The Young Turks - Trump Nightmare Begins

Episode Date: January 22, 2025

New allegations against Pete Hegseth are revealed in an uncovered affidavit. Biden pardons his entire family, Fauci and more. Trump issues pardons for nearly all the Jan 6 rioters, including those who committed violence. Trump targets birthright citizenship and immigration in slew of executive orders. Hosts: Ana Kasparian & Cenk Uygur SUBSCRIBE on YOUTUBE ☞ https://www.youtube.com/@TheYoungTurks FOLLOW US ON: FACEBOOK ☞ https://www.facebook.com/theyoungturks TWITTER ☞ https://twitter.com/TheYoungTurks INSTAGRAM ☞ https://www.instagram.com/theyoungturks TIKTOK ☞ https://www.tiktok.com/@theyoungturks 👕MERCH ☞ https:/www.shoptyt.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

You're listening to The Young Turks, the online news show. Make sure to follow and rate our show with not one, not two, not three, not four, but five stars. You're awesome. Thank you. Your all-time favorite president, me. I'm so upset. Oh my God. Begha! All right, well, the young Turks, Jane Cougar, Anna Kisaring with you guys. If you notice, I didn't say live from the Polymarket Studios because the Polymarket sponsorship ended on last Friday.

We're grateful for a chance to support that the fact that they supported us in this last year. It was a super challenging year for us, for many media companies, many former media companies who are no longer around. We're grateful to Polymarket for their no strings attached sponsorship, never once had a content conversation with them or an editorial conversation with them. Their support helped us navigate through that difficult time and continue to support TYT and the staff here. And to our members, your support is what we rely on through all the years and decades that Young Turks has been on. I appreciate that they took the load off of you guys a little bit last year as we were

trying to raise money. And so it was a good partnership for us. I'm very happy about it. But that is concluded now. And we'd love to have more folks come in. and work with us and that's a long term project, but the most important thing by far is our members and our audience and our viewers, and that is who we always represent. All right, Casper. All right, well, we begin with some news that broke later today, and it had to do with the

nomination of Pete Heggseth for defense secretary. So let's get to the details on this huge story that just dropped with the Wall Street Journal. All right. Trump's defense secretary pick, Pete Hegesith, is now facing some heat from his former sister-in-law. In fact, his former sister-in-law has now provided members of the Senate with a sworn affidavit that alleges that he mistreated his second wife and was volatile and threatening during the course of their relationship. So it's very similar to other allegations that we've heard about Pete Heggseth. It's similar to the email that Pete Higgs's own mother had written to him in regard to the way he treats women. But here's what you need to know based on the latest update to this story. So the affidavit was written by a woman by the name of Danielle Hegzith.

She is the sister of Pete's second wife, Samantha Heggst. Now you might be wondering, why does she have the same last name as them? Like what's going on? Well, it turns out she actually married Pete Hegg's brother and has since divorced. Now, the reason why, now Pete and Samantha were married for eight years between 2010 and 2018, and they have three children together. Now in the affidavit, Danielle claims that Pete Hegesith passed out on multiple occasions from drinking too much, from alcohol abuse. On Christmas Day, she provides that as an example. It was either in 2000 or 2009,

according to the affidavit, where he drank so much that he threw up and passed out. I'm gonna go ahead and give him a pass on that. It's Christmas, people overdo it, it's not the end of the world, but the allegations get a lot more serious. She also claims that he drank too much and passed out in the bathroom of a Minneapolis bar in 2013, but let's get to the more serious allegations. So per the affidavit, Samantha once told Danielle that she hid from Pete Heggs, her husband at the time, out of fear for her safety. So she says this to her sister somewhere in either 2014 or 2016, Samantha also created a

code word to use in case she needed a relative to come and help her because of Pete Heggis's behavior. She sent that code to Danielle in either 2015 or 2016. So while Danielle states that she never saw Pete Hegesith emotionally or physically abused Samantha firsthand, she says that she herself was once emotionally abused by him. So let's get to the details on that, as reported by the Wall Street Journal. So she said he drunkenly yelled in her face in 2009 after she walked out of a room when he was telling a story that she had a racial that said had a racial slant. So she didn't like the story. She said it had a racial slant. She said he was in the military uniform, became very aggressive, and yelled at her long enough

that another person whose name is redacted had to pull him away. Danielle also allegedly heard Hegsith make some grotesque statements. At one point, Danielle said that she heard Hegseth say that women shouldn't have the right to vote and they shouldn't work. Other times he made rude comments about women's looks and once stated that he never used condoms it says. Danielle Hegesith also said that she heard him say Christians need to have more children to overtake the Muslim population. So there's more to this including Pete Heggseth's now ex-wife coming out to release a statement about what her sister has provided members of the Senate.

But before we get to that, Jake, I want you to jump in. Yeah, so lots of thoughts in different directions here. I don't love that this person is coming out with this, even though I agree with what she's saying largely. So let me break it down into a couple categories. First of all, I don't need to know about his condom use at all. Okay, so keep that personal stuff out of this. The reason why I don't love the revelation is because the X and and Hegsworth have some deal that they made when they got divorced. They want to protect the kids and they wanted to be private.

So now it's no longer private and she didn't ask for permission from the ex who was her friend, right, to out all of this. On the other hand, look, guys, do we have nonsense conversations in media all the time and in Washington? Nobody ever talks about what's real and obvious, right? So does Pete Hegzeth have a drinking problem? There's no question in the world that he had one. I don't know if it's continuing, but he had a serious drinking problem according to almost everybody who's commented on it, right? Right. So to pretend that he didn't have one is absurd. It's totally absurd. And every Republican out there is pretending he didn't have one when it's obviously.

