The President's Daily Brief - August 5th, 2022. Do You Know How Many Terrorists Are in the United States? The FBI Says It Doesn’t Know Either...

Episode Date: August 5, 2022

It’s August 5th. You’re listening to the President’s Daily Brief. Your morning intel starts now. ------ First, there are Afghan terrorists in America but the FBI has lost track of them. That’s the alarming admission made yesterday by the FBI Director. We’ll discuss the latest. As always, I’m keeping an eye out for developing stories. Put these two on your radar. First up, the Chinese Government and its partners have bought over 200,000 acres of American land — including 300 acres near a key Air Force Base. I’ll share the latest on attempts to roll back those purchases. Second, an update on the War for the South Pacific. As PDB listeners might recall, there’s a big fight between America and China over influence in the South Pacific — with Hawaii in the crosshairs. I’ve got an update on our government’s efforts to claw back power in the region.  And finally, one more thing before I let you go. Questions and comments from listeners, this one from Jeremy in Topeka, Kansas. He’s skeptical that Africa should be of interest to Americans. I’ll explain what he might not be considering, and then you can decide. ------ Please remember to subscribe if you enjoyed this episode of the President's Daily Brief. Email: [e-mail] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

It's August 5th. You're listening to the President's Daily Brief. I'm your host and former CIA Officer Brian Dean Wright. Your morning intel starts now. First up, there are Afghan terrorists in America, but the FBI has lost track of them. That was the alarming admission made yesterday by the FBI director. We'll discuss the latest. As always, I'm keeping an eye out for developing stories. Put these two on your radar. First up, the Chinese government and its partners have bought over 200,000 acres of American land, including 300 acres near a key Air Force base. I'll share the latest on attempts to roll back those purchases. Second, an update on the war for the South Pacific. As PDB listeners might recall, there is a big fight between China and America over influence

in the South Pacific, with Hawaii and the crosshairs. I've got an update on our government's efforts to claw back power in the region. And finally, one more thing before I. I let you go questions and comments from listeners. Today's from Jeremy and Topeka, Kansas. He's a bit skeptical that Africa should be of interest to Americans. So I'll explain what he might not be considering and then let you decide. But first, let's get started with today's main brief. This month marks the one-year anniversary of America's retreat from Afghanistan. So in the chaotic weeks and months afterwards, the United States allowed thousands of Afghans to come to the U.S. as refugees, some with permanent status, others temporary. Now, at the time, many observers

to include people like me, we were very concerned about, and in fact, we warned that the vetting process of who was good and who was bad in that group, well, it was so haphazard that the Biden administration would eventually allow in extremists, perhaps even terrorists. Well, those warnings have been proven to be painfully correct. The director of the FBI yesterday admitted at 3,000 24 of the individuals that the Biden administration evacuated from Afghanistan are, in fact, on the Pentagon's watch list for known or suspected terrorists. Now, unfortunately, that number of likely terrorists keeps going up. In February, the government only admitted to 50 people accidentally slipping into the country

when they should have been blocked. Now, that initial February number came from an Inspector General report, and that expressed alarm to the government couldn't find these individuals. Well, actually, the FBI knew they were somewhere in the U.S., but no idea exactly where. But unfortunately, that bad problem is now worse. We've got at least 324 likely terrorists roaming free, not 50. And as we all know, it doesn't take many terrorists to cause major damage. There were 19 hijackers that carried out the September 11 attacks, 19.

Now, as alarming as all this is, and it is, none of it would be known if it weren't for a whistleblower. Someone within the Department of Defense was alarmed by this discrepancy, that is to say, not 50 potential terrorists, but 324. And that whistleblower felt like neither the military nor the FBI were being candid with the Congress about the extent of this problem. So the whistleblower gave that information to two senators who in turn grilled the FBI director about it yesterday at a hearing.

And by the way, that number 324, might still be too low. So when the FBI director was asked about that number, or if it might be higher, he said, quote, I don't know that I have the exact number, end quote, and I'll have to get back to you. So if I were briefing you in the White House this morning, here would be my counsel on what we can fairly say is an absolute debacle. So simply put, it's time to be honest with the American people. the FBI has to know what the exact number is of Afghans who are here and likely terrorists. But it's not being shared because of politics. And I suspect that the president doesn't want egg on his face for both retreating from Afghanistan

and admitting that he imported terrorists into the country, even if accidentally. But burying this problem is not going to solve it. In fact, it'll make it profoundly worse because at some point it will be discovered, maybe by another whistleblower or, God forbid, a terrorist attack. And at that point, it will be impossible to hide. So let's be honest with the American people. What is the number and what are we doing about it? And specifically, why haven't these suspected or confirmed terrorists been arrested or deported?

