Erick Erickson HR 2 10-17-25

What's up, baby? It's Bretzky, and I'm here to tell you that SpinQuest.com is giving out free sweet coins. All you got to do is purchase a $10 coin pack, and guess what? They're going to give you the coins from a $30 coin pack. That lets you play all your favorite games like Blackjack, Wanted Dead or Wild, and we're talking real cash prizes, baby. SpinQuest.com. SpinQuest is a free-to-play social casino. Boydware prohibited, visit SpinQuest.com for more details. Hello, America. Hello, America. It is Eric Erickson here. The full number, 877973-725. Should you wish to be on the program, I would be delighted to have you. We are keeping our eye on the White House. The president of the United States and the president of Ukraine are there to be meeting. There are active conversations about the use of Tomahawk missiles inside Ukraine by the president. He is seriously thinking of granting permission. to Ukraine to use those tomahawk missiles. Now, we are told something new that we didn't know the other day. It turns out, sorry, didn't scare me this time. Dude just went past my window. I'm seven floors up. He's on one of those window-washing thingy bridges, and there he goes. Wow. Okay, sorry. So we're told that it was Vladimir Putin who asked for the meeting with Donald Trump. It was not a Trump-initiated conversation. It was a Vladimir Putin-initiated conversation. And it came after President Trump openly suggested that he would send Ukraine Tomahawk missiles. The Tomahawk missiles would give the Ukrainians long-range capabilities. Those long-range capabilities would be able to reach the drone factories within Russia. Not only that, they would be able to reach power plants within Russia. They would be able to reach natural gas depots and hubs.

inside Russia. The Russians have been bombing the Ukrainian power grid pretty heavily over the last month. So it is October, obviously. And in October, it starts to get cold in Ukraine, and it's going to get colder and colder over there. And before winter sets in, the Russians have been blowing up the various bits of Ukraine's power grid that they're capable of blowing up. They have targeted natural gas supplies within Ukraine. And Ukraine would like to reciprocate because Russia is so big, the largest country on the planet. It's hard to make the Russians feel the way the Ukrainians feel. The Russians have their own problems. The Russians are short of food. The Russians have real issues. But the Russians typically have their lights on at night and have heat at night in ways the Ukrainians do not. If you expand the missile reach of the Ukrainians, well, then you expand their capacity to wage war. You expand their ability to inflict damage on the Russians, and you probably more quickly bring this situation to an end. While we are waiting on the president of Ukraine and United States, there's another story. Now, those of you down in Lafayette, notice, by the way, so I live in Georgia, but I am from Louisiana. And so I know it's Lafayette, Louisiana. In Georgia, for reasons that flummox me to no end, they say Lafayette. Now, here in Georgia, we have Vienna, Georgia, home of the Vienna sausage, except it's Vienna. My wife to this day, she likes pigs in a blanket, and she says, well, you go get me some Vienna sausages from the grocery stores? I don't know what that is. Do you mean a Vienna sausage? And she gets mad at me. She also says pecan, and I say that's something you flush, but that's neither here nor there. We also have Cairo, which you would think is like the syrup, K-A-R-O, but nope, it's spelled Cairo, but they pronounce it Cairo. My favorite is we have Houston County in Georgia, but it's Houston County in Georgia. Y'all, I got no idea. I don't know. I don't know. I've told the story before. I one time worked for member Congress who had a lady from Chicago come down, and she did not know the uniqueness of the pronunciations in Georgia. So she went to what in Illinois is Cordill and said Cordillay, but in Georgia we say Cordial. And, well, it caused problems. So in any event, it's Lafayette, Louisiana. It is God's country. The food there is fantastic. Now it makes me miss Don's, among other things. But a Lafayette resident has been charged in connection with the October 7, 2023 terrorist attack on his real court document show. Mahmoud, Ahmed, Yaqib al-Muttati, 33.

