Trump Buying Greenland? Venezuela's 50M Barrels, Newsom's Fraud Probed + Iran On The Brink | PBD Podcast | Ep. 714

Patrick Bet-David, Tom Ellsworth, Vincent Oshana, and Adam Sosnick break down Trump’s controversial plan to buy Greenland amid global pushback, the U. S. securing up to 50 million barrels of Venezuelan oil, the looming fraud probe into Gavin Newsom’s administration, and escalating unrest in Iran. -------- 👞 GET THE NEW FLB 1'S: https://bit.ly/4mXV9gd 📺 JEFF SNIDER'S YOUTUBE CHANNEL: https://bit.ly/4i5uz3W 🎙️ FOLLOW THE PODCAST ON SPOTIFY: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://bit.ly/4g57zR2⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ https://bit.ly/4g57zR2 Ⓜ️ CONNECT ON MINNECT: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://bit.ly/4kSVkso ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ https://bit.ly/4kSVkso Ⓜ️ PBD PODCAST CIRCLES: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://bit.ly/4mAWQAP⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ https://bit.ly/4mAWQAP 🥃 BOARDROOM CIGAR LOUNGE: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://bit.ly/4pzLEXj⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ https://bit.ly/4pzLEXj 👔 BET-DAVID CONSULTING: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://bit.ly/4lzQph2 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ https://bit.ly/4lzQph2 💬 TEXT US: Text “PODCAST” to 310-340-1132 to get the latest updates in real-time! ABOUT US: Patrick Bet-David is the founder and CEO of Valuetainment Media. He is the author of the #1 Wall Street Journal Bestseller “Your Next Five Moves” (Simon & Schuster) and a father of 2 boys and 2 girls. He currently resides in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:08Patrick Bet-David?

  Adam, what's your point? The future looks bright?

• 0:12Speaker 01

  My handshake is better than anything I ever signs, right here.

• 0:16Patrick Bet-David?

  You are a 101?

• 0:17Speaker 01

  My son's right there. I don't think I've ever said this before.

• 0:25Patrick Bet-David?

  Alright folks, it's as if every day you're looking at the news, it's just getting thicker and thicker and thicker. There's so many things to talk about right now. Yesterday, we had the best strategy kickoff meeting ever in the history of Bedevic Consulting. It was all day, it was a phenomenal, phenomenal meeting. We ended up very, very late at night. Those who were there, you know exactly what I'm talking about. A lot coming out soon here, but we got a lot of stories. We got, again, three of the smartest brains out there in Florida. Okay, we were able to figure out a way to do it, and then Rob and I decided to join them. We got Brandon Snyder and Ellsworth here with us. Brandon, you're like Madonna, you just have a first name.

• 1:01Speaker 02

  Thank you.

• 1:01Patrick Bet-David?

  You're so big, we don't even have to say Madonna's last name. What is Madonna's last name? Nobody knows.

• 1:06Speaker 02

  Mm-mm.

• 1:06Patrick Bet-David?

  You're like Prince, you're like Madonna, so just Brandon.

• 1:09Speaker 02

  That's good territory, thank you.

• 1:09Patrick Bet-David?

  Yes, it's a great place to be, it's a great place to be with Madonna. But, uh, maybe 30 years ago. But, okay, so this story here, a few things on what's going on, folks. Trump just came out and said, "Look, Venezuela is gonna give up 50 million barrels of oil to US." Okay? And China comes out and says, "Wait a minute, what are you talking about? That's ours." So there's this fight going on, remember the key word that Rubio used? "Western Hemisphere." Very soon, Rubio could be the head of state of four different places. He could be running Gaza, Venezuela, and Iran if it goes the way it is going right now with the decisions he has to make. But that guy's got a very busy schedule, but Trump says 50 million barrels is going to the US.

• 1:53Patrick Bet-David?

  And Polly Market decides to refuse. Paying out bets that US would invade Venezuela. Cause the word invade, so. That's a very interesting, now it's getting a little bit technical on how they have to pay out, right? The key word invade, it wasn't an invasion. They came and took him out, right?

• 2:10Tom Ellsworth?

  Yeah, it's a question that they're, well, let's talk about it.

• 2:13Patrick Bet-David?

  Yeah, we'll definitely talk about it. Rubio tells lawmakers, Trump wants to buy Greenland. We don't know if it's on sale or not, I went on eBay the other day, I didn't see Greenland for sale, I went on Realtor.com. Zillow, couldn't find it, but maybe they're on a different website we don't have access to. John Harbaugh, for some of you guys that follow sports. Did you ever think he was gonna get fired from the Ravens? I never thought it was gonna happen, but this. Field goal kicker fired John Harbaugh. If that field goal goes in, I don't know if the guy's getting fired, so should they fire the kicker? Should they fire him? Who knows? He says he's got. Eight job offers already. And we'll get into that if we have a chance to get into it.

• 2:49Tom Ellsworth?

  Rookie kicker, to be fair.

• 2:50Patrick Bet-David?

  Yeah, so what did I say? Did I say, it's a kicker, right?

• 2:53Tom Ellsworth?

  No, I know, but I'm saying, to be fair, it was a rookie kicker.

• 2:56Patrick Bet-David?

  It doesn't matter what shot, it's 43, Tom, it's 43 yards. I could have gone, Dylan would have kicked the 43 yard, now listen, sometimes we talk like that, but. That's part of fan and screaming and arguing and. It's a different time. Prediction markets show. Rising odds. Trump seizes Panama Canal and moves on Greenland, which by the way. That was the deal with Hutchinson, that China came in and said, no, no, no. You can't get those 47, was it 47 ports? And two of them were the main ones that they were gonna get, right? A couple of the ports were in Mexico. But the deal was stopped. Trump administration, ready for this one? A lot of people. Jeff. In Minnesota are not happy about this, devastated. Because small business owners are gonna be impacted by this. Trump administration is freezing $10 billion.

• 3:41Patrick Bet-David?

  In child and family aid. To five states over fraud concerns, and by the way, you know what they said? Fraud investigation of California has begun. Califor- what do you mean fraud investigation of Califor- it just began. And Nvidia CEO says he doesn't care about California's proposal, billionaire tactic, I'm okay with it. Although Bill Blackman has some comments on it and some thoughts on it. Iran on the brink as protesters move to take two cities. Appeal to Trump, you should see they have Trump's name stickers all over streets, they're renaming streets. After Trump in Farsi, just a very interesting spectacle. Reza Pahlavi came out and gave a message to the Iranian people, I've made so many new Iranian friends.

• 4:26Patrick Bet-David?

  It's been incredible, the amount of love I've gotten after I called that Reza Pahlavi. The DMs are beautiful, you guys are so beautiful, so respectful. This entire community, it's been a great experience talking to them. All I care about is for Iran to be free again, so the people who live there. The people who live there, who live in Iran. My goal is to see them be free, so one day we can go to Iran. And visit the city, the beautiful history that it has. Rob's been asking about going to Iran for a while. And listen, I like to have people's dreams become a reality, he's been begging for this for three years, I'm like, Rob. I don't know if it's gonna be tomorrow, the next day, but just wait patiently, maybe it'll happen. God willing, it's gonna happen here soon. Oil and Russia, something's going on over there, right? Did you see the ships are coming in and?

• 5:11Patrick Bet-David?

  Kinda like, hey, if you're gonna come this far, we're gonna come and protect, they're worried about maybe the next. North Stream pipeline, they're being a little bit paranoid right now, which kinda makes sense. Because there's a lot on the line, White House laser focused. On affordability, which is probably the issue we'll start off with today. As Trump softens tariff strategy. The dollar, Snyder, I'm gonna come to on this one. The US dollar set for the biggest drop in a decade after trade war, I know you've talked a lot about the Euro dollar, zero dollar, so I kinda wanna hear your thoughts. On this as well, Michael Burry from Big Short says markets are missing a trick. As the Venezuela raid just changed the game. What the hell is he talking about? Well, they're dressed at.

• 5:53Patrick Bet-David?

  Um, Trump warns Iran that US will rescue protesters. What does that mean? In an interview with Wall Street Journal, Reza Pahlavi was asked, "Are you for US intervention to come and help out?" And he flat out says, "We don't need a single boot of your military on the ground in Iran." Okay? Now, I don't know if Iranians agree with that. I mean, that's what he's saying. I don't know if Iranians are sitting there saying, "Wait a minute. For 47 years, we've been, we haven't gotten a single boot, and it's not been free. Do we want it? Do we not want it? Do Americans want it?" So, there's a lot of, it's a lot of topics there that we can address, and hopefully, we'll get into it. Uh, and then, in India issues, Trump warns of higher tariffs on India over Russian oil purchases.

• 6:37Patrick Bet-David?

  US dollar set for the biggest drop in a decade. Ackman, we'll talk about that. Uh, US economy expected to grow faster in 2026 despite stagnant job market. Goldman Sachs says nearly half of Americans feel financially behind as 2025 comes to a close. Chili's trolls, fast food giants with 10.99 burger. Brandon is upset, so we'll talk about that. And then, we got a couple of other things going on with Canada. Uh, OpenAI and reports Netflix. Tom wants to talk about this issue of 41% of Netflix's shows for kids have LGBTQ community within them. Having said that, folks, since September 9th or 10th, even when we went to Aspen, I keep telling you this.

• 7:21Patrick Bet-David?

  I have been wearing the same exact shoes. I'm not kidding with you. This sounds crazy, doesn't it? It has to be, it's the only thing that I wear every single day, and I show you every single time. This is on, right? Future Looks Bright shoes. We are now seeing this in 20, I think we just hit 25 or 26 countries that it's been ordered in. If you're somewhere in the world watching this, you haven't placed an order yet, go ahead. But here's a Future Looks Bright shoes. Rob, go ahead and play the clip. When we set out to create a shoe that blends comfort, function, and luxury, we had the choice to make it fast, we had the choice to make it cheap. We chose neither. Instead, we chose Tuscany, Italy. We chose true Italian craftsmanship. Each pair touched by 50 skilled painters. We chose patience,

• 8:06Patrick Bet-David?

  spending two years perfecting every detail, and we chose the finest quality at every step. Introducing the Future Looks Bright collection. Not rushed, not disposable, not ordinary. Rather intentional, luxurious, timeless.

• 8:29Patrick Bet-David?

  Alright, so guys, it's officially on the fourth order. This is how quickly this thing's going right now. Well, people, we were not expecting for a shoe, but it has become such a big hit. And the biggest thing is people come to this page and they compare to the Berluti, the Ferragamo, the Zenia, the Gucci. And you look at the FLB and what it offers with the super foam technology at the bottom of it and the craftsmanship. Made in Tuscany, Italy, at five factories. If you haven't placed an order for yourself, or your husband, or your son, or somebody, go place an order. They will fall in love with the shoes. Go read the reviews on the website for yourself. Only from people who purchased the shoes. And enjoy it. They'll come back to you saying, "This is the most comfortable thing I've ever worn." Go to VTmerch.com, place your order. And having said that, let's get right into it. First issue I want to get into.

• 9:14Patrick Bet-David?

  "White House laser-focused on affordability as Trump softens tariff strategy." Okay, so there's two stories. Like, "Well, you know, affordability is just a Democrat hoax. It's not a real thing. No one's really dealing with that. It's just a bunch of BS." But behind closed doors, apparently, guys, we gotta get this affordability thing scored away as we're going through this next phase. So the Trump administration is ramping down tariffs for even more goods as the White House zeroes in on its messaging around affordability. The White House announces Wednesday that tariffs slated to kick in Thursday as furniture, kitchen cabinets, and vanities would be postponed for another year. This indicates that on some level, the White House understands that President Trump's tariffs are driving up consumer prices

• 9:59Patrick Bet-David?

  and that Trump and the Republican Party are incurring substantial political damage. From higher prices, Michael Strain said, the White House slapped a 25% tariff on furniture, kitchen cabinets and vanities in October tariffs on furniture were slated to increase to 30% in January and tariffs on the cabinets and vanities were set to increase to 50%. But they're trying to figure out something going on here with affordability. Tom, your thoughts on the story?

• 10:22Tom Ellsworth?

  Well, first of all, we were correct. We talked about this and we said that the tariffs, and we said at the beginning of the year, they would be tactics, not taxes. And guess what? All the economists come out and so surprised. Oh, wow. Well, you know, it really hasn't gone up and hasn't been as inflationary as we thought. Even the Fed, Jerome Powell, you know, the short timer who's about to lose his job, has said that. And what's happening this week is the president is talking more about affordability to kind of take the messaging back from the Democrats who keep saying, oh, it's inflationary, inflationary. If you look at one of the things that was happening this week, it was a bunch of pre-made construction

• 11:02Tom Ellsworth?

  stuff. These are things that, you know, average Americans buy every week, not vanities, kitchen cabinets, you know, higher end furniture. Come on. Those aren't the things that people are buying every week and that's not what tariffs are going to cause inflationary. As a matter of fact, he moved on some agricultural tariffs that were in Italy and it took the tariffs down to 1.2% on certain Italian pastas. So the pastas that are coming in, it was less than one seventh of our sales tax. So what's happening right now, point one, the president hears these messages Democrats are trying to push on affordability. So now he's fighting back saying, hey, it wasn't inflationary in the first place. And I'll

• 11:46Tom Ellsworth?

  tell you what, let me suspend this tariff over here, this tariff here that was on kitchen vanities, cabinets and things that you would use for remodels. And Americans aren't really doing that right now, right? There's not a lot of remodeling going on. You see the quarterly reports from Home Depot and Lowe's, but energy is down, heating oil is down for the winter, and also He just did like what he did on the imported Italian pasta, make it like a 1% tariff coming over there. So he's getting the joke that he can't just say to the microphone, "Oh, affordability is a headline issue that's being spun by the Democrats." No, there's some reality to it because the prices haven't come back down from Biden inflation. And so now the White House and the President are out there speaking to it to counter

• 12:30Tom Ellsworth?

  the message of the Democrats. And yes, certain things like Italian pastas came down a little bit.

• 12:35Speaker 04

  Jeff, your thoughts on this? Yeah, this is not a messaging thing. And the fact that they tried to treat it as a messaging problem shows that they're still kind of out to lunch on it. You're saying it's a real thing? It is absolutely a real thing. And, you know, the original problem here that Republicans had specifically is they came in, you know, last year or the year before, sorry, it's 2025 or 2026 now, they came in the year before and said, "We're going to bring prices down." Well, in economics, prices don't go down. That was a mistake to begin with. When prices went up back in 21 and 22, that was a permanent change. You can't go backwards. Every supply shock in history, prices go up in a step fashion and then they level off where they are at a new step fashion or the new equilibrium, and they stay there. So what

• 13:18Speaker 04

  Republicans should have said is, "You want to blame Biden for that? Fine. Biden made you poorer. Now we're going to try to fix it." Not by getting prices to go down, because they will not go down. They should have been clear on that. Prices will never go down again. We are never going to see 2019 prices again. So what we're going to try to do is our absolute best to make sure the jobs market is as strong and as resilient as matching the rhetoric coming from all these different economists in the Federal Reserve. So that what happens is, what should have happened, if we had a strong economy, that you have prices that went up in 21 and 22, or 21, back then, five years ago, and then incomes rise to, first of all, meet prices and then exceed them. What happens first?

• 14:00Patrick Bet-David?

  What happens first? Income goes, uh, cost of goods goes up first, then income rises?

• 14:05Speaker 04

  That, well, that

• 14:06Patrick Bet-David?

  What is the typical pattern?

• 14:07Speaker 04

  Well, there, in this case, because prices were forced higher by government action, it was a non-econom-

• 14:12Patrick Bet-David?

  Income has to be forced to increase.

• 14:13Speaker 04

  Income should naturally go, if, if there was a actual recovery from the pandemic and the lockdowns, then incomes would naturally rise over enough time that it would equalize with the prices from 21 and 22. And then exceed them, so that even though, you know, the cost of a car is now 50,000 instead of 30,000. You have more than enough income to pay for it. And so we all get used to the new higher prices and it doesn't become a major problem.

• 14:36Patrick Bet-David?

  But is that happening?

• 14:37Speaker 04

  No, that's the problem. What really happened was prices went up massively in 21 and 22 and it, incomes never caught up. This is what people are talking about when they talk about inflation and affordability. It's not about the price of, you know, a dryer or something that's gone up in the last year. It's the price of everything that went up five years ago and incomes never went up enough to, to, uh, for people to claw back.

