The Chris Cuomo Project - Steve Bannon on Trump’s Return, Garcia’s Deportation, and Cuomo’s Comeback

Episode Date: April 17, 2025

Steve Bannon (Former Trump Chief Strategist and Host, “War Room” Podcast) joins Chris Cuomo for a and wide-ranging conversation about economic populism, immigration, and the soul of the Republican Party. Bannon defends Trump’s trade agenda, calls for tariffs and tax reform, and lays out his plan to restore the middle class by confronting elites in both parties. The two also debate the deportation of Kilmar Abrego Garcia and whether due process still matters, plus Chris opens up about his brother Andrew Cuomo’s decision to run for mayor of New York City. Follow and subscribe to The Chris Cuomo Project on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and YouTube for new episodes every Tuesday and Thursday: https://linktr.ee/cuomoproject Join Chris Ad-Free On Substack: http://thechriscuomoproject.substack.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Must be 19 plus and present at Ontario. Void were prohibited. Terms and conditions apply. Please play responsibly. If you have questions or concerns about your gambling or someone close to you, please contact ConX Ontario at 1-866-531-2600 to speak to an advisor free of charge. You know who President Trump listens to and is driving a lot of what we're living through? Steve Bannon. Chris Cuomo here. Welcome to the Chris Cuomo Project. Yep, Steve Bannon. You may think he's crazy. You may think he's some kind of zealot. Let me tell you what he absolutely is. Relevant, relevant to the president,

which means relevant to your life, because he is a big driver of the policy agency behind what Trump is doing. So you wanna have a serious conversation? A real deep dive into why we're living through what we are with tariffs? Steve Bannon is the guy to have a serious conversation? A real deep dive into why we're living through what we are with tariffs? Steve Bannon is the guy to have it with. So that's what I talk to him about.

Not all the, what do you mean three terms? And what is about this? What about that? Not all the shiny shit that drives way too much of our media. You want to have a real talk about what really matters and what is really going on, here it is. Steve Bannon, thank you for taking the opportunity. This is a conversation.

I want to get the world of our politics and our culture through the lens of Steve Bannon's mind and see if my audience can get past their preconceptions. You can ask me anything you want as well. So let's begin. What do you got for me, handsome? Talk to me about your brother's run for mayor. I think it's one of the most fascinating events

in politics today. And I don't think it's being covered enough. Talk to me about that. Why does your brother want to be mayor of New York City, and why does he think he can turn New York City around? My brother has a problem, okay? He maybe inherited it. It may be a genetic trait or a genealogical trait.

He inherited from my father a problem. He believes that it's worth the price of admission to serve. He believes it. I was not excited about him running for office because I see it through the lens of being his brother I can tell you as a matter of fact. My brother is one of the most competent individuals No matter what situation I would have in my life

Andrew's one of my first three calls if someone wants to kick my ass Andrew's one of my first three calls if I have to figure out how to beat Steve Bannon in a debate on anything, Andrew's one of my first three calls. Whether I'm gonna buy a house, what is the- Was that, were you guys like that as kids? Were you that close as brothers growing up? Andrew raised me. He's 13 years older than I am.

He has a lot of stuff about him that is different than what's in me, but almost everything that's in me is derivative of what I learned through him. Mechanics, fishing, masculinity, ethnic identity, family responsibility, and role of a male within our given family structure and culture. It's not that I was, you know, a single parent raised or an orphan, but my father committed himself to you. He was in public service my whole life.

And you know, that generation of ethnic assimilator, they were all about giving back to America. So my father was gone a lot and I was what they call in Catholic families a blessing. I was six years after my last sibling, my closest sibling, 16 from the oldest. So, you know, not only did I wear girls clothes until I was like 11, they,

and not because of an identity thing, it was just what clothes were in the house, but they were gone. You know, my mother was politically active, my father was politically active, so Andrew raised me. So yes, yes, yes. But I didn't want him to run for mayor.

Why? I don't think the people deserve him. I think he's given enough. I know the media the people deserve him. I think he's given enough. I know the media wants to kill him. You're not allowed to come back on his team. On your team, you're allowed to come back. On their team, you are not allowed to come back. You must die.

And a single allegation is enough. And Andrew had more than a single allegation. So he is attempting something that is against the rules of the radical democratic establishment. And I worry for him, and I worry about that because I hate that dynamic, and I think it has destroyed my father's party. Andrew disagrees.

And he says, New York City feels like it did in the 70s and 80s. And I don't like it. I'm here. Mom is here. Maria's here. Our niece, our nieces are here. Their kids are here. We got to do better than this. And that was the end of the analysis for this fucking guy. And I was like, well, hold on a second. This is going to happen. This is going to happen. And that was the end of the analysis for this fucking guy. And I was like, well, hold on a second. This is gonna happen, this is gonna happen, and that's gonna happen, and that's gonna happen. And he's like, yeah, yeah, I don't play scared. You play scared.

Stay in the media, media boy, and you play scared, and you play gotcha. I want to serve, I know I can do this. They have compromised Adams. Andrew is not sideways with Eric Adams. He does not dislike Eric Adams. Eric Adams was good to him. But the legal and the political

have put a burden on Eric Adams. And Andrew believes that it makes it an untenable situation for him within the same party that's trying to kill him. So that is the analysis for me of my reluctance to see, not because Andrew can't do the job. And again, Andrew is a uniquely competent individual. My father, with not a trace of deference to his child,

would immediately say to you, Steve, you know the game and you're coming at it as a Catholic practitioner also, which my father did, Andrew's better than I am. Is he the thinker that I am? Is he the philosopher that I am? Is he the wordsmith that I am? You judge that.

He is better at getting things done than I am. Andrew can make deals. He is better at getting things done than I am. Andrew can make deals. He is a mechanic. He's a mechanic with cars, with washing machines, and with complicated systems. He knows how to get things done. He always has. I watched him rebuild a washing machine on spec. Put aside your personal, the brother, do you think he is what New York City, given the calamity that New York City is today, do you think he is what New York City needs?

Look, New York City is the greatest city in the world. I've loved it, I've had the opportunity to live there on and off in my adult life. I fell in love with the city. It's the global capital of the world, global financial capital of the world. It is in dire straits. It's not the New York, I think people that love it,

you know, it really used to be, can your brother turn it around? Can he? 100%. Should he? Different question for me. I'm telling you, I'm not, I see my brother with very clear eyes.

Is he the most likable? No. Does he have that, that a lot of politicians have, that shine, that charisma? No. And he doesn't want it, by the way. He is not a people pleaser. Is he competent?

Is he a fixer? Is he a tough and tested guy? 100%, the most in the field. It's not even a close call. Should he do it? Different question. Can he fix New York City? I'm telling you, Steve,

there's nothing the guy can't fix. That's what he is as a fixer. Can he make you like him? That's a different question. Can he make the party feel that he'll carry their water in the ways that matter to them? It's a different question. And if he's lucky, if he's lucky, he'll get the people to decide that question.

If he's lucky. Because as we both know, parties beat people 10 times out of 10 in our process right now. So did I answer your question fully and completely? Fascinating. One of the most important races, it's not getting covered enough, but it's going to be a barn burner. It's going to be very interesting to see how New York City's turned around. It's too great a city to let it go down the path it's going. I think what happens to the city after the election is interesting. I think it's not going to be a barn burner because Trump

takes up all the oxygen and tariffs have no one talking about the party, the New York City race. Garcia, nobody's talking about the New York City race. Constitutionality, nobody's talking about the New York City race. And I think you've seen that. I mean, you know, the piece that's driving the news cycle on the mayoral race this morning is, Andrew Cuomo screws up fundraising application. It's like, this is not a barn burner right now, but it's because the president takes up so much oxygen.

