Bill O'Reilly uncovers new details about Reagan's presidency in new 'Killing' book

It's always a good time when Glenn and his friend Bill O'Reilly get together. O'Reilly called into Glenn's radio program Monday morning to announce his newest book in his series, called Killing Reagan.

Glenn's first question was obviously about the title, since Reagan wasn't killed, was he?

"Here's the most interesting part of the book," O'Reilly said. "Ronald Reagan gets elected and shortly after is shot and is almost killed. He comes out in a robust way. We all remember. His little bathrobe, standing, making jokes, and everybody breathes a sigh of relief. The president is going to be okay. But he wasn't okay."

O'Reilly went on to explain the detrimental effects, both mental and physical, that the near-killing had on the rest of Reagan's presidency, and how at one point he came extremely close to being removed from office.

"We found out that he was within a whisper of being removed from the presidency and nobody knows that, and the story is so dramatic. And then after he passed the test that they gave him, he made a miraculous comeback mentally because of the Soviet Union," O'Reilly said. "I think is fascinating for anyone who cares about Ronald Reagan."

Glenn agreed.

"There's a lot of great stuff in the book. Including the fact - did you guys know that Ronald Reagan tried to join the Communist Party? He was rejected by the Communist Party," Glenn said.

SPOILER ALERT: "At the end of this one, he doesn't die," Glenn said.

Listen or read the transcript below.

Below is a rush transcript of this segment, it might contain errors.

GLENN: It's always good to have our good friend on our program. Mr. Bill O'Reilly on the show with us. He has a brand-new book called Killing Reagan, which Reagan wasn't killed, but really why be picky on things like that?

PAT: That was a detail. What?

GLENN: Bill, welcome to the program, how are you? Bill, are you there? I'm not hearing Bill O'Reilly.

STU: Oh, my gosh.

PAT: Oh, no.

PAT: You pissed him off.

GLENN: It's Donald Trump.

PAT: He's angry. Yeah.

GLENN: Guys, in New York, can you tell me what's happening with Bill O'Reilly?

PAT: Hmm. If he's on, we're not hearing him. So that's probably a problem.

GLENN: Okay. Well, tell us when you can get -- tell us when you can get Bill O'Reilly.

STU: I guess this means Reagan is alive.

PAT: Yeah.

GLENN: Do you think that this was John Hinckley saying, "Bill, I don't appreciate it. I'm going to take you down too. I'm going to silence your voice."

STU: Because you say that Reagan wasn't killed, but he did die.

GLENN: Yes.

PAT: Yes. But he died of something else.

GLENN: Natural causes.

STU: It was a little later.

GLENN: It's actually a very fascinating book.

STU: I will say, this is the most interested I am in the entire series.

PAT: Oh, really?

STU: Yeah, that's fascinating to me.

GLENN: They've been good books.

PAT: Oh, they've all been really good.

STU: I didn't say that they weren't good.

GLENN: Yes, you did. That's what I heard. That's what Pat heard. That's what America heard.

PAT: I heard it.

STU: I can't deal with your incompetent hearing abilities. What I said was I thought --

PAT: You tell Bill he was incompetent.

GLENN: That's what I heard.

PAT: That's what I heard.

STU: I'm talking to America. You are here. Bill is not.

GLENN: Bill is always --

PAT: Wow. You said this is a problem interview.

STU: That's not what I said.

PAT: Holy cow.

GLENN: Holy cow. Bill, are you there? Okay. Well, we're going to have to reschedule. Phones are broken, apparently. We don't have phones that work.

PAT: Why would you have that?

GLENN: Don't worry. This is only a multi -- you know, tens of millions of dollar show. Why would we have a phone that works?

PAT: Why would you have that?

STU: I don't know. I can't answer that question. If I do, you'll just twist my answer, so I won't attempt it.

PAT: So you don't want to talk to Bill?

STU: No.

GLENN: I heard he wanted to twist the knife.

STU: I didn't say that word.

GLENN: It's amazing. It is absolutely amazing.

JEFFY: Write your own book, Killing O'Reilly. Okay.

STU: Wasn't there a left-winger who did say that actually?

PAT: Yeah, there was. I'm trying to think who it was and can't remember right now.

GLENN: Can we play the football player -- let's play the football player. The audio. Can we play the audio --

PAT: No.

GLENN: Can't play the audio. This is a story out of California that is just infuriating. There is a football player at a high school that is there at a high school, and he sees this other kid just wailing -- just wailing on this blind kid. Now, the blind kid can't even defend himself, he's blind. So he's not seeing the punches coming his way.

