Hour 1 - Between Iran and a Hard Place

0:00This is an iHeart podcast. Guaranteed Human. Welcome in everybody to the Tuesday edition of the Clay Travis and Buck Sexton Show. Much to discuss with all of you. We have of course the deadline of eight eastern time tonight for Iran. They either concede to the Trump administration demands or Trump will unleash hell. In fact, what he has said more specifically is he is going to go after them in a very big way, including civilian infrastructure, things like power. So he is turning up the heat considerably for the regime to open the straight and concede to demands about the nuclear program. We will discuss that of course today, get into some of those details. JD Vance in Hungary. Place that has gotten a lot of attention in conservative circles for years now because it is a country under the Orban government at least that had taken on some particularly social conservative policies in the past.

1:11We will have some highlights of what JD said there. And we have also got some updates on the Artemis II program talking about the spaceship. We call it a shuttle. I guess a ship. It is both really. Yeah, either one works. It is a ship. It is not a UFO. It is a spaceship. It is a shuttle. That works. We will talk about Artemis II, what that means, and the future of space exploration and space. Commercialization. But something that I just wanted to throw into the mix yesterday. Trump revealed it. We didn't get to this. This is cut six. Play. Before we talk about where this is all going with Iran, I feel like the whole world in a sense is waiting to see what happens with this negotiation. There is a big red line that Trump has drawn here. But in advance of that, something we didn't get to yesterday. We wanted to cut six. Trump said that Kim Jong-un had a very particular word that he used for Joe Biden.

2:11This is cut six. Listen to this. To protect them from North Korea, we have 45,000 soldiers in South Korea to protect us from Kim Jong-un, who I get along with very well as you know. You notice he said, very nice things about me. He used to call Joe Biden a mentally retarded person. Don't tell me about your stuff. Joe Biden said he's a mentally retarded person. He was so nasty to Joe Biden. It was terrible. But to me, he likes Trump. And you notice how nice things are with North Korea. Very nice. Clay, so put aside what one thinks of Kim Jong-un saying this about Biden. I would say this, most people that I speak to and that I see weighing in on this Iran war, they really are just, their faith is in Trump to bring it across the finish line. And this thing before, there's a lot of downside that we feel in this country and our allies feel a lot more than what we've already witnessed for sure.

3:14And it's worth noting that Joe Biden was the commander-in-chief at least technically for four years. Somebody not of sound mind and completely incapable and not even intelligent particularly at all before his dementia set in. So I think this is one way of saying you can trust in Trump on this one and see how he brings this thing through. Yeah, look, first of all, I didn't think they would have the goal anyone to say, oh, we've got a 25th amendment him now. After for four years, they've let Joe Biden bumble and stumble his way around and we're even willing to accede to his ability to run for re-election, which is even crazier. Look, Trump is bombastic. He is often outrageous in many of his public pronouncements on social media. I thought we were past the point buck of people losing their minds over Trump's social media posts, but evidently we are not.

4:16And so he threatened and has set an 8 p.m. deadline. And as part of that deadline, he is basically threatened to in the civilization of Iran. This is what I was looking for. Trump warns Iran, quote, whole civilization will die. And quote, if deadline not met, that's pretty intense. That's intense, but it's also very Trumpian. And so, look, Trump is going to, I believe, take this aggressively in the up to and including potentially extending this deadline. We will see. I think we are going to get some form of resolution sooner rather than later, because I think Trump has decided that he is in favor of getting the straight of Hormuz open and believes that he can negotiate with the existence. I think that's where his game plan is. And he is trying to in the meantime extract the maximum amount of negotiating leverage that he can.

