Trump’s Second Term: New Directions, Challenges, and America First Priorities with Noah Rothman and Ashley Hayek
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Welcome to another episode of Breaking Battlegrounds with your host Sam Stone. Chuck Warren out of the studio today. So as per usual now, a fantastic guest fill-in host, Sean Noble. He is the host of his own podcast, Lightbeard Dark Money. You definitely need to check that one out. And as always, we're going to be jumping right into the first part of our program with our first interview. Noah Rothman is a senior writer at National Review. He is the author of Rise of the New Puritans, Fighting Back Against Progressives, War on Fun.

and unjust social justice and the unmaking of America. I actually think, Noah, we have a bit of an old bio for you. Do you have a new book since these? The last book I published was in the summer of 2022, and that was Puritan, The Rise of the New Puritan. Okay, okay.

Perfect. Well, thank you so much for joining us. I'm behind the stick. I need to get another one out. It's been two years. You've got plenty of material. Yeah, we're going to whip you on here, man. Come on. We need this. You've got the good stuff. You've got so much material. That's right. National Review keeps me busy. Yeah. Well, and you've stayed busy. The National Review has been a phenomenal coverage for this last election. I think your piece from yesterday on the –

Progressives anti-American cope, anti-America cope. Get into what you were seeing as the reaction on MSNBC and other places.

Yeah, well, I don't want to overstate it because in general, the reaction seems to be from Democratic partisans and responsible Democratic political actors has been a sense of betrayal more than shock and anger, not like 2016. And so the reaction has been kind of muted, and there has been a subdued response to it.

and some policing of the overreactions to which Democratic and progressive partisans are tempted. But not all of them.

There's been a fair amount of effort to transpose the blame for what befell the Democratic Party onto America writ large. And Americans, their troglodytic attachment to cultural proclivities to which progressives with their enlightened ideals are not so inclined.

This is fundamentally about America, toxic masculinity and white supremacy. Boston University Law School Professor Judge Shrugman declared CNBC's John Harwood said something similar, that the arc of the history in 2024 did not bend towards justice but away from it.

Others, Eli Mistel, a nation correspondent, assigning blame for the fate that befell Kamala Harris to America's male population and its hidebound population.

Racism is in there, too, but certainly misogyny and misogyny is applicable across the board, according to Joe Scarborough, who said, you know, there's misogyny among Hispanic men. There's misogyny among African-American men. All of this is attributable to thoughtlessness. So there are men among men? Yeah. I mean...

I mean, this is a recipe for marginalization, right? This is self-soothing, a psychological balm that you would apply to the wounds that American voters have meted out to you. But it's not something that Americans writ large are going to respond to. They're not going to say, well, yeah, I guess I am a hidebound Neanderthal with contempt for my neighbors. Maybe they have a point and I should really dwell on it. No! No!

They're going to reject that nonsense. Do you think – I mean because that tack obviously is one they've been applying broadly to white men for the last decade. But this is kind of the first time that black men and Hispanic men have come to be painted with that same brush. I didn't feel like Obama and others who came out on the campaign trail and chastised them helped Kamala Harris in any way. How do they see this as helpful going forward to just deepen this divide? Yeah.

I have no idea how they think it was helpful. I don't know why they thought it was helpful on the campaign trail. As you said, Barack Obama came out there and started banging the drum about how African-American men need to abandon their attachments, I suppose, or their hostilities to the women in their life and violence.

Michelle Obama did something very similar, hectoring American men, essentially saying that their political interests, their political self-interest is at odds and incompatible with the women in their lives. And it was just sort of a hectoring lecture, and I can't imagine that it was fueled by any data, any hard data.

Kamala Harris's campaign was peddling a defective product. And everybody out there who was attempting to sell it, to pitch it, were not operating on informed speculation fueled by data. They were just throwing stuff against the wall to see what stuck. And nothing stuck. Otherwise, I can't imagine why Barack Obama, who's a pretty accomplished political actor, would retreat into that sort of attack on voters in an effort to get them to do what you want through

through emotional blackmail and emotional manipulation. It's just bizarre. Well, I think that the major crux of the failure of the Democratic establishment's view of the world was that they just decided to ignore the pain and suffering of American people through inflation.

They tried to gaslight the American people saying inflation is not bad. The economy is good without any recognition that when prices went up, they did not come down. They just stayed up and they may have gone up slower eventually, but they were still going up and they put the entire election through the prism of abortion.

And so these lecturing of the men was you've got to protect the women in your lives against these evil people who want to take away their bodily autonomy. And even the women were like, well, it doesn't do that. Doesn't really matter if I can't feed my family. Well, and it was on the ballot thing, right? In a lot of states. Yeah. Right. Yeah. But that is, that's the other thing. I mean, the, the,

There's sort of question begging going on here, the assumption being that men are responsible for this and women rejected wholly the Trump campaign. But they didn't. If the exit polling is at all accurate and it's not going to be affected too terribly when all the votes are counted in the West.

Females, women voters, moved in the Republican direction. The only women who moved towards Democrats were college-educated white women, which was the entirety of this campaign was dedicated to appealing to that cohort. And it didn't, I mean, it worked. It generated that a little bit of traction in that demographic. But at

but at the expense of every other demographic. And just looking at the numbers, there just aren't enough college-educated white women to make up a national coalition. That is not a governing majority. No, no. Fueled by faulty assumptions from the start. Do you think, I was trying to think back at the moment that really shifted this campaign, and I really think, just kind of thinking on it, see if both of you agree, I think that Walls-Vance debate

was where it really got lost for the Democrats. Their response to that and the campaign from that point forward was so massively angry and ineffective that I think they just furthered every impression people had from that debate.

Maybe. I mean, it's an interesting theory. It would be the most impactful vice presidential debate in the history of vice presidential debates if it moved the needle at all in one direction or another. My thought was more that it moved. It did a lot of good for Joe, but for J.D. Vance's image, for sure. Yeah. And it was that was definitely. So I view the I don't view it as there is one pivotal moment as much as there were inflection points.

First big inflection point, obviously, was the first debate when the rest of the world discovered what we already knew, which was Joe Biden was suffering from...

severe mental decline. How this was a surprise, I have no idea because we all knew. I mean, when I saw the debate and he stumbled and I was like, oh, that's uncomfortable. But I didn't view it as a catastrophic failure because I was fully assuming that that would happen. But then the Democrat establishment who had been, you know, either just burying their head in the sand or willfully ignoring or believing what they were being told,

You know, they freak out. Then the next inflection point was the assassination attempt. Then the next one, obviously, was when Biden drops out. And then, you know, that's when everyone thought, oh, this is this, you know, Kamala is going to save us. Her numbers went great. She had that sugar high. And then you had, you know, the debate with Trump did not go great. But then this debate with Walt with Walls and J.D. Vance.

Definitely created that like, oh, this guy really is kind of cool. I think J.D. helped him tremendously, especially with women. Yeah. Normalizing him to a degree. Yeah.

