Transcript of Thursday Afternoon Breaking News Updates with Ben - 4/16/2026

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Pope Leo XIV striking back against Donald Trump. As Donald Trump has attacked the Pope, he's mocked the Catholic Church, he's done AI images of himself as Jesus, he's continued to do things like defund Catholic charities, he's taken money, millions of dollars away from the archdiocese in Miami. We'll talk about Pope Leo XIV's speech that he gave in Cameroon. And Pope Leo XIV isn't holding back right now, but this is the fight that Donald Trump and MAGA decided that they wanna pick. They're gonna go all in on attacking the Catholic Church right now and attacking the Pope. You have this disastrous press conference I showed a little bit of there at the outset of Donald Trump on the White House lawn. He's heading to Las Vegas right now to pretend the economy's booming and everybody's doing great. Later today, we'll bring you the speech that he gives there. But Donald Trump on the White House lawn disparaging Epstein survivors, basically saying, you know, he calls them the victims or whatever. That's how he referred to the survivors, the victims or whatever. That's, by the way, how Donald Trump feels about the survivors. There is whatever, whatever.

He doesn't believe them. He attacks them frequently. He disparages them frequently. We'll talk about that. You also have Donald Trump saying that, you know, he's not sure if the ceasefire with Iran is going to be extended. He's also said he doesn't know, you know, what Iran's going to do there. We'll cover that. Also, Donald Trump's ballroom has been halted yet again by a federal district court judge. We'll talk about this order by Judge Leon. Judge ordered that all of the above-ground work should be halted, uh, and that Donald Trump can continue building whatever bunker or whatever's happening underneath, uh, but anything that went down, uh, above ground, the ballroom itself, will be halted. Donald Trump's flipping out about that. Donald Trump made a post moments ago, which we'll pull up in just a little bit as well, where Donald Trump said the whole ballroom is actually not a ballroom. This is all for my safety and security. The ballroom is a way to protect me from drones and ballistic ballistic missiles, and that's why we're doing the ballroom. We'll cover that. We have some hearings on Capitol Hill. You had Mike Walls, Donald Trump's ambassador to the United Nations, testifying.

He was cross-examinate— cross-examined by Democrats and Republicans in the Senate about Donald Trump's genocide, war crime threats, and execution there too. Show you what Mike Walls responded in a little bit. You had RFK Jr. testifying today. We'll go through some of that testimony. You know, apparently there was a story in the New York Post that he would cut off, cut off raccoons' penises and he would study the penises of dead raccoons. But he was just a bizarre— this is just such a bizarre regime right here. In any event, he testified and he was asked a lot of questions about his anti-vax stance and some of the horrible statements that he made, and he just denies that he makes them even though there's like actual audio of him making statements. We'll cover that. Um, and then we're learning more about, again, these purported negotiations between the United States and Iran. Donald Trump continues to say they're going great, amazing, they're heading on the right track. Um, but when you actually see what Iran's saying, it doesn't seem to be going in that direction. But set aside what Iran's saying, what's Europe saying, what are nations in— what's the rest of the world saying?

Who are either observing these negotiations or speaking with the parties to determine what's going on. Well, Europe and Middle East nations believe that at a minimum, it will potentially take 6 months for the United States and Iran to reach any type of significant deal. This isn't happening overnight. So again, if you think about the trajectory of COVID Right. Remember, we've said that this kind of follows how Donald Trump dealt with COVID during his first term, like a miracle. It's all going to go away, bend the curve, and then kind of just ignored it and pretend that everything's great and he's doing a great job. Remember, he said he gave himself an A, like he did an amazing job with COVID And on a scale of 1 to 10 with COVID remember, he said he gave himself an 11. So if you think about 6 months from now as well, right, we're pretty much going to be heading into next year, right? We're going to start heading into 2027 soon. And, you know, I think that Donald Trump's plan is just to drag this along. And what I think is important, which is already becoming an issue, but, you know, we have to really pay attention to it.

I mean, like Europe, for example, and Asia running out of jet fuel. I mean, there's going to be serious food shortages already. We're seeing that. In certain locations, but food shortages could potentially start to sweep throughout the entire world, and that could create, you know, real serious issues and panic. So we're focused there. Prices continuing to rise. And when Donald Trump was asked on the White House lawn today about high gas prices right now and what his view is, are they gonna go down anytime soon? Donald Trump's like, Nope, the prices are good. I mean, the prices are, you know, great. Stock market's amazing, he says. So, you know, I think, I think we've done our job. The parallels between this moment and COVID are just so obvious, right? So let's go through what went down. I showed you that first clip right there when Donald Trump was asked, do you believe there should be a public hearing for more of these Epstein survivors? Let's just play that clip again and let's, uh, let's do a fresh start of the episode now that the mic's working. Let's play that clip again, Jeremy.

The first lady last week called on Congress to further look into and uncover the truth on the Epstein files, the Epstein saga. Do you believe that there should be a public hearing for more of these Epstein survivors?

Okay with it. I think we've had a lot of public hearings. I'm okay with it. But I understand that the women didn't want to go under oath. That's what I heard, that the women, the victims or whatever, they refused to go under oath, which was a little surprising. So Melania felt strong told me about it because she was accused of that. I met her through Epstein, but it turned out to be totally false. It was a false story.

Then on the White House lawn, Donald Trump also, uh, said that the, uh, First Lady came out. The reporter asked, the First Lady came out last week and said she had no links with Epstein. Like, why did that even happen in the first place? Let's play this clip.

He came out last week and said she had no links with Jeffrey Epstein.

Who did?

The First Lady.

She had none.

Why did she come out and say that last week?

Because The fake news was saying she did, and she had none. And I think that's been proven. Uh, it bothered her that the fake news was being fake news. That's all. She just wanted to clarify.

Ah, she just wanted to clarify. No links. So when we all saw those emails that have Melania's name on them that were sent to Ghislaine, and Ghislaine sent it, and all of those photos that are out there, everything, everything's fake. Everything's fake news, apparently, according to Donald Trump. What about, uh, What if there's no deal, Donald? I mean, what's going on right now with these negotiations with Iran? Here, let's play this clip.

