America's 250th Independence Day Celebration

In 2025, Americans lost more than $21 billion to fraud and identity theft. That's why so many people are turning to Aura. Aura helps protect your identity with fraud alerts, dark web monitoring, and up to $5 million in identity theft protection. And if you become a victim, Aura's 24-7 U.S.-based support team is there to help. Don't wait until your identity is stolen. Start your free trial today at Aura.com slash safe. That's Aura.com slash safe. safe. News, politics, entertainment. This is O'Connor and Company. Good morning to you from your nation's capital, a little wetter, little sticky, little hot still, but it looks like the heat is broken. We're on our flagship station, WMAL, right here in. The District of Columbia, it's Larry O'Connor here in the Relief Factor Studio. Good morning. Congratulations. We did it. We made it through. It was touch and go there for a while with an evacuation of the mall and wicked thunderstorms just erupting out of nowhere. It's kind of a normal occurrence here in the Chesapeake Bay area. It's summertime, especially when it's hot and humid. Thunderstorm. Every day the weather report is, it may be a thunderstorm today, or there might not be. And then when it develops, it's like, oh, yeah, it's the end of the world. Powered down, trees down, lightning strikes everywhere. I had another one last night, right around 8, 9 p.m. And that forced the evacuation. It was a mess. But then, well, the show must go on, and it did. And it was one for the ages. We're going to share with you. all of the things that happened on July 4th here in the nation's capital and around the world as the morning develops also at 705. We'll hear from our legal analyst Hans von Spikowski, a little recap of those Supreme Court decisions and some legal fights going forward. Plus, our very own Willie Nelson correspondent in Washington was all over the place this weekend. We'll check in with Willie and find out about his strange connection to the newly betrothed Taylor Swift. It's disturbing. There's a story there. I wonder if she wrote a song about breaking up with Willie. We'll get into all those details with Willie. Also at 805, we're going to hear from Matt Morgan talk about his reflection on one of the counterspe. Why are we having to give counter speeches to the president on the 4th of July? Well, apparently, Wes Moore and Zohran Mamdani wanted to make sure you heard the other side of this story. So we'll talk about that. And then Theo Wald, former assistant attorney general. is going to join us coming up in that eight o'clock hour as well talk about the birthright citizenship situation and what the legal strategy is moving forward but let's get to this weekend what an epic epic night where the president finally took the stage after rain delays worries about thunderstorms various other issues that were delaying and there was a threat of a postponement in fact of all of these festivities. And we'll get into all of those details about the rain and the evacuation and the mayhem. But I want to get right to the president and some of the highlights of his speech and some of the other great speeches that we heard from our elected officials on this momentous occasion of our 250th anniversary. Our birthday, our declaration of independence here is the president's Saturday night, maybe even Sunday morning during his speech. Take a listen.

So tonight we're joined by that crew of NASA. Artemis, you know the crew, everybody. Artemis 2, and everybody watched. Isn't that amazing? They became very famous. Everybody watched. I was watching. I don't know what it was. That one got the attention of everybody. And along with the last man to walk on the moon, Apollo 17 astronaut Jack Schmidt. Thank you, Jack. You look like you could be with them, Jack. You look very good. You look very good, Jack. Thank you very much. What a job. Everybody was watching. That was the Artemis crew, of course, along with our oldest living astronaut who walked the moon. We're going back to the moon. Only America can do it. Did you see the manager of the U.S. men's soccer team, by the way, gave a great speech after our last victory there that put us into the round of 16. He said saying, when you go out there, you know, touch the moon. Touch the moon is sort of the slogan now for the team. Touch the moon. Because of all of those teams from all of those countries who love soccer. where it's their obsession. There's only one team, one country who's actually touched the moon. That would be us. It's actually a very cool thing. And I do love that we celebrated that. Also, by the way, he had this display of all these historic American flags and a couple of, you know, you hear about the ancestors of a president. You hear about the, you know, great, great, great grandchild of Andrew Johnson or something and, you know, sort of. people who carry those names. Well, he had a couple of other really cool ancestors there, people who were woven into the fabric of America's story to present these historic American flags. It was a cool moment. Let's go to that clip 12, please. This is clip 12. Teddy Roosevelt and the legend of the Wild West Buffalo Bill Cody. These were great, powerful people. whose incredible grandchildren happened to be with us tonight, and they stand alongside one of the first American flags ever to fly over our expanding nation. It was carried west just as Lewis and Clark began their journey in 1803. Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you very much. Great to have you. Great to have you to honor this audacious and indomitable soul of America. We also have the first flag ever to fly over one of the greatest architectural feats of all time. A thing called the Brooklyn Bridge, one of the most beautiful bridges anywhere in the world, built a long time ago. To its right, the banner that flew atop our flagship after America's Navy sank. the Spanish fleet to the bottom of the Manila Bay, one of the greatest naval victories in history.

Very cool. And so all of these American flags were in frames sort of along the stage. They were all brought out. And there's Teddy Roosevelt's great-granddaughter and Buffalo Bill Cody's ancestor or progeny, I guess, is the appropriate word. Great, great-grandchild. Who's your great-great-grandma? Buffalo Bill Coley. That's pretty cool, actually. And then he wrapped up this speech. And by the way, for everybody who's like, oh, it's going to be a CPEC speech. It's going to be a rally speech. It wasn't. Listen, he did point out. some of the dangers that our nation has in front of us. And he did focus on communism and the rising tide, sadly, of one political party. He didn't name the Democrats. I'm adding here to it. But the fact that one political party is actually letting the communists come in through the side door, maybe even the front door in some cases, he pointed it out. It was wise and important for him to do so. If it's divisive for the President of the United States on the anniversary of our 250th. birthday of declaring independence from tyranny to point out that we've got people who are now using the democratic process to elect and empower those who will impose tyranny. Well, that's a thousand percent appropriate for our president to warn of that and make that crystal clear about what's going on here. If the communists were in a foreign country with weapons poised on us to impose their will, Through military action, I would want our president to warn of that. I believe our president did warn of that. His name was Ronald Reagan when he was giving speeches like this. But now the communists are not using weapons. They're using, you know, TikTok ads. and academia to brainwash young voters who don't know the perils of communism. You want the leader of the free world to stand up for freedom in places like that. So as the president received some criticism for bringing communism and warning that communists are here and we will never allow them to take over, that's not political, that's patriotic. And then the president wrapped up his speech in true statesmanlike manner with some humility, in fact, and some grace and some gratitude. Here's clip 13, the president from Saturday night. Lightning will never stop you. And I want to thank everybody. And we love you all. And it's an honor to be your president. Thank you. God bless you all. God bless you all. Thank you. We have a great fireworks display tonight, and I'm going to be watching it with you. It's going to start very quickly. So thank you very much. You're going to really like this. Thank you very much, everybody.

And it was great, by the way. Fireworks all across the horizon of Washington, D.C. You know, usually on July 4th, we always have spectacular fireworks in July 4th, but usually they're shot off kind of right behind the Washington Monument and the World War II Memorial. There's a couple of different places you can shoot them off. Over there in the tidal base, and I think they have a barge and other areas to shoot it off at the Jessifer's Memorial. These fireworks were shot off. All the way around that expanse and into the Potomac across from Arlington. It was spectacular, absolutely spectacular. Not just one sort of location, but the entire horizon on the mall as you were looking. And, well, it delivered. It absolutely delivered what it promised. It was the greatest fireworks spectacular display I've ever seen in my life. I dare say anyone has ever seen. Only downside is it began, I think, around midnight. A little after midnight, in fact. Yes, I was that dad who said to Mike, and I have adult kids, too, not even children. In a weird way, it's easier to drag your, you know, six-year-old at midnight down to the ball to watch fireworks. But when you've got, you know, I had a 21 and a 25, 26-year-old. at 26 she is now and uh and oh and my 19 year old and they were like they they were hyped for it but then when it got kind of late and mom and dad were feeling kind of late we just did oh we watched it on tv and had a game night at our dining room table and it was great and it was air conditioned because we're american damn it but it was spectacular truly truly spectacular and delivered everything that the president promised. I'd love to hear from you, by the way, as the morning goes on, about how you celebrated and what was unique about your Independence Day celebration. If you want to call the program, the number is 855-75-7-884-4-2-55. How did you celebrate our independence this weekend? And was this one different? Was it special and why? It was special for me because of our 250th. But it was also special, just as the president noted in his remarks, because we are now facing an existential threat again, this time from within. This time, as was predicted over 100 years ago, we capitalists are, well, purchasing the noose from them to hang ourselves, sadly. And we need to take these occasions to educate those who are stupid enough to vote for socialists. More to come. For nearly 3,000 years, Homer's The Odyssey has shaped Western imagination. It tells the story of Odysseus as he faces monsters, shipwrecks, false comforts, and impossible choices on his long journey home. As one of the foundational works of Western literature, Homer's epic is more than mythology. It explores permanent questions about courage, duty, loyalty, family, leadership, temptation, and the search for home. In one of the epic's defining moments, Odysseus rejects the offer of immortality from the goddess Calypso, choosing instead the long and difficult journey home. His decision reveals one of the central themes of the Odyssey that a life of duty, family, and home, is greater than a life devoted to comfort or glory. Achilles chose glory. Odysseus chose home. That's why Hillsdale College has released its newest free online course, the Odyssey. Taught by Professor Benedict Wayland, the course reveals why Homer's masterpiece remains one of the greatest works of Western

literature. Find this free course at Hillsdale.edu forward slash start now. The Odyssey from Hillsdale College, go to hillsdale.edu forward slash start now. And that's what the president had to say. He had a lot more to say, and I suggest you grab the speech. The president, it was not a short speech, but it was a great one. And you really should check it out. It's on social media there. I'm sure a cell of news channel or town hall has the speech in its entirety as well posted. Go to town hall. You can grab it there. Then what about those gentlemen who would be president or would like to be president? We heard various remarks about the 4th of July from men who would love to move on and expand their political careers. From the political left, people like Mayor Zohran Mamdani, who thankfully can't be president, but would love to control the next president. He had... Quite a presentation out of New York City. We'll share that with you in a moment as well as Wes Moore, the governor of Maryland. Those were Democrats who decided to, well, crap on America in their speeches. And in the Republican side of the equation, you had two men whose names are bandied about to be president, Marco Rubio. That would be the Secretary of State Marco Rubio and JD Vance, your Vice President, JD Vance. And they delivered. First, for his part, the Secretary of State produced a mini documentary of sorts, a video that was posted on his social media. Let's grab a little bit of that. That's clip 33 from Secretary of State Marco Rubio, telling the story of America. 250 years ago today, a small band of men gathered in Philadelphia and declared war on the most powerful empire on the earth. They pledged their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor to the cause of their posterity. Many of them would lose everything in the revolution. Their homes burned. Their land ransacked. Every last pound and shilling to their name poured into the patriot's struggle. Some would die as poppers. But that was a price that each and every one of them was willing to pay, a price they were willing to pay for us, for me and for you. Because they understood something that free men have always known, that there are things more precious than wealth, more valuable than safety, that there are great causes more important. than even life itself now this truly is great it's about three minutes long and i implore you to go check it out but that framing there these founders and you always hear you know our founders were rich property owners racist white men and powdered wigs and they were just declaring independence because they wanted to keep more of their money and then the A very different perspective there when you think about how many of them died in the cause or lost all of their fortunes in the cause, what they were risking, and then transitioning that to those throughout our country's history who sacrificed with our military for wars overseas to advance the cause of freedom. It's a beautiful, patriotic, and important perspective.