Well, the fact that J.D. did, and no, I'd be real interested because you covered this every day. It seems to me that J.D.'s strategy of basically flooding the zone with the media, talking to them constantly, being completely available, having a comment on everything, was exactly what was needed to keep the pressure. I view these things as like,

If the ball is in your side of the court, get it immediately to the other side of the court. Well, it certainly established a beneficial contrast with the Harris administration or the Harris campaign and its allergy to allowing its candidate to speak extemporaneously in any setting.

And the same could be said for Walsh. He was a little bit more accessible to the press, but not too terribly. The two of them were very scripted. Their public appearances were choreographed in ways to insulate the candidates from any unforeseen events. And to an extent, that's best practice. But it contrasted mightily with the Trump campaign, which was just about as freewheeling as you could possibly get, as accessible as...

As accessible as any political campaign in my memory. And that was similar to how Donald Trump operated in the White House. You could, you know, whatever your thoughts on him, he was always available. He would give you a comment on the record whenever he possibly could. In fact, he would go on for minutes at a time while he was giving you that comment.

And yeah, to the extent that that projected authenticity, you know, whatever you think of Donald Trump. And if we look at the exit polls, we're going to be you've got to look at these exit polls because it's all the data that we have right now. Donald Trump is not popular. He was more unpopular than Kamala Harris. His favorability rating is underwater compared with Kamala Harris's. But he nevertheless won the election. There's a lot of people. I don't know how what percentage of the electorate there are, but they're out there. A

A lot of people in the electorate have voted for Donald Trump, knowing full well who he is and how they dislike his personal conduct, his personal comportment. It's not something they appreciate. But they voted for him anyway for political outcomes, for their own personal outcome. Right. I mean, it's a transactional relationship. Yeah, it was something that Republicans need to be fully aware of, that they expect deliverables results. The.

The notion here that the former president has a cult of personality around him, and Republicans might be willing to convince themselves that there is genuine affection for Donald Trump in ways that there never had been previously. And there maybe is, but not always.

But not enough to, I think, counteract what is probably the mandate that he has, which is to reverse Joe Biden's policies and deliver the kind of financial relief that they expected from Joe Biden and didn't get. That's a big, tall order. And it'd be a mistake to misread that as a broader mandate. He has got to deliver on his agenda. We're going to be going to break here in just a moment, but we're talking with Noah Rothman, senior writer at National Review. You can follow him on Instagram.

at Noah C. Rothman or obviously at National Review. When we come back, I want to talk about a little bit about who the international winners and losers from this election are and what we expect in terms of foreign policy outcomes. So stay tuned for that. Breaking Battlegrounds coming right back.

Folks, this is Sam Stone for Breaking Battlegrounds. Discover true freedom today with 4Freedom Mobile. Their SIM automatically switches to the best network, guaranteeing no missed calls. You can enjoy browsing social media and the internet without compromising your privacy. Plus, make secure mobile payments worldwide with no fees or monitoring. Visit 4FreedomMobile.com today for top-notch coverage.

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Welcome back to Breaking Battlegrounds with your Sam Stone. Joining me in the studio today, we have Sean Noble. He's filling in for Chuck Moran. But folks,

Before we continue on with our interview with Noah Rothman, senior writer at National Review, we've got to tell you once again to check out our friends, invest the letter Y, then RAFY.com. Learn how you can earn up to 10.25% fixed rate of return in a secure collateralized portfolio. When you invest with Y Refi, you're doing well for yourself and your family by doing good for others and helping students pay off their high interest loads early. So check them out, invest the letter Y, then RAFY.com.

All right. Continuing on. Noah, you had a piece a couple of days ago about Israel. And the headline is, why is Israel waiting to be attacked again? Talk to us about the foreign policy aspects of a Trump victory and now what awaits what's happening in the Middle East, for example.

Yeah, so that piece was a response to some unconfirmed but widely reported, nevertheless, movements by Iranian military assets and statements by Iranian officials that they are going to retaliate.

again for a retaliatory response from Israel in response to the October 1st missile barrage in which Iran launched and managed to hit a variety of Israeli targets. Israel responded in a calibrated way on October 26th, and the Iranians say, well, we're going to hit you again. And Iran is a little bit more vulnerable now, according to reporting, those strikes neutralized missile production facilities and a lot of the air defense systems.

inside Iran, so it's far more vulnerable. And that vulnerability is a little bit dangerous. Vulnerable powers have a tendency to try to secure their interests in risky ways. They become more risk-prone. And I'm nervous for the transition period because the two hot wars that we currently have in the Middle East and Europe

are going to change under a Trump administration. The approach to those conflicts is going to evolve in ways that are kind of unforeseeable, in part because Trump, the candidate, has been somewhat ambiguous about how he intends to approach those things in some ways. So let's go to Europe, for example.

Donald Trump hasn't really established a position on the war in Ukraine, Russia's war of conquest in Ukraine. He says he's going to get it done, get it over with. Somehow he has a secret plan. But his vice president has been far less ambiguous. He has said that this is not a conflict that involves U.S. interests and the United States should extricate itself from it with all due haste.

um kiev is going to hear that loud and clear and it's going to assume that it has a very narrow window to secure whatever interest it can before its advantages run out and that could make it be very risk-prone it could end up doing more things like it has been doing attacking uh russian navy vessels now in the caucuses one of the reasons why i think it ended up taking and securing territory inside the russian federation was to present

the Biden administration with fait accompli, that you can't just go to the negotiating table and say, okay, we're going to freeze this conflict in place on the lines of conflict now, at which point Russia will open that conflict up whenever it wants to. You can't do that anymore because we hold Russian territory. It's a sort of insurance policy that I think will come to bear on the Trump administration as well. And I might want to secure more of those interests to secure against the prospect that the Trump administration wants to throw it under the bus. And similarly, Iran,

now understands and should understand that it has a similarly narrow window of opportunity to affect whatever battlefield shape the battlefield in ways that are advantageous to it before the

Trump administration comes in and restores a policy of maximum pressure. There's a very tiny window here. And I think the America's adversarial powers and its allies who are threatened or perceive their interests to be threatened by a new Trump administration will do their best to change the status quo and present the Trump administration with certain conditions that it may not necessarily believe are advantageous. Right. Do you think so? So overnight, I mean, on Thursday evening, we had this brutal attack of, you know,

of Jewish Israeli soccer fans in Amsterdam where, you know, Arab mob screaming free Palestine, beating up and running down Israeli fans because there was a soccer game there that included the Tel Aviv soccer team. Is this...

impart a distraction that's away from the Middle East that draws, because Netanyahu responded by sending Mossad to Amsterdam. That seems to be pretty dire and a bad distraction for them to be dealing with when they've got Iran sitting in the backyard waiting to do something.

