The Joyce Kaufman Show 8/5/26 - What is happening with the candidates in Michigan? Back and forth with Iran, Cuba's spies in America, Senator John Cornyn and Thom Tillis not for the American people and more

This is the Joyce Kaufman podcast, honest, straight, and unapologelic with your host, Joyce Kaufman. Hey, listen, it's the midweek. We used to call it Hump Day, right? Not anymore. It feels like, I don't know, it feels like the weeks go by more quickly, but they're actually longer. I don't know if that makes any sense to you at all, but... Makes sense to me. And I'm the one saying it. So we'll see. We'll see what kind of presentation I have up my sleeve for this midweek. Actually, so many things that I want to talk about. Obviously, the Michigan primaries. There's an avowed communist that's going to be running as a Democrat. in Michigan. And he's running against a guy who really, I can't even tell you much about Mike. He's been MAGA, he's been anti-Trump, he's been all over the place. And he's going to need every bit of MAGA to win this election against this Abdul El-Sayed. And this guy hit him with two barrels today in his... I guess his acceptance speech, he got the Democratic nomination. And he said a lot of things about Mike Rogers, which are too hard to deny. So it's going to be a very hotly contested race, and there's going to be tons of money pumped into it, and it's going to be very interesting. So as bad as I think it is for democracy, it's great for talk radio. terrible when you have to make a call like that. When you have to say to yourself, well, it may not be good for my country, but it sure is good for my show. But that happens, unfortunately, more and more. Now, I've seen a couple of people finally catching up. And actually, I was late-ish to this as well. So I can't even be mad at them. But people are finally good and fed up with the, we're going to bomb you into oblivion, know we're going to negotiate peace back and forth and back and forth. I mean, it's like watching a tennis match. My neck is sore. So even Brigitte Gabriel, who hung in until the last second, has finally, you know, put out a statement. which is what many people have been saying for a long time and people like me have been saying for at least a little while. But I think it's now pretty clear that nobody supports this back and forth stuff anymore. President Trump has to end all the negotiations with a terrorist Islamic regime in Iran. Because talking to the mullahs is not diplomacy. It is self-delusion. It's almost a half a century. This regime has perfected the art of lying and stalling and deceiving and violating every commitment it has ever made.

History is very clear, unambiguous. The only path to lasting victory against this enemy is the complete elimination of its leadership. And that's the only way the Iranians will actually have a chance to seize leadership. The pattern of their deception began at the very moment of their inception. In 1979, the Ayatollah Khomeini made promises, oh, I'm going to be a moderate, and I'm going to protect all the minorities while the whole time he was consolidating power. And within weeks, those promises just evaporated. They took American diplomats hostage, held them for over a year, what was it, 444 days. If that's not a calculated act of state terrorism, and one, by the way, that the regime still celebrates. I don't know what is. Documents have turned up since. that show Khomeini never intended to honor any of the assurances that he gave to the Carter administration. Don't even get me started. I don't want to speak ill of the dead, but Jimmy Carter was a disaster. This was not an aberration. This is what they do. This is the template. The nuclear file is the purest example of continuous serial deceit. For years, they built undeclared enrichment sites at Natanz and other places, while insisting that the program was purely civilian. The IAEA, the International Atomic Energy Agency, showed over and over again. They documented all of the failures to declare facilities or materials or activities. And when confronted, Tehran actually offered a bunch of fake, phony explanations, and they stonewalled the inspectors, and they just kept working in secret. Then the JCPOA under President Obama, that didn't help, certainly didn't change their behavior, rewarded it. Iran received tens of billions of dollars in sanctions relief and unfrozen assets while keeping the core of its nuclear infrastructure and actually advancing the ballistic missile program and expanding the terrorist network. Sunset clauses. made sure that the most serious restrictions were going to expire and Iran would be free to race towards Obama. President Obama's deal and the approach under President Biden only emboldened the regime. Money was flowing to Tehran and through it, it was flowing to Hamas and to Hezbollah and to the Houthis and to the Iraqi militias.