5:21And he knows that all of the Iranians monitor every single thing that he says on social media. And that's what this story is. So I just sometimes buck and befuddled. I would understand if this were still 2016 and Trump had only been a political figure for a year. And people were still trying to grapple and figure out exactly what the, what the intent of these messages is. But the intent is quite clear. It is that he is going to try to get maximum negotiation leverage. The argument I think you can make against this is not that Trump is going to suddenly start nuclear war or something like that. It's that by making all of these outlandish threats that he actually doesn't gain that much negotiating leverage or as much as he thinks he does because he's been doing it for a decade now, that's to me the counter. I don't, I don't see Iran bending the knee right now over this. I just don't see it happening. That's just my prediction. I could be wrong.

6:30They've gotten at some point. I think the regime feels like, well, what do we have left to lose? And I think the answer is they aren't there. They think that they are in a backed into a corner and do anything they can now to and they'll suffer through anything. They had already rejected yesterday a temporary ceasefire that was offered if they would just open the straight of hormones. And the Iranians claim this has been in every analysis whether you're writing a grad school paper or you're in the most deep dark bowels of the Pentagon strategy files. Everyone knows the straight of hormones is a strategic choke point for global oil. And that's just that's what Iran has been really holding over the world for a long time, more than anything else, more even I think in some ways than the threat of a nuclear program. Because it's all we know they can do this and we know that this is something that can start to have major economic impact. So Iran said no to that.

7:36And now the the Iranian regime to the degree that we can get inside into this state of the negotiations. They want a permanent ceasefire. They want full sanctions relief and they are not willing to make any nuclear or other concessions. So Iranians are taking a pretty hard line negotiating posture in at this point in response to where we are. You know hitting critical infrastructure is that is where Trump goes with this when he said like we're going to what is it just you know annihilate your civilization or something like that. Can actually backfire on you a bit because they're then the people of Iran start to say well hold on a second why are we all being punished they know it's not us. That's a consideration that I know that Trump and the team have but it's a it's a big one to work through. Yeah look I mean the quote is a whole civilization will die tonight which is so cinematic and and apocalyptic I read that as I will kill a lot of the Iranian leaders and you should be aware that your civilization is going to cease to exist meaning the way that you run Iran is going to cease to exist.

8:54Regardless the goal is to terrify people in Iran that are still in power that if they are in any way. Recalcitrant when it comes to negotiating with president Trump that there will be consequences. And look what do we say Buck a couple of weeks ago to me the off ramp here is the challenging part. I don't think there's any doubt that we have severely curtailed and diminished Iran's ability to in any way inflict harm upon anyone in the Middle East or around the world. I think you would have to be a moron to argue against that. So the question is to what extent is there an off ramp here where Trump can claim hey we have reached a resolution we've reached a cinematic conclusion in a way that he is able to declare victory and walk away to that to me that is the question of what is what is that off ramp.

9:58What what to him is a victory that he can claim the straight of war moves being reopened obviously is a very tangible one the price of oil and gas would drop overnight probably $30. And get us back down close to where we were before this all started so I don't know that Iran to your point is willing to give that at this point. So what kind of negotiating victory is out there on the table that the president can take by the way Trump is very good at going out and claiming victory even when it's not necessarily a transcendent victory right. So I think there are probably off ramps that Trump can take that would allow him to say we have chained our objectives now it's time to ramp down everything that's been going on in Iran. Well what he really wants is this straight to reopen which has been made clear by his true social posts and everybody can see that and that's because of the economic impact on the global oil markets which has an enormous possibility at least of affecting domestic politics here at home in an election year.

11:08Because remember the price shock can be a little delayed from all of this to I know we're seeing prices rise already but it could be there are things like Amazon I think is even raising its prices on some vendors because of the increase in oil right for yes doing fulfillment for them and products 50% of oil globally something like 50% is not used to go into vehicles and for transport it's actually used in products. So a lot of things that you buy are petroleum based products and those prices over time will also rise from all this so this is this is about Iran trying to use economic pain as its leverage to get Trump to back off and Trump just continuing to pound the Iranian military and let's be honest the Iranian infrastructure now. If that's what he does tonight and say have you had enough have you had enough punishment I'm not sure that the answer that clay is going to be yes yeah these people are wacko I mean the ones calling the shots here they're there I know we've said always taking out so much of their leadership yeah but even the second wrong of leadership there it's not good.