Is President Trump taking up, so do you believe that at News Nation? I mean, I don't, I think it's completely demonstrable and I think it's because of you, by the way. One of the reasons I wanted to talk to you is that your war room mentality, you know, for the audience, you'll remember I had Steve on and a lot of you came at me saying,

why were you like half acting as his lawyer? No, I wasn't. I knew people wanted to dismiss your enthusiasm for the president and your desire for a change in the constitutional structure we have right now about how long you can serve as you being a desperate, a revolutionary and wanting to destroy America. I knew that that's how it was gonna read.

You're saying you want him to do what the constitution says he's not allowed to do. That means you wanna destroy the constitution. I don't believe that's where you're coming from. So that's why I said it. But you are the reason the guy takes up so much oxygen. He is living your strategy of how to flood the zone, distract the media and have a multi-front war in politics, which

is a very single-focused business. Don't you think that's the reason that your News Nation show, at least as I would say, I'm going to give you one man's perception, is that your show on News Nation, as News Nation builds itself, I think is getting a lot more attention, at least I know it's attention from people I know and respect in the business and politics than the CNN show. Because you guys that hold. Different audience, I am the same guy. You and I have been around each other.

But you're taking, you're also taking multiple views. Yes. Every day it's popping up in my newsfeed, guest you've had on, et cetera, where we monitor all these 24 seven. And it's MSNBC, right now CNN, we don't even talk because it's just not, it's MSNBC and News Nation that we're pulling clips from and looking at and analyzing.

Right, I mean, very different animals. Look, and you know this, you know the guys involved, but Perry Sook owns the most television stations in America. Okay, he's next star, he owns News Nation. The man has his own politics. He has an absolute demand that you be transparent if you're on his air at News Nation. It's not a local TV station, it's not a newscast. If you are going to say

something, you better fucking own it. That's where he's coming from. I don't know how much he cares. I've had absolutely no influence from him because I'm a quitter, right? So if you tell me what to do, I'll quit. And so I haven't had that happen, but his guy, Sean Compton, who has a very heavy-handed News Nation in terms of the business, Mike Korn, who runs it, their rule is, if you pick a side, you better say it. Don't pretend that you're being down the middle

if you're picking a side. So the bet, News Nation is making two bets, okay? And they're both bad bets in terms of what works well on cable television, which is one, don't pick a side, sides are for suckers. And America is a centrist country. And that's where the majority is. The parties play to fringes, and they magnify minorities,

and that's what social media is, and that's what works for the media. But remember, America is more than that. America is not Twitter. That's their first bet, which means you are going to be outside the cycle very often. The second one is that the parties are the problem. Now I say that more than anybody else on News Nation because it's hard to book.

You know, if I'm like, I hate Republicans, I hate Democrats, the parties are the problem. They're tearing us down. It's tough to book somebody who's an elected official from either party. So it is a very unpopular thing, what I'm doing at News Nation. I would not have been allowed to do it under Jeff Zucker. No way. Why?

Because he knew that that was playing against what resonates. But the bet is that long-term America needs and will want what NewsNation is offering, which is I'll talk to Steve Bannon, I'll talk to James Carville, and I'll test the ideas of both. Neither is my enemy.

Neither is my enemy. I may agree with some stuff, I'll say it. I may disagree with some stuff, I'll say it. I don't have bad guys on the show. And if they are a bad guy, I'll have them on because they're a bad guy. Like, you know, I would have them on and say, all right, you know, I think what you're saying

makes you a bad guy, let's test it. And that's not the way to get a following in our media right now. You get it the way Matt Out does, the way Hannity does. Not the way we're doing it, but we're betting on something else. The way we've done. Yeah, right. Support comes from American financing. Look, we all know what the problem is. Prices

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So you call today, 866-889-4242. That's 866-889-4242. Or just go to americanfinancing.net slash Cuomo, NMLS 182334, www.nmlsconsumeraccess.org. You are the spirit animal of man. And do you see yourself in these circles of influence around the president? Which circle do you put yourself in with only one proviso? If you say anything more than the second circle, I don't believe you. But what circle of influence do you think you are in the president's world?

First is intimates and take what they say as truth. Second circle is a bounce idea, which is Bannon says this, what do you think? Third circle is, yeah, I heard what that guy said. In the circles, look, clearly war Room, I mean, we pride ourselves on being the top media platform, more than Fox. We think Fox are a bunch of neoliberal neocons. We think we're the home of the vanguard of the Trump movement.

And it had been, you know, for a while, and why I was at Breitbart, remember, it was Ben Shapiro that said, when he left, Ben Shapiro said, I turned Breitbart. Remember, it was Ben Shapiro that said when he left, Ben Shapiro said I turned Breitbart into Trump-Pravda. So I've been very proud to be part of the populist nationalist movement on the ideas and moving those ideas from President Trump. When I first really figured out he was gonna run in 2014 and so I'm up in New Hampshire with Dave Bossie,

who you know well, but on those cattle calls. I think it's really that we kind of, I think, verbalize and have guests and kind of drive the narrative of what the Trump version of populist nationalism is. And so I don't know if you can call it an influencer. We disagree on certain parts of policy. There's no doubt about it. Like today, I had Eric Prince on talking about how do we actually get to mass deportations? Because there's been some confusion here with

the current situation in El Salvador and the criminal part of that and the terrorist part of that. And then President Trump made some comments yesterday or last night about incentivizing people to go home and how you're going to do it. What is really the plan on mass deportation? So in the execution of these, we always have questions and comments and observations and can make recommendations. But you say we, I say you, and where do you see your influence? Like, if you believe,

you're always a phone call away from the president, but do you believe that what Steve Bannon says matters as a first order of importance to the Trump administration? I think it's generally, I think it's, I think it's kind of what you try to do with News Nation is that we provide, I provide a platform for the strongest voices in MAGA, whatever that vertical is of doing like Mike Davis, you know, so many of the people, Scott Besson was a contributor for us, Peter Navarro was a co-host for us. Russ Vogt came on about every week, starting in 2021. Mike Davis, the Viceroy, really found Mike.

I knew Mike from the first administration. We gave him a platform. So what we try, Julie Kelly, if you look at every vertical, whether that's finance and economics, whether it's national security, whether it's taking on the administrative state and the deep state, we try to provide the cutting edge news and information to understand that our mission here as human agency, the only way we can move forward is to empower people and to empower

people to take action. It's kind of what we've been very much, Chris, watching the AOC Bernie Tour throughout the United States, we've drawing these massive crowds. And you can see the Democratic Party, I think, is very much the smartest people in it are getting back to having to energize citizens that have those beliefs, empower them, give them information, and drive it.

