U.S. & Iran reach ceasefire deal

Your education is more than a path to a degree. At Regent University, it's an important step in God's plan for your career. It's where you'll be equipped to lead and serve with purpose. It's where 40,000 graduates have prepared to fulfill their callings, and so can you. Choose a top-ranked program from over 150 areas of study on campus or online and watch what God will do. Learn more at regent.edu. That's regent.edu. Welcome to today's podcast, sponsored by Hillsdale College, all things Hillsdale at Hillsdale.edu. I encourage you to take advantage of the many free online courses there. And, of course, I'll listen to the Hillsdale Dialogues, all of them at Hugh for Hillsdale.com, or just Google, Apple, iTunes, and Hillsdale. Good evening, Grace, America. I'm Hugh Hewitt, what, night and day of news. We've got a lot to cover today, and I will cover it all, but I'm starting with the United States Senator Susan Collins of Maine. Senator Susan Collins, I wanted to talk to you about budget, and I'm going to do that, but first, let me get your reaction to deal, no deal, ceasefire, no ceasefire. It's really unfolding, so I don't yet have an opinion that's fixed, other than if the strike reopens, it's a big win for America. How do you view it? Well, certainly getting the straight reopened is a big win, not only for America, but for our allies as well. The news reports have been so conflicting all day that it's difficult to know whether the ceasefire is holding or not. My goal is for this military conflict to be briefed. and successful. We must ensure that Iran cannot develop a nuclear weapon. We learned that it had thousands of ballistic missiles, which essentially provide a shield for its enrichment of uranium. And we know that Iran remains the leading state sponsor of terrorism. Nevertheless, I don't want to see boots on the ground except for the amazing rescue of those two airmen, which was truly extraordinary. And I don't want to see a long conflict. So I hope the ceasefire is going to hold and be transformed into a permanent cessation of hostilities with a run. giving up. It finally, it's nuclear ambitions and its sponsorship of terrorist groups all over the world. That is the best case. That's what I think we might be getting, but it's going to be in the details. Now, we learned a lot. You mentioned the remarkable rescue. The American military never ceases to amaze, and they've done remarkable things. But we've learned that the conflict is expensive. And we are a sea and air power primarily, and budgets have to reflect that, and that we're going to need a lot of new munitions and drones and ships. Your chair of appropriations in the Senate, President Trump sent a budget request of $1.5 trillion last week, including a lot of money for ships, 18 warships, 16 support ships. What did you make of the overall request, Senator, because that's a big gulp when it comes to defense?

It is. It's about a 28% increase compared to last year. We do have to keep in mind that the president is compensating for years of underfunding by the Biden administration. So we do need to do some catch-up to make sure that we are prepared to meet the global threats that we face. We have not yet received the detailed budget documents from the Department of Defense. We expect those next week. So it's too early for me to bless or to say what I want to see in there, whether the 28%, which would bring us almost $1.5 trillion is the right amount. I will say that there is one omission, and that is apparently the budget is only going to provide for one. DDG 51, workhorse of the U.S. Navy, and disclosing my parochial interest, they are built at Batharm Works in Bath, Maine, as well as at the Ingalls Shipyard in Mississippi. But we've seen just how critical these destroyers are, and I think that we need more than one of them, especially when you look. at the ever-growing Chinese fleet, which now exceeds the size of the American naval fleet. You know, Senator, every summer I go up and down that river with visitors when I'm up in Maine and show them the bath ironworks, and they tell us the statistics during World War II. 17 destroyers a month were coming from eight shipyards. Now, there's one shipyard doing one and a half to two a year. I can't believe that. The Arleigh Burke is the ship. Other than our carrier is a big deal, but the Arleigh Burke is our ship. So I'm sure you'll have something to say about that. I did hear from a... pretty connected person that there may be a request in the budget for housing for the workforce because it's getting too expensive to live near Bath, near Portsmouth, near some of the other places we build ships. Is that ever crossed your radar before? Absolutely. When I talk to the workers, and ironically, I'm going to be there tomorrow, both at the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard and at Bath Armworks with the Chief of Naval Operations. So I'm very much looking forward to showing them our gems. Both of them are extraordinary shipyards. But the three issues that come up with the workers over and over again are...

transportation because some of them find it far too expensive to live in Beth or Kittery, and they tend to be commuting from Sanford in the case of Kittery or Lewiston in the case of Beth. So that transportation is important to them. And housing, and that's why I've secured some funding. for more parking in those facilities. That's really important. And shuttle buses, which I think could be very useful. The second certainly is workforce housing. I'm going to be interested to see what the President's budget proposed. I have been able to get funding that is supporting the construction of six workforce projects and that. And the third issue is child care. And that in the Kittery, Portsmouth area, we eyeballs also been working with Jeanne Shaheen from New Hampshire to try to expand. the availability of a child care center there. Those are the three issues. That's important if we want to be a Navy power. We've got to have the Arleigh Burke. So I'm sure you will work on that. Let me ask last year you were both a budget hawk and a budget. Spender. You want a defense, but you save some cuts as well. What did you stop from getting cut last year? And is that back in the eye of the hatchet man over at OMB? Whoever that might be. I'm not saying it's a respout. It could be anybody. That is always a challenge, but I always remember that the President's budget request is just that. It's a request. It's Congress that has the power of the purse. Of course, we work very closely with the administration, and we're going to be starting our hearings up very shortly with department heads and agency leaders. This budget would increase defense by 28 percent, but it cuts non-defense by 10 percent relative to last year. And as I said, I think we need, we do need an increase in defense. And I worked with Mitch McConnell and Tom Cole in the House to increase beyond the president's budget somewhat last year, but not... where we really wanted to be. So we'll take a close look at what the president's requesting. I do not support the decreases that OMB is...

is trying to push through again this year in medical research. I think that's one of the best investments that we can make. Not only does it lead to effective treatments, cures, means of prevention, but in the long run, it saves money. So if we... I'm sorry. Well, I just want to make sure you had a chance to ask you about the campaign because I'm following it from inside the Beltway. Mr. Graham Platner looks like he's going to win. He looks like someone I would not encourage you to debate. I'm happy to moderate one if you do decide to debate him. But he does not seem to me to be within the 20-yard lines of American politics. What do you make of him as an opponent? Well, I am prepared to run a vigorous substantive campaign against either Governor Janet Mills or Graham Platner. It is they present different approaches, that's for sure, and different challenges. But whomever the Democrats choose to put up against me, I will run a vigorous campaign and I will win. You may recall six years ago, I was written up by the pollsters and pundits, and I went one by nine points in a state carried by Joe Biden by nine points. I remember it very well, and I remind everyone, Susan Collins.com, the most important race in the United States will be over early. No ranked choice voting. We like that. It's just going to be Susan Collins versus one of those two Democrats. Go and help her out, especially if you're in Maine, go and sign up and volunteer, but you can contribute from everywhere. Senator Susan Collins, thanks for kicking off today. We will talk again many times in this election season. I appreciate the time. Don't go anywhere, America. I'm Hugh Hewitt.

