The President's Daily Brief - December 6th, 2023: Wray’s Warning, Hostage Horrors, & Menendez’s Mystery

Episode Date: December 6, 2023

In this episode of The President's Daily Brief:   FBI Director Christopher Wray highlights an imminent terror threat to America, drawing parallels to the rise of ISIS.   A deep dive into the plight of hostages under Hamas, and the terror unleashed in the October 7th massacre.   Analyzing Russian President Vladimir Putin's strategic Middle East visit amidst international tensions.   In the Back of the Brief: Unraveling the connection between gold bars found in Senator Bob Menendez's home and a 2013 armed robbery.   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

USAA knows dynamic duos can save the day, like superheroes and sidekicks or auto and home insurance. With USAA, you can bundle your auto and home and save up to 10%. Tap the banner to learn more and get a quote at usaa.com slash bundle. Restrictions apply. It's Wednesday, December 6th. Welcome to the President's Daily Brief. I'm Mike Baker, your eyes and ears on the world stage. Let's get briefed.

We'll kick off with U.S. FBI Director Christopher Ray's recent testimony. where he sounded the alarm over a terror threat to America, the likes of which he says we haven't seen since the emergence of ISIS. Later in the show, we'll uncover new details about the difficult conditions endured by hostages under Hamas, and we'll discuss Vladimir Putin's rare journey abroad as he seeks alliances or friends, or at least weapons dealers, in the Middle East. Finally, in today's back of the break,

We examine an odd development in U.S. Senator Bob Menendez's bribery case. The gold bars discovered in the New Jersey Senator's residents have been linked to an armed robbery from 2013. But first up, the PDB spotlight. FBI director Christopher Ray presented a sobering account of America's national security challenges before a Senate committee this week, telling senators he's seeing, in his words, blinking lights everywhere. Testifying on Capitol Hill, Ray told Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, quote, while there may have been times over the years where individual threats could have been higher here or there than where they may be right now, I've never seen a time

where all the threats or so many of the threats are all elevated all at exactly the same time. Now, his testimony drew stark parallels to the era preceding the September 11th attacks with this blinking lights analogy that underscores the heightened state of alert. According to Ray, the October 7 massacre in Israel marked a turning point, propelling the terror threat level to heights the intelligence community hasn't seen since the rise of ISIS. He warned of a veritable rogue's gallery of foreign terrorists now mobilized in a call for violence against the United States. Now, Director Ray's urgent testimony coincides with the impending expiration of a significant law used to collect intelligence on terrorists, and that would be Section

702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act or FISA. The provision is scheduled to sunset at the end of December. Director Ray made an urgent plea for the renewal of this legislation, citing its importance in thwarting terrorist activities. Section 702, he said, is, quote, key to our ability to detect a foreign terrorist organization overseas, directing an operative here to carry out an attack in our own backyard, end quote. Now, if you're unfamiliar with Section 702, this 2008 law empowers the government

to collect the communications of foreign targets outside the U.S. That means emails, phone calls, internet activity, all under the watchful eye of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court. Now this oversight is meant to ensure adherence to legal standards and the protection of civil liberties. However, despite the guardrails present in the law, it's been criticized by civil libertarians. While it expressly prohibits the targeting of U.S. citizens

or anyone on American soil, there remains the contentious issue of incidental collection, where Americans' communications may be swept up if they're in contact with foreign targets. Advocates for Section 702 argue its indispensability for national security, citing its role in thwarting international terror plots and cyber threats. Opponents, however, warn of potential overreach and insufficient checks and balances. Now, the discourse around Section 702 of FISA is at a crossroads, as the nation grapples with the need for security and the importance of protecting individual freedoms.

Now, speaking from a counterterrorism perspective, there are two truths existing here at the same time. Look, Section 702, used properly, is an enormously effective and necessary tool. While at the same time, if used improperly, it can definitely result in overreach an unwarranted imposition on the civil liberties and rights of innocent civilians. But when talking about national security, homeland defense, and the prevention of terrorist attacks, the answer isn't to simply discard or get rid of Section 702 because it could infringe on someone's liberties at some point. The answer is to act responsibly to create safeguards and effective protocols that ensure 702 isn't misused. All right. When,

return, we've got new information about the condition of hostages returned in Israel, and Russian President Vladimir Putin embarks on a critical tour of the Middle East. I'll be right back. Welcome back. I want to turn to Israel and the hostages who have now returned home after 50 days in Hamas custody. Over the past two weeks, there's been a lot of discussion of the condition in which these hostages were returned. In particular, many people have noted that some of them were smiling and even thanked them Hamas terrorists who accompanied them to the site of the exchange. Well, according to Israeli officials, there may be an explanation for that beyond the hostages' Stockholm syndrome affection for their captors. An Israeli health ministry representative

informed the Knesset Health Committee that the hostages, prior to their release from Hamas, were administered tranquilizer pills. The drug identified was clonazepam, commonly used to manage anxiety disorders, seizures, bipolar mania, psychosis-related agitation, and obsessive-compulsive disorder. The drugging would have made the hostages appear calm, happy, and upbeat, even after suffering physical abuse, deprivation, and psychological terror experienced at the hands of their Hamas captors. In addition, doctors are revealing more about the physical condition in which many of the hostages returned. Dr. Moser-Glasberg, a director at Schneider Children's Medical Center, which received many of the children who were returned, said that reports that

