Transcript of Trump’s Asia Victory & South America’s Right Turn | 10.31.25

President Trump returns after his face-to-face with Xi Jinping, bringing home trade deals and a thaw to relations with China.

I thought it was an amazing meeting. He's a great leader, a great leader of a very powerful, very strong country, China.

I'm Daily Wire executive editor John Bickley with Georgia Howe. It's Friday, October 31st, and based on what George is wearing, apparently this is a Halloween edition of Morning Wire.

After a series of truck crashes involving illegal immigrant drivers, the Trump administration is shifting its crackdown into high gear.

The question becomes, if you can't understand English, you can't understand road science, how in the heck can you ever pass a test to be issued a commercial driver's license?

And a series of seismic elections in South America is dramatically shifting several countries in the region toward greater alignment with the Trump administration.

Thanks for waking up with Morning Wire. Stay tuned. We have the news you need to know.

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Following his showdown with Xi Jinping, President Trump has returned from his Asia tour with new trade deals in hand, and perhaps, most importantly, reduced tensions with China.

Dailywire's Senior Editor, Kabbit Phillips, who is not in a costume, is here to break down the monumental visit. Hey, Kabbit. So let's start with this big meeting with she, the fruit of that meeting still We're learning about that now. What do we know so far about what went down?

Well, first, the meeting between the world's two most powerful men only lasted about an hour and a half. That was significantly shorter than the 3-4 hours that officials had predicted earlier. Now, typically, when it comes to diplomas, You see, that is not a good sign if it ends short. But the two men were all smiles when they emerged, with Xi described it as feeling, quote, warm when he met Trump, and then Trump touting what he called a, quote, amazing meeting. Here he is grading the talk aboard Air Force One.

But overall, I guess on the scale of from zero to 10, with 10 being the best, I would say the meeting was a 12.

Now, we're still waiting on the official terms of this deal to emerge, which Trump said were, very close to resolved. But it appears the big ticket items on his wishlist that we've talked about earlier in the week were all met. In a Truth Social post early Thursday, Trump said that Xi has, agreed to work diligently with us to stop the flow of fentanyl into our country. As a result of those assurances, he announced plans to lower the existing fentanyl tariff that had been in place.

I've agreed, as you know, I put a 20% tariff on China because of the fentanyl coming in, which is a big tariff. Based on his statements today, I reduced it by 10%, so it's 10% instead of 20% effective immediately. I believe he's going to work very hard to stop the death that's coming in.

And then on top of that, Trump also said that Xi had agreed to, quote, purchase American energy, potentially oil and gas from Alaska. Now, remember, that's important because Trump is looking to keep Beijing from buying more Russian oil, so that would obviously be a win-win if this happens. On the agricultural front, President Trump says that China has now also agreed to begin the purchase of massive amounts of American soybeans, sorghum, and other farm products. With that news, he encouraged farmers to go out and, quote, immediately buy more land and large tractors. Finally, he said the Chinese would resume the sale of rare earth minerals that are used for tech products and large magnets. That was very important for the White House. Here's Trump on that front.

But all of the rare earth has been settled, and that's for the world. There's no roadblock at all on rare earth. That will hopefully disappear from our vocabulary for a little while.

Now, big picture, Trump says that the overall tariff rate for Chinese exports will now fall from 57 to 47%. There are still significant tariff barriers in place, but there's a far cry from the 100% plus rate that had been threatened if a deal did not come to fruition by next week. The two countries also agreed to remove port fees that had been impacting cargo vessels from each side. Looking ahead, Trump said the two leaders are going to continue talking. It seems like they've cleared the air a bit. The vibes are good. And that Trump said he will now travel to Beijing in April, and then the G will come to the US, potentially even Mar-a-Lago down in Florida. So a reset on their relationship.

So we're still waiting on a broader deal to officially be signed, but it seems like the big hurdles have been cleared at this point. Now, this is good news for investors. Tell us about that.