Had a very good conversation. Are you considering extending the ceasefire with Iran? With who? With Iran. Uh, we're doing very well, I can tell you. Maybe it'll happen before that. I'm not sure it needs to be extended. Iran wants to make a deal, and we're dealing very nicely with them. Uh, we've got to have no nuclear weapons. If we do, that's a big factor. And they're willing to do things today that they weren't willing to do 2 months ago.

It's interesting because 2 months ago, almost going to be 3 months ago at this point, back in February, Donald Trump said there was going to be a deal and they're going to do things that they weren't going to be able to do recently. And if we go back to last June, he totally obliterated the nuclear facilities. So last June, everything's been obliterated. So what are we even talking about here? Also, Donald Trump agreed to Iran's 10-point negotiating framework, and under Iran's 10-point negotiating framework, they're allowed to enrich uranium. That's what the 10-point framework said. We all know that's what the framework said. It's public what's been said. And from what we understand in the negotiations, the Trump regime said, can you not enrich for 20 years? Pass the problem along to people 20 years from now. Iran said, no, we'll hold off for a year, maybe 5 years of enriching uranium. And apparently that's where a lot of the dispute is. But you had the Pakistani field marshal, Asim Munir. He was in Tehran in the past 24 to 48 hours because there has not been any progress made at all in these negotiations. Let's also not forget Remember what they told us earlier this week to manipulate the market, right?

Everybody remembers that today was supposed to be the day where there was going to be a meeting on Thursday. Remember Barak Ravid from Axios? Like, I know there's so much news happening everywhere and it's coming from all different directions that sometimes we forget these things, but today, Thursday, was what they told us on Monday, that there would be another round of negotiations in Pakistan today. And that didn't happen. So now they say, oh, don't worry, it's going to be happening in a little bit. And the real answer probably is closer to what Europeans and what the Gulf states are saying, that this could probably take about 6 months on the low end in terms of actually coming up with a deal. So the question is, is, well, what do we do from now Until then, obviously a ceasefire would be a good thing, but how do we deal with the fact that Iran controls the Strait of Hormuz and they're not going to let any vehicles that are allied with anyone other than them through the Strait of Hormuz? That the United States then did an additional blockade of the Persian Gulf, even though we know that there are some, uh, tankers that are able to get through.

So how do we deal with that in the interim? And look, we all know that there has been a massive shock in the supply of oil. And I know gas prices are high right now, but all things considered, the level of the supply shock compared to the price of oil is not really congruent based upon what we know about the oil shock, right? With the strait, there's really no major difference. Maybe a few extra tankers may be getting through right now, but, but not really from when the war began, right? I mean, here we are April 16th, the war began end of February, and there's really no discernible difference in the Strait of Hormuz. In fact, if anything, there's a little— maybe less tankers even getting through based on the additional blockade by the United States, or the purported blockade. But then it's also like, there's so much that the United States and Trump did that makes very little sense. So if you were going to do the blockade, then why did you remove sanctions on the Iranian oil and the Russian oil? Because as soon as you remove sanctions on the Iranian oil What Iran was able to basically do is take that oil that they already had, put them on ships, and make the transaction and sell them to now buy themselves time for a few more months so that even with this blockade, because we removed this— you ever get that?

Because we removed the sanctions on Iranian oil, they were able to make the transactions that they needed to help them survive a blockade that we've now put on. So there's no, like, coherence and logic behind anything we do. But what else would you expect when you're dealing with someone who continues to pick a fight with the Pope? A reporter asked Donald Trump, why do you keep on fighting with the Pope? Like, what are you doing here? Play this clip.

Why are you fighting with the Pope?

And are you worried it's upsetting your—

No, no, I don't. I have to do what's right. The Pope has to understand that. Very simple. I have nothing against the Pope. His brother's MAGA all the way. I like his brother, Louis. I'm not fighting with him. The Pope made a statement. He says Iran can have a nuclear weapon. I say Iran cannot have a nuclear weapon. And if the Pope looked at the 42,000 people that were killed over the last 2 or 3 months as a protester with no weapons, no nothing, I mean, you take a look at that. So I can disagree with the Pope. I have a right to disagree.

You know, also one of the things that he says over and over again is, you know, he lies and says Iran— that the Pope said that Iran should have a nuclear weapon. You know, I'm glad that the reporter basically said, you know, the Pope never said that. The Pope never said Iran— the Pope's just been saying don't engage in war crimes, don't blow up elementary schools. Don't engage in genocide, you know, stop using God's name to justify your war crimes and your genocides. That's all the Pope has said. And Donald Trump and Hegeseth and all these MAGAs got very angry at that concept. How dare he? How dare he say, you know, all of these things about us? Okay, well, if you believe that that's about you, you should probably look in the mirror that you're engaged you know, you're engaged in that, uh, in that conduct. I'm going through more of these clips right here. A reporter asked Donald Trump, how much longer will Americans continue to see higher gas prices? Let's play this clip.

Okay.

And then on gas prices, how much longer will Americans continue to see these high gas prices?

Well, they're not very high if you look at what they were supposed to be in order to get rid of a nuclear weapon with the danger that entails. So the Gas prices have come down very much over the last 3, 4 days. I know, you know, that's what ABC says. But the fact is that if you look at the stock market's up, everything's doing really well. And the big thing we have to do is we have to make sure that Iran does not have a nuclear weapon, because if they do, you want to talk about problems, you'd have problems. So very important is that Iran does not have a nuclear weapon, and they've agreed to that. Iran's agreed to that, and they've agreed to it very powerfully. They've agreed to give us back the nuclear dust that's way underground because of the attack we made with the B-2 bombers. So we have a lot of agreement with Iran, and I think something's going to happen very positive.

