I can't see them voting for a freak like Tallarico.

I really can't see it either.

And I've tried to look back at Ted Cruz's race against Beto O'Rourke to see if there's any sort of analogy that we might be able to discern.

There's a couple of differences, obviously.

Ken Paxton is not an incumbent.

I mean, he's running for an open seat that was held by John Gordon, who's not doing anything to certainly help the Republicans in this particular case.

You also have a situation where... where Tallarico's received pretty favorable media coverage.

It's just

Sir.

Steve, it was great.

Uh, we try to make the trip to Latrobe to see, uh, Pittsburgh Steelers training camp, because it's a place that my parents took me when I was a kid, so I wanted to bring, uh, my son with me.

Uh, and I did not expect [laughs] the news to, uh, to certainly take the, uh, the turn of events that it did yesterday.

Pat McAfee was here on the campus broadcasting his show live.

Uh, he had Mike McCarthy, the head coach, on right before Aaron Rodgers.

And, you know, it was a fairly subdued interview, no, no real big news, and then Aaron Rodgers takes the stage and the crowd just went nuts.

Am, am I off base there? Or was that a uni- Was that a unified response?

But are, are the fears of communism and allegations of election fraud, are those prioritized for voters?

I think those are issues certainly, Laura, that conservatives pay attention to.

I mean, having run a conservative news website myself, I can tell you that when we publish stories about those topics, particularly on the issue of election integrity, they tend to get clicks because I think that there is a conservative base that worries about that.

But you're absolutely right that the bread and butter issues are ultimately what I think not only Republicans, but independents are going to vote on in this midterm election.

They're going to look and see, and, and Kristen correct, correct me if I'm wrong on this, they're going to look and see how their personal finances are doing.

Are they improving or getting worse? And that's probably the issue that Republicans need to focus on, which is why the members of Congress need to get a reconciliation bill through the body before election day in order to show the American people they're actually doing something to address the affordability issue.

Well, is it that it's not credible, or are they are focused on the fact that there has been such a, a ceding of power from different branches of government to the executive in a way that people have lost faith in the true balance of power?

Oh, sure.

And, you know, over on the media side of things today, here he was making this particular case on the deportation matter.

Donald Trump promised to carry out the largest mass deportation in our country's history.

The fact of the matter is, if you look at the first year of the Trump administration, they did not hit the mark on the president's own promise.

And now the mass deportation coalition is saying that they need to deport up to a million

Are you bringing this up because you're saying this was a win they needed?

Yes, I'm saying that Donald Trump is, if that's the promise that he was going to deliver on, and that was a central theme of his 2024 campaign, these victories at the Supreme Court certainly put him on the pathway to getting back on track when it comes to carrying out that.

Now, we may disagree on whether or not that's the policy the United States should carry out.

I just happen to say, as a conservative and as somebody who was animated...

That, that's a bit extreme, don't you think?

This is a, a concern.

It certainly seems a bit extreme that these candidates are taking such a strong stance against Israel, particularly when Jewish voters have traditionally voted for, for Democrats.

And so I am, um, somewhat alarmed by, uh, the, the tone and tenor of the rhetoric that is, uh, is animating not only some of the candidates, but, but certainly the, the voters who, uh, have latched onto this, this issue in a way that is deeply troubling.

Now, a couple things to remember.

First of all, I think that, uh, the, the role of AIPAC oftentimes gets exaggerated, and that is, uh, that is one factor that certainly, uh, was, was a, a key in some of these races in New York City.

The other thing, when it comes to military aid to Israel, I would argue it's some of the best money that's spent, in part because Israel is the one true ally that the United States has in the Middle East, and we've certainly seen that, uh, throughout the most recent campaign with Iran.

It means different things at different times, but it's definitely distinct from this subset of the New York liberal Democrat.

That that's a bit extreme, don't you think?

This is a concern.

It certainly seems a bit extreme that these candidates are taking such a strong stance against Israel, particularly when Jewish voters have traditionally voted for for Democrats.

And so I am somewhat alarmed by this.

The tone and tenor of the rhetoric that is is animating not only some of the candidates, but but certainly the voters who have latched on to this issue in a way that is deeply troubling.