PAT: This is crazy.

GLENN: I mean, it's really crazy. It's really crazy. So everybody is standing around doing nothing.

PAT: Filming it.

GLENN: Yeah, doing nothing. And finally this high school football player comes up and he grabs the guy who is wailing on him.

PAT: I think he drilled him. I think he hit him in the head, which he deserved.

GLENN: Did he hit him in the head? I just saw him throw him down.

PAT: I think he did. I think he did.

GLENN: Either way, that's fine. He pulls him back, Pat says hits him on the head, and throws him down to the ground.

Well, he then goes right over to the blind kid and is like, "Are you okay? Are you all right? Here." And he helps him get out of there. Everyone runs around the bully and is helping the bully up.

PAT: Because he got blasted by the football player. And the football player is yelling, "What are you doing? That's a blind kid you're hitting. What are you doing?" In more colorful language than that.

GLENN: Now, who gets expelled?

PAT: The football player.

GLENN: The football player does. This is insane. Absolutely insane. What's wrong with us?

PAT: Well, Glenn, they have a zero tolerance --

GLENN: Yeah, I have a zero tolerance -- zero tolerance for common sense.

PAT: Yeah, that's what all of those policies --

GLENN: We'll get back into that here in a second. You have Bill back on?

STU: In theory, yes.

GLENN: Bill.

BILL: Beck.

GLENN: How are you doing, buddy?

BILL: Good. I'm glad you guys have telephones finally. Telegraphs.

GLENN: Well.

PAT: Thought we'd join the last century.

BILL: Working phones is really getting tough to do, but I'm glad you have a phone now.

GLENN: Yeah, I know. How are things, Bill?

BILL: Busy. Just like you, you know, trying to change the world.

GLENN: Yeah. So Bill, I have to ask you. We're going to get to your book in just a second. I have to ask you, just because it will be fun to hear the answer. I hear Donald Trump is beating your butt and is taking you out to the woodshed every night.

BILL: How exactly is he doing that, Beck?

GLENN: Well, because he has said that he's not going to do you show anymore. And then you immediately countered with, "Oh, no, no. I don't want you on the show."

BILL: No, I didn't say anything to anybody. And he got into kind of a fight with Fox News hierarchy. It didn't have anything to do with me.

GLENN: Well, that's not the story that we heard in the papers. They were saying that -- I want you to know I believe that you --

BILL: Whoa, whoa, in the papers?

GLENN: I believe that you were the one who said, "I'm not going to put up with this nonsense and have you on the show anymore." But there are a lot of people that believe that Donald Trump came out and said that he doesn't want to put up with your nonsense. Which was it?

BILL: Okay. Number one, you're believing the papers. Is that what you're telling me?

GLENN: I'm just saying, Bill. That's just what people are talking about.

BILL: Okay. Number one, I don't have any beef against Trump. Number two, I didn't say anything about Trump to anybody. Number three, he ran into a problem with the Fox News hierarchy because he was bashing people like Krauthammer and Hume and Will, and those -- he didn't like them because they didn't approve of him. So I think that's the genesis of it. But it didn't have anything to do with me directly?

GLENN: Do you know him, Bill, well?

BILL: Yes, I know Trump well.

GLENN: Is his temperament -- can he be president of the United States with that temperament?

BILL: You know, he doesn't like to be criticized. And if you're president, you're criticized every second on the second.

GLENN: Right. Right. I mean, I don't like being criticized. You don't like being criticized. But it comes with the gig.

BILL: Yeah. And I don't know if he's accepted that reality. And I think that's the problem with him. And I think that's why his numbers are going down. And his poll numbers are going down because, if you're going to run for president, you have to be able to overlook stupid stuff.

GLENN: Yeah.

BILL: Now, if he is attacked unfairly, then there's no -- I have no problem with him fighting back. But certainly on my program, he's gotten a fair shot. And we bring on people who like him and don't like him. That's what we do on The O'Reilly Factor. All sides are heard.

GLENN: Go ahead.

BILL: He doesn't like to hear people say that they don't approve of him, and that's the problem.

GLENN: Yeah, he doesn't like me too much. So I cried myself to sleep last night and I moved on.

BILL: Well, who does? Let's be honest. Who likes you? No one.

GLENN: I know. So my wife watched your show last week or the week before --

BILL: Not you. But your wife?

GLENN: No, it's more of a girl show.

BILL: Yeah, it's like The View.