A lot of agreement. I think something's going to happen very positive. I don't think $4 is high. That's what ABC says. I mean, No wonder that he has the worst approval right now in presidential history. Donald Trump's disapproval right now is higher than Nixon when Nixon resigned among the independents. Just think about that. Trump is less popular than Richard Nixon at Richard Nixon's resignation. That also tells you though about the kind of broader political framework that exists in the United States, right? And the capitulation on Capitol Hill by MAGA Republicans, how they no longer do their Article 1 function, which is to be a co-equal branch of government. With MAGA Mike and all of these MAGA sycophants, they let this lunatic, this piece of trash who you see right there spewing that nonsense, saying that $4 gas is not expensive. That, that just, that's where their position is. I mean, that is how deranged it is, right? They, they go from telling you, they go from telling you that their whole platform is they're going to make things cheaper and that Biden, you know, was someone who made things far more expensive on day one.

They're going to make this cheaper, that cheaper. The fourth quarter, it's going to be roaring, it's going to be booming, and things are going to be amazing. And then when it doesn't happen, what do they do? They say it is amazing. This is great for us. For $4 gas, what are you, ABC? What are you, ABC, saying that? That's where they always go to because these are deranged human beings. But going back to what I was saying before, this is why you need a robust Article I Congress as a check on this lawlessness. These war crimes, you know, this behavior right here, right? I'll show you. You know, we've got reporters on Capitol Hill right now, whether it's Pablo Monríquez, whether it's Scott McFarland and others who are there speaking with lawmakers. Let's take a look at what Democratic Congresswoman Kamlager Dove had to say when she was asked by our team in D.C. About the prices going up and how Donald Trump claims no problems with affordability anymore, that everybody's doing amazing. Here's what Congresswoman Kamala Harris had to say. Let's play this clip.

Are you concerned about the impact that this war in Iran is having on our national debt?

Oh my God, yes, of course I am.

You would—

Stevie Wonder can even see how much this is costing us. So gas prices are going up. It's almost $10. In California and fertilizers going up. I mean, you name it, the prices have gone up. And this dude, Dr. Jesus, okay, is wanting to spend $2 billion of your money every single day rather than help you get healthcare. Fuck his ass.

Thank you, Congressman.

Wow, powerful words. Then you have Scott McFarland, who's on Capitol Hill, and he's talking— he's talking to a lot of Democratic lawmakers who are pushing for, uh, 25th Amendment commissions and, uh, a real deep dive into Donald Trump's fitness to serve. One of the big themes we've been seeing over and over again is, you know, just so many people finally coming to the conclusion that we've been talking about for so long on the Midas Touch Network, that this guy is beyond cognitively and physically addled and unable to do the basic work It's just obvious. I mean, it's happening in plain view. Check in with Scott McFarland, Midas Touch chief DC correspondent.

Here on Capitol Hill, House Democrats do want to fight some messaging fights. They are pushing this legislation to set up a commission to help execute the 25th Amendment on Trump if and when that time comes. There have been 65 co-sponsors so far who've signed on to it and could be more. Yasmin Ansari. The Democrat from Arizona told me it is worth having this public discussion on the 25th Amendment. It is warranted, even if it's not really going to happen anytime soon. 25th Amendment, you can press it on social media. Getting any feedback at all, negative or positive, from Republicans or purple districts at all?

I think we're getting a lot of positive feedback. I have been very impressed, actually, to see not unelected, but Republicans, people like Tucker Carlson and former Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, people like Nick Fuentes, Alex Jones, people I never thought I would ever agree with on anything, recognize that Donald Trump is so mentally unstable and he clearly is in a state of cognitive decline. And I'm grateful that Representative Raskin is leading the charge on this 25th Amendment bill and has started an investigation into his cognitive decline because he is unfit and he is a national security threat to the United States of America.

You know, our reporters are not just asking questions of Democrats on the Hill. We're catching up with MAGA Republicans because we've got serious questions for them. We're asking the MAGA Republicans the questions that you want answered. So one of the individuals that our reporter spoke to is MAGA Republican Congress member Troy Nails. And we asked him, are you concerned about the impact that the war in Iran is having on our economy in the United States, on the debt in the United States that continues to increase? I mean, weren't you all talking about being fiscal hawks, right? You're fiscal hawks. You were gonna— you were guys were gonna bring down the debt, bring down the deficit. You guys were gonna be the heroes, you all said, even though Donald Trump contributed about 30% of all of our debt, more than anybody else. During his first term in just 4 short years. Now the debt is soaring right now. So there must be some intellectual consistency here, right? MAGA Republican Troy Nails, tell us that you're concerned about the debt. Play the clip.

Mr. Nails, real quick, are you concerned about the impact that the war in Iran is having on the national debt?

No, no, no, no. Were you worried about the impact impact of the war in Ukraine had on the taxpayers in this state, in the United States, the billions that we put in. You know, and you got to ask yourself the question, is the billions that we put into Ukraine, what have we gotten out of that? What, what, where are we at in Ukraine other than tens of thousands of soldiers on both sides being killed? Where, you know, that thing was just totally mismanaged by obviously the previous administration. I've never voted, never voted to give Ukraine a nickel. And I'm so glad I made that decision.

But what have we gotten out of the war in Iran besides like higher gas prices?

Oh, we have a much safer world. Come on, you can't—

the region's on fire right now.

Well, because we're going to finish the damn job.

We're going to finish the job.

But I will tell you this. Iran right now has been degraded to the point it will take them a decade, Maybe more. I mean, with the amount of damage we've done to their military assets and the missile sites and all this stuff, I mean, I think, I think the Israelis are probably sleeping a lot better today and they'll continue to sleep a lot better as we continue to degrade them. The embargo, the shutting the strait down, I think that's all good stuff. We have to, we have to take Iran down to their knees and it's going to happen one way or the other. It's going to happen.

Thank you, Congressman.