Okay, does he have sex and misogynations? Well, I'm sure that if you're a right winger, you'll say no, there's, you know, there's a lot of right wingers who say that I don't, you could tell them the most sexist thing in the world. They'll say it's perfectly fine, right? There's plenty of right wingers who will be bothered by some of the sexist and misogynistic things that he does. But has he done those things? Of course, absolutely has. Right. So from people, women who work with him, women who were married to him, women who know him. This is obviously a significant issue for Heggsiff. I'm worried about that because there are going to be literally hundreds of thousands of women who report to him as their boss. There's three million people in the Pentagon.

That's a giant problem, let alone women who serve in combat that he's not, doesn't appear to be in favor of. Is he qualified? He's obviously not qualified. The senators asked, Democratic senators actually did a very good job of asking, him some specific questions about the Defense Department and he had no earthly idea, didn't even bother studying, like some basic questions. So number four, why is he picked in the first place? Because Trump saw him on Fox News and liked him, liked his looks, liked what he had to say. These are so obvious. Central casting, that's all that matters. And I just, look,

you can be supportive of Donald Trump and like overall cheerlead his entire agenda without green enlighting every single person he nominates to be in his cabinet. This is a bad pick, period, it's just a bad pick. I mean, he is just surrounded by controversy. His past statements and actions keep coming back to haunt him. I feel terrible for his ex-wife because I totally agree with you, Jank. It is clear to me that as part of their divorce, they signed a deal, you know, that all these, you know, nasty details wouldn't come out to the public because they have three kids.

It's really damaging to kids when they hear about these things. And so I just think this is hard on his family, hard on his kids, okay? It's terrible for, you know, the Trump administration in terms of confirming this guy. He's the top person I have an issue with when it comes to Donald Trump's nominees. He's not, he is not credible, or I shouldn't say credible, well, you could say credible, but not experienced for this incredibly important role. This is defense secretary, okay? We're not talking about some small rinky dink ambassador of some random country role.

We're talking about the head of the Pentagon, and we already know the military has had longstanding issues of sexual assault and rape, period, it has. Yeah. The idea of women or men who have been victimized in that way in our military having to report to this guy is problematic to say the least. You said worst pick. That one's a tough one. Maybe we should do a poll on that too. We got a poll, by the way, in the chat about this. Is it going to affect the most important thing in the world? If any Republican senator is going to flip on him, we're going to get to that in a second. But in terms of the worst picks, I think it's Cash Patel, Hagsdeth, and Tulsi Gabbard. So he's in the top three. Cash Patel is probably worse. But that's a

in my opinion, that's a really terrible three that are unqualified and are going in for all the wrong reasons. And last obvious thing on Hexon is, man, he hates Muslims, right? And that's another reason why he, that's not a negative in Washington. I think that's one of the things that's keeping him afloat. Like the fact that he despises Muslims is getting, you know, some lobbies to go, hmm, maybe him as Secretary of Defense to order the bombings of more Muslim countries, sounds pretty good, right? So that's probably keeping him afloat, even though terrible and then, so anyways, let's give you more of the details. So I want to talk a little bit about the response to this.

Okay, so in response to the affidavit, Samantha Heggsith came out and said the following to NBC news, she says, quote, first and foremost, I have not and will not comment on my marriage to Pete Hegseth. I do not have representative speaking on behalf, nor have I ever asked anyone to share or speak about the details of my marriage on my behalf, whether it be a reporter, a committee member, a transition team member, etc. In this case, it was literally her sister. She continues, I do not believe your information to be accurate, and I have ced my lawyer. There was no physical abuse in my marriage. This is the only further statement I will make to you. I have let you know

that I am not speaking and will not speak on my marriage to Pete. Please respect this decision. Now, a lawyer for Pete Hegesith has also come forward to deny these allegations that were stated in the affidavit saying that Sam has, Samantha, has never alleged that there was any abuse. She signed court documents acknowledging that there was no abuse and recently reaffirmed the same during her FBI interview. Belated claims by Danielle Dietrich, an anti-Trump far-left Democrat who is divorced from Mr. Heggis's brother and never got along with the Hegsith family, do nothing to change that. And look, even before I read his statement, I assume that this is the statement that was gonna come out from Pete Heggsett's side. Oh, there were, you know, family issues. This person has a grudge, holding a grudge against Pete

Heggseth, and that's, of course, the statement that came out from the lawyer. A little more from Pete Hex's lawyer, he says that after an acrimonious divorce, Ms. Dietrich has had an ax to grind against the entire Hegseth family. Dietrich admits that she saw nothing but is now falsely accusing Sam of lying to both the court and to the FBI because of private undocumented statements that she allegedly made 10 years ago.

So he's specifically referencing a court document that Pete and Samantha signed back in 2021 that stated that neither of them was a victim of domestic abuse. He's also alluding to the fact that Danielle has spoken to the FBI multiple times during Pete's background check. So that's the entirety of the story. And look, if it was just this one sworn affidavit provided to members of the Senate, then I think it's totally fine to question whether Pete Hegesith has these issues. But you take the whole picture and all the different accusations, the email from his mother,

chiding him for how abusive he is toward women, allegations from a Fox News correspondent, who soon after his nomination was announced, felt the need to chide him on the network that he works at about his treatment of women, about his state, public statements about women, especially women in combat. So these are, in my opinion, huge issues. I do think that he's disqualified from serving in this role. Do I think that it's likely he'll be nominated anyway? Probably, I mean, Republicans have the simple majority necessary to confirm him. So we'll see what happens. Yeah, so I'm gonna get to that last real quick on more obvious things.

FBI is not doing real checks of these nominees. I've now read enough about the checks and internal reports from the FBI that are leaked to the press. They're doing perfunctory checks to make sure that they all get confirmed. It's very clear from the Trump administration, do not try to find something wrong with them, okay? And they're not allowed to talk to a lot of the witnesses in the Hexith case, etc. So these background checks have turned into total nonsense. And so this started with Kavana on and is now continuing into this process. So, and remember, guys, like, our considerations as in the American people for who's the right person in these positions is very different than the Senate's consideration.