12:26Well they're kind of in a tough spot right because if you are too concilatory with the United States at this point you might get killed in Iran right so yeah talk about between a rock in a hard place if you're too aggressive with the US we take you out if you're too concilitary with the US then Iran takes you out so you want to talk about the delicate dance that Iranian leadership that is trying to govern this country has to follow right now that is quite difficult I think I think right now. Now the if there's an 11th hour deal which we are we are now less than eight hours away from the deadline hitting here if there's an 11 hour 11th hour deal clay I think it will be Iran has agreed to a temporary ceasefire and the opening of the straight with nuclear negotiations and other concessions to follow. And that would be what it looks it will not be an ad they will not do an abject surrender but if they give trump the straight of our moves that will be enough to avoid the end of their civilization strike that is supposed to come tonight yeah I would also say the straight of our moves can be a trust but verify situation that's very easy to test if Iran says the straight of our moves is open now we're going to allow transit and it doesn't occur then you have a pretty good sign that you been lied to.

13:45That there is an easy test scenario now the challenge is you have to convince some of the ship owners that have loaded up their ships with oil I mean buck would you want to be on one of those ships right now would you want to be in the straight of our moves on a completely. Like it would be a very very large personal check to me to get me to go ride by be a little hard to sleep if you're on the in the straight of our moves also being on an oil tanker that got that gets hit by a missile would be really that's a really bad place to be no even if it you know even if it's not like immediate catastrophic damage which I could be you wouldn't want to have that situation that's for sure all right here's a question an important how many insurance brokers does it take to ensure your business if you're like most business owners out there the answer is way too many multiple policies so many applications and here's the thing no clear view of how it all fits together and when there are questions where do you go to get clarity who can answer those questions well this is where shoot super shore comes in super shore changes all that there's one broker for all your business insurance back by a team that works with you year round and not just at renewal time.

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16:10Welcome back in clay Travis bucks sexton show let me tell you guys something by the way Georgia 14th congressional special election is two day north Georgia we had both the Democrat and the Republican on clay fuller is the Republican I would encourage you to vote for the man named clay. And and that election and I understand some of you are just like when are these elections going to end is it feel like we've been have like special elections forever you said I voted in 2024 and then this is Marjorie Taylor greens congressional seat that she abandoned and clay fuller is running as the Republican to take it back and this is for a relatively short term buck what are we talking about April. Until November and then in November this all of this seat will be back on the ballot so Democrats tend to be more energized more excited no matter what year it is to show up for special elections they always do the media always treats the special elections as a substantial referendum buck they typically are not but north of Georgia.

17:26We would like for you to go out and vote today even though it's sometimes frustrating to feel how you have perpetual election season you want to know how the Democrats are doing they're having a they're having a rough one their numbers aren't good and so they need to get their base fired up and so clay they're going to the they're going to the greatest hits we have a Democrat member of Congress calling for 25th amendmenting Donald Trump over the Iran war we'll discuss this that's where they are again. Pretty soon they're going to say that Russia is coming yeah you're going to Russia made Donald Trump in you know attack Iran it's Russia collusion some cyber scammers like to impersonate the IRS this time here before April 15th it is their opportunity to call you and tell you you owe back taxes and need to pay up before it's too late how do they get your number info in the first place comes from a data breach of one kind or another I don't need to tell you but the IRS does not make such phone calls it's important to understand our cybercrime and identity theft are affecting our lives lots of places can actually expose your information that's why life lock monitors millions of data points a second for risk to your identity