We gotta take them down to— we gotta take them down to their knees, everybody. We're gonna negotiate them down to their knees right now, okay? Because let me tell you something, let me tell you something, those Israelis— Israelis are doing really good there. Israelis are sleeping much easier right now. So, so do you care about— I don't know how the Americans are doing. No, I don't care. What about Biden and Ukraine? I'm glad I didn't do anything with Ukraine, but I'm glad the Israelis are doing good and we're going to bring them down on their knee. The embargo thingy that we're doing, the embargo thingy. I mean, how do you even watch this stuff with a straight face? I mean, this is the group of clowns. I mean, there are people in that guy's district who see that and go, that's my guy. The cigar-smoking Batman villain saying that what makes him happy right now while Americans are suffering is that he, by the way, I don't even think the Israelis are, I don't think it's an accurate statement. I think that they've been bombed more and they've had more insecurity there than before. So I don't believe the statement's true.

But the very fact that America first means that now while he's smoking a cigar and says, I don't care about the debt or I don't care about the economic conditions while Donald Trump's out there saying $4 is not a lot of money. $4 per gallon is child's play. The market is doing amazing right now. But look, when you talk about intellectual consistency, that's not a trait of MAGA. So I'll show you right now when Democratic Senator Van Hollen got the opportunity to cross-examine Mike Walls, Trump's ambassador to the United Nations, the first kind of top Trump official who showed up. The hearing was about like additional aid to the United Nations. It really didn't have to do with Trump's unlawful war in Iran, but Democrats finally had an opportunity to speak to a Trump official because Rubio hasn't testified before Congress. Hegseth hasn't testified before Congress. Just think about that during a war. They are so scared. They're such a bunch of scared weasels that they don't even send people to show up to testify. Right. Instead, they do their pathetic propaganda state regime media press conference. They don't even testify before Congress because they're a bunch of losers.

They're weak. They're scared. They're losers. And that's not a political statement. It's just the reality. So Mike Walls testified about United Nations funding, but he was asked questions because Democrats had finally an opportunity to ask a person in the Trump regime about the war. So one question that Van Hollen had was, you were very outspoken when you were a Congress member. Congress member Walls, now you're the UN ambassador or the US ambassador to the United Nations. And you said Putin is a war criminal and that if Biden didn't say that, that Biden should be impeached and removed immediately. By the way, Biden said that Biden was strong against Putin. So now what's your view about that? Let's play this clip.

Would you agree that we should enforce and that there be consequences for war crimes? And let me ask you a different way. Would you agree it would be a violation of international law to blow up a bunch of civilian infrastructure in Iran because Iran did not agree to open the Strait of Hormuz? That would be a violation of international humanitarian law if we actually did.

Actually, that's That is incorrect. It is. We have a long history. We could show, look at video after video of the bridges that we bombed in World War II and Vietnam and conflict after conflict, power plants in Serbia under the Clinton administration.

Mr. Ambassador, this was not my question. This is particularly a regime that has dual use. Well, I'm going to have to—

military with civilian uses.

Mr. Ambassador, that was not my question. President Trump threatened to hit civilian infrastructure if Iran did not open the Strait of Hormuz. We all know international law. We know there are some exceptions to the general rule that you shouldn't hit civilian infrastructure if the enemy is occupying it.

Obviously, he didn't answer that. But here's the one on Putin. Let's play the other clip. If we've got the other clip with him talking about Putin and Van Halen. All right, we know. Let's take our first quick break of the show. We will be right back after our first quick break.

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Welcome back. Ben on breaking news. I'm Ben Myselis. This is your breaking news. Breaking news from earlier today: a federal judge, Judge Leon, in Washington, D.C., ordered that all of the above-ground work on Donald Trump's ballroom need to be halted forthwith. This is after the same judge ordered that the ballroom project be completely, uh, stopped pending Congress, uh, passing legislation to fund the ballroom. The federal judge did indeed say that if there are national security issues, the judge's order blocking the ballroom would not address any of the national security issues that Donald Trump claimed may or may not exist. But then Donald Trump rushed to the Court of Appeals, and there's a judge named Rao, um, who's auditioning to become a Supreme Court justice, far right-wing extremist justice on the Circuit Court of Appeals. She wrote a scathing order saying that, uh, you can't stay or block any of the national security issues regarding the ballroom, then sent the case back to the federal judge in Washington, DC, who, by the way, the federal judge in Washington, DC, who's a senior district court judge, was appointed by George W. Bush. Very far right-wing judge, actually, who's the district court judge, um, not a MAGA judge, whereas you have the MAGA judge on the circuit court of appeals, uh, who made the ruling, uh, which basically overturned what the district court judge did.

But the district court judge said, all right, let me be very clear on what my order was, even though I believe it was very clear. The ballroom The location where Donald Trump says he's going to hold his fancy parties, okay, that's going to be blocked. That needs congressional authorization for that to exist. All of the underground work, the bunker, the secret military installations that Donald Trump claims to be building, I'm not blocking that. I'm not touching any of that. And the federal judge says, you know, it's very disingenuous right now that the Trump regime's argument is that the ballroom itself is a national security protection for him. I mean, just think about that right now with so many issues going on in this country, with so many people suffering, with Trump starting wars here and wars there. And now he's threatening he's going to go to war with Cuba next and invade Cuba like this. His main priority is building golden ballrooms and arches not getting congressional legislation to actually fund these things, just tearing things down, ripping it apart, and then saying he's doing it for his national security. That this is what we need for our protection and safety is a golden ballroom right now.

Okay, let me just share with you what the judge's order says, because I think it's very instructive. On March 31st, 2026, I granted the motion of the National Trust for Historic Preservation in the United States for a preliminary injunction to halt construction of a ballroom on the White House grounds as ultra vires, meaning outside of the scope of the Constitution. In recognition of the national security and presidential security concerns raised by the ongoing construction project, I excluded from the scope of the injunction for my order blocking the ballroom any actions strictly necessary to ensure the safety and security of the White House and its grounds, including the ballroom construction site, and provide for the personal safety of the president and his staff. Defendants now seek to turn this exception on its head and unreasonably insist that the entire ballroom project may proceed. Based on the record before me, I cannot possibly agree, but I will clarify the scope of the injunction as described below. And then he goes on to say how on April 1st, the National Trust— that's the group that brought this lawsuit against Donald Trump— citing public statements by the president interpreting my order, filed a motion for clarification for preliminary injunction.