So for example, Marco Rubio is another terrible pick. He's not liked by the left, but he's also not liked by the right wing base that views him as two establishment, okay? Yeah, but the senators love him. He was confirmed 99 to 0. No, okay. So I, and that's why I think Hegsith probably has a pretty good chance. Because Marco Rubio basically says, I will keep doing whatever we were doing earlier. And the Senate loves that. And Hegseth isn't really challenging anything that they're doing.

So look, I'll read the last couple of comments here from our members because I think they're interesting. But we're Dragon Cat says, I'm a recovering alcoholic 15 years now. I don't like to admit this, but I want people, but I want to prove I know what I'm talking about. Pete is a serious alcoholic he's currently using, he's so dangerous for this position. Now I'm not reading that because I think cat is definitely right. That's just her opinion, right? But should they be concerned about his alcoholism as he goes to be the secretary of defense? Of course, of course.

So if they were doing real hearings, that would be a massive iceberg for him. Last one is the rep cat, the political cat boy said, Trump did XYZ against women and it made zero difference. This guy either gets confirmed or he doesn't, but ultimately he's not going to be. because he beat his ex-wife. By the way, we don't know that he beat his ex-wife at all, okay? So whatever might have happened in terms of sexism, misogyny, alcoholism, my point in reading those comments is, you guys are right, that's not going to determine it.

What's going to determine it is the senators thinking, is he good for our political interests, donor interest, et cetera, and that's what they're going to make their decision on. But no one in mainstream media tells you that. They have this theater as if the senators are actually concerned about these issues. And that's what they base their decision on. They don't base it on that at all. The number one thing they're worried about is,

is Trump going to take my head off if I vote no on Hague. And remember, there's 53 Republican senators now. He can still afford to lose three and win because the vice president presumably would break the tie. Right. And is he going to lose three? No. I would be super surprised by that. And I don't think that these revelations are that dramatic only because they,

They can affirm things that we all pretty much 100% knew about exit. So we'll see if this story develops further. For now, why don't we take our first break? Get that out of the way. And when we come back, we'll talk about Donald Trump's sweeping pardons, along with these sweeping pardons that Biden also implemented right before leaving office. We'll be right back. Frack, frack, frack, frack, like a duck.

Frack, frack, frack. All right, back on TYAT Jank, Anna Ziah and Tricia Briggs. They just hit that beautiful join button. I'm Michelle Moody, thank you for gifting five endorse memberships on YouTube. Anna. Well, there was a pardoning spree on inauguration day, and we should talk about it. And I was going to talk about the things that Joe did today with the pardons of people that were very, very guilty of very bad crimes, like the unselect committee of police. political folks. So this is January 6th. These are the hostages. Approximately 1500 for a pardon.

Yes. Full pardon. Full pardon or permutations? Full pardon. Rules for thee, but not for me. That was Donald Trump chiding Joe Biden for the preemptive pardons that he implemented on inauguration day in the final moments in the White House. But Donald Trump himself had his own sweeping pardons, which we'll get to in just a moment. But for the purpose of the conversation, let's just quickly go over what Biden did in his final moments in the White House. So it turns out that he decided to issue pardons of his immediate family members, including his brother James Biden and James's wife, Sarah. He also did a preemptive pardon for his brother Francis and his sister Valerie Biden, Owens, and her husband,

John. So those were the family members who were preemptively pardoned. Biden says that these pardons were necessary because my family has been subjected to unrelenting attacks and threats, motivated solely by a desire to hurt me. The worst kind of partisan politics, unfortunately, I have no reason to believe these attacks will end. It's just interesting that this is what was going on in the backdrop of Donald Trump's inauguration, because when Biden met with Trump yesterday for the inauguration, the first thing he said to Trump was welcome home. So it's like pleasantries and complimentary attitudes like face to face, but behind closed doors, he's going to come after my family members and I need to do preemptive pardons. I just think the preemptive

pardon thing, Jank, is unacceptable. And like did your family members commit crimes? Because if they didn't, how like what would they prosecute your family members for? Yeah, so Look, let's break this down. First of all, the pardon was supposed to be, you commit a crime, you get convicted, you show remorse. That was actually a critical part of receiving a pardon in the past. And then you've done some good things in the world and they give you a pardon based on that.

Or they found evidence that you're clearly innocent and then they overturn your conviction. Well, they don't overturn your conviction, but they give you a pardon in that in essence does that, right? So it's starting to break down actually with Gerald Ford, because he's going to, you know, He gave a full blanket pardon to Richard Nixon after Watergate so that the country could heal. My ass, it was the elites covering for each other. Come on, Gerald. Okay, so he started the madness.

Then Trump brought it back and started giving out pardons to people who had not been convicted yet. Or that didn't show any remorse at all, right? So he just started mangling the pardon process. Now Biden has taken it over the top. So by saying, I'm going to give full blanket pardons preemptively. before anybody's even investigated, let alone charge, let alone arrested, let alone tried, let alone convicted. And for this period of time, they were allowed to commit any illegal act they wanted, and you're not allowed to prosecute them for it. Well, brother, you said you were here to protect democracy.