is charged with providing, attempting to provide, or conspiring to provide material support to a foreign terrorist organization and visa fraud in federal court. Online jail records show he's being held in St. Martin Parish jail. Al Matadi is accused of being part of the military wing of the Democratic Front for the liberation of Palestine, which carries out... carried out one of a series of terrorist attacks on Israel that killed over 1,200 people. Cell phone records pinged Al-Matadi's phone to a cell tower in Farr Aza, the site of one of the attacks. Prosecutors also obtained recorded calls that allegedly showed Almatadi used that phone to organize a group to participate in the attack. Accordingly, 60 people were killed and 19 others were kidnapped in that attack. He's alleged to have falsified the application for a visa to enter the United States. Officials said he was living and working in Lafayette. The criminal complaint was filed October 6 under seal in federal court in Lafayette and unsealed late Thursday signed by FBI Special Agent Alexandria Thomas O'Donnell, who's described as having almost as many names in her name as the terrorist. I made that part up. I mean, you've got Special Agent Alexandria M. Tomin O'Donnell indicting Muhammad Ahmed Yakub al-Matadi. Okay. Well, she's a counterterrorism expert, assigned to investigate the murders and kidnappings of Americans on October 7th. So just think about this. Joe Biden, President of the United States of America, allowed into the country one of the people who participated in the October 7th attacks. This is how screwed up immigration was under Joe Biden. One of the Hamas terrorists who participated in the October 7, 2023 attack, was granted permission to enter the United States by the Biden administration, and he took up residence in Lafayette, Louisiana. That's how screwed up it was.

He falsified his application for a visa to enter the United States. His cell phone tracks him to one of the terror sites. Notwithstanding all of that, the Biden administration led him into the country, and he's been working in a restaurant in Lafayette, Louisiana. This man went from shooting people in the head to sucking the heads of crawfish in Louisiana and thought he could get away with it. And it was not the Biden administration that caught him. It was the Biden administration that led him into the country. It was the Trump administration that caught him and is going to prosecute him. He's in prison now. The counterterrorism expert of the FBI who was assigned to help deal with the victims, murders, kidnappings, and terrorists involved in October 7th, tracked him down and found him in Louisiana. led into the United States by Joe Biden and his administration. I got a real problem with the failures of the Biden administration on this one. I mean, seriously, y'all. How do you do this? You open the borders to everybody, and a guy lies about his background, and you don't verify it before you let him in. You let him in and then decide you're going to try to verify it. and it turns out to be fraudulent, it's absurd to me. It's genuinely absurd to me that we are at a point where the Democrats took our border so unsuriously that one of the people who allegedly was involved in the attacks on October 7th, could take up residents in the United States, and of all places, Lafayette. I love Lafayette. I love South Louisiana. I grew up there. In fact, I worked with a guy in Middle Georgia who is an older gentleman years ago. I mean, he was old. Long time ago, passed away since. He and his wife used to get in the car and drive to Prejones, which is an incredible Cajun restaurant in Lafayette. They would drive from Macon, Georgia, to Lafayette, Louisiana for the sole purpose of eating at Prejohns. That's how good the restaurant is. I have been to Lafayette many times. They are really good people. They are... hardworking, kind souls in Cajun country. And a allegedly a murderer of Jews from October 7th decided to land there and take a job and hide out. I got to say.

It is the last place on planet Earth. I would expect one of the October 7th combatants to hide out. And while he was there, undoubtedly, he encountered many of the wonderful people of South Louisiana who didn't care where he was from. Many of the people from Lafayette work for oil companies, some of whom have been overseas to the Middle East. He had... fantastic food while he was there. You know and I know he wasn't keeping halal in South Louisiana. You get offered buné, you're going to eat the bunin. But there he hid, thanks to the Biden administration, allowing a terrorist into the country. Now, I just, I'm going to go on and step out here because I have a sneaking suspicion if I wait too much longer to go out. While we're in commercial break, the president and of the United States and Volodymyr Zelensky will start speaking, and I don't want to miss it. So I want to be good with clock management. So I'm going to go on now and step out. When we come back, hopefully by then, we will have the presidents of Ukraine and the United States in the Oval Office talking. And who knows, maybe it'll be another big spectacle like that first time. I'm hoping not, though. I'm hoping we get a real commitment to help Ukraine here. Because the President of the United States, I think, is getting tired of dealing with the President of Russia making promises he has no intention to keep him. Those who love him? Listen to find out what he's going to say next. Those who disagree with him also listen to see what he's going to say next. It's the Eric Erickson Show.