A very different perspective that we heard from Wes Moore and Zohran Mamdani, who both wanted to claim, I think, that our Fourth of July story has to begin with either slavery or with immigration and how poorly people have been treated by our country. We'll get to it in a minute, I promise. You need to hear it. First, JD Vance, the vice president, who also is suggested might be the next president in the United States. He was in New York Harbor with a beautiful setting, Statue of Liberty behind him, tall ships across the harbor coming in for the celebration. And he delivered some remarks that are worth your attention. This is clip 29, please. Thank you. So just a few days after, the Declaration of Independence was signed. George Washington read aloud the words of the incredible declaration. We hold these truths to be self-evident. That all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights. And that among these rights are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Even today, 250 years to the day later, These words command a tremendous power over us as Americans. For 250 years, they have stirred our hearts and they've reminded us of who we are as a people. But to Washington soldiers, to the people, to whom they were first read, think about this, they were entirely new. What has become standard American parlance, they had never heard those words before. Incredible stuff. And it's truly a great speech. I beg you to go and soak it all in because you need to hear this. And you need to sort of cleanse yourself, a baptism, a patriotic baptism of sorts. Cleanse yourself from what you're about to hear from Mayor Zohran Mamdani and Governor Wes Moore, who decided that instead of celebrating who we are, they needed to shake their finger at you and lecture you about how awful your country is. I wish it weren't so, but that's exactly. what they did and we'll share it with you regrettably coming up in a moment first of i want to tell you about think factor i love this stuff whether you're preparing for exams juggling family and career or you're just looking to stay sharp as you age thank you very much fig factor is here to help now is created obviously by the same company that makes relief factor Think Factor supports sharper focus, stronger recall, clearer thinking. It's a natural way to give your brain the daily nutrients it needs for memory, attention, and even vibrant vision. I take Think Factor every single day, and it helps me with my recall. I've noticed a big difference just one month into taking it. If you want to stay focused during demanding tasks, keep your memory strong, maintain mental energy for whatever's ahead. Think Factor is for you. Call 800, the number four, Relief, or visit ReliefFactor.com to order Think Factor. That's 800, the number four, relief, or go to Relieffactor.com. Your first bottle is just 1995. Think Factor.

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would trigger people like me and like you. He purposely delivered these video remarks to our country, to the world, because he wants you to be angry. And it worked, by the way, but I pause, and I remind you, don't take that bait. Don't do what I did and get angry at him. Instead, you should laugh at him. You should mock him and you should use this as an opportunity. to bolster your love of this country. You know, nothing makes somebody love our country more than seeing somebody burn our flag, than seeing somebody protest and burn one of our presidents in effigy. That's what this speech did. This is the rhetorical equivalent of burning the American flag on our 250th anniversary of declaring independence on the most patriotic moment in New York City, by the way. That's what Zohran Mamdani did. He used his speech to rhetorically burn the American flag. Here's a little bit of it. We'll start with clip 26, please. Zohran Mamdani. This is the hero of the Democrats, by the way. Listen, I'm not that guy who always says, points the finger. Oh, Democrats are evil and Republicans are great. No, I've heard me criticize Republicans enough here. Honestly. Lord knows you get that elsewhere. But it bears mentioning as you hear this that this is the man who not one Democrat dares to stand up to and challenge and say, actually, you're wrong about that. They all want to harness his political power, his political energy. He is the most powerful and influential voice in the Democratic Party right now. And here's how he chose to celebrate Independence Day. Go ahead. So standing here with me today. all of whom were recently naturalized. Nearly a decade ago, I too felt what you feel, the joy of no longer being just a New Yorker, but an American too. You each hold a special power, the power to determine what America means. The powerful have always known their answer. America, in their view, is an arena of supremacy, where only a select few are allowed freedom, where not all are created equal. America, if you ask them, becomes less, the more people it welcomes. America, they will tell you, belongs only to those with the right accent or the right shade of skin. The rest of us, they insist, should be grateful for merely being allowed to visit. How small they are. How weak. How unoriginal. At every moment in our past, those who led through exclusion and isolation have tried to win power and enrich themselves by turning us against one another. Division is the oldest trick in politics and the cheapest. But time and again, including 250 years ago, those forces of division have been vanquished by the forces of progress. As Thomas Payne once wrote, This new world hath been the asylum for the persecuted lovers of civil and religious liberty. Hither have they fled. And yet today, Too many of our leaders do not believe in a vision of this nation as an asylum for the persecuted, but rather as one that persecutes those seeking asylum. As we mark 250 years, what do we see? We see a city of contradictions within a nation of contradictions. We see the wealthiest country in the history of the world, one where children go to sleep hungry, while the world's first trillionaire hungers for more.

We see monopolies that dominate every industry, and oligarchs who buy elections. We see mass agents terrorizing our streets, eating food cooked by our undocumented neighbors, before spiriting them away in unmarked vans. We see a nation whose immense wealth has been built by those with calloused, dirt-street hands, those who toil on factory floors and chisel into stone. And we see a nation that has allowed so much of that wealth to be held instead in the soft hands of a precious few. Yes, we see America in a health insurance industry that exploits the sick, but that is not all we see when we look for America. We see it, too, in the nurse who works a double shift and then stops on our way home to check on an ailing neighbor. Yes, we see America in corporate landlords for whom negligence is a business model. We see it, too, in the father who tucks his children into bed, beneath a ceiling stained with leaks, who wakes before dawn to go to work, and still believes his country can do better by his family. Yes, we see America, when we spend our tax dollars on bombs and bailouts, when we sell our elections for the highest bidder. Yet we see it just as clearly in every American who still believes this country belongs to we, the people. We see America each time neighbors link arms with neighbors, without asking how long they have lived here, or what papers they have, as ICE invades our neighborhoods. We see America each time those young and old stand in the beating rain or the stifling heat to cast their ballots. So listen, we can continue. By the way, he's framing the shot there as he said. We'll talk about the desk he's sitting at in a moment. He says he's sitting behind it. He's actually sitting in front of it with his back against a fireplace. It was obviously set up as a staged event for who sits with their back. against a fireplace with a desk right under them. No one puts the desk there. They put the desk there for a purpose. We'll show you in a moment as he explains what that desk represents. He's also surrounded by 10 newly sworn in American citizens, all holding American flags. He's literally using them as props because they never get to talk. They're just there to be his set dressing. And they all look so angry at you. They are pissed off at you. For what? For allowing you to be a U.S. citizen? And he and Wes Moore, the governor of Maryland, will get to his speech in a moment. They both do the same thing. They all speak in platitudes about what they believe our founding principles were from their perspective. And then they constantly throw, they both did the same thing. They say, and yet. And yet, the people who have been elected to be your leaders over the last 250 years haven't been perfect saints. And yet, America has not always done everything perfectly. And yet, there have been, of course, and yet.

These people who hold our nation up to the utopian perfection that our founding documents and principles aspire to are disgusting, thinking that they can grandstand and create this sanctimonious platform to stand upon and lecture us all from. Because obviously, There have been imperfections, and so they stop for a moment on this occasion and amplify every single imperfection as if it is the totality of our story. And this is a man who, within the last 10 years, chose to be an American citizen, now lecturing you about how awful you are. where it takes the Ugandan American, who has now become your New York City mayor, to finally allow this country to reach its fullest potential, which apparently means not allowing people to amass fortunes over a billion dollars and delivering government-run health care. See, that's America's real potential. And until we do that, we've not lived up to our ideals. What? Said Thomas Payne? What? There's a little bit more. Clip 27 now, please, of Zohran Mamdani. As I sit behind George Washington's desk, alongside new Americans who came to this country, I cannot see all of America. But like so many who came before, I can see New York City. The city I see today looks very different than the one that greeted George Washington. In July of 1776, our city simmered under the yoke of oppression. The British had imposed a colonial rule so repressive that 250 years ago, 80 miles south, a small group of newspaper editors, farmers, and soldiers. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I can only see New York City. By the way, he's not sitting behind George White. This is the funniest part of the whole thing. He's sitting in front of the desk. Facing the camera are the drawers of the desk. But he did it on purpose. He said, listen, I'm going to sit here behind the fireplace in front of the fireplace with my back against it. Move that desk right in front of me because I want to piss people off because this will really anger them the fact that I get to sit at George Washington's desk because, yes, that same office now the mayor's office was the former president's office at our founding. And he did it to anger you. He did it to divide you. And that's the other thing in the first clip that we played where he says, oh, division is the cheapest and easiest form of politics. That's all he does is divide. He divides us by race. He divides us by religion. He divides us by nationality. He divides us by immigration status. He divides us by wealth and by class constantly. And it's always the other guys that he's pointing to. That would be you that are the problems. And then he gives you hateful, despicable, bigoted words that you have never uttered in your life and claims that that's what you live by. Let's go this last clip here, clip 28, if we have time for it, a little bit of Zoraam. I'm Donnie here. As we mark 250 years, what do we see? We see a city of contradictions within a nation of contradictions.