• 14:59Patrick Bet-David?

  So on whose fault is that too? How do you address it?

• 15:01Speaker 04

  First, whose fault is that? It's the government's fault. They created the pandemic and the lockdowns and then because of the pandemic-

• 15:07Patrick Bet-David?

  Under Biden, when they did the pandemic and the lockdown-

• 15:09Speaker 04

  You can't forget, it was also Trump.

• 15:11Patrick Bet-David?

  It was, the spending was on both sides.

• 15:13Speaker 04

  Spending was on both sides, the lockdowns-

• 15:14Patrick Bet-David?

  lockdown was on both sides.

• 15:15Speaker 04

  Yeah, it was both sides. I mean, you gotta blame both sides for this part.

• 15:17Patrick Bet-David?

  On lockdown?

• 15:18Speaker 04

  Sure. And spending and then the printing.

• 15:20Patrick Bet-David?

  Who locked down on Trump's side?

• 15:21Speaker 04

  2020, two, two weeks to, to flatten the curve? That was, that was in Trump's watch.

• 15:26Patrick Bet-David?

  Right, the lockdown, but, but it wasn't a, you're not talking about the lockdown that happened under Biden?

• 15:31Speaker 04

  No, the repeated, the repeated, you know, the repeated emergency pandemic measures, that was absolutely devastating. That's where really the price changes came from. Cause what happened is you had the economy starting to come back from the lockdowns. So there's more demand that was rising, but at the same time, supply, the supply side of the economy was hindered by all those emergency measures and the just-

• 15:51Patrick Bet-David?

  The government printed more money?

• 15:52Speaker 04

  Not money printing, not money printing. What happened was it's called a supply shock, which is a, an imbalance between demand and supply. So you have demand and supply that completely plummeted during the lockdowns. When they came back, demand started to come back, but supply couldn't. It was restraining, people were home, they couldn't work, you know, we, we couldn't get stuff shipped from overseas. So demand came back faster than supply and this is basic economics. What happens when demand is, is growing faster than supply is? The only way to reconcile those is prices have to rise. Think about it as an auction process. If you have an auction where a ton of people show up and there's only a couple sellers, the sellers are going to get huge prices for it. So because supply was restricted, that's why it's called supply shock, prices had to rise to meet for the rising demand.

• 16:34Speaker 04

  Now, what should have happened, what the government said was going to happen, was that we are going to do all these stimulus plans. We're going to give money to people. And what that's going to do is that's going to temporarily stimulate the economy so that the process I talked about where incomes would start to rise and then slowly over time, they would offset and exceed price changes. But that never happened because stimulus never really actually stimulated. How do you address it now? How do you address it now is we've got to get the labor market back working again, which means the economy needs to hit some kind of equilibrium coming off of that, you know, three years ago, four years ago, where it was artificially stimulated in all the worst ways. Now it has to clear out all the bad stuff, including the stuff we're going to talk about here with fraud.

• 17:18Speaker 04

  I mean, fraud and government waste was a huge part of stimulating the economy, which is the worst way to try to create a sustainable economic growth pattern. You don't, you don't create growth from waste and fraud and inefficiency and unproductivity. So we've got to clean all that stuff out and let the economy start growing. It's like the same reason why you cut back all your weeds in your garden, you know, all the bad growth, you've got to get rid of that. Tom, what do you think about what we're saying?

• 17:40Tom Ellsworth?

  So there's, there's a couple of things here. First of all, I agree that there is this cataclysmic jump in prices that happened under Biden. And you can argue whether it started at Trump, but you can certainly look at the charts and it went nuts under Biden. And there's a lot of core products that probably aren't going to be able to come down. Energy is one where the president can help it get down. I mean, look what Biden did. Biden depleted the SPR, Strategic Petroleum Reserve, to artificially drop gasoline prices in the face of...

• 18:12Speaker 04

  Which never happened. They, they used the SPR and it didn't actually get oil prices to go down.

• 18:16Tom Ellsworth?

  Correct, but that's what he said he was doing. Instead, it just depleted it. And so

• 18:21Speaker 04

  Again, that's all just messaging. We need to do something to appear to be doing something.

• 18:25Tom Ellsworth?

  Correct. Well, he didn't do anything. What Trump is doing something, and you can look at the price of gas outside of the blue states where it have the artificial cap taxes. Like California's got a dollar ninety cap tax on the true price of gas. So you take a look at what you'd pay, say, in Texas, Alabama, even New Jersey, and then put a dollar ninety on it, the California cap tax. And that's why it's five dollars in California and two ninety-nine in other states. So the president can push down on energy, but this president needs to talk about affordability to blunt what's happening with the Democrats. That's the messaging thing. What you're saying, solution, I agree, the solution isn't messaging, but in one year, you're not going to have a thirty percent increase in American income. That is, by the way, we do see that around the

• 19:10Tom Ellsworth?

  world. It's hyperinflation, right? If everybody's income goes up, then all the companies that pay

• 19:15Speaker 04

  That's why it happens over time. What I'm arguing for is that from the president and political perspective, is that what they should do is be honest. They should just be honest and say, look, we're not going to get prices to go back. That's not how economics works. So that's, we're not even going to try. That's not our goal here. What if you hurt the man, though?

• 19:32Tom Ellsworth?

  Do you think any president would say, you know, the other guy did it, and I can't fix it. I'm not even going to try.

• 19:36Speaker 04

  No, that's what I'm saying is

• 19:38Patrick Bet-David?

  He's not saying that. What he's saying is

• 19:39Speaker 04

  We need to go in another direction.

• 19:40Patrick Bet-David?

  What Snyder is saying is we're officially in a new reality.

• 19:44Speaker 04

  The new reality is

• 19:45Patrick Bet-David?

  And this new reality is

• 19:46Speaker 04

  Fifty thousand dollar a year cars instead of thirty thousand dollars.

• 19:50Patrick Bet-David?

  So then, but what do you do with that? How do you address that?

• 19:52Speaker 04

  You're not going to get the cars to go, prices to go down.

• 19:54Patrick Bet-David?

  I understand that. That's what I'm saying to you. So when you're saying, so is the solution

• 19:58Speaker 04

  The messaging, if you want to go to the messaging, the messaging needs to be

• 20:01Patrick Bet-David?

  And I'm not talking messaging. I could care less about messaging. What I care about is results. I want to find out, what do you do?

• 20:07Speaker 04

  Strongest job market that we can possibly have. Because that's the only way to get out of this, is to make sure that incomes grow in a fashion that pays for all of those price changes from five years ago.

• 20:18Patrick Bet-David?

  Yeah.

• 20:18Speaker 04

  How do we get jobs growing again? We need a lot of things to take place, but among them is we need the banking sector to be more efficient and actually start making loans again, instead of just lending to BlackRock and the most liquid borrowers out there. We need a more efficient banking sector. We need a more efficient monetary system. We also need, like I said, we got to get the government out of the economy. The government is the biggest impediment, because the government is all fraud, waste, and inefficiency.

• 20:45Tom Ellsworth?

  I agree with that, but you've just Can you hear me?

• 20:49Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 20:49Tom Ellsworth?

  Yeah, I agree with that, but you you can't, you know, fix every layer of the lasagna all at once.

• 20:55Speaker 04

  I'm not arguing that we should. What I'm saying is the government should come clean and say, look, we're not going to focus on prices because that's a lost cause. They should be honest about that. That's a lost. Prices are never going to go backward.

• 21:06Patrick Bet-David?

  Prices of what?

• 21:07Speaker 04

  Everything, just general prices.

• 21:09Patrick Bet-David?

  General prices, yeah.

• 21:10Speaker 04

  Houses, houses.

• 21:11Patrick Bet-David?

  You saw the article that came out saying with gas prices being worse than Brent, I was saving Americans a half a billion dollars. I don't know if you saw that number or not.

• 21:17Speaker 04

  Yeah, I mean, the wholesale price of gasoline at the CME is a dollar seventy a gallon. That's where it is right now, which is the lowest it's been in five years. That's actually not a good thing.

• 21:24Speaker 02

  What about the deflationary innovation, though, like the way that like a flat screen TV started off at ten thousand dollars and now it's two hundred dollars? So like, there's there's examples of things going down in price.

• 21:32Speaker 04

  Yeah, there's always individual items that go down in price and tradable commodities can go up and down in price, sure. But we're talking about goods that usually, the economists use the term sticky. This is what sticky really applies to, which means that when prices go up, they tend to stay there.

• 21:45Speaker 02

  But the things that are killer, though, is like electricity, food, housing. Like, I think those are the core things that people really get upset about if those are unaffordable. And I, I mean, I think the problem, too, is like, I think deficit spending in general is a bigger example of what happened during COVID. Like, the M2 money supply chart I sent you, Rob, like, so this is the amount of money in the economy. And like, obviously, it went up a ton in 2020, but just the fact that we're spending like an extra trillion dollars per year than what we actually have, like, that's the creation of new money. I know it's not money printing. It's like the the Treasury issuing new debt, but that's adding new money into the economy. That's artificially increasing demand. So, you know, of course, things are going to be more expensive. We're like putting more money in the economy every year.

• 22:27Speaker 02

  And that's such a waste of capital, too, by the way, like, the Fed created like an extra nine trillion dollars of money on its balance sheet. So that went to banks. So why aren't banks using those loans efficiently? Like, are they just sitting on that money?

• 22:39Speaker 04

  Yeah, what they've been doing is buying US Treasuries. Because they're risk averse.

• 22:43Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 22:44Speaker 04

  So we need risk-taking in the economy, which can't happen because of all this other stuff.

• 22:47Patrick Bet-David?

  I think the one part that you talked about, which I agree with, Rob, can you pull up the the the number of banks in the history of America over the years? How many we had and how many we are now?

• 22:56Speaker 02

  Small banks.

• 22:56Patrick Bet-David?

  That's exactly, small banks, just banks, total banks in America. If you go to, yeah, while you're doing that, I'll look up the reports. But the the question becomes of prices, like you said, you know, flat screen TVs went from ten thousand dollars. You can buy a TV right now for four, five hundred bucks. I can't believe how cheap it is right now to buy a, yeah, so what does it say? It says 4,000 commercial banks in the US. 2023. Okay, so let's just say around 3917, according to FDIC. The number of banks peaked in the 20th century with estimates typically around 29,400, 30,400. That's before the Great Depression. But even at 1980s, we had 14,000 banks.

• 23:39Patrick Bet-David?

  To go from 14,000 banks to 3917, no longer lending money to small business owners to start because the underwriting becomes tighter. They want the bigger deals, they want the bigger business. I can see this happening. I can see this happening. But, you know, the other part is as well where the incentive comes about.

• 23:58Patrick Bet-David?

  Let's develop cheaper cars, okay? More cost-effective cars. Let's develop housing that's going to be more cost-effective. How do you do that? Innovation, this is a, this is a time where innovation can really lead. But that, go to that chart right there, Rob. Go to that chart right there, look at that. I mean, that tells a whole story right there.

• 24:16Speaker 04

  Consolidation.

• 24:17Patrick Bet-David?

  Look at that. That's not good.

• 24:19Tom Ellsworth?

  Yeah, it wasn't a contraction, it was a roll-up.

• 24:21Patrick Bet-David?

  Yeah, it was a roll-up. That's exactly what it was.

• 24:23Speaker 04

  It's all mergers.

• 24:24Patrick Bet-David?

  It's all mergers and, and the consumer wins there. Look how sudden it is from 1980s. So why, by the way, Jeff.

• 24:31Speaker 04

  That's the Euro-dollar system.

• 24:32Patrick Bet-David?

  Well, why is that sudden from 1980 though? If you look, if you look at the number, it's increasing 50, 60, 70, 80s and then it drops.

• 24:39Speaker 04

  Yeah, the reason why is because of international consolidation. You have international competition. So we internationalized the monetary system starting in the 50s, 60s and 70s. And by the 1980s, it became hyper-international, which meant that you don't have a small regional bank in a, in a local US location, competing with other small regional banks in that same location. Now you have large-scale banks in Switzerland and Japan and Asia, competing with the large banks on Wall Street. And those are the only banks that, they suck up all the money and oxygen, so there's a.

• 25:11Patrick Bet-David?

  Got it.

• 25:12Speaker 04

  And it is a big bank, what do you do? You buy all the smaller ones. It's the cheapest way to continue to grow in scale.

• 25:17Patrick Bet-David?

  The average person watching this, what can they do?

• 25:20Speaker 04

  What can they do?

• 25:21Patrick Bet-David?

  What can the average person do?

• 25:23Speaker 04

  As far as, you're talking about prices?

• 25:25Patrick Bet-David?

  To, to, to fight against this.

• 25:26Speaker 04

  The exception. Last time I was here, you talked about is invest in yourself. Make sure that you are individually doing everything you can to maximize your own talent. So whatever prices are doing, whatever the, you know.

• 25:37Patrick Bet-David?

  You're not affected by it.

• 25:38Speaker 04

  You are affected by it, but you can, you can better, you're better able to handle it. If you're investing in yourself and raising your own income potential, then you can handle higher prices.

• 25:46Patrick Bet-David?

  I agree.

• 25:47Speaker 04

  I mean, this is terrible. This is horrible stuff. But I mean, it's the reality. The reality is we can't change it. We can't go backwards. So let's be honest about it and deal with it moving forward.

• 25:57Tom Ellsworth?

  Well, to your, to your point about wages. You've got a couple of things that are going to happen this year and that you're going to hear headlines that are more and more talking about like job retraining and displacement and you're going to hear going into the election, no, the, the labor market's actually better than people think, but we have some people in the wrong places and robots are taking over the warehouse jobs. So those people need different training and need to be other places. You're going to hear about displacement, geographic labor shortage and job retraining, which is all messages that's true, but they're going to be trying to say, hey, better paying jobs are available here, here and here. Cause remember it's election year.

• 26:36Patrick Bet-David?

  Yeah. So let's go to this and Jeff, I'm going to come to you with this one here. U S dollar set for the biggest drop in a decade after Trump's trade war. Again, we're on the same topic, but it's now the dollar. People, people are concerned, is there a real issue here or there are not? Here's what it means for your wallet, folks that are listening. Okay. So let's go through it. Here's what it means for your wallet. Jake, if you need to do your thing, do it now because I'm going to go to Jeff first. Okay. Yeah. So here's since January, the dollar index, which measures the strength of the U S dollar against six major currencies, including the euro yen, the pound is down about 10%. That's the biggest tumble for the dollar since 2017. Some everyday products are set to get more expensive at the same time.

• 27:19Patrick Bet-David?

  The dollar slump could help American companies sell more abroad and even support job growth. Below are, cover them in full, economists point to two main drivers behind the slide. Donald Trump, global trade war and Federal Reserve, three interest rate cuts. The tariffs, the highest since 1930s and averaging around 14 to 18% combined with lower interest rates have made the dollar less attractive to global investors, pushing its value down. For US shoppers, the most immediate downside shows up at the checkout counter when the dollar weakens. It takes more cash to buy goods made overseas and reiterates usually pass those costs on to their consumers, retailers.

• 28:01Patrick Bet-David?

  That means imported products like iPhones, laptop, TV, assembled abroad are more likely to see a price hike if the dollar decline continues. Clothes, shoes, furniture and even new cars and replacement auto parts can also become more expensive, particularly when they're sourced from Asia or Europe. Jeff?

• 28:20Speaker 04

  Oh, there's a lot there. And you're right in my wheelhouse too. There's a lot of misconceptions there. First of all, DXY Dixie is not the dollar index. It's the one that everybody knows and it's one everybody follows, but as you said, it's basically the Euro. It's 57% the Euro. And the Euro has had a good year against the dollar, but even the overall narrative misses a lot of context. And a lot of context is the dollar had a major spike at the end of last year and the early part of this year. So the base comparison's off to begin with. The dollar isn't crashing, isn't even actually going lower. The dollar is down from extreme levels earlier this year. What is the dollar actually? You mentioned a couple of factors. Everybody mentions interest rate differentials, Fed policies. Those don't actually matter.

• 29:04Speaker 04

  They matter in certain situations like the US dollar versus a Canadian dollar. But you look at, say, for example, the Japanese yen versus the US dollar. The Japanese, the Bank of Japan is raising rates, JGB yields are going up. At the same time, US rates are going down and the yen is weakening. The yen is weakening by a lot. And there are actually a lot of currencies around the world that are actually weakening by a lot against the US dollar. What does that actually mean? What does the US dollar actually tell us? It's not about interest rate differentials, it's about monetary flows. The US dollar is a global financial bellwether. It tells us when conditions in the monetary system globally are either good and improving or going in the wrong direction. When the dollar goes up, not a good sign. That means that money is becoming tighter and flows are being constrained and restricted.

