clearly, things are moving very aggressively, very quickly right now. So as things develop, we'll bring updates right here on events. In Congress, separately on another national security issue, did you know that we've been funding the Taliban to the tune of $40 to $45 million every week? Of course you did. You've been advocating against it, haven't you? Yeah, $40 to $45 million a week?

Congressman Tim Burchett has been fighting to stop this. I talked to Congressman Burchard earlier this year about it as he was fighting to get this legislation through the United States House of Representatives saying, What are we doing? No more money to the Taliban. They'll hate us for free. And yet it continues. He got the legislation through the House. He's having trouble getting it through the Senate. Why is that? Well, here's Tim Burchett this week, cut nine in his own words. Watch. Hey, everybody, Tim Burchett. As you know, as I've been championing the cause to quit paying the dead gum Taliban $40 million or $45 million, whatever is a week.

We've given them over $5 billion total since the Biden administration. Every week, every week, we can't stop the bill. We can't, I mean, we can't get the bill passed in the Senate. It's taken me over a year to get it out of the Dedgram House. And we got a fellow over in the Senate who was a staffer, he was a former, I believe, ambassador to Afghanistan. And his name is what? Tom West.

And apparently our good friend Tulsi Gabbard, and the Trump administration denied him his security clearance because of his alleged cozy relationship with the Taliban. And so I suspect that's what's going on in the Senate. That's why they're stopping the bill. And people say, well, y'all are in the majority. show you just act like it well you got to have 60 votes over there to pass a bill of this significance and that's the hold up that's the hold up we can't get 60 votes to ban funding for

the taliban man your senators hate you the united states senate senate is a dumpster fire you can't get 60 votes to stop funding for the taliban what the hell is wrong with you whose side are you want you're not on our side we're sending money the taliban that's psychotic you know anybody went to the war in Afghanistan? You know anybody who had to fight back against the Taliban? Members of my family did. What about yours? How many of our communities have had great men and women who've been deployed into that region to fight the Taliban? And here we are, sending them $45 million a week. It's an outrage. Why is Tim Burchett one of the only people even talking about this? He had to fight Tutank now to get that bill through the House. And now he's fighting

to Tutsin now to try and get it through the Senate. He's not even a part of it. And he's trying to point out the friction points, the obstruction, the people are getting in the way. They can't get 60 votes to do that. Disaster. I do have some good news, though, for you. Something important transpired in the last 24 hours. As a part of negotiations for passing the defense funding bill yesterday, Republicans to include Tim Burchett and Anna Paulina Luna, who we had on this program yesterday, were pretty insistent, thankfully, that we need to figure out a way to cut off all this funding to the Taliban, come hell or eye water. And it appears that they succeeded. Yesterday, Anna Paulina Luna shared this on Twitter and then subsequently an interview with reporters

that she was able to get on the horn with the Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who by the way, as indicated in the past, he's trying to cut off funding to the Taliban, so I'm not even sure why they're still receiving funding but anna paulina luna said our secretary of state is incredible he talked to us on the phone he told us he is now cutting off all funding of u.s tax dollars to the taliban we will be providing him with the vehicle in which that is happening now what that means if i'm reading between the lines which i'm always doing we will be providing him with the vehicle in which this is happening it's not like Congress is cutting checks that have Taliban on the foreline, right?

They're not saying Taliban. What's happening is this money is flowing through non-governmental organizations. It's the way that corrupt Washington has always operated where they take your tax money. They send it off to some NGO with some sort of feel-good name that tries to provoke you into not scrutinizing it all. And then they take that money. And then that goes off to something illicit. And then it goes to kickbacks.