We see the wealthiest country in the history of the world. Oh, yes. We've already heard that part. All right, that's fine. It's a shorter clip of a period. By the way, one other thing, when he talks about, you know, a father tucking his child in as there are leaks in the ceiling in New York City, yeah, horrible stuff. Democrats run that city and have done so for decades. His criticism is not of you or of me. but of his own political party. All right, a little bit more, Wes Moore coming up next that you're going to hear. But first, I do want to celebrate 250 years here of Americans believing in a powerful idea that were meant to live free, free to work hard, free to move, and free to enjoy life without being held back. But if you've got everyday aches and pains, or maybe even worse than just everyday aches and pains, you've been, well, slowed down from your independence because of pain. I was laid up because of pain with sciatica is about six weeks ago. I started taking double doses of Relief Factor, the 100% drug-free research-based formula designed to help my body fight inflammation, which is one of the root causes of pain. And, well, yesterday I walk all through the National Mall in the Great American State Fair without a single twinge of pain. Declare your independence from pain. Go to Relieffactor.com. $1776,800, the number four, relief. Here's something most people don't know. When Warren Buffett was just 13 years old, he didn't put his money into a savings account. While other kids were earning next to nothing at local banks, Buffett put $114 into a little-known investment. Today, that $114 would be worth over $15 million. And it wasn't a risky trade, it wasn't even insider knowledge. It was an account that's been around since 1888, and over the last 25 years, it's average 29% a year. That's what happens when your money is allowed to compound. Compare that to today's savings accounts, paying less than half a percent, while inflation quietly eats away at your buying power. Buffett understood early. Banks are great... great businesses, just not for savers. If you'd like to see what some investors call the 29% account, go now to account 29.com. That's account, the numbers 2.9.com. Again, account 29.com. Wes Moore is the governor of Maryland running for re-election this year, and he has his eyes set on the White House as well, whether as vice president this time around or as president, perhaps. He claims he's not running for president, but that can change quickly, I promise you. Wes Moore has decided to take the occasion of our turn 50th to do a counter speech as well. Why do you need to have a response to the president's speech? These politicians have all said, They need to give their own response because Donald Trump can't meet the moment. They love saying meet the moment. They want to meet the moment. First of all, they said that without even hearing the president's speech. They all delivered their speeches before the president delivered their speech. So by definition, it's not a response. It's a pre-sponse.

a precursor. If anything, President Trump's speech was the response to these American haters. Wes Moore decided that he wanted to take this occasion to redefine patriotism for you because, well, appropriately, people who love this country will hear someone like Zohran Mamdani or as you're about to hear from Wes Moore. We hear them criticize our country, especially, and again, it's all about the setting. It's all about the timing. On our 4th of July celebration of independence for 250 years, where foreign countries can set aside our differences. Foreign countries can set aside problems. For crying out loud, Japan, a country we dropped two atomic bombs on, set that aside and celebrated the greatness of the United States of America. But Democrats... couldn't stop themselves. And when I say Democrats, I mean powerful elected officials who have ambition, who sadly in their political party, gain respect and stature when they talk our country down, when they criticize us, when they dump all over us. They couldn't look past whatever flaws our nation had and celebrate those things that we all agree make us great. No. Like Zohran Mamdani, the communist in New York, Wes Moore decided that his path for political ambition and success in his political party is to tell you that if you think you're patriotic because you love this nation and you celebrate our founding, well, you've got it all wrong. Like Zohran Mamdani choosing to give this speech from the perspective of a newly minted immigrant who comes here, becomes a citizen, and then wants to complain about everything that's wrong. Wes Moore decided his own path to redefine patriotism, the 1619 project. Here's a little bit of that speech. Yet today, the very premise of patriotism is under attack. Its meaning is being narrowed. Its purpose is being distorted, and we cannot let that happen. So today, I want to talk about why this matters and how we can move forward together. It matters because America's strength has never come from what we claim for ourselves. It has always come from what we give to one another. We are a nation of strength because we are a nation of sacrifice and a nation of service. Yeah, okay. I'm sorry, I can't take it. It actually goes on and on. And unlike Vice President JD Vance's speech and President Trump's speech and Secretary of Revenue, I don't suggest you go and watch it. If you want to, if you want to be better informed. I don't want to start our week and our Monday on our next 250 years on this note. I really don't. They chose to put it out in the public arena, and it's our responsibility to report on it and to give you our commentary. But let me just say, both Zohran Mamdani and Wes Moore, their speech has had a lot in common, not least of which, which you just heard there, about America's generous spirit.

about our charity, about our giving, about our volunteering, about how patriotic and wonderful our country is because of all, which is true. But you see, they don't celebrate or enact policies that have anything to do with giving and charity and sacrifice. As Wes Moore just... noted the greatness of America is about what we all give to each other. That's fine. But Wes Moore does not pass a law encouraging people or celebrating or rewarding people to give to one another. No, he compels you to give up what you have. Zohran Mamdani is not asking you to give and be charitable. He is taking it from you against your will. Please do not confuse voluntary charity and self-sacrifice and sharing and giving to make your fellow man better off in the long run. Don't confuse that with state-sponsored theft. But to redefine taxation and totalitarian policies that Zohran Mamdani suggesting for New York City or for what Wes Moore has already done in Maryland to confuse that with charity is to forget about burning the American flag, you're burning the dictionary. They have another thing in common these two, by the way, and I've mentioned it before. They both have terrific smiles, and it's an important thing when you're a politician to look happy. It's infectious. You want to have fun. And when Zohran Mamdani is being produced and handled for his TikTok videos, he has a great smile. But both of these men looked dower. They looked angry. And it did not serve them well. I'll leave it at that. A good morning morning from your nation's capital as, well, I was going to say cleanup begins after the July 4th celebrations, but the city has never looked better. No cleanup needed, in fact, I took the family down to the mall yesterday for the Great American State Fair, and the city has never looked better, and it was crowded. People were in great moods, even though it was 95 degrees, and my shirt was sopping wet within. Five minutes of walking through the various state presentations. We can talk about that a little bit as well as hear from you on your July 4 celebrations. What made it special this here, 855-784-4-2-55. Good morning. Larry O'Connor here on O'Connor and Company. Coming up, we've got Willie Nelson, town hall correspondent in Washington, D.C., talk about what he saw that night, especially when the mall got cleared and people had to sort of celebrate in the streets before they were allowed back in for the... fireworks because of lightning strikes and thunderstorms. Also coming up in the next hour, Matt Morgan is going to join us, get his impression of Governor Wes Moore's speech and redefining.

what patriotism means. If you disagree with him, you're a nationalist, says Wes Moore. We'll get into that. Right now, we're joined by Hans von Spikosky. Hans, of course, is our weekly guest here on all things legal. He is our legal analyst, in fact, so it makes a lot of sense. He also is with a senior legal fellow at advancing American freedom. Advancing American freedom. Hans, good morning, and happy Independence Day to you. Well, same to you. It really was an exciting week. I've been in this town 20 years. I've never seen a July 4 celebration like we had this past weekend. Yeah, it really was stunning and phenomenal. And you were saying you actually live in the flight path of those flyovers because the flyovers on Saturday until the storms had to shut them down. I mean, it was like a flyover every half hour. There was some great military jet doing their thing. No, that's right. It turned out we're under the approach path to the mall. I didn't know that until they started flying over the house. And so we're standing. My wife, I was standing out in the middle of our street. Yeah. Watching the planes go over and they were coming in very low. So it was really spectacular. That is so cool. Where I live, we get the Blue Angels once a year for the Naval Academy commencement speeches addresses. And it's great. For a couple of days, they're out doing their rehearsals and then the actual flyovers. But it must have been absolutely stunning and spectacular. And while we've got you here, I'd love to ask you real fast, because I mentioned this earlier, as we talked about Zohran Mamdani, being a recent immigrant from Uganda and not wanting to impose the same kind of ideology that has crippled countries around the world during the Cold War. You have your own family history, child of immigrants, coming from a totalitarian country, don't you? You have a bit of a different perspective than Zohran Mamdani. I do. My father was Russian, a white Russian. He fought the communist twice in Russia and then Yugoslavia before fleeing, basically, the United States. My mother grew up in Nazi Germany, and Zohran Mamdani wants to basically put in all of the same kind of, frankly, socialist, communist ideas they fled from. In fact, look, I don't know if you saw this, but the Babylon B had a great little story and picture of Cubans getting on rafts to flee New York City the way they had fled Cuba. And I think that's, look, they were, they were being funny, but they were making a very strong point about what he's trying to do in New York City, which will devastate and ruin the city of New York. Yeah, which we can have an economic debate about such things, but there's something that really, I think, touches off a hostile reaction from people like me, people like us, when a Zohran Mamdani or a Wes Moore or any other politician uses the occasion of our Independence Day, July 4th.

to basically criticize our freedoms and then to inject their political perspective as if theirs is the truly patriotic principle that links us back to our founding. It couldn't be further from the truth. It's just a lie. It is. And they really want to destroy our institutions. They apparently support, you know, violent protests in the streets. We've seen that. They want to convert the American Revolution into the French Revolution. I mean, that's really the kind of ideas that they're pushing. Also, by the way, Hans, they pretend to love the institutions of this country, but when those institutions run contrary to their opinions, they try to trash it or they want to destroy it, like the Supreme Court, for instance, as we had many decisions come down on behalf of the president. They, of course, said, oh, that's it. This is a rogue court and all that thing. Well, they did get one last week, and suddenly they all loved the Supreme Court again, and that was birthright citizenship. I'd love for you to reflect on that one. I know we've had a lot of time since the last time we discussed it, but you didn't think that it would come down quite as it did, right? Yeah, I mean, that was actually, frankly, shocking to me and very disappointing. Even the Washington Post, which, as you know, is very liberal, even they had an editorial, while they were happy with the decision, even they said the court had gone too far. in saying that birthright citizenship is required by the 14th Amendment. They actually said, no, they could have decided it on a statutory ground. I think they were wrong. Both Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito wrote devastating, devastating dissents that totally took apart. the majority opinion written by the Chief Justice, which historically, he got everything completely wrong. And that's the reason for a very bad decision. Clarence Thomas, I noted that he said during his dissent that he does not believe history will be kind to this decision. He's got a pretty good track record when he says that. Do you have some solace in the fact that it was 5'4 and that Thomas believes that this decision was on shaky ground to begin with it? There were only one justice away from having this reversed? Or what do you think the way forward is?