• 29:47Speaker 04

  The dollar surged earlier in 2025. If you remember the chaotic marketplace, you know, they blamed it on tariffs, but it really a lot of different reasons. But you had, you know, the stock market was down, March and April. You had commodities being liquidated. What was the dollar doing during that liquidation, that deflationary period? The dollar was spiking. So the dollar was going up as we got extreme monetary conditions. Now, after, you know, things calmed down after April into the summertime, the dollar backed off. It wasn't crashing. It wasn't, it wasn't signaling a new paradigm shift that everybody's moving away from the dollar. You know, this narrative of sell America came up. That wasn't happening. The dollar was coming back down off of a deflationary extreme. And then it settled down and against most currencies, not the euro, it has actually been moving higher again.

• 30:30Speaker 04

  Couple of notable exceptions, the euro as well as the China, China yuan. But for most major currencies, the dollar is actually going higher and they're going lower, which again is not a good sign. It means financing conditions are tightening all over again. So there is a lot of misconceptions about what the dollar is actually signaling. As far as its impact on the US economy, you know, there's this old economics textbook narrative about beggar thy neighbor. You cheapen your currency, it makes your exports cheaper to sell overseas, right? That doesn't actually happen. We see the dollar go up, that usually means that demand is weak overseas to begin with. So even if it's cheaper to sell stuff overseas, when the dollar goes down, it's not actually a good thing anyway. It means that global economic circumstances in very broad terms are less than ideal and getting worse. So there's a lot of misconceptions where it comes to the dollar.

• 31:15Speaker 02

  Brandon, what do you have with this? Yeah, no, I agree with a lot of that. And I think a lot of it is like the fact that we're in like an international contraction and that's a lot of it, like Europe has been raising their rates and we've been cutting our rates. I don't think we should be cutting our rates. And I think a lot of it goes back to the fact that like I, I don't think that we're in a like real market based system. We're in like a, I would almost call a socialist based system where like we have this board of governors who are controlling, controlling the price of money and the amount of money that's in the economy. And I think that's the fundamental problem with all of it. Like we don't have market conditions impacting what the price of money is. We have a group of people deciding what the price of money is. And until that changes, I don't think that we're going to get like a real healthy functioning economy. You really think that? I mean, that's not going to change any, but that's not going to change.

• 32:00Speaker 02

  I think it's the root of all of our problems, though. You really trace all problems back to the fact that the like the the price of money is the most important thing in the economy and right now it's a socialist structure how the price of money is determined.

• 32:12Patrick Bet-David?

  But do you think that's gonna change?

• 32:13Speaker 02

  No, but I think that's the the root problem of everything.

• 32:16Patrick Bet-David?

  I totally get the root problem, but is it gonna change is the question. Tom, your thoughts?

• 32:20Tom Ellsworth?

  So there's a couple, a couple angles here. And to to kind of just sort it all out for the average consumer. It is good when the dollar is stable because the dollar is what everybody looks to as a when you hear the words reserve currency or you hear, as Jeff said, global bellwether. A stable dollar stabilizes markets and that's good for consumers on both sides, meaning German consumers who are importing our stuff and Americans that are importing German stuff. So a stable dollar is good. There's a lot of factors that go into it right now, but there is a simple truth that

• 33:04Tom Ellsworth?

  when we lower interest rates, it does make the dollar relatively less attractive as an investable because the US government is gonna pay you that interest rate if you buy those T-bills. But by the way, you have to remember, we talk all about that the number one owner of T-bills is Japan and things like this, but you know what the number one buyer is? I think 60% of it is bought by our states, if I'm correct, bought by the individual municipalities and states that have, it's like Florida has excess money, they buy T-bills at that, at that rate. And so I think the headline, oh, the dollar is going to drop. What Jeff said is very important.

• 33:43Tom Ellsworth?

  It's like, was it bad when the headline said inflation is dropping from 8% down to four? No, that that was actually good news and it meant that inflation was getting back to, you know, historically uncontrollable levels. That's what happened with the dollars. So in many ways, Pat, this is a big headline. Oh, the dollar is dropping, dollar is tanking. And who is talking about this? Daily Mail. Oh, right? The economic experts and the, and the, you know, Chicken Littles of the Daily Many male who apparently didn't have, you know, any new pictures of, you know, Prince or what his name is now, Montbatten, Citizen Montbatten, and instead they talk about dollars set for a big drop. Well, it's returning to where it was before we had, what was that

• 34:28Tom Ellsworth?

  called, April 2nd, Liberation Day?

• 34:30Speaker 04

  Liberation Day.

• 34:31Tom Ellsworth?

  Liberation Day, when the markets went bonkers, and now everything's kind of coming back to normal.

• 34:36Speaker 04

  That's, you know, that's a big issue, too, is that they want to make a politics out of this, right? Every time the dollar, if the dollar goes down by a little bit and, you know, it's, oh, the president is ruining the dollar, we need to get rid of Trump because he's done, you know, the treasury market is blowing up because Trump is doing this and doing, it's, you gotta separate the politics.

• 34:52Tom Ellsworth?

  And they like, they like sensationalist headlines, like, "One day after a hurricane in Jamaica, tides to drop 15 feet today. Well, of course, we had a storm surge from a hurricane." It's literally the same. We had an economic surge in the spring.

• 35:06Patrick Bet-David?

  Well, that's good because you're reassuring that that is not a concern on top of everything else that Americans are dealing with affordability. It's, it's not going to add to the damage and pain that they're having right now.

• 35:19Speaker 04

  Can I add one more thing?

• 35:20Patrick Bet-David?

  Sure.

• 35:20Speaker 04

  Well, the reason why this is a big issue, and the reason why it comes up is, you know, there's hysterics about the politics of it, and people were naturally asking the question, because you hear all the time, is the world going to ditch the dollar? If they do, what is that going to mean for me? Because if the dollar is ditched, which by the way, it needs to be, it, there's, it's not just a thing about, you know, flipping one currency to another.

• 35:40Patrick Bet-David?

  You think the dollar needs to be ditched?

• 35:41Speaker 04

  Yeah, the dollar system, your dollar system needs to be replaced.

• 35:43Patrick Bet-David?

  It needs to be replaced with what?

• 35:44Speaker 04

  It absolutely needs to be replaced.

• 35:45Patrick Bet-David?

  With what?

• 35:45Speaker 04

  Of something else, hopefully a private currency, but that's way down the road. The point I'm making is that most people don't understand what a reserve currency is and what it needs to do. And understanding what a reserve currency needs to do and what it is, you understand why the dollar sticks around as long as it has. It's not going to be replaced tomorrow. It can't be replaced tomorrow. No matter how much many other people might want to try, it is not happening, it's not going to happen anytime soon, because a reserve currency has to do tremendous amounts of things, and it, and the way that it actually takes place is, it would be like, the analogy I always use is, Say you want to build a new internet that's better and faster, but you have to do it from scratch. You have to put in new wires, new hardware, new software, you have to do everything from scratch. That is replacing a reserve currency. You have to rebuild the internet.

• 36:30Speaker 04

  It is literally impossible.

• 36:32Speaker 02

  And one thing on that too, the unfortunate thing about reserve currency is like it's literally designed for you to abuse the hell out of it, like the thing called Trivin's dilemma. It's like you basically are supplying the rest of the world with adequate money so that they could interact in the global economy. So like it's set up to fail within 100 years pretty much.

• 36:49Speaker 04

  Well, that's where the Eurodollar came from. It's solved Trivin's dilemma.

• 36:53Patrick Bet-David?

  Interesting. Yeah, I mean, this just went to a whole different direction, but I want to stay on topic with a few, you know, hitting eight more stories here. God willing. Okay, let's get to the next one. Venezuela. President Trump comes out and says that the US, Rob, do you have the story? I think you got a video on this one as well, if I'm not mistaken. President Trump comes out and says Venezuela to give up 50 million barrels of oil to the US. I am pleased to announce that the interim authorities in Venezuela will be turning over around 30 to 50 million barrels of quality sanctioned oil to the US. This oil will be sold at its market price and the money will be controlled by me as the president of the United States of America to ensure it is used to benefit the people of Venezuela and the US.

• 37:38Patrick Bet-David?

  I asked Energy Secretary Chris Wright to execute this plan immediately. It will be taken by storage ships and brought directly to unloading docks in the US. Thank you for your attention to this matter.

• 37:55Patrick Bet-David?

  Such an interesting guy. Thank you for your attention to this matter. We just got 50 million barrels, folks. And Trump in a social media post, it will take, the US crude oil, crude features fell 1.3% to 56.39 per barrel on the heels of Trump's announcement. The announcement came three days after US captured Maduro. Wall Street Journal reported Tuesday that Trump plans to meet with representatives. From the major oil companies Chevron, ConocoPhillips, ExxonMobil, along with other domestic producers at the White House on Friday to discuss making significant investments in Venezuela oil sector. Now, watch this.

• 38:38Patrick Bet-David?

  Here's what's interesting. While this is going on, China's like, wait a minute. That's ours. That's not yours. Here's the Ministry of Foreign Affairs from China giving their message. Go ahead, Rob.

• 38:56Speaker 05

  The United States has brazenly resorted to the use of force against Venezuela and demanded that America First be applied when Venezuela disposes of its own oil resources. This is a typical act of bullying, a serious violation of international law, and a grave infringement on Venezuela's sovereignty that also severely undermines the rights of Venezuelan people.

• 39:14Speaker 04

  We just wish they would have thought of it first.

• 39:16Speaker 05

  China strongly condemns this. I would like to stress that the legitimate rights and interests of China and other countries in Venezuela must be protected. The United States has long imposed illegal unilateral sanctions on Venezuela's oil sector and has recently brazenly used force against Venezuela, dealing a severe blow to the country's economic and social order, and also threatening the stability of global production and supply chains. China has already issued strong condemnation in this regard. I would like to reiterate that cooperation between China and Venezuela is a cooperation between sovereign states and is protected by international law and laws of both countries.

• 39:51Patrick Bet-David?

  For sure. Tom, how do you feel about this?

• 39:53Tom Ellsworth?

  Oh, first of all, who is she from? She was from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and I thought the Ministry of Foreign Affairs was something that involved Eric Swalwell. So, we'll pass on that. Second, here's something fun facts. Fun facts. Ready for numbers screen? The total output right now during the naval semi blockade from Venezuela is 600,000 barrels a day. That is the output right now. The nominal output, when they were under this, over the last couple of years, when they've got electricity shortages and all the things that the problems they had in their economy, was 800 to 900,000 barrels a day.

• 40:34Tom Ellsworth?

  The logical limit, based on every pipeline and the port, there's a port Jose and there's a second port, there's two main ports, is only 1.7 million barrels per day. That means if everything was working perfectly right in Venezuela and the ports were operating at maximum efficiency and all the pipelines that go into this huge center geography that's in Venezuela and this big valley where all the oil is, we're all working maxima to 1.7. So what Trump is basically saying right now, somewhere between 600, 900 barrels a day, for the next 90 days, if he wanted to, he could step on the air hose to China and Iran

• 41:14Tom Ellsworth?

  and only send the oil here. Now, there's also something very interesting. Venezuelan oil, because you've heard people talk about light sweet crude and WTI, West Texan Intermediate, which is the Permian Basin, there's all different types of oil and just like there's different types of gasoline and aviation gas. Well, guess what? Venezuelan crude is known as heavy crude. And heavy crude needs special refineries who can handle the heavy crude. And would you like to know where the most heavy crude refineries are? And the answer is the United States Gulf Coast, particularly. Gulf of America.

• 41:56Tom Ellsworth?

  The Gulf of America. Houston Galveston has the most facility in the world to refine Venezuelan oil. Almost like the US oil makers knew or were buying from Venezuela all along and had the facility, so when they got that type of crude, they could turn it into the big four: automobile gas, heating oil, aviation fuel, and then all the derivative products that come out of a barrel of oil, the plastics and plastic-like items. So what's going on right now, there's only one US

• 42:33Tom Ellsworth?

  Oil company operating at speed, not Chevron, and they're getting about 250 million barrels a day. So guess what? So if he's gonna have a meeting in the White House, really, he's really asking Chevron, are you gonna put up more money for infrastructure? Number one, because they wanna move that well beyond 1.7 million barrels a day. They wanna get up to two and a half, three million barrels a day. That's gonna take pipelines, and that's also, I won't get into the technology of it, but Venezuela pumps most of their oil cold, meaning they don't put steam or other things into the ground to pull it out, like what they do, like for the oil sands in Alberta and the shale that's in North Dakota.

• 43:14Tom Ellsworth?

  They use a lot of heat to go down there, loosen up the oil so it can pull it up. So what the president is basically saying here is like, you know what? China, you were, you were skimming out the back door, a couple hundred thousand barrels a day, and they needed it. So Trump's gonna put a stop to that. So China is gonna have, not have access to that.

• 43:36Patrick Bet-David?

  What a move.

• 43:37Tom Ellsworth?

  That's the power move.

• 43:38Patrick Bet-David?

  What a move.

• 43:39Tom Ellsworth?

  And then never mind Iran, what's going on over there. And now, he's, wants to take it, but he wants to pay the people, he wants Chevron to pay the people of Venezuela. He wants to get up to two and a half, three million barrels a day, but he wants the people of Venezuela to be paid for it. You know why that's good? Every time we try to rebuild the country, who pays for it? We do. We gave all those contracts to Halliburton when we were rebuilding the Middle East after wars, right? Well, guess what? They came out of American taxpayers. Well, now this is, hey, we have regime change, we have some government we like, there's gonna be some bumps in the road, this is all gonna go there, and we want their country to get the money for their oil so they could rebuild themselves. Now, sure, there'll probably be a lot of American contractors down there wanting to

• 44:23Tom Ellsworth?

  get paid to do it, but it'll be money that comes that way. And that is the story of Venezuelan oil.

• 44:29Patrick Bet-David?

  I, I, how much of this do you think, like, I almost wanna think about, how much of Venezuela? of what happened with Maduro was singular and how much of it was a process of sequencing because of the ties Venezuela could have for America to get access back to the Panama Canal because the Panama Canal, if I was to write a priority, Tom, and this goes to all of you guys, question for you, you're the president, Trump administration, you're sitting there, 10 issues, rank importance of some of these issues, which one's more important than the

• 45:06Patrick Bet-David?

  other, ready, hang on, Maduro being captured, you got Iran regime changing, okay, because of how chaotic it is and you know how they call them the Middle East, what do they call it, there's a word for that they are the agency of terrorism in the Middle East, you hear a comment like that.

• 45:29Tom Ellsworth?

  Sponsor, sponsor.

• 45:30Patrick Bet-David?

  Sponsors of terrorism in Iran, okay, all right.

• 45:32Tom Ellsworth?

  Money and influence.

• 45:33Patrick Bet-David?

  How about Panama Canal, if, let's just take those three, of those three, which one do you think is number one most important to US, Panama Canal, Iran, Venezuela.

• 45:46Tom Ellsworth?

  I would say the canal, because once you get the canal off of Chinese influence, so they needed the canal and they also needed the metal in Venezuela, because that's how they get the oil.

• 45:55Patrick Bet-David?

  Perfect, so then China's the one that stopped the Panama Canal deal with Hutchinson, right?

• 46:00Tom Ellsworth?

  Right. That's exactly when they told the guy he couldn't sell his shares.

• 46:02Patrick Bet-David?

  So do you think this is their way of saying, no problem, you want to do that, we've been allowing you to come and get all this oil from the Western Hemisphere, Venezuela, here's what we're gonna do to you, go ahead, now what do you want to do, so is he gonna use this as a leverage on the tariffs with China, because I know they've set it off, you know, they're like, now we'll renegotiate the China stuff in 90 days or a year or whatever, they kind of put it off, but do you think this is one way of getting the Panama, like if all of a sudden, because look what happened right there, look at the date, and look at what happened with the percentage increases, chances going up, it went from 30 to 40 percent, what caused that, Venezuela, why does the Venezuela event increase the chance, so there's some ties there between the two, what do you think Jeff?