Welcome back, America. I'm Hugh Hewitt. Noah Rothman is the senior editor at National Review, like me, a hawk on the Iran War. I'm not sure if you agrees with me that as of last night, I thought it was a big win for America and President Trump. Lots of mixed reports. Noah, you have the floor. Well... I don't know if I would call the current state of affairs a great win for the United States. I wrote about this this morning, and my take on it is that the ceasefire is fine for two reasons. One, because we've achieved most of our tactical objectives from the air, and we're literally running out of targets. When we were hitting Carg Island yesterday morning, they were restrikes on targets we've already hit. So we were being duplicative there. But second, I don't think the terms of the ceasefire are in any way durable. which is why I'm actually reassured by them. I don't think this current status quo was going to hold. And if it did, there would be some catastrophic consequences for American prestige and naval hegemony rather going forward. But they're so incompatible. The terms are so far apart. And the United States has so much leverage over Iran at the negotiating table with my anxieties over who we're sending to that negotiating table very much notwithstanding that I imagine that we have the capacity to execute our objectives in the diplomatic forum. And barring that, we reserve the right to re-engage in hostilities. And right now, it does seem like... If the Iranian regime is not brain dead and the body doesn't know what the brain wants and is simply acting on inertia with these strikes on Gulf targets, then there is this parallel war that's going on, which is also unsustainable. I think that this war is going to recommence in short order if Iran cannot get its house in order and engage in these diplomatic talks in a more meaningful fashion. But yeah, I am anxious about the state of these terms. I just don't think they're going to hold. I don't think that there's ever been a war with which I'm familiar in the modern Middle East that did not end in a ceasefire that was broken repeatedly by both sides for about a week. So that doesn't really concern me, especially since Iran had the mosaic defense and they've delegated down attack authority to commanders in regional level. But we'll see. Well, also, I think. And I don't see many people online talking about this. The military does BDAs, battle damage assessments. We've been at such a high pace of operation. Now we're going to go have a very good look-see at what isn't blown up. And the second Mew, the second Marine Expeditionary Unit, will arrive as will other assets. I'm not really worried. If they break the ceasefire, I think Donald Trump will not hesitate to go back to the war. I really don't. Do you have any doubt about that? I don't know. I'm apprehensive about it. I think it would be, I can't get into the president's mind, and I think nobody can. So it would be unwise for us to assume that the president cannot be swayed by people in his orbit who are very apprehensive about this war and politically, in the degree to which it would be detrimental to Republican political prospects in November. I can't discount that. However, the terms of this ceasefire, as I understood them, were very clear.

And it had nothing to do with the 10 points on the Iranian side or the 15 points on the American side, none of which were really at issue. It was we stopped shooting, you unblock the straight. And the straight is not blocked conventionally. The street is blocked by a modest application of military force and the theoretical prospect of much greater force in the future. But that's still interdicting traffic in the strait. Iran is not holding up. It's in the bargain here, even though we've stopped shooting. And yeah, that will not persist for much longer. All this conversation over the course of the last 24 hours, 24 hours, by the way, in which the entire American commentary community spent in a state of abject emotional distress, visibly psychologically distressed. I'm going to argue with you a little bit. The people I followed the most were not upset. They appropriately judged the post yesterday as not referring to genocide, but to the destruction of the Iranian regime. And they read all the way to the end, which is usually necessary in an SAT question and posts by Donald Trump. God bless the Iranian people. It was just absurd to conclude he was going to use a nuclear weapon. I am, however, worried about the American... But that was the conclusion that a lot of... That was the conclusion that a lot of people who have foreign policy PhDs retailed, as though there was no detriment to their credibility by doing so. And yet they continued to do so for the benefit of an audience that was rending garments and has been renting garments, even when the attack that they feared didn't occur. They were engagement farming. So here's my question, Noah. Can they be fixed? Because I don't think the center right. and the conservatives have lost their mind. I listen to you and Rich Lowry and Jim Garrity, and we don't always agree you and I don't always agree, but we're civil and we can talk to Democrat. I think they're cracked. They're absolutely cracked over there. Nick Christoph, who's been a guest on this show repeatedly, warning about nuclear weapons. It was just insane. Yeah, it was quite insane. And there really is no way to evaluate it outside of a psychological predisposition to believe that the president is capable of doing things that no civilized human being would do. Nobody with the capacity, nobody with any perspective of posterity or fidelity to convention, norms, international law, all of that go out the window. And, you know, there's reason to be skeptical about all that. But it is really a vast leap to suggest that the president was talking about a genocidal campaign against the Iranian people. And that is what was retailed right up until the ceasefire happened, at which point the very same people pivoted to rending garments over the degree to which America had sacrificed its hegemonic responsibilities over the Navy, and maybe the president should keep going. It was just a weird back and forth, but no, no, there was no confrontation with the contradictions that they were inviting. It was the seamless transition. was left to us who were observing this sort of thing to say, hey, do you realize he just did a 180? And yet you don't seem to recognize it. Any place left that the request for an explanation of inconsistency can be asked and answered? I don't think there is. I think there's yelling at each other and people like Hasan Piker and Ben Rhodes who've lost their minds. But there's just no place in American media where the two sides can meet and confer.

Yeah, I mean, it requires a different forum. Social media certainly doesn't encourage deliberation and cable news panels to generally encourage conflict rather than conflict resolution. So I tend to stick to my writing long-form pieces, which I feel like, and reading long-for pieces, which I feel like is where you can air arguments. And the central premise that I aired this morning is that the United States and Israel did not change their position to get to the ceasefire. I read it. Two weeks ago, Iran's position... And do you think China took note of what we can do and how quickly we can do it? Yes. So, yes, demonstrative capabilities here will absolutely have a sobering effect in Beijing. If the ceasefire were to hold at the terms that it is currently... established, I think Beijing would be emboldened to execute something like a hard or soft blockade of Taiwan. Iran has proven that even the minimal application of force to a contested waterway is sufficient to close it. I think Beijing would test that proposition, which is why I don't think this is something that is going to be durable. I think it will fall apart. However, it does look like China put a lot of pressure on Iran. to come to these terms. That's the reporting, at least. And if China got nervous. And it makes sense. It makes sense. And if China got nervous, that says a lot about their position. Yep. Okay. Last question. Do you have any idea who's running Iran? Have you read anything that tells us whether or not the 50 people in the bunker on Saturday night or Sunday morning survived? I have not, and that's a real big question mark. And there's a bunch of conflicting reports about the extent to which Makata Khomeini is. alive, well, in contact with Beijing. That was one report that I read, that he was leading some of these efforts, and it was difficult to translate that to the lower-level communities, the mosaic strategy, where they have these commanders who have autonomous, decentralized authority, that it was difficult for him to disseminate that control. But I've also read other pieces like the telegraph in London yesterday, which said that he's incapacitated and unconscious, so I don't know. That's what I read. He's in a hospital in Krum, unconscious and dying. Noah C. Rothman, great peace this morning, great commentary on the editors, keep it up. How are you on commentary today? Thank you, my friend. Don't go anywhere, America. I'm Hugh Hewitt. Welcome back, America. I'm Hugh Hewitt from Inside the Belway, joined by Sarah C. Bedford of the Washington Examiner. Sarah, there has been so much news that I'm not sure what's real and what isn't real. What's your understanding about the status of the ceasefire with Iran? Well, it seems to be so far holding, you know, 24 hours in. There had been some concerns about, you know, the level of control that Iran obviously still has over the Strait of Hormuz and that potentially Iran would still be choking off. ships going through there. And then there were some questions about whether the ceasefire applied to what Israel was doing in Lebanon and some bombings in Beirut. But so far, it hasn't fallen apart yet. And, you know, look, this all seems to be part of a way for Trump to sort of buy some time to finalize a deal that would achieve his goals in a sort of lasting way without the sort of massive strike that he was promising yesterday. How did you read his tweet?