Yeah, well, it's not good. The images that we saw last night out of Amsterdam were abhorrent. It's the sort of thing that you would have seen 100 years ago in Europe. And that's no coincidence. I don't suspect. There's been some early indications that Moroccan mafia figures might have been involved in this, some of which have links to Iranian intelligence. I wouldn't be surprised if there was an operational link.

to Tehran and its intelligence apparatuses and perhaps the terrorist networks that orbit around Tehran. I don't think this was organic. It's the sort of thing that didn't look spontaneous to me. And I wouldn't be surprised if there was a feature of grand strategy from the anti-Semitic powers in the Middle East that are engaged in a hot war with Israel right now to attempt to create conditions that

make Israel less secure and that compel its allies in the West to engage more actively with Israeli interests, which Tehran and other powers in the region that are hostile to Iran believe erodes the support for Israel on the ground and ultimately secures its interest by undermining the regimes in Europe and in the West broadly that support Israel. So I would think that this is part of a broader

broader issue and it's not like we don't have evidence for that the in the united states these protesters were smashing up campuses and smashing up you know windows and streets we know they were funded indirectly by iran through a variety of networks that allow it to shield its finances from scrutiny but that is the allegation of the biden administration and a

And Iran has its hands in these violent protest movements all over the world. And it advances their interests. We have to ask ourselves, why? Why would they do this? Well, I was about to ask, is that a switch from them trying a hard power approach with the Biden administration? Now you have with Trump, the president-elect, you've got Hamas has called for peace. You have the Houthis have already announced a ceasefire.

The hard power elements are running fast away from this conflict. So the only way Iran can now escalate it is via these sort of underground sort of soft power moves. I apologize. We have just about a minute and a half left here. OK.

No, yeah, I think that's absolutely right. And it is a return to a certain kind of form that allows Iran to execute its destabilizing operations on the ground, but evade responsibility for them, direct responsibility, and thus direct retaliatory measures from Western military powers. So, yeah, it's probably a smart strategy insofar as Iran has options to smart strategies right now. It should beg off.

It has been seriously degraded. Its operational capacity and its terrorist networks have been very seriously degraded by Israeli retaliatory strikes against Hezbollah and Hamas and Iran directly. They are in a disadvantageous position, so they should recalibrate their position. But there's a face-saving element to this, too. The Iranian regime has one raison d'etre, which is anti-Zionism.

If it doesn't stand firm against Israeli actions, against it directly, it could face a legitimacy crisis, and that can lead to some very unstable actions in the future. Fantastic. Thank you so much, Noah Rothman. We always appreciate having you on the program. Folks, follow him on X at Noah C. Rothman. You can also follow him at nationalreview.com. We always appreciate your insights, Noah, and look forward to having you back on the program again. My pleasure. Thanks for having me.

Fantastic. Breaking Battlegrounds coming right back. Stay tuned. We've got Ashley Hayek from America First Policy talking about the first steps of the new Trump administration coming up.

Welcome back to Breaking Battlegrounds with your Sam Stone guest hosting with me today, Sean Noble. But before we get into that, folks, I don't know if you've seen this thing with China hacking everyone's phones in the world. Basically, on the other hand, if you were with our friends at For Freedom Mobile, your data, your phone would have been secure. Literally, the government is out there panicking right now today, telling people not to use their phones because China has access to everything you're sending through them. Amazing.

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And we're continuing on. Our next guest today is Ashley Hayek. She is the executive director of America First Works, friend of the program, originally from the small agricultural town of Clovis, California. She is the America First Policy Institute's chief engagement officer, political strategist with over 15 years of experience. She's also the director of the American First Policy Institute's chief engagement officer, political strategist with over 15 years of experience.

She has an amazing bio, but I got to get right here to the end of it because I've never brought this point, but she is spot on. She attended the University of California, San Diego, received a degree in political science, proud wife of a United States Marine, mom of five. She's got more things on her plate than just about any human you or I know. And she manages to juggle it all in her best stilettos. That is that is the best line in a bio I think I have ever read on this program. Ashley Hayek, welcome back to the show.

Thank you. And what's the point of doing it all if you can't have great shoes, right? See, Kylie is absolutely a big girl. Yeah, I completely agree. Yes. See, I'm just saying. It's all that matters. See, as a guy, I just have these old pair of cowboy boots and you just keep polishing them. Whatever's good.

That's awesome. Ashley, talk to us about you for having me. Yeah. Talk to us about what you saw. So America first had a lot of activity going on during the election. Tell us what you guys saw on the ground and how that's going to inform what happens as we go into the next administration.

Sure. So when we, when America First Works, you know, set up, set out to redefine the political game, we wanted to make sure that we were very much involved in communities and having conversations with voters. And one thing that was a priority for us, too, was to kind of change the way we look at politics, where we look at our voters like customers and how do you serve your customers? But more importantly, how do you retain your customers?

And one of the biggest things that we saw in 2020, even 2022 and 2023 in Virginia specifically, was we were not very successful at that early or male voting. So not male like men voting, but just the absentee ballot voting. How do we improve that? And how do we?

just connect with our customers or voters in a much more meaningful way. So we built out a ground game. We also worked with about 100 different conservative organizations to really make sure that we were making the biggest impact and had the highest return on investment for people who were a part of our team. And what we saw was absolutely phenomenal. So first of all,

The number one issue, which is probably not surprising to anybody, was the economy and how inflation was just absolutely crushing families. And being able to have conversations about how much more expensive things are today than they were just two years ago was really impactful. And it cut across any sort of demographics or pandering that you see that the left does.

The second issue, of course, is the border crisis. And then you compound that with stories from, you know, Jocelyn or Lincoln. You hear about the Children Are Not For Sale ballot initiative that was so successful in Arizona and all the horrific stories about children being lost across the country. That popped up as a big issue. And then actually a third issue that we started to hear in some states was

was about education. And that issue started popping up around early to mid-September, I think when a lot of families were starting to go back to school. And people don't realize what the profound impact of COVID mandates and COVID lockdowns had on our school system and on our kids. So it was really quite interesting to see what issues people cared about the most.

and contrast that with the Kamala Harris campaign, who really focused on joy, vibes, and public shaming people who didn't agree with them without offering any sort of vision or solution for the future. And ultimately, I think that that's going to have a major impact in the next administration, especially in the first hundred days of the new administration.

Ashley, we have just a minute left before we go to break. Then we're going to be coming right back with more from you here. But the ad Trump ran targeting the Kamala Harris's crazy transgender policies, obviously, which tie into schools and to, you know, girls in the boys, boys in the girls locker room competing on girls teams. Did

Did that you're the first person I heard mention the school timing. Do you think that ad hit home? Because that came out right about the same time. One million percent. I mean, it is so clear how the left has pushed radical agenda agendas on gender, family, women's issue, tampons in boys bathrooms, calling masculinity toxic.

All of that, and that cut across, especially with the Hispanic vote, black African-Americans, men. Also, we saw that even in the Arabic communities as well, which is why I think Dearborn was a big reason Dearborn flipped. Only white progressives liked that idea. We're going to be coming back with more from Ashley Hyatt in just a moment. Stay tuned.

Folks, this is Sam Stone for Breaking Battlegrounds. Discover true freedom today with 4Freedom Mobile. Their SIM automatically switches to the best network, guaranteeing no missed calls. You can enjoy browsing social media and the internet without compromising your privacy. Plus, make secure mobile payments worldwide with no fees or monitoring. Visit 4FreedomMobile.com today for top-notch coverage.

digital security, and total freedom. And if you use the code BATTLEGROUND at checkout, you get your first month of service for just $9 and save $10 a month for every month of service after that. Again, that's code BATTLEGROUND at checkout. Visit 4freedommobile.com to learn more.