When you take what Trump did on pardons and make it worse, more on Democratic, how did you help? This is a terrible precedent. And if you're a Democrat that supported in any way to your perform, I don't want you, coming back later and saying, I can't believe Trump's handing out pardons like it's candy for all these crimes that they committed in office, etc. Biden just set that precedent. Do you know that Trump considered giving preempt importance just like Biden did for everyone involved in January 6th and chose not to? So Trump actually showed a little bit of restraint there and Biden didn't. See, this is what drives me crazy. Now everybody's being, in my opinion,

watch the post a lot of times, et cetera, being soft on Trump, right? That is not the correct lesson to learn. You're not supposed to be soft on Trump. You're supposed to be hard on Biden and everyone, all the politicians, Republicans and Democrats. When a politician does something wrong, you call it out, regardless of which party you identify with, regardless of which party the politician identifies with. It's frustrating. I mean, that's the reason why we started this story with that video. On one hand, you have Donald Trump, again, chiding Biden for doing the preemptive pardons, which I agree with. I chide Biden as well. But then he announces that he's doing sweeping pardons of January 6 rioters, which again,

we're going to get to in just a moment. But a few more Biden preemptive pardons before we get to that. Because he also gave Anthony Fauci, the former director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases at the NIH, a preemptive pardon. General Mark Millie, who was Donald Trump's former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. He's given a preemptive pardon and then the members of the House Select Committee that investigated Donald Trump and his involvement in attempting to overturn the 2020 presidential election. Those individuals have been given a preemptive pardon. And of course, former Congresswoman Liz Cheney is part of that group.

And so the full and unconditional pardons for Fauci and Millie cover the period extending all the way back to January 1st of 2014. And Biden says he did so to guard them from potential revenge from the Trump administration. He also commuted the life sentence for a guy named Leonard Pelletier, who is a Native American activist who was convicted of killing two FBI agents back in 1975 on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota. The guy's in his 80s, so I don't think he serves as any kind of threat to public safety. But I just wanted to mention that that was one of the other pardons he did. Yeah, so look, again, frustrated at both sides.

So on the one hand, Republicans say like, oh, I can't believe these pardons are coming out of nowhere. No, wait a minute, Donald Trump is threatening all those people. Don't pretend he's not threatening them. Don't pretend that the right wing doesn't want to arrest Dr. Fauci, because they definitely do. And so it's like when either side gets the vapors, it drives me crazy. Like, I can't believe Biden preemptively pardoned Dr. Fauci. We weren't going to do anything. No, that's not true.

You definitely were going to do something, right? Well, okay, so let me pause on Fauci because Fauci, look, the whole thing about the lab leak, right? At first, the media made it seem as though there's no truth to that whatsoever, no truth to that whatsoever. Fauci also said the same thing, and then later on it turned out likely that COVID came from a lab leak in China. But what part of that has a doctor going to prison? No, no, no, no. I'm not saying that he's- But when I go on right-wing shows, I tell you guys all the time, they actually do agree with us on anti-war, anti-corruption, etc.

But they also say things, they don't hide their opinions at all. And they hate Dr. Fauci. No, they do hate Fauci. And they want to arrest them because they disagree with them. They don't get it. Okay, I don't deny that, okay? But one of the arguments that they make is that Fauci was involved in a cover-up in regard to that lab leak, that gain of function, you know, testing and stuff that took place at that lab. at that lab, they are alleging that Fauci knew about it, that he was involved with that lab.

They're alleging that because they allege a lot of things. Now, might that be true? It might, but that's super speculative. And so look, guys, if they uncovered a crime, I'm all for prosecuting, okay? But, and I say the same thing about Trump as I do about Democrats and Fauci and anyone else. And so don't get me wrong, I definitely disagree with the preemptive pardons, they're garbage, There should be no such thing for Fauci or anyone else. But I don't want the right wing pretending that they weren't going to dig and dig and dig and see if they could find Fauci, you know, jaywalking and go, that's it. We want him arrested. And why do you want Fauci arrested?

Was it because you really thought he had massive violations of the law? No, you just don't like it. You hate him. You hate him politically. And that's why you want him arrested. We can debate that all day along with any right wing or I'll debate you on that. I don't care. I know, I know you hate him, that's not against the goddamn law, okay?

So I understand why Biden did it, but he still shouldn't have done it. Because it's a, look, if you care about democracy, you care about protecting people who didn't commit any crimes, but you also care about protecting the process, especially from Biden, the hypocrite in chief, who said, oh my God, I am here to protect democracy and our system and the way we do things normally. And then the minute he had an opportunity, he's like, I was just kidding. It's just personal. So my family members, they're protected, all these other guys are protected.

I'm doing pardons with the exception of Gerald Ford for Nixon that no one's ever seen. This is also pretty unprecedented, right? Because look, the point that I'm trying to get at is I don't know what Fauci knew and didn't know about the lab leak, okay? What I'm trying to say is this is a pretty sweeping pardon that, like how does this exactly work? I want to understand. So does that mean that any criminality? that Fauci or any of these other people might have engaged in, dating all the way back to January 1st of 2014 is now okay?

That's why it's insane. That's insane. Because what if, okay, forget Fauci, I mean, any one of them, pick, I don't want to, you know, needlessly to fame anyone. Just pick a name out of a hat. What if they killed someone and we didn't know? Adam Schiff. Well, so, sorry, now they have a blanket part. That's crazy.

That's crazy. Biden was supposed to, when he claimed that he got elected to stop this, kind of stuff. And on his way out, he puts it on steroids. He does, yeah. And he opens a giant door for Trump or anyone else to walk to drive a tank through that and say, okay, now all my criminal friends are pardoned for anything they did might have done the things that you didn't discover, etc. Last thing on his family members, that was so gratuitous. Yeah. Because nobody was talking about those people, right? Now it makes me think,

oh my God, maybe they did do something. Because I understand why you might want to protect Fauci and Millie, right? But the family members? But the family members, what a hunter I get, they're targeting him, et cetera. Again, I don't agree with any of it, but at least I understand it, your rando brothers and their wives, now I want an investigation. Now I'm being anything, maybe they did take stuff, maybe, and look, there's things floating out there, take it with whatever giant grain assault you want.

That Biden didn't, wasn't in cahoots with Hunter or his brothers to do these scams that They kept doing, milking the Biden family name. But that Biden would conveniently call in when they were doing those business meetings. Not say anything about the business, not actually affect the business, but call in and go, hey, how you doing, Hunter? Hey, how are you doing, bro, et cetera. There's a lot of smoke. So now, now I really want them investigated.