Do you think Bernie and AOC are a bad sign for you or a good sign for you? I think it's a good sign for the country. I think it's also, my big criticism or observation is that the Democratic Party, as you know, I come from an Irish Catholic Democratic Party family, union family, huge Kennedy, you know, Kennedy folks. The mention of a name Republican or Richard Nixon

in my household was like, not a mortal sin, but a venial sin, it was not good. And they're classic Reagan Democrats, they came back really through the Vietnam War and then with President Reagan. With the Democratic Party walked away from the working class, they walked away from really populous nationalists, which was the backbone of quite frankly,

your father, besides some of his more liberal cultural views, was very much a person that looked at the middle class and the working class as his primary constituency, not the elites. And it'd be interesting, your father today, where he would fall out in the political sphere with people like Bobby Kennedy and Tulsi Gabbard and even Donald Trump, who was a Democrat

back in the old days in New York. And what this new realignment that we're working on means, the one thing I've seen about AOC and Bernie is that there's a huge thirst on the Democratic Party for populism and getting back to taking on the oligarchs. When you actually see the speeches and actually see the talks, they're really talking about climate change and DEI and Gaza. they're really talking about climate

change and DEI and Gaza. They're not getting to the heart of it. They're not getting to the heart of what the oligarchy has done to this country. They're not delivering the punch. But you can see out there that people are looking for a populist solution. They're looking for a populist national solution. And this is what I've been arguing for years. The country, two thirds of the country, can come together around these basic economic ideas of how we save the working class and how we rebuild the middle class. And I think that that is our great challenge. And of course, you know, it's a fight every day and the two parties are concerned. The Republican Party, as you see, we're raising up that you have to tax

the wealthy of which the war room is the driving force of that upper bracket is just not gonna get an extension of Trump's tax cuts. And I actually think later, maybe even potentially have increased taxes is the blowback we've gotten on the party is unbelievable. So you're saying you should tax the rich or you should not tax them?

Oh, you have to, no, you have to. So yeah, they're not going to like that. But that's part of the point. I think you give Trump too much shine in this regard. You see him giving a break to the automotive guys who gave him money, to the Apple guy who gave him money. His tax structure was overweighted to the rich. The tariff stunt that he's doing,

which I'm fine with conceptually. Wow, wow, wow, Chris, it's not a stunt. You know who pays tariffs. It's a regressive tax, not a progressive tax. No, no, no, no, no, first off, first off, there's no sign, we did this in China, in 18 and 19, the prices went up. You're, by repeating the talking points,

you're acting like a running dog for the Lords of Easy Money on Wall Street. That is the established orders. Oh, you can't have tariffs because it's an increased tax. What this is, is actually- Milton Friedman says a tariff is an increased tax. Okay, but hold it. Not a big Democrat.

Now you're repeating, no, but hold it. Not a big Democrat. Now you're repeating, no, but he's a Austrian school of economics. Milton Friedman's very good on some things, but terrible on others. He's not a populist, he's not an economic nationalist that says you have to. He would disagree totally with any type of protectionist

policies that try to bring industry back to this country. We have a central problem, and this is why we have these massive budget deficits, okay, because the federal spending at certain levels is actually needed, like on Medicaid. The reason Republicans are not going to actually be, which I've been arguing for years, are not going to be able to take a meat ax to Medicaid. Why? There's so many of the MAGA families that need Medicaid. Why? Because the jobs in this country don't pay enough. That's right. And the corporate, because we've gone to a service industry, Chris. The whole point of, well, brother, you're agreeing with,

they don't say it's a tax. You need these to bring industries back to the United States. We are not going to bring back and rejuvenate, become a manufacturing superpower again with high value added manufacturing jobs that can employ whether a man or a woman as a single family provider of an income, like my dad as a lineman for the phone company

could send five kids to Catholic school and have my mom as a homemaker the entire time off of being basically a blue collar guy, eventually a lower white collar guy for the phone company. I agree with you about the ambition. You don't agree with me. You don't agree with me. I agree with you about the ambition. You don't agree with me. You don't agree with me.

I agree with you about the ambition. But Chris, the tariffs are a central part. This is what Alexander Hamilton, this was the whole American plan. This is reports on manufacturers, which is just as sacred to us, almost as the Declaration of Independence. I say, if you wanna build a manufacturing base

and not just be yeoman farmers, you've got to basically have industries here to do it. This whole thing is about- I don't have any problem with that. It's about how, Steve. How do you, so look, when you look at China- How are you gonna do it? How are you gonna do it?

There's other tools where you must use them. I'll give you ideas. Go ahead. You look at China, all right? First of all, look, the tariff history is very easy for people to access. Our trade imbalance with China is not because of anything to do with tariffs. It's about the WTO and how we responded to them getting into the WTO.

And in fact, the trade deficit increased while they were systematically having to reduce their tariff structure. Now, can tariffs be a tool in the box? Yes, I'm not saying absolutely no. Hang on, hang on a second, don't skip over, go back. Now Chris Cuomo's finally gotten to something important. Let's go back to the WTO. That's a very condescending thing to say.

It's a very condescending thing to say. But make your point. You're hitting me with the Wall Street, you're hitting me with the Wall Street running. No, you're characterizing my comments to diminish them, but they are my own. But go ahead. I'm not, I'm not.

Go ahead. What did I gloss over? Okay, you glossed over the trade deficit. The trade deficit is absolutely central here, and you're right. Huge. How did they get into, think about it for a second. How do we have Tiananmen Square in 1989? And the next thing you know, you cut to the Clinton years

and it was not just the Clintons. It wasn't Bob Rubin, I used to work for it, right? It was both parties. It was the Bush-Hunta, the Bush 41 that sent- I like Bob Rubin, by the way. Good man. Bob, good man. Don't agree with all his politics, but one of the best secretaries of treasury we've

ever had. And somebody I've strongly recommended, Scott Besson, reach out to and make sure he gets his wisdom of what he did, particularly the surpluses he helped with Newt Gingrich develop in the 90s. That trade, allowing China in, and basically shipping 5 million high paying jobs, manufacturing jobs and those 10 or 15 years to China has created the economic dilemma we have today. That is true.

The 25 trillion dollar trade deficit, which 18 trillions directly associated with China, the 30 trillion dollar really stealing of intellectual property, which not just was espionage, we actually gave it to them. That is true too. Right, okay, that was espionage, we actually gave it to them. That is true too. Right? Okay, that leads to your 36 trillion dollar debt

That is true too. Right? Okay, that leads to your 36 trillion dollar debt and the two trillion dollar annual deficits we have that if we don't stop, we're finished as a country. The model we have today is unsustainable. You are correct. And here's the thing, even President Trump,

right now in the first six months of this year, the deficit, the trade, the deficit, the budget deficit is $1.3 trillion. And I sat on the show today doing the math. We're going to have because we agreed with the CR to take Biden's budget and Pelosi's budget and just kick the can down the road. On September 30th, we're going to have a two and a half trillion dollar deficit for this fiscal year. This is financial and economic insanity. The working class are the folks paying for it. They're the nine million people that

haven't worked in two jobs, some three jobs that are going to credit card debt. So you and I can reason together, what do we have? The solution for that is not to serve as economy. The solution is not everybody needs to learn to code, particularly with AI coming and cutting out all those entry-level coding jobs. The solution is that we're going to have to have a forcing function to force manufacturing jobs back here.

And Chris, the established order of Wall Street, the global corporatists, and the apartheid state of Silicon Valley are arrayed against that because this is how they've made so much money. And this is how the oligarchy, so to attack the oligarchy, lets you and I reason together and attack the oligarchy. And the way we do that is we set up with tariffs and you're right, other tools to bring manufacturing jobs back to the United States because right now we don't have the ability to go forward.

This financial crisis, you just saw the bond market start to freeze up last week. And I tell people, look at LIS Trust, the bond market has turfed out more governments than howitzers. And we're getting into a situation where the alternatives for the American, not just President Trump and his administration, for the American people are being narrow and narrow

and narrow and we'll be responding to the global bond market and the dollar will be under pressure and not being the primary reserve currency. If that's gonna happen, that's gonna be chaotic and the people they're gonna pay are lower down the food chain as they're paying today. I agree with all of the concerns. I agree with all the concerns.