Defendants Trump, meanwhile, not surprisingly, filed an appeal and an emergency motion to stay. On April 11th, our circuit court remanded the case with instructions to promptly address the pending motion to clarify how the injunction and its exceptions ensure safety and security pending litigation, and extended my temporary stay of the preliminary injunction to April 17th, 2026. On April 13th, defendants filed their opposition to the National Trust's motion to clarify and attached a Secret Service declaration. And it goes on to say, that same day, defendants filed a motion seeking a further 14-day stay of the preliminary injunction. I now find this motion's ripe for decision. And he goes on to say, defendants argue the entire ballroom construction project from tip to tail falls within the safety and security exceptions and therefore may proceed unabated. That is neither a reasonable nor correct reading of my order, with an exclamation point. My order preliminarily enjoined defendants from taking any action in furtherance of the physical developments of the proposed ballroom. The accompanying opinion stated the ballroom construction project must stop until Congress authorizes its completion. It is, to say the least, incredible, if not disingenuous, that defendants now argue that my order does not stop the ballroom construction because of the safety and security exception.

And the court goes on to say the injunction excludes only below-ground construction because throughout this case, defendants Trump raised discrete national security concerns about construction of underground elements. Early on, defendants argued that security concerns warranted permitting the current below-grade construction to continue. Specifically, defendants indicated that national security-related facilities are being constructed below the ground, referencing a security bunker. By the way, do y'all remember the reporting that we were doing on the Midas Touch Network 6 months ago, maybe longer? And we said what this is all about is a security bunker underneath. They're building data centers, security bunkers for Donald Trump because he's terrified of, I think, what can happen to him based on his unpopularity. And he's not intending to leave the White House, so he's building a military installation for himself when he doesn't leave office at the end of his term. That's one of the things I said that he was doing. Lots of people go, oh, you're being hyperbolic. Security bunker? What are you talking— bunker? What do you— what do you mean? That's exactly what they— what they're doing. And he's also using that as a pretext to now say, I have to continue to build my ballroom because the ballroom and the bunker are one and the same.

And so now that I've ripped to shreds the East Wing, now it is a national security harm to me if I don't build a ballroom because I ripped it down unlawfully. I have to build the ballroom to protect myself because the ballroom protects against ballistic missiles. I kid you not. FPV drones and other types of drones right now. That's the argument that he's making before the court. While all of these issues, while Americans are suffering and struggling, this is what Donald Trump is saying to the Americans. People right now. So I wanted to talk about that. Some other things that I think we need to discuss: World Cup boycott. World Cup boycott. One of the things that we were also talking about months and months ago is that a World Cup boycott was growing and picking up steam. Now, the Financial Times reported yesterday that travel industry executives, hotel industry executives, and Sports industry executives are saying fans are being put off by expensive match tickets, inflation fears, and anti-American sentiment. U.S. hotels are now slashing their summer room rates as World Cup demand falls short. Just think about that. Only Donald Trump can make the World Cup demand fall short.

Like, how is it even possible to make the World Cup demand fall short? Well, when you put ICE and Border Patrol Gestapo around the area, um, kidnapping people, killing people, throwing people into concentration camps. When you put ICE and Border Patrol in airports, um, Donald Trump has threatened the lives of the Iranian soccer or football team, saying, yeah, if they want to play, they could play, but I can't, I can't say what's going to happen to them if they show up. Good luck, we wish you the best if you come here. So again, as part of Donald Trump's war crimes, threatening to destroy the Iranian civilization, also in my opinion threatening to kill their soccer team or their football team. Um, you've got again Donald Trump's threats against Europe, against NATO, against Canada, against the rest of the world, and this, and his unlawful war in Iran. People don't want to show up here. Tourism is already down massively here in the United States, and The idea of going to the World Cup and being in the United States right now with all of the images that people see on TV with ice and more, people just don't want to do that.

We'll watch it on TV. Why would we show up? Also, things are unaffordable here. I mean, for you to just even like take a train to the game right now, it could cost $100. And if you think about people in other countries showing up here, $100. Based on what they're used to spending in their countries. It's again, it is unaffordable to show up. It is dangerous to show up. You have Donald Trump turning it into an event for himself, not making it about the world and athletes, making it about him. He's already given himself a fee, a fake FIFA Peace Prize before going to war with the entire world. People like, why would we do this? You've turned the World Cup into some grotesque thing. Donald Trump managed to pull that off. Also, while we're on the topic of sports, I think this is a major development as well. Saudi Arabia basically saying, you know that LIV Golf League that we've been basically the sole funder of? Remember everybody, LIV and how LIV Golf, you know, started, you know, rising and became the main golf league and picked out all of these top players who are PGA players who became these LIV Golf players.

And there were all these lawsuits back and forth. It's funded by Saudi Arabia. And as part of the, I guess, unspoken or I guess spoken quid pro quos that exist, the United States provided security umbrellas and gave weapons and chips and information to Saudi Arabia, Middle East countries, made what made the weapons available, um, and promised protection. That security umbrella has been broken by Donald Trump. And I think it's a bigger story that Saudi Arabia is announcing that it's not going to be funding LIV anymore, which basically means the LIV Golf Tournament, the LIV League is basically destroyed at this point. To me, it's a bigger story than just that. I mean, obviously, here's the headline from Wall Street Journal: LIV is facing the possibility of imminent closure with Saudi Arabia's public investment fund on the verge of pulling its backing for LIV, according to a person familiar with the matter. Then, as Golf Channel reports, with the news of a possible ceasing of operations for LIV Golf, Which players' moves are you watching right here? And LIV Golf executives were summoned to New York City for an emergency meeting amidst reporting that the league's future is in question.