or post yesterday because I thought the people who thought he was threatening genocide were acting in bad faith. I didn't read it that way at all. Oh, I mean, you know, his opponents and critics were accusing him of war crimes and genocide, like you mentioned, at one hour of the day. And like an hour later, they were accusing him of chickening out and being a coward. So the criticism of Trump was sort of all over the place yesterday. But Trump very frequently makes, like, big hyperbolic threats to achieve. his strategic goals and the confusion around what he means and what he will and won't do. That's a strategic thing that Trump deploys in a lot of different contexts, but especially when it comes to military operations and diplomacy. So it's not really surprising that Trump would use hyperbole when we now know he was on the brink of some sort of acceptable ceasefire deal. No, I think Iran is blinked yesterday that they cannot continue to take this pounding. in the period of the ceasefire. We continue to surge additional assets into the Gulf. More and more stuff is arriving here. Do you think, do you have a feeling about whether or not the war will resume? Politically, I think it could be difficult for Trump to do that. You see, I mean, just the domestic constraints that he does have. The war is not as popular as it was even a few weeks ago at the outset. People are having more skepticism that this won't be a limited engagement with a quick, clear victory like Trump promised at the outset. He might lose the support of some Republicans who could get nervous if this looks like it might turn into some sort of protracted conflict. Most of them have been willing to give him the space. to show, you know, what his goals were and how quickly they could be achieved. That could change as well when Congress comes back on Monday. You'll have Republicans chased down in the hallways of Congress facing those tough questions. And so those domestic constraints alone could make it difficult for Trump to resume the war, not to mention, you know, the political headaches caused by the rising price of oil and things like that. Now, Vice President JD Vance is going to lead our delegation to Islamabad. I don't know who else is on the delegation, do you? I don't think it's clear that Wyckoff and Jared Kushner and some of the people who were conducting negotiations before would be taken off. But it's certainly a sign of how serious the Trump administration is taking the negotiations that they're putting JD Vance as the face of it. And notably JD Vance is, you know, reported to be one of the leading anti-war voices in the administration. But he's also the second highest ranking official behind Trump himself. So it shows the seriousness with which Trump is taking this. High risk or no risk for J.D.

It certainly is high risk because, you know, he's staked his credibility to being opposed to this kind of conflict, and he's not exactly tamped down the speculation and reports that he's been opposed to this the whole time. If he allows himself to be tied closely to something that ends up being an albatross for Donald Trump, he's got plausible deniability right now about the war. That goes away, the deeper that he is more publicly involved in whatever happens next. I actually kind of read it as a vote of confidence in both the vice president. and the ceasefire that he's going for that very reason. Now, the essential elements of the ceasefire are two, in my view. One is the strait that Hormuz returns to the status quoante, and number two, the highly enriched uranium leaves Iran. Anything else that has to be a must have? No, I mean, the ending Iran's nuclear capabilities is the top stated goal that Trump has. And so the getting the enriched uranium out is hugely important. Trump seems to be projecting confidence that that's going to happen. And, you know, the Strait of Hormuz, that is a huge choke point. Iran has proved they do have significant leverage. And Iran hasn't been degraded so totally that they're not able to still choke up the flow of goods through the Strait of Hormuz. So. That is also something that's of paramount importance for resolving the conflict. Sarah C. Bedford, always good to see you. Follow Sarah on X at Sarah C. Bedford at the D.C. Examiner. Thank you, Sarah. Come here, Dan Kane, please. Cut number six. I've laid out the statistics. But it does not truly capture the nature of combat. This is gritty and unforgiving business. It's chaotic. It's hot. It's dark. It's unpredictable. And there's always unknowns. And our people... proudly walked into those unknowns and continue forward. And through it all, the joint force has demonstrated the unwavering resolve that the nation demands of us. We are a mission-focused force, and our objectives always is to create the conditions for peace, and today we have, while be ready should that peace break, which we hope it is not. I have more General Kane for you right after the break. He gave a concise three and a half minute summary. We'll come right out of the break with that summary when we return to the Hugh Hewitt Show. Welcome back. Pretty quickly, Mike Rogers, our candidate for Senate up in Michigan by hour. I mean the Republican nominee will be Mike Rogers. His website, what is your website? Rogers for Michigan. Is that it, Mike? Rogers for Senate.com. Rogers for Senate.com. R-O-G-E-R-S-F-O-R-S-O-R-S-O-R-SENET.com. We need those $10, $25, and $50 contribution. Mike, tell me what you assess the Iran Seats Fire as being. Good deal, bad deal, no way to tell.

You know, I know we have a lot of things that we've got to get ready for. So one of the things when you go through an exercise like this, this conflict in Iraq where you're degrading the top terrorist state's military capability, you learn a lot. And I think what they're doing is applying that. I don't know all of the aspects of the budget, of the proposed budget for defense. But I do know that there is a lot of new technology that we can apply. across the board to get ready to make sure that a country like China doesn't get an advantage or Russia doesn't get an advantage. or even another Iran pops up somewhere around the world, doesn't get an advantage, North Korea, that kind of thing. And so I'd be interested to go through it line by line. I'm interested to see what kind of technology they're investing in. Listen, if this is all about old legacy systems, probably a mistake. If it's about modernizing even one more time here, the United States military, it's probably the right decision. So, Congressman, I've got to congratulate you on winning the national championship. Go blue. Hate to say it. O'Connor will give me a hell about that. But number two, Michigan won World War II. It actually built the stuff that won World War II. Is it part of the rearmament of America? Needs to be. It's not yet. And one of the reasons I'm doing this, Hugh, is for that very reason. You know, we used to have a strategic air base, and we had two Democrats in the Senate for 30 years. Strategic airbase is no longer there. The naval subtracking station in the Upper Peninsula no longer there. We used to have a bigger role in building submarine components in the west side of the state. Doesn't happen. Under 700 foot ships on the east side of the state doesn't happen. We even lost tank production. It's now down in Lima, Ohio. Again, it needs to be. We have certainly the skilled workforce to be able to ramp up to do this. And it absolutely needs to be back in the business of defense industrial base. And what people don't realize, that's just not building up for war. It has ripple effects throughout the commercial economy. It has dual use technologies, other things. It creates more opportunity. And what I worry about is that we've atrophied ourselves so much. We don't have the ability to sustain long, big operations if we had to. No, nobody wants to do that. But if we had to, could we do it? And I think the answer is questionable right now. So we've got to get back into building things, not only across America, but in Michigan. And having a senator that actually worked on a car assembly line knows the value of these manufacturing jobs, knows how it applies to defense, I think is going to make the difference for Michigan going forward.