Even if we can't convict them, like see, now it's so counterproductive. It shows guilty heart, guilty mind, et cetera. And now that brings us to Trump and he goes, oh, you're doing pardons, I'll show you pardons. President Donald Trump has now issued sweeping pardons for those who were convicted of crimes related to the January 6th Capitol riots in 2021, including those caught on camera violently attacking police. So he pardoned nearly all of the 1,500 people charged. More than 1,100 of them had already been convicted. The rest had their cases pending. So 717 of them were sentenced to time behind bars.

251 of them were sentenced to home confinement. And while pardoning virtually all of those charged, Donald Trump did commute the sentences of 14 others, and that includes several individuals who, who were actually convicted of seditious conspiracy. Now Trump's pardons also include 700 defendants who were convicted and completed their prison sentences or were never ordered to serve time. And more than 900 of these defendants actually pleaded guilty

through their trials through the court process. Now obviously all of this flies in the face of Trump and J.D. Vance's promise that he would issue pardons on a case by case basis and not pardon those who engaged in violent acts. So for example, Vice President J.D. Vance had said just days ago that people responsible for the violence during the Capitol riot

obviously should not be pardoned, but they were pardoned by Donald Trump. So more than 100 police officers were injured. 200 people were found guilty of assaulting cops. Those people have been pardoned. Some were armed with poles, bats, and bearspray. A former metropolitan police officer by the name of Michael Fanon, lost consciousness and then later suffered a heart attack after a rioter shot him in the chest with a stun gun.

Now, Trump also pardoned former proud boys chairman Enrique Tario, who was sentenced in 2023 to 22 years in prison and commuted the sentence of oathkeeper's founder Stuart Rhodes, who was ordered to spend 18 years behind bars for plotting to prevent the peaceful transfer of power. Now, Tario has already been released from prison. And I want to kind of draw attention. into one other specific individual who's been pardoned and is now free. And that person is a gentleman by the name of Matthew Kroll. So he is highlighted in the video that we're about to watch right now. He's the one wearing the red hoodie. You can't really tell because it's so far away, but he's an older gentleman.

He stole a police baton from an officer and then proceeded to use the baton to assault police. According to the Department of Justice, Matthew Kroll, 64 years old of Linden, Michigan, was sentenced to 51 months in prison and 36 months of supervised release, he actually pleaded guilty on August 15th of 2023 to one count of assaulting, resisting or impeding certain officers using a dangerous weapon, which is a felony. So he is also a self-professed executive officer of the Genesee County, Michigan volunteer militia, and also an associate of the Wolverine Watchmen, which is an extremist group comprised of individual. who are also convicted in the plot to overturn the election.

And it's, I mean, it's just, look, I'm not in favor of violent crime, regardless of who does it, okay? I get mad at the left. When they coddle violent criminals, I'm going to get mad at the right for coddling violent criminals. You want to make a case for pardoning some of the people who wandered into the Capitol building, didn't actually use violence against anyone, and got caught up in it, that's fine. Pardoning guys like Matthew Kroll, who stole a baton from a police officer and then proceeded to assault him and other officers with said baton, how are you going to make an argument in favor of releasing that guy? Yeah. So look, I love doing the show with you guys. We're live 6.8 p.m. every Monday through Friday, as you guys know, on YouTube. And so we've got chat polls going on right now when you guys think of the different Bidens, the Biden, the different pardons, the Biden pardons, the Trump pardons, et cetera. and I want to give voice to a couple of members.

And then I want to come back and tell you what I think of Trump's pardons. Brian Hurst said on super chat, Trump ran out saying he would pardon January 6thers, promises made, promises kept. Biden said he would never and did worse. So that's an interesting point of view. And it is fair to say it's like people shouldn't be surprised. That actually bothers me when people are like, I can't believe Trump pardoned these people. Why can't you believe it? He said he was going to.

and then he won the election, and then he did. Why are you pretending to be surprised? It's just like there's a lot of people in mainstream media that do that. I'm shocked and chagrin by this. Guy, what did you think he was going to do? I mean, he ran on it, but he also made it appear as though he was going to be a lot more nuanced in issuing these pardons. He wasn't.

Oh, yeah, but that's like for me, Trump acting in self-interest is baked in. I, of course he's going to do the most outrageous thing. So I don't know. I'm not one percent surprised by it. I think I love how open-minded our audience is so many different points of you here. First, post-traumatic South disorder says, I don't give a bleep how it looks. I'm relieved for Fauci. They were going to dog that poor man into an early grave.

On the other hand, Nufi Dragon says, this is why I love T.Y.T. and Jank. I never once considered the future powerful disastrous ramifications of Biden's preemptive pardons. Now, one last one for you guys. These are all members from tyt.com. You can sign up there as well, be part of the show. Worst case scenario dragon says, I'm not that mad at pardoning on January 6 people. Trump got them into that mess, told them the potus was behind them, convinced them that it was the right thing to do. That's actually a really good point that in my mind got clouded by the fact that he's coddling violent criminals.

Okay, I'm sorry. I just, I don't want to hear any excuses for anyone. I don't care if it's politically motivated. I don't care if it's just someone who's off their rocker because they're high on bath salts. If someone is posing a threat to people, including police officers, they should suffer the consequences for that, period. Yeah. It makes me really angry that they were included in the blanket pardons.

So look, so here's my opinion on Trump's words. The, you want to blame Trump, of course, 100%. Now, again, he told American people. that American people put them in charge. That's not why they put him in charge, but they were aware of it, right? The person I blame most to be honest is Merrick Garland, because he went after the small fry. He went after the average guy who has no power, who's not an elite, who broke into the building. It was an easy conviction because it's trespassing, it's breaking into the building, it violates several laws.