hostages were returned in more or less stable condition are not true. The doctor confirmed that the hostages that her hospital received had lost 10 to 15 percent on average of their body weight. The hostages shared stories about how limited the food they were given was if they were given food at all, sometimes only a cup of tea and perhaps a biscuit or a single dry date in the morning and rice in the evening. Doctors also noted the poor state of hygiene as captains were given very limited access to water. Some reported not having cleaned themselves throughout the entirety of their 50-day stay in captivity. Now, the doctor told reporters, quote, their head lice was the worst I have ever seen. Even with five or six treatments, the lice were not gone. As a result,

the freed hostages also returned with skin rashes and lice bites all over their bodies, and they had infected wounds that had not been properly cared for. And remember, this is an addition to the psychological trauma that the hostages were forced to endure during their captivity. All right, Russian President Vladimir Putin kicked off a significant Middle East tour today with scheduled stops in the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia, where he's expected to meet with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. The Kremlin has announced that their discussions will cover a range of topics, including bilateral relations, the oil market, international affairs,

and the ongoing conflict in Gaza. This visit is especially timely in light of recent developments within OPEC Plus, the influential group of oil-producing nations that includes Russia, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE. Just last week, OPEC-plus members agreed to a voluntary reduction in oil output, a strategic move aimed at bolstering oil prices. Now, President Putin's travel has been notably limited in recent times. Since launching the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, his international visits have been restricted mostly to China, Iran, and countries that were part of the former Soviet Union. This limited travel is partly due to an arrest warrant

issued by the International Criminal Court or ICC, the warrant accuses Putin of war crimes, specifically the alleged force relocation of Ukrainian children. However, that won't be a problem for Putin's trip to Saudi Arabia and the UAE, as neither of those countries signed on to the ICC's founding treaty, and that frees them up from obligations to arrest him. Now, later this week, President Putin's diplomatic engagements will continue as he's set to host Iraq. Iranian President Abraham Reisi in Moscow. Putin and Reiki are deep into a bromance of convenience, with Iran providing much-needed military resources to shore Putin's military adventurism in Ukraine, and Russia reciprocating with technology and assistance to Iran's missile and nuclear weapons programs.

As far as the stability of the world and global peace goes, well, it's a match made in hell. Now coming up in the back of the brief, an odd development in the bribery case of New Jersey Senator Bob Menendez. It turns out those gold bars discovered in his home while they're linked to another caper committed in 2013. I'll be right back. In today's back of the brief, a report by NBC News has linked four gold bars listed in a federal indictment of New Jersey Senator Bob Menendez to a 2013 robbery. of a businessman now accused of bribing the senator. Menendez, his wife Nadine, and New Jersey businessman Fred Dabes, Wail, Hanna, and Jose Ribe, were indicted in September for allegedly engaging in a bribery scheme meant to benefit the local business leaders

along with the government of Egypt. In a review of court documents, NBC News was able to link the mysterious gold bars in Menendez's possession back to businessman daves, who had previously reported the unique serial numbers on the gold to authorities after a 2013 robbery. During the 2013 heist, thieves made off with $500,000 and 22 gold bars belonging to the New Jersey businessman. They were later recovered by police who had the New Jersey businessman signed property release forms to take back the custody. He told investigators in 2014 that each bar had a unique identifying serial number and that that, quote, you'll never see two stamped the same way. Now, the matching serial numbers will likely make connecting the gold bars to the alleged bribery scheme, well, a whole lot easier for

investigators. Two of the bars were found during a search of Menendez's home by investigators in June 2022. And they also found pictures of the other two gold bars, which investigators allege the Senator's wife, Nadine, gave to a jeweler to be sold. During their search of Menendez's home, authorities found a total of 13 gold bars, along with $56,000 in cash, some of it stashed inside pockets of Menendez's jackets. Sounds like your average home. Dave's fingerprints have since been found on tens of thousands of dollars discovered in an envelope in the senator's home. Now, all parties named in the September indictment have denied any wrongdoing. Of course they have. A representative for Menendez slammed the latest revelations concerning the gold bars

as, quote, anonymous media leaks designed to prejudice his right to a fair trial. Okay. Now, a sane person would ask, okay, is Senator Menendez, still a senator, or as he had the good grace and decency to resign in the face of these charges and a substantial pile of evidence. Seriously? This is Washington, D.C. Come on. More to the point, this is Capitol Hill. Senator Menendez has given up his position as the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, but only because it was absolutely required by the bylaws, which state, and, and I'm paraphrasing here, anybody who sits on the U.S. Senate form, Relations Committee probably shouldn't be working on behalf of a country other than the U.S.

Now, Bob is still a U.S. Senator, despite many colleagues, including a majority of Democrat colleagues, calling for him to resign his seat in the Senate. It is entertaining to note that Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, a longtime friend of Menendez, they've both served in the Senate for 30 years, well, he's not one of the senators calling for Menendez's resignation. Although in a terrific bit of unintended humor, Senator Chuck did note a couple of months ago that the New Jersey Democrats' actions fell, quote, way, way below the standard of the office. That's good to know. And that, my friends, is the president's daily brief for Wednesday, 5 December.

If you have any questions or comments, please reach out to me at pdb at thefirsttv.com. I'm Mike Baker, and I'll be back later today with the PDB afternoon, Bulletin. Until then, stay informed, stay safe, stay cool.