Just joined us? No worries. Check out the Eric Erickson Show 24-7 stream at Ericerickson.com. Available for Apple CarPlay and Android Auto. I'm coming. Sending a note to my wife. The phone number 8779373-745 should you wish to be on the program, except I'm sorry, it's just habit at this point. It's always good for you to have the phone number if you want to call, but I don't have a call screener today because it's hunting season. My buddy Emory texting me says, can I have Charlie's job? I would say, yeah, except he would take today off to go hunting, too, because he's a bigger redneck than my producer. You can, by the way, if you want to send a voice memo to the show, send your name and the city you're in with your short, pithy, to the point, audio voice memo to contact at e.w. Erickson.com, and, well... We will review it. My team will review it to see if you're an appropriate fit for our radio program as we wait. Looking at a live shot here of the White House, waiting for something we assume we're going to be invited into the Oval Office for remarks. We don't know yet, but we are awaiting the situation. I think they're actually waiting for Volodymyr Zelensky showing up. We'll see what happens. I want to bring you the latest when we get to it. There's a lot of other stuff happening out there, including the... No King's protest. I got some other strong thoughts on this. In the meantime, my buddy bin Dominic, but for whom I would not have this job. He and several friends of mine got Red State started and put me in charge of it back in the day, and one thing led to another. He's now the editor at the Spectator World, or the American Spectator, not the American. This is complicated. It's the Spectator, U.S. edition. He's got a piece. Schrodinger's covert action. While much of the pushback from the right wing to Donald Trump's international hawkishness has come from voices focused on the Middle East and feared potential for wider wars prompted by support for Israel, the actual test of a break within the Republican Coalition on foreign policy disputes could come over the president, stepped up focus on Venezuela. The most recent development with Trump issuing a rare public acknowledgement, he's authorized covert CIA actions on land. I authorized for two reasons, really, he explained. Number one, they've their prisons into the United States and the other things are drugs. We have a lot of drugs coming in from Venezuela and a lot of Venezuelan drugs coming in through the sea.

Think of it as Schrodinger's covert action. Does it really stay covert once you announce it? This would also seem to go against Trump's stand against starting new wars, particularly those with a mind on regime change, which some of the presidents, more hawkish supporters, would clearly like to be the ultimate aim. It also includes newly ordained Nobel Prize winner Maria Corina Machado Maria Corina Machado, who took to the airwaves in an interview with Christiana Amun poor this week, practically begging Trump to greater action against Maduro. The sheer amount of resources the United States has moved into the region is impressive, well beyond the drones being used to take out a series of Venezuelan drug shipments at sea. Here's the Wall Street Journal. Quote, the U.S. has moved advanced weaponry into the Caribbean and in the skies north of Venezuela, including eight Navy warships and attack submarine F-35B jet fighters, P8 Poseidon's. spy planes, MQ9 Reaper drones. The Pentagon has deployed elite special operations forces, including the Army secretive 160th Special Operations Aviation Regime. The Knight Stalkers, a U.S. officials said, large troop carrying and attack helicopters in the mix, as are aircraft conducting training flights. Something is clearly going on there. Something's clearly going on to the markets right now as well. Things seem to be upending. The regional banks, the economics seem to be souring there. Swiss America has been warning people about... a Secret War on Cash for some time. They would love to send you their great special free report, The Secret War on Cash. You get a free copy by calling or texting 800 to 889, 2646. Just mentioned Eric, E-R-I-C-K. When you call her text 800-289-2-8-6-46, 800-289-26-46, Swiss America will send you their report, The Secret War on Cash, completely for free. You can also go to Swiss America. www.com slash Eric, Swissamerica.com slash E-R-I-C-K. Let Swiss America get you their secret world cash report completely free. It can help with your retirement and your finances. It can help you. and keep you educated on what the government is doing. The phone number one more time, text my name Eric to 800-289-2646 or go to Swissamerica.com slash Eric. Message and data rates may apply. Lodomir Volodymyr Zelensky and President Trump have just begun meeting at the White House. They have walked into the building. We'll bring you the latest when we get back.