He went after the violent people too good, that's good, we wanted him to do that. But he left the people who actually planned their event completely untouched, for two and a half years. So what, they just did it on their own? It just popped into their head one day, all the different states, and they just decided to come to the Capitol and bum rush it.

No, it was part of a plan. And they wrote it in a book, Peter Navarro did, about how it was meant to delay the proceedings so they can bring it back to the states. And at the states, they would have local fake Trump electors steal their election. But Mayor Garland believes in protecting the elites. So he's like, oh, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no,

no, no, no, no, no, no. I would never charge Trump or any of the other people that already worked in government because those are the beloved elites. They're free to go. And then they realized Trump's going to run again. And he's like, wait, wait, wait, wait, I meant special counsel. So it was the way that he did it and the timing of it was deeply political. Merrick Garland was one of the worst attorney generals we've ever had. So now, because of that, the American people never got a full hearing on it. And they don't really know what happened. If they knew, in my opinion, if they knew what we know about what actually happened with the fake electorplot and et cetera, they wouldn't have put Trump back into office and those guys would still be in prison.

But we never got to hear that because of how Merrick Garland handled it. So now you're saying Trump not only should be free to go, Peter Navarro, by the way, back in the White House now with Trump. And all the organizers who made those guys who told those guys to go do it are back in the White House and they're perfectly comfortable, but those guys have to sit in prison that whole time. So I'm with one of our members, the worst case in Air Dragon, on everybody who wasn't violent, I'm not in favor of their pardons, but I get it, man. Trump is the one who told them to do it in the first place. Yeah. And he's back in power.

But for the violent ones, Anna's 100% right. If you're a conservative, do you have any principles? I thought like one of the top, top principles of conservatives is don't let violent criminals get away with it. Right, exactly. Now you're saying asterisks, unless they're right wing and they want to do. to help steal an election or whatever you for overturn an election. You think it wasn't stealing? I think it was, but there is no asterisk.

If you're a violent criminal, you belong in prison for both sides. I agree 100%. All right, we gotta take a break, but when we come back, we gotta get into some of the executive orders that Donald Trump signed on his first day, on inauguration day, literally hundreds of them. But we'll give you the highlights and more when we return. I do want corruption. All right, back on TYT, Jankana with you guys.

Lee, thank you for gifting five young tourist memberships and Fats Satter, thank you for gifting 10 on YouTube. You guys are amazing, we love doing the show with you. Casper. Well, there are literally hundreds of executive orders that Donald Trump signed on his very first day in office for a second term, and we should discuss the, I mean, they're all relevant but some of the most relevant ones we're going to get into the details of right now. President Trump, the cartels are now going to be seen as foreign terror organizations.

Would you think about ordering U.S. Special Forces into Mexico to take them out? Could happen. Stranger things have happened. President Donald Trump has now categorized Mexican drug cartels as foreign terrorists. And that's one of his nearly 200 executive orders, which he signed on inauguration day. And that's why you heard a reporter ask him, as he was signing that executive order, whether he intends to use U.S. military in Mexico to fight drug cartels. Now, before we get to some of his other executive orders, and many of them had to do with the southern border and immigration, Jank, I mean, look, I hate the cartels, I despise them.

and they've caused a lot of problems, not only in their own country in Mexico, but obviously here in the United States as well. We know that somewhere around 100,000 Americans are now dying every year from drug overdoses, fentanyl being the most dominant drug that's killing people. So I understand wanting to go after the cartels. This is going to be a disaster. I don't know if he would actually do this, but if he is serious about doing this, it would be a disaster. I remember when Mexico got serious about fighting the drug cartels, what happened when they did that? They got worse.

Yeah. So, and the drug cartels took over and it was incredibly violent, enormously violent. It was a total disaster. So guys, this has three different parts. First is, should they kick people out of the country that committed felonies here, or part of drug cartels that committed crimes? Yes, where's the question? Yeah, so, well, I guess for some on the left, that's a question, but I think that's mental.

So yes is the answer. And that one's clear and easy. And no matter what you happen to think of it, the American people believe that about 98% of them, okay? Right. So that was locked in. And if he just did that, it would like, that would be really popular and his numbers would go up.

Right, but he can't help himself, right? So then, and by the way, we've got no fights with some folks on the left because they say, no, it's all a fantasy. There are no drug cartels, they don't take over any. apartments or buildings. They don't do anything wrong. There is no crime. It's all imagined. There are no cartels and they're not here. Okay. So that's, in my mind, that's crazy talk, right? So understand that that's our perspective. Now, calling, no, bucket number two, calling them terrorists. Why? Isn't felon, violent, criminal enough? But like, why do you need to attach a new

name to it? Well, isn't the only reason why to do that, to basically open up avenues to go after them militarily? Yes. And so that's why I'm concerned. Yeah. So this going after using the military inside the United States, totally unacceptable. And there's no need for it. What, our cops can't arrest drug cartel gang members. Of course they can. They have great numbers in the past. And so, and the military doesn't do a better job of policing than the police does. No, but whatever you think of the failings of the police, right? So it's just there's no need for it. And second Anytime we start calling people terrorists, here comes to demagoguing, so the word has no meaning. It doesn't really, it's never used consistently, it's only used against people we don't like.

So it's just totally, best case scenario is totally needless, worst case scenario used for demagoguing and military force. So the third bucket is, should we invade Mexico? Are you kidding me? Why would we attack Mexico? What kind of lunatic talk is this? And I know why Trump's doing it, Anna, real quick. He does, he thinks keep everything on the table, right? And let me let me make sure that I use my leverage, and this is among my options.