Oh, no, I agree. There's one thing that we could change this decision, and that is a change in hopefully one or two justices on the court who take the correct view, which is the one expressed by the dissenters. Frankly, the other thing that's going to have to happen is both the executive branch to the extent it can and Congress are going to have to tighten all of the rules regarding, for example, legal immigrants coming into the country. They're going to have to change the questionnaire that tourists fill out when they're on planes headed to the U.S. and say, are you pregnant? Because if a woman is pregnant and she's coming here as a tourist, she needs to be stopped at the airport, put on a plane, and sent back out of the country. That's the only way to prevent the long-term consequences of what John Roberts incorrectly decided. So statutorily, they can do this. Like, all right, if somebody has a baby here, constitutionally, that baby is a citizen no matter what the circumstances. So, and that's what they claim the constitution states. Fine. Those are the rules. Okay. So now we're just going to keep pregnant people from coming to the country. Is that statutorily, there's nothing preventing that being our immigration policy, right? No, no. And also, for example, if someone's a permanent resident alien, They should change the law to say that you are immediately automatically deportable if you have a child in the United States or get pregnant. That's another unfortunate consequence of what the Chief Justice has done. Well, get ready for that fight. That'll be a hell of one. Hans, also, while I've got you, Mike Johnson, the Speaker of the House, suggested yesterday on Fox News that he is going to now push for the Save America Act once again, this time in another reconciliation bill. Knowing the rules there in the Senate, is that a possibility? Or will they have to do away with the current parliamentarian to get that done? Is there a way? the Save America Act fits into the fiscal rules and restrictions of a reconciliation package. Well, the parliamentarian has said that that's against the rules to do that. So unless John Thune fires her, he doesn't have the 60 votes to overrule her. I think the other thing he's got to do besides firing her is to consider actually punishing. The handful of senators who've been voting against this. Yes, Thom Tillis, for example, is headed out of... the Senate, but right now he's the chairman of one of the subcommittees of the Banking and Finance Committee. That ought to be revoked. He should not be the chairman of that committee. Mitch McConnell is the head of one of the major committees, rules and administration. His chairmanship ought to be revoked if he continues to oppose this.

Finally, Hans, everyone's going to be talking about soccer today as the U.S. teams squares off against Belgium in the round of 16. Florin Balogun, one of the top stars, got a red card on questionable rules on the last game, which meant he wasn't going to be eligible. That got reversed yesterday by FIFA. There's some suggestion that the Trump administration and the Justice Department may have played a hand in this. Is it typical for U.S. attorneys to get involved in an international sporting event like this? Well, I don't recall that happening before. On the other hand, international organizations, for example, the International Olympic Committee, they have in the past made questionable decisions. And for the executive branch to get involved, I don't think it's that unusual, even though it doesn't happen at all. Well, if it's happening here on our soil and there's fraud involved, we should get involved. We'll get more on that a little later. Thanks, Hans. Coming up, we're going to hear from our Washington correspondent Willie Nelson, who was all over the place this last week, from New York Harbor to the deck of the USS Arlington, sailing into New York Harbor on that great Navy vessel to the National Mall on Saturday, including a danceoff. He started dancing. with all the people down there at the mall. It's a long story, but it was because of the rain delay, the storm delay, the heat delay. Here's what happened. It is impossible to recount what happened in Washington, D.C. this weekend without talking about the weather and most specifically the heat. It was, and I know you guys are, oh, you're whining about it being hot. I don't know. It was the hottest spot in the country. It was hotter than Phoenix, Arizona. It was scorching. It was well over 100 degrees. It was also about a thousand percent humidity. All right. Maybe the Mike DeWine point wasn't quite that high. I would say it was in the 90s, certainly. And also, by the way, add to that the fact that there was not a breeze to be felt pretty much anywhere. and you've got thousands and thousands and tens of thousands of people all crammed into one space. It was intense, to say the least. I was down at the mall yesterday, and we had a bit of a break. I want to say it was about 95 degrees when I was there yesterday, and not quite as crowded as the all-day concert and American State Fair Festival that was going on on the mall. The state fair was going on, but not the concerts and certainly not all of the people in anticipation of that evening's fireworks that you saw on Saturday. And yesterday when I was there, it was, well, it was hard to manage. You know, you park somewhere and you walk a few blocks to get to the mall. And by the time you're actually in and bouncing from state to state pavilion, you're drenched. And so that's what it was like on Saturday, but that much more. And then around 5 p.m. They actually...

postponed the entire event. They shut down the Great American State Fair. They shut down the Ferris wheel. They stopped the concert. They postponed the entire event due to heat. It got that bad. Add to that, a thunderstorm that was rolling into the area. Here in this region, just off of the Chesapeake Bay in the mid-Atlantic, I've been doing radio here every morning for going on my 15th year now, starting my 15th year this month. Every single day over the summer, I've been giving a weather report that's part of doing morning radio show. And the weather is almost always the same. You give the temperature, that changes. But every day it's, you know, sunny skies's possible thunderstorm this afternoon could be severe. It's very funny. Every single day in the summer, you always say, ah, the possibility of a storm could be a severe thunderstorm. And then some days, nothing develops. And some days, some rain happens. And some days, like Saturday, the 4th of July, you have a squall breakout. I mean, this was one of the most severe thunderstorms we've had since a couple of years ago when an actual tornado ripped through part of Annapolis, destroying some homes. People lost power. Trees were getting blown down. At my home, part of my fence got blown in. That's how severe the storm was. And I was at a pool party of my friend, Sarah and Tommy's house. And we were having a great time celebration. Then everybody is like, you know, that moment. Okay, everybody out of the pool. Everyone had to get out of the pool. And we all sought shelter as it just became a downpour. And when that happened on the mall, they cleared everybody out of the mall. So everyone's now flooding into Constitution Avenue or Independence Avenue. Everyone's just filling the streets. outside the mall the people are still there and they just decided to have a party they all started dancing and our own willie nelson actually participated in the dance off he did a uh a running man he didn't do the uh the the sprinkler thing you know with the he did basically he did every single cheesy late 80s early 90s dance move and then there was this moment if we can get to this this is um clip five This is a beautiful moment. I think this is in the lobby of what was the Trump Hotel. I'm trying to, now that's not. I don't know what space this is, but this was caught on video of all these people who sought shelter. They went into the lobby of this building and take a listen to what happened.

Saint-Gul, and who are saved. That's amazing. Actually, that was on the Twitter account of Secretary Brooke Rollins of the Department of Agriculture. So maybe that was the atrium at Ag. I've never been in that building, but it is right off the mall. Great times, despite the weather. Good Monday morning from the Relief Factor Studios. And yeah, we're basking in the glow of that incredible Independence Day holiday weekend that we just enjoyed. And as I mentioned with the weather and how dicey it was, you know, Fox News had a whole setup there. They had the platform and the booth and the green room and they just did a whole... media set up. It was almost like they were covering, you know, the Republican National Convention or something. And at one point, Fox News is like, oh, great. We would plan the entire evening here. We've got all of this programming. We've got the fireworks. And now we've got a cancellation. We've got a postponement. We've got a storm coming in. We've got a heat stroke. What the heck is going on? Brett Bear reported that he had picked up the phone. And, well, I'm guessing the president probably called him. But either way, he had a conversation with President Trump to give a status report. And here's what Brett reported at the time. He said, those veterans had to go through bad weather, had to go through bad weather on D-Day. I'm going through bad weather. No matter what happens, I am delivering this speech. We are going to do this program. Maybe it'll be a little bit shorter, but I'm going to do it, whether it's 10 or 11 or 2 a.m. And I said, Mr. President, you know, there might not be anybody here. He said, I don't care. It's America 250. If they can storm the beaches of D-Day on D-Day. I can deliver a speech, and we can keep on this program going. And they keep going, they did. The show must go on, and the president does come from the entertainment world, so he gets that. And they did stay there. In fact, there were tens of thousands, if not upwards to 100,000 there in the mall once the fireworks began, and they were spectacular. They didn't go anywhere. Well, I mean, they had to clear the mall. And then what did they do? Well, they flooded into the neighborhoods right around the mall. And we just showed you the spontaneous national anthem that broke out in other areas. Dancing broke out, including this dork who decided to start dancing in the middle of this tree. Can we see that, please? This clip cut 39. It is. There's, yeah, I mean, listen, talk about the whitest of white dudes dancing. For those of you who are listening on the radio, you should go to Salem News Channel, check the stream out. He's doing the robot. He's doing the running man. Oh, wait a second. That's not just any ordinary dorky white dude. That's our dorky white dude. It's Willie Nelson. Tout Hall and Salem correspondent for Washington, D.C. Willie, you got moves, my friend.

Good morning, Larry. Great to be here with you. Thank you. I appreciate that. Do you appreciate me calling you a Dorky White dude? Hey, you know, it's nice to be talked about regardless. I'm just sorry you didn't do the sprinkler. That was the one move you could have added to the, to the repertoire or the Roger Rabbit. But tell me what the mood was like there. You were there, you were doing the whole thing. It must have been, you know, how many changes of clothes did you bring because you were sop and wet? And then suddenly you get the announcement. Everybody's got to clear out of the mall because of weather. What was the mood like from everybody? Yeah, so I had the pleasure of going to the salute to America's celebration. And at first, it was incredibly, incredibly hot out. I think it was close to 100 degrees when I left my apartment. And they were worried about the heat advisory all night. And this thing was way more packed than I was expecting, to be honest. I mean, I even had like a special pass. And even the special pass line had a pretty big line. So this thing was filled to capacity. Yeah. Yeah, it was huge. I saw that too. And that, of course, you get all those bodies together and the heat then starts to generate even further. When they cleared out the mall, what time was that? Yeah, so they cleared out the mall probably around 7 p.m. They announced that everyone was going to have to evacuate due to an oncoming storm. And it was a little unclear whether it was a serious thing or not. I heard the announcement and I thought, wait, did I hear that correctly? Because I was taking some video on my phone. And then two minutes later, they announced it again. And nobody wanted to leave. I mean, nobody wanted to leave. Everyone was like, no, we're staying around here. I ran into other people who were like, no, I'm not leaving. Other media people. And eventually, after like 15 minutes, Secret Service or mall police started telling everyone like, no, this is serious guys. But then right at the same time, all of a sudden. all these flyovers began. It was like, they were like, we're going to do the grand finale right now. And so everyone was kind of just looking around and amazement, owing and awing, as we're supposed to be evacuating. But eventually, we were able to evacuate. And Larry, as you said, then began the dance party. I was ready to go home, Larry. Honestly, I did not know how Washington, D.C. gets down. You know, I've only been here for a month now. Larry, this was this was the party of the year. There you go.