Then you're with me on terrorist brother, thank you. But here's the thing. I think that there's a difference between the goal analysis and the means analysis. Here's what's wrong with how Trump did this. And this isn't just me. This is all of our friends that are institutional investors and are on the bond side and are captains of industry. They tell you the same things they're telling me, I'm sure, which are he didn't have a plan. Okay. which are, he didn't have a plan, okay? He didn't communicate this well in advance and he is inconsistent and that breeds uncertainty

and he has been offensive to people. So now you've got a little bit of a personality vibe going with the EU and how it makes them feel about how they should respond to him. So there's, there are multi-factors here going on. It's not that tariff don't tariff. That's not what I'm saying. But the idea that you are a tariff structure away from getting everything done that you

just articulated is not going to happen. What I'm saying is, when you look at China, but here's the piece. When you look at China, what are the biggest reasons that they have advantages over us that we can control, right? Because the CCP doesn't give a shit about its people, they don't give a shit about their currency, they don't have to worry about elections, they don't have to worry about all the things that are- The environment, the environment, all of it.

The environment, they don't have to care about any of that. All of the things that we value here, they don't have to value. Okay, they invest in STEM and in industries and in a way that we don't even discuss. You want to build, Bannon and Cuomo decide to go into business and they're going to build an AI related or new economy related concern and we go to the government, they'll underwrite it there. They will go to their teaching academies that they have, where they're putting out four and five times per capita, the STEM students that we are, and they say,

great, we'll get you the workers, you have to train them, we'll underwrite the business. And we're not doing any of that. Hang on, on. Hey, we're second. Hey, we're second First off what we've done today and if folks should understand we're essentially I think now in an embargo of China in the United States and I think people better understand this we are now engaged and what they've been doing to us for 2025 years called economic warfare, unrestricted warfare.

We're engaged now and the Nvidia announcement on the licensing deal is escalatory to the fact that I think I make it maybe the moral equivalent of cutting, not quite, but maybe cutting off the Japanese of oil in August of 1941. The Chinese have just announced that cutting it off from rare earths, they're going to cut us off from shipment of magnets, and they're gonna cut us off from ball bearings, which I say, hey, I talk about the Eighth Air Corps over Germany all the time. They're going after the ball bearing plants.

That's how critical ball bearings are. What you talk about in STEM, let's just isolate that. Remember, in the apartheid state of Silicon Valley, which the progressive Democrats allowed to happen because all those guys are progressive Democrats. And I don't care how much they brode out after we won on November 5th and how much they're hanging around Mar-a-Lago. In federal court today, FTC, a president Trump's administration, and people who are as anti-monopolistic as ever in this thing have literally taken Lena Conn's, what she did in cleaning up the lawsuit

Trump brought in his first term, and she is magnificent, and nobody in the Democratic Party, or the progressive movement had her back. Zuckerberg's in court today for being a monopolist, and they're gonna break up Facebook. I'm telling you, this is going to happen, and President Trump did not blink to do it.

The oligarchs in Silicon Valley, at all the STEM education, we've turned the elementary schools in the country into STEM factories, okay? The problem is African Americans and Hispanic kids can't get into the state universities, computer science and engineering schools. I went, before going to Harvard, I went to a land-grant university that today, I don't know, 75 or 80% of those billets and slots are taken by South Asians or folks from China. The reason is, their governments are prepared to pay full freight of the $30,000 or $40,000 a year and in-state tuitions lower.

This is why Silicon Valley is an apartheid state. This is what H-1B visas, the scam that they've used to bring indentured servants from India, who these people they pay these guys. So we agree that that has to be addressed. This is the whole part of the oligarchy, but once you take care of that, you don't need massive government programs. We do it through public education. You do it through the universities. I'm fine if it's all private. If you just open it up. Right now, if we stop the oligarchs from saying on HB1B visas, because I've asked a million times, I said, please show me of the millions of H1B visas that

are here, show me for any American citizen, regardless of their ethnicity or race, show me a bill that the person taking the job has a higher education or better job experience. It doesn't exist. That's why they've never shown one. The whole scam. I don't have the same focus of the outside versus inside, where the workers would come from. Of course, it would be better if they're sourced from the American citizenry than from outside

the American citizenry. I'm fine with that. But I'm talking about moving the blame structure to the side for a second in terms of what will make our middle class what it was when you and I grew up in it? Bring it, bring it. What was New York City when your father

was coming up through New York City after the war in the 40s and 50s and 60s? New York City was a manufacturing. They made things. It's a manufacturing. So I'm just saying to make people- Hang on, hang on. Milton Freeman and these people, Paul Ryan and guys on the left,

they take it like this is the second law of thermodynamics, that this is a part of physical, it's a physical property that the jobs left. It's a physical property you can't manufacture like manufacturer- It's a choice structure. It's not, it's exactly a choice structure. It's a choice structure. So I'm just saying that's the right word, incentive.

And the choices and incentives were all made so the Lords of Easy Money on Wall Street, the global corporatists and Silicon Valley, forget Hollywood, they weren't that powerful. Those three massive institutions of money and power in the way modern America rolls, had the decision, and they made a decision over time to ship to Lao Bai Jing, the slave labor of the Chinese people.

As you said, the CCP doesn't care about that. They don't care about a damn thing. And look at, they work 20 hours a day. For women, it's a horrible environment. They dump stuff everywhere. The CCP cares about one thing, concentrated power. Just like they're the ultimate last dictatorship of the 20th century, right?

And this is the war we're in, Chris. And so tariffs is a mean. But first of all, hang on, one more thing. I just wanna say about reciprocity, because you said at the beginning, he didn't think it through. In reciprocity, President Trump is agreeing with Chris Cuomo. He's saying it's not just tariffs.

In fact, he's saying it's not tariffs alone because sometimes the tariff structure doesn't look that bad like with the CCP. It is all the non-tariff, it's the counterfeiting, the currency manipulation, the non-tariff barriers, all the games that are played. That's what reciprocity means. Now, was President Trump and Peter and everybody

as articulate and maybe give enough time to socialize this for? No. Maybe, maybe not. But eventually, Chris, you have to have this fight. And you're right. It's not simply tariffs. That's part, reciprocity, it's not a tariff war.

This is what reciprocity means. And guess what, Chris? Japan, Korea, Taiwan, Vietnam, India are all stacked up like over LaGuardia on a Friday night to meet with Besson and James and Greer, the trade group. Wow, they're meeting with China too though. They are meeting with China, but hang on, Wall Street Journal reported today, part of our deal is that, hey, if you're going to do a deal with us, you want access to this premium market, you're going to have to give us a priority and we wanna downsize your relationship with China,

which all those guys are begging to do because they know what the CCP is. It's a black hand that will crush them. They understand this. So, hold on, hang on, hang on. But back to the reciprocity. Chris, he, the reason it just wasn't some, he started with the tariffs of the 25%

for automotive, et cetera, but he kept saying and kept saying, I'm talking about reciprocity, which is a level playing field. 90% or 80% of the reciprocity is what you're arguing. It's not an exact tariff. It's all the mechanisms they use which are quite powerful. I'm fine with that point. And all the countries coming over here,

not one country has come publicly and say, we don't know what Trump's talking about. Trump's, this is more Trump just being Trump, all of them saying, okay, we got it. We may not agree with your calculation and your formula. We're prepared to sit down and get into serious discussions and we'll figure it out. I just think they would have done that

without this stunt period. And our markets wouldn't have been as royal. Chris, what do you call the stunt? Because look, I don't believe the tariffs were ever intended as a fixed tax structure. They were always a tactic. And they were a stunt to get people to come to the table. I just don't think it was necessary,

but that's a political choice. And he made his political choice. Hang on for a second. choice. Hang on a second. No, hang on a second. You know, because your father's an expert at this and your brother, what a forcing function is. People are just not gonna sit there to get to, you have to have a forcing function to force them

to the table or to do something. That's an assumption. And maybe you're right, maybe you're not. Now we won't know because he went this way. Why, how would you, how would Chris Cuomo then get the world, he's trying to reorganize the commercial relationships of the world to put America first and particularly put America's citizens first because the globalist

that always looked for sending capital, right, to the place that would have the cheapest labor and the lowest environmental standards, right? They always place that would have the cheapest labor and the lowest environmental standards, right? Right. Right? They always went there to change that commercial relationship. Yeah, he gets it.