Mike Rogers, always good to see you. Keep coming back. Rogers for Senate.com. Go and be a part of the campaign to get Michigan, a senator who knows what he's talking about. Rogers, R-O-G-E-R-S for Senate.com. Rogers for Senate.com. still on the table. And is it fair to keep 90 million Iranians under that threat for the actions of their leaders? Well, look, the leadership is really to blame for the condition of the country in Iran. The president of the United States has made very clear that the United States has a lot of leverage here. We have economic leverage. We've got military leverage. What he's trying to do is make sure the American people are safe and strike a deal that's good for the American people. I just look, I encourage the Iranians to come to the table seriously. We've seen some signs that they're good. going to do that. We've seen some signs of ravado. Fundamentally, we're in a good spot. They're reopening the straits. We have a ceasefire. And frankly, if they break their end of the bargain, then they're going to see some serious consequences. Wiping them off the map is different than an economic leverage or military leverage. Why is that kind of language useful in this kind of? It's an area. Well, again, the President of the United States is saying that unless the Iranians do the right thing, he is going to have some serious consequences for the regime. We obviously don't want the people of Iran to suffer, but we have a lot of leverage the President of the United States could use, and it's why I think it's so important for the Iranians to be negotiators in good faith. Welcome back, America. That's Vice President JD Vance as he embarks on a trip to Islamabad to lead the negotiations with the Iranians. I'm joined by his former colleague, United States. Senator Rick Scott, who represents the great state of Florida. No CENTCOM intimately well. Senator Scott, welcome. What did you make of the deal announced last night? Well, I think all of us are optimistic. I mean, you don't underestimate Trump. This is a guy that knows how to do a deal, and he's clearly used his leverage, and his leverage is the fact that he's willing to do something in contrast to Obama and Biden. And number two, we've got the strongest military in the world. And number three, I think all these leaders in Iran have watched all their friends die. So I think they're going to say, well, I think there is an option here. I can stay alive and actually give the citizens of Iran some rights back. So I'm optimistic. You know, this will be good for the world. Maybe, you know, I'm disappointed in some of our NATO allies. But I think, you know, this is. This should have happened years ago. Obama should have done it. Biden should have done it. They should never have been able to get these weapons that they have. But there's a lot of work left. You know, a deal does not happen until it's closed. I mean, I'm a deal guy. I'm a business guy. I've purchased a lot of businesses in my life, and nothing's done until it's all done. So there's still a lot of work left to do. Now, Senator, I'm going to shift from the deal that we don't know anything about yet.

to the one that we know more about, which is the budget deadlock, the DHS being shut down. Maybe the house is going to reopen. Maybe you're going to do a second reconciliation. How do you view the situation right now? Well, I'm frustrated. Number one, I think we ought to be in D.C., and I think we ought to make all the Democrats sit there until we get this done. I'm frustrated because we should never have given them this leverage. We never should have funded all their earmarks that we did. But we did. Now, I think what we have to do is we have to stay in D.C., all of us, the Republicans and Democrats, stay until we get funded. And this is... If you think about what that typical American family cares about, they want a good economy, they want a good education system for the kids, they want to be safe. This is about the safety of Americans. But it's clearly shown you the difference between a Republican Democrat. This is the Senate Democrats, you know, defund the police program because they don't care about people like Lake and Riley or a young lady up in Chicago, Sheridan just passed away or Justin Ungari. They don't care. I mean, I don't get how they don't care about their families because When they allow, they don't fund Homeland Security and CBP and all these things, they're saying that they don't care if their families are unsafe. I care that every family is safe. I want my family to be safe, your family, every American family to be safe. So I think this is pretty simple. They don't care, we do. So, Senator, I would love to see there a second reconciliation come along. We're going to pick up another seat in the House. Maybe we'll have a little bit more maneuver there. I'd like to just see the Trump budget funded through the end of his term so we don't have these hijinks in a second term with the House. Is reconciliation possible? Yeah, we need to fund all of Homeland Security for probably the next 10 years because we know this is what they're going to do. We know the Democrats, this is what they're going to do. Let's fund it for the next 10 years and make sure that everybody in America knows that Republicans care about your safety. The Democrats clearly don't. So, yeah, we can do it all through reconciliation. That's what we ought to do. You know, I've never heard that before. I've always argued for forward funding of the Columbia submarine because they need a demand signal. Can you actually do multi-year funding beyond like two years? You just have to make it mandatory. I mean, that's how a lot of federal programs are done, if they're mandatory. At that right, you can do it through reconciliation. So I do think we probably ought to fund it for 10 years. Let's make sure there's no question about we're going to protect American lives. All this is is saying, we want your neighborhood to be safe. We don't want criminals to come from other countries where they open up their prisons. We don't want another president to open up the borders. We don't want any of this stuff. We're going to fund this. Now, you're a detail guy. Would it be possible to do other things besides border and homeland security? In other words, to get the most contentioned stuff put to bed for 10 years so Americans knew they were safe and their defense procurement was in order? Yeah, we can do what we have to do. It's all to be budgetary, not policy. So absolutely, we should, you know, we're, look.

Democrats are not going to fund our military. So the only way we're going to get that done is we're going to have to do that through reconciliation, I bet, because the Democrats are going to fight that. Because they want Trump to fail. I mean, it's so fascinating. This is about American safety. And when Democrats think it's not about American safety. It's not about American safety. It's not can you make Trump fail? So I think we ought to use reconciliation. Hugh, it's the same way. It's basically not, it's getting rid of the filibuster for budgetary items is what we're doing. I am so in favor of that. I think, I just, I got, I got to ask you one of the questions. I mean, I don't just want to get rid of the filibuster, but guess what? It doesn't work. I mean, the filibuster would stop debate, not to stop votes. And then what it's been used now to say, so we're not going to let you get nominations done. I think we had to change that last year, right? That would you change that? I mean, I don't, I don't, I mean, it's not my first thing to do, but guess what? We have the House, the White House and the Senate. We better the hell get our stuff done or why vote for us? All right. Last question, Senator. California announced the numbers on their high-speed rail. It's over $168 billion, and it doesn't work. It's not going anywhere. Didn't you build light transit in Florida for like under $10 billion? So you'd love this, Hugh. The month I got elected, okay, I killed the high-speed rail project in Florida, because here's what the deal was. It's going to go 84 miles, high-speed, stop 15 times, okay? And the state had to spend a whole bunch of money. and lose money every year. So I said, this is stupid. I'm not doing this. California, of course, said, no, we're all in. Some reporters said, I'm going to write a book about you, give it up the money, and California's taking it. So I stopped that program, and then the private sector added a fast rail from Miami all the way to Orlando, okay, without the state funding it. So what's better that's private sector taking the risk or the taxpayer taking the risk? The private sector will probably figure out what works and what doesn't work. Yeah, and by the way, yours is working in Florida, and we're not even close in California to being done. Senator Rick Scott, it's so crazy. It's so good to have you back on, ran into him last week, and we said, looked at each other and said, we haven't talked in a while. Keep coming back, Senator Scott, good to talk to you. Don't go anywhere America. I'll be right back on the Hugh Hewitt Show. Welcome back, America, Hugh Hewitt, joined now by former United States Senator Jim Talon. Senator, first of all, step back, tell us what you think, you know, 12 hours or 28 hours or 24 hours into this ceasefire. I think the president very effectively threatened to escalate in order to de-escalate, which is a classic doctrine. He used the language of the Middle East. You, I... If it hadn't been so serious, I'd have been laughing all afternoon. In other words, this is the way people talk in the Middle East.