That we listen, we don't have a party. We usually don't stay out quite as late as the New Yorkers do. But when we party, we do party. It's just, you know, we all have early wakeups. Willie Nelson joins us. He's our Washington correspondent. He's, in fact, he's in the press briefing room at the White House right now, reflecting on the events there on the fourth. Real fast, when they called the evacuation, you said some people didn't believe it. Like, if I'm in Washington, D.C., on the mall, through the security, the president's supposed to appear. And suddenly they say, we have to evacuate due to heat. I would think, oh, so this is really a bomb threat, right? They're just saying it's he because they don't want to cause a panic. Did anybody, were people talking about that maybe? I didn't hear that once. No, I genuinely did think it was the weather because it did change from significantly hot to very, very muggy and overcast very quickly. Now, the confusion was whether it was temporary or not. Everyone was saying, oh, it's a temporary evacuation. And then others were saying, no, I'm getting out of here. This thing, you know, is a bus. But when I was leaving, I saw all the TSA machines have been broken down. So even I was like, well, how are they going to get everyone back on if they've just broken down all the security? Right. Lo and behold, after a couple hours of dancing in the streets, which honestly, in my opinion, this made it way, this made it even more fun. Because everyone was just in the 4th of July celebratory mood, the American spirit, having the time of their life. People of all ages, I mean, It was almost like it was planned that they had a DJ right in the front just blasting so many great hits. Everyone was just having the time of their life, joining in a dance circle. And then at one point, President Trump posted on Truth Social that this thing is going to happen. I don't care what it takes. And I love what he said. I love what he said. He said, it's a Saturday night. Let's have some fun. Because that's exactly what the mood was. I looked at my phone. I said it's... It's 9 p.m. He's right. It's Saturday night before the July. We're here to have a good time. Let's keep the party rolling. It's so cool. And... Well, I'll see, also you guys, you started doing the line dancing thing, but you took over the streets. I mean, all the streets were shut down, so it became this spontaneous patriotic Washington, D.C. Street party. It really is an incredible thing. People of all races, and you, even you, Willie, breaking out your moves. So you get back in. Oh, by the way, did it actually rain on you? Like where I was in Maryland, I was probably about 30 miles from the mall. We got drenched. We had an absolute downpour. Did it rain on the mall? Did you guys get soaked as well? I would not describe it as drenched. It was way less worse than... It wasn't as bad as anyone was expecting. I think it was...

Like a slight drizzle. I mean, I was expecting a storm or at least like a heavy downpour, but I mean, I was never at any point soaked other than when I did eventually get back in and I forgot that I'd have been raining. So I sat down on my seat and kind of got in a short sweat. Nice move. Yeah, yeah. Rookie mistake. I'm from the West Coast. And other than that, it really wasn't that like terribly wet. All right. All right, so we did get a storm elsewhere in the region. Fireworks were spectacular. We all saw that. By the way, before we get too far down our agenda here, Willie, I do want to point out you started the week with a pretty special thing. I saw this great video that you supplied for Town Hall and for Salem, where you got to fly out on a helicopter and land on the USS Arlington and then sail into New York Harbor. Tell us about that for a bit. That's correct. And by the way, thank you and Sean Spicer for setting that up. That was an incredible experience. I got to fly out of a helicopter out of downtown Manhattan to the USS Arlington, which is a naval ship that has Navy sailors and Marines on it. And they were sailing into New York City for the Fleet Week and celebration of America's 250th birthday. And to have the honor to speak to these sailors and marine members about what it means to celebrate 250 and what it's like to live on the ship and everything they've done in the military was, you know, words can't even describe. It was so incredible. And these are some of the, these are the hardest working men and women this country has to offer. And they could have been more proud to be celebrating in New York City. Morse of July, Larry, it was a once in a lifetime opportunity that you sent me on, and I, you know, I couldn't be more grateful for it. Well, it's very fun. Sometimes, as editor of Town Hall, sometimes I get to do some assignments, and you were the perfect man for that assignment, Willie. And I got to say, there's something so cool about, you know, 250 years ago, it was the British fleet. It was coming into menace and wreak havoc on Americans, and now it was replaced by the U.S. fleet. That was a beautiful thing to see. All right, and now I got to say, I didn't expect this, but, Willie, we got to turn to the other major event this weekend. The marriage of Taylor Swift to football player Travis Kelsey, we were going to make passing mention of this until we found out. that our own Washington, D.C. correspondent, Willie Nelson, actually has a connection to Taylor Swift. You, as a kid, a teenager, you appeared in the Shake It Off video? That's correct. When I was 18 years old, I'm 30 years old now, so this is 12 years ago. A week out of high school, I dance in the music video, shake it off alongside Taylor Swift. Oh, man. And you couldn't, like, seal the deal? You didn't say, I mean, she could have had you instead of Travis Kelsey. Did you make a move? Did you try to sweet talk her in any way?

You know, we did have some chatter. And she told me she really liked that my name was Willie Nelson. And she actually said it makes sense. That's why you're such a good dancer. So she was flattery of my name. And honestly, I have nothing but good things to say about her. She was great to work with. No, it's great. And for those of you watching the stream, there is a picture of Willie, a very young Willie Nelson dancing with Taylor in the video. So what do you think of the wedding? You are now our official Taylor Swift correspondent since you have such a deep, close personal connection to T-Swift. What can you tell us about the big wedding? Well, I take all assignments very seriously, Larry, and I studied hell out of this wedding. So they had it at Madison Square Garden on Friday, July 23rd, and get this. Adam Sandler was the efficient. How about that? Adam Sandler. That would be cool, but only if he does one of his voices. You know, I'd want him to do it as... One of the movie characters. Did he sing? Did he do the wedding singer stuff? That would have been great. Oh, that would have been really great. No, he did not sing. However, Paul McCartney and Stevie Nix did. So that's a pretty good lineup for a couple wedding performers. Willie, I'm going to have to cut it off there. We've reached our quota of Taylor Swift stuff. We just can't. Otherwise, our audience starts to get dumber as we go. No, we're happy for the married couple. We want them to have babies. And they should name their first baby Willie after you. Thank you, Willie. Appreciate you joining us, as always. Keep up the great work. He's having fun. It should be fun. And if you're like Willie and you're climbing the corporate ladder, you're launching a new project, you're looking for the extra edge, your brain is the most valuable asset. And now there's a way to support it every single day. Think Factor. It's from the makers of Relief Factor. Think Factor is built to help you stay sharp, nurture your memory, boost your attention. It unlocks the mental clarity and precision. You need to stay ahead of the game, no matter the challenge. I've been taking Think Factor for about a month now, and I notice the difference. So I personally endorse it. It does give you that extra edge. If you're a go-getter, you refuse to settle. Think Factor helps you to perform at your best. Call 800, the number four, relief, or go to Relieffactor.com. The first bottle is just 1995. 800, the number four, ReliefFactor.com to order Think Factor. And yes, we're spending quite a bit of time reflecting on the weekend here. There's plenty of news as well looking forward. And coming up in our next hour, we're going to talk about the way forward legally for the...

The birthright citizenship issue, we'll speak with Theo Wald of the former assistant attorney general. Talk about that and statutorily what the president could do or policy-wise what the governor could do. Also, Matt Morgan is going to join us. He's a delegate in Maryland. Talk about Wes Moore's, I hate America, Independence Day speech and whether that's going to play nationally as he clearly wants to be your president. of the United States. That said, we've got to talk about these fireworks. And again, the liberal media's response to these fireworks, it just astounds me that we can't just set things aside. See, I can't imagine right of center media. If Kamala Harris were president right now. And Kamala Harris had planned the biggest fireworks display in the history of this country, which you probably wouldn't have anyway. But if she did. I can't imagine getting in front of you speaking into this microphone and saying, well, you know, the fireworks may have been big and bright and colorful, but it caused a whole lot of damage. through air pollution and air quality. I wouldn't do that, but that's what the left did. That's what the New York Times did. That's what CNN did. They put all these warnings out. They all said, this is a terrible thing because of smoke, because apparently fireworks caused smoke. Now, and by the way, other side of that same coin, there is no possible way they would have done the same thing if their gal was in the White House. If one of their can, Joe Biden or Barack Obama, God knows who else, Gavin Newsom were the President of the United States and they planned this giant fireworks display, the New York Times would not be wringing their hands and clutching their pearls over smoke. becoming an environmental hazard. But this was across the board. First, Doug Burgum, Rofast, Doug Burgum, the Secretary of the Interior, who sort of oversaw a lot of the festivities in Washington. He was on CNN Sunday asked about this. It's a great response. This is clip 17, please. Boys and Girls Clip 17. Go ahead. The plan was 850,000 fireworks. The goal was to break the world record. Did it? I'm confident we did. Anybody that saw it knows there's been nothing like that in the history of the U.S. It was really spectacular.

Oh, so that was just that. Later on, there was some question of this. In fact, CNN put this post out that said residents of Washington, D.C. briefly experienced the worst air quality of any major city in the world. Well, the key is briefly. Briefly. I assure you that there are other cities around the world that has worse air quality. Have you been to Manila? No offense to Manila. But I've been to Manila. Generally, on a regular basis, it's not the best air quality. Residents of Washington, D.C. briefly experienced the worst air quality of any major city in the world according to a company that ranks pollution globally as the capital reckoned with the aftermath of a massive 40-minute 4th of July fireworks show. Reckoned with the aftermath. They have set themselves up to be the no-fund party. That's who they are now. They don't want you to have any fun. They don't want anyone in this country to enjoy being American or to enjoy themselves for that matter. They cannot help themselves. Here's the New York Times. The Trump Derangement Syndrome infiltrating the people on the left, the organized intelligentsia, headline, opinion, guest essay, Trump ruined Fourth of July for me. Let me just say that if your love of this country and your ability to celebrate our independence is contingent on who's sitting in the White House, you're not doing America properly. You need to go back and learn how to properly do America. Politico followed suit. Their headline, the rise of the right has reshaped how we think about patriotism. By the way, there's nothing new here. I remember John Kerry and Bill Clinton and Michael Dukakis. These are the politicians of my youth, all saying, don't you dare question my patriotism when no one questioned their patriotism. It's always funny to me when they lead with that. We have to fix this country and don't question my patriotism. I'm sorry, I think that that's a you thing. I think that's in your head because, frankly, you're not feeling very patriotic. Patriotic means you love your country. And if all you do is bad. Imagine being in a marriage. I hear this all the time for people like Zohran Mamdani and from Wes Moore, who we're going to speak about a little later in that speech, and other people on the left who like to. crap all over this country and its founding and its principles. They always say, you know, well, the highest form of patriotism is to point out the flaws of your country. To truly prove that you love your country, you have to point out their flaws at any given opportunity. Let me just tell you something. Guys, don't try that with your wife or with your girlfriend. In fact, I shouldn't even make this gender specific or sex specific. Women, don't do that to your guy. You know, I love you. And to prove how much I love you, I am now going to take this occasion of your birthday to tell you about everything that's wrong with you. Yeah, don't try that. It's not going to end well for you.