Exactly. Now, on Thursday, the markets did take a minor step backwards after multiple days in a row of record highs, but they're still way higher than they've ever been before. It feels like years ago, but remember, when Trump first announced His liberation day tariffs back in the spring, markets absolutely tumbled. But since that day, the Dow is up 13%, the S&P 500, 21%, and the Nasdaq is up, get this, 35%. With each trade deal that's been signed, Tariff lowered. Investors have grown more and more bullish. That's not the only good news for Trump, who famously keeps a very close eye on the markets. This week, the Federal Reserve also lowered its benchmark interest rate by a quarter point between 3. 75 and 4%. That's the lowest that rate has been in over three years. Now, that is music to the ears of Trump, who for months now has accused Fed Chair Jerome Powell of acting too slowly and keeping the economy sluggish by keeping rates high. The White House is confident that cut is only going to further stimulate the economy at a time also when hundreds of billions of dollars in foreign investments are set to start pouring in.

All right, so lots of reasons for optimism, but again, waiting on the exact terms of that deal. Khabit, thanks so much for reporting.

Absolutely.

The Trump administration has pledged to crack down on a legal immigrant drivers, but Americans have been left wondering, why do these crashes keep happening?

Here with more is Daily Wire immigration reporter, Jennie Tear. So, Jenny, we've seen now multiple of these cases where we have illegal immigrants who have received CDLs, these commercial driver licenses despite not having citizenship paperwork, sometimes not even speaking English. How is this still happening?

Right. So we saw this viral video back a few months ago of Harjinder sing making an illegal U-turn in Florida. That resulted in the deaths of three people on the road there. That really brought this issue to light. We're seeing now other instances of illegal immigrants who were handed commercial driver's licenses that have been on the roads for years. Many of these illegal immigrants actually carry California-issued commercial driver's licenses, which states like Florida have really zeroed in on and taken legal action. The Trump administration is also threatening to hold up funding to the state over this. Now, I've spoken with some trucking experts in the industry, and they say that there are a lot of things to blame for this. One is that under the Biden administration, you had illegal immigrants coming across the border by the thousands every month. And what the Biden administration was doing, and what still continues to be done, is that if you cross the border illegally, you have a six-month window after you apply for asylum where you can wait. And then after that time, you're able to get a work permit. So that's given illegal immigrants that go to states like California the ability to get those CDLs.

And then you had another issue, which was that federal authorities weren't enforcing the rules on the books about testing that needs to be done in England. English. The written tests are done in any language right now, and the skills testing is supposed to be done. This is with a driver in the car. It's supposed to be done in English only. There's been a lot of speculation lately that that hasn't been enforced for years, and that's also what's contributed to this.

A lot of factors contributing, but lax enforcement maybe was one of the bigger ones. Now, the Trump administration is trying to stop this. What are they doing?

The Trump administration is now closing the doors on the opportunity for any illegal immigrants and any non-English speakers to get this. So you can be an immigrant to the United States. You could be a green card holder. You can have a specialized work visa, but you can't have just jumped the border and gotten a work permit after applying for asylum like so many did. They're asking states to go through their records of who's obtained a CDL. And if they have obtained a CDL and they're an illegal immigrant, they're getting notices in many states. I mean, I spoke with many migrants down at the border during the Biden years. One of them reached out to me recently and said that the state of North Dakota had issued him a letter that asked him to turn in his CDL immediately, which he did. But this is something that's happening widespread. It's showing that We're starting to see this really take effect. We recently spoke with Marcus Coleman, the father of Delilah Coleman. She's a six-year-old who was actually victimized by one of these illegal immigrant CDL recipients in the state of California, and she She is fighting for her life still.

Marcus is a truck driver himself. Here's what he had to say.

It was mainly just the laws that need to be changed. Governor Newsom needs to stand up and be responsible for his constituents instead of sitting there throwing the blame on everybody else.