He gets it. He does it. He makes all his stuff in China for a reason also, right? Let's leave. Let's leave. Yeah, man it. No, his policy, I don't know. I haven't followed that.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, you haven't followed. I failed to believe that. I failed to followed that. I fail to believe that. I fail to believe that. You fail to believe it. But these, not to never believe anything Chris Cromo told me on, let's- Find me something that Trump sells that he doesn't make in China. Have one of your guys Google it while we're here. I think it's a lot.

I don't think he sells anything now he's president, but I think- He's selling Bibles, flags, sneakers, all this shit that has Trump on it. I think it's a lot. I think it's a lot. I don't think he sells anything now he's president, but I think when he was off his merchandise. Flags, sneakers, all this shit. That has Trump on it. I think the Bible's American made. Do you? I have no idea, but I think it's American made. Okay.

I think it's American made. That's not my point. I'm not here to condemn Trump. What I am is I'm agreeing with these ambitions. I'm just saying, I think there's more to it and it's not that big government is the answer. Give me an example, give me a forcing function on how you're gonna do it.

All right, so here's the pushback. I don't know that you needed this kind of forcing function to go to the people that you're talking about and saying, I'm telling you, things are about to change. Do you wanna sit and meet and be part of it? Or do you want me to put it on you? What do you want? And I think that he would have had the same yield

without what we had to live through in the markets recently. Okay, hang on one second. Okay, let's go back in time and history. When she came over, we had a meeting in Mar-a-Lago and it was agreed to that we're gonna work at a different relationship. Gary Cohn and the guys took it from kind of the globalist perspective for 100 days and came back with Trump in June of that year with their thing and Trump says we're not doing that. That's the

old way. I need something deeper. This is when Peter Navarro and Stephen Miller, particularly Bob Lighthizer and myself to a degree got involved with Lighthizer and for two years, two years they walked on worked on a very fundamental and comprehensive deal as you remember all the way to May of 2019. That would take care of what we call the seven original sins of how the Chinese Communist Party run particularly stayed on industries what they do with Lao Bai Jing labor, environmental all that. After two years of negotiation in a draft form, which is gonna be agreed upon and then signed sometime in the summer of 2019,

Wanxi Shan and she, after meeting with Putin at a Belt and Road conference, came back and said, you know what, we're not interested. That deal would integrate us into basically the global economy is run by the United States of America. It would make us subservient to the foreign devils. We're not going to do it. We're in fact, we're going to have a break technologically.

We're going to decouple from you guys. We're going to block Facebook and Google and all these guys. We're going to build our own giants, which led to things like TikTok. Also deep sea at the very early stages. We want to have a total break from the West because we think our systems better. They then declared a people's war against the United States, which really went to economic war with us. And that's where we've been for the last couple of years. And people have been in denial. Even the Biden administration tried to do a little, but it's

not enough. Okay. President Trump, because the center of this, the center of this has always been about China, right? The other nations of the world, including the EU. Look, Mitt Romney was right when he said it all those years ago when people played it as a gaffe about who our biggest enemy was and he said China. What I'm saying is, well, first of all, if we look just at what the net effect has been of what Trump has... By the way, just a point of order, I think Mitt Romney said the wrong way. I think Mitt Romney in the debate said Russia. I think it was President Obama that actually said the 1980s are calling and want their foreign policy back. Obama was the guy that tried to have the pivot to Asia away from the Pentagon's sin come mentality

of which we're still working on the apparatus in this country, the Wall Street apparatus, all of it in the military, the military's been totally tied to the Middle East. No one's wanted to confront the Chinese Communist Party. The oligarchs are making too much money. The Pentagon doesn't see it as a big land war, that you don't need big army. This is why we're having this crazy debate internally about Persia and its nuclear weapons.

Right now, Obama, as much as President Obama tried to do a pivot to Asia, he got the Pentagon to forward deploy one Marine brigade to Darwin, Australia, and he will tell you that of everything he tried to work on, that was the hardest, and that's the one he had the least success in because of the embedded nature of the American elite

about the Chinese Communist Party. And this is something now that's coming up and we are engaged in a great economic war of two systems. These systems are incompatible. I agree with what you're saying. I agree with what you're saying in terms of what the dynamic is. I'm just saying China has yielded nothing in this current period. They've done nothing but restrict what we need. So what are they saying? You want to play the tariff game, we will play it with you when we believe we can win. So the idea that this was the master stroke,

I don't agree with that. I do agree. I think, but hang on. That's why I think we've got the tariffs, 124%. Now we're in, I think we're in a total trade embargo almost between the two nations and hey. Well, that's not good by the way. We're in, I think we're in a total trade embargo almost between the two nations and hey. Well that's not good by the way.

Well how do you bring it to a head? The Chinese Congress party are just not gonna. Wait so hold on a second, hold on. I keep not getting able to say this one thing. First of all we're both right. Romney is notorious. You're right, you're right cause you're agreeing with me but I accept that.

Yeah I know and that is a big I accept that. Yeah, I know. And that is a big component for you, typical Irish guy. The Romney had two evolutions, right? The first one was what you mentioned with Obama. Yes. They want their policy back. Then in 2022, when he went to revisit, he was like, well, here's why I said it about Russia,

but now it is China. So he said two evolutions. We were talking about different ones, but that's, but hang on, hang on, but this is a very important point. Let's talk about that 10 years of Mitt Romney. It shows you Mitt Romney was running for president of the United States. He was the flower of the Republican party in the Republican party's mentality. When he said that not only was he wrong in 2012. He was dead wrong in 2012

But for your audience this shows you had the establishment of both parties We're thinking this when Obama said China. It's not like a lot of Democrats jumped up and said hey, you're right Right the person who was the fiercest? Chinese warrior and even when I was in the White House her staff Was the fiercest warrior for China, was Nancy, against China was Nancy Pelosi. Nancy Pelosi went to Tiananmen Square back in the 90s. I think she almost got arrested one time on some commemoration.