• 46:43Speaker 04

  I think these are all related, I think these, you know, Trump has this image among, you know, certainly his detractors, he's some kind of buffoon, right? They're playing strategic chess here. Everything they're doing is not, it's not like we're gonna get Maduro because we want a regime change in Venezuela. They're getting Maduro because it's the most efficient use of resources because it accomplishes four goals at once.

• 47:04Patrick Bet-David?

  That's the first domino.

• 47:05Speaker 04

  Well, yeah, I mean, if you look at what they're trying to do, Iran plays in this too.

• 47:10Patrick Bet-David?

  I think so.

• 47:11Speaker 04

  How do you mess with the Chinese? Well, you get them distracted over in the Middle East in having worried about, you know, all the stuff that's taking place over there, you know, is Iran, which is an ally of China, are they solid enough, are they gonna be a solid Chinese ally in a couple of months, maybe? And this goes back to, you know, why did the US strike the Iranian nuclear facilities? Well, yes, again, more than one goal was accomplished in that strike. First of all, it set back the Iranian nuclear capacity, but also showed to the Iranian people that the Iranian military is toothless. They had Israeli planes and US planes loitering over the country for, was it weeks on end?

• 47:46Patrick Bet-David?

  Yep.

• 47:47Speaker 04

  And they could do exact, they were taking out Iranian leaders. It was sending a message, and it wasn't sending a message to just the Iranian people that says, "Look, these leaders aren't as powerful as you think it is." It was a message to China. "Look at what we can do. Look at what we can do in Venezuela." And by the way, Venezuela is hyper-strategic, and it's not just about Venezuela. Venezuela, as you said, the next step toward reasserting dominance on Panama Canal and a whole bunch of other stuff that we probably don't even know about. What I'm saying is I think the Trump administration doesn't act on simplistic impulses and irrational emotion as people have this caricature.

• 48:21Patrick Bet-David?

  The media paints it out to be.

• 48:22Speaker 04

  Yeah, it's not. There, you can see, there is definite strategic planning going on.

• 48:26Patrick Bet-David?

  So let me ask you, if they're saying Western Hemisphere, right? Look, this is the Western Hemisphere, the Monroe Doctrine, right? 1800s.

• 48:36Speaker 04

  Donrow.

• 48:37Patrick Bet-David?

  Yeah, so, "Western Hemisphere, Western Hemisphere, Western Hemisphere." Well, then, somebody could say, from China, "Well, then, why do you care about Iran?" Or do they? Are they leaving it out there? It's interesting, right? When you think about it. But what are your thoughts on the story here with Venezuela?

• 48:51Speaker 02

  No, I think it's a huge opportunity just for the world in general. Because I mean, there is a time where I believe Venezuela was number four in terms of overall GDP. And it makes me think of when the Soviet Union collapsed. That if you handle this thing correctly, then you could open up that whole that whole country back to the world as a new market. And you have to be careful imagining it too, because I think like when the Soviet Union collapsed, we kind of mishandled it. We let the CIA, let the oligarchs take over. And then the resentment from the country to that led to Putin being in control. So I think if this is done correctly, it could be a beautiful thing. It could kind of get that communist virus out of South America. Because the whole communist spread across South America started with Cuba, then it went over to Venezuela. Now it's gone over to Colombia. So they could start like extracting that kind of spirit from South America. That's a big thing too.

• 49:36Patrick Bet-David?

  Now, while we're on this, it's interesting because have you guys been following the whole Russian tanker? That's been followed by US?

• 49:41Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah.

• 49:42Patrick Bet-David?

  The last week, USC's Venezuela linked Russian flagged oil tanker after weeks long pursuit. Rob, go a little bit lower to look at this because the timing, let's just look how beautiful the ship is first. Take a look at that ship. Okay, brand spanking new, go a little bit lower. Great condition. Yeah, great condition. Just had it detailed.

• 49:59Speaker 04

  How much oil was it leaking along the way?

• 50:02Patrick Bet-David?

  USC, well, climate change, we got to take care of that. So USC's a Russian flagged oil tanker that was being shadowed by Russian submarine on Wednesday after more than a two week long pursuit crossed the Atlantic as part of the US blockade of Venezuelan oil exports. This appeared to be the first time in recent memory that US military has seized a Russian flagged vessel. The operation took place after the tanker originally named Bella One, great name, slipped through the US Marine time blockade of sanctioned tankers in the Caribbean and rebuffed US Coast Guard efforts to board it. The seizure effort was first reported by Reuters. It was on ex-military European Command says that Trump administration has seized the vessel for violating US sanctions, the blockade of sanction and illicit Venezuelan oil remains in full effect.

• 50:47Patrick Bet-David?

  Anywhere in the world, the US official who were speaking on the condition of anonymity said Wednesday operation near Iceland was being carried out by US. US Coast Guard and US Military Coast Guard did not immediately respond to the request of a comment. Go a little bit lower to see if the Russians have said anything about it. There's no immediate comment from Russia as well. Interesting. Tom, your thoughts on this?

• 51:06Tom Ellsworth?

  Well, first of all, what I, the, my favorite line of the whole article there was, was being shadowed by a Russian submarine. In other words, we knew that, or we figured that out. And I think it goes to the technology advantage that we had when we went in and got Maduro. Remember, nobody, we didn't lose any equipment, we didn't lose any guys, we didn't have like a massive firefight on the ground that somehow involved also civilians accidentally. We went in, we closed our eyes in and out, and now they're saying, well, it was being shadowed by a submarine, and can you see the Russians? Wait, they know we're here.

• 51:45Patrick Bet-David?

  Can you see if there's an image of it, Rob? Can you see if there's an image of the submarine, Russia, Venezuela?

• 51:52Speaker 04

  I thought I saw one.

• 51:53Patrick Bet-David?

  I thought I saw one on X as well. If you type in submarine, oil, Venezuela, shadow submarine, yeah.

• 52:01Speaker 04

  I mean, it might have been a stock photo, but.

• 52:02Patrick Bet-David?

  It could have been. I mean, nowadays, anything is.

• 52:04Tom Ellsworth?

  AI.

• 52:05Patrick Bet-David?

  See if there's anything there with the submarine. No, is there?

• 52:12Patrick Bet-David?

  No, no.

• 52:13Tom Ellsworth?

  Because if it was never really seen, but we knew it was there, then we leaked to the media to tell Putin, dude, we know you're, we know you're following this thing.

• 52:20Speaker 04

  Again, that's the point, right? I mean, the reason why they took this tanker is actually about India.

• 52:25Patrick Bet-David?

  This is really about India. What's that right there? Let me read the top, what it says. Russia dispatched a nuclear submarine to escort a tanker attempting to reach Venezuela. The tanker was already harassed by US Coast Guard. Moscow is moving to guarantee its safe passage through the Atlantic in recent US piracy. And who's saying that? Is that the submarine?

• 52:46Tom Ellsworth?

  All the stuff I've seen has not said that it is the sub. I, I've not seen, if it's out there, I'd love to see it, but I didn't see anything that talks about, oh, here's the picture of them both pulling over for lunch.

• 52:58Patrick Bet-David?

  Yeah, I thought I saw something, but it could have been AI that is saying. Jeff, what do you have with this?

• 53:02Speaker 04

  I guess, I think this is about India. Again, multiple goals here. They seize the tanker, say you are violating sanctions, we're going to enforce sanctions. Who is the biggest buyer of Russian oil right now?

• 53:12Patrick Bet-David?

  India.

• 53:13Speaker 04

  India. So they're saying, "Look, you guys are continuing to buy sanctioned Russian oil, and there is a ton of it floating around the world right now." There is a massive amount of seaborne oil at sea inventories. And so what they're saying to India is, "Look, we've tolerated it. We've let it happen. We've talked about it. We've given you warnings. Now we're actually going to act on it."

• 53:33Patrick Bet-David?

  Rob, what's this?

• 53:34Speaker 06

  This is President Trump aboard Air Force One where he talked about sanctions against India for purchasing Russian oil.

• 53:40Patrick Bet-David?

  Go for it.

• 53:58Patrick Bet-David?

  Is that Lindsey? Who is that to the left?

• 54:00Speaker 06

  Lindsey Graham.

• 54:01Patrick Bet-David?

  He looks like, he looks different from a profile. Like, it doesn't look like himself. But there's a story here, Rob, if you want to go to, from CNBC. "India State-Owned Refiners Keep Buying Russian Oil Even As New Delhi Seeks U.S. Tariff Relief." So let me get this straight. You're coming to ask for relief, yet you're still buying? If you want to go to that story, Rob. State-owned refiners in India are still buying Russian oil. The U.S. imposed a secondary 25% tariff on Indian goods in August, citing New Delhi's continued imports of Russians' crude. Washington also sanctioned Russian oil companies Lukoil and Rosneft in late November. On Sunday, Lindsey Graham claimed that India's U.S. Ambassador Vinay Mohan Katara had asked

• 54:46Patrick Bet-David?

  them to urge President Trump to lift these tariffs, arguing the New Delhi has reduced its purchase of Russian oil, while India's overall demand for Russian crude oil fell in December. Analysts say the decline was largely driven by reduced buying from Mukesh Ambani-owned Reliance Industries, which had been a major importer before the U.S. sanctions on Lukoil and Rosneft took effect in late November. So there's, do you have a video on this, Rob?

• 55:12Speaker 06

  I do. It's just the President, again, talking about Modi.

• 55:16Patrick Bet-David?

  Is it the same thing?

• 55:17Speaker 06

  It's a different speech, but he just talks about Modi and the Apache helicopters that India purchased from him.

• 55:23Patrick Bet-David?

  But he's not talking about oil? No. Okay, Brandon, your thoughts on this?

• 55:26Speaker 02

  Yeah, so think about what could be done here. So Russia, and you know, when you talk about going after the core, the nucleus of somebody's power,

• 55:34Patrick Bet-David?

  Yep.

• 55:35Speaker 02

  Like thirty to forty percent of Russia's GDP comes from selling oil. So it's already hurting them that that oil's down from seventy or eight dollars a barrel to like fifty-six now, which I almost think the market was anticipating this takeover Venezuela with what oil prices have been doing. So what could be done now where India buys like thirty percent of, they represent like thirty percent of Russia's oil buyer? So now could we start selling Venezuela's oil to India to offset that if we want them to stop buying Russia's oil? Because if if we chop away at Russia's oil demand, then that, you know, that decimates them. Their GDP's already going down because of the the lower price in oil and the lack of buying pressure from countries. Because it's really just China and India that buys Russian oil, and Iran a little bit, but so, you know, if Iran falls,

• 56:18Speaker 02

  if we have Venezuela's oil, then really we have the biggest oil-producing countries in the world like at our mercy. You know what I mean?

• 56:26Patrick Bet-David?

  Yeah, but you know what this is doing? Let me tell you what it's doing. And and this is the feeling I'm getting. And I I'm really curious to know how he's gonna react. I think he is fully suffocating Putin.

• 56:39Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 56:40Patrick Bet-David?

  I think he is fully suffocating Putin to the point where you ever gone into a fight and the guy's choking you and you're willing to do anything and everything to get out of it? Or else you're gonna pass out?

• 56:51Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 56:51Patrick Bet-David?

  You do something really dumb and reckless?

• 56:53Speaker 02

  Mm-hmm.

• 56:55Patrick Bet-David?

  What's Putin's next move? Actually, think about it.

• 56:59Speaker 02

  Another submarine?

• 57:00Patrick Bet-David?

  No, but really, what do you do next? So let me get this straight. So it's like, okay, okay, all right, so you're putting sanctions on, you know, EU and whatever. I'll do business with India. No, you can't. All right, Iran, keep sending me drones so I can attack Ukraine. Nope, decimate Iran so they can't. So now I can't buy drones from Iran to attack Ukraine. No. Okay, so let me go to China. China can't get the oil from Venezuela now. Well, it, so now the- He is, he is so cornered right now, Putin.

• 57:33Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 57:33Patrick Bet-David?

  In such a way that Putin is probably sitting there saying, man, I miss President Biden.

• 57:39Speaker 04

  But you notice how he's doing it very slowly, incrementally. It's almost like, you know, just tightening the noose a little bit at a time.

• 57:46Patrick Bet-David?

  Yeah.

• 57:46Speaker 04

  So you don't really realize it.

• 57:48Speaker 02

  The right sequencing.

• 57:49Patrick Bet-David?

  But, but I don't know about whether he's not realizing it. Here's, here's a question.

• 57:53Speaker 04

  Well, I think that's the whole submarine story.

• 57:55Patrick Bet-David?

  But Jeff, here's a question, Tom, I'll come to you here. Do you think he's doing, do you think he stops this aggressive, like what's more important to him? Do you think he would allow all of this stuff to happen and get behind Putin and support him to open a business again? If Putin flat out just comes out and gets it over with with Zelensky?

• 58:15Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 58:15Patrick Bet-David?

  Do you think that would put a stop to all of this? To a lot of this?

• 58:18Speaker 04

  I think that's the two, the carrot and the stick, right? The carrot has always been stop the war in Ukraine and join us and let's do a lot of business. Let's buy all your oil again. The stick is, we're going to slowly strangle you and there's nothing you can do about it.

• 58:30Patrick Bet-David?

  It doesn't, how much worse doesn't get than this? I mean, of course, there's different levels of worse, but Putin is, Putin can't breathe right now.

• 58:39Speaker 04

  I think the goal here for Putin, what he really cares about is remaining as president of Russia. So if, if Trump can undermine his power base, he ends up like Maduro.

• 58:50Patrick Bet-David?

  I mean, what else is he doing right now? You know, Brandon, go ahead.

• 58:56Speaker 02

  Yeah, no, I just think it still goes down to who's going to break first and kind of comply with us more first between Russia and China because we, we need one of them to be more friendly with us than they are. You know, we need one of them to turn against the other and ideally it'd be probably better and easier to get Russia to turn against China with us.

• 59:13Patrick Bet-David?

  I don't, I don't, I wouldn't be surprised if they do something very reckless right now. Like I wouldn't be surprised if, if China all of a sudden does something to Taiwan. I wouldn't be surprised.

• 59:23Speaker 02

  That's what Barry said.

• 59:24Patrick Bet-David?

  Who said that?

• 59:25Speaker 02

  Michael Burry. He said, he said, watch, we just had Preston for a playbook for what China can do to Taiwan.

• 59:30Patrick Bet-David?

  Oh, I, I think if he said that, I think I wouldn't be surprised if that, can I read that? He said that? Says markets are missing trick as Venezuela. Is that part of the article?

• 59:40Speaker 02

  Yeah, it's the one that we were going to do.

• 59:41Patrick Bet-David?

  Okay. So let's go to it. Let's go to that story. What page is that?

• 59:43Speaker 04

  The very last paragraph.

• 59:45Tom Ellsworth?

  That's a summary statement at the end.

• 59:47Patrick Bet-David?

  What page is that on? I want to go to that story.

• 59:49Tom Ellsworth?

  Uh, Michael Burry is page seven.

• 59:53Patrick Bet-David?

  It's seven. Okay, let me go. Boom, boom, boom. Okay. So, Big Short Michael Burry says markets are missing a trick as the Venezuelan raid just changed the game. Okay, and to me, it's not even the Venezuelan game. Well, it's kind of...

• 1:00:06Speaker 02

  Geopolitics.

• 1:00:06Patrick Bet-David?

  Yeah, that makes sense. So, Michael Burry says US on a raid of Venezuela is much bigger than the markets here. The Big Short investor said, who recently pivoted from running a hedge fund to writing on Substack, publishing a post nearly, uh, early Monday saying the game just changed in the mid to long term, and markets are now pricing in all that they may of this weekend's events. This is a paradigm shift despite the markets yawning. He later wrote on X, "Benchmark oil prices climbed less than 1% on Monday, and US futures opened higher after the US captured President Nicolas Maduro over the weekend, and President Trump, America-run, the oil-rich country be... The seizure was a shot across China's bow."

• 1:00:47Patrick Bet-David?

  Uh, Burry wrote, pointing to billions of dollars in loans that China has made to Venezuela under its belt, and wrote initiative which were collateralized, fusing future oil output. That is now in the US hands. The investor who shot the fame after the president bet in 2000 housing bubble was featured in a book, The Big Short, wrote that China may now have a blueprint for how to take control of Taiwan, but must be in awe of Trumpian America's infuriating, uh, gall and decisive power. Burry said that China stock, uh, strike him as somewhat riskier now in terms of running afoul of sanctions. He wrote that Alibaba, Baidu, and other potential sanction targets could be in for some volatility of China escalates. Yeah, I think, I think something's gonna happen.