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All right. Welcome back to Breaking Battlegrounds. We're continuing on now with Ashley Hayek. She is the executive director of America First Works, friend of a program, a friend of our program. And you can follow her on X at Ashley Hayek. Ashley, as we went to the break, you were talking a little bit about some of the cultural relevance of the Trump ad that dropped. How do we solidify those cultural victories that we saw in this election?

Well, I think this started early on too with Disney, Bud Light, Target, with all of the radical transgender issues. When you had Dylan Mulvaney in the White House and when the Biden-Harris administration called Easter Transgender Visibility Day, it's a bridge too far. One of the pieces of the Trump Agenda 47, one of

One of the commitments he made was keeping men out of women's sports. And I think that is going to be a big priority and also restoring Title IX to what it is intended to be. And that's been made abundantly clear on what they'll be able to do since that is something that the Biden-Harris administration completely disengaged.

destroyed, especially in the past year. And I think that had a profound effect on this election. And I'm looking forward to returning to some normalcy. Yeah, no kidding. I was talking to some Democrat operatives, excuse me, a couple days ago. And, you know, when I when I was doing the outside work in the 2012 election, there was

We would focus group stuff all the time. And what we realized early, well, towards the end of the election, but before Election Day, was that this Priorities USA ad that they were running against Romney called Stages about this guy who had been asked to build a stage for a big meeting at the factory. And then the Bain Capital guys came in and fired everybody. He said, it was like I was building my own coffin. It was an absolutely devastating ad.

These Democrat operatives said they were doing focus groups towards the end of the election and that this ad about the trans issue was popping harder than anything else that they were testing against them. And what's interesting is when I saw the ad the first time, I was like, ooh, it made me a little uncomfortable because I was like, boy, I don't know if that's going to react. And Ashley, you know my wife, Alyssa, said,

She said, that's the best out of the season. I was like, what? And it was it was I just hadn't put, you know, the I was looking at it from an operative standpoint, which is always a mistake. You have to look at it from the lens of what's the average voter emotion. Yeah. In particular, moms, you know, how are they going to react to that? And it was it was it was exactly right.

Well, across the seven battleground states, early and absentee voting by liberal women dropped by over 545,000 votes compared to at the same time in 2020. That's just going into Election Day. And what we saw was that women who were conservative, they actually had an increase of 112,000 votes compared to Election Day. So.

number one bill the establishment media was completely gaslighting us by saying that com where it had all the support from women when now it's been proven that there are over three hundred thousand less women who are going to this election and half a million of them are liberal women

We'll pull up the final stats on the women's number as we do our deep dive. But it was I think that signal just a broad awakening amongst women who are just realigning their values. And then what we saw going into Election Day was that men were leading in

conservative men were leading over liberal men in every single battleground state, except for Wisconsin, who has a major turnout on Election Day. So I think it just goes to show you it was a bridge too far for most Americans and how out of touch they are with real people. Yeah, and I think that ultimately when the Democrats, you know, invariably they've got to do their after action and their self-reflection.

I think they're not doing very well with that right now. They don't start with, we are completely out of touch. We are the elitists who are completely out of touch. If they don't recognize that, then they're not ever going to fix the problem, which is probably good for us, I guess, as long as we take advantage. I mean, because one of the things that I've been telling people is as much as the Democrats need to do self-reflection, we need to look inside how we built this coalition, how this happened, and make sure that we don't screw it up. Because...

It can be a permanent alignment or it can be a flash in the pan. I think this is going to be a permanent alignment. I think one of the things that we have started doing is immediately reaching back out to the voters that we connected with in this election, asking what is your priority for day one of the new administration? And we want to make sure that we continue to message what America First values are so the American people can hear directly from us and not be gaslit by the establishment anymore. One thing that I think...

that is going to be actually amazing. I remember in the 2017 inauguration address, President Trump had said, "The forgotten men and women of our country will be forgotten no longer." And he made promises in that address about fixing our inner cities and rebuilding our highways and taking care of our veterans, because it was right after Obama's disastrous veterans fiasco in Arizona, actually.

And I think we're going to see that again because he is a man who delivers on his promises every single time. And so long as we can remind the American people promises made, promises kept, and this is what the America First movement is, we can continue to build on that. Do you think, Ashley, it's a perfect transition to what I wanted to talk about next here. Do you think that the people leading his transition understand the importance

how tight the timeline is to do that. Because you, obviously we have, it looks like control of all three branches now. That's critical. But even leaving that aside, you have two years. Then whatever you do in Washington will take a year to filter down to, just because the budget cycles take a year to filter down to the states, to the counties, to the cities. So all these changes, sweeping changes that need to happen,

If they're going to be in place by 2028 when hopefully we'll have J.D. Vance or another America first candidate leading the charge, those things have to be done really fast. You've got two years to pass them quickly.

a year to implement them, and then people would have a year to see some results. I think that I have no doubt that they are going to execute at the quickest level possible. This is something I know that they have been planning on for quite some time. They have incredibly capable engineers.

people, successful business people with Howard Butnik and Linda McMahon leading the transition effort. I have some friends who are working in there as well, and they are by far top notch, high quality. This is not a 2016 scenario all over again. It's this is, I think, the best of the best.

That being said, we also have an obligation as we the people to make sure we're holding our congressional members accountable. Because I remember there were certain members of Congress who are conservative members of Congress that were pushing back on the president's agenda in 2017. And that really delayed a lot of things. So we the people have a responsibility to make sure we are communicating to our members of Congress

that they need to make sure they're supporting the president's agenda and getting that implemented immediately. I know there's executive orders that are written that are ready to go for day one. That was a huge priority of President Trump. I know that they have their policy agenda they're working through and their staffing plans they're working through. But we, again, have an obligation as the American people to support the president and his agenda by holding our congressional members accountable.

Do you think – I wonder how much of a problem, Sean, and I'd love your take, that will be this time around because it doesn't seem like many of the ones who thwarted Trump's agenda the first time are still there. That's right. Yeah, I think that when you look at the – particularly congressional leadership, you're going to have whoever is the Senate leader, which looks like it probably is going to be Thune, definitely close to Trump.

Obviously, Mike Johnson has attached himself to Trump's hip. As he should. As he should. For his own security in that position. But then you also have committee chairman and I mean the whole congressional establishment, the Republican side of the congressional leadership and rank and file.

I mean, this is a Trump party now. 2016, it was not. He was kind of the anomaly. And it was a shakeup of Washington that created tension with both Republicans and Democrats. You're not going to see tension with Republicans this time. Actually, how effective? Obviously, you know some of the barriers with civil service rules, but it's very clear now.

that we need to both reduce the size of the federal government, that we have too many employees in virtually every single agency or every agency, but that we also need to bring them back to their constitutional and statutory authorities and take away some of this free reign that the bureaucrats have given themselves. Who do you expect to see helping lead that charge? Because that might be the biggest lift in all of this. The bureaucracy might be the greatest entrenched power in the world right now.