Now, a couple of things to remember.

First of all, I think that.

It means different things at different times, but it's definitely distinct from this subset of the New York liberal Democrat.

How much of a reality check do you think Republicans are actually going to give the president when it comes to the SAVE Act? Or do you think Trump is just going to be digging in his feet over this?

Well, based on the fact that they seem to target Mike Lee last week and give him an earful about the SAVE America Act, I do think that there will be some senators, maybe a John Cornyn type who decides to speak out on this.

I hope that they don't.

I hope that instead they have the resolve to get behind what the president's agenda is.

After all, he knows and he is in touch with the conservative voters who I think ultimately are going to probably be a decisive factor in whether or not they turn out for the midterm elections.

We know from not only the polling, but President Trump's own election, that election integrity and immigration are big issues.

The Save America Act combines those two, and it's why you see Senator Mike Lee pushing it so aggressively.

Check it out.

In the case of John Cornyn, I would say just take a look a couple of hours ago, him picking a fight with Senator Mike Lee over the Save America Act.

Now, John Cornyn is a sponsor of the Save America Act, but he doesn't have the backbone to stand on the Senate floor and make the Democrats debate this until...

they get to the point where it can pass with a simple majority vote.

And so I think that you're right.

This is probably going to be a challenge for President Trump and other conservatives for the months to come.

But I would just encourage these lawmakers to remember that the American people are paying attention and they expect this Republican Congress to actually get some things done, whether it be the Save America Act or another reconciliation bill.

Then you got these oth- other guys just having to go home on an issue that should be a win for them by now because of the backlash to something that, like, nobody asked for.

And the other thing that I think has conservatives a, a, a little bit uneasy about it is the lack of transparency.

You heard that in some of the, the comments from the Republican senators.

But the other thing, Audie, conservatives for years have criticized the Judgment Fund because left-wing groups and environmental causes have used that to sue the government and then settle, and a lot of that money then went to bankroll those organizations which were working against conservative causes.

So you can't be in a position where you've criticized the government for setting up a fund like that and now be in a situation where you're talking about this weaponization fund.

So I think it's created some unease.

... to do that

...

Yeah

... and there was-- it was important to do that at the time they did because the, uh, executive branch needed time to implement all of the, the changes to the law, particularly tax law, and Americans saw some of the benefits, particularly when it came to their tax returns, uh, this, uh, spring.

The problem is that you have so many other elements of Trump's agenda that just simply have not been legislated yet, uh, that are s- are waiting for Congress to do something.

Uh, that has everything to do with energy.

It has, uh, healthcare reform.

Obviously we talked about it already, the Save America Act and making some changes to our electoral system, uh, to secure elections.

And so I think those are probably the things that are most top of mind for the American people because two of those obviously intersect with the cost of living, uh, healthcare premiums, and, and the cost of energy in this country, and the other, uh, being elections, uh, is consistently, uh, r- at the top of the chart for Republicans who believe that too many states have t- uh, election laws that are not secure-

Right

Right

... uh, to fund, uh, the, uh, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, um, and Customs and Border Protection.

We had, um, the farm bill, and we had, uh, FISA extension, which, uh, which, you know, they wereI guess somewhat moderately successful on, on some of those.

Uh, for instance, conservatives, and I think this is what you're getting at, wanted to make sure that the reconciliation bill, because it requires a simple majority in the Senate, included as many pieces of the Trump agenda as possible.

Instead, they decided to take the easy route and, uh, and just fund, uh, those pieces of the Department of Homeland Security that the Democrats were obstructing.

There's doubts as to whether they'll have the, uh, stamina to be able to push through a r- third version of a reconciliation bill, which is entirely possible if they have, uh, the willpower to do so.

But, uh, there are some big questions as to whether or not, uh, the senators and the, the representatives in the House will be able to, to do that.

Right.

Um, where do you think this goes from here, and is this just kind of where we exist now?

Well, Jessica, you're absolutely correct.

I mean, Congress is slow oftentimes to react to these things, and yes, we know that, uh, Kalshi is, has banned politicians who have bet on their own races because [laughs] obviously that's pure insider trading.