Iran enriched uranium to 60%. That's pretty near weapons grade under Joe Biden, while their proxies were getting stronger and more aggressive, as quite evident by the October 7th massacre by Hamas. And then all of these sustained attacks on shipping and the direct missile barrages against Israel. All of this occurred after years of Western concessions. Soft power and engagement did not moderate the regime. It financed its expansion, and it bought them time. And conservative analysts have been documenting the way they, you know, the regime's negotiating playbook, right? Good cop, bad cop theatrics. between supposed moderates and hardliners, while the supreme leader retains absolute control. All these future promises, very vague, demands for sanctions relief right away up front, and deliberate stalling. Why? So they could advance their nuclear work. A 2025 United Against Nuclear Iran report detailed 10 recurring tactics that Iran uses to extract concessions while preserving its weapons pathway. These are not new. These are the same methods they've used for over 40 years. And if we haven't learned anything, certainly recent events only reinforce that.

The American and Israeli military action definitely degraded their capabilities and definitely took out the leadership in 2026. But then the regime just went right back to form, demanding that you lift the freezes on the assets and that you restore oil sales and the nuclear issues. Well, we'll talk about them later. never offering anything that would resemble verifiable dismantlement. And conservative voices across the nation who have been warning that any deal short of unconditional surrender just hands the mullahs enough breathing space to reconstitute. And history shows they'll use that space exactly as they always have. When you're in a war against the totalitarian theocracy, one that exports terror and seeks nuclear weapons, half measures don't work. Negotiated pauses are not a strategy. They're surrender by installment. The only durable victory is the one that actually removes the enemy's decision-making center. When the leadership... that has directed hostage-taking and proxy wars and nuclear deception and regional destabilization for four decades is gone. Every senior figure in the clerical and the Revolutionary Guard hierarchy, then maybe, and only maybe the Iranian people will gain the opening that they've been denied. Regime change doesn't come from talking to the same men who have murdered protesters and hang the dissidents and lied to the whole world. It comes when those men no longer hold the levers of power. And I would say no longer breathe. Just being honest. President Trump recognized their nature when he withdrew from the JCPOA and started applying a lot of pressure to them. At that time, he understood that military force can, you know, actually impose real costs on them. But continuing to negotiate now? It just means we're going to repeat the same cycle of deception that has already cost decades for the Iranian people's freedom and for the West security. Stop the talks, finish the job. Only then will the people who are inside Iran who want a different future have any chance of building one. That's just the bottom line. And how many times can we say it over and over again? Enough. Just do it. You know, I thought he had the stones to do it. I'm beginning to question that.

Anyway, don't forget to download that 850 app on your phone or laptop, cell phone, wherever you want. You can listen to the new podcast, not just mine, but all the new podcasts. You can get breaking news. And of course, you can also participate in our contest. It's a good app. And if you don't, if you're like so many people who tell me, I'm not adding any more apps to my devices, okay, then just visit the website. 850WFDL.com. Let me take a quick break. Please stay right where you are. I'll tell you. I don't even know where to begin. There are just so many stories that need to be told. And I'm just one person. I'm not actually going to whine like that, but it did occur to me. that I listen to, not a lot, but a significant amount of other programming in the news arena. And it's amazing to me, stories that I think are fascinating and should be covered. And if I had a staff and a crew like these shows have, I'd be all over these stories because I think the people are interested in them. And I don't know, maybe I'm, I don't know, I guess I'm wrong. Because they don't seem to rise to the level of Perez Hilton needing to be, you know, taken to a loony bin recently. I don't even know who Perez Hilton is. How about that? I thought they were talking about Paris. You know, that's how a little aware I am of some of that stuff. You know, the big story today, you know, ooh, Gigi Hadid and Bradley Cooper, are they married? They're wearing matching rings. Who cares? I mean, that must rival the least interesting story of the year. And that's the kind of stuff that I see people are saturated, and they don't even want to watch news shows anymore. They'd rather... ignore it and hope it goes away, everything. The Michigan primaries were a joke. This guy barely won in a primary, okay? And they're all hysterical that now he's going to flip and it's going to be not a purple state anymore. Michigan's going blue. What? I don't think, unless... The Republicans literally blow themselves up. I don't see how that can happen. You know, some of the things that come out of these socialist, Democrats, or whatever they call themselves, are so stupid and so non-palatable to the American people. You could just pretty much coast into victory if you're a Republican candidate in one of those situations.