I'm not sure and I would never want to get ahead of the team on who they envision for a role like that. But some of the plans that have been publicly discussed include taking some of the agencies and putting them back into America and out of the D.C. swamp and giving other everyday Americans the opportunity to have some of these jobs, which I think would be brilliant and effective.

more open-minded and inclusive, if you will. So I know that that has been discussed in the past. And also, you know, Elon Musk being such a big part of the movement, Vivek Ramaswamy, all have thought about this very extensively. Former Secretary of Interior David Bernhardt has been involved in a lot of those conversations. So I do think that there is a plan. I hope they go after the FBI immediately, but that's just my own personal preference.

Well, I think the top leadership of the FBI, I think we're going to see mass retirements between now and January 22nd. And anyone who stays should be canned. I mean, those in the intel agencies, the 51 people who signed the Hunter Biden laptop letter, every one of them needs to be gone. Yeah.

That's exactly right. That's exactly right. And you know what? And by the way, I wish, I don't know if this is even possible, their security clearances should be revoked. Yes. Because the fact, a lot of them, they get that security clearance and they're able to get these contractor jobs. It needs to be pulled and they should not have access to any classified material ever again. Okay.

Talking to our good friend, Sean, Russ Walker, you know, who knows kind of that end of government. He says that's absolutely something the president and his office can do, you know, day one kind of thing. I think, Ashley, you're spot on with that because we've got to stop this. We never need to see Victoria Nuland back in an official position in Washington again. I mean, it's just enough is enough.

And they shouldn't have the benefit of a high, super high paying job when they work to undermine our democracy in our country. Absolutely. We have about two and a half minutes left, Ashley. What what can folks expect from your organization, from America First Works in terms of helping lead and helping bring people together over this agenda?

So our goal is we've already started reaching out, like you said, to people that are, you

across party lines, Democrats, independents, Republicans, what would you like to see as part of the new America First movement or this America First agenda? And getting that information and making sure that they receive information about the policies. The first 100 days are going to be absolutely critical. And we look forward to elevating and really amplifying all of the great work that will be coming out of the new administration. We'll be directly getting that information to communities so people are aware of what's

going on and how they can be involved and how they can help. And I think also we're looking at what we can do at the state level, because at the end of the day, we as conservatives believe there should be less federal power and more state power. So how do we take these great America first policies and translate them into advocating for policies at the state level as well? And we've got some really good pickups.

There was a big shift. President Trump was able to change some of the state legislative makeups all the way down the ballot. So I'm looking forward to seeing what we can do in the state houses across the country as well. It looks like Texas's state house has kind of undergone a Republican shift from particularly kind of from these these soft public education Republicans here.

I would expect full school choice coming in there. We're going to have other states that are trending that direction. Arizona, we may have added a few seats. Trump really had bigger coattails down ballot than people thought.

Oh, so one thing people aren't talking about, Republicans flipped at least, it's close to 100. It's like 94 Democrat-held legislative seats across all of the states. There's still a couple that are in question. However, if Republicans prevail, there's one seat that's in question. I think it may have been called yesterday, but I haven't checked. It was in Pennsylvania. Republicans will have flipped three chambers, Michigan's House, Minnesota's House, Pennsylvania's

and Pennsylvania's House, costing Democrats two state trifectas and solidifying Republican control of both chambers in Pennsylvania. That's huge. Last question. Did you have a little giggle like I did when you saw Gretchen Whitmer get saddled with a Republican legislature? Oh, I'm thrilled. I can't wait. This legislative cycle is going to be so fun. Absolutely. Thank you so much, Ashley Hayek. We always love having you on the program. Folks, follow her at AshleyHayek.com.

Stay tuned. If you are one of our subscribers, make sure you download this podcast episode of Breaking Battlegrounds back in the air next week.

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Welcome to the podcast portion of Breaking Battlegrounds. Shawn,

I wanted to get into something because it actually ties into the title of your podcast, Light Beer, Dark Money. It's a great podcast. People who are not following it should be. I'm guessing it's not about beer.

Well, I mean, we all love beer. But but no, it's about dark money, because one thing I've been laughing at in the last 24 hours is all of a sudden there's all these Democrats coming out and saying, oh, we've got to get the money out of politics. Yeah. It's it is astounding to me that the whiplash that they when when it doesn't go their way.

It has to be totally changed, totally changed, even though they outspent Republicans on the campaigns and the outside efforts. It was more than two to one. Yeah. Across all the Biden or the Harris to Trump campaign, more than two to one.

The PAC land appears to be like three to one. Three to one. Yeah. And then look at Senate race stuff. The Democrat Senate outside spending and the candidates was three to one. And then the House races was the same thing. And it actually gets – the difference gets more dramatic if you start looking down ballot all the way at state House and state Senate races. Yes.

Where they were up four, five, ten to one. I mean, in Arizona, people need to understand this. Here in Arizona, literally in the last two weeks of this election, there was a $4 million infusion of cash for a handful of legislative seats. It was like five seats, right, that they were targeting? Yeah, five seats. And that's on top of the tens of millions that had already dropped in. This was $4 million in the last two weeks to impact five legislative seats. And guess what?

They're all going to be Republican. Which is astounding. I mean, thinking about this, obviously, if you're listening to this in Florida, Florida is used to having sort of big money state house and state Senate races, right? California. California, New York, Texas, Illinois. Like those states are used to this. We have never seen anything like this here in Arizona. And you're seeing it in Arizona and many other states where they are flooding cash with

via these NGOs, via ActBlue, which I personally believe is just a straight-up money laundering. It is a money laundering. I mean, there's so much evidence now, and hopefully now that Trump has won the election,

We can have somebody at the Department of Justice actually open an investigation on this because there's so much evidence about how ActBlue will take the contribution information from one person and then magically that person gives $200,000 over the course of the next few months. And it's not from them. Where does that money come from? Little old ladies who are retirees living in double-wide trailers are giving $100,000 a year to Democrat candidates. I...

I want to know how many gold bars they have hidden under that trailer in that circumstance because my goodness. Yeah. Well, and what I remind people of, and this ages me, but during the Clinton 96 campaign, people will not remember this. There was a scandal in which there was Chinese money being –

laundered into the the Clinton Gore campaign that you know we in the house we did some investigations on that but of course Clinton had won the election so there was no law you know federal law enforcement investigation on that and that Act Blue is basically functioning in that capacity right

And guess what? They use Wells Fargo as their bank. So some heads need to roll because what I suspect is that it's not just billionaires somehow funneling money into the ActBlue money laundering machine. I'm pretty convinced there's some foreign money involved in that. Well, I think there's a lot of it. I think when you look at what's going on around the globe right now,

If you were Russia, why would you not try to put your thumb on the scale? If you're China, why would you not try to put your thumb on the scale? Iran? I mean, if you're Iran, who got $8 billion in cash. Right. Flung over. I mean, where do we go? Well, I mean, at the very least, you should tip the people who handed you the $8 billion. I mean, that's just good courtesy. Yeah, 10%, $800 million. Okay, yeah. So there's $800 million. Right. This is insane stuff, folks. Yeah.