Players are reportedly in the dark over the future, and the meeting has nothing to do with a potential DP World Tour merger. And so think about it, what does Donald Trump care about more than just about anything? The ballroom, the arch, the triumphal arches, golf. Right? And his relationship with like golf players and professional golf players. So you're Saudi Arabia, you feel betrayed by Trump and the fraudulent security umbrella you were promised. We're going to put Trump on hotels. We're going to put your name here and there. We'll give you this money. We'll buy your crypto and your this and we'll get, you know, but you have to protect us. That's what all of this was. I mean, Qatar doesn't like Donald Trump. Donald Trump used the presidency, in my opinion, to extract stuff. And it's not a— doesn't— it's not like a shrewd negotiator. I mean, anyone— Biden could have done it if he wanted to, um, you know, Obama could have done it if he wanted to. But when you're a public servant, you're not supposed to violate the Emoluments Clause of the Constitution. You're supposed to look out for the people, not use the power of the United States built over 250 years as a tool for you to extract personal— I mean, it's— anybody can do that if that's what— if you were the president of the United States and that's how you wanted to use, uh, the presidency.

But then when Donald Trump got the, the jets from Qatar and the crypto money from the— from Abu Dhabi, when he got the hotels and the— this investments, and Kushner got this money from the Saudi sovereign wealth fund, okay, it was a— I scratch your back, you scratch my back, okay? You're supposed to protect us. Then when you go it alone with Netanyahu against Iran and you don't tell the Arab nations what's going to happen, you get these Arab nations attacked, all of their factories, their desalination plants, their liquefied natural gas plants, other infrastructure obliterated by Iran that had links to the United States in this, you know, in this horrific war that took place. One of the first things they said is, okay, we're not going to fund LIV anymore. We won't fund— good luck with the golfers now. Well, good luck with that. But there's a bigger sign of things to come. These sovereign wealth funds in the Middle East would spend lots of money in private equity in big deals in the United States. They would put a lot of money in the US believing it was a secure and stable market, believing that the investments were good investments, but also part of this quid pro quo security umbrella.

Lots of other countries also would buy the US Treasury bonds and buy United States real real estate, park their money into the United States stock markets. Lots of, you know, a stronger dollar. Now we're seeing all of that, the dollar weakened. We're seeing treasury bond yields surge. We're seeing countries removing their gold storage from the United States. We saw France do that recently, remove their gold from New York and didn't even seem like Trump even like kept their gold and they had to like reach like a settlement when they wanted to remove the gold that they couldn't even find it in, in the United States anymore. There was a whole deal that had to be worked out there. Um, the bond auctions that take place with the Treasury Department being less successful. I think you're going to find a trend of not just Saudi Arabia, but Abu Dhabi and the UAE and Qatar and all of these countries that would invest a lot of money saying, yeah, we're not going to do it. We'll look at— we're gonna look to China, we're gonna look to Europe, we're gonna look to Canada, we're gonna look elsewhere where possible.

And I think Liv is just foreshadowing what's to come in other areas. All right, we got that clip, by the way, now of Mike Waltz during his testimony where he was cross-examined by Senator Van Hollen. I wanted to show you that before the break when he was asked about statements he made as a congress member about Putin. When he was a Congress member, Walls, a Republican Congress member. Now he's in the Trump regime. He's the United Nations ambassador from the United States. Here's what he had to say about Putin. Let's play this clip.

You said that President Biden needed to make clear that, quote, Putin is an absolute war criminal, unquote. Do you stand by your statement that Putin was an absolute war criminal?

I'll tell you, Senator, statements I made as a member of Congress, very different than what I make now as an ambassador to the UN working for President Trump and representing the United States. So are you retracting? I certainly, I support President Trump in everything he is doing in trying to end this awful conflict.

I just find it very interesting, Mr. Ambassador, that you called upon the former President Biden in no uncertain terms to condemn Putin as a war criminal, and you won't call upon President Trump to do the same thing. As you know, he has refused to do what you called upon President Biden to do. Let me move on.

You know, Senator, it's quite difficult to mediate the end of the war, uh, if you take such maximalist approaches. And now being a diplomat and a mediator and fulfilling his goals, working for him and his agenda, is very different than when you're elected a senator.

It's interesting, though, I have to say, Mr. Ambassador, I was a simple question. I guess you, or you're not asking this president to do what you asked the last president to I mean, did you hear his response there?

He said it's hard to take this maximalist approach. What do you mean the ma— well, first off, stop using the word maximalist, okay? Stop acting like you're smart and using big words, okay? Maximalist. Haven't you heard that word over and over again throughout this, uh, catastrophic war in Iran? It's a maximalist, maximalist, maximalist, you know. These are idiots bullshitting their way through an assignment by trying to use big words to the teacher and acting like they're smart. Okay, that's what this— it's no different than what you all may have seen in high school and middle school where the unprepared person just starts saying, indubitably and maximalist, indubitably, arguably. Now you don't know what you're talking about. Maximalist. It was your statement, your word. Your words. You said, and rightfully so, that Putin is a war criminal. It's not maximalist. That's an objective reality. So you were being asked a question by a Democratic senator about the objective reality. He was a war criminal 2 years ago when you were a Congress member. Has that changed? Well, that was so maximalist. It's your words. Stop saying that. Behave like a normal human being. And this is where I say it over and over again.

This isn't a political thing. Democrats, Republicans. Democrat was calling Putin a war criminal and then testified like that and then said, maximalist. I don't want to go maximalist. I would call them out for it. I don't care what political party you're from. That's a ridiculous statement right there. And then he goes, well, when we're trying to mediate the dispute, I can't do— what do you mean you're trying to mediate the dispute? Mediate? So now the US has taken the position that they are a neutral, that we're just neutral in all of this. And we've seen— you get what he's admitting right there? There's no difference between Ukraine and Russia, although we all know to Donald Trump he's supporting Putin and everything that he does. But Russia is— has their sworn policy to destroy America. That's their goal and objective. Like, well, I'm just being neutral. On the one hand, Zelensky is trying to help us deliver drone technology and help us address modern warfare. And Zelensky would help the United States strengthen NATO, the alliance that the United States helped found and lead until Donald Trump destroyed it. But, you know, there's that. On the other hand, Putin wants, you know, to destroy the United States and work with China to reshape the world order, with the US being very bad.