And Democrats and apparently some Republicans, including Thom Tillis and John Cornyn, immediately denounce the fund, which, you know, they describe a payout for punks. John Cornyn is even dumber than Thom Tillis, if that's possible. He went so far as to cancel a face-to-face meeting with Todd Blanche. I mean, this four-term senator hasn't received this kind of attention from the Washington Press Corps since the time he snuggled up to Volodymyr Zelensky or Volodymyr Zelensky. And Trump responded last week to John Cornyn's pouting. You know, these people are political animals. You know, these people are political animals, but they don't care one bit about the American people. Rather than doing something constructive for the country and for their constituents, in the final months of their utterly forgettable Senate careers, Thom Tillis and John Cornyn instead chose to make Todd Blanche their whipping boy. He's a decent guy and probably the best candidate for this job in years. You know, these guys who never met a Ukraine aid package, they didn't support. You know, all of a sudden, they found their tough guy. They found their inner mafioso and maiden or else. offer that the administration couldn't refuse. And on Monday, Todd Blanche put it in writing that the fund had been shut down for good. And they were gloating, Thom Tillis and John Cornyn? Because the agreement also limits the IRS's ability to audit other Trump world figures aside from those that were named in the lawsuit. So a committee vote. To confirm Todd Blanche is now set for, I guess it was set. You know, I can't even follow. It just gets too overwhelming. The stories start to run together. You know, the opposition to Todd Blanche was not only a public relations stunt. But it's also a real example of DC-level political hypocrisy. You know, these are two men who voted to confirm Merrick Garland as Attorney General. As a matter of fact, John Cornyn had a big endorsement speech of Garland on the Senate floor. He got snookered by Garland's promise to end the politicization of DOJ. Yeah, at the same time that Biden's DOJ began rounding up John Cornyn's constituents for even minor involvement in the Capitol protest.

And then they also, both of these guys, voted to confirm Lisa Monaco, the Trump-Russia collusion mastermind as Deputy Attorney General in April of 2021. Yeah. You just can't make this stuff up. These people are animals. And it'd be one thing if they were political animals on behalf of the American people, but they don't care. They have shown and proven beyond the shadow of a doubt they don't care about the American people. And now that they're on their way out the door, their own fault, you know, they want some bodies. They want some heads or some notches on their gun belt or whatever it is that the expression of the day is. Sickening. Just sickening. But I can't get used to it. I'm not going to forgive it. And I'm not going to forget it. You know, right now, I've been looking at a story for the last couple of days where the Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, has linked these anti-ice and pro-Moduro protests to Cuban-hired networks. that are designed to pressure U.S. lawmakers. Yeah. He said, Cuba still has an ability to infiltrate and influence top-level U.S. institutions and detailed what he described, and he's a Secretary of State, he must know what he's talking about. He described a dangerous Cuban spy network that is undermining American interests. Think about that. A failed state 90 miles from our shores that happens to be aligned with adversaries to this country is a national security threat to our country. Yeah, the State Department just released a 100-page report detailing Cuba's influence operations in the country, linking them to Antifa and this radical activism. and while labeling it the capital of 21st century communism. They actually are in influence and espionage superpower. If you look at the history of spying in the U.S., Cuba is the only country that consistently has embedded spies in our system. Don't even pay them without even paying them. We had a U.S. ambassador who ended up being a Cuban spy. and was recently convicted. We've had them penetrate the highest levels of defense intelligence agencies. Yeah. It was the ambassador and national security official Manuel Rocha. He pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 15 years in prison for acting as a secret agent for Cuba for decades. And then there's Anna Blen Montez, the DIA analyst who was found passing American secrets to Cuba. One of the single biggest intelligence failures and potentially the most serious penetration in our history. So Marco Rubio also said that Cuba employs networks of protesters across the country to advocate for different causes just to pressure U.S. lawmakers.