And so there's a number of factors here that I think we need to, to take into account.

I mean, certainly in the case of this soldier, indefensible what he did, and whether it be regulatory at the federal level or the state level, I do agree with President Trump that it's gotten out of hand.

I'm glad to see him speak out against this, uh, despite what so- some things have, may have happened in the, in the past.

But in this particular case, Jessica, you're absolutely correct that it's time, uh, for, I think, the world and the United States in particular to show some leadership on these, these, uh, these prediction markets, because otherwise they're gonna become addictive and grow out of control.

And Rob, I know, I know your point of view is that this really has to have some teeth to be able to do anything.

Are we ever actually gonna see the government open? Like, are, is it going to fully open at this point, or is it just gonna be partially closed like an old Mattress Firm? What's the, what's the scoop?

Yeah, this is, uh, th-this has reached, uh, proportions that, that I, I never ex-expected it.

And quite frankly, Tony, thank you for bringing it up because so many news organizations in the legacy media, if this had been a Democrat president and a Republican Congress, there would be, uh, tickers on, on every single, uh, news website that you could imagine.

It would be a topic of conversation every single night in primetime TV.

And, uh, it's just frankly not, uh, received the attention it deserves.

Uh, you're absolutely correct.

There are portions of the government that remain closed because Democrats refuse to fund, uh, those agencies that, that, uh, do immigration enforcement.

Right

Right

... uh, pivoting to a general election posture against Susan Collins.

And so I think that Republicans are salivating [laughs] at the chance to, to maybe take on some of these socialist Bernie Sanders style candidates in general election contests.

And maybe that's an indication, Tony, as to why, uh, the generic ballot is, is the way it is, because there's, uh, um, you know, obviously a contingent on the left in the Democrat Party that would like to nominate hardcore progressives, uh, for these Senate races or these House races.

In some cases, they haven't been successful.

In some states, the moderates and more independent-minded, uh, individuals have, have pushed back on that.

But as we saw with the most recent release of the Heritage Action Scorecard that really, you know, covered exclusively by The Daily Signal, uh, there are I think only three Democrats in the House who scored anything above a zero on that scorecard.

[laughs]

Rob, tell us what's up.

Yeah, Tony, that's right.

Well, after weeks of pressure from conservative grassroots and the fact that, uh, you have a situation in which President Trump has thrown all of his weight, it seems, behind the Save America Act.

He said literally that he will not sign any other legislation until this gets to his desk.

Uh, the [laughs] the, the GOP establishment, which, uh, tends not to necessarily respond favorably to the grassroots, has decided now that they are going to bring up the Save America Act and have a debate on it.

The big question for, for your viewers to, to be paying attention to is just how serious they are about this and if they will actually allow this talking filibuster and, and force Democrats to get on the floor and, uh, and state their opposition to a measure that has the support of over seventy percent of Americans, uh, for things like voter ID and proof of citizenship to register.

No endorsements for senators who don't vote for the Save America Act." So do we see a couple of senators maybe a little bit more nervous in the upcoming election? How, how, how much of a punch does that, or, yeah, how much of a punch does that particular threat pack in this case?

Yeah, well, if you look at some of the senators, like for instance, Thom Tillis comes to mind.

Help us out here.

[laughs] Yes.

I'm sure that Senator Mike Lee and Chip Roy, Congressman Chip Roy, are [laughs] paid influencers.

Uh, the Save America Act, as you indicated, is incredibly popular, not only with Republicans and Independents, but also it seems a majority of Democrats.

Uh, the, what the Save America Act would do, it would require proof of citizenship when an individual goes to register to vote.

It would also require federal, uh, excuse me, a voter ID for federal elections.

These are common sense things, usually have the support of upwards of 70 to 80% of Americans across the board.

What is it that the Congress actually thinks that it can accomplish in the meantime? I mean, could we see at least a couple of investigations, maybe some particular hearings on, on rogue judges that are ignoring the Constitution? Is there anything they can be doing that's worth, you know, the oodles of money we're paying them?

Um, as congressmen start to trickle back into Washington, DC now, do you think that there are a few, um, [lips smack] balloons on the Democrat side of the aisle that are popped, hearing some of their colleagues talk foreign policy?