Now, you've reported before that ICE has been specifically targeting some of these drivers for enforcement. Can you share more about that effort?

In states like Oklahoma and Indiana, ICE has been out in full force on major interstates rates. They've been pulling people over, trying to look for illegal immigrants who have CDLs, and they've actually gotten dozens arrested through this effort. The head of ICE even said on Thursday that there could be a nexus to terrorism with some of these drivers.

We don't know what they're carrying across state lines in an 18-whaler. Terrorists will stop at nothing to harm the United States. It's well within the realm of possibility that some of these trucks could be carrying toxic chemicals, bombs, or God knows what.

Well, this does seem like some low-hanging fruit when it comes to improving public safety. Jennie, thanks for reporting.

Thank you.

Massive political shifts are taking place in South America, including rightward shifts in multiple countries, including Bolivia and Argentina. The Trump administration is playing a key role on several fronts.

Joining us to discuss the Trump administration's relationship with South American governments is Andres Martínez Fernandez, Senior Policy Analyst for Latin America at the Heritage Foundation. Andres, thanks for coming on.

Thanks for having me.

We've seen rapidly changing dynamics between the administration and various political leaders in South America. Let's start with Argentina. We just saw Javier Mallet's party win a landslide victory. How significant is this victory in the country?

Well, it's really significant because President Mallet is representing a major departure from what has been for the past couple of decades, Argentine leadership, which is typically far left leaning and socialist in its nature for economic policies. Also, that has brought about, generally, an anti-American vent. But President Mallet has brought an agenda, which is really the opposite of all those very pro-market individual responsibility, cutting government, which has just generated a massive crisis in the economy in Argentina. As far as relations with the United States, we've likely never had a more aligned leader in Argentina. So this victory really solidified what was with his victory a couple of years back for the presidency, a massive shift, but it really solidifies that with this legislative win, which is going to help him with his agenda.

The US recently helped Argentina with a $40 billion support package. How much of a role did that play in the election?

I think a very significant role, and President Trump deserves a lot of credit for the victory that we saw for Millé's party. What we saw was just in the days prior to the elections was the White House meeting with President Mallet and President Trump, and the announcement of this package, which is directly aimed at stabilizing the financial crisis, which, again, was generated by the socialist policies which dominated in Argentina for so long. This is a vital economic stability move. But in addition to that, it's a major sign of confidence from the United States and from the world, which I think translated into more confidence from Argentines in the President of Argentina's ability to stabilize the economy and try to path forward.

Now, turning to Bolivia, we recently saw a monumental election there, the first conservative President in 20 years. What is the significance of that election there, and does it fit into a larger trend in South America?

Yeah, absolutely. It does seem to be certainly part of a broader trend that we've seen. In a lot of ways, President Malay was the start of this as far as the current wave of right of center leaders coming to power, Bolivia being the most recent. But before that, we saw elections in Ecuador, which solidified a more conservative leader, and also elsewhere in the region. We have upcoming elections in countries like Chile, in Brazil, in Peru, where a conservative candidate is well poised also for victory there. I do think part of that is centering from the impetus that we see from the successes of Argentina, but more broadly, the Trump administration's very positive engagement with these partners. The shift in Bolivia, specifically, is historic. This is a country which has just been completely controlled politically by the socialist movement there, which has dominated institutions and weaponized those to maintain power. The people, just overwhelmingly, despite all of that, rejected that movement and now have a more conservative leader who was promised to do a series of shifts, not only as far as domestically, aligning with more pro-market economic and stable policies, but also as far shifting towards the United States and Western alliances.

Well, many fascinating and promising developments in South America. Andres, thank you so much for talking with us.

Thank you for having me. Thanks for waking up with us. And for those just listening to the show, you can also see our smiling faces on Daily Wire Plus for free.

And the bird in George's hair, and the smoke filling up the back of the office.

And the candelabra.

We'll be back this evening with the news you need to know.

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