and then it goes to campaign funds and then it goes to all sorts of corrupt nonsense and so in other words there are NGO vehicles through which american tax dollars are flowing to the tune of 40 45 million dollars a week to the Taliban Tim Burchett has identified them and a Paulina Luna has identified them and apparently she's giving Marco Rubio some sort of assist on here's the place where that money is flowing and Rubio yesterday made a commitment to cut all of this off, which is good, but also, why now? Why, why this late? Why is it taken so long? I'm a Rubio fan. I like what Rubio's been doing lately. I'm concerned that it's taken this long for the Secretary of State to become aware of the way that this funding,

this funding is flowing. Now, by the way, it does appear the reason that Rubio got on the phone with her and had this conversation, there's reporting from Axios that Rubio's commitment came amidst that fight over the $900 billion defense spending bill that just passed the House yesterday. And Mike Johnson basically called Marco Rubio and asked him to intervene here to try and cut off all of this NGO funding to the Taliban. Rubio did. He jumped in to do that. So I'll take the victory in so far as we're actually cutting off funding. But we're not done yet. The Senate still has work to go because they've got to pass this thing. And while you're in the business of pressuring the Senate to get rid of the blue slip, I'd ask for your help,

continue to pressure your senator to ban funding to the Taliban. Any other American enemies we want to fund? Anybody? You know, who else are we funding out there? Yeah. So, Taliban funding. Let's stop that. Yeah. Why are we funding non-government? Yeah, that's a great question. Lugnuts, great name. Lugnuts asks, no more NGOs. Why do we need them? Yeah, look, if you are an NGO, let's ask a basic question. If you're a non-governmental organization, why are you receiving government funding? How are you a non-governmental organization if your funding comes from the government?

Wouldn't that make you a governmental organization? An extension of the government organization? You're not a non-governmental organization at all. When we are NGOs, we think charities, places that aren't taking tax dollars, the kinds of places where, you know, ordinary Americans make donations and then whatever mission that that organization is supposed to serve, they need to be good stewards of the money that have been donated to them. By the way, in a tax-exempt way, people give charitable contributions to these NGOs and they get tax write-offs for it. Why is the government funding any of this? Meaning, why am I funding any of this? Let's cut that off.

It's the same reason why we wanted to cut off USAID. It's entirely corrupt. It's stealing our tax dollars and pretending like it's giving it away to noble charities. Instead, it was doing nothing but robbing us blind. Let's not do that anymore. How about no? How about no? Thank you, lug nuts.

Excellent point. Very excellent point. So we get that. We get the Taliban funding is cut off recently. Okay. And then close to home. Let's talk about a couple of things going on real quick, close to home. I told you this week about how Charlotte Mecklenburg, the Democrats who run that town, they just love violence against American citizens, apparently. They're all in on like just releasing criminals back under the streets who stabbed people on the light rail system. What I didn't realize, though, is that the gentleman who was just stabbed on the light rail, his name is Kenyon Toby. Kenyon Toby. The guy who was just stabbed, apparently was stabbed while he was trying to protect an innocent elderly woman from assault. We have a Daniel Penny on our hands, apparently.

This gentleman, his name's Kenyon Toby, he told WRL News that he saw the assailant, Solerzano, remember that guy. That's the illegal Honduran who keeps on pouring into the country with a long rap sheet of being a very violent guy. he saw the guy yelling at an older woman before Solerzano handed his bike to another passenger and said, quote, I'm about to show you who I really am. That was the threat. I'm about to show you who I really am here. And here's the clip, the actual WRL news piece. And Dobie said on TikTok, he said, quote, I wasn't trying to be a macho man.

He posted from his hospital. Remember, he was stabbed over and over. But what I won't allow is for you to attack random people for no reason, especially the elderly. Dobie said he jumped up and told Sarla Zano to leave everybody alone. Dobie claims that Solerzano then grabbed his hands and stabbed him as he tried to grab him back. Dobie told WRAL news from his hospital bed, he pulled the knife out, began coughing up blood, and eventually passed out. Dobey added that Solerzano ran and got off the train.

I guess it's better off that it happened to me and not an older person, he said. He added he had no regrets jumping in and if he had to, he would do it again. He said he noticed on the ride there were no security guards. I noticed that there weren't going to be any. Somebody would have had to do something.