Engaging and Fearless, the Eric Erickson Show, tackling politics and culture with clarity. Greetings, conversationalists. Welcome. It is Eric Erickson here across the United States. We are waiting for the presidents of Ukraine and the United States to speak publicly. from the Oval Office. It appears, let's jump over. Perfect timing. They waited for me to get back from commercial break for this. We're going to the Oval Office with the President of the United States and of Lotomayor Volodymyr Zelensky. They are sitting inside the cabinet room. I'm waiting for my TV system here that I have in the office. It's on a little bit of a delay, and I want to be able to jump into here. Let's go. Listen. if we can, as this thing loads. We hear what Mr. Trump has to say. We put on his music, right? He was great. Great guy. He's coming December 5th to perform at the White House for some of the people. If the cabinet members are good, if they're doing a good job, we'll let them come along with some others, right? We're going to have a good time. December 5th. Well, thank you very much, everybody. It's an honor to be with a very strong leader, a man who has been through a lot, and a man who I've gotten to know very well, and we've gotten along really very well. And we had a big call yesterday, as you know, with President Vladimir Putin, and we'll be talking about it. President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine has endured a lot. I mean, he really has. He's endured a lot. And we've endured it with them, to be honest. It's been a long time, and I think we're making great progress. So we're going to be talking about that today. We'll be talking about what took place yesterday with my phone call with President Vladimir Putin. And I think that things are coming along pretty well. It began with Alaska, where I think certain guidelines were. discussed and we want to see if we can get this done. This was long ago into the Biden administration. I came here and we inherited this and we'd like to see if we could finish it, end it. We want it to end it. So many people have died in this war. And we're going to get it ended. So I just want to thank you all very much. If you have a couple of questions, go ahead, please. In fact, before I do that, let me just ask the President to say a few words. Thank you, President. Glad to me to again, Mr. President, thank you very much for the invitation. Again, my congratulations with your successful. She's firing the Middle East. Thank you. Yeah, and you did it, and I think this is momentum to finish Russia's war against Ukraine. I think that, yes, we understand that Vladimir Putin is not ready, I think not ready, but I think that I'm confident that with your help, we can stop this war.

We went through a lot of details. He wants to get it ended. I think that President Volodymyr Zelensky wants to get it ended. Now we have to get it done. President Trump, Karen Castro from Lindel TV, and although I love asking you questions, today my question is for... President Volodymyr Zelensky, Ukraine. Go ahead, please. Thank you. Our president, President Volodymyr Zelensky, President Trump, just broke it a peace deal in the Middle East that all Americans, both sides of the aisle are very proud of. But to meet that deal, both sides had to make concessions. Our president has stuck out his neck in many ways to make a peace deal for your war as well. What specific concessions are you willing to make to end this war with Russia? Will you give up joining NATO? Americans have foreign war fatigue, and our president, as he said, we need... our Tomahawks too. To me? Yes, you, President Volodymyr Zelensky. Thank you very much. That's some question. So many questions in one. Thank you very much for your question. First of all, I think we need to sit and speak. The second point, we need ceasefire. Even now, you see in the Middle East, it's very difficult to hold ceasefire everywhere in every war. It's very difficult. We want this, Vladimir Putin doesn't want. That's why we need pressure on it. We will speak with President today what we need. We understand what we need to push Vladimir Putin to negotiation table. And as I said previously, so we are ready to speak in any kind of format. Bilateral, trilateral doesn't matter. Matter, just peace. This is important. And we don't speak about NATO or NATO. For Ukrainians, it's very important. Of course, it's our decisions, decisions of allies to decide where we are. But are you willing to get into? Yes, but the most important thing. the most important thing for people in Ukraine, which are under each day's attacks, to have really strong security guarantees. NATO is the best, but weapon is very important. Allies on our side is very important. And between us, for us, bilateral security guarantees between me and President Trump is very important. I don't know, we didn't speak with details about it, but this is... the most important document because the United States is very strong. Sir, President Trump, you are the middleman right now, hoping to end this conflict. Who is doing a better job negotiating? President Volodymyr Zelensky or President Vladimir Putin? I think they're both doing a great job in that sense. We have to get it done. We've got to take some of the hatred of each other. You know, they don't like each other. I say that in front of President Volodymyr Zelensky, but I say it in front of President Vladimir Putin, too.