I get it, but it sounds mental and it's destabilizing for the world when we threatened to invade half the countries in our hemisphere. Look, I sympathize with people who want to take out the cartels, right? If we lived in this fantasy world where the military goes in, wipes out the cartels, guess what happens next? Even if it goes smoothly, which it won't, but even if it goes smoothly, best case scenario, there's still different. demand for these drugs. So as long as there's demand, there will be new people who are willing to illegally cultivate and sell these drugs. Yeah, and so glad you brought that up in. We're gonna go back to the same problem. We need to figure out, look, there needs to be a solution. This is a problem. And so he has correctly identified a legitimate problem. Again, I don't know

how serious he is about using our military in Mexico to go after these cartels. But that is not the solution. Not only will it be destabilizing, it doesn't actually solve the root of this very serious problem. Yeah, and it bothers me that whenever we talk about drugs, we start blaming other countries. Like they made us take the drugs. And that Oxy wasn't the number one reason why we had this giant spike in heroin and then fentanyl. It was. And it wasn't like Mexico or China invented Oxy. We did. We did. Our companies screwed over the American people and profited off of their deaths as they often do. But you can't blame corporations because corporations are gods.

So everyone lies collectively in media and in politics and pretends the Mexicans did it or the Chinese did it. When the reality is that the number one cause of this problem was American corporation. Yeah, pharmaceutical companies incentivizing doctors to overprescribe painkillers, also misrepresenting just how addictive the painkillers were. I mean, that was really the root of the problem. In addition to the, look, there are a lot of Americans who are just not feeling great about their lives, right? And they're looking for ways to numb it. So this is a much, much more complex issue then, we got to take out the cartels.

Okay, again, best case scenario, even if you do, you somehow manage to like round up and kill every cartel member in Mexico, and it's not going to go as smoothly as that. But let's say that happens, it's not going to solve the problem because the demand is still there. Now I want to get to some of the other executive orders that Donald Trump has signed. For instance, he has declared a national emergency at the border in order to restart construction of the border wall. And one thing you'll notice, it's like a through line with many of his executive orders. He is understanding that as president, you actually have a lot more power if you're willing to identify something as a national emergency. This was something that Democrats were urging Biden to do in order to get some of his agenda items

accomplished, but he was unwilling to do it. Now, he also again wants to send military resources to the border. Trump said during his inaugural speech that he will invoke the Alien Enemies Act of 1798, a wartime authority to deploy the full and immense power of federal and state law enforcement to eradicate foreign gangs and criminals from the United States. So that's the executive order that Jank was alluding to a little earlier. Keep in mind, that act has only been deployed three times prior and during serious conflicts. So for instance, the last time that act was used was during World War II, and it was specifically utilized in order to force Japanese Americans into internment camps.

Then there was the issue of birthright citizenship, which I I really want to talk about because there is no question in my mind that right now, those pushing to change birthright citizenship are hoping that this case make it to the Supreme Court. And I don't know how the Supreme Court would rule on it. So Trump has directed the US government to, or US government agencies to no longer issue citizenship documentation to babies that are born in the United States on US soil, but to parents who are undocumented, who are not American citizens. And that obviously flies in the face of the 14th Amendment of the Constitution.

The 14th Amendment, which was ratified in 1868 after the Civil War, stipulates that all persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof are automatically citizens. So again, he wants to change this by essentially making it so you're only a U.S. citizen if you're born in U.S. soil to American citizen parents. More specifically, Trump is ordering the Social Security Administration to no longer recognize the babies of undocumented parents as U.S. citizens. Let's take a look at this video. This next order relates to the definition of birthright citizenship under the 14th Amendment of the United States. That's a good one.

Birthright. That's a big one. What about that one in the course? That one is likely to be. Could be. We think we have good grounds, but you could be right. I mean, you'll find out. It's ridiculous.

We're the only country in the world that does this with birthright, as you know. And it's just absolutely ridiculous, but we'll see. We think we have very good grounds. So what he just said there is not true. We are not the only country who do birthright citizenship this way. Different countries have different policies as it pertains to birthright citizenship. Some have restricted birthright citizenship, indicating that at least one of the parents needs to be a citizen of the country.

But in regard to unrestricted birthright citizenship, the United States is joined by dozens of other countries, including Canada, Brazil, Argentina, and Mexico. They have unrestricted birthright citizenship like the United States does. Now, when it comes to the Supreme Court, what is the likelihood that they vote in favor of Donald Trump? Because they do want this to make it to the Supreme Court. Well, the Congressional Research Service said,

then, this is during Trump's first term when he first floated idea that prevailing legal interpretations held that children of undocumented immigrants are citizens, but the service cautioned that the Supreme Court has not firmly settled the issue in the modern era. And about 4.4 million U.S.-born children under 18 were living with an undocumented parent in 2022, according to the Pew Research Center. At least 1.4 million adults have parents who are undocumented. Okay, so this one is the sacrificial lamb. So it's meant to distract you. I'll use two different animal analogies is also the squirrel.

They run the birthright citizenship out, everybody chased after that, they forget about the other executive orders and they all go relatively unchallenged. Because this birthright citizenship thing can't stand, it's clearly unconstitutional. And he says, oh, we're the only nation who does it. Again, Anna showed that it's not true, but I love that we do it. I love that we started that idea and that if you're an American, it doesn't have anything with race or religion or ethnicity, it's the people who are born here that we're all Americans, no matter where we come from. And that's a beautiful thing. And that's something that we should

be proud of. By the way, his position on this is deeply, deeply unpopular. So this is another one of those things that if he actually tries to do it, will drive his numbers into the ground, right? So look, I don't know why he chooses to do these deeply unpopular things when he generally likes to be popular, maybe it's out of vengeance, and that's just genuinely who he is. Maybe he thinks his base wants it. But in this case, with birthright citizenship, this is almost no chance of going into effect. It's wildly unconstitutional and totally ridiculous. So the order will take effect in 30 days. I do think it's unconstitutional. We'll see how it plays out in the courts. The ACLU has already taken up this issue and has filed a lawsuit