18:33life lock detects and alerts you to potential identity threats you may not spot on your own like cyber criminals pretending to be you and if you do become a victim of identity theft a dedicated US based restoration specialist at life lock will fix it guaranteed or your money back it's easy to help protect yourself with life lock join now and save 40% off your first year with my name Buck as your promo code call one eight hundred life lock or go online to life lock com use promo code buck for 40% off terms apply welcome back into play and buck so we got the big deadline tonight this is heavy stuff everybody we have blown up thousands and thousands of targets inside of your Ron have completely taken out their main their navy their air defense who knows how many ground unit targets we've hit i mean the Pentagon does but it's a lot

19:35I believe they use some Chinese made essentially shoulder fight man pads man pad I know a lot of your military you know better than I do but for anyone else man portable air defense system with a little shoulder fired rocket think a little bit like the Stinger missiles from Charlie Wilson's war made them really famous I think they took down one of our planes with a man pad so there's a lot of those that they've deployed as a additional tier of air defense but that's that's not what we were initially worried about you're initially it would have been things like the Russian with the S 300 S 500 surface to air missile systems those are those are all gone basically we've taken all those out we have total air dominance and get hit whatever targets including this is where it play it has been additionally impressive fearsome and impressive which is the ability to find and take out their human you know senior human targets you know taking people off the battlefield here who are in

20:38the military chain of command the political chain of command there due to do so seemingly at will certainly in the early days of the conflict I mean that initial strike which really just decapitated the Iranian regimes senior leadership and in one fell swoop was an incredible hit and so all that's gone on but but now what is the huge question we have this deadline looming and democrats are already smelling blood in the water on this whole thing politically they they they just want Trump gone and I want to say this clay we're going to talk about this a lot so I don't want to divert this but if you want to weigh on this too of course by all means man guys when the democrats get any power back you're it's going they're going to go completely insane just be prepared I just want you to be prepared for that now maybe it's in terms maybe it's not maybe it's the 28 election may but whenever you have democrats that have some real power again good lord they are going to be insane and and they're going to settle scores and they're going to be vicious so just we all need to get prepared for that reality right I mean I think we're we're

21:43going to be if you think that that Trump has been aggressive on his critics and by the way hardly anything's happened to any of them democrats don't make threats they actually take action they were willing to just talk to all the non violent j6 people yes yes I mean they they put thousands of people in prison for what was the total number I mean like over a thousand j6ers went to prison didn't they yeah and some of them were kept in solitary confinement for years years we used to have Julie Kelly on talk about this all the time who is a Trump critic that has had anything at all other than better media access like every time Trump comes after anybody they make more money and they get they become like a superstar on the left I mean Jimmy Kimmel

22:43the dog women I mean nothing happens any of these guys I I support I support the Trump 24 agenda with with everything I got it so does play and he really every it was so what was needed in the moment and such an enormous political win but now we're in it my friends now we're in the game so to speak and it's not a game it's deadly serious but we're in the midst of the execution phase of the Trump agenda and there's been some really good stuff but you know don't make Kristi know I'm head of dhs and don't make pan bondy the head of the department of justice okay people are asking me I get this all the time when are the you know the so-and-so prosecution's going to start you know when when there's there going to be accountability for filling something and I say that's a DOJ issue I you know I'm not the attorney general I think I probably would have been a better attorney general than pan bondy but put that aside I'm not the attorney and I have had a lot of agree I'm not the attorney general clay neither are you this is this is why

23:46personnel is policy this is why really matters you have in charge now I do have a lot of faith in marker rubio and events I think have have bolstered and supported that I do have a lot of faith in in Pete Hegg Seth and some of the the other senior members of the Trump team that are trying to figure out not just national security broadly but this issue of Iran and what's going on here uh and we judge them by results though and we have to see what happens with this red line on the other side of things these democrats you got rocona I wanted it just I'm going to play you can react to this rocona says it's time this and this is what I meant about the the the lunacy of democrats when they're back in power it's just going to be everything we've seen before rocona says 25th amendment time for Donald Trump because of iran play 32 if the united states congress has any life left in it every member of congress and senator must be calling for crumbs removal today based on the 25th amendment he's threatening the entire destruction of a civilization