So she was the fiercest, but the democratic establishment, particularly the money interests of Wall Street, the global corporatists. You gotta be pro-China if you want the money. If you're playing with the money guys, you gotta be pro-China, cause that's where they make it. That decade of Mitt Romney and his awakening, right? Which you sit there and go,

hey, he's not an average citizen. He gets all the access to this, particularly ran for president and being in the Senate, is guess what dude, it's too slow. The reason that the working class is in the shape it's in, is that the leadership of the nation, number one, Wall Street, the corporatists in Silicon Valley, actively worked, actively worked to build

an existential threat and empower an existential threat for money, not for ideology, for money. Yes. They're 30 pieces of silver. In the Mitt Romney's of the world, quite frankly, bro, you don't get a pass because you're too freaking stupid to ask the hard questions that had to be asked you're supposed to be a leader hell you want to be the when he in 2012 he just gave a dead wrong answer Russia was not the biggest geostrategic threat in 2012 wasn't even close it was China

and radical Islam right Russia is just in just a kind of a backwater at the time and this is what the problem with the country is, that the elites in this country, it's not that they're greedy and venal, they're dumb. Okay, they're dumb. And we've been led by dumb people and stupid people and people that didn't wanna put it on the line. And that's why I'm so proud of MAGA

and I'm so proud of the anti-CCP. Remember, I'm the only civilian in history there will be fully sanctioned by the Chinese Communist Party. Two minutes after Biden was inaugurated, Matt Pottinger, Peter Navarro, Mike Pompeo, and myself, and those three were government officials. And I'm proud of that because I don't believe

that the Chinese Communist Party is the legitimate government of Lao Bai Jing or the Chinese people. And guess what? Lao Bai Jing agrees with me. So look, if everybody is on the same page about what needs to change, the debate has to be about how. And again, the idea that you're a tariff away from this all being fixed is not true,

but you're also not saying that. I agree with you on that. And I just think you have to look at the other spaces also about, well, how do you get them back? Well, you're not gonna just tariff them into coming back. You have to make this the right place with the people that they need, and it's gonna have a lot of different components to it.

That's all I'm saying. And it's gonna need that. Right now we got almost half a million open manufacturing jobs in this country. You know, you gotta have people to fill them. Look, hang on. A lot of this is just, and this is what Peter Navarro and people are talking about,

bringing the high tariffs on the cars. It's one thing to assemble. With the previous, what President Trump's done and others have done previously, is at least to force some of these guys back here to assemble, but that's not manufacturing, what I call high value added manufacturing. That is the five million jobs.

And so here, but here's the problem. On every show you see and in the Wall Street Journal and the Financial Times of London, who are neoliberal neocons who believe Milton Friedman, let's you know, Milton Friedman's thing, Elon Musk put up today, the pencil. The pencil has parts from many different countries, right? That simplistic mentality is gonna lead you

to be impoverished. The reason that if you look at New York City, you look at our great cities, the trains of dollars we spend overseas underwriting the security of this apparatus, this global trading apparatus, which the American citizens do, plus the ability not to have high value added manufacturing

and not have great paying jobs, is led us to a situation that our working class has taken the brunt of this, and the middle class is 100 days away from being laid off, if they're ever laid off, they're all sitting good until the 100th day after they're laid off, and then they start panicking. Can I pay for the kids' school?

Exactly. Because the savings rate is so low and the credit is so high. 100%. And we allow people to charge things. I mean, not just because we're both Catholic, but the amounts that you're allowed to charge is crazy. Am I gonna make Chris Cuomo, not just MAGA adjacent,

you may get to actually be a populist nationalist on your economic side. Once we convert you on that, we got you for everything else, Chris. First of all, listen, don't flatter yourself. Second, these are not Trumpian ideas. My father was talking this talk, you know. All the, no, no, no, but that's okay, hang on.

But that's what was lost. That's what the Democratic Party lost. That's, Trump was a Democrat. It's not lost in me. I mean, I've always, I've always believed that. No, I know that, but no, but I'm saying the party, you said the party, the party left the American middle. I'm not a party guy.

I know this, but I'm saying the democratic party, this is why they're in a jam. They became the party of the credential class. They are the party of the elites and the cognoscenti and the liberals that are easy to dislike because they keep telling you how stupid you are. And they fixate on things that fail on two levels. One, they're not majority concerns.

And two, they are fundamental violators of the live and let live edict of American culture. And that's where the left got themselves in trouble. There used to be a, you and I were raised with a mind your own business mentality of, you know, like, hey, did you hear what's going on in the gate? Gossip is one of, not only is it an arguable, original seven deadly sin,

but it's one of the 10 commandments, okay? Don't bear false witness. Just shut up, whatever happens in that house happens, okay? Until it spills over in our house, leave it alone. I don't care what they do, I don't care how they do it. The left lost sense of that, that's their problem. For me, when you look, the reason I didn't like Trump talking about the Gilded Age,

he should have been talking about the post-World War II golden age, which is really what you're talking about. And again, that's his problem, he's not my problem. What I see is capitalism is great, that's who we are, that's our national religion as, as bridled by our law and order through the constitution.

Okay, great. You have an overweighting on the top right now, everything has been skewed for the top, they have been the beneficiaries of everything. And it is capitalism for them on the top right now. Everything has been skewed for the top They have been the beneficiaries of everything and it is capitalism for them on the upside and a Socialism backstop for them on the downside meaning big time Walmart gets to distribute profits because we've we've Socialized the risk. That's right. So that everybody bails them out. That's right. Keep all the upside. That's right So they get to distribute profits. Okay, we can't fuck with that. Okay, okay, fine. But Walmart's employees are part of a social safety net

that we're paying for them while they get to distribute profits. That's wrong. Bernie Sanders says that he gets called a socialist. It's why the budget deficits are so, just back to President Trump one thing, I think what he's saying at the Gilded Age is that at that time, what funded the US government from our founding all the way up to the early 20th century was a tariff structure.

Say, if you want access to this premium market, which he's kind of saying today, you got to pay. Right. So he looks back to McKinley and these guys. I realize this is a different time, but the concept's the same, that hey, this is a premium market, if you want in here, you either move your manufacturing jobs back, or if you don't, you're gonna pay a premium to get here. Now, how do you deal with the fruit of that,

which is people saying, well Steve, I don't wanna pay $700 for what I'm paying $75 for right now. I want cheap stuff. $700 for what I'm paying $75 for right now. I want cheap stuff. You're gonna work through with competition and other things you're gonna work through, those price increases are never gonna come. Just like we were all warned, people's hair was on fire back in 2018 when President Trump started putting

the tariffs in against China. And people said, everything's gonna be an increase. We actually had a lower cost in 2019. So look, this is going to be a process. There's no doubt about that. But you have to do this. If you want to have a country that is economically vibrant and robust. When is the last time America did anything that required the shortest of short term pain?

We should have been, look at the pandemic. We couldn't even do anything that involves not doing what you want to do or not getting what you want to get when you get it, whether you can afford it or not, is punished in America. I think Americans right now, see, we don't have an alternative system. The two trillion dollar deficits that we're going to continue to run unless we have significant spending cuts, unless we start to get Scott Besson and President Trump get a higher growth rate that gives more tax revenues, we get significant spending cuts. And to fill that gap, we do have, we let the tax cuts for the wealthy expire to go back

to the original, the snapback from 36 to 37 to 39 percent, or actually, are you go to 40 percent, unless you do that, the system we have now is going to continue to embed inflation as you have to roll over the $36 trillion of debt, which is increasing at a base of $3 trillion every hundred days. Well, Trump has no interest in changing the architecture of the top tier. He called it a middle-class tax cut. It was just overweighted to the top.

And then he punished New York, because he was mad at us by taking away our state and local tax exemptions, which made it even more expensive for people in my position who are high-end income earners in New York state. But he did that on purpose. Well, maybe make it as an incentive to people to change out the governments there to get

to administrations and governments that actually are not so high-taxing, right, and actually bear the fruits of freedom on those local tax would not be enforced. Well, listen, I mean, you talk about an incentive structure, that's fine. I'm just saying, I don't see Donald Trump agreeing with Steve Bannon that, yeah, we got to tax the rich more It's hang on hang on Chris. It's already been leaked This is why today Larry Kudlow and Steve Moore yesterday and Sean Hannity known as radio shows going nuts saying it leaked out that President Trump is open to the concept and behind closed doors

Senators and congressmen are saying hey We just don't see how the math works that if we extend the tax credits particularly the fact that President Trump has promised no tax on tips no tax on overtime in the big enchilada no tax on Social Security if you add that we're another I don't know 250 500 billion short every year right that gap right. That gap has to be made. Then just the math works out that the logic is, you gotta take care of the entrepreneurs. You gotta make sure that the entrepreneurs

that are building businesses aren't caught up in this. But you have to go with that upper bracket, and particularly the people that are quite wealthy. It's called a snapback. It goes from 37 to 39%. I actually think it should go to 40%. I argued this, this is the exact thing I argued in the Oval Office in June of 17 when the Wall Street Journal came after me and three progressive Democrats sat there and encountered it.