He was threatening to escalate in order to get them to de-escalate and it worked. Now, what we have to see is because the gesture of good faith is reopening the straight. That was the symbolic way of them saying, yeah, we know we're beaten and we're going to be able to negotiate. So they've got to get that straight open. And if they don't, I think this is going to be a short-lived ceasefire. I think you tweeted. Didn't you tweet out said it'll be a two-day ceasefire, not a two-week ceasefire, and I think you're right. Well, now, what I'm watching is statements by the Speaker of the Iranian Parliament, and they're very hard-line. And otherly, they have to be, or they're going to get shot by the most hard-line guy in the room. On the other hand, they've got to now know how badly damage they are. I listen to General Kane this morning. My got that 90% of what they had a month ago is gone. Oh, yeah. That's right. And that's why I think you're also correct in saying that the feature of this negotiation that we're going to insist on is turning over the enriched uranium because, yes, we don't want them to build ballistic missiles. Well, they can't do that anyway. We don't want them to supply the proxies. They can't do that either. They got no drones. They got no missiles and they got no money. What they do have, evidently, is some enriched uranium. So I think that that's going to be what we want to see. Now... Listening to the clips you played by from the vice president, it sounds like there's a group of people in the government who really are prepared to negotiate. And that explains a lot. It explains why he's going to Islamabad and why they have some optimism that we might be able to get an agreement. But it won't be on their terms, you. It'll be on our terms. Donald Trump is not the kind of guy. My experience with the vice president is he's, I'm sorry, Jim, go ahead. I was going to say, Trump is not the kind of guy after he's beating the stuffings out of you for five weeks to give you your terms in negotiations. I would suspect an alien had taken over his body if he does that. All right, so talk to me about sending the vice president of the United States to this, because I have been racking my brain. I know that Dan Quail was sent on the Philippines or did the Philippines deal while the president was out of pocket, but when there was an attempted coup. But do you ever remember a vice president doing this kind of a deal? No, I mean, not offhand you. I think the key thing is to send somebody. whom they know has the ear of the president and can speak for the president. So formally,

You know, the vice president is that guy. That's the reason Trump sends Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner. Again, it's the Middle East. And in the Middle East, they negotiate through their best friends and through their family members. And in this case, he's sending along the vice president, I think probably to show everybody here how serious he is. So, yeah, I mean, the key again is that they can speak for the president. And the people all around that table will know they can speak directly to the president. Now, Jim, I keep asking people online and critics of the deal, is the United States and the West and the Gulf allies in Israel better off today than they were five weeks ago? How do you answer that? Oh, absolutely, because Iran has been defamed. Not only, I mean, again, General Kane went through. the assessments that CENTCOM has. I have no reason to believe that's incorrect. You, we ran over 13,000 sorties, precision strike sorties, with the best intelligence that any naval and any Air Force and Naval Air Force has ever had. And we set out to destroy not only their existing systems, but also the defense industrial base. And there's simply no way that wasn't successful. I mean, I knew it was going to be successful from the beginning because They have no integrated air defenses. They've been exposed over the course of the last couple of years, as if not a paper tiger, at least nowhere near as strong as we thought they were. So, yes, we have defanged them. No matter what happens, this is a big win for us. Now the question is, can we break their will, in essence? So, Senator, your old colleagues, and some of them weren't there like Chris Murphy and Richard Blumenthal up and Connecticut. They're saying, insane things. What has happened to the Democratic Party of Scoop Jackson and a bunch of other Democrats who used to take this stuff seriously? You know, it's hard to say. I think they're still around, but they're probably not talking. I mean, look, their base is energized in opposition to Donald Trump. And you don't want to say anything. If you're worried about getting primary in the next election, you don't want to say anything that sounds supportive of him, even on such an important issue of foreign policy. So I guess that's where they're coming from. Some of them are running for president. And that would explain it. But you, I'll tell you, and I thought this from the beginning, you were on a big risk in a war. Like, I knew the military phase was going to be successful. And there's a good chance the diplomatic phase will be successful, which means the whole operation is going to be viewed as a success by the American people. So I wouldn't go that far out on the limb if I were them. I'd keep my powder dry, but a lot of them aren't. Too late. Too late. They're out on that limb. Okay. Nobody's looking at Cuba this week. Everybody's been looking at Iran for a month. What do you think is going on down there? Well, I think we're proceeding with regime realignment.

You know, they've released prisoners. They've taken some other actions. And the president let an oil freighter get through, which tells me that they are progressing towards in the direction that we want them to go. I mean, again, what we're seeing here is a consistent policy applied around the world of gaining positions of leverage over our adversaries and then using it to get them to change their intention rather than trying necessarily for regime change. Now, it was easier in Venezuela and Cuba because we're not dealing with as high-level fanatics there. But that's exactly what we're trying to do in Iran. It's a question of having destroyed their capability now breaking their will. It'll be a remarkable next week. We'll have a lot to talk about. I don't know how long these negotiations in Islamabad are going to go on, but they're unprecedented. And if they bear fruit, they'll be quite the marker for Vice President JD Vance and his team. Thank you. Senator Jim Talent, Paul Mons, X at Jim Talent. I'm Hugh Hewitt. Thank you for watching today. Time to bring in Mary Catherine Hamm, host of Getting Hammered. my colleague at Fox News as well. Mary Catherine, there's a lot of serious stuff to talk about, and I will get to that. But I've got to begin with Girl Scout cookies, because I listened to the Getting Hammered episode today, and your guest co-host Kelly sold 11, 147 boxes of Girl Scout cookies, as opposed to your poultry six boxes of Girl Scout cookies. That really is quite the contrast. I think I'm going to trust Kelly in selling something. Yeah, I couldn't move product. I couldn't do it. How can a five-year-old knock at the door and not sell a box of cookies? How is that possible? I think I was just... I think I might have just given up quickly. I was nervous. I didn't like knocking on doors. I didn't like bothering people. I was maybe less extroverted than I am now. I really, I've grown. I think I can sell them better now. Well, and Kelly is a, you know, I don't want you to get rid of Vic. And I don't want a threesome. I like the two. I can understand what's going on. But Kelly's auction deal, the 255, I think that's an amazing skill set. Can you learn that? I mean, I guess I could, but she went to a full school for it. And you can hear her improving every day because when she folds laundry and when she talks to me on the phone and when she picks up her children from school, she's just auction chanting all day long every day to get better and better and better. I didn't know that she was quite the player in Colorado. I've been going to Colorado for the 25 years of this program. And my buddy out there, Michelle Austin's been my Sherpa. And she said, oh, Kelly, five stars. Why is she living in Colorado? That state's going to the way of California. You know, but the beauty of both states will keep people around. It's her home, and she would like to make it marginally better. All right. Now, I want to move up the scale of seriousness. Our governor, because you and I are both Commonwealth voters, both citizens of the great state of Virginia, our governor Abigail Spanberger is trying to achieve a new record for plummeting approval polls. Is there anything she could do to change your mind about her being the Manchurian Democrat?

I think she's waited too long to say anything to rebuff anything that her ultra-liberal legislature did. If she wanted to be a moderate, she had plenty of opportunities to do so by speaking out against anything they were trying to do and adding all these new programs and payroll taxes or trying to read District 10-1. And she's on board for it because I think these are the things she likes. So she's not changing my mind. I'm not sure she can change a lot of people's minds who've soured on her because she really sold something different. than what she's doing. And they may still be very successful with the redistricting because it's a tough road to hoe for Republicans in a midterm year on this obscure election. But her numbers do not look good and she's not that great at selling herself. I have already voted no. Despite the 15 point win, by the way. That's the fall from grace. A 15 point win to this. To this. And it's because she's got no charisma and apparently no moral center. But I want to talk about the redistricting. I went and I voted against it because I'm a Republican. But I don't get upset about redistricting because I've been around politics forever. There are no Republicans in Massachusetts for a reason. There are no Republicans in New Hampshire for a reason. California is playing hardball. Texas is playing hardball. So the Virginia people want to play hardball. But this is not a blue state. It's a purple state. Do you think there's a chance that could lose given the high-mindedness of some of our progressive Beltway buddies? there's a chance it does look like early voting totals for republican areas have been pretty good. They may have ticked off a bunch of people. Now, is that going to be enough to override the excitement on the left for a 10-1 map in Virginia? I'm not sure, but if you could get the message out and a bunch of money just went into the effort on the no side, if you could get the message out to voters, hey, do you want the most fair map in the country turned into the most gerrymandered map? A lot of them will say no, naturally. I think that's a natural position and a fairly easy argument to make, but Republicans... have stayed quiet on this for a long time, at least on the airwaves here. I haven't seen much of anything. I've gotten a couple mailers. You've got to make the argument, and there's a chance you could win this fight. But I think it's not a lot. Governor Yon called up and wanted to come on and talk about it. So I think the former governor of Virginia is in the fight fully now. What I wonder about, though, is Barack Obama is everywhere. with a lie. He's lying to everyone. Republicans want to steal the election, so vote yes before April 24th. It's just a lie. Do you think that helps them? It has been incessant, by the way. That's one of the markers of this is that I have heard Obama more times than I did maybe during his term on every podcast I listen to and every ad. And it is a lie. This temporary thing is nonsense. The Virginia voters voted in 2020. 2020 to make this a bipartisan commission. They remember doing that, right? It was their decision. They came up with this five, six map that is fair. And Democrats are just blatantly lying about the fact that they want to sort of rejigger it just temporarily so they can make things fair. It's not fair. It's the opposite of fair. But I don't know if that message is getting out. All right. Now I want to talk to you about the president's posts.