pro Hamas, anti-ice, pro-Maduro protests, they're all linked to the same network of Cuban hired protesters. There's nothing organic about it. It's funded, it's organized, and Cuba is a part of that network. And apparently, a very integral part. It's a network that'll weaponize against us, and they talk about it openly. and how they'll use the network to pressure American policymakers. He also said that Cuba has been running dangerous influence campaigns throughout Latin America. Well, that's no surprise. If you look all throughout Latin America, every communist left-wing insurgency that destabilized governments across the region, every single one of them over the last 40 or 50 years has found its help. Even its beginning, its birth from a Cuban influence operation. And of course, the critics came out and said that the State Department's report is a scare tactic to potentially justify military action against the country. Marco Rubio doesn't play that game. You know, he dismisses people who sympathize with Cuba's communist government led by Miguel Diazcanal. He says, oh, I know there are plenty of people in America, academia, and frankly in the American press that sympathize with the Cuban regime, and they have for a very long time. It's anti-Americanism. And it's motivated by ideological affinity. But it doesn't mean that we should ignore these threats. So I say, you know, and it pains me, as you all know. Thank God for Marco Rubio pointing this stuff out. All right, let me take a quick time out, a quick break here. Please stay right where you are. Okay, so apparently the Senate Judiciary Committee did vote Todd Blanche's nomination out of committee. And it's set for a full Senate vote now. But, you know, the vote was along party lines. This is the same garbage over and over again. And it's, you got a really tight, tight timeline, rather, to secure a full Senate vote before they go to recess. Oh, yeah, they're going to recess. They've been so busy. Doing nothing. So, you know, I'll try to stay informed and keep you informed, but it's just, it's just incredible to me. How you could have two. senators who literally won't be senators come January holding up this confirmation vote until they got what they wanted. That is not politics for this country, for the good of this country. It's vile, is what it is. There's way too much of it. You know, I was complaining.

in my No Restrained podcast about this whole transgender, you know, just the language that's used. This has been going on for far too long. And I'm looking at a story, I think it was last night, that some transgendered TV star, who I never heard of, but that doesn't mean anything. She's a reality TV star, Sydney Star, a transgender whose real name is Sydney Favors, was arrested Sunday in Georgia on felony charges of sodomy, sexual battery against a child under 16, and aggravated child molestation. This is a man who says he's a woman. The IMDB website calls him an actress. who has appeared in Empire and Star and apparently the biggest thing he ever did was Love and Hip Hop New York. Whatever that is. You know, I don't know, wild it out. So this guy, pretending to be a woman and a TV personality rapes a kid at a hotel in Georgia. But everything is okay. We should not be, we shouldn't condemn him. I guess we should understand him. I guess that accusing him of performing, I don't even want to go into the details, but it's pretty disgusting, right, to a juvenile.

Didn't they say that this kind of stuff never happens when we were concerned and said, well, you know, these people claiming to be the opposite gender could end up with them luring people in under the guise of being male or being female when they're the opposite? And now TMZ is reporting that Stephanie favors the mother of this transgender star. says she's blindsided by the child sex allegations against her child and fully stands behind Sydney, that the allegations are completely out of character for Sydney, and she does not believe her biological son would engage in sexual activity with a minor. Is your biological son, your biological daughter? I'm so confused. There's a video of the mother and this transgender reality star dancing on TikTok. Like, what is wrong with people? Me and my mommy doing the Mariah Carey challenge. What is the Mariah Carey challenge? You know, I give up, you know. I'm just, I'm falling further and further behind because I'm trying to pour over these stories that make absolutely no sense to find out if there's something relevant. You know, if they're front page news, if they're above the fold, I have to at least read them. And then I read them and I think to myself, this is insanity. This is absolutely crazy. Now you got Mike Rowe, who I think is really a great guy, been talking for years about, you know, should our children be spending an enormous amount of money, accumulating college debt when they're not going to be able to get a job. You know, and he's been steering them towards trades and being more open-minded about different career paths. And so apparently he made a comment about socialism. And the left lost it. These people with the Trump derangement syndrome, they just, they cannot contain themselves. If you step out of their line, they go crazy. Apparently, all he did was call out the communist candidates in the DSA clothing. And even Bill Maher, the comedian, used the words of the Democrat Socialists of America against them. He wanted to expose the reality of their communist views. And so Mike Rose shared the segment. reminded of how we struggle to reconcile our support for an idea we might like if it's promoted by a politician we hate and vice versa so he got 7,600 comments now I'm sure a lot of it were bots and trolls and personal attacks and it takes up so much time