Democrats would be fine with this. Gary Cohen, Steve Mnuchin. Oh no, no. Okay, when you say that, let's go back to the beginning months of the Biden administration. They put forward a tax plan that would go after and tax the oligarchs, tax the billionaires. It didn't even get out of committee. They had the Senate, they had the House, and they had the White House.

It went nowhere. Why? Because the puppet masters in the Democratic party are all the guys on Wall Street and the corporatists. They control the credential class that you see on cable TV every night arguing about shawty funding. The Democrats talk the talk of taxing the top end all the time. Republicans never do.

This is what's going to break. This is what I keep telling people. The biggest sign that we can show on populist economic nationalism of working for working class and the middle class, the most important thing we can do is not extend the tax breaks to the wealthy the upper bracket the upper bracket and I here's talk about incentives one of the reasons we have this spending is because the donors as you know control Washington DC both Democrats and Republicans yes if you want to get guys moat all money on time if you want to motivate people to actually start cutting federal spending and telling politicians this has got to be cut

This thing's ridiculous right now the trillion dollars we spend in the Defense Department And I'm a hawk that was eight years of naval officer my daughter went to West Point and served in Iraq So I'm not a dove you got to cut the defense budget can't be a trillion dollars If you want to incentivize people to do it you've got it Let them pay for it when they start paying for it, all of a sudden they go, hang on, you're telling me working class people in the middle class got this tax cut and we didn't? Yeah, exactly what I'm telling you. By the way, I'm telling you, until you start telling these politicians we have to work together to make reasonable cuts that we have to get together, the country's

now on an unsustainable path. And trust me, the people down at the bottom are gonna pay the most. The people that are the backbone of this nation, right, are gonna pay the most. It's time now to lance the boil. They have been. I mean, look, when we were growing up, right? Yeah, Pop went to law school, free by the way,

but he went to law school. He was a genius. So St. John's gave him a scholarship. Top of his class, St. John's University as well. Of course he had to share it with an Irish guy because it was a built-in bias there, but that's okay. And then, so he is a little different, but that was the dream.

His parents couldn't even read, okay. Did not really speak English. Completely who the president says he doesn't want in the country right now, right? No real skills, no money. Will you stop? Come on, that's what he said. He wants them from Norway.

He wants them from Norway. No, that's, stop, stop. He wants them from Norway, Steve. He doesn't want my people here anymore. No, stop, stop. He doesn't want your people either. Stop, stop, stop. It's not like you guys were so smart when you first came over.

So you know, when... We're still not just hammerhead mix. So when they come in, we used to be able to say that, right? My brothers, the family, you know, as you learn, when you get into our stage where you've built your family, you've had your romances, you have your kids, you know, you have your family, your blood,

and then you have the family you choose, which might as well be blood. And for me, it's Irish, Jews, you know what I mean? It's all ethnics. And our connective tissue has been destroyed by a real misplaced sense of righteousness and culture. But that's for another day. The middle class was everything in this country.

Biden understood that. He just was too old and really not skilled enough to do anything about it. I don't think that that is anything other than popular is fighting for the middle class. Can I say something? I think Joe Biden is the biggest phony. He's from Delaware. It's the credit cards. All the corporations are in Delaware with a mailbox because they got an easy federal court up there. Right. Delaware is bought and paid for.

Joe Biden has been a running dog for the globalists from the beginning with a happy talk. He goes up to Scranton every now and again and gives the I'm Joe from Scranton. He ain't Joe from Scranton. Listen, just like Mitt Romney doesn't get a pass, Joe Biden doesn't get a pass. Look, I don't think any of them get a pass. I mean, that's my beef about Trump. I mean, the idea that he's a real populist, I just don't buy it, but it doesn't matter to me. How can you say that?

Chris, why does he have this movement that actually is- Because of you. That's why you guys made him your horse. No, get out of here, get out of here. That's absolutely, he has a visceral connection with working class people because he understands. In Washington, DC, out of the room, out of the deal, and he's put working class people in the room, out of the deal,

and he's put working class people in the room. He understands, I don't believe he has a connection. This guy used to not even shake hands, Steve. You and I both remember that. He would not shake people's hands because he thought they were dirty. I'm just saying he ain't Mario Cuomo, okay? He is not a guy who comes from that.

I grew up right across the road. He's a guy from Queens. He's a guy from Queens. He's from Jamaica Estates, and then Fred moved them out onto the island. He's not a guy from Queens. I've never even met anyone who sounds like him, by the way. I don't even know where his accent comes from. New York.

Chris, are you gonna sit there and deny President Trump going around the country in these rallies? No, it was one of the most misunderstood things that the media suffered from in 2015. President Trump going around the country in these rallies. No, it was one of the most misunderstood things that the media suffered from in 2015. But that's because they... The total connection. But he was, look, to me, he was playing,

he was playing all the hits from Tom Tancredo, but he was a TV celebrity. Tom Tancredo, my guy. He was a TV celebrity and the media slept on that. They saw Trump just as how they knew him from New York social culture. And they missed that in America, he wasn't just a celebrity,

he was a celebrity for being great at business. I know you got to wrap up, but I- No, I'll talk to you all day, I'm loving this. I haven't even asked you what I care about most. So, you know, people, you know, they talk about, you know, President Trump, I said in 14 and 21, we had the longest sides of all. In 14, the reason I was attracted to him as a candidate

is that he would talk in a different vernacular. He didn't use a political nomenclature. He talked about issues that people, and it hit in the solar plexus. Most politicians, when they talk particularly Republicans, it's so thin with no oomph in back of it. The way they talk about Milton Friedman, the way they would talk about tax cuts, and the way they would talk about going forward, and you can see they were a controlled opposition

to the basically neoliberal neocons that ran the country. Trump was totally different. And when he talked, he is an expert in mass communications. That's one of his powers. That's what led to the connection of the American people. I saw it very early on with Dave Vossy and these cattle calls he would do in Iowa and New Hampshire, that Trump connected to people in a way

that nobody's connected. That is the Trump movement. The Trump movement connects with President Trump. I'm not saying he doesn't know how to sell the message. I'm not saying that. I think he doesn't know how to sell the message. I'm not saying that. I think he's a brilliant salesman of the message. I think it's his particular genius.

I'm just saying it's not organic. And should that matter? No, the policies matter. All that matter are the policies. Now, the meanness, the attacking the media, the one other thing I wanted to talk to you about, which I really don't understand, okay, is the marriage of expedience

and respecting the Constitution. I don't understand what we're dealing with right now with this Garcia case. I am not stupid enough to argue in favor of an MS-13 guy. Nobody wants gang bangers in their communities. But you are about to, so go ahead. No, I'm not. I have no problem kicking the guy out of the country,

but respect the law. Or do what JD Vance is arguing right now. Change the law, change the due process requirements for immigration. Change it. You can probably do it by statute. It is already clear in 5th and 14th Amendment jurisprudence that non-citizens do not get the same protections

of due process nor equal protection that citizens do. So you have constitutional basis, change the law. I have no problem with that. What I have a problem with is, you knew the guy had a federal order allowing him in the country legally. And you ignored it because you don't like who he is and threw him out.