24:47he is calling iranians animals he is showing a total disregard for the humanity of people in Iran and gaza in Cuba this is a moral crime it is a war crime we need to be demanding that congress convene today and we need to be invoking the 25th amendment real clay on the one hand on the one hand yes crazy talk and they're not going to invoke the 25th amendment is on the other hand democrats are going to bring war crime prosecutions against people in this administration I really do believe that I think they're going to if they can if they if they have the if they can you know run the club they can't run the clock out before it I think that they'll go after people I went off on this on jesse water show last night um I'm sorry anyone I really thought buck that there would be too much shame to go 25th amendment again they went 25th amendment in the first term for Trump then Joe Biden was an actual uh dementia patient for four years we called it the

25:49weekend dead bernie's presidency and they tried to run weekend dead bernie's two and if you were in the democrat party and I think there was only one guy right the Minnesota congressman that everybody forgot that ran for president against him and had the rally that nobody showed up for a new hamster that was like which made us talk about it because we felt bad for him and I've already forgotten that guy's name he was the only democrat who said Joe Biden isn't up for being president of the United States rocona didn't come out and say hey we've got a 25th amendment uh Joe Biden which probably in any of the lives of people listening today is the only time when the 25th amendment has really been justified Trump just did an hour and 15 minute press conference yesterday answering questions from everybody under the sun now you may not agree with him that this is what I was going to ask you buck uh so the any democrat who mentions the 25th amendment for Trump I just immediately toss on the dumpster fire of stupidity and say I can't take anything you say

26:55seriously because you covered up for Joe Biden Dean Phillips wow there's a throwback for you that dean if dean Phillips wants to call for Trump to be 25th amendment did I would not agree with him but I would at least say you know what you called out Joe Biden and said he wasn't up for the job and now you're calling out Trump at least there's some consistency there buck other than we've now got what six and we've got 10 full years of Trump as a political figure 10 years plus and we've got now going on six years of him in office other than other than what like the immediate aftermath of covid coming right March we're going to have the whatever hit number of days to stop the spread and Trump eventually righted that wrong can you think of anything that Trump has done that has been truly consequentially wrong for the country I mean as an executive making choices

27:56might I'm not saying you agree with everything that he did but you go back most people would go back now and say hey the Iraq war was a mistake George W Bush we shouldn't have spent trillions of dollars on that I think almost everybody would have other than the immediate response to covid back in March of 2020 in nearly six years is there anything you can point to and say you know you might not like a higher but that Trump a hundred percent got wrong other than early covid I can't on policy not only has he been concerned on important policy not only has Trump in consistently right and proven right by events he's been right even when he has gone and maybe more so than ever when he has gone against GOP orthodoxy like on the trade issue yes for example that's so that's a perfect I think you know or on renegade well this is tied into trade but renegotiating NAFTA which a lot of Republicans I can't do that I'm just gonna know he was right he was right and they were wrong oh you can't agitate China no he was right and they were wrong so on those things Trump's biggest

29:00mistakes I think have been and he admits this so anyone who's like don't you dare no Trump knows this his biggest mistakes term one were personnel related and his personnel have gotten a lot better but I think because of the four prosecutions that he faced and all the people who really turned on him loyalty was even more elevated in his mind as necessary for his agenda in the second term and and some of that I think unfortunately was not lined up with a key competence at the highest level in a cut and he this is why he's removing people I by the way I completely disagree with anyone who's saying oh I mean well no one's really saying that about the hs anymore that's a sad that's actually a sad situation with no the sad situation and you know my my feelings about gnomes public life or or known Devon on the show you know some of us see things before they happen but that's okay but I actually feel badly now because the personal dynamic and everything else pambondi I think from I don't know her seems just like a lovely person and a patriot and great

30:03I just think you needed a pitbull at the top of DOJ you needed a pitbull you know she's like she's like a lovely like a lovely golden retriever I love golden retrievers I just want to go the retriever running DOJ I think that's well said I would just add this on the bondy front you can have a golden retriever as the front facing object of the of the administration to me for the DOJ for instance but you have to be the best damn communicator on the planet and she wasn't good at that right and then you have pit bulls underneath that are actually the number two wags you need a wags yes and so but she wasn't even a good communicator that was what was super frustrating to me about her tenure with the DOJ she created a lot of messes and look I mean you got to break a lot of things inside of the DOJ yeah and you needed to be willing to mobilize quickly and handle these

31:07things efficiently getting it right but getting it right last or getting it right too late not good enough in this well guys it's April we're running out of time here's the other thing about lawyers and I say this as a lawyer they may have political opinions but they're all cash in big checks and really it's one big club I mean they're making thousands of dollars an hour and you might ostensibly be a republican and you might ostensibly be a democrat but there's a lot of cross pollination there and both sides are getting really rich this is where strump got the swamp right and I don't think this is my opinion as a lawyer I don't think there are very many lawyers that actually really want to draw too much attention to themselves they want to be able to go across both party lines because they don't know who's going to be president four years in Washington is the snap of a fingers and some of you recognize this now the older you get I mean buck this is where I you know you make fun of kings and everything else but I would argue one of the biggest challenges

32:12we have in this country is eight years it's hard to fix a lot even if you have a truly excellent president eight years passes in the blink of an eye seems like a long time when you're a kid seems like a long time when you're a teenager you get into your 30s 40s and 50s and beyond eight years like you look over your shoulder in the time is passed and I think one of the things Trump is trying to do is he recognizes how little time he has left in office and he's trying to fix everything whether it's the structure of the White House or who's in charge in Iran Venezuelan Cuba if anything his sin is overreach trying to fix so much because he's concerned that we're going to get another Joe Biden like figure back in the White House at some point in the future and he's trying to go ahead and correct all the issues that he saw from Biden but that he knows they're going to follow him inevitably that's that's what I think I think it's overreach trying to fix too much at once if you want to criticize Trump born on America's darkest day of 9-11 the tunnel

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34:16welcome back in play Travis bucks x ten show haulers 800 to a two to a two I will get to you at the top of the next hour so if you are listening to us right now I can see the topics good questions from Utah from Ohio from Florida among others we will get to those when we come back at the top of the next hour so hang with me and I will go to you at the top of the next hour in the meantime uh one of our listeners in salt lake city he's got a question um that a lot of people have been asking and I wanted to play it for you cut D listen how come Trump don't just take over the street and the oil supply as well he talked about it a long time ago with that interview with Barbara long long birds or whatnot and uh he said he just take the oil later than he just take take it take it over okay this is a question I bet you have gotten quite a lot to buck the biggest issue with the straight-of-war moves and with having uh ships that are

35:20helping to provide uh security it only takes a drone or someone with a rocket launcher someone with I mean one individual can blow up an oil tanker uh potentially and even if you have great security it's hard to stop one person who could launch a drone or a rocket launcher or something of that nature or or you could just fill a a you know small motorboat yes with basically the USS coal routine uh where you fill a small boat with as much dumb dumb explosive as you possibly can and then you just have the guy go full lahu Akbar pull the pin on the grenade and kaboom so yeah it's not hard to do so I think the answer is that the concept of providing 100% security to tankers is more difficult than it might sound now in order to take over oil and gas production in Iran we would have to take card island we would have to put boots on the ground and we have to

36:25invade it's called an invasion other than uh the saving of the uh the the proven who was on the ground we have not yet had any boots on the ground I would mention buck we didn't get a lot of attention but Israel also put boots on the ground to help us rescue the American servicemen uh that is a pre significant gesture on their behalf they put Israeli lives on the line to save an American life it hasn't gotten very much attention but credit to them for that all right lots of questions open phone lines we're coming to you guys next when we return this