Former Gov. Gilmore Has Some Strong Opinions On The State Budget

The sun is up over central Virginia skies, handover moving, and the city's alive. One more hour to own this town. YV.A., never slowing down. Wake up with Rich and win the day, or spend a whole day playing catch up anyway. Richmond's morning news keeps you running strong. 9 a.m., let's roll all morning. We roll on here at 903 on News Radio, WRVA. Governor Jim Gilmore, Ambassador Jim Gilmore, joins us every Thursday. Sir, you left this big cliffhanger for me. You said, I don't think that'll work just bombing them to try to bring Iran to its knees to capitulate, to give up their nukes, to give up the straight of hormones. Why is that? Well, listen, I've got some general officers I've been talking to that think that bombing enforces enough that that will work. You know, Vladimir Putin is not making that work in Ukraine. Right now, he's just attacking civilians in Kiev and Ukraine to try to bring the Ukrainians to their knees to surrender to him. That hasn't worked, and it will not work. So at this point, he's doing war crimes for no good. So now let's shift back over to Iran. The question is, can we bomb them into submission? Some people think that we can. So far, we have not. The Ukrainians are the Iranians are basically saying, no, we're here. We're going to run the Strait of Hormuz, and we'll talk to you about Nukes one of these days. The president says they've agreed to give up their nuclear, their bomb program. They say they haven't, so that's still a matter of negotiation. But the real crisis point at this point is their control over the Strait of Hormuz and 20% of the world's energy. So these are big, big political issues now that we're dealing with. And the question is, how do you solve this problem? I don't think the president has gotten a lot of really good options right now, and neither do I. But I do think that there are ways to address this. And I think you address it through allies, through further discussions with our NATO allies and others in the Gulf, and I think a solution can be reached multilaterally. But this administration doesn't like multilateral solutions, so that's a discussion that's still ongoing. Yeah, absolutely. Okay, can we turn our attention to what's going on here in the Commonwealth of Virginia? First of all, I have to ask you, and shame on me, for not asking earlier, how was the Independence Day celebration at Monticello and the naturalization ceremony? Look, that was a really great ceremony. It was at the crack of dawn, for gosh sakes, up in Charlottesville. but it was a very distinguished thing. They had a couple of thousand people there, I believe, to sit and watch. And it's just a great ceremony that there are people who are here legally. They want to now become citizens. They jump through all the hoops. And they were very proud of what's going on, and everybody around them was proud. So it was a very, very good ceremony at the home of Thomas Jefferson. A lot of emphasis at that point on the Declaration of Independence. And also great speakers as well. My friend, Judge J. Harvey Wilkinson, by the way, gave one of the most powerful talks. And, you know, if it could be tuned into, it really ought to you listen to. I heard that it is absolutely tremendous. My family and I were up in D.C., and it's, I'll never forget it. It was a dream come true of being in our nation's capital for our 250th birthday. Turning our attention to what's going on here.

in the Commonwealth of Virginia. Wow, I don't even know where to start, sir. We've learned that the state budget has so many things that weren't passed through the General Assembly. They were all lopped into this budget. We've learned that audits of campaign finances for statewide officials and members of the General Assembly have been wiped out during this budget process. We learned that much of the marijuana laws are now so convoluted. that we're not even sure whether any of our laws really on the books are pertinent anymore. We've learned that through this budget process that they've had, so many of these gun laws. and our Second Amendment rights are now just confusing, not to mention the gun laws that they passed originally through the General Assembly. There's a lot of confusion right now in Capitol Square. I wanted to get your thoughts. Okay, so for your listeners, I think that we all agree that what the budget discussion was really all about was data centers and the big investments that are coming to Virginia for data centers and how that imposes on the communities. and on electrical power demand. That was all the issue, and Louise Lucas didn't want them to have any other tax breaks that were agreed to, and instead she wanted to redeploy the money into welfare programs, I think. That was the fight, and that was settled. But look what that's done. That's overpowered the deeper issues you're referring to. And I think now is the time over the next weeks and months ahead for us to figure out what's actually in this budget. because it really wasn't talked about very much in the media. But marijuana is now legalized, which I do not think is a good idea. I just think that somebody's trying to line their pockets through drugs and now officially. I think that's a bad idea. We were put back into a climate agreement that's going to add additional finance burdens on the people of Virginia. It's not affordability. It's anti-affordability. And guns, well, look, we've got Second Amendment rights here, and everybody knows that I'm a former NRA board guy. I think that the responsibility of citizenship to handle firearms is built into the Constitution, and the governor and the legislature are impinging on that. So there's just a lot in this budget that we would need to talk about. You and I will have a lot to talk about in the year ahead about the wrongdoing that this Democratic majority has done in the legislature. Governor, why does it feel like I'm talking about when Nancy Pelosi said, well, we have to pass the bill to see what's in it? You know, that's right. In a way, Louise Lucas actually diverted attention, and the governor diverted attention away from very major liberal policies that were put in place. And to the listeners here, I mean, just recognize this. When you vote for the House of Delegates and for the State Senate, you know, if you're going to, everybody knows I'm a lifelong Republican. If you put liberal Democrats completely in charge of the government, you're going to get liberal policies. So you may as well like it because that's what you voted for. So marijuana, guns, you know, data centers, these, clam it.

Look, under your list is you need to understand this is really not about gun locks or triggers. This is about the question of what is the role of a citizen in a free society. The founders put the Second Amendment in for a reason, and it was to empower individual citizens. But that means there's a responsibility that citizens have. And that is if they can have a firearm, they can't use it for a crime. That's part of citizenship. And that's what the premise is. You know, what the left is saying at this point is, nope, we don't have any faith in citizens. We're seeing, you know, high-profile guns and so on and people shooting in the middle of the night and all that kind of stuff in the streets. And the best way to solve that is to eliminate firearms. I disagree with that. Not only do it, will it not work, but it goes against the principle that citizens have a duty if they're going to have firearms to obey the law. And that's what the really principle that we're fighting for here. And the left is basically saying they all with the law. We're going to get rid of the instrumentality of firearms. That's greater. I just think that's wrong. And it's also bad politics and bad policy. Governor Jim Gilmore, our guest here on News Radio, WRVA. We catch up with them every week. Sir, thank you so much. I will talk to you next week. I'm back to see your listeners again. I'm grateful to be here. I'm grateful for you. Governor Jim Gilmore, our guest here on News Radio, WRVA.