• 1:01:31Patrick Bet-David?

  I think one of these big things could potentially happen because you are literally suffocating these people right now.

• 1:01:37Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:01:37Patrick Bet-David?

  Go ahead, Brandon.

• 1:01:38Speaker 02

  Yeah, I mean, when it comes to what's more strategically important between, um, Venezuela for us or Taiwan for China, I mean, it's probably Taiwan that's more strategically important. Like, it'd be a bigger blow to the US if China successfully took Taiwan than, um, the fact that we took Venezuela, right? Would, I wasn't 75% of our semiconductor conductors come from there?

• 1:01:59Speaker 04

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:02:00Speaker 02

  Yeah, so that I saw. I think that's a bigger asset if they were able to take it. I don't think they would be able to take it, even if they use the full force of their military. Like, they're not capable of doing what we did, just because of the way the Taiwan is set up. You know, we've done videos before in the past of like, how harsh the conditions actually are for the Navy to go across and take it over. It's like a mountain in the middle of the ocean. So I don't think they'd be capable of that. And if they did try to do it, I think we would try to get close with Russia really quick and and stop selling China oil. Like, China's extremely dependent on oil from other countries. So for that reason, I don't think they're just I think they want to. I don't think they're capable of doing it, though.

• 1:02:34Speaker 04

  I think, you know, what Burry said, he's it's not about oil here, or at least in this one respect. What he said was that, you know, through the Belt and Road Initiative, China has lent billions of dollars all over the world. And with Venezuela, that was collateralized by Venezuelan oil, Trump just took their collateral, which means those loans are worthless. Because let's face it, Venezuela is not going to pay them back. And China knew that when they extended the loans. That's what China does. It extends loans to these countries that they know that they can't pay back, intending to either take the oil as the collateral, or some other form of collateral. Usually it's facilities like, you know, a railroad or a dam or some kind of mine. So what Trump said is, okay, I see your Belt and Road Initiative, and I'm going to take the initiative and stake the collateral right off the board, which makes that loan and your entire effort in Venezuela worthless. Again, it's a piece

• 1:03:20Speaker 04

  on the chessboard that it's it's a pretty damn big one.

• 1:03:22Speaker 02

  Yeah. Yeah, the economic hitman principle, they took that away from like, they took away the resource they actually care about.

• 1:03:27Patrick Bet-David?

  What does he want, though? He has to want some.

• 1:03:29Speaker 02

  Trump or Xi?

• 1:03:30Patrick Bet-David?

  Trump. What does Trump want? What does Trump want?

• 1:03:33Speaker 04

  I think he realizes that this is Cold War II. Let's be honest about this. China is not a, what is it called, strategic partner?

• 1:03:42Speaker 02

  Rival or whatever they call it. No, this is Cold War II, and it has been. You know, why did they leak that story from, what was it, New York a couple of months back, where they had all of those SIM cards in a room that could just basically fry the communication grid in New York? Why did they leak that?

• 1:03:59Speaker 04

  To say that, look, we are kind of at war with, why have the Chinese been buying farmland next to air bases? Yeah. To do what the Ukrainians did in a first strike to launch a drone attack to take out the US air power. Is this one you're talking about? So what I'm saying is that the Trump administration at least realizes, even though they don't want to say it explicitly, this is Cold War II. And so we need to think Cold War II. Where's the done rogue doctrines coming from? It's the execution of that strategic realization. We are in a Cold War with the Chinese. And the worse it gets for the Chinese system, the more likely it turns into something that gets really bad. Yeah.

• 1:04:34Tom Ellsworth?

  What I think what people need to look at is what you're talking about, is this is really 3D chess. Venezuela is not about Venezuela.

• 1:04:44Speaker 04

  Right.

• 1:04:45Tom Ellsworth?

  It's not about Marxism in the Western Hemisphere, although they want to-

• 1:04:49Speaker 04

  That's sort of like a benefit, right?

• 1:04:51Tom Ellsworth?

  Right. They love, you know, I think that there's a part of Marco Rubio, and Marco Rubio is the guy whose desk this whole thing really sits on. This isn't the Department of Energy. This is sitting on Marco Rubio's desk on 3D chess. Because it is, it is the blow against Russia, it is the blow against China and their collateral, it is taking back the hemisphere, it is a blow for, against Marxism. And the US mainstream media wants to talk about, oh, it was illegal to go in there, and now the greedy, you know, all the greedy energy companies are going to get the oil. Wait a minute, only Chevron's in there materially benefiting right now.

• 1:05:34Tom Ellsworth?

  And Trump's inviting everybody else, would you like to invest in Venezuela? Would you like to-

• 1:05:38Speaker 04

  Yeah, would you like to spend billions of dollars first before-

• 1:05:40Tom Ellsworth?

  With your money, not my money, with your money, and then pull the oil out and then pay the Venezuelans for the oil out of their country. So when he stabilizes Venezuela, the phrase that we all want to look at here is very simple: on our terms. And this is all related to the Cold War. He wants China to be a trading partner on our terms and not manipulating Venezuela. He wants Iran to be- Not in this hemisphere on our terms. Is there something for them to trade on oil? There's a deal to be made if they'll do it on our terms and only go over here and not over here. And now he also has an impact on Russia, who is basically like the credit card in the middle of this.

• 1:06:23Tom Ellsworth?

  They're the transaction guy in the middle of this. And now he's like saying, no, no, no, transactions don't go through you. And he's like, well, how am I going to make any money? What's kind of the point?

• 1:06:30Speaker 04

  You gotta ask me for permission.

• 1:06:31Tom Ellsworth?

  And by the way, how important was it? They sent one of their own subs to shadow one tanker? We're not talking about a pipeline. We're not talking about-

• 1:06:40Speaker 04

  That was a tanker loosely.

• 1:06:42Tom Ellsworth?

  Yeah, yeah, an old jalopy tanker. So this is all about the 3D chess game on our terms. And I think history is going to look back on this and see just how big of a deal it was. And I, you know, and I'm going to, I'm out and saying that this is Trump and Rubio. And we're going to look back on this on one of the most amazing times, not just getting Maduro, but all the six months that are going to go around this, that it is going to be tremendous.

• 1:07:14Patrick Bet-David?

  Yeah, for the folks that are watching out there, um, this place is 22 degrees. The podcast room, and I think they do this on purpose for us-

• 1:07:22Tom Ellsworth?

  We could use some oil in a heater right over here.

• 1:07:26Patrick Bet-David?

  It's, it's, you have to be here to see what it feels like. Uh, uh, but it's, it's, it's, I agree with what you're saying on how, um, unique of a time we're living in for this many things to be moving.

• 1:07:38Tom Ellsworth?

  We're going to look back on it.

• 1:07:39Patrick Bet-David?

  Yeah, you think about-

• 1:07:40Tom Ellsworth?

  If, oh, oh, oh.

• 1:07:42Speaker 04

  The big if is if they can pull it off.

• 1:07:44Patrick Bet-David?

  I think they could pull it off because they have so much leverage right now, Jeff. The amount of pain-

• 1:07:50Speaker 04

  We have not yet seen the Chinese and Russians-

• 1:07:52Patrick Bet-David?

  Retaliation.

• 1:07:53Speaker 04

  Not retaliation, but them realizing, it's sort of like- Do they know what Trump knows, that they know, that the Trump knows?

• 1:08:00Patrick Bet-David?

  You think they're not paranoid? Do you think, uh, do you think?

• 1:08:03Speaker 04

  Well, I think that's why Trump has had to establish these precedents.

• 1:08:06Patrick Bet-David?

  Let me ask you a question though. By nature, by DNA and nature, who do you think is naturally more paranoid? American leaders politically, Russian or Chinese?

• 1:08:16Speaker 04

  Chinese.

• 1:08:17Patrick Bet-David?

  And then second is who?

• 1:08:18Speaker 04

  By, there's other Chinese.

• 1:08:20Patrick Bet-David?

  That's right. So, so you don't think they're sitting there wondering, knowing what he's doing? I don't think they're delusional.

• 1:08:28Speaker 04

  I do, I think they are. I think that the Chinese have been following the caricature that has been printed about Trump. And I think that's, you know, a lot of intelligence is really just regurgitating all these mainstream ideas. And I think what's, what's happened is they have vastly underestimated, first, first of all, his resolve, but also his strategic planning, as well as the ability to execute on that strategic planning. So I think the Chinese have yet to fully respond, to fully comprehend what's taking place.

• 1:08:53Patrick Bet-David?

  There's no way they are who they are without sitting there mapping out and saying, these are the 22 things he could do.

• 1:08:58Speaker 04

  You gotta remember, this is a communist regime. They're not exact, I mean, the image of the Chinese as, you know, there's these long planners who are thinking a thousand years ahead. No, that, these are communist bureaucrats. They are thinking about tomorrow. They're not thinking about a thousand years ahead.

• 1:09:12Patrick Bet-David?

  I don't know about that.

• 1:09:12Tom Ellsworth?

  I think they're a little bit more longer. Maybe not a thousand years, but they think 10 when other people think 10 minutes.

• 1:09:17Patrick Bet-David?

  Yeah, I, I don't, I don't know if they, you know, when they said the whole made in China 2025, remember how by 2025, they wanted to be able to take over the world and they're gonna be the, the biggest thing. And when they announced it, you know, and then COVID happened. So to me.

• 1:09:33Speaker 04

  Yeah, but those are just five year plans.

• 1:09:35Patrick Bet-David?

  If China is sitting there behind closed doors, seeing what's going on, my concern is with the amount of suffocation, where you cause people to see how much control they've lost, they make desperate moves.

• 1:09:50Tom Ellsworth?

  Like COVID.

• 1:09:50Patrick Bet-David?

  Like COVID. And desperate moves could be massively retaliatory and all of a sudden you're like, wait a minute, what just happened?

• 1:09:58Speaker 04

  Or if you want to be positive, that's exactly what the Trump administration is counting on.

• 1:10:02Patrick Bet-David?

  Why?

• 1:10:02Speaker 04

  Because then they could use a desperate move on the part of China or Russia, whoever it is they think, as their next step. Now we're justified in taking it up a notch. Cause the Chinese did this and they expected.

• 1:10:13Patrick Bet-David?

  So a question for you, what's up a notch?

• 1:10:15Speaker 04

  I don't know. I mean, that's. Rubio, in terms of pressure?

• 1:10:19Patrick Bet-David?

  Yeah, yeah, what's next?

• 1:10:20Speaker 04

  Um, alright, so putting enough pressure on Russia.

• 1:10:23Tom Ellsworth?

  They're distracted with Venezuela. Let's get Taiwan now. Let's make a desperate move. Let's do a naval blockade. Let's do an economic super sanction. I mean, you see what I mean? Would China, now, do I think they put boots on the ground and go on Taiwan? No. But would they maybe move three chess moves ahead, thinking that the rest of the world is distracted by Iran fall or not fall? And Venezuela and what we're doing, and Putin, what he's doing? Would China take advantage of that and, and make like three big chess moves on Taiwan? I, I think so.

• 1:10:54Speaker 04

  What is it the leverage the Chinese have? What is it they have that they could use as leverage? There's really, I mean.

• 1:10:59Speaker 02

  Manpower.

• 1:11:00Speaker 04

  Man, but I think, you know, more of an economic thing, like rare earth.

• 1:11:03Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:11:03Speaker 04

  So, okay, you need rare earths for basically anything that has to do with, um, modern electronics. So maybe they start restricting rare earths.

• 1:11:09Speaker 02

  Well, just the refinements of rare earths, like we just don't have the refining capacity. We have rare, it's just not refinements.

• 1:11:14Speaker 04

  It's not easily, easy to get right. So, I mean, so Trump is already sort of like ahead on that part, saying, okay, we're going to start building our capacity. So we're going to take away the Chinese leverage before they can even use it.

• 1:11:24Speaker 02

  And their biggest asset is getting the discounted oil from Russia and Iran. So, you know, if Iran suddenly falls and Russia has enough pressure on them to stop being so friendly with the oil they give to China, then China's really in a stranglehold where they stop getting the cheap Russian and Iranian oil. Cause that's like Chinese, China's nucleus is the ability to get cheap oil from Iran and Russia.

• 1:11:43Patrick Bet-David?

  Yeah, I mean, you know, the, the, uh, th- this is the other question as well. We talked about it on the podcast on Monday. It's very obvious that Trump is relying on Marco a lot more than he's relying on JD to get things done.

• 1:11:58Speaker 02

  Hmm.

• 1:11:58Patrick Bet-David?

  It, it, it seems as if the second most powerful person on his team is not Vance.

• 1:12:06Speaker 02

  Hmm.

• 1:12:07Patrick Bet-David?

  It's Rubio. And by the way, if Rubio's in more of these meetings. Doing the deals, world leaders are now accustomed to who? Rubio. Rubio, to be doing that, which means they're kind of sitting there saying, "We either want this guy in 2028 or we don't." But if Vance is not in those rooms building those relationships and Rubio is, it may be Rubio's turn in 2028 and then Vance's turn maybe in 2036.

• 1:12:34Tom Ellsworth?

  You know, you bring something interesting up. I was watching the weekend news shows and Rubio wasn't out there like a proxy, just giving the administration's talking point. He was processing points and responding to reports, you know what I mean?

• 1:12:48Patrick Bet-David?

  Yeah, for sure.

• 1:12:49Tom Ellsworth?

  Very different from the Senator from Michigan, "I support what the administration has said about this, this and this, and I think he's doing a fine job and I think you're full of crap." You know, that's a proxy out doing the talking point. Rubio was going, "No, no, no, you don't understand. A, B, C, this is how we're gonna be." You know, and he was really there putting the processing down that impressed me.

• 1:13:10Patrick Bet-David?

  Okay, let's go to the next story. Bill Ackman slams California tax well, uh, well tax as expropriation of private property. Okay, is there a clip on this or is it a tweet?

• 1:13:22Tom Ellsworth?

  It's a tweet.

• 1:13:23Patrick Bet-David?

  Okay, let's go through. Oh, we already talked about this from December 29th. Why is the story on January 5th though? Why is it showing that some of the story is here? Let me see this, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. $1 billion, 5% tax, California. We talked about that already, right? I thought it was a newer story that he brought up. I'll, uh, I'll skip that story. I'll skip that story because I thought it was a newer one. Um, and we covered that one right there. We covered that one right there. Uh, you're talking about which one's going to be BYD, Tesla China, boom, uh.

• 1:13:54Patrick Bet-David?

  Okay, here we go. Homeownership rate in New York is the absolute lowest in the US. Think about it. Lowest in the US, New York? Yes. New York is the lowest in the US. When you look at this article, Rob, I don't know if there's a chart for the other ones because...

• 1:14:13Patrick Bet-David?

  I'd want to know who is the highest, if New York is the lowest, if we can pull that up. Homeownership, long viewed as a cornerstone of American economic security, remains stubbornly out of reach in New York State. By the end of 2024, the Empire State posted the lowest homeownership rate in the country with just 51.3% of residents owning their homes. The report places New York at the bottom of a national ranking and highlights how sharply the state diverges from much of the rest of the country where owning a home remains the norm rather than the exception. The study, conducted by Stage Properties Brokers LLC, tracked quarterly ownership trends across 50 states throughout 2024. Using a single most recent full year available data, the rankings were determined by the state's

• 1:14:56Patrick Bet-David?

  share of each state's population that owned a home in the fourth quarter year, capturing not only where the state ended the year, but also how ownership levels shifted over time. In New York's case, the trajectory was flat to down, reinforcing the state's longstanding reputation as a renter-heavy market dominated by high prices, limited inventory, and dense urban housing stock, particularly in New York City. Who was at the top, Rob? Does it show you who was at the top or no?

• 1:15:23Speaker 06

  No, I can only find a chart that was from 2022, but nothing for 2025.

• 1:15:28Patrick Bet-David?

  Tom, where are you at with this? Why does this story matter?

• 1:15:31Tom Ellsworth?

  So what I think it points out is that New York was already difficult for people to actually own a house. And what's interesting, in blue states where the property taxes are higher, people forget that there's hidden costs of homeownership that people don't see, first time homeowners don't see right off the bat. And that is the property tax that you have to pay. Usually, December 20th, everybody gets a property tax bill. It's usually due by January 20th or something like that. And that is based on the price of the house. So if the house is more expensive, not only do you need a bigger down payment, not only do you need a bigger mortgage, now you're paying more property tax, and because the value of the house is up...