against this executive order in particular. Now Trump also ended all categorical parole programs that under President Joe Biden allowed 30,000 migrants per month to enter the country via US airports, bypassing the border for applicants from Cuba, Venezuela, Haiti, and Nicaragua. So that was again, another executive order pertaining to immigration that Donald Trump signed on his very first day. Additional orders directed officials to restart the remain in Mexico policy, which was implemented during Trump's first term. I actually think that was a good policy, one of his better immigration related policies, and I wasn't the only one. Biden,

who for whatever reason overturned it as soon as he went into the White House, realized he made a mistake and tried to re-implement it. But at that point, Mexico had moved on and did not want to re-implement it. Also, Trump is issuing a pause on the refugee admissions that will be in place for four months until they can figure out what the hell is going on. So no asylum seekers for four months. That was another executive order. Among those seeking lawful entry under Biden are the roughly 1,450 people per day who have been using the CBP1 mobile app to schedule an appointment to make a humanitarian

claim for asylum. And Trump has now ended that program, that app is now defunct. The U.S. government will no longer be using it. The Washington Post says that now there is a notice posted to the agency's website that says future appointments have been canceled. And the cancellations will affect about 30,000 people, according to two Border Patrol agents who spoke to the Washington Post on condition of anonymity. 2,000 of them, by the way, are Afghani individuals who helped U.S. soldiers in the fight in Afghanistan, in the war in Afghanistan. Yeah, so I get remain in Mexico, I think it probably makes sense, and I certainly understand after the election why they would do that and some of the other laws that were mentioned. But denying the asylum seekers is illegal according to international law. I know no one in America cares about international law anymore, but we do.

And it's problematic. You had a good system for them applying instead of just running across the border and you got rid of it. So now it's going to be a bigger mess. How does that help solve anything? It's just being spiteful for the sake of being spiteful. So look, guys, we have to be principled on all of this stuff. So for example, his TikTok executive order, I hate that they ban TikTok. I can't stand it. I think it's one of the worst laws that have been passed.

But you can't just say, oh, I'm just not implementing it for 75 days. That was one of his executive orders. That's not a thing. So if they have an available buyer, he can't accept. by 90 days, but they don't have an available buyer. So he's just going outside the law. So I can't stand any executive order that goes outside the law or outside the constitution, even if I agree with the substance as I do on the TikTok one, right?

So and then some of the executive orders on LGBTQ stuff was were terrible. He's questioning the Bostock decision, which prevented discrimination against transgender people and based on any gender identity, the whole entire LGBTQ community on employment discrimination. And he might be saying, hey, I don't want it extended to schools, so you are allowed to discriminate in schools, which is already terrible. But if he then questions whether you can discriminate at employment, we're affecting core constitutional rights here, and it's terrible.

So, and by the way, as always, when he overreaches, it will be unpopular. It's one thing when you say, hey, we want to get rid of convicted felons. We want to, you know, have people remain in Mexico, whatever. These things that we are already polled and shown to be popular, whether we agree or disagree with them. But when he goes into these absolute extremes and does illegal unconstitutional things, people are not going to be in favor. Last thing I have on this is that Box, one of our members wrote in on Super Chat.

And he said, I'm no Trump fan. But him doing an hour-long off-the-cuff press section while getting his voters business done on day one was super cathartic for me. And that's such an interesting point, and that's why I read it, because Anna, in the midst of discussing all of the policy, they're so thick with policy on day one with all these executive orders, we shouldn't overlook the optics of it. Oh my God, I'm not overlooking it at all. Yeah.

Look, I'm gonna be honest with you guys. I know the left thinks that I'm like MAGA, some members of the right think I'm MAGA, I'm not MAGA, but I will admit this, I am super envious that MAGA has Donald Trump actually doing what he says that he was going to do when he was campaigning. I don't agree with some of the stuff that he said he was going to do when he was campaigning. With Democrats, we don't have any of that. Okay, we don't have anyone even giving the appearance of giving a damn about the base or the voters. All we've been getting from Democrats is this sense of entitlement.

Like we're supposed to be their public servants and get them elected. Yeah, and so look, I we know and we covered every day on the show that Donald Trump does some of the things that he promised Maga, and then he does things he didn't promise Maga, okay? And he violates a lot of his promise, tons and tons of his promises, and we covered on the show. But the point is that he appears to be acting on their behalf with great vigor, right? And on the Democratic side, when we look for defenders and we look for somebody who's fighting for us to get things done, past policy issues, whether it's through bills or executive order, what do you know what I'm about?

to say is true, the minute I say it, what do they tell you all the time on the left? They say, well, you have to push your politicians into doing them. Why? We voted for them. Why don't they just do the thing that they said they were going to do? Why don't they keep pushing them afterwards? And when I do, by the way, they go, how dare you push a Democrat? How dare you? You're helping Trump and the Republicans. No, I would love for a Democrat to show this kind of enthusiasm for delivering on campaign promises, Even though as we just explained in painstaking detail, all the ones we massively disagree on, as a matter of optics, it's great politics to do that.

And the Democrats never do it. They never do it. They say, you have to push us, and you're not allowed to push us. Just shut up and vote for us. And I can't stand it anymore. They're immovable, okay? There is no pushing them. Okay, because they'd like you to believe they're different from Republicans as it pertains to

corporate influence and corruption. But they're not. They're just as bad, and they're always going to look out for their donors before they look out for their own base. And if you critique them a little bit, they've got an entire mob online, entire army of people who come after you and blame you for Donald Trump's election. No, no, no, the Democratic candidates, the Democrats themselves, the mainstream Democratic Party, they help Trump get elected. And it's time that they're held responsible for that. All right, we got to take a break. When we come back, we've got a lot more to get to, including some details.

about the ceasefire, very wobbly unstable ceasefire in the Middle East between Israel and Hamas. That more coming up, don't miss it.