Tremendous bad blood. It's really is what is holding up, I think, a settlement. I think we're going to get it done, and we have to make it long-lasting. As I said in the Middle East, everlasting, right? Everlasting. And the Middle East is a much more complicated situation. You know, we had 59 countries involved, and every one of them agreed. And it's, you know, it's sort of amazing. Most people didn't think that was doable. This is going to be something I really believe that's going to get done. I had a very good talk yesterday with President Vladimir Putin. I think he wants to get it done. And President Trump right behind you. When we were in Israel with President Trump earlier in the week, we heard a lot about the difference in diplomacy between President Trump and President Joe Biden before him. What do you see is the biggest difference in diplomacy between President Trump and President Biden? President Trump. has a big chance now to finish this war. President Biden now is not the president, so he doesn't have a chance to finish this war. And President Trump is really showed for the war that he... can manage his firing Middle East. And that's why I hope that he will do this. And we will also have such big success. For Ukraine, it's a big chance. And I hope that President Trump can manage it. We'll step out of there right now. This is the presidents of the United States and Ukraine meeting in the cabinet room surrounded by you've got JD Vance there, Marco Rubio, you've got the diplomatic team. They will, after this session, have some private closed door conversations. If I were president, I got to say, I think the thing that would annoy me the most is that the reporters are president, try, president, just like have somebody in there pointing and shut the reporters up. Goodness gracious. So, listen, you all know where I stand on this. I think that Vladimir Putin doesn't really want peace. I don't think he can afford to bring his soldiers home out of Ukraine because many of them were let out of prison. They were killers. They were sent to the front lines where they just learned to get better at killing. And having them go back to Russia, I think would be his destabilizing. I think that Vladimir Putin has caught the tiger by the tail and can't let go of this. But if anyone can get him to let go and make sure he didn't get devoured by the tiger, so he does let go and gives pieces, probably drop. I mean, Armenian Azerbaijan hate each other. He's brought peace to them. Indian Pakistan, they hate each other. He's gotten peace there. Hamas and Israel hate each other. He's gotten a monocum of peace there. He's gotten Arab neighbors who despise Donald Trump to or despise Israel to recognize Israel. So, look, I say give the man the benefit of the doubt. Giving the benefit of the doubt, see what he can do. If he can bring peace to the Middle East, maybe he can bring peace to this situation. I just hope that we keep and recognize it was the Russians that invaded Ukraine. There would have been no war but for the Russian invasion of Ukraine. The Russians are not exactly honest brokers in this. So hopefully the president of his team, I think Marco Rubio in particular, does not like Vladimir Putin.