• 1:16:14Tom Ellsworth?

  Now, the insurance is more to ensure that house if you have to rebuild it because of fire, loss, or storm, whatever it is. And so, blue states have all those headwinds, it all adds up to being much more difficult to actually own the home. And that's what we're seeing in the bluest of blue states, which is California, but it used to be New York, but they're right there at the top two. Now, it's difficult. So what do I make of it? It's failed economic policies. You could also take a look at all the blue states and the cost of electricity per kilowatt. I found a chart yesterday that was talking about that, and it was blue states were doing that, too. So now, it's also, the bigger

• 1:16:57Tom Ellsworth?

  your house is, the more expensive the electricity is, so more expensive to run the heaters and air conditioners. And so, I think this shows that when you've got more reasonable governors that are out there trying to set the stage to help people own homes, it starts with moderated enough supply so that the price is in line, and then property taxes that are reasonable, and then both of those things kind of contribute to insurance being more reasonable. This basically takes it away from being just a verbal headline to being a fact-based, you know, allegation here where the evidence backs it up. It is

• 1:17:39Tom Ellsworth?

  more expensive in a blue state to own a home and fewer people can do it.

• 1:17:43Patrick Bet-David?

  I mean, that chart right there shows it. All the blue to the left, all the red to the right. And by the way, as I'm going closer to this list, here's what I noticed. The lowest, lowest is New York, then it's Massachusetts, then it's Rhode Island, then Hawaii, California, Nevada, Connecticut, Alaska, Jersey, Oregon, Massachusetts. Now, if you go to highest, which is around 80, 81%, West Virginia is the highest, then Mississippi, Delaware, Vermont is blue-ish, Maine, New Hampshire, Idaho, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Minnesota. By the way, Florida ranks as 15th state for highest homeownership, 69.45%. West Virginia's

• 1:18:23Patrick Bet-David?

  80%, New York is 50%, 51% when you look at that list. So Florida is still on that list for lifestyle over some of the other states. Jeff, your thoughts on this?

• 1:18:35Tom Ellsworth?

  Yeah, I mean, the reason why West Virginia is at the top is because of, you know, the value of houses is much lower there, which is good and bad.

• 1:18:43Speaker 04

  But you know, New York, again, it reinforces the reason why we have Mendami now as mayor of New York City. Because for most people, they believe that homeownership and just the basics of American in life are just out of reach. And they have gotten further and further out of reach. Now, you can have an argument about why that is and how to fix it. But as far as most people's perceptions, it reinforces those perceptions that something isn't right here. And I would actually argue that New York is two stories rolled into one. Because I, you know, I grew up in the upstate New York in the Rust Belt. So in New York City, as Tom said, highly dense, very expensive to live. So people who do have a job and are gainfully employed are still priced out of the marketplace versus upstate, which is an economic wasteland. People don't have a job and are priced out of the market because

• 1:19:26Speaker 04

  they have no income. They have basically state aid. So you have a story. It doesn't matter where you are in New York, or you know, what it is, the end result is the same.

• 1:19:34Patrick Bet-David?

  The question is, how much do people love the NFL team, the NHL team, the MLB team of West Virginia? I mean, when you watch their NBA team in West Virginia, they crush it. The beach in West Virginia is amazing. So is it lifestyle? Because what does New York have? Everything. What does California have? Everything. They got so many sports teams you can pick and choose from. If you don't like the Lakers, go to the Clippers. You don't like the Dodgers, go to the Angels. You don't like the Rams, go to 49ers. You can pick and choose, right? At least they don't discriminate, right?

• 1:20:06Speaker 04

  Those are symbols of past prosperity, right? That's why they have so many past prosperity.

• 1:20:11Patrick Bet-David?

  But then the question becomes for an individual that's watching this right now saying, well, if I'm 30 years old, guy asked me a question on Manek the other day. He says, Pat, here's where I'm at. I'm out of Toronto, okay? I want to take my family out of Toronto. 35 years old. He says it's hard. My family ties, my in-laws, my parents. How do you overcome this challenge? My wife doesn't want to move, but I know the right thing to do is to leave because that's better for me long term. What do I do? It's going to be hard. But I think people are starting to ask the question of, where should I spend my lifetime raising my family, raising my kids in a safe place? I can keep the taxes. I can save more money. Cost of living is going to be better.

• 1:20:57Patrick Bet-David?

  People are asking those types of questions. Brandon, what are your thoughts on this?

• 1:21:00Speaker 02

  Um, yeah, I mean, since the time I turned 25 or 26, around when COVID happened, I was like dead sad and getting either to Texas or Florida. And I started in Texas, ended up here, but uh,

• 1:21:09Patrick Bet-David?

  Where'd you go to in Texas? What part?

• 1:21:11Speaker 02

  Fort Worth, lived there for a year.

• 1:21:12Patrick Bet-David?

  Really? How was that?

• 1:21:12Speaker 02

  I loved it.

• 1:21:13Patrick Bet-David?

  Really?

• 1:21:13Speaker 02

  Yeah, beautiful place.

• 1:21:14Patrick Bet-David?

  Yeah, it is.

• 1:21:14Speaker 02

  I like Florida more, but uh, yeah, no, Texas and Florida are both awesome.

• 1:21:18Patrick Bet-David?

  Did you go to that Federal Reserve uh, uh, building in, in Fort Worth that uh, the currencies, did you see that tower or not?

• 1:21:25Speaker 02

  Uh, no, I didn't go there.

• 1:21:26Patrick Bet-David?

  I thought for sure you would have gone to try to steal a machine or something.

• 1:21:28Speaker 02

  I'll circle back.

• 1:21:29Patrick Bet-David?

  Printing machine.

• 1:21:29Speaker 02

  Um, but yeah, no, I mean, New York, New York's a disaster because I think that a lot of these places like that have wealth concentrated where there's a big tax base, you get these Nazi swamp creatures who end up running for politics there. And then there's decades and years of them, you know, potentially maybe embezzling money or uh, misallocating money like where billions of dollars go disappearing. Like you just get the wrong type of people in the positions of power and then it's just layers and layers and layers of um, bad policies. Like it takes too much, takes too long to get building permits in New York. Um, they do the rent control stuff. So all that stuff compounds. I, I think like 7% of the expensive apartments in New York are owned by foreign investors. So like there's just empty million dollar buildings in New York that are, or million dollar apartments in New York that are owned by Chinese internationals.

• 1:22:13Speaker 02

  So it's, it's all kinds of toxic sludge that's piled up over the years with, with New York.

• 1:22:17Patrick Bet-David?

  So are you saying you're not moving to New York? Is that kind of what you're saying?

• 1:22:20Speaker 02

  No, I, I wish I, I wish I could, but um, no, not the way it's running. Like,

• 1:22:23Patrick Bet-David?

  Not right now.

• 1:22:24Speaker 02

  Back in the Robert Moses days, maybe that's when it was really humming, but not, not anymore.

• 1:22:27Patrick Bet-David?

  Not anymore.

• 1:22:28Speaker 04

  There's a life, life cycle of states in the same way. There's a life cycle of, of companies, right?

• 1:22:32Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:22:33Speaker 04

  It starts out, you do all the things that you need to do to become successful. Then you get lazy, then you get corrupt and it all falls apart. We've seen that with New York. We've seen that with California.

• 1:22:41Patrick Bet-David?

  Yep, true. By the way, Marco Rubio tells lawmakers, Trump wants to buy Greenland.

• 1:22:46Speaker 02

  Hmm.

• 1:22:46Patrick Bet-David?

  Okay. Now the question is, You can't find it on sale on Realtor, Zillow, all these other sites. We were talking about it earlier, but apparently they want to make an offer. What does that mean? Rubio, out of nowhere, makes that announcement and people are reacting to it. Buying up Greenland. Secretary of State Marco Rubio told lawmakers Trump wants to buy Greenland rather than invade it. While Mr. Trump has asked aides to give him an update on the plan for acquiring the territory, US officials said on Tuesday. Rob, is this a clip of Rubio or?

• 1:23:16Speaker 06

  No, this is President Trump talking about the necessity of acquiring Greenland.

• 1:23:20Patrick Bet-David?

  Go for it.

• 1:23:21Speaker 07

  I will say this about Greenland. We need Greenland from a national security situation. It's so strategic. Right now Greenland is covered with Russian and Chinese ships all over the place. We need Greenland from the standpoint of national security.

• 1:23:38Patrick Bet-David?

  Cold War II.

• 1:23:39Speaker 07

  And Denmark is not going to be able to do it, I can tell you.

• 1:23:43Speaker 07

  You know what Denmark did recently to boost up security in Greenland? They added one more dog sled. It's true. They thought that was a great move.

• 1:23:58Speaker 07

  Oh, I don't want to talk about Greenland now.

• 1:24:00Speaker 04

  Oh, no. I don't want to talk about Greenland now. After the dog sled.

• 1:24:04Speaker 07

  From the standpoint of national security.

• 1:24:05Speaker 04

  Oh, my God.

• 1:24:06Speaker 07

  And the European Union needs us to have it, and they know that.

• 1:24:10Speaker 04

  That's amazing.

• 1:24:11Tom Ellsworth?

  Listen to that last line. The EU knows that it is strategic. They know that there's a gateway up there where Russian naval forces come through. They also know that it is, that NUK could be a base of operations for a fast response to the Northern Atlantic. And what you just heard there, that is the story behind the story. They'll have you believe that it's all rare earth minerals. Well, there's a lot of rare earth stuff that's very valuable in Greenland that would help the West, all of the West, by the way, not just the USA. But he's saying there needs to be more security. Greenland is a strategic location and the Dutch aren't going to get it done. And the EU knows it.

• 1:24:55Tom Ellsworth?

  So the EU may be posturing publicly, but privately they know that if, if Russia gets more out of hand following the resolution of Ukraine, which we hope is in a short time, is that this is important. And you just heard it there at the very, very end of it. By the way. Fifty-four thousand population?

• 1:25:17Patrick Bet-David?

  Yeah.

• 1:25:18Tom Ellsworth?

  Fifty-four thousand?

• 1:25:20Patrick Bet-David?

  How's the nightlife? It's like it's got a good party town or?

• 1:25:23Tom Ellsworth?

  No, I think that's it. I think it's fifty-four thousand. I think it's the same population as Boca Raton, Florida.

• 1:25:30Patrick Bet-David?

  Fifty-four thousand. By the way, while this is going on, on Tuesday, leaders of six NATO nations joined Mette Frederiksen, the prime minister of Denmark, to issue a remarkable joint statement pushing back against Trump's assertion that the US should be taking over Greenland. The nations that align with Denmark were Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Poland, all of which are close allies of the US. So it's interesting. Jeff?

• 1:25:57Speaker 04

  So they're just negotiating for a price?

• 1:25:59Patrick Bet-David?

  That's what they're doing.

• 1:25:59Speaker 04

  That's what they're doing. Rob, can you pull up an overhead or an overhead map of, you know, the pole, the North Pole? So you can really see, you really have to appreciate where Greenland is in its actual context to understand what Trump is talking about. Again, you have to think about this from the perspective of Cold War II. And if you see Greenland in there, look at where Russia is. It's right in the middle of everything there. It's basically, just from a military perspective, where the Russians have most of their military assets on the, what is it? The Kolar Peninsula or whatever it's called? It's basically straight line across from Greenland. So what Trump says about a strategic location of Greenland is absolutely correct. And if you are thinking and acting as if we are in Cold War II,

• 1:26:43Speaker 04

  that is essential, that is essential to the United States as Taiwan is to China. Because if you look at the strategic area of China, China is basically bottled in, in the Pacific by Taiwan. Right. So you have all of these strategic bottlenecks. So that's where this is coming from. You're right, it's not rare earth. I mean, rare earth would be a bonus and a benefit, sure. And who was it that came out? There's somebody on social media came out with an idea. As you said, there's only fifty-some thousand people in Greenland. Why don't I give them all a million dollars? We're going to give every one of you a million dollars. It's going to cost fifty billion. Nothing for the US. I mean, they borrowed the money anyway. We're going to give you fifty billion, we're going to give Greenland fifty billion dollars. You guys vote to have the US annex. But the point I'm making, though, is that from the Trump administration's perspective,

• 1:27:27Speaker 04

  understanding Cold War II, Greenland is absolutely essential.

• 1:27:31Tom Ellsworth?

  And by the way, Rob, can you put that map back up there? There's a area called Murmansk, and take a look at where Murmansk is. It's very close to Finland. It always makes Finland very nervous. You see it right there, where on the northern edge by the red line?

• 1:27:45Patrick Bet-David?

  Yeah.

• 1:27:45Tom Ellsworth?

  That is where the Russian Navy and the nuclear sub headquarters is. And that is the, if you want to look at the Fort Knox of Russian Navy interest, that's it. And so Greenland gives you an opportunity to monitor in the northern Atlantic, and Russia knows it, and they don't want it. By the way, Boca Raton, Florida has 104,000 people. Greenland has 56,000. So I said it was about the same price, but if Boca Raton had a war with Greenland, Boca would probably have to give up seven and a half points.

• 1:28:21Speaker 02

  So Greenland's gonna be like Ukraine, pretty much, at the very least at first.

• 1:28:26Patrick Bet-David?

  What is more likely to happen? Us getting Panama Canal, us getting Greenland?

• 1:28:33Patrick Bet-David?

  I mean, what else would be on that list?

• 1:28:35Tom Ellsworth?

  I think the canal is not a done deal, but I think there is an absolute path to do it.

• 1:28:41Patrick Bet-David?

  This here, is this impossible, or is this possible?

• 1:28:44Speaker 02

  I think step one, like, we're gonna put assets in Greenland that make it like a satellite, at the very least. Like, that's not a hard sell. And I think the harder thing to do is the Panama Canal, because we probably have to use force to do that, if we don't do it the civil way, through BlackRock.

• 1:29:00Speaker 04

  Yeah, I think they're just negotiating on price agreement. This is what it is. I mean, that's what Trump does. He's negotiating through the public and through private means, and they're just trying to come up with a fair price that actually works for everybody.

• 1:29:11Patrick Bet-David?

  This is the Prime Minister of Denmark?

• 1:29:13Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:29:14Patrick Bet-David?

  What'd she say? Oh, boy.

• 1:29:17Speaker 08

  Threats, pressure, and condescending remarks, even from our closest allies for a generation, about wanting to take over another country and another people, as if it was something you could buy and own that has no place anywhere.

• 1:29:32Speaker 04

  Except all of human history.

• 1:29:33Speaker 08

  We shoulder our responsibility in the world, and it is not us who will seek out conflict. But let there be no doubt. No matter what happens, we will stand firm on what is right and what is wrong.

• 1:29:45Patrick Bet-David?

  Right, okay, alright, so deals coming our way here soon. And

• 1:29:50Tom Ellsworth?

  Good luck with the dog sled.

• 1:29:52Speaker 04

  You know, you can see almost Trump in his, um, you know, the godfather sense. I'm gonna make them an offer they can't refuse. That's where, that's what he's working toward.

• 1:30:00Patrick Bet-David?

  Well, there's this other offer he's about to make is one, they don't have a choice but to refuse. It's a demand. Trump administration freezes $10 billion in child family aid to five states over fraud concerns. CNBC, uh, story, Rob, I think you got a clip on this one here if you want to go to it. Let me read the story while you're looking for it. So, the Trump administration said Tuesday freezing $10 billion federal grants, funds to certain childcare family assistance programs in five states. Because of serious concerns of fraud, all five states targeted in the freeze are California, Colorado, Illinois, Minnesota, and New York, that are led by Democrats. The action applies to three programs overseen by US and Health and Human Services. For Jones, the move comes after a day of Minnesota Governor Tim Walz dropped his bid

• 1:30:44Patrick Bet-David?

  for a third term amid political fallout from widespread fraud in social services programs in the states, including the childcare services with a federal prosecutor as estimated more than $9 billion. Families who rely on childcare and family assistance programs deserve confidence that these resources are used lawfully and for their intended purposes, says Deputy HHS Secretary Jim O'Neill. More than $7.3 billion in TNF funds have been frozen, nearly $2.4 billion in CCDF funds have been frozen, nearly $840 million in social services block grant funding has been frozen. Is this President Trump speaking on it? Go for it.