GLENN: Yeah, it's like The View. And she said she had seen Carly Fiorina on and said that you were quite complimentary of her. Which makes me question her immediately. And said that she really held her ground with you. I'm doing a sitdown with her for today for a couple of hours. And interested to hear your -- your thoughts now after the interview with her. Is she the real deal?

BILL: Well, look, I hit her with some real haymakers about her tenure in the private sector --

GLENN: She handled it well.

BILL: -- at Hewlett-Packard. About how she reacted to various criticisms of her. Some policy situations. And she didn't -- she wasn't in a snit or anything like that. She answered the questions in a very logical manner.

GLENN: Like an adult?

BILL: And I complimented her on that.

GLENN: You don't have to tell me who, but do you see the next president yet?

BILL: You know, I don't see the next president yet. I think the Republican field is narrowing quickly. Trump, Carson, Fiorina, Bush, and Rubio look the -- look to be the only candidates right now that have a chance. Although, John Kasich is doing something very interesting. He's only doing New Hampshire. And if he does well there, he thinks he can break out fast into the other states.

GLENN: Yeah, he lives in a fantasy world.

BILL: He had a really good record in Ohio.

GLENN: I didn't know they legalized drugs in Ohio because he must be smoking some --

BILL: No, they haven't.

GLENN: -- if he thinks -- oh, really? Well, then we should have the state police stop by his house because --

BILL: Do you not like him?

GLENN: No, come on. Come on, Bill, for the leave of Pete, John Kasich?

PAT: Come on.

GLENN: No, no, I don't like him.

BILL: He didn't a great job in Ohio, boy.

GLENN: Oh, that is fantastic.

BILL: Did you look at what he did there? Turning that economy around.

GLENN: Love him. Love everything about his little -- bless his little progressive heart. I just love him.

BILL: No, come on. Look, just look at the state when he got there, and look at the state now. Economically, the guy did a great job. Go ahead.

GLENN: All right. I'm less interested in your book now.

(laughter)

BILL: I'll throw some Muslims in it.

GLENN: How come you don't have that? Killing ISIS, something like that.

BILL: Right. You know, if I had known you were writing that Muslim book, I would have put Muslims in the Reagan book.

(laughter)

GLENN: All right. So tell me the most interesting thing in the book. Because actually, I haven't read it. But I've thumbed through it.

BILL: Well, you should read it or have someone read it to you. You have a lot of servants.

GLENN: I would read it. If it was written by anyone else, I would have read it three times by now.

BILL: No, you wouldn't, Beck. No, you wouldn't. Here's the most interesting part of the book. Ronald Reagan gets elected and shortly after is shot and is almost killed. He comes out in a robust way. We all remember. His little bathrobe, standing, making jokes, and everybody breathes a sigh of relief. The president is going to be okay. But he wasn't okay. And the White House was able to keep that from the press and able to keep that from the people. He had his good days and his bad days. And we were taking our research from the people who loved Reagan, not from the snipers on the left. Okay? But the people who worked for him for a long time. People who admired him. On his bad days, he would even come down to the Oval Office and watch soap operas on TV. And on his good days, he was brilliant. But there came a point in the second term where his main advisers, Baker was the chief of staff, if you remember, was so concerned about him, that they had a meeting in the Oval Office. And he came into the meeting. And he didn't know that he was being watched, and if he had not performed well, they were going to try to remove him under the Constitution. And vice president Bush would have taken over the presidency.

PAT: But this had nothing to do with --

GLENN: This had nothing to do with the shooting?

BILL: No, it did. Because the shooting changed his physiology and his psychology. You're shot at that level and you almost die, you get that kind of trauma, you're never the same. Never the same. And because of his age, he -- his recovery time while it seemed on the surface was miraculous, it really wasn't. So that he would be in and he would be out. But I'll tell you why, when we were researching this and we found out that he was within a whisper of being removed from the presidency and nobody knows that, and the story is so dramatic, and then after he passed the test that they gave him, he made a miraculous comeback mentally because of the Soviet Union. And we go through that. And it's all weaved together. But the book I think is fascinating for anyone who cares about Ronald Reagan.

GLENN: I will tell you this, Bill, that I actually do find it fascinating. There's a lot of great stuff in the book. Including the fact -- did you guys know that Ronald Reagan tried to join the Communist Party? He was rejected by the Communist Party. They thought he was a lightweight. It's a fascinating read. Bill, before we go -- I'm sorry to cut this short because of the phone thing. But real quick, your thoughts on the pope. You're a Catholic.