[chuckles] Probably, yes.

I mean, it just goes to show...

I mean, this is, uh, this is one of those issues where, where Donald Trump has done such a masterful job that it's hard for the Democrats to keep pace with, uh, with, with what he and Secretary Rubio and so many of the others from his administration are, are grappling with.

Uh, remember, Tony, if we, we rewind, go all the way back to 2009 and the time when Barack Obama was president, and then, of course, famously went on this apology tour all over the- all over the world, in which he was apologizing for one thing or another that the United States did, uh, got us into that, uh, terrible Iran deal.

Um, we had more of the same during the four years of Joe Biden because a lot of it was just the leftovers from the, the Obama years, who had, uh, taken up those old jobs at the State Department or wherever they were.

So what Donald Trump has done is really...

Uh, what in the world are they gonna do as far as unifying or gluing together any kind of a message?

[laughing]

...

the dramatic, uh, decline under President Trump when it comes to, to jobs.

And in fact, um, I think some of that can be obviously attributable to DOGE and the efforts to, to trim and make the government more efficient, that's a good thing.

But also, this president, uh, he, he understands that where you really turn the economy around is when you have the private sector growth, as you indicated, Tony, it's not creating these government jobs.

And, and let's face it, the government, both at the federal level, state lo- state and local level, has become far too bloated, and we shouldn't become dependent on, on these jobs, uh, because a, a Democrat president like Joe Biden wanted to juice the numbers, and that's exactly what he was doing.

The other thing that we need to remember about public sector jobs are, first, uh, they're [chuckles] they're going to likely increase inflation because it means more government spending, which is the, the significant driver of inflation.

The question that I have now is, as we get ready to see this hit a final House vote and then over to the Senate, is Thune now annoyed enough with the left and their claims that women and Black people and poor people are all too stupid to get voter ID? Is he annoyed enough now to allow the vocal filibuster, the talking filibuster, to happen, watch Cory Booker yell for a while, or, or what do you think?

Right.

So when you talk about impeachment, that is, that is literally the only way to remove them.

Now, in some states, you have judicial elections, and you'll have a, uh, you know, a finite time period which, uh, you may serve as a judge.

But when it comes to federal judge or appellate judge or certainly the US Supreme Court, uh, that's a different set of circumstances.

So when the US Senate makes that decision to confirm somebody, they're ta- it's, it's a big responsibility.

It's one of the reasons why [chuckles] there's so much attention that's usually paid on these judges.

And, uh, and so then what would the process be? Well, similar to other impeachment processes, you would have a situation where it would start in the US House.

How do you think that based on the temperature of DC, this stuff is gonna shake out? Is the DOJ gonna play ball, or what are we, what are we gonna see here?

Right.

Uh, but what they were able to do was to extend those until the end of January.

And now you have a situation where you had Democrats, it was a bipartisan bill, I believe seven Democrats in the House voted for this six-bill minibus, as they call it.

It appeared that the Senate was going to take it up this week, and they were going to be able to fund the government, and there wouldn't be a fight....Now, in the wake of the, the latest, uh, shooting death in Minneapolis, Chuck Schumer, as you indicated, has decided that this is going to be a fight that he wants to pick with Republicans and President Trump.

And I ultimately don't know whether or not Ch- Schumer is going to be successful.

We know that he wasn't successful in the last one.

They m- they s- maybe from a messaging standpoint, he, he injected the issue of healthcare into, uh, the midterm election campaign, but the Democrats never got what they wanted and what he had promised that, uh, that they were holding out the votes for.

My goodness!

You know what I mean? And again, people see an image that they don't want in that mistakes were made argument.

You're right, it is a powerful image.

JD Vance also said that as the father of a five-year-old, he expressed compassion And I think that Noel is correct, that he handled a difficult situation probably as best as he could.

I think that the point he's making, though, is if you look at places like Texas and Florida, where local law enforcement and the governors are cooperating with federal officials, you're not seeing the kind of chaos on the streets that you are in places like Chicago and Minneapolis.