We're just, we're just being neutral here, right? I mean, it is weak. It is pathetic. That response is— and again, that's why people hate, you know, just hate this stuff. Is he— why? Maximalist. Democratic Senator Murphy cross-examined walls as well. Let's show you what happened during that cross-examination. Let's play it.

But President Trump has said that if Iran does not comply with his demands, that he will end Iran's civilization with specific threats to target civilian infrastructure. This looks to a lot of us into the world like a promise by the President of the United States to commit war crimes. I'm sure you don't agree with that assessment, but we have never had a president before threaten to end an entire civilization and double down on that claim if that country does not accede to the demands of the United States. So what does the president mean when he says that if these negotiations don't work out, he will end Iran's civilization.

Well, Senator, I think that statement in the broader context— he also talked about attacking, uh, infrastructure, bridges, power plants. And we all know Iran has a long history of co-mingling both civilian and military, of hiding weapons in hospitals and schools, uh, and using what could be just pure civilian infrastructure to also power factories for drones, for missiles, uh, and, and the IRGC controls nearly 50%, uh, of the economy.

I think it looks like, frankly, um, well, look, I guess, what does it mean? What does it mean to end a civilization?

But I think we have to look at the fact that you have a regime that literally chants death to America for the last 47 years and has acted on it, has killed thousands of Americans, has slaughtered its own people. Do you know how many— I mean, How many machine gun bullets does it take over the course of a week to kill 40,000 of its own people?

Right, but does that merit a threat to—

I think it's some— civilization, Senator? It was some tough talk. And what are the results? What are the results? Was we had the highest level engagement in the history of the Iranian regime with the vice president and speaker of the parliament. Less than a week later, we had a ceasefire. 48 hours later. They clearly got the message and they clearly came back to the table.

Yeah, and I guess it's an open question as to whether we should try to pursue our aims by threatening another nation with mass civilian casualty. I don't know that that's something that we should celebrate, that we are able to cow nations to our demands by threatening to kill civilians.

But as a former military member, and I'm safe in speaking for our military, uh, they take every precaution possible to avoid civilian casualties. But this regime responded. And again, if we focus on the results over the rhetoric, they came to the table, they got the message, they put the ceasefire in place. They haven't honored it with the Straits of Hormuz. And now we have talks ongoing.

They put the ceasefire in place. They didn't honor it. So we're doing a fake ceasefire. Where nothing's really happening and no ships are leaving the Strait of Hormuz, and they still control the Strait of Hormuz. So we did a fake ceasefire. But look at the results. Donald Trump threatened to destroy their civilization, and they immediately entered into a ceasefire that they're not following. It's an interesting telling of history because it's not the true one. It wasn't that Donald Trump threatened to destroy their civilization. That led them to enter a ceasefire. It was that Donald Trump threatened to destroy their civilization, imposed a deadline. Then Donald Trump got afraid of his own deadline because he could not execute the threat based on the pressure that was put upon him. So then Donald Trump begged for there to be a ceasefire with Iran, where Donald Trump then manipulated the markets by agreeing to all of Iran's 10-point demands. And those demands included Iran gets to enrich uranium, Iran gets to keep control of the Strait of Hormuz, permanent security guarantees for Iran, Hezbollah, the Houthis in Yemen, the Shiite groups in Iraq, that Iran gets full reparations for the war, that all sanctions are removed from Iran, that Iran gets to charge $2 million per tanker leaving the Strait of Hormuz.

It was not the threat of destroying civilization that led to the ceasefire. It was the threat of destroying the civilization and then Donald Trump not carrying it out, and Trump begging for a ceasefire by agreeing to Iran's 10-point plan and then showing up in Islamabad And then Trump having J.D. Vance and Whitcoff and Kushner say, we're not going by the 10-point plan. Here are the terms that we're dictating to you. And Iran said no, and we'll keep controlling the Strait of Hormuz. That's where we are today. That's why we are where we are today. The fact that Walls can go up there and say it's because he made a social media tweet, that that's what did it. It's actually the exact opposite of that. And why is what I'm saying even important? Like, why does— like, why does it even matter? You know, and this is— this is why, though, I don't really like debate shows because you don't get at the truth. And this is why I don't like platforming people like Scott Jennings or any of that. Don't get me wrong. Like, I respect the art of a good debater putting a Scott Jennings in his place.

I love when Mockler, like, crushes the guy and like, no one does it better than Mockler. And I think you need that. Especially young people like Mockler doing it. He was one of my closest friends, Mockler, and he's crushing it, right? Does a great job. But the thing about a debate like that is when you do the split screen, you know, someone like a Waltz who's a sociopath or Scott Jennings or whoever, these liars, they just go and they'll just lie. And it was because Donald Trump sent a strong message that— and it's like, that's not what happened. That's not the reality. I prefer this format where we can actually show the data and show the clips and show you the evidence. And you could truly make a decision. Now, you could ultimately disagree with me and what I'm saying, but it's not a de— there's not a debate. There's not a both sides of what happened here. Trump imposed a deadline. Trump backed down against his own deadline. Trump posted he agreed to Iran's 10-point plan. Trump reposted Foreign Minister Araghchi of Iran's announcing the 10-point plan is the framework for the negotiation. Iran agreed to Iran knew the Trump regime was going to lie, but now Iran got Trump to basically publicly admit to the 10-point plan.

So that sent a message to China, Russia, Europe that Trump is broken. The message to— for Iran, you may be saying, well, why would Iran agree to that? Were they deceived by Donald Trump? No, they knew that he was lying. They knew the stunt that he was going to pull, but they don't care if he pulls the stunt. They control the Strait of Hormuz. They're gonna use their time to rebuild their missile arsenal. I'm sure, although it won't be admitted, China and Russia, whether it's through the Caspian Sea or otherwise, are gonna start giving them weapons and intelligence. So Iran's gonna use this to build up. They're gonna repair the stuff that's been broken. They're gonna keep building their drones. They control the Strait of Hormuz because Donald Trump was so dumb and removed the sanctions against Iranian oil. During the war, Iran was able to make a lot of money and get its oil out of the ports and to, uh, their destinations so that they could— they predicted a situation where Trump may do a blockade like this. So Iran's good for the next 60 days or so. Meanwhile, they know that time is on their side in a way, because in a war of attrition Iran can outlast the United States because here in the United States, when you start to see $5, $6 a gallon of oil or more, the pressure that's put on Donald Trump, when you start to see the markets crash and the bond yields rise and all of that, you know, Trump backs down.