BILL: Yes. I like the pope. I think I understand what he's trying to do. The churches are in trouble. He wants to get more people interested in the church so he takes a holistic point of view that, you know, "Look, we are accepting of sinners. Everyone is welcome. Everyone can come back." At the same time, his job on earth is to administer to the poor. And I don't really think he understands the best way to do that because he was raised in the Argentine economic system which is corrupt. However, overall, the pope is a good man. I think he did the Catholic church a lot of good. Christianity a lot of good.

GLENN: Were you at all disappointed that he did not take on the abortion cause in front of Congress or that he -- he lectured about American Catholic communists or the fact that on Saturday at the United Nations, we're talking about doing a gigantic global program that is a power grab? Are you disappointed in any of those things?

BILL: Well, I think the abortion thing he believes is polarizing, and that if he had gotten into it specifically, he would have lost some ears. Then he made a calculated decision. There's no doubt that the pope and the Catholic church are anti-abortion. And they always will be. And I think he made a calculation. Look, I'll avoid confrontation. And I'll be inclusive as I can. I think that I would have played it differently had I been him.

GLENN: Yeah.

BILL: Nobody is perfect.

GLENN: Hang on, that's news. Bill O'Reilly would have gone for the confrontation.

Bill, God bless you, thank you so much. Keep up the good work.

BILL: All right. Thanks for having me here.

GLENN: All right. Buh-bye. The name of the book is Killing Reagan. Bill O'Reilly. The next in the series. I'll give you a hint, at the end of this one, he doesn't die.

Featured Image: Host Bill O'Reilly appears on 'The O'Reilly Factor' on The FOX News Channel at FOX Studios on March 17, 2015 in New York City. (Photo by Rob Kim/Getty Images)

What do clay pots have to do with to preserving American history?

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Editor's note: This article was originally published on TheBlaze.com.

Why should we preserve our nation’s history? If you listen to my radio program and podcast, or read my columns and books, you know I’ve dedicated a large part of my life and finances to sourcing and preserving priceless artifacts that tell America’s story. I’ve tried to make these artifacts as available as possible through the American Journey Experience Museum, just across from the studios where I do my daily radio broadcast. Thousands of you have come through the museum and have been able to see and experience these artifacts that are a part of your legacy as an American.

The destruction of American texts has already begun.

But why should people like you and me be concerned about preserving these things from our nation's history? Isn’t that what the “big guys” like the National Archives are for?

I first felt a prompting to preserve our nation's history back in 2008, and it all started with clay pots and the Dead Sea Scrolls. In 1946, a Bedouin shepherd in what is now the West Bank threw a rock into a cave nestled into the side of a cliff near the Dead Sea. Instead of hearing an echo, he heard the curious sound of a clay pot shattering. He discovered more than 15,000 Masoretic texts from the third century B.C. to the first century A.D.

These texts weren’t just a priceless historical discovery. They were virtually perfect copies of the same Jewish texts that continue to be translated today. Consider the significance of that discovery. Since the third century B.C. when these texts were first written, the Jewish people have endured a continued onslaught of diasporas, persecutions, pressures to conform to their occupying power, the destruction of their temple, and so much more. They had to fight for their identity as a people for centuries, and finally, a year after the end of the Holocaust and a year before the founding of the nation of Israel, these texts were discovered, confirming the preservation and endurance of their heritage since ancient times — all due to someone putting these clay pots in a desert cave more than 2,000 years ago.

I first felt a prompting to preserve our nation's history back in 2008, and it all started with clay pots and the Dead Sea Scrolls.

So, what do these clay pots have to do with the calling to preserve American history? I didn’t understand that prompting myself until the horrible thought dawned on me that the people we are fighting against may very well take our sacred American scriptures, our Declaration of Independence, and our Bill of Rights. What if they are successful, and 1,000 years from now, we have no texts preserved to confirm our national identity? What kind of new history would be written over the truth?

The destruction of American texts has already begun. The National Archives has labeled some of our critical documents, like our Declaration of Independence, Constitution, and Bill of Rights, as “triggering” or “containing harmful language.” In a public statement, the National Archives said that the labels help prepare readers to view potentially distressing content:

The Catalog and web pages contain some content that may be harmful or difficult to view. NARA’s records span the history of the United States, and it is our charge to preserve and make available these historical records. As a result, some of the materials presented here may reflect outdated, biased, offensive, and possibly violent views and opinions. In addition, some of the materials may relate to violent or graphic events and are preserved for their historical significance.