That is not American. It is un-American. We can debate this another time, because I got bad, but I will tell you. Look at you running away from the back. I think this gets back. What did I just say that's wrong? What did I say that's wrong?

Only everything. Give me one, just give me one. I think this gets back. What did I just say that's wrong? What did I say that's wrong? Only everything. Give me one, just give me one. This gets back to the unitary theory of the executive and one of the big fights that we're having. You know, President Trump, I think now has had 170 lawsuits in federal court, all arguing about guess what? The Constitution.

Is the powers of the executive as laid out. Okay, number one, he's the chief executive officer of the US government. Therefore, on things like impoundments, things like the budget cuts he can do, which he's been taking to federal courts, letting go of executives, even in the alphabet agencies, he is the chief executive and can make those decisions. Number two, he is the commander in chief of the armed forces. And at a time of a declared emergency or declared war, he is the commander in chief.

Number three, he's the chief magistrate and chief law enforcement officer of the US government. What the courts are doing and trying to do is come in between him and his actions as commander in chief. And I think that'll just have to play out. You see, this is gonna play out. People on the left.

You can litigate it, I have no problem with that. People on the left say it's a constitutional crisis. I'm not saying it's a crisis. I'm saying, here's the part you don't wanna deal with. The law as is, you don't have to like it, but you have to follow it or you have to change it. Those are your options. This has nothing to do with the unitary executive You want to argue that you can't they're coming they're coming between him and his actions as

There's no they I'm talking about this instant case. Okay, there is The courts look why did you come between people? Federal judges in this ring or trying to come between trying to come between. Okay. Hold on. Let's just listen That's his own guys Said they made a mistake in Deporting this guy because there was a federal order in effect. They admit they made a mistake They didn't even appeal the decision That eventually that they originally lost on this guy that gave him, which I will admit right now, I don't like as a legal mechanism.

I get why Reagan changed what he did in 1980 to conform American federal law to this treaty that we had signed about refugees. I get it. I just don't like this. If you don't get asylum, which this guy didn't, he was not allowed asylum, he lost the case, what is this withholding deportation, which is like asylum light? I don't like it, but it is a legal mechanism, so you have to change it. This guy has this legal mechanism in his favor,

he won the case, the government lost, they didn't even appeal. And now you're saying you're gonna ignore it. You're saying because, yeah, he has powers that go beyond this. No, he does not have a power that goes beyond it. Not right now. It's in his role as commander in chief on a terrorist criminal element.

It's in El Salvador. The El Salvador president said he's not gonna send on a terrorist criminal element, it's in El Salvador. The El Salvador president said he's not gonna send the guy back. You're gonna have all the Democrats in Maryland are gonna go down and grandstand on this. El Salvador, no, they can grandstand. I don't like that.

I don't like the grandstand. I'm not arguing for that. You're driving the grandstanding. It's gonna grandstand. I am not driving the grandstanding. I'm saying arguing for that. You're driving the grandstanding. It's going to grandstand. I'm not driving the grandstanding. It's a 90-10 issue with the American people. I'm saying respect the law if you say you respect the law.

That's all I'm saying. And it's a very easy fix. The El Salvador's guy is saying what he's saying because that's what Trump wants him to say. The reason the Supreme Court was 9-0 is because I'm right. The reason they used the word facilitate is because you have no legal right to grab a guy out of El Salvador. They're gonna have to give him to you,

but you're gonna have to ask for him. And Trump doesn't wanna ask for him. The president of El Salvador has done an amazing job of turning that country around. I think you would agree with that, right? It was a hell hole in what he's done. In some ways, yes. He's a little heavy, this guy.

He's hurting people there too. And I think that matters. How you change things matters. I'd love the podcast, I gotta bounce. Here's what I wanna talk about next time. But you're so engaging. Well, first of all, Steve, I believe that conversation is the cure.

I think the fact that people who listen to The War Room absolutely have to believe that I am all kinds of bad, okay? And I know that my audience, which is over sampled, independent, a lot of critical thinkers, they're gonna say on first blush, what are you talking to that psycho for? And then they'll hear you and they'll say,

wow, Steve Bannon has changed. And then if they're really critical thinkers, they'll do research and they'll say, oh, he hasn't changed. That's what they'll say. And the next time I talk to you and I'll come on the they'll say, oh, he hasn't changed. That's what they'll say. And the next time I talk to you, and I'll come on the war room whenever you want, but here's what I want to talk to you about.

I'm reading Jesus Wept, right? And it's breaking my heart every chapter that I go through this book about the last seven popes. And all of a sudden they're talking about Francis getting installed. And the author, Phil Shannon, has this whole passage about you where he says, and there is this scruffy man

in the middle of all the Curia officials, anxiously listening on as Francis gave his speech, his name, Stephen Bannon of the United States. And I'm like, what the fuck? And I started, I mean, I knew that you were Catholic and I knew about your organization. And there's this whole read on you in this book that we have to talk about.

I don't even know if you're aware of it. We have a bureau, we have a bureau. I started a Rome bureau during Breitbart and War Room has a Rome bureau. Every other day we go to our Rome bureau chief, international chief out of Rome, who's very dialed into the big picture behind the scenes. But this guy gives you so much attention

in the politics of the Vatican and the cover-up and the this and the that. We gotta do, I'll come on the War Room to talk about it if you want, but I really wanna talk to you about it. I would love to. I would love to because we're also, the part of the war room, you know, it's like it's like sedimentary rock to how you build an audience. One of our big is traditional Catholics,

Latin mass Catholics are the are a big part of our audience, traditional Catholics. I can still hear my father saying it when I go to mass, I was making my crosses for Palm Sunday, and my father used to make me go with him six o'clock Latin Mass. Whenever he thought I was out drinking, he would make me come with him to six o'clock Mass the next day to punish me. Agnus Dei, quetolus peccata mundi. I can hear him singing it in my ears every time I'm in Mass.

Unbelievable. Anyway, Steve. That's a throwback. I know. I miss it, by the way. I think they should have just given him the option. But Vatican II is a story for another day. Steve Bannon, conversation is the cure.

You don't have to agree on everything to talk about everything. And you are always welcome on my platforms. I appreciate you taking the opportunity. I do want to come back. I do want to come back and talk more about economic nationalism and tariffs because you were on to something important. You called it. It's not simply tariffs. It's reciprocity, everything else. And you're 100% correct. We got it. Those are the elements too. This is, I think, the most important conversation we can enlighten

the American people on of exactly what the stakes here, how we got here, and how our path out of here is. So I'd love to come back and talk to you. You are welcome here. You're welcome at News Nation. And if you ever want me on the war room or anything you're doing, I'm a call away. Thank you. Thank you, guys.

Appreciate you. Look, I know you get more clicks, you get more likes, you get more resonance if you just hunt for gotchas that will trigger the algorithm. But man, what is that making any better? You know that you may not agree with the how, but the what is on point. The problem is the gap between really, really rich and just about losing your shit is really too big. How do you fix? How do you adjust? How do you make it so that there are more who have more? That's the real question and nobody wants to talk about it, but we did today. Thank you for

subscribing, following, joining me for this conversation with Steve Bannon. Thank you for checking me out at NewsNation, 8P and 11P every weekday night. Problems are real. Let's talk about what's real and let's get after it.