I am not nearly as upset with them as you and Kelly are. In fact, I thought the first one on Easter, though it was indiscriminate in its language, was aimed right at the bunker in Tehran to try and get them to stay longer so the B-2s could drop the ordinance on them. And then I thought yesterday's was intended to focus their mind completely on their being destroyed. And I don't see how anyone can read that. as a genocide-threatening quote, because he said at the end, the regime that has been there for 47 years will be ended. God bless the Iranian people. I mean, if you read the whole thing, it's not elegantly put, but it's not a threat of genocide. always end up medium on these things because there is a part of me that wants a president that does what Victor Glover did when asked to reflect on Easter, right, and deliver something that's beautiful and solemn on holidays. It could be separate from this tweet. But I am not a person who. Victor Glover of Artemis who gave that wonderful message you played. I don't have that. That's wonderful. But I am not a person who thought that this is like destined to happen tonight. And it is, he's on a quest for war crimes. And I thought that that betrayed a lot of sort of not having learned anything about the president for a long period of time. And then the worst behavior was those who at 8 a.m. were freaking out that he was going to cause a genocide. And then by 8 p.m. said he was a chicken for not doing so. That, that turn of events I do not understand. Kelly mentioned that she's got a lot of friends who have been broken by Trump. As do I, and they've reacted in different ways. One of them, and it's like you were talking to me, is triggered by whatever he does that is outrageous in the ordinary course of thing. And he demands, almost demands an apology from me. And I don't apologize. I say, by the way, the Iranian people, 50,000 of them were murdered or 35,000 were murdered. And he's taking on the regime. Do you think those people will ever come back to normal? Well, I mean, just have a conversation with them. I'm not sure. I'm not sure, but the only way out for them is through because Trump is the twice duly elected president of the United States. And that's the thing that I couldn't handle at CNN when I worked over there. Even though I was Trump critical and plenty Trump critical, I had to keep telling them, this man is the president. You cannot unpresident him just because you're grouchy about it. That's not how it works. Now, they certainly tried. But there is sort of an inability to cope with that part of it. And by the way, you could turn about fair play. You could just ask them about everything that Biden did wrong, ask him about the Afghanistan withdrawal every day and ask him to apologize for that. That was an international humiliation for us. But they never get sort of held their feet, their feet held to the fire over that. All right. Let's finish with the least serious but most wide-ranging.

topic. Doing your own wallpapering. If you had asked me, the thing I can remember from my youth, the steamer, the big old steamer to get the wallpaper off and then trying to make the lines line up and they never did. Haven't heard my father curse that much ever. Why did you do it? It was a new frontier, much like Victor Glover. You know, I really had to go for it on a much smaller scale. And, no, I don't know. I was just DIYing and I got carried away and I thought flowers would be pretty over here and they certainly are pretty. But, man, it was a battle, Hugh to line those things up. You mentioned in passing that you built a, quote, craft corner. Is the craft corner hermetically sealed from the smalls? It is not, but they are getting slightly more reasonable. You will notice there have been fewer stories of destruction lately. Yeah, but they'll be paste and glue and sparkles, right? We'll put them up high. We'll see what happens. Mary Catherine, I'm not sure it's a very good idea, but I do want to say I salute you for trying the wallpaper. I've never done it. I'm never going to do it, but I appreciate you're joining me. Mary Catherine, is Vic gone for good? Is he off, have you cut him? Has he gone to AAA? What's the deal? No, he's just on spring break. So let him enjoy his mitis and he'll be back soon. Well, I think Kelly is a fabulous addition. How long have you two been friends? He's great. 20 years. We met at some, at a gala here, I believe it was like an AFF event. Oh, it's like BFF's getting together. And finally, I did not know until three weeks ago that you played lacrosse at Georgia and that you guys were good. Oh, yes. Just club. Just club. We were pretty good. Yes. We won the SEC championship three out of four years. Hang around one second off air. I got to tell you something about your one pound hamburger. Stay tuned to America. I'm Hugh Hewitt.

Back, America, I'm Hugh Hewitt, joined now by Comfortably Smug of the Ruthless Podcast. Smug, first of all, is March Madness over? Well, March Madness is over, but Hack Madness is now in the championship round. It's pretty exciting. Who are the finalists? It is Don Lemon and Stephen Colbert. Banner year. I put my money on Lemon early. I think it's going to pay out very well. Smug, where do you think we are? Reports are all over the map on Iran. How do you think the president played it? Where do you think we are? So I think we are in a tremendous place. I think President Trump has accomplished so much already in respects to Iran. You've gotten rid of the terrible leadership of that country. You have essentially defamed it when your general Kane described that 80% of their missile launchers are gone, 90% of their Navy is gone. That's an unequivocal success for the entire world, for America, for the region. And I hope that peace can take hold. I hope the new regime in Iran realizes that America at any point under President Trump can do whatever they want. can continue bombing or whatever they want to do unless the Iranians agree to have peace and let the Strait of Ormoos have free travel. Now, one of my favorite parts about the ruthless podcast is you guys are very, very blunt when it comes to the insanity on the left. I want you to think about a new game that will somehow illustrate the backflips we have seen. We went from Donald Trump is going to use nuclear weapons to Taco. in the space of an hour last night. It was insane how the left reacted to this. He was going to use nuclear weapons and then he'd chicken out. What do you say to people like that? There's no thread of an argument. There's just an emotional reaction to whatever happens is bad. It's incredible. I think it is more emblematic of the fact that I constantly bring up is that the left is no longer ideologically based. They have no values. They have no beliefs that unite them. It's how you can have a march where we have Queers for Palestine marching where gay people in Iran are typically thrown off of buildings. So there's no reason or logic to anything that governs the left. It is simply about... power and opposing Trump. Anything that can increase the amount of power that the left has, whether it is controlling people's health care, any aspect of their lives essentially is what they're gunning for. That's what they are after. And that's why they don't need to feel any sort of ideological consistency between saying it would be a genocide if he does it. And it is chickening out if he doesn't.