I'm going to take the occasion of our anniversary to tell you everything that's wrong in our marriage. Who does that? Answer? Liberal Democrats, apparently, and our media. You know, our founders believe the freedom wasn't just a word. It was a way of life. It's the freedom to move forward, the freedom to pursue what matters most, and the freedom to live fully. But pain has a way of taking those freedoms away. That's why relief factor exists. It's funny when I was walking all through the mall, I think I'd probably put in about five miles yesterday with my two sons and Meredith. And I stopped at one point and said, you know, a month ago with my sciatica, it was right around Memorial Day, a little over a month ago. I didn't think I could recover. I thought that I was going to have to live with that pain for the rest of my life. Relief factor has been the difference. Relief factor is a 100% drug-free research-based supplement. It's designed to help support a healthy inflammatory response, and it addresses pain at its source. It doesn't cover up the pain. Over a million Americans have tried relief factor. About two-thirds go on to order more. Right now, you can join them. You can try Relief Factor right now for a special patriotic price of just $17.76. Get that three-week quick start for 1776. Go to Relieffactor.com or call 800, the number four, relief. Good Monday morning to you. Coming off of a long holiday weekend, we hope that you're ready to start the second half of this year, the right way. Started every morning right here on O'Connor Company. It's Larry O'Connor in the Relief Factor Studios on our flagship station, WMAL, out of Washington, D.C., glad to be a part of your morning routine. Coming up in 30 minutes, we're going to check in with Theo Wall. Now, he was a former assistant training general. He's a former White House deputy assistant for domestic policy. He has been part of drafting the president's policies on birthright citizenship. So we're going to go right to the source and figure out from him what the way forward is on our immigration policies in light of last week's Supreme Court decision. Again, he's one of the ones who wrote the current policy that was up for a challenge at the Supreme Court. So that's coming up in 30 minutes with Theo Wald. Right now, as we've all morning long been reflecting on the events this weekend, our Independence Day holiday, the speeches, the patriotic ones we led the show with some great remarks from the vice president, the Secretary of State, and the president, of course. But then sadly, we had to show you the mayor of New York, Zohran Mamdani, and the governor of Maryland, Wes Moore, who decided that they wanted to redefine patriotism. They wanted to redefine what it was to be America, what our founding principles were. And, oh, by the way, If you disagree with them, well, as Wes Moore put it, you're probably a white nationalist. In fact, let's play that clip real fast from Wes Moore. It's cut 23 here, a little package put together by the local Baltimore television station, WBAL. Here's Wes Moore telling you that if you disagree with him, you're probably a racist and a Nazi. Go ahead.

That is the work of patriotism. Patriotism is neither passive nor performative. Patriotism is not selfish. It is selfless. But today there are those who will use patriotism to justify pulling books from schools and rewriting history until it comforts those in power. That's not patriotism. That's nationalism. Patriotism asks you to fight for values. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Matt Morgan is a delegate of the Maryland General Assembly. He represents St. Mary's County. He's also the chairman of the Freedom Caucus. Well, great to be lectured to about rewriting history from a guy whose political party tore down statues representing historic founders of this nation. What do you make of Wes Moore, your governor, my governor, now trying to make a play for national politics by dumping all over our founding? Well, I thought she thought it was ironic. First, he sets this up as a counter programming to the president. He held this speech in the second floor of the state house, which holds about 50 people. Now, I logged in because I knew I was going to do this interview with you, Larry, online. The YouTube channel had 17 people watching it when I logged in at 11 o'clock in the morning. So let's sit there and say that, you know, this is about the same amount of people that are in our local coffee house. much less, you know, competing with the president of the United States is a little bit hysterical. But with that being said, he had a great opportunity to differentiate himself from Democratic candidates across the country. Instead, by saying that, you know, he agrees with the country, he wanted to celebrate it. Instead, he went down the same path as Zaharadani up there and listed his great list of grievances. Yeah, and listen, we know what Wes Moore stands for. We know who he is as a politician. He's no different than pretty much the most radical of the left. He just, he shades it or camouflages it a little bit better. and tries to wrap it in a faux patriotism. But I was struck by the fact, Delegant Morgan, that one thing Wes Moore's got going for him is he's pretty telegenic. He's got a good smile. You know, he's good at sort of the retail end of politics. But this was an angry Wes Moore. There wasn't a whole lot of smiling going on there. I felt like he was lecturing me. I don't think that plays very well. Well, Wes Moore is a very good actor. I mean, he can unload a line, a rehearsed line that someone else's wrote, probably better than, he's probably the best politician since Obama to do that. But when you ask a follow-up question, it's very empty. There's not a lot of substance behind that. And take the little clip that you played just for people listening, the lead in here. Basically, he's saying that if you disagree with... You want the pornography out of the schoolroom. Well, then you're a nationalist. If you disagree with his revisiting his history, you're a nationalist. If you, you know, he confused patriotism and nationalism and said that...

nationalism is about splitting people up in groups. Now, there's one thing consistent with Wes Moore and Annapolis Democrats. They're always going to accuse you of what they're already doing. Nobody splits people up and divides people more than Annapolis Democrats and Wes Moore. They do it consistently. About a month ago, he just launched a task force for migrants. while ignoring the rest of the population. So look, this is a history with them. It's classic Wes Moore, and people should know what they're getting themselves into when they support this guy. Yeah, you're right. And it is kind of fascinating. By the way, it's the political left who want to ban books from schools. They banned to kill a mockingbird. They banned Huckleberry Finn and the Mark Twain books. They love banning books. We conservatives, yeah, we dare to say that our sixth graders shouldn't be exposed to gay pornography, like explicit gay porn with these are graphic novels. So it's actually drawings and vivid drawings at that. And then suddenly we're accused of being a nationalist. Listen, if they want to have a political debate about this, I'm more than willing to engage in it. I think we're going to win that one. Delegate Morgan. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, Maryland people are on our side and American people are on our side because it's common sense that you want reasonable regulations about what your children read. That's called being an adult. But look, this constant, I don't know why it was acceptable for either one of them, Zohran Mamdani or Wes Moore, to come out on our nation's 250th birthday. Like, these guys cut on the nation all the time. You would think just one day, one day out of 250 years, they could come together and say, you know what, America's a pretty good place. But instead, they hold press conferences to, you know, to elevate themselves instead of celebrating the country. It's also, by the way, ironic, you know, you get to work in that state house 90 days of the year during the session of the beginning of the year, Delegate Morgan. At that point forward, it becomes basically a museum. It's an amazing tourist attraction. I love going. It's the oldest functioning statehouse in the country. It goes back to pre-constitution days. In fact, it is the site. where General George Washington surrendered his commission as the commander-in-chief of our armed forces and just went back to his private life at Mount Vernon during the Articles of Confederation years. He had an opportunity, Wes Moore did, to celebrate that. He mentioned it. But instead, he actually displayed himself to be the opposite of General Washington. And he's actually trying to acquire more power. And that's how he's been as governor, too, in terms of regulations and taxes. He can't help himself because that's how you get rewarded in the Democratic Party, I believe.

Yeah, that's absolutely true. I mean, the Democratic Party needs a permanent underclass and their party is based on taking from one group of people and giving it to another group of people. That's their entire party right now. And he's a governor that came in the office with a $5 billion surplus, blew it to the point where we've raised $2 billion in taxes. Look. My car registration was $185. You add on that plus some of the green mandates that have been absolute failures as far as energy policy goes. You have a state that is very hard to live in, and that's why people are considering moving from Maryland. And it's sad. And it shouldn't be that way. I'm a Republican in Maryland. I'm outnumbered. I used to live in California, so I'm used to being outnumbered. But once in a while, we actually can rally and we can get a Republican governor elected. We saw it with Larry Hogan, Governor Ehrlich as well. Two of the last four, Larry. Yeah, exactly. So we can get it done. So give us a little hope here. Dan Cox has been nominated again as governor. We'll have him on the show to lay out his case. But he ran against more last time, and it did not go well for him. He's now the nominee again for the Republican Party. What's the case to be made against Wes Moore? Well, I think you have two competing views. This election is about worldview. And if you want to go down the route of Zohran Mamdani, you want to go down the route of insane taxes, high cost of living, them choosing criminals over citizens. Well, then your choice is clear. Support Wes Moore if you like that. Dan Cox is a noble guy. I served with him in the General Assembly. You know, the media tends to paint him as a radical. I would ask on what issue? What issue is he is a radical on? To me, his policies are pretty common sense. I think he agrees with overwhelmingly to 80% of Marylanders. It's just whether a question of whether people are willing. willing to hear him out and give him a chance. And I would ask people to be open-minded through this election. They know the results they're going to get in the next four years. We're coming into Annapolis next year, Larry, looking at a $3 billion deficit. caused by Wes Moore. Nobody will tell you how they're going to close this deficit. Personally, I think they're looking at some type of broad-based tax increase, like expanding sales tax, six to eight percent, because they're out of accounting and gimmicks. Meanwhile, by the way, the Francis Scott Keybridge, I mentioned this on the show last week. The Empire State Building was constructed in one year back in the 30s. The Francis Scott Key Bridge has been collapsed over two years now, and not one thing has been done to build that. You would think that we could call into question Wes Moore's incompetence, let alone ideology in this election. Yeah, absolutely. Let me ask you, if Ron DeSantis was the governor of Maryland, would that bridge be built?