I mean, it boggles the mind what the reason might be here, but tell the American people one way or the other. And look, I understand that the initial, embarrassment will involve a political hit to Joe Biden and his national security team. But at what point does embarrassment not really matter anymore? I mean, at what point does pride stop becoming important and instead replaced by the obligation to protect the country? You know, how craven can someone be if you sacrifice your countrymen to save face or win an election? Because fair or not, that's how this appears. Politicians are putting their own political hide ahead of their oath to the American people.

And either you're serious about that oath or you're not. So step up, Washington, D.C. It's time to serve and protect. Coming up a closer look at what's on my radar. Two briefs for you this morning. First, China is buying up farm ground in America, plus an update on the war for the South Pacific. And of course, the question about Africa from a listener.

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Start comparing hundreds of sites with kayak and get your trip right. Kayak, got that right. As always on the PDB, I'm watching a few other stories this morning. Put these two on your radar. First, the U.S. House and Senate are considering bills this morning that would stop the Communist Party of China or its friends from buying land, especially farmland in the United States. Now, to explain the backstory here, China is buying a substantial amount of America's farmland, about 200,000 acres all across the United States. But a little over 10 years ago, they owned a fraction of that, about 13,000 acres. Now, where they are buying the land is of special interest.

For instance, they've scooped up over 300 acres near an Air Force base, which hosts some of the nation's most sensitive drone technology. And I doubt that is a coincidence. But look, beyond land, China continues to buy real estate of all kinds in America, upwards of $6.1 billion so far in 2022. That's according to the National Association of Realtors, by the way. Now, while it is true that some states have laws that ban foreign ownership of farmland, including in Hawaii, Iowa, and a handful of other states in the Midwest,

there's no federal law to stop it. And that has prompted a couple of senators, Tom Cotton and Tommy Tuberville, to introduce a bill called the Securing America's Land from Foreign Interference Act. That would put an end to the communist purchases. So the House of Representatives has its own version of the bill. It's called the Prohibition of Agricultural Land for the People's Republic of China Act. That is sponsored by Washington State's Dan Newhouse. Now, I flagged this issue and these two bills for you this morning because I suspect that things are going to get very nasty over the next 12 to 24 months with China.

We are seeing just a small taste of that this morning as China conducts live fire drills over and around Taiwan following Nancy Pelosi's visit just a couple of days ago. And as things get worse with Beijing, we're going to be looking for ways to reduce our exposure to Beijing's backlash or to penalize them for their bad behavior. And these bills may be one way to accomplish both. So if you are concerned, you now know the names of these bills and you can contact your elected representatives to encourage them to pass it or at least to vote on it. So as always, go to house.gov or senate.gov and make your voice heard. Finally this morning and keeping our eye on China, we've got an update on the war

for the South Pacific. Now, Peebee listeners may remember my previous briefs on this. China is making a major push to secure port access and landing trips all throughout the South Pacific in island nations like Kiribosh and Tonga and the Solomon Islands. And that's bad because Beijing intends to use these islands as sort of lilypads of sorts, hopping from island. island to island in the event of war with the United States, extending the range of their military all the way to Hawaii. And that is why we should care about this quick update. The Biden administration has sent our Deputy Secretary of State to the region,

along with Ambassador Caroline Kennedy, the daughter, of course, of President Jack Kennedy. Now, those two ladies just met with the leaders of Samoa, and this morning are headed towards Tonga and then the Solomon Islands. and it's that last stop that's going to be a real challenge. The Chinese are actually looking to buy an old plantation on one of the Solomon Islands. It's a plantation that has a World War II-era landing strip and a deep water port. But here's the interesting part.

The Chinese company that wants to buy the plantation, it's called the China Forestry Group, well, they are aggressively chasing after the acreage, but they have yet to inquire about the trees, only the landing strip and the port. and that's a curious thing when you are a forestry company. And that, in fact, is why the Australian Broadcasting Company issued a report on it a couple of weeks ago. Now, it's unclear if this plantation deal will go through or not, but we certainly know that the government of the Solomon Islands is very close with China. Beijing, in fact, trains the island's police, and they've constructed government buildings, too.