He referred to the number of reactions to Bill Maher's new rule segment on his show real time. You can't argue, you can't debate. You can't even talk about biology or science. You just have to go along and allow them to change your language and to change your culture and to change your morality. Or they'll tear you apart. Good for Mike Rowe. He fought back. He said, do you really believe my comments about communists who claim to be communists are synonymous with a red scare? If you haven't noticed, no one in the DSA, including the communists, is being dragged before Congress and made to swear a loyalty oath to the Constitution. Today, a communist in America can run for office with the endorsement of the governor of California and the tacit approval of a major political party. Seems to me we're about as far from McCarthyism as we can get. And he suggested Democrats have been afforded a layup opportunity to say to the communists, hold on, comrade. Our tent is not that big. We respect your right to hate America, but we don't want you in our party, and we're not going to support your candidacy. But they can't do it. They can't do it. They're going to embrace Abdul El-Sayed and the one who wants to do away with Thanksgiving. I mean, sometimes I look at these stories and I say, I can't. I can't take them seriously. They're too crazy. Don't forget coming up after me is Guy Benson, followed by Will Kane, then it's Joe Pags, Lars Larson, the overnight guys until 6 a.m. when Jennifer Ross and Stephen Deiner, they'll be back with the South Florida Morning Show, followed at 9 by Brian Kilmeade, noon, Eric Erickson, and I get to come back at 3 o'clock. Still have a segment in today's program, so stay right where you are. I'll be right back. I mean, you got this Wisconsin Democratic gubernatorial primary frontrunner. as a description regarding her own kid, like she made it sound like a disease. Yeah, this Wisconsin State Assembly member, Francesca Hong, with the support of Hasan Piker and Elon Musk Omar, it looks like she'll be the next DSA candidate to advance to the general election. Meanwhile, we got clips of her in September 2021, including one where she's lamenting her proximity to whiteness, referring to her biracial son. You can't make this up. Appearing on Listen MKE as the hashtag Stop Asian Hate. Here's a panel discussion. that included Wisconsin, the interim chief diversity equity and inclusion officer, blah, blah, blah, the daughter of Korean immigrants who described herself as a woman of color while struggling to navigate white spaces in her hometown of Madison, Wisconsin.

I wasn't always aware of the struggles of other communities of color because for me, assimilation always kind of took over. And so I did marry. My proximity to whiteness continues. She married and divorced. A white guy has a biracial son. He's half white and half Korean. And she made it sound like a terrible thing. These people are racists. You know. That's her own child. She said she wants to make sure that talking about racial identity and the role of race is ubiquitous in classrooms. Really? Because right now the rest of us are finally grateful that we don't have to, you know, play this critical race theory game anymore that they pushed on our kids. And this one is running on a, oh no, bring it back in. And even more, I have a biracial kid and I'm uncomfortable with it. What the hell? The service industry is rooted in white supremacy. Oh gosh. Save us from ourselves, really, because these people... Why do all these people who hate white people marrying and procreating with white people, you know, I don't get it. Thank you for your time this time until next time. My plan is to be back here tomorrow at 3. If it be his will and he delays his, what lies behind us and what lies ahead of us to what lies within us. So wherever you are, just be yourself. Everybody else is taken. God bless you. God bless Israel. And God bless the USA. See you tomorrow. This has been the Joyce Kaufman podcast, available everywhere you get your podcasts.