Yeah, and I think that we'd be driving flying cars across it at this point. Yeah, no, absolutely. Yeah. So once again, they come out and they promise that government's going to be the end-all, be-all to everyone, and then it's failing. Delegate Matt Morgan, speaking on behalf of we few, we proud, we Republicans in the state of Maryland. Thanks, Delegate Morgan. Appreciate it. We'll have Dan Cox on soon and other Republicans, as I know what it's like to be a minority Republican. I know where you're living right now. You might feel the same. Keep it here on O'Connor and Company. Florian Balligan is a soccer player for the United States men's national team. He usually plays professional football, they call it over there in Europe. For Monaco, which is part of the French Football Federation, the FFF, if you're keeping a square at home. I think he's got a $40 million dollar euro contract there with them. He's good. He's very good. And he's the star player for the U.S. men's national team. And he got a red card, a bogus, stupid red card penalty in the first round of 32 for the knockout rounds there in the World Cup against Bosnia-Herzegovina. The U.S. won anyway, even though we were shorthanded. We got a second goal there to ice the game. But because of the international rules, that red card means that he can't play in tonight's match against Belgium to advance further than America's ever advanced before. But they appealed. The U.S. men's team appealed. In the afterglow of our Independence Day celebration, FIFA, the international body that rules over soccer for the World Cup, reversed that red card. They suspended it and now Balagon will play. And that's where the drama begins. There is some suggestion that President Trump and some attorneys for the administration put pressure on FIFA to make this decision, which, by the way, if they did, good. It's what you want your U.S. government to do to protect. Trust me, one of these European, Latin American countries, they would have done worse. They would have threatened some attack. Well, Europe can't attack. They don't have any military left. But the Latin American countries would have sent some cartels in there to defend their team and defend their player. But the fact of the matter is that apparently isn't what the president did. Apparently, he called FIFA to get information, not to say anything, not to lobby, not to put pressure on, but to find out exactly what went into this decision, how they reached it. so that if asked, he would be able to give an answer on it. No one from FIFA has said in any way that there was any problem. In fact, it turns out that the way they went about this suspension violated FIFA internal policy, and they have reversed it. The bottom line here is that we get our full complement of our team and we're able to compete against Belgium at full strength. It's going to be a tough match. We might end up losing. but at least we're going to put our best foot forward and our best player forward. By the way, it should be noted before you hear about it elsewhere, that by definition, Florin Belogan, the player that we're celebrating here and getting excited about him helping us win the World Cup potentially, especially now the Brazil is out, that's crazy, Norway beat Brazil. It should be noted that technically, by definition,

Mr. Baloggan is an anchor baby. Well, he's benefited from being a birthright citizenship baby, let's just say. You see, his parents are British. They were visiting New York from London. And when they went to return, the mother was pregnant well into her eighth month, she was prevented from getting on the plane by officials because they didn't want her to do the transatlantic flight. And so by an accident of timing, Belogan was born in Brooklyn, thus making him an American citizen. birthright citizenship ironically and then at two months old he returned to london and basically has spent his whole life in europe that's why he's a good soccer player If he were here, he'd be a good football player or basketball player or baseball player, and he'd be, well, probably making even more money playing a sport that people cared about. But instead, he plays soccer for Monaco, and that's probably a good life, too, I suppose, making $40 million living in Monaco. I'll take it. Isn't Monaco tax-free? Okay, it's worked out well for him, let's just say. But he is a U.S. citizen. because of birthright citizenship. That's the irony while we're having this debate in this country. And now he might be the most celebrated athlete in the world if he can lead our team to victory. And now you know the rest of the story. So there is some irony here, I think. Of course, he is the exception, not the rule. And I was wrong to call him an anchor baby because as far as I know, he has not now used his U.S. citizenship to bring eight members of his extended family in from foreign countries. And also, by the way, even if he did, they wouldn't be on welfare and they wouldn't be on government assistance and they wouldn't be bilking. taxpayers here in America to be able to support them because they've got a very wealthy nephew son grandson and cousin one of the most celebrated soccer players in the world so they wouldn't need that we welcomed that family because they won't be taking money from our pockets to pay for their food. Coming up, we're going to have a conversation about birthright citizenship, and now we might overturn it, ironically. And go USA. Go! Yeah, the truth is coming out. Lots of reporters now are actually doing their job. Trump asked about the rule, got the information from FIFA.

White House lawyers and lawyers affiliated with Justice Department offered to help the U.S. men's team. Basically, they picked up the phone, called the people at the U.S. men's national team. It's the national team. You know, that's okay. There's nothing wrong with that offered to help. Process went through all the official channels. Everything is on the up and up. And now you're getting people, especially Euro trash reporters, saying, oh, this was Trump threatening them. And this is, you know, this is not fair. This isn't right. They're actually saying that Balagon should just out the sportsman-like thing to do is to not play. Oh, sure. You know, I remember Ronaldo, I act like I don't like soccer because it's a fun schick, but no, I appreciate, especially at the international level. And I remember a World Cup, it wasn't four years ago, maybe eight years ago, the one in South Africa, where Ronaldo, one of the most celebrated players on the planet for Portugal, he was red carded, and they overturned his red card. And it may have been FIFA corruption. Absolutely. Guess what? FIFA's corrupt. But nobody was screaming that Ronaldo should step down and not play. And as great as Balagan-in, is he not Ronaldo? He might be someday. But this is going to be great tonight. Now at least both teams with full compliment can compete the way they're supposed to in Seattle, even... even power and see who's the best team, which is how it should be. And, you know, hopefully we'll win. God knows we shed enough blood on Belgium's soil. Yeah, you want to know what real sportsmanship would be if Belgium forfeited the game because America saved their butt twice in two different world wars. Look up the Battle of the Bulge. We've spelled a lot of blood to keep Belgium free. Thank you very much. All right. I'm going to get off my little soccer soapbox here and bring in Theo Wald, former Assistant Attorney General, former White House Deputy Assistant for Domestic Policy. And Theo, I know that you're a part of the brain trust that is trying to navigate these new waters with birthright citizenship. You've been there with the president crafting these policies in the past. And yes, I recognize the... irony here that our famed soccer player here for the men's national team actually benefited from birthright citizenship. That said, Theo, thanks for joining us. Good to talk with you. Good to be with you, Larry. Thanks for having me on. Hope you had a great holiday weekend. Yeah, it was amazing, wasn't it? Yeah, truly. The Supreme Court decision was much more far reaching than many people thought. They actually hung their hat on the 14th Amendment. Obviously, there's a disagreement there about what the 14th Amendment's intentions were. But here we are. What does the president do now? What can Congress do now within these confines to do something about this birth tourism epidemic that we're seeing?

Yeah, that's an excellent question, Larry, given where we are. And as you noted, all the court actually structured its opinion. I don't think many people thought they would actually go to the heart of the constitutional question, in part because this was going to be a John Roberts decision from the word go. So John Roberts is notorious for trying to solve things with cute little additions or subtractions here on the margins. But they went right at the constitutional question, which would mean now the administration's got to focus on two things. imposing some regulatory architecture that will govern birth tourism, both shutting down the birth tourism centers that are here in the U.S. and restricting the travel of obviously pregnant foreign nationals who are trying to enter the U.S. And on the first point, Larry, I think it will surprise a lot of people, but these birth tourism centers are open and notorious. I mean, in some places like in South Florida, or Southern California, they actually have billboards advertising their services, usually in Spanish or sometimes in Russian. So it's not a great mystery where these places are, who's operating them. I think it's high time that the Department of Justice and local U.S. attorney's offices go after them. So I think that's the first and obvious course of action the administration is going to take. So first of all, will that be, it will, I shouldn't even ask Theo, it will be challenged in the courts if we come up with a new policy. First of all, can the executive branch do that with the wide range of powers that they have in forcing immigration laws, or is this something that would have to be passed through Congress? Look, it can be done by the administration, but here's the thing that I really hope this decision impresses upon, you know, your listeners, obviously, but anyone who's interested in actual constitutional government is that Congress really has to get off the sidelines, and they've got to start dual-tracking some of these initiatives. So my point throughout the birthright sort of, you know, architectural rendering when we were drawing the blueprints for this litigation was this works best. if Congress at the same time moves the statutory fix. So I think the administration has plenty of levers they can poll right now, but it would be better for the purposes of litigation and fighting this out in the courts, which is going to happen. As you noted, it will happen. I think it's better long term for Congress also to be moving something statutorily. We're speaking with Theo Wald, who was in the room as the president's executive order having to do with birthright citizenship, was first crafted. And he's a former assistant attorney general. Theo, this birth tourism is happening, as you noted. And I'm told that Guam, the U.S. territory of Guam is one of the central hubs here. Guam is so close to China. And you're getting these Chinese nationals coming in, having babies in Guam, suddenly you've got a U.S. citizen. Does this Supreme Court decision apply to a territory like Guam, or can the president make this unilateral for all of our territories that are not states?

And another great question, which I hope also raises some awareness of how our insular territories have essentially built local economies that are dependent on Chinese tourism. So back in 2018, I was part of the team that renegotiated our compact with the Northern Mariana Islands. And at that time, the governor of the Northern Mariana Islands told us that in their obstetrics ward, which you, Larry, and all of your listeners paid for it, built by U.S. tax dollars. They had about 400 beds on any week of the year of those 400 beds, about 350 were taken by Chinese tourists who fly in, give birth to an American citizen and then go home. So great news is the president can unilaterally, through executive power, impose a new restriction on Chinese, especially on Chinese tourism, to the insular territories. Puerto Rico, Guam, the Northern Maryland Islands, American Samoa. do not have the full interpretation of the 14th Amendment. The 14th Amendment doesn't govern entirely in the insular territory. So the president can do, he can narrow the executive order and apply it just to the territories to restrict Chinese birth tourism. That would include the U.S. Virgin Islands. That would include Puerto Rico as well, right? Yes, that's correct. That's completely correct. And if people don't think it's a problem in the Virgin Islands or Puerto Rico, they should go visit and see the giant fifth column Chinese communities that have opened. And no surprise here, they do everywhere, just yards away from some of our military installations in both of those territories. I was at the U.S. Virgin Islands in early 2024, and I was shocked to see the presence of not Chinese Americans, not Asian Americans, not Americans of Chinese descent, Chinese nationals. There's so many of them in the Virgin Islands. They're really making a play for the Caribbean. No, that's exactly right. And I lived in Puerto Rico for three years. I was a federal law clerk at the federal district court there, and I traveled all throughout the Caribbean. This was back in the early, you know, 2015, 2016 time period. And look, the growth of Chinese national communities that are paid for to set up shop to develop an interest in, you know, coal refinery plants in the U.S. Virgin Islands. U.S. military installations, you're dredging the harbors in St. Lucia, the Chinese are definitely making a play for the Caribbean. That's exactly right there. They have an embassy in Antigua, which is, you know, it's bigger than their embassy here in America. It's insane how large it is. So given that and given the seriousness of this issue, It's fascinating to me to still see this debate going on in this country about whether this is a very real concern and a national security concern that we need to take seriously because I'm sure you saw Zohran Mamdani's Fourth of July address basically co-opted our independence 250 years ago and determined that it's really about allowing people from any country in the world to come here and become a citizen.