Iran knows that. They're not dumb. In fact, they're a very sophisticated society. And one of the big problems in terms of the whole negotiating dynamic is, number one, Donald Trump, because he has a very myopic view of things and because he's, in my opinion, racist and xenophobic, like he thinks he's like negotiating with like cavemen shouting "Allahu Akbar" wherever they go. You're dealing with a very sophisticated civilization of PhDs and engineers and very smart people. There's a reason the Iranian civilization has been so strong for so long. And even with a regime in power that is repressive, to say the least, and there's a lot that can be said about the way this— a lot of, you know, this Iranian regime, the idea of underestimating your enemy is like rule number one in negotiation of what you can't do. Stop underestimating. They are smart. They are shrewd. They are smart. They are shrewd. They think 30 to 40 steps ahead. They have every scenario mapped out right now. They've got a social media game. They've got a diplomacy game. They've got a war game. They've mapped out every move no matter what you do. And Donald Trump's just winging it.

You know, it's just like, what are you doing? What are you doing? How do we not even have the Secretary of State involved in these negotiations? At a UFC fight, at a UFC fight during the— the person who's supposed to be involved, Rubio, no, just, just not involved in this. Instead, we have Whitkopf and Kushner. Whitkopf and Kushner and JD Vance, people who have no idea about diplomacy, negotiation, nuclear capabilities. How do you even negotiate at a technical level when you don't have people people who have any understanding of nuclear capabilities, of enrichment, of civilian-use nuclear versus non-civilian use, weapons-grade, non-weapons-grade. These are very technical issues. When Obama negotiated this, he had the top PhDs, nuclear physicists, scientists, you know, who— they're dealing at very granular levels. And now you have Trump imposing using the negotiation. I'll leave everybody with this point right here, and then I'll show you Pope Leo XIV before we go. Trump, Putin, very similar in so many ways. If you think about Putin's purported negotiations with Ukraine, it's an attempt to use the negotiation to extract things that could not be achieved in the war itself. I don't— I'm not— there's differences obviously in the different— in the wars and the invasions, and so I don't want to get But in terms of a negotiating mindset, Trump and Putin don't negotiate.

For them, negotiation is chicanery, trickery, scheming, dominance. That's not what a negotiation is, because these people cheat and steal their entire lives. There's no morality in what they do. So a negotiation is a tool to steal and to take and to dominate when you couldn't achieve that through war, which is an ultimate act of aggression and domination. So when Trump posts, oh, we're going to destroy you in the negotiation, you're never going to be able to negotiate if that's your standpoint, if that's your view, you know, and you want to go to war. I will condemn you as a war criminal. And I think that's the worst move. But there's a war path and then there's a negotiation path. But if you're going to negotiate, you can't threaten to kill the other party in a negotiation. Because they're not going to want to negotiate with you. You're going to have to give up certain things. There's a give and take in a negotiation. You leave things on the table, you come together, you try to reach common ground, you know. And if you even look at what Putin wants to do, right? Putin wants Donbas, he wants eastern Ukraine.

Give me that and then we'll stop. And then Zelensky is like, I'm not stupid. You haven't been able to achieve that in a war. If I give you that, then you're just going to use it to further invade and take it, take us over. Iran realizes that if Donald Trump, you know, that, that if you know what Donald Trump's ultimate plan is here, and that, and they're guarding and protecting against that. You couldn't do this in the war, now we control the Strait of Hormuz, now we're supposed to give it to you? Why? You couldn't take it in the war. And in fact, we followed all of your statements where you've said, oh I'm going to, you know, we're going in. We've got the minesweepers. We're there. Europe, go in. I'm not going in. We don't need it. I don't need your oil. I need your oil. Open up the fucking straits. Excuse my language. Open up the effing straits, you assholes. I mean, you look like you realize how weak that makes you look and how pathetic that makes them. You don't think they realize that when— and now you're trying to negotiate. If you don't do it, we're going to crush you.

And then Donald Trump's also saying the war's over. We're not going to be going to war anymore.

Okay.

Iran sees all of that. I mean, Trump quite simply is the worst negotiator ever. Can't negotiate, doesn't know how to negotiate, never knew how to negotiate. Why he bankrupted so many things, like everything, right? With all of his scams. The biggest scam is saying he's a dealmaker. He's not a dealmaker. He's a destroyer. He's always been a destroyer, never a dealmaker. Dealmaker was cover. For destroyer, right? And that's what he does. You let him in, he sucker punches you. The art of his deal is the art of the sucker punch. Oh, you know, just come on. Boom, boom. And just think about what he did with Iran already. The two negotiations he invaded during the negotiations. But that's how he lives his whole life. That's how he's always done things. He uses formalities, norms, good faith and fair dealing to destroy and doesn't have normal human being feelings about it. So before we go, I'll show you what Pope Leo XIV said, because I started out by saying he's in Cameroon talking about Trump. Let's play this clip of Pope Leo XIV.

Jesus told us, blessed are the peacemakers, but woe to those who manipulate religion in the very name of God. God for their own military, economic, or political gain, dragging that which is sacred into darkness and filth. Yes, my dear sisters and brothers, you who hunger and thirst for justice, who are poor, merciful, meek, and pure of heart, you who have wept You are the light of the world.

There you have it, everybody. Make sure you catch the show I do with my brothers this evening, uh, 8 Eastern, 5 Pacific. We go live then. It's been great spending this time with you with Ben on Breaking News. We'll see you next time. We appreciate you. Shout out Midas Mighty. Make sure you subscribe. Help us get to 7 million subscribers. Thanks everybody for watching. Want to stay plugged in? Become a subscriber to our Substack at midasplus.com.

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