• 1:31:21Speaker 07

  From Minnesota and from the United States. It's actually more from the United States because Minnesota puts in, and we're not gonna pay it anymore. We're gonna have Walz go pay, we're not gonna pay them, and we're not gonna pay California, and we're not gonna pay Illinois with that big slob of a governor that they have that doesn't run, you know, we brought down crime by 25%. He didn't do anything, he's not doing anything. But they want us to leave. He had, he had a day where they had 17 murders, not too long ago, 17 murders and 77 people shot, but 17 died. And then he talks about, oh, we can handle, he can't handle it.

• 1:32:02Speaker 07

  But we pull back and we'll go in at the appropriate time, but we're the ones that brought the crime down, we brought it down 20%. They didn't bring it down, Pritzker didn't bring it down. Same thing with Gavin Newsom.

• 1:32:15Patrick Bet-David?

  By the way, while this is going on, I'll come to you guys. It's unclear which agency is investigating California issue and what the probe email entails, but Trump's announcement comes after California's Republican gubernatorial and comptroller candidates claimed they uncovered 250 billion in potential welfare fraud through a tip line investigation the New York Post reported on Monday. Not 9 billion, 250 billion? California or Gavin Newsom is more corrupt than Minnesota? If that's possible, the fraud of California has begun. Thank you for your attention to this matter, President Donald J. Trump. Tom, your thoughts on this?

• 1:32:51Tom Ellsworth?

  It's huge. It's, we said, we were doing research here and we were adding things up. And we were seeing Governor Newsom getting a non-passing grade from his own non-partisan state auditor and how he shut down an audit because he didn't want the spotlight to be on the results of it. So he actually shut it down when Democrats were saying, "Hey, we're taking heat now. Why are you shutting this down?" But what's going on here is, I love, one of the phrases I love that was in the story was, "This action, this action by the US government will deprive families of resources they need." Yes, you know what families?

• 1:33:34Tom Ellsworth?

  The Schumer family, who's trying to keep their dad's job and they needed money from Minnesota on their thing. So maybe the Chuck Schumer family will suffer if this spigot gets turned off to Minnesota. Maybe the Elon Omar family will suffer as the backdoor skimming that they're allegedly doing gets stopped. So I always love it when they all talk about that there's these, "All these poor families are suddenly to get something." No, that's not true. They're not getting it now. It's not supporting their diet now. It's not supporting their lifestyle now. This money is slushing. The FBI watched a large restaurant that claimed that was feeding a bunch of schoolchildren.

• 1:34:18Tom Ellsworth?

  They watched the thing for weeks for how many people, how many people came out. And they put cameras up, you know, all around the place to basically say, here's a perfectly good example. It was getting millions of dollars and not there. So what the, what the federal government is doing here is exactly what the taxpayer wants, Pat. The taxpayer wants, stop using my money for this crap. Stop it. This really pisses me off. There's two levels of justice, one for them and one for me. I mess up on my taxes for by 50 bucks and I get a $300 fine from the IRS. These guys steal it blind and nothing ever happens to them. There's two levels of justice here and I want it stopped. If you're going to tax me more, do things to me, first stop this crap. And guess what?

• 1:35:02Tom Ellsworth?

  American people are going to be very, very pleased by this. Number one. And number two, we said that when you would see what's happening in California, it would be eye-watering numbers compared to Minnesota, that it would be nothing compared to what's there because of what they did and what they did on the Medicaid shortfall and how they took money from the feds on Medicaid, took money from the feds on placement services and destination support for the people that came across. They were getting all kinds of checks from the federal government and from the Biden administration. And now it's all coming home to roost and people in California

• 1:35:44Tom Ellsworth?

  that were working with Gavin or even standing to the side, not throwing them in front of, under the bus, but they certainly are saying, well, you know, we did have this audit that we kind of wanted because there were Democrat candidates there, Pat, that wanted to prove they weren't part of this or that. And so when the audit stops and they say you're all dirty, you know, that's what's going on. And by the, this is just the beginning. I believe this is going to be half a trillion dollars in California. I believe it's going to be 500 billion. You think so? Yes. Over the course of time? Because all you have to do, no, and by the way, I'll give it a five-year look back. On a five-year look back, I believe it's going to be half a trillion dollars. That would be 100 billion a year over five years. And all you have to do is add up the things that are there.

• 1:36:29Tom Ellsworth?

  But that's the back of the, that's the back of the cocktail napkin that I'm looking at. And I'm, I'll put my name and my reputation out. This is going to be half a trillion dollars. Damn. Over five past years, which is why Gavin Newsom stopped the audit and why these things were happening the way they are. California is, is the mother lode compared to Minnesota. And the bag man, Tim Walsh, that helped allegedly bring all those dollars to the Kamala Harris campaign at a time where she didn't have full support from the DNC and its treasure test. Jeff, what do you have with this?

• 1:37:05Speaker 04

  I have three things here. One, what Tom's saying, and I think you're right, Tom, but would anybody be surprised? I think nobody would be, if they found half a trillion dollars in fraud, nobody would be shocked by that. That's the first thing. Second thing is, I think you speak for most people, arrests are, didn't happen. People are tired of just talking about it and saying, we're going to investigate. Start putting people in jail. Let's, let's have some accountability. Let's stop talking about it, investigating. Let's bring some cases forward, some big ones. We don't want to just know about the, you know, the individual daycare center operator, who was actually behind them? Who were the politicians who are getting the backdoor benefits? Because we know this is a machine. I help you get government money, you kick back some of that money to me when it's time for a campaign. We know this, how this works.

• 1:37:49Speaker 04

  This is, we've gone through this throughout history. You know, the Democratic machine in New York, Tammany Hall, that's exactly how it worked. So, most people want to see, yeah, this is great, where you're starting to uncover this. We all knew it was kind of taking place to begin with, but start freaking arresting people. Start putting them in jail. Start, you know, start having some convictions here. We're tired of talking about it. Let's see some real action. And the third thing is, getting back to our major point, which is, why did all this fraud really explode in the 2020s? This is an aftershock or an aftereffect of COVID. Government size ballooned. And government employees, government people, government politicians, their eyes got huge. They had money flowing in every single way that they possibly could. So of course, the first thing they thought about is, how can we steal our part of it?

• 1:38:34Speaker 04

  So the bigger the government gets, the more you should expect this kind of thing to take place. When the government completely exploded after in 2020, 2021, this is the necessary byproduct from it. Nobody's surprised by it. So the only way to correct it is to hold people accountable for having done it. And that was the other kind of wink and nod behind all of that was that we're never gonna do. You guys can steal all you want, we'll never hold you accountable. We're never gonna, we're never gonna tell anybody this is a gravy train forever. So in order for this to stop, we need to actually have some kind of accountability.

• 1:39:04Patrick Bet-David?

  Well, I mean, Newsom is number one right now on calcio. If you look at it right there. And there's no bumps. It's just going up and up and up.

• 1:39:12Speaker 04

  Well, that's the, Pat, that's the other side of this, right? Is

• 1:39:15Speaker 02

  Thirty-five percent.

• 1:39:16Speaker 04

  You, if, if you're a Democrat, you've been told your entire modern life that Trump is Hitler. So if Trump is Hitler and Gavin Newsom's the guy who's saying, I'm gonna take on Hitler, you won't care what Gavin Newsom does. You let him get away with stealing and fraud and everything else because he's the guy who's taking on Hitler.

• 1:39:32Patrick Bet-David?

  That's what it is.

• 1:39:33Speaker 04

  That's, that was, Democrats invented that cover so that they would be able to do that. If I demonize Trump as Hitler, then Democrats will vote for me no matter what I actually do. And Republicans do it too, to a lesser extent. But it's, if I'm the guy who's going after Trump, the people you hear criticizing Trump the most, calling him Hitler are probably the dirtiest ones out there. Because they know that they, they have the votes back. All they have to do is

• 1:39:56Patrick Bet-David?

  That makes sense. Rob, is midterm still the same? Has anything, is it still 73, 74% on calcio for midterms? I'm actually curious to know what calcio has for midterms, 2026 midterms. Has anything changed at all? No, it just went higher. Wow. Okay. It went higher. So 77% is Democrats. Republicans keep going lower and lower and lower chance of winning.

• 1:40:16Speaker 02

  That's the economy.

• 1:40:17Patrick Bet-David?

  That's the economy. Brandon, thoughts?

• 1:40:19Speaker 02

  Um, yeah, I mean, I think the only place that's more of a black hole for money that disappears, I mean, I don't know where it goes, is Ukraine above California. But it's pretty close. That's a good analogy, really. That's how I've always thought California. Like, I hate waste of potential so much. It's one of the saddest things out there. And I've always been baffled why, like, you know, our own federal government seems to be at a deficit for money every year where they have to borrow more money. Why the biggest states in the country are always out of money before they, before the end of the year and have to ask the federal government for more money. And then there's such a lack of results for it. Like, there's incomplete highway projects in California and New York. There's homeless people, there's inadequate shelters for the homeless people, there's inadequate

• 1:41:01Speaker 02

  healthcare, etc., etc. So, I mean, I think it's the most interesting thing ever to like, see the full picture of the fraud and if it's all connected. I wonder if it's possible to create some sort of AI that like creates like a web of how these things all attach together. Because I, it was disappointing how Doge kind of got quiet after they started getting too close to the dangerous things, like with social security and everything. Like, it's like, because it's the biggest money pod in the entirety of human history, if you think about it, like the US federal budget, you know, like where all that money goes, like how much of it actually goes where it's supposed to go. I think we have no comprehension of how much money actually gets wasted and gets like, you know, shimmyed off into the pockets of people who are in on it.

• 1:41:44Patrick Bet-David?

  Yeah. I mean, Tom, your breakdown of saying California could end up being a half a trillion dollars by the end of the day, and you saying, I want to see some accountability as your second point, people got to get arrested. Trump's doing a couple of things here. You know who he is helping out? He's kind of helping out JD and Rubio. I mean, he's managing 25 projects, and one by one by one, here, we're going to take care of Newsom this way, we're going to take care of China this way, we're going to do this this way, we're going to do Greenland, we're going to do resources this way, we're going to do Panama Canal this way.

• 1:42:20Patrick Bet-David?

  And meanwhile, celebrating New Year's at Mar-a-Lago, and meanwhile, you know, having parties, events, you know, doing what he's doing. Got to respect the fact on how he's working. He's at this point managing more projects in one year as a president than two, three, four presidents have done combined. If you actually think about the amount of stuff that he's doing.

• 1:42:41Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:42:41Patrick Bet-David?

  You take one president, and in two terms, if they would have gone Greenland, that's a massive accomplishment, right? You understand what I'm saying? You take one. Like, if I was to ask you right now, what's Bill Clinton's biggest accomplishment, aside from having a lot of interns at work?

• 1:42:59Speaker 02

  I don't think we can go there.

• 1:43:01Tom Ellsworth?

  He came closer than any president since to actually balancing the federal budget.

• 1:43:08Patrick Bet-David?

  I agree.

• 1:43:08Tom Ellsworth?

  Yes.

• 1:43:09Patrick Bet-David?

  So that's a big, I agree.

• 1:43:10Tom Ellsworth?

  And I think there was a part of Clinton that really believed that you needed that stability. Because Clinton was not a Bernie. Clinton was a Democrat moderate.

• 1:43:20Patrick Bet-David?

  What would you say about Bush? Not the father, the son.

• 1:43:23Tom Ellsworth?

  The son?

• 1:43:24Patrick Bet-David?

  Biggest accomplishment.

• 1:43:25Tom Ellsworth?

  He was, well, he responded to nine 11, but he spent a lot of money on a war that turns out did not turn up weapons of mass destruction, number one. And number two, he actually presided over an expansion of government that was kind of reckless. I think my history on George W. Bush is that he was, you know, not as tight as he needed to be and government size.

• 1:43:47Patrick Bet-David?

  What's his victory, Tom? Victory? That's all I want to know. What's his victory?

• 1:43:50Tom Ellsworth?

  I don't have a pure victory.

• 1:43:52Patrick Bet-David?

  That's my point. So now watch this, Tom. Stay with me.

• 1:43:54Tom Ellsworth?

  Or a signature legislation.

• 1:43:55Patrick Bet-David?

  Go to senior.

• 1:43:58Patrick Bet-David?

  Oh, the fall of Soviet Union. He oversaw it. Oversaw it, but it's not him. I think it was the Gulf War. Right? Go to Reagan.

• 1:44:06Tom Ellsworth?

  Oh, Reagan.

• 1:44:07Patrick Bet-David?

  Tear down that wall.

• 1:44:08Tom Ellsworth?

  He, he preside, he triggered through his tax and economic policies and David Stockman, one of the biggest economic expansions, including job growth, job creation and wealth creation for the American middle class. Reagan, the Reagan revolution was true. The Reagan economy was real.

• 1:44:24Patrick Bet-David?

  So that's one end. Hey, Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall.

• 1:44:28Tom Ellsworth?

  Exactly.

• 1:44:28Patrick Bet-David?

  So that's probably going to be the bigger one that the people are going to know. Economy people, you're probably going to think about what you said. Okay, go to Kennedy. Go to Carter. Kenny's the moonshot. Go to, go to Obama. Obamacare. Right?

• 1:44:45Tom Ellsworth?

  We're going to get coverage for 30 million people. Now, at the fourth year, I'm going to let these folks raise it 27% and next year 35%. Ignore that part.

• 1:44:53Patrick Bet-David?

  Now, go to Trump if he's able to pull this off. Do you understand what I'm asking you?

• 1:44:57Tom Ellsworth?

  Trump becomes like Reagan. Trump has an international and an economic balance like Reagan did. Reagan had those two signature things. Reagan changed the world dynamic with freedom and democracy and tear down this wall and presided over economic expansion. You know what? For the first, Trump could be known for both.

• 1:45:17Speaker 02

  He's being as disruptive as JFK was. Like JFK was trying to mess with the Federal Reserve and mess with the CIA and everything. Like he's poking around and the way, the reason I like what he's doing, he's he'll like mention it, then forget about it for a while and then just do a shock and awe strike.

• 1:45:30Tom Ellsworth?

  JFK created the Peace Corps.

• 1:45:32Patrick Bet-David?

  So again, what I'm saying is, he's got a lot of stuff that's going on. If he's able to succeed on all of these, this is a monumental presidency.

• 1:45:40Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:45:41Patrick Bet-David?

  Monumental presidency. A case study that you'll look back and say, yeah, everyone's gonna be compared to this. Can you imagine like the next guy's being a president? If he does one press conference every six months, like dude, what happened? Like every day we're talking to this guy.

• 1:45:55Speaker 02

  Is that why Jane Vance has kind of gotten quiet? He doesn't want to follow that act?

• 1:45:58Patrick Bet-David?

  But I think, but I think.

• 1:45:59Speaker 02

  Let Rubio do it.

• 1:46:00Patrick Bet-David?

  But I think Rubio will. Go ahead, Tom.

• 1:46:02Tom Ellsworth?

  If I could add one thing?

• 1:46:03Patrick Bet-David?

  Sure.

• 1:46:04Tom Ellsworth?

  Remember, we're also gonna need to give Trump credit for what he prevented. It's not just what he did for a policy and economy, but it's what he prevented from happening. Because had Kamala Harris been elected?

• 1:46:17Patrick Bet-David?

  If Kamala Harris got elected, Tom, it is a very different world we're living in today. Anyways, let's go to the last story here. Iran. Iran on the brink as protesters move to take two cities, appeal to Trump. Rob, if you want to go to that story first. Iranians are now changing street signs and putting Trump on their folks. Iranians are asking for help from America. You'll see where I'm going with this. Iranians are asking for help from America and Trump. Iranians who live in Iran, who have Iranian license plates, like that one right there. Do you see the license plate on the back? That's an Iranian license plate. Play this clip here, Rob, if you could.

• 1:46:58Patrick Bet-David?

  Well, what, watch what they're doing.

• 1:47:01Patrick Bet-David?

  Okay?

• 1:47:03Patrick Bet-David?

  Alright? Trump. T R A M P. That's how you spell Trump.

• 1:47:09Speaker 06

  Wow.

• 1:47:10Patrick Bet-David?

  Is it like way or avenue? Yeah, President Trump way. Yeah, zoom in a little bit to see if it's a way or avenue, what that says.

• 1:47:15Speaker 06

  It's street.

• 1:47:16Patrick Bet-David?

  Okay, street, there you go. In Germany, they say strasse, right? Strasse, yes. Like Trump strasse. So, so they're doing that, and in the interim, Rob, if you got it, there's a bunch of different videos to go to, I don't know which one we want to go with. Watch this here, watch this here. This, is this the two cities, Rob?