Yeah, and unfortunately, that has been the view of most of the established uniparty elites in D.C. for 40 years, as you know, Larry. I mean, it's not just Democrats, but Republicans have long-seated the idea that academics, eggheads, and, you know, judicial activists in robes get to determine the benefits and the obligations of U.S. citizenship. And the one thing I hope comes home to everyday working hard Americans is the idea that the citizenship belongs to them. It's not open to everyone in the world who can afford, you know, a jet plane ticket. American citizenship, its privileges and its duties belong to the people of this nation and this nation alone. The Zohran Mamdani speech, though, it's emblematic of where the Democrat Party is. And I think this answers, you know, your overall question, why, given the threat posed by some of our strategic adversaries. like China and the very decided moves that they're making on the chessboard and taking places in the Caribbean and developing foreign national communities controlled by their government inside of the US. Why aren't we solving this? And I think the answer is really in Zohran Mamdani speech, which one of our major political parties now believes as sort of a core tenant that there is no threat. Right? We're just living in sort of like Sesame Street. There's no bad actors anywhere. Number one. And number two, that citizenship and its obligations is essentially just an external benefit. It can be just elastic. It's universal. And so it can be extended to someone from Uganda as just as well as it can be given to someone in Boyle Heights in L.A. Yeah, that's, can you expand on that a little bit? Because this is, I don't know, is it a new idea, a new concept? Because it's new to me, especially in linking it in some way to our founding fathers. Do we blame Lin-Manuel Miranda for like blurring the lines in his Hamilton musical about what immigration means and who wasn't American at our founding? Because it was, it was. Honestly, shocking to my sensibilities to see this man who has only been an American for less than a decade sitting there at George Washington's desk lecturing us about what the true meaning of our founding was. Now, I mean, this is going to sound crazy, Larry, but I am known with my friends for saying the Hamilton musical actually was a big part of the universalist project of the left, which is... I nailed it. I know. I mean, honestly, it only works in a historically illiterate people. And I think the Spencer Pratt post that went viral over the weekend about Independence Day, which is what we say in my family. It's not just the Fourth of July. It is your Independence Day. That's right. Don't celebrate Fourth of July. That's just a date on a calendar. It's not the Fourth. It's Independence. But, you know, Pratt makes this great point. I mean, it's smarter than most intellectuals that the big universities can come up with, which is communist focus on rewriting, revising, and destroying your history because they know, if you don't know where you came from, you have no way of measuring. The ludicrous craziness of what the left is proposing, being rooted and anchored in your past is the only way you can really steer the ship forward.

And I think Zohran Mamdani's speech works because a lot of people say, oh, well, you know, like the founding fathers were of different races and they were immigrants. And you and I was in, that's kind of crazy. But then looked just a few years ago, right, the Google Genesis AI project, they were, you know, when you would query, show me the founding fathers, they would send back images of Native American, you know, tribal chieftains and, you know, Mexican signers of the Declaration of Independence. And so I think. For an educated person, and I don't mean like someone who has a fancy policy degree, I think for someone who reads and has thought deeply about our nation's founding, this is all crazy. But for people whose only connection to the founding fathers is an episode of the family guy or Hamilton, Zohran Mamdani's speech actually speaks a great, you know, as they say, a great authentic truth. And that's a great danger for all the rest of us. Well, we got to leave it there, Robic guest said. Theo Wald, you are very smart and very fascinating. I'd love to have a longer conversation with you someday. Keep in touch. Theo Wald, ladies and gentlemen. Oh, you know, life moves fast. including our radio clock here very fast staying sharp focused and clear head it isn't always easy it's why the same company that brings your relief factor has developed something new think factor think factor is made to help you think clearer and perform better daily it's a powerful blend of nutrients and that and they unlock mental clarity and precision nurture your memory and boost your attention think factor gives you brain power and performance that finally meets for lasting daily results supercharge your memory and mental sharpness with think factor right now you can get uh three weeks supply your for excuse me your first battle for just nineteen ninety five go to relief factor dot com or call eight hundred for relief relieffactor dot com for think factor It is 8.51 here on the East Coast in your nation's capital, Washington, D.C. Good morning. Larry O'Connor, Here, O'Connor and Company. I've lived here for, well, I'm starting my 15th year here in Washington and on the East Coast, but I still always do the quick three-hour math to figure out what time it is in California because I've spent most of my adult life in Southern California in Los Angeles working around. People say they're from Los Angeles. But they don't actually live in Los Angeles. They'll live in a city like I lived in Whittier. My son lives in Whittier when he's not living with me out here in the East Coast. And my kids. I've got one kid in the Navy who's stationed in San Diego. I've got another kid going to school at UC San Diego. So, you know, I'm still doing that math in my head. And right now it's 552. For those of you listening on The Answer in San Diego or KRLA in Los Angeles or up into San Francisco. And it's one of those things where you know, wherever you're from, you always sort of keep your roots there at some point, even though I don't consider myself a Californian anymore. You always sort of want to have a quick look-see as to what's going on in your old hometown. And that's what I did this morning. I woke up and say, hey, I wonder how they celebrated Fourth of July where I grew up in Orange County, California, where my congressman was B-1 Bob Dornan.

During the glorious Reagan era, I think it was in 84 when Reagan was running for president, where Orange County, California, the county where I grew up moved there when I was 13. I believe Orange County went for Ronald Reagan that year by like 90%. Ronald Reagan called Newport Beach, California, where good Republicans go to die. In fact, John Wayne himself did just that, lived on Balboa Peninsula. and ended up passing away there. He lived all his later last. So did Buddy Ebson. So did my friend Bruce Allen, who used to be the president of the Washington Redskins. He's got a place out in Newport Beach as well. Newport Beach is a great place. So I checked it out. I wanted to see why, hey, what was going on? I remember many July 4th with a boat parade. There's a harbor. It's beautiful people who go on their boats and watch the fireworks from their boats or watch it from the beach and all that stuff. So imagine my shock when I checked out this morning, the fact that Newport Beach was trending on social media for all the wrong reasons. Authorities in California were forced to shut down businesses from Newport Pier to Pacific Coast Highway due to non-residents wreaking havoc on July 4th. Yeah, people came from all over the place to go invade this beautiful beachfront town with one of the greatest beaches in all of Southern California with a beautiful boardwalk, restaurants, you can bike up and down the strand. Newport Beach stores were looted. including a pavilion's grocery store video footage shows a massive amount of trash and debris left outside the store authorities say about a hundred people were arrested multiple police officers were injured According to the write-up in the Orange County Register, a July 4 celebration that drew thousands of people to the Balboa Peninsula in Newport Beach for the holiday weekend erupted in chaos Saturday night. Fights broke out. Fireworks were hurled at police officers and more than 400 were arrested, according to the register. Young adults and miners threw explosive mortars, fireworks, and other projectiles at crowds and law enforcement officers. And it is at this point where California residents should say, wait, I thought we made these things illegal. It's almost like people are willing to break the law. It's almost like if your state encourages people to break our immigration laws, then people will break other laws. And by the way, I have no doubt that a good percentage of the people involved in these riots in Newport Beach, quiet little conservative Republican Newport Beach, at least of my youth, a good majority of those people in fact did break our immigration laws. or their parents did. That's what happened to Orange County. People say, what happened to Orange County? This is what happened to Orange County. Liberal Democrat policies and lacks immigration laws. And prosecutors in L.A. County who refuse to put convicts away and jail people who break the law. They've got a good DA in Orange County, but there's just so much he can do when people come across the border from L.A. County. Maybe they should build a wall.

Association posted on Facebook on Sunday, the Newport Beach Police Association. A large group of agitators arrived, invaded Newport Beach, spurred on by an alleged TikTok takeover. This was all inspired apparently by social media. These persons came to our city with the intent of causing harm, injury, and destruction, bringing harassment, disturbances, and mayhem. While she didn't point to specific posts on TikTok or elsewhere, Newport Beach mayor, Lauren Cleman said social media played a major role in inciting the chaos Saturday night as videos of young people lighting fireworks and engaging in unruly behavior drew more of them to Newport Beach. The number of people on the peninsula had tripled by about 9 p.m., she said. Absolute. mayhem in what was once considered a conservative wealthy area. I mean, it's still a very wealthy area. Good luck getting a house on Balboa Peninsula. But maybe that's going to change soon. Maybe, you know, this is what happens when these policies manifest in this kind of lawlessness as stores are looted. places are burnt garbage is left they had to bring out the mounted police by the way to ride across the beach and drive all of these crowds away and of course if you're trying to celebrate your fourth of july weekend and you decide to bring your family to newport beach this is what you're met with the left ruins everything they touch including a place as pristine as newport It's very sad. And all of you in Southern California are in my thoughts. You can fix this. It just takes one election to write the ship. I want to tell you about my friends over at Relief Factor again, because as we celebrate independence, and it's not just a one-day thing for us, we celebrate independence every day. I want you to imagine a life free of pain. I want you to have liberty from your chronic pain. That's what Relief Factor will do to you. You see, Relief Factor was created to help people address inflammation. It's one of the most common causes of ongoing aches and pains, either from aging or overexertion or just daily living. It's a 100% drug-free research-based formula that works through multiple metabolic pathways to support comfort and mobility, no prescription, no masking symptoms, just real relief so you can keep moving forward. Relief factor has helped me get through a horrible bout of sciatica that I had about eight weeks ago. And I will never stop taking Relief Factor now that it's given me a pain-free life. Get your $17.76. Three-week quick start. It's ready for you right now. Just go to Relieffactor.com or call 800, the number four, relief, relieffactor.com.

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