Now I want to go back to Hack Madness for a second. You had a new entrance this year, Hasan Piker. I know nothing about this guy except he's nuts. First of all, tell me what I, a boomer, need to know about a Gen Alpha or a GenBer. You know, he's a dummy youngster. Yeah, so here's the situation with Hasan Piker is the most important thing to understand about him is where his political beliefs lie. He said America deserved 9-11. That's like a direct quote. And this is now an individual who has gained such popularity within the left and its progressive base that he now campaigns with mainstream Democrat candidates. We're talking about. Democrat Senate candidates in Michigan just the other night. He was on stage campaigning with the candidate that they have there. And he's become increasingly popular. Like, you know, he gets glowing profiles in the New York Times and Vanity Fair. Like, the left has gone whole hog on this insane individual. And the grassroots left and the younger folks on the left tune into his stream. And they're on board with him. He's like the more extreme post-Bernie left. Okay, now let's match him with Graham Platner. I opened the program with Susan Collins, moderate Republican, not unlike my own politics. She's going to win again. She always wins, but she's running against the oyster farmer, who is a decorated vet. I get that part. But he's to the left of left and he had a Nazi tattoo. What's happening to the Democrats? Well, that's the thing is they have realized that the American people are not on board with their policies. So they have to try to do. anything possible. He thinks he's fighting Trump, and you bring up these things like he's had a Nazi tattoo. He is not illogic consistent. He's nowhere near the voter base in the state that he's running for, but the media is still propping him up despite all of this, even though Susan Tucker Carlson is much more representative of the voters of that state. And again, it goes back to the fact that there is no... ideology that ties the left at this point. It is just by any means necessary to trick voters for them to get into power. That's what their belief system is. Now, Smog, we're in a ceasefire. It could go either way. There are so many different conflicting reports. But I really do believe there are a lot of people on the left that hope it fails because it will hurt Donald Trump. I even think there were some people on the left who didn't say it out loud, but they were kind of hoping the pilot got captured. Did you sense that? 100%. I mean, you look at X and these are Americans. Like, you know, thank God now on X with Elon Musk, he updated it so you can see the location of individuals. This is not some, you know, crazy account from Zimbabwe. These are actual Americans on the left who are like, boy, I bet the Iranians are going to get them. And if our airmen are captured, this is emblematic of the war crimes that America is committing, it's hard to understand how we got to this point.

in our country where we have the bravest military. It's an all volunteer military force serving, trying to protect us, defending us. And yet there are people in this country rooting for Iran. It's unbelievable. And the last thing I want to cover with you, Smug, the president's post of yesterday morning said, tonight, a great civilization will be destroyed. In the same paragraph, he says the 47-year rule is going to be destroyed. God bless the people of Iran. It is impossible for him to have been interpreted. I mean, you really cannot read that and think he's talking about destroying the people of Iran. He's talking about the regime. And yet all we see is the first line, the purposeful misdirection of what the... Post was about. It's just unprecedented in the media that they want to do this. And again, I think that's why, you know, shows like your show, our show at Ruthless, have such a tremendous success. Tuning into NBC, CNN, all these mainstream outlets for news leads to misdirection. Americans have decided they want to actually get the truth and know what's going on without a filter. And that's where folks like I step in. I hope the mainstream media continues to run their reputation in the mud. And how long is voting over at your X account comfortably smugged? The finals are between. I'm kind of surprised Abby got knocked off by Stephen Colbert, but Stephen Colbert is retiring or being retired, so it might be a little nostalgia there against Don Lemon. How long can they vote for? voting is currently underway. It will continue until about 1.30 p.m. tomorrow. All right. Smug, good to see you. By the way, with Duncan in today, he's been taking three or four days off. I talked to Ashbrook about him, the naked burglar days. He was gone. Did he come in today? Yeah, he's finally back in town. Him and his family are back. Did you quiz him about the naked burglar? I did. I asked him why he could live in a place like Northern Virginia. He should move to North Carolina like I did. But you removed the suspicion from there was a cloud of suspicion over him two nights and two days ago. I heard it. I believe you guys, whatever you have to say. Smug, good to see you. I'll talk to again soon. Go and play in the final round of Hack Madness. Don Lemon, Stephen Colbert, who's going to win this year's big bracket? All you have to do is go to X and go to comfortably smug. Come right back, America. I'm Hugh Hugh. but

34 minutes after the hour, America. I'm Hugh Hewitt, joined by my friend Dan Rundee, senior advisor at the Center for Strategic and International Studies here in D.C., preeminent think tank on these matters. Now, Dan Rundi is also the author of the American Imperative. You may have heard him talking about his book. It's a lot about how you develop close relationships with new allies and strengthen those that exist. As we wait to see what happens in the Iran battle, I wanted to ask Dan. Let's assume that there is a ceasefire. What do we do for our allies in the region, and what might we even do for Iran, Dan? Well, that's a really great question you. Thanks for having me on. I certainly hope that the ceasefire holds. I think one of the things that your listeners are really astute because I'm a listener and I consider myself being educated by you, Hugh. And I would say one of the things for your listeners think about is the role of Pakistan in brokering this deal. Pakistan is a complicated relationship for us. But in this instance, they've brokered a what's right now a fragile ceasefire that could turn into something else. We have to bridge the gap between what President Trump has said and what these crazy people in Iran are saying with their 10-point plan. Certainly, they were forced to the table. Iran blinked. I think that's an important thing for your listeners to also understand. Iran blink. This is because of pressure. by the United States and our ally Israel to pressure and force them to the negotiating table. These are folks who were unwilling to discuss a ceasefire very recently, and they've been forced to the table. I know that President Trump and his team are not going to accept a bad deal, so I think these are all things for your listeners to consider. But I think, and I think there's several things that President Trump is going to want to see, and those fundamentals are no nuclear pathway. no proxy warfare, and no disruption of global energy. So those are the first three things we need to think about. So then assuming that this holds, my hope is that we continue to be watchful and maintain pressure as need be. We have a lot of military assets in the Gulf right now and nearby, and Israel is also very wary. of Iran and this is these are folks that lie in negotiations they promise one thing and don't follow through But I do hope that they've been pressured enough by President Trump and the Trump administration and by our friends in Israel to make real changes. Let's hope that happens. Again, the fundamentals are no nuclear pathway, no proxy warfare, and no disruption of global energy. Assuming all of that holds, then I think several things, we could think about several things.

One is thinking about the role that Ukraine is going to play in the future here because Ukraine has provided technological solutions to defend our Gulf allies and has also made clear that the kinds of anti-drone technologies that Ukraine has. is something that we're going to need both in the United States and in the Middle East, our partners in the Middle East. So I think we're going to have to rethink how we defend ourselves here and how our partners and allies defend ourselves. And some of that's going to be learnings from Ukraine. And some is also going to be from, you know, hard lessons that we've learned in the last month or so in this war. We're going to take a lot away from it. So I think one thing is we've got to defend ourselves and think about how we defend ourselves in a future, given what we've learned from what's happened in the last month. And so I think, yeah. No, my question is, America has a tradition. Let me be the first person to bring up the Marshall Plan. We have a tradition of hammering opponents into the ground. We may have done that in Iran. We don't know who's alive. We don't know who's running the place. We don't know who's going to be running the place for a long time. And we've taken over Venezuela. You're the international aid soft power expert. Yeah. How soon do we become open to helping those countries on the ground? Because Iran's bankrupt and Venezuela is close. Yeah, so I mean, absolutely in the case of Venezuela, you're seeing incredible amount of change in the last 90 days. If we talked four months ago that we were going to be having visits from the representatives of Delci Rodriguez government and talking about minerals deals in Venezuela, energy deals in Venezuela, infrastructure deals in Venezuela, all happening right now and visits from that government to the White House. You and I have said, that's crazy. That is happening. So I think absolutely that's happening and should happen now in Venezuela. And I'd like us to work towards some sort of a democratic transition in Venezuela over the next 12 to 18 months. And I'd like to see Maria Corina Machado, the winner of the Nobel Prize. have a chance to really run in real free and fair elections in Venezuela, and we should all work towards that over the short to medium term. But in the meantime, we should be working towards helping rebuild Venezuela as long as this government of Venezuela is cooperative with us, releases political prisoners, makes economic reforms, and stops being a bad actor. All right, pause. We'll come right back with Dan Rundee for the $64,000 or a million or a billion dollar question about.