I didn't want to see anybody else get hurt. I didn't want him to get hurt either. Wow, that's a great story. that's a great story story our our friend matt van swall shared this that's actually how i became aware of it yesterday and um and take a look at this guy here he is lying in his hospital bed now notice by the way the victim is black and this is something i brought up when we saw his name originally i kind of i did a jake tapper style jump to conclusions i said his name's kenyon uh uh uh toby and um he's he's a black dude is it doby or toby by the way i think it's

Kobe. Kenyon Dobie. And he's a black dude. And he's the guy who like stood up for the train. He's like defending everybody. The media are not lionizing this guy. They're not celebrating him. They're not talking at all about that an illegal alien just stabbed a black man nearly to death aboard a light rail train. They gave up on this story immediately. Why is that, by the way? Why did they give up on this? And so by Dobie's on account, he said that he rescued this elderly woman from this Honduran illegal. So that's, well, if all of that is true, that's a heartwarming story and horrific that this guy was stabbed and just terrible. Now, there is a go fund me currently up for Dobie.

And they're giving them a lot of money right now. People are really supporting this, dude. $108,000 raised so far to support him. him in his recovery. So that's a that's a that's a that's a big thing. A lot of Americans coming through they because you know why it's because Americans want stories of heroism. They want people to actually stand up for the innocent and they want their country back. They don't want illegal aliens stabbing people on trains. So that's a that's pretty straightforward. That's that's wild. So that's what's happening in Charlotte. Meanwhile, in the nation's capital, Washington, D.C.,

we do have law enforcement on the streets of D.C. in the form of the National Guard. The National Guard continues to be out on the streets of D.C., but not without vile harassment by the left. Take a look this week. We got video footage of an annoying protester screeching at National Guard troops in Washington, D.C. Cut seven, watch this. What's up? What's up? There's the officer.

So you guys are aware that you're violent in the competition? you from south sergeant i was i was 11 bravo i got out in 2011 i did fuck up my rank there you got me there but i was not a good soldier i have a problem with authority but apparently you don't you don't believe in the constitution but at least i believe in that so where are you from soldier um that continues for minutes upon minutes upon minutes some of that great video footage captured by ford fisher you saw there uh and you know that it's just just endless harassment of these guys and just imagine much harassment they've sustained from lefties who are not filming it or they're not being captured on video as it's occurring. And that's just part for the course. Those guys, that's Union Station,

by the way, the video footage you're looking at, standing outside of that beautiful train station that up until very recently had become a total hellhole managed by the left into its really unfortunate decline. President Trump has rescued Union Station. Union Station is not the sad drug overdose, homeless, psychopathic, dirty place that it was before. It's been cleaned up. And that's thanks in no small part to the members of the National Guard who go in and out each day to do that thankless job as far as the left is concerned in order to try and help secure the nation's capital.

They're just doing the job. That guy is very fortunate that those members of the National Guard have such restraint and poise and professionalism and didn't. punch him in his freaking face. What a jerk that dude is as he goes out there and he harasses those guys. He sounds mentally old candidly, but that's all being recorded. And how did we get here? How do we get to the point where the troops are being harassed on the streets of Washington, D.C.? Well, look no further than the seditious six. Those members of Congress, Democrats, who all came out, they released a video saying that the troops need to ignore the orders of the

president of the United States. And that leads to this. Now you have the troops being harassed on the streets of Washington, D.C. So great job, seditious six. And Mark Kelly, you definitely deserve the investigation that's underway into you right now by the Pentagon. Mark Kelly, by the way, is furious about this. Democrats in the Senate are furious about this. Axios for the report overnight that Democrats are expressing concern that Senator Mark Kelly is under review after Trump black.

Last, yeah, after he told the troops to ignore the commander in chief, Democrats on the Senate Armed Services Committee are calling the Pentagon's investigation into Mark Kelly a threat to, quote, politicize our military justice system. No, no, not at all. This investigation is designed to depoliticize the way that Mark Kelly has been behaving and the encouragement, the seditious encouragement that he's made that the troops, they should ignore the orders of their commander-in-chief. Total insanity, which is part for the course for these Democrats these days.

I've got a big radio show coming up today. The big national radio show, The Vintz Show. You can get your local listings, Thevince Show.com. Well, of course, do it live on Rumble. Rumble.com slash Vince. Join me in the chat. Always nice to talk to everybody there. And then I'll be back with you tomorrow.

Christmas is getting close, ladies and gentlemen. Very, very close. And you're the best audience anywhere. Thanks for spending some time with me. Join me on the national radio show. Always appreciate you guys. And I'll be back with you tomorrow on another great addition of events.