So our diplomats have their work cut out for them over the next couple of weeks, but I must say. It is good to see at least some elements of the U.S. government getting serious about this. The goal is to keep the South Pacific neutral, if nothing else. And that will help all of us breathe a little easier, especially for our friends in Hawaii. All right, ladies and gentlemen, one more thing before I let you go. Jeremy from Topeka, Kansas, wrote in after a couple of my briefs to you all on what's happening in eastern Congo. Now, as you all might recall, that's the country in Central Africa that has lots of minerals. of global interest, most especially the mineral cobalt, which we all need for batteries and

electronics. But there is a rise in violence these past months in eastern Congo, especially with the neighboring country, Rwanda. And that could put at risk the mining of that very important mineral, plus others like copper and tin. But Jeremy's not convinced, so here's his comment and question. Brian, I enjoyed the show and mostly agree with you, but I'm not so sure on Africa. It seems like it's not all that important when you consider things like Mexico, the stuff in Europe and problems with China, and the Middle East too. So what am I missing? I'm just not seeing why I should really care. Well, Jeremy, these are all actually really interesting and fair counter arguments, and I get it. So all the places that you mentioned have very critical immediate interests to the United States.

But I think that Africa should absolutely weave into our foreign policy interests as well, because we end up. paying for it if we don't pay attention. So let me make that case with one qualifier. I'm going to talk about sub-Saharan Africa. In other words, not the Middle Eastern portion way up north. So I'm talking south of the Saharan desert because that's the part that's usually, well, ignored in America's international affairs. All right, so let's first talk economic interests. And folks, if you've got a map, either on your phone, your computer, or in your mind, pull it out now and let's take a quick trip. First, Nigeria in West Central Africa. So we export about a billion dollars worth of cars there, another half a billion in wheat, and about the same in machinery. So our farmers and manufacturing

companies do care what happens in Nigeria. Plus, that country produces a lot of oil and gas. In fact, we import about three to four billion, give or take, depending on the year. And Europe, they're doing the same thing. In fact, right now, they are chasing after 9,000. Nigerian natural gas, all to help offset the loss from Russia. So the point is, Nigeria is important to us, even if we don't talk a lot about it. And maybe we should. They have a tremendous corruption problem, lots of Islamic radicals, violence against Christians, a whole slew of concerns. But Jeremy, if you're not convinced, let's head east to the Congo. Now, we have talked about this country a fair amount because of the minerals in eastern and southern Congo,

from cobalt, of course, to copper and gold. But putting that aside, they have another unhappy export that we have to pay attention to. Viruses. So tropical regions like the Congo produce a very deadly mix of bugs that the rest of humanity has to deal with. And in fact, just yesterday, the Biden administration declared the monkeypox virus, a national health emergency. And that virus hails in part from, the Congo region. Now, we can probably debate whether Biden and his team should have issued

that emergency declaration. In fact, I think it was a bad call. But the point is that it's not just monkey pox. It's HIV, Marburg, the Crimean Congo hemorrhortic virus, and lots of others, all of which continue to evolve. And if we're not watching, that will create serious problems. Now, beyond Nigeria and the Congo, I think there are a lot of other examples to note, such as as Angola with its big oil exports. We've got Zambia and it's copper. South Africa buying $5 billion in American goods each year. Or Kenya and Tanzania, they both got amazing coffee.

Okay, confession, I just love coffee. So, Jeremy, you got to give me those two. At any rate, one final piece here. As a former CIA officer, I can tell you that putting aside specific countries, there are a lot of targets who hang out in sub-Saharan Africa, and I mean some pretty seriously bad guys, especially related to the counterterrorism mission. So having a presence there and paying attention is really important.

Now, is any of this as important as, say, securing our southern border with Mexico? Probably not. That's fair, Jeremy. But do we have economic interests plus counterterrorism interests? And one thing that I haven't mentioned, I think we can actually target China all throughout the African continent because they are as thick as thieves there. So if it ever came to it, we could make life very miserable for the Chinese communists if we wanted to start

screwing around with their investments all throughout Africa. Now, to do that, you have to have some quiet Americans operating in the shadows, wiring that place for the day when you need to get, well, operationally nasty. So the bottom line, Jeremy, is that I think sub-Saharan Africa does have some important countries and regions for all of us to care about. Now, these places don't get a lot of attention. But when things go bad, you know, from missing cobalt to monkeypox, it's better to have at least a few boots on the ground than none at all.

And I think it's good to have a few PDB briefs in your back pocket to make sense of things. So there is my Africa pitch, Jeremy, and everybody else. You know, let me know if you agree. And that, ladies and gentlemen, concludes your morning brief. As always, we close out the show reminding each other. of why we are here, talking about our country and our world. It's the creed of every good spy and every smart American. It's from John chapter 8, verse 32. And you shall know the truth. And the truth shall make you free. Good day.