You know, go ahead. Let's get the money out of politics. Let's get the NGOs out. Yeah. I mean, it's it is a it is such a hypocrisy for the Democrats to to make these claims because they are the they are the original purveyors of dark money. Right. And then it wasn't until the Supreme Court had the decision on Citizens United in early 2010 that Republicans caught up.

And then Democrats, again, out snookered us. They have then mastered it even more. So even though at some point I was called the prince of dark money, I'm a feudal dude now. Right. No, you're – I'm a peasant of dark money. I mean, you may still be allowed to own your farmstead. Right. But you're not living in the castle anymore, man. No.

No, the amount of money that they're throwing around is just absolutely mind-boggling. And it does go to a very interesting point that I think is going to get lost, is that look at how much money was spent against Donald Trump and against Republican senators, Senate candidates and House candidates. And yet Donald Trump won. We took the Senate. We're going to keep the House. And what it proves is that ideas are more powerful than money.

And this is what I've always said about Trump from his first term is that one thing Ashley pointed out that he did different than everyone else was he started going through his campaign promises that everyone assumed were just campaign promises and were meaningless. He started going through them. So if you're looking at a second Trump administration and thinking he's not going to do the things he said –

You know, you're crazy. And I think by and large people believed him and that helped the result because you talked about with Noah Rothman the fact that his approval ratings are further underwater than Kamala Harris'. The difference is that Kamala Harris' ideas were at the bottom of the freaking ocean with the Titanic and that sub that got cracked. I mean –

Yeah, it was clear that what she was selling, the American people were not buying because –

the Democrats have focused on elitism. They focused on the things that they think are important, like DEI and woke and trans and, you know, things that the average American just says, what are we talking about? I mean, I need to afford eggs and chicken and bacon and I need to put gas in my car to go to work. And

And I need to make a living wage. I mean, it's it's those things that they the Democrats just completely lost touch on. Sean, none of that matters when we don't have tampons in the boys bathroom.

I'll tell you, Kamala, you know, there's all kinds of there'll be all kinds of finger pointing what what went wrong. And I mean, fundamentally, would Josh Shapiro have changed the outcome of the selection? Probably not. I don't think so. Then maybe he would have delivered Pennsylvania, but it wouldn't have been Michigan. It wouldn't have been Wisconsin. It wouldn't have been Arizona, Nevada, Georgia, North Carolina. So Trump would have still won. But it just does.

highlight the out of touch nature of Kamala Harris to pick a guy that is to the left of her when she needs to try to moderate to become an actual normal person. I would add this.

By the time people saw enough of Tim Walls to have an idea of who he was, they didn't like him. Yeah. Right? I mean, just viscerally talking to people, they're like, he's an oddball. He's not a normal guy. And the moment in which he lost all credibility was when he tried to load his shotgun. Yes. Yeah.

Look, I'm all for at this point you take every candidate out to the range and just videotape them at the start. Watch how they handle it. Watch how they handle it because if they're Tim Walz fumbling putting a shell in a shotgun that he supposedly has had half his life, it doesn't fly. People see that stuff. They see it.

To me, the advantage of Shapiro might not have even been for this election but would have been for the next election because he gives you a more normal picture from the Democrat Party of someone you could look at and go, oh, I can see myself voting for that guy. Yeah.

Could the average American today see themselves voting again for Kamala Harris or Tim Walz? Not in a million years. No. And what will be interesting – so the Democrats definitely need to – there is no leader now, right? Obama is no longer – that's an interesting side thing to this is he's been the leader of the Democrat Party since he was elected. He may not be anymore. That's right. His push of putting Kamala in without an open process –

has backfired. You know, he put his people into Kamala's campaign, did not deliver. So the shine is off a little bit there. Yeah. If you're Gavin Newsom. Yeah. Do you care that Obama is is not as relevant? Yeah. So you've got guys like Josh Shapiro and as crazy as it sounds, being here in Arizona.

Mark Kelly. Mark Kelly. Is now an up and coming leader. Mark Kelly is an up and coming leader. Look, I mean, for those of us who are here, it's crazy because he's kind of the emptiest suit in a room full of empty suits. But he doesn't sound like he's nuts. Right. And that gives you a sense of how thin it is for them. It's really thin. If Mark Kelly is among the top tier of the future leadership of the Democratic Party.

They don't have a very good bench. They have a terrible bench. And yet we've got a great bench. Yeah. Because there's a vast array of people. Their best people are also people who are sidelined by their identity politics like Shapiro. Yeah. You know, and.

He's problematic because he's Jewish. Right. He's problematic because he's Jewish. Gavin Newsom should be problematic for his policy, but he's problematic for being a straight white male. Right. You know, it's that kind of thing that is holding back a lot of potentially their best candidates. OK, last note before we get to Kylie's section, because I have to bring Kylie into this one. I'm going to ask all of you. I'm going to tell your wife to cover her ears. Sean, just just go ahead. All right.

So apparently, Anna Paulina Luna turning or doing her little turns in a Trump bikini did not hurt her electoral chances in South Florida. Kylie?

Were you stunned by that result? I was not stunned. I'm sure. I mean, we've talked about this, about putting your face also on signs. Right. Yeah. Do it if, you know, if you're attractive for male or female, because I think it goes both ways. If you're an attractive male and you're on the sign, you're going to get female votes. Right. It goes both ways. But it is the unattractive people who put their face on a sign. Yes, it's always. It's like, what are you thinking? And why? Oh my goodness. Yeah, no. Like,

But yeah, lean in. I mean, if you've got it, lean in. I mean, it definitely helped her. You know, that's one thing I've always respected about Tom Horne. He's smart enough to leave his picture off the billboard. Yeah, be confident. Hey, look, we have to all understand our limitations. Here's the thing, Democrats. A gorgeous Hispanic woman in a

bathing suit is not a limitation in any culture on this planet. And that's kind of a great transition to my section because... I figured it would be. Yeah, because this sparked me when you were reading Noah's bio. It says fighting against progressive wars.

progressives war on fun. Why do progressives hate fun? I don't know. So I want to talk about Peanut the Squirrel. They clearly do. They do. They do. I want to talk about Peanut the Squirrel because he deserves some justice here. So for those that don't know the story, I'm going to share the story and then we can kind of discuss about it. But I wasn't as interested in it until I read this headline and it says, How a squirrel became a rallying cry for the far right. After the lawful removal of an illegal pet in New York, right-wing activists called to arms. They're like...

They're holier than thou. Now they're following the laws. So there's a couple living in New York and they have a rehabilitation shelter for animals. They have over 300 animals in this shelter. They had a squirrel named Peanut, a part of this. And basically he was a squirrel that was injured on. And so this man took him in. So I actually remember I've.

I'm going to admit I've followed Peanut since Peanut's emergence. Yeah, really? Yeah, Peanut was injured, possibly attacked by another squirrel as an abandoned kit, which is what they call them. Right. Yep.