and we'll be willing to hold a firm line. Let's step out. If they're still talking, when we come back, I'll jump back over to the White House. When the truth seems hazy, Eric will clear the way. It's the Eric Erickson Show. Taking the complicated and making it simple. It's the Eric Erickson show. President of the United States still speaking in the cabinet room with Volodymyr Zelensky. Let's jump back to that, the president answering questions from reporters. But we're in it to see that. And if we can end... quickly, and I think we can. I mean, I had a very good talk yesterday. We're going to be talking about it, but I had a very productive talk yesterday with President Vladimir Putin. We'll see what happens. But the war in the Middle East was far more complicated. We got that one done. I think we have a good chance. I think President Volodymyr Zelensky wants it done, and I think President Vladimir Putin want it done. Now all they have to do is get along a little bit. President Trump. Can you give us an update on the trade negotiations with China or perhaps like a great best of the time? Yeah, I will. And I'm going to let Scott do that. I think we're doing very well. I think we're getting along with China. China would like to have something as of this moment. We'll be meeting in a couple of weeks. We'll be meeting in South Korea, myself. I think so. It looks like it's going forward. I think so. They want to meet. We like to meet. I have a very good relationship with President Xi Jinping, and we're going to see what happens. But, you know, for years we were... taken advantage of by China, very badly. We were losing hundreds of billions of dollars a year to China. We really built their military, if you think about it. The kind of money that presidents allowed to be lost to China was just insane. And then when I came into office, as you know, I put very severe tariffs. So we took in hundreds of billions of dollars in my first term from China. Biden let that go because there was so much. let it continue, but he gave all sorts of exceptions. And by the time you looked at it, Scott, I would say there wasn't, it wasn't the same thing. He would give an exception for anything. If you got up and went out to dinner, he'd give you an exception. So it wasn't the same thing. But I put on very serious tariffs. So we took it hundreds of billions of dollars. And then we, I left office. The election was rigged. I left office and that was the story. Now I come back. And we are in a very strong position because of tariffs. We're in a very powerful position because of the fact that we have tariffs. If we didn't have tariffs, we would be in a very weak position. We would be in a weakened state. But with tariffs, we've made hundreds of billions of dollars, not only from China, but from others. And China wants to talk, and we like talking to China. So we have a very good relationship, and we're going to be meeting in South Korea a couple of weeks.

And I just got back from a long trip. I'm going on another long trip. And Scott, do you want to say a few words in there, please? Yes, sir. So the entire relationship stems from the great perspective the two leaders have for each other. China did a substantial unprovoked escalation last week. We were unable to get in touch with them since then. It's been IMF World Bank Week. They have had working level people here. There have been meetings. The vice premier, who is my countercars. and I will be speaking this evening at around 8.30, 9 o'clock. And then he and I in a delegation will meet in Malaysia probably a week from tomorrow to prepare for the two presidents to meet. So, again, I think that things have de-escalated. We hope that China will show the respect that we have shown them. And I am confident that President Trump, because of his relationship with President Xi Jinping, will be able to get things back on a good course. Is the hope for that meeting with you and President Xi Jinping some kind of trade deal then? Could be. Look, I think we're in a very strong position. I think we're in a very strong position. We're getting, as you know, as of November 1st, I could move it up if I wanted a 100% tariff over and above what we get now. President, we got to stop there to go out. We will be back here in a few moments. But first, I got to tell you about Vision Computer. If you're buying a computer, building a computer, you're upgrading a computer, they are your one-stop shop anywhere nationwide. Vision Computers.com or 404 compute. More importantly, if you need managed IT for yourself, for your home, for your company, Vision can take care of you. Now, just think about this. You are not an IT person, probably. You need to be able to get someone on the phone. You could go Googling, but God knows what you're going to find out. You might find out your computer is terminal cancer if you Google it. So why don't you just call Vision at 404 compute? Sign up with them. It's $199 a year per computer. You can do it for yourself, for your business, and your employees will get the phone number. You call, they answer the phone. You don't have to Google that your computer has some sort of... terminal cancer. You call somebody in 15 seconds or less. They get on the phone and actually tell you what's going on. 404 computer vision computers.com. They're going to be able to keep you up and going. So you minimize loss. You maximize profit and your company and yourself, you got peace of mind. 404 computer visioncom. Let vision computers take care of your computer needs nationwide.