What do we do with Iran if it's a rational actor atop the regime? Stay tuned. He'll be right back. Dan Rundee, the author of The American Imperative. My friends, you've probably seen the headlines are worse, your latest sell bill. Big wireless is raising rates again. That means you'll be paying more for the same service or getting pushed into a pricier plan that you simply don't need. That's not right. There's a better way, and it's called consumer cellular. Millions of Americans have already made this switching for good reason. Consumer cellular is consistently ranked number one in customer satisfaction because they treat you like a customer, not a number. With consumer cellular, you get flexible, affordable plans that fit your life, not the other way around. No long-term contracts, no hidden fees. You can keep your phone and choose a new one. So don't let big wireless dictate what you pay. Take control today. Visit consumer cellular.com slash hue and use the promo code Hugh Hewitt-U-G-H for your second month for free. Or call 800, 411, 44-54. Again, remember my code is Hugh. If you're over 50, listen to this. You can get a single line with unlimited talk, text, and data for just $35 a month at consumercellular.com slash hue.

Welcome back, America, Hugh Hewitt, with Dan Rundi. Dan is a senior advisor at the Center for Strategic International Studies here in D.C., author of the American Imperative. He lives, breeze, eats, soft power, and how to develop ally relationships. So, Dan, what do we do with Iran if they're not nuts? I'll put it, I just say, for 47 years, they've been nuts. Let's just assume they're not a democracy, they're not our friend, but they're not nuts. What do we do? So I think this is the first time anyone's asked me that question, and I think I'm really glad you're asking this to you because I think we need to get ready for the possibility of such a situation. And that could present itself in a number of different scenarios. One is that there's some sort of a palace coup. And some sort of an Iranian pinotche takes over the country that's willing to deal with us, similar to like a Delci Rodriguez in Venezuela or something along those lines. Or there's some sort of popular revolt at some point. We've asked, the United States has asked folks not to go out into the streets because it was too dangerous. But given sort of the economic pressures, given we've talked about this on your show before, about the water pressures in Iran, there was something we talked about in the past. There's enormous water scarcity in Iran. And there's enormous financial problems in Iran that partially because of the mismanagement and corruption of that society. And who the heck wants to invest in Iran? It's a really scary place to invest. But if all that were to change. You could see there's an enormous Iranian diaspora that you know about because you lived on the West Coast of the United States, and they're just really creative. There's some incredible entrepreneurs. I mean, it's just world-class talent in the Iranian diaspora. And so I think you could see a situation either through an Iranian Pinotche or through some popular revolt and some kind of a multi-party democracy down the road. That's not insane to say this. We should be thinking about these sorts of possibilities. that we should then offer to a big Marshall plan for Iran under those circumstances. They've got a lot of oil resources. They've got some of the largest reserves in the world of oil. They've got gas. They may have some minerals to think about as well then. But most importantly, they've got incredible human talent in the country that's been repressed and oppressed. That I think... under the right circumstances could be put to rebuilding the country, but also the Iranian diaspora could put forward and rebuild it. The other thing to think about you, if we were going to have a Marshall Plan, is if you look at the neighborhood, we all look at and say, oh, my gosh, it's a crazy neighborhood. The reason it's a crazy neighbor, because they're crazy, and they've made it a bad neighborhood. But if you look, you could also argue that it's pretty centrally located place, similar to the way the UAE. or, you know, Qatar have used their geography to their advantage. Iran could absolutely use its geography in a better way to its advantage in terms of regional connectivity of Central Asia or whether it's gas, rail, digital.

there could be all sorts of possibilities that we've, in essence, closed the door on for 50 years because they're crazy. So to the extent you had a non-crazy regime in Iran, we'd have to all rethink about our mental models in our head about you, basically just write it off as just, well, they're crazy, so we can't do anything about it. They've been lying in cheating for 47 years, but here's my key question. If they offer us their highly enriched uranium for a price, should we pay the price? That's a good one. I would say yes, to the extent we also, though, had enough pressure on them and enough leverage on them to make sure because they are not, these are not trustworthy people. These are bad hombres to quote President Trump. These are liars and cheaters. So these aren't our friends for now, but what we should hope for is to maintain pressure. Take what we can get. We absolutely need to have no nuclear pathway. But we should think about, we should lift our sights a little bit and think about if we have some kind of a, we can hold the ceasefire. We should think about what are the possibilities we could create for them. President Trump's a really creative negotiator. And so I could absolutely see a scenario over the next several years if the ceasefire holds. and we're able to bridge the gap between President Trump's vision and these crazy people's unrealistic 10-point plan, and they move towards where President Trump is through pressure. We should think about these things, connectivity, energy, minerals, the human capital, and what we could do. They need help. As I told you, last time I was on the show, that... Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had a video clip. I'm sure you went back and looked at it after we talked about it, because I know you do your homework, where he had a glass of water on the table saying, I want to solve Iran's water problems. Because as you know, Hugh, Israel is in a desert, but they've made their desert bloom. They know how to manage water and solve water problems. And the Iran's mismanaged their water. So if there's one country in the world that could solve Iran's water problems, it would be Israel. And let me say something else that no one said before. which is if we are thinking along these lines and things went the right way and we had either an Iranian Pinotche or a popular uprising, we should hope and believe that three to five years from now there were an Abraham Accords between Iran and Israel. That's what we should be aiming for as well. Cyrus Accord would be great. I got to get one minute in with you. Yes. But Dan, you know Central in Latin America. What about Cuba? Are you an optimist? I'm absolutely an optimist. I hope that by September or October, we have a change in the regime. I'm not going to call it regime change, but again, some kind of a negotiated deal with Cuba is very possible, Hugh. There's clearly a lot of discussions going on. The pressure is strong on the Cuban regime. I'm sure. Marco Rubio is very aware of the history and this is a historic opportunity, something that would be in America's interests and the Caribbean's interests and the Western Hemisphere's interest. It would be so great to have a different regime in Iran and a different regime in Cuba. Not only wouldn't it be great for the people of Iran and great for the people of Cuba, but the other thing for us to think about is these.

These horrible regimes have been totems for the anti-American left for decades. This has been a vector for folks to express their disapproval of the United States and use these as... countries and as sort of a weapon against us ideologically and in diplomatic circles and also even in the, as a proxy to fight against us and to fight against freedom in the world. So getting rid of these two odious regimes would be so good for the world and we'd be safer for it. The United States would be safer for it and the people around Cuba would be much happier, freer, and much better off. And if we... Ten seconds, Dan. If Venezuela, Iran, and Cuba, within the next three years, transition to not dangerous governments, how's that rank? A, B, C, D, and National Security Affairs. And the A plus. A plus. That's what I think. And I hope that's where we're going. Dan Rundee, follow him on X at Dan Rundee. And follow me to the next segment. Dan is a senior advisor at the Center for Strategic International Studies in the United States. In a world that screams for your attention, there is a place that invites you to peace. You don't need a building. You don't need a choir. You just need to turn your heart to Air One. Air One. Songs that heal. Lyrics that pray for you when you don't have the words. From Lauren Daigle to elevation worship. And more. This isn't just radio. It's worship for the everyday. Escape the noise and worship now. Download the Air One app. Ask your smart speaker to play Air One or visit Air One.com. Air One. Worship. Now.