And that's, I think, ultimately what President Trump and J.D. Vance are trying to accomplish here and pleading with people like Tim Walz and Jacob Fry to do so.

they are doing stuff in places where they know they have political uh purchase or influence

yes and and i think some of the political messaging around this is as actually this is an area where i think the administration by coming out early on in 2025 and saying we are going to focus on the worst of the worst and the criminal illegal aliens they've done themselves now a disservice because president trump said that he would carry out the largest deportation in the u.s history you're not going to achieve those numbers by just going after the worst of the worst, right, Elliot? Does that put in context for you the

Mm

... a test of this come November with the midterm elections, and they may say, "Hey, it's a little bit too chaotic.

Uh, let's just focus on a couple of core things." One thing that I do think, there- I, I reported on this yesterday, uh, for the Daily Signal, uh, new polling out of North Carolina showing that despite the fact that voters are giving Trump fairly good marks when it comes to, to border security and immigration, uh, uh, obviously important issues that were the centerpiece of his 2024 presidential campaign, he's significantly underwater when it comes to some of the economic issues.

And so if there's one area of focus that I think Trump and Republicans need to double down on in 2026, it's to remind the American people of the good things that not only they've done so far when it comes to the economy, but the things that they can look forward to this year.

Namely, those bigger tax refunds, the fact that there's going to be more deregulation, and hopefully that will free up more business investment.

There will be manufacturing jobs coming back to the United States.

And so those are the types of things that I think they need to talk about and not have so much chaos necessarily in the background, but, uh, it's a balancing act because we know Trump likes to do both.

Mm

Right

...

he was clear with the American people that he would carry out the largest deportation effort in our country's history.

You have to go all the way back to the 1950s and the Dwight D. Eisenhower administration when, when something of this scale was done, and obviously, there were a lot fewer, uh, illegal aliens in the country at that time than there are today.

So I give you that context, and your, your, your listeners and viewers know this, but it seems that a large segment [chuckles] of the American population, and I speak specifically about Democrat mayors and governors, uh, were not paying attention when Donald Trump made these promises and said this is what he was going to do.

So it should come as no surprise to anyone that ICE and other law enforcement were going to ramp up their efforts in cities where this is known to be a problem, and that's exactly what you saw happen in Minneapolis.

And, of course, uh, you know, the, the tragedy that ensued when, when a, a, a woman, a 37-year-old woman, decided to ram her car into an ICE officer, and in self-defense, he, he fired and, and killed her.

Right

Yeah.

[chuckles] I, it just, uh, it, it's not, uh, it's, it's, [chuckles] it's nothing that you wouldn't, you wouldn't expect from the Department of War.

But let's face it, Pete Hegseth stepped into a job where you had years of, of, uh, uh, abuse of the system.

You had, uh, a, a devotion to climate change, and the, the Pentagon focusing on issues other than war fighting.

Obviously, there was a whole big debate during the COVID years about kicking people out who didn't want to take the vaccine.

I mean, you could go down the list of the social issues that really, I think, divided our troops unnecessarily.

And so when I, you know, had the opportunity to spend time with, uh, the secretary on Monday, things that you hear him talk about are the surge in recruitment and the fact that there are more and more Americans who want to join the military today.

I think the real pulse of America, we- has kind of figured this all out, I think.

How do they propose to close that, sir?

Well, and, and first to your point about the Republican Study Committee, I believe they have 189 members, and right now there are 218 House Republicans [chuckles], so pretty much, uh, includes, uh, a, a vast majority of House, House Republicans.

And so by them putting their weight behind it, you would hope that that would signal that they're serious about cutting government spending.

But Steve, you and I both know, because President Trump tried to do this upon taking office last year, how difficult it is when you actually get into the process of eliminating government programs and reducing that deficit that you talked about.

And so what the Republican Study Committee is attempting to do here is to go through, department by department, and eliminate what areas that they think are duplicative, wasteful, um, try to find efficiencies throughout the government.

Um, obviously, the president [chuckles] adding, adding a, you know, this $1.5 trillion for, for the Pentagon, uh, will, will be a hurdle that, that lawmakers in Congress will have to overcome.

But I think just like you and I are expected to balance our budget on a monthly basis, we should expect the same of our congressional representatives.

They're just kicking the can down the road, sir.