• 1:47:30Speaker 06

  This is Tehran, and then I also have another one.

• 1:47:33Patrick Bet-David?

  This is Tehran? I like the way you say it, Rob, like you've been there 20 times. I can't wait for you to say when we're doing a podcast on Tehran. Rob's gonna call his wife, "Babe, we just finished the podcast in Tehran." Look at that. They're not letting up. Khamenei is not in a good place right now. Whatsoever. Khamenei is, uh, uh, not in a place where, you know, his people are not letting up. This is just Tehran, Iran. Is that a fire there, like on a shop or something? Yeah, all the way in the back, if you look closely. But Rob, the two cities, so we're on page eight, oh, page eight, I keep looking at page six, I'm like, where is this thing? So let me go to page eight. Um, Trump, uh, Iran on the brink, okay, here we go. Iranian protesters issued a direct appeal to help from Donald Trump on Tuesday.

• 1:48:17Patrick Bet-David?

  Again, Iranian people appealed for help from Trump, the appeal shared on X. Showed a woman holding up a sign with words, "Trump, a symbol of peace, don't let them kill us." On it, the woman's cry for help amid reports of at least 29 deaths, apparently the number right now is 36. Just about two hours ago was 36, could be even higher right now, more than 1,200 arrests, according to human rights activist, New Agency, H R A N A. They also report an escalation enforced by security units, including the use of pellet guns, tear gas, and direct assaults on demonstrators. The National Council, uh, Resistance of Iran also claimed the cities of Abdanan, not Abadan, Abadan is a big city, Abdanan,

• 1:49:02Patrick Bet-David?

  and, uh, Melak Shahi, Melak Shahi, uh, Malek Shahi were effectively taken over by protesters today. There were major developments in two cities in western Iran that have effectively taken over, and people are actually celebrating in the streets.

• 1:49:18Patrick Bet-David?

  They are chanting "Death to Khamenei", despite everything the regime has done. The fear factor seems to have shifted because people have made the suppressive forces flee. Rob, which clip is this one here? That's the city that you mentioned. Abdanan? Yep. Okay. Why don't you try to pronounce it? This is Abdanan.

• 1:49:39Patrick Bet-David?

  Okay? Celebrating, okay?

• 1:49:51Patrick Bet-David?

  God love it, man. I was born in this era. The biggest revolution in the history of mankind in Iran. Nine million people, they say, revolted. Four to nine million people revolted. The numbers vary. Here's what Trump had to say. Trump said, he came out and said, "If you do anything to Iran", I want to see what that page is on, Rob. Uh, uh, Trump, uh, specifically told Iran, uh, where is that story, Rob? I know it's somewhere here. Could be in the addendum. Let me see in the addendum side. Um, I don't know, it's a little Trumpy. Anyways, he told Iran that if you do anything, "I'm gonna come out and take care of the people." Um, do you see that story? I thought I just saw the story there of Trump. Anyways, while, there it is.

• 1:50:35Patrick Bet-David?

  So if Iran shouts and violent to kill peaceful people, which is their customer, okay? This is an older one. But there was another one that he, he said, page eight. Three? Do you see it? Trump warns Iran he will rescue protesters? That's the one. What page is that on? Page three. Page three. Trump threatens that he will, uh, rescue protesters. Financial Times. If anything happens to them, which is the same one that Rob has up here. But then here's what happened. Reza Pahlavi posted a video yesterday. He did two things. He did three things, actually. He did an interview with Wall Street Journal, okay? Where in the interview, he's being asked, "Do you want intervention?" Meaning, "Do you want America to intervene and to help you?" In this interview. This is one of the comments he made that's confused.

• 1:51:21Patrick Bet-David?

  A lot of Iranians, now obviously the people that are, that he can't do anything wrong in their eyes, they're not going to protest to this, but the logical, reasonable players who are looking at the saying, wait a minute, you're saying you don't need a single boot of your military on the ground in Iran? Yes, I don't need it. Iranians are saying, Trump, come help us. But you're not saying you don't need anything. No, we don't need any intervention. They're going to be able to do it all by themselves. Okay. No problem. So that's the role he's playing. That's what he thinks the strategy. And then he got back from vacation, I believe from Bahamas, and he posted a video. Rob, which clip is that?

• 1:51:56Speaker 06

  This was the protesters in the street begging for Trump to prevent any type of...

• 1:52:02Patrick Bet-David?

  Can you play that, please? Go for it.

• 1:52:07Patrick Bet-David?

  Paul Mac, help.

• 1:52:14Patrick Bet-David?

  Yeah, here's what he said. He says, "Foreign intervention such as operations in Venezuela was as. Reza Pahlavi emphasized that the regime must be carried out by Iranian people themselves with no need for foreign military intervention for special operations. The regime is in the weakest state and the people are protesting to bring it to an end." So it doesn't need help. For 47 years, Iran, do you think the 1979 revolution happened without intervention? By the way, do you think your father became the king without any intervention? Do you think your father, let me say that again, your father, a man I support, do you think he became the leader of Iran without intervention? You don't think anybody got involved for

• 1:52:54Patrick Bet-David?

  Mossadegh to fall? You think Mossadegh was like, all of a sudden decided to step away and go live in a small little village? And I'm not a socialist. Mossadegh was a modern day Bernie Sanders. He would have been horrible for Iran. Your father was good for Iran. Okay? My opinion. There's a lot of people that are saying certain things nowadays about your father. I thought he was great for Iran. But here's a message, which by the way, I like that he's playing offense. Watch the message you just said here. I just don't understand some of his sequencing. Here's a message that he just gave. Go ahead, Rob, if you want to play this clip. Go ahead.

• 1:53:26Speaker 09

  همیه انا، در این چند روز گذشته من از دستیک تذارات و راه بیمایی شما را دنبال کردم.

• 1:53:32Patrick Bet-David?

  Over the last week, I've watched the particular those that taking place today in the ghazars. Despite the regime's ongoing violence, you are resisting and it's inspiring.

• 1:53:40Speaker 09

  و قصد کردید که ازدهام جمعیت باعثی میشه که نیروها پس داره من و رنریزش رو به سمت شما بیشتر میکنه.

• 1:53:48Patrick Bet-David?

  Increased defections of the Iranian people.

• 1:53:49Speaker 09

  فرا باید مهم اس نش که این انضبات و گستردهگی رو حرف سو کنه.

• 1:53:52Patrick Bet-David?

  Critical to keeps his demonstrations disciplined and large as possible.

• 1:53:54Speaker 09

  من اولین فراخان خود را امروز با شما در میان میگزارم.

• 1:53:57Patrick Bet-David?

  This is my first call with you.

• 1:53:58Speaker 09

  و از شما دعوت میکنم که این جمعه و اشنبه 18 و 19 پیم. و سر ساعت 8 شب همه گی چه دقیقه ای آنها یا حتی از منازل خودتون شرکب شوار سردادن بکنید.

• 1:54:10Patrick Bet-David?

  I'll call you to begin chanting exactly what's on your heart.

• 1:54:13Speaker 09

  در نتیجه بازده این حرکت ها من فراخانهای بعییر به شما اعلام خواهم کرد.

• 1:54:17Patrick Bet-David?

  This is on your response. I will announce the next calls to action. Okay, so he's asking people to chant what they want. Do they want his return? Do they want him to be there? And then I think he was on Hannity yesterday, Rob. I don't know if you have that clip or not. Right here. Is that the clip? Yeah, that's the clip. If you want to play that clip, go for it.

• 1:54:36Speaker 09

  Look, in all these years, I've never seen an opportunity as we see today in Iran.

• 1:54:42Patrick Bet-David?

  He's right about this. This is the biggest opportunity ever.

• 1:54:45Speaker 09

  Iranian people are more than ever committed to bring an end to this regime as the world has witnessed in the last few days. The level of demonstrations unprecedented in Iran. Over a hundred cities and millions of people on the street chanting "Death to the dictator" and "End to this regime". And by God, it is about time that Iran gets its opportunity to free itself from a tyrannical regime.

• 1:55:09Patrick Bet-David?

  So here's what I would say. He's right. This is the closest it's ever been. But I'm gonna tell you this, and I'm gonna tell you this very clearly. All the comments and stuff that comes at me does nothing to me. I have one priority. I want to see Iran be free. These Iranian people, these young men, young boys, young women that are in the streets protesting, making all the noise with the burden of families that their kids are out there doing what they're doing. No one's going through tougher times than them. But Reza Pahlavi, you better close the deal this time. Because if you don't, you're done. You are done. I will for the rest of my life, call you the Jeb Bush of your family, which there's nothing wrong with that. He's a very nice man. But he's not George Bush.

• 1:55:54Patrick Bet-David?

  And he's definitely not George Bush Senior. And it's okay if you're Jeb Bush. You've done what you've done. You do very good interviews. You've done very good things over the years. But I hope you close the deal. I hope all this pressure, I hope the amount of frustration you and your people are getting from me drives the hell out of you to prove a point to say, we're gonna go get this done. I hope you do. I hope you drive like hell. I hope you do. I think you're gonna back down at the last minute, and I hope I'm wrong. By the way, if I'm wrong, I'll be the first person to come out and say it. I'll be the first person to come out and say it, if I'm wrong. I'm not trying to be right or wrong here. I'm trying to see Iran to be free. I don't have anything in this. I don't want nothing from you. I don't need any, you typically need money from other people. I don't need nothing from you.

• 1:56:39Patrick Bet-David?

  Nothing. I got so many messages from people that message me, very, very well-known celebrities. Very, very well-known names saying, "Keep pushing because it's driving him." Don't worry about all the backlash you're getting and all the things that people are saying. You indirectly could become the enemy to drive him to get to work because you're the only one that's saying what millions of Iranians are thinking that have been waiting for 47 years, and he could play a very big role. I don't care what you do. I'm gonna be on you like white on rice, cuz to me, you're not my king. My president is Donald J. Trump. And your father was a king. I respected that. I was painting in my house. You're not Crown Prince Reza Pahlavi. You're Reza Pahlavi. You're not a Crown Prince.

• 1:57:25Patrick Bet-David?

  And it's constitutional monarchy that you're trying to push, and now you're changing, flip-flopping. "We need intervention." "We don't need intervention." Just last year, you said Israel should attack Iran. Now you're saying no. So how do you change your intervention philosophy? Stick to your frickin' philosophy. What do you believe in? You know what it's almost like, Tom? Here's what it's almost like. Let me tell you what the frustrating part is. It's almost like, one day, "No, no, let's do this." And then he talks to seven people, "Oh, okay, you're right. No, let's do this." And he talks to five people, "No, no, let's do this." No, what do you think as the leaders arrive? Should they intervene or no?

• 1:58:01Patrick Bet-David?

  Have you called yet? Have you called the White House? I hope you have. I hope your team has. I hope they want to talk to you. I hope you want to talk to them. By the way, if Trump gives you a call, you are the luckiest man alive because your reputation is on the line. And this is going to be the closest chance you're ever going to get. Ever. Ever going to get. It's not going to get closer than this. So if you want to help the Iranian people, so all the reputation and rumors that people would say, all you cared about is going to families and raising money, raising money, raising money. And the fact that you've never had a job in your life. You've never ran a job in your life, your entire life. Everyday 3 o'clock games, you know, chess and all this other stuff that you have based on the things I'm hearing from everybody. This is your chance.

• 1:58:47Patrick Bet-David?

  I will be the biggest supporter and fan if you pull this off. I'll go on Twitter, on X, on YouTube telling you, "Respect the man pulled it off." I'll be the one that'll say it. Everywhere. I'll be the one that says it. But I'm very comfortable calling you the Jeb Bush of your family. You. Very comfortable. If you don't pull this off. I love seeing all this virality stuff that's happening with Iran. I love it. I love all this stuff that's happening right now. I hope you are working your ass off. Morning till night. I hope you're a diplomat, calling people. Learn from Trump that he has relationship with his friends, his allies, his enemies. He talks to everybody.

• 1:59:31Patrick Bet-David?

  He talks to everybody. And he moves on very quickly. Because that's what the Iranian people need. But something tells me you're you're kind of like, "Well, let me tell you who I am. Do you know who I am? You are..." and all the people around you. Shomoh, shohan, shohi.

• 1:59:46Patrick Bet-David?

  They can't talk to you like that. You are the crown prince. You're not. You are currently Reza Pahlavi. If you close the deal, I will call you, whatever it is. If you do. Till then, I'm Reza Pahlavi. That's your fight. I am so curious to see your fight. All the criticism and the shots that you're coming, I had no idea how disrespectful some of the people on your side are. Wow. The threats on your side are. I had no idea some of the people that were reaching out to me were some very interesting organizations that were reaching out to me. I didn't know that. But um. We're gonna keep making our noise here, our voice here. Because my number one priority is the Iranian people.

• 2:00:32Patrick Bet-David?

  Not a son of a father who was a king, whose grandfather was a king. Who shows up every time these types of things happen and gets eyeballs and disappears again, comes back up again. My number one priority isn't that person. It's Iran. But if you do pull it off, I will give you all the respect, the glory. Whatever small respect and glory you can get from our audience and the people that we have. I have no problem being right or wrong here. Priority is Iran. Hopefully you'll pull it off. We'll be watching you. Very, very closely and we're rooting for you. Because Iranian people deserve it. They've been waiting for forty seven years. And the name that's always been said is forty seven years. Do you know in America when you run for president, how many years it is? Four years.

• 2:01:17Patrick Bet-David?

  Two terms, eight years. You campaigned for eighteen months. You've been campaigning for forty seven years. There may have never been any candidate in the history of mankind that's been running to be the leader of their country for forty seven years and has disappointed its people every year. You. But if you go and win, salute. I'd be the first person to say it. You get all my respect if you pull it off. And I hope I'm wrong. But we will see. We are rooting for the Iranian people. And anything the Iranian people need, I am more than happy to help. But at the same time, it has to come with a leader that's willing to do the right thing. I hope he does.

• 2:01:58Patrick Bet-David?

  And if President Trump calls you, pick up the call. If he doesn't, you call them. You go to them. Go knock on their doors. Hey, I'd like to be able to help, but let's see what happens next. God willing, he has a sequencing in place. Uh, and he's able to pull it off and help these guys out. Okay. Rob, what story do we have left? Is there any other story that's left outside of this for us to um, go to? I think we did a lot of these on the addendum. Is there anything else I got here? No. Uh, there's manufacturing boom? No, no. Tom, is there anything that we have to hit? I don't think so. I think everything else has been hit.

• 2:02:36Tom Ellsworth?

  I thi- I think that's a great wrap. Uh, the people, uh, to, to, to finish up, starting this year, looking at people who just want freedom. They just want their country back. And they're crying out for a synergist to come to the fore and to, to, to make that happen for them. And along the way, people are kinda screwing around. Um, and I, I, I'm glad to see, I'm proud of my president saying, "These people are speaking. They want their country back, and I'm gonna back them up. Don't slaughter these people." I love that by Trump.

• 2:03:04Patrick Bet-David?

  Yeah, and that's called intervention. That's called intervention. That's called, if you mess with the Iranian people, America's not gonna be happy about it. That's called intervention. So either you want that, or you don't want that. Because obviously Khamenei is not afraid of Reza Pahlavi's threats. "You better not mess with my people." Khamenei's like, "What the hell you gonna do?"

• 2:03:25Tom Ellsworth?

  While he's picking carpet color for his new, uh, his, his, his, his, his French chateau where he can go hide, or his, you know, um, you know, Russia is gonna give him some things he can hide. He's gone. I mean, he's, it's about to fall. I mean, I'm not, I'm not saying absolute, but it sure looks like it's about to fall. It looks like Russia's gonna give him a place to stay, and that opens a door for the people to, to, to get leadership and a, and a government to have their country.

• 2:03:53Patrick Bet-David?

  Yeah. Okay, gang, another great podcast, Wednesday. Really enjoyed it. And, uh, Rob, uh, what's the next one? Home Team Friday?

• 2:04:03Tom Ellsworth?

  Yes, sir.

• 2:04:03Patrick Bet-David?

  Is what we got. We'll be together on Friday. And guys, again, Jeff Snider, Euro Dollar University. If you like, listen to him as much as we do, his insight, go to Euro Dollar University and, uh, subscribe to his channel, support his work. Jeff, great to have you on again. Tom Brandon, God bless everybody. We'll do it again on Friday. Take care. Bye bye.