And they nursed him back to health. And then they tried to release him. And he didn't want to go. Well, he came back the next day torn to shreds by another squirrel. Because squirrels are terrible and territorial and whatever. I can't imagine the New York ones. Yeah, they're twice as big. Worse than the D.C. ones. I mean, have you seen their rats? These squirrels have a lot to compete with. That's right. Well, so he had this squirrel for seven years. He was the first squirrel ever to reach a million followers on social media.

He would hula hoop, dance, do all sorts of human stuff. J.D. Vance called him the Elon Musk of squirrels. Wow.

The Department of Environmental Conservation of New York got a search warrant for the squirrel. Four departments and a judge signed off on this search warrant. Twelve officers showed up to this couple's home and raided his home. Twelve officers for a squirrel? Yes, for five hours. They took his bathroom apart before they let the guy go pee. Yes, he needed a police escort to go to the bathroom. They wouldn't allow him to feed his rescue animals. He had 300 other animals to care for. They ultimately took the squirrel.

And then he found out on the news that Peanut had been euthanized, not from the DEC.

And Fred the raccoon. Yes. Let's not forget Fred. I know Peanut's the cuter face of this thing, but man, I was a Fred fan. Yeah. Fred was also euthanized. And they said they euthanized them for rabies, although apparently they're supposed to have this quarantine period, which the animals weren't given. They just euthanized them. But you can't test for rabies until after they're euthanized, which is why they said they euthanized them to test for them. Yeah. They have to do a brain biopsy.

to test for rabies. Now, here's the thing. This is the same reason I object when someone's like, why doesn't your cat have a rabies shot? I'm like, because it's an indoor cat. Right. Yeah. This was an indoor squirrel. Yeah. There's nowhere for it to get rabies. Right. And he's going back to the house. He came back. He's like, help me.

This is such a terrible story. So the only time he was out was seven years ago. Yeah. If an animal gets rabies, they're dead within six months. Yes. Okay, that's just a progression of the disease. The fact that Peanut was alive when the SWAT team came in... Meant he did not have rabies. Yeah. Yeah, so...

Justice for Peanut. There was at Harris's last speech, there was a squirrel that ran across the stage. So everyone was saying that that was his. That was Peanut. He was the indicator that she was going to lose. I will say that I think part of the shift in New York and some states, not so much the presidential election, but some of the other stuff, I think Peanut had a part in that. It could have been. I mean, look, it is stunning how much Trump cut into...

Harris's base in those big blue states. It was a full 12 percent shift in New York state. And as of right now, based on the numbers coming out of California, we won't know for sure until it's all counted. But it's 12 points as of this point in California. And it was 13 in Illinois. That's a shift no other Republican in recent years has managed to touch. And part of its timing part. I mean, you know, there's peanut. There's people with peanuts in the girls room.

There's a lot of things Democrats stepped out and overreached on. But these type of stories, I don't think they understand what they've done with this. This exposed part of what, you know, we've talked about it here. Others have talked about it a little bit. I think this is the great underreported story in America right now is that we have reached a point maybe about eight, 10 years ago.

Where the bureaucratic class decided that they are the rulers of this country. And I dealt with this at the city of Phoenix where we had the former head of the airport just straight up say, well, you're not qualified to make criticisms of my job. And I'm like, my job is actually making criticisms of your job. Right. That's the role. That's what I'm here paid to do.

It's unbelievable. I mean, but this is the attitude from the bottom to the very top. Yeah. That's the attitude that got Peanut and Fred killed. Right. Right. Yeah. And I did a quick Google search. There's an estimated 835 illegal immigrants in New York. And there was one illegal squirrel that they went after. Yeah.

That's what they spent their time doing. Anyways, so I got another story for you. Okay. Actually, I have an update from last week's that happened in South Carolina and then another incident that's occurring in South Carolina. Well, this was a good one. Well, good. Not good, but I mean it. Yeah. So South Carolina is being terrorized right now by Nicholas Hamlet. He is on the run for murder from Tennessee. So-

I talked about this last week. He had called officers from the middle of the woods saying he was being chased by a bear and fell off a cliff and was injured and needed help. So they sent search and rescue and they found a deceased man who was not Nicholas. It actually ended up being a

I'm going to say semi-homeless man because he would sometimes be homeless and then go back and forth. That's the status, by the way, for most of our homeless population, actually. So I think some other homeless people in this area had said that he saw Nicholas befriending this man and then lured him out to the woods and then murdered him. So he's now been spotted in South Carolina on a trail camera at 1230 in the morning by Chaplin High School. So...

Be on the lookout. There's been no updates since November 1st in South Carolina. Okay, and do we have a mugshot or a photo of this guy? Yeah, we'll put him up on social now. Okay, so you can go to the Breaking Battlegrounds social media. If you're in that area. And if you have any information, they're now offering $5,000 reward. Now, is that close to, what's the trail that runs from here?

the south the appalachian trail is that in that um oh wait that was uh we'll put more information on our social media i'm not quite familiar where i do remember so my south carolina stuff my sister one of the bravest things i thought she was nuts but one of the bravest things i think maybe the bravest thing my i've ever heard in my family is my younger sister walked the appalachian trail by herself when she was about 18 19 years old did the whole thing um

And she was telling us a story of some guy she met at a campsite one night and they were talking and they had a great conversation and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And they were going opposite directions. So the next morning they just, you know, head off in their separate directions. And she got to like the next town stop where you're getting, you know, picking up your supplies and all that. And there's a wanted poster for this guy for murder for like multiple murder, you know, most wanted, blah, blah, blah, all this stuff. Um,

And if you think about it, like that's a great way to avoid any sort of law enforcement is to be out on a trail like that. And not avoiding people. Right. You don't have to avoid people at all. In fact, and then it's totally normal among that population that you don't have ID. Yep. And there are people who basically live walking up and down the Appalachian Trail, stop and wash some dishes here or there for a month or whatever to keep their lifestyle going. Right.

Not to give the criminals of America any ideas. Well, yeah. Good job, Sam. Yeah. It's in northern Richland County. Okay. I'm not sure where the Appalachian Trail runs from there. But besides this murder terrorizing South Carolina, we have 43 lab monkeys that escaped Alpha Genesis Lab in Beaufort County, South Carolina. Oh, my gosh. 43. Wait, didn't some escape in California, too?

Recently? Yeah, like yesterday. Well, maybe these are the same. I don't know. I think they're from California to South Carolina. Yeah. No, these definitely escaped from a lab in South Carolina, and they're still in South Carolina. These are flying monkeys? Yeah, no, no. They're definitely ... Right out of Wizard of Oz. So what happened is Alpha Genesis, they provide non-human primate products and bioresearch services, okay? These are 17-pound monkeys that escaped after a new employee failed to properly secure the lab door.

So the CEO said it's like follow the leader. You see one go and all the others go. It was a group of 50 and seven stayed and 43 left, basically. So law enforcement's warning residents to keep their doors and windows shut. And the CDC said the risk to the public is low as long as you do not approach or come in contact with them.

Low risk if you don't see these. So it does seem like as long as you don't touch them, then you're fine. Don't worry. Our controls are much better than Wuhan. Yeah. So apparently the monkeys are messing with the captures. And so they've set up these traps for them. But they'll kind of jump in the trap, grab the food, and then jump back out. And they are saying that the primates are watching them just as much as they're watching humans.

Yeah, but they're fairly smart. I mean, you know. They seem very smart. The seven who stayed behind, you want to know about them, weren't they like, finally, we got rid of all the assholes. Or it's like, more food for us. Got the hammock all to myself. Spread out. I'm typing California monkey escape. I thought I saw something yesterday about monkeys in California escaping.

I don't know. Nothing's coming up. Because in the same article that I had read, they said this has happened prior, not this many before. But a few years ago in 2016, 19 escaped. Last year, actually, in Pennsylvania, a dozen escaped after a truck carrying 100 of these monkeys escaped.

Then a few of them got away, but they got them back pretty quickly. This is the longest they've ever been out. There was a case in the, I think it was the late 80s, where a bunch of monkeys that had been infected with Ebola were sprung from a facility by one of those animal rights groups, right? Which is what prompted a lot more security at these facilities. That also led to the outbreak movie. Yeah, that's right. I think Dustin Hoffman was in it.

So that was actually the story behind that movie was that it started with some people like, folks, do not –

Do not. Do not go anywhere near a lab animal. No. Well, they did say that these monkeys have not been tested on yet because they were too young and they had just been transferred from Monkey Island, which is where they're living free, and then to this facility this year where there are 6,000 other monkeys. You don't want to leave the island. They did not want to leave. But one thing I do want to know. I would not want to leave if I were them either. I know.

I don't blame them. Well, yeah, because they're about to be tested on. So Alpha Genesis received in 2022 eight violations from the U.S. Department of Agriculture for housing violations, which obviously included this. Well, not included this because this is happening right now. But basically they got in trouble in 22 after they housed seven monkeys in the wrong enclosures, which ended up in a monkey pen.

dying and four others needing extra veterinary help because of other monkeys attacking them. But there was an investigation into them earlier this year, I think maybe a follow-up after that, and they did not receive any violations. So leading into this

They were in compliance. So monkeys, I have a friend who is a zoologist who says monkeys are both the friendliest. Like, they're a lot like people. You might find them and they're wonderful. Like, they're the nicest things you can ever be around. They're totally safe. They're wonderful. Then remember that exact same species is an absolute mass murderer waiting to happen. Yeah, I imagine that's how squirrels are too. There you go. All right.

It's all I got for you today. Okay. Well, that was good stuff, Kylie. Thank you. Good updates. All right, folks. We will be back on the air next week. Sean, any final thoughts? No, I just think it'll be interesting to watch. We continue to watch the meltdown on the left. If they will ever actually do some real self-reflection, it'll be interesting to see what they come up with. But

I'm looking forward to the new administration and how this goes forward. Safe to say, based on the last three days, I do not expect that self-reflection to be all that deep. And just one quick thing. I think it was a brilliant stroke for Donald Trump to assign or to offer to Susie Wiles to be the chief of staff. She's been a rock for him for many years. She brings a lot of good temperament.

And she's a very smart person. And she's the first woman chief of staff in history. Great point. I thought that was a really, really good decision. One other thing I want to throw out there, rank choice voting. Got what it deserved. Yes, it did. It got a spanking. Everywhere. Everywhere. Except for Washington, D.C. Washington, D.C., yeah. This was on the ballot here in Arizona, and it got destroyed. It only got about 40 percent of the vote.

And in the other eight or 10 states that it was on the ballot, it was soundly defeated, except in D.C. Not a state should never be a state. And the cherry on the top was that Alaska repealed rank choice voting. Yeah.

Amazing. I mean, it was an amazing day. How much money did Arabella, that group, and the Soros group throw away on those campaigns? It's a lot. I think, well, just John Arnold and the Arnold Foundation, that was $36 million, I think. And that was a fraction of the full, you know, because all the lefty groups were involved. We're pushing that like crazy. Yeah.

Before we got on air, you had one point, one thing you thought Donald Trump should do day one. I thought it was a brilliant idea. Tell the listeners. What was it?

Puerto Rico. Oh, yeah. So that's right. So I am. I am. It's a long show. Yeah, I've been watching. I've been watching for many years the idea of Puerto Rico becoming a state. The Puerto Ricans have voted to become that they would like to become a state. I think it would be a brilliant stroke for for Donald Trump to come out and say, yes, I support statehood for Puerto Rico.

It would be completely mind blowing for the left who thinks that Tony Hinchcliffe somehow represents Donald Trump and, you know, and a comedian making a funny joke somehow as a policy. It would also cement the gains we've just seen with Hispanic voters in a very significant way. I think. And, you know.

When I was a staffer in Congress, I got to know the representative, the delegate from Puerto Rico who was a Republican at the time. And they are Americans. They want all the same things that we have. And there's just – it doesn't make sense. And I think your idea of talking to Guam and the Mariana –

So as we were talking about this, I suggested you bring in two states at once, essentially, Puerto Rico being one, and then take like Guam, the Marianas, some of the other U.S. territories, Puerto Rico.

put them together in, you know, I mean, it's not perfectly geographically aligned, but whatever. Put them together and make them the 52nd state. Yeah. I think makes a lot of sense. I just don't like the idea that we have American citizens who are disenfranchised outside of D.C., which, again, they have more representation than anybody on the planet. And it's in the Constitution. Right. Should never be a state. Right.

But everyone else should have statehood rights is my point of view. I'll throw out one other thing he should do. We were talking with Ashley Hayek about the 51 people who signed the Hunter Biden letter. Every one of those should be fired day one. I fully agree with that. But he should pardon Hunter and Joe Biden on that day also. Agree. Agree. Yeah. I mean, again, and that's, you know, it's so interesting to me the caricature that the left has created about Trump and how he constantly...

And it's, you know, the various things. And I think that what we're going to see in this administration, because it is, you know, he's one term president, you know, this is second term now. Right.

He is going to he ultimately is a successful business guy who likes to get the big deals done. I think we're going to see some really big movement on things like immigration and, you know, other. I think when you talk about cementing the coalition going forward, those type of big successes that we're going to solve problems that have festered for decades and more. Boy, that would go a long way because I think people more than anything else right now, you talk to a lot of people who are partisans.

The thing we all want the most is a government that works and doesn't waste our money. Yeah. Yeah. Like if you're on the left, you want them to spend money, but you still don't want them to waste it. You want them to spend it delivering things that you want. And if you're on the right, you'd rather they not take it from you in taxes and not spend it at all. But either way, we all agree that when you're wasting the 30 to 50 percent of our government spending at every single level, that is just absolute fluff. Yeah. Yeah.

And that just hurts everybody. Yep. Yep. All right, folks. For Sean Noble, for Kylie, Kylie Campbell. I always, I see, I keep stumbling over that and going back to the Kipper. I do too. Like my age with Riley. Right. But thank you so much. Great updates. Justice for Peanut, folks. Finally.