According to this statement, our founding documents are either “outdated, biased, offensive,” “possibly violent,” or a combination of these scathing descriptions. I’m sorry, the Declaration of Independence is not “triggering.” Our Constitution is not “outdated and biased,” and our Bill of Rights certainly is not “offensive and possibly violent.” They are glorious documents. They should be celebrated, not qualified by such derogatory, absurd language. Shame on them.

These are only the beginning stages of rewriting our history. What if they start banning these “triggering” documents from public view because they might offend somebody? Haven’t we torn down “triggering” statues before? What if we are no longer able to see, read, and study the actual words of our nation's founding documents because they are “harmful” or “possibly violent”? A thousand years from now, will there be any remnant to piece together the true spirit behind the nation that our founders envisioned?

The Declaration of Independence is not “triggering.”

That is why in 2008, I was prompted to preserve what I could. Now, the American Journey Experience Museum includes more than 160,000 artifacts, from founding-era documents to the original Roe v. Wade court papers. We need to preserve the totality of our nation’s heritage, the good, the bad, and the ugly. We need to preserve our history in our own clay pots.

I ask you to join with me on this mission. Start buying books that are important to preserve. Buy some acid-free paper and start printing some of the founding documents, the reports that go against the mainstream narrative, the studies that prove what is true as we are continually being fed lies. Start preserving our daily history as well as our history because it is being rewritten and digitized.

Somebody must have a copy of what is happening now and what has happened in the past. I hope things don’t get really bad. But if they do, we need to preserve our heritage. Perhaps, someone 1,000 years from now will discover our clay pots and, Lord willing, be able to have a glimpse of America as it truly was.

Top 10 WORST items in the new $1.2 TRILLION spending bill

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Biden just signed the newest spending bill into law, and Glenn is furious.

Under Speaker Johnson's leadership, the whopping $1.2 TRILLION package will use your taxpayer dollars to fund the government through September. Of course, the bill is loaded with earmarks and pork that diverts money to fund all sorts of absurd side projects.

Here is the list of the ten WORST uses of taxpayer money in the recently passed spending bill:

Funding venues to host drag shows, including ones that target children

David McNew / Contributor | Getty Images

Money for transgender underwear for kids

Funding for proms for 12 to 18 year old kids

Bethany Clarke / Stringer | Getty Images

Border security funding... for Jordan and Egypt

Another $300 million for Ukraine

Anadolu / Contributor | Getty Images

$3.5 million for Detroit's annual Thanksgiving Day parade

Icon Sportswire / Contributor | Getty Images

$2.5 million for a new kayaking facility in Franklin, New Hampshire

Acey Harper / Contributor | Getty Images

$2.7 million for a bike park in White Sulfur Springs, West Virginia, a town with a population of less than 2,300 people

$5 million for a new trail at Coastal Carolina University

$4 million the "Alaska King Crab Enhancement Project" (whatever that means)

FRED TANNEAU / Stringer | Getty Images

There is no doubt about it—we are entering dark times.

The November presidential election is only a few months away, and following the chaos of the 2020 election, the American people are bracing for what is likely to be another tumultuous election year. The left's anti-Trump rhetoric is reaching an all-time high with the most recent "Bloodbath" debacle proving how far the media will go to smear the former president. That's not to mention the Democrats' nearly four-year-long authoritarian attempt to jail President Trump or stop his re-election by any means necessary, even if it flies in the face of the Constitution.

Meanwhile, Biden is doing worse than ever. He reportedly threw a tantrum recently after being informed that his polls have reached an all-time low. After Special Counsel Robert Hur's report expressed concerns over Biden's obviously failing mental agility, it's getting harder for the Democrats to defend him. Yet he is still the Democratic nominee for November, promising another 4 years of catastrophic policies, from the border to heavy-handed taxation, should he be reelected.

The rest of the world isn't doing much better. The war in Ukraine has no clear end in sight, drawing NATO and Russia closer and closer to conflict. The war in Gaza is showing no sign of slowing down, and as Glenn revealed recently, its continuation may be a sign that the end times are near.

One thing is clear: we are living in uncertain times. If you and your family haven't prepared for the worst, now is the time. You can start by downloading "Glenn's Ultimate Guide to Getting Prepared." Be sure to print off a copy or two. If the recent cell outage proved anything, it's that technology is unreliable in survival situations. You can check your list of supplies against our "Ultimate Prepper Checklist for Beginners," which you can find below:

Food

  • Canned food/non-perishable foods
  • Food preparation tools
  • Go to the next level: garden/livestock/food production

Water

  • Non-perishable water store
  • Water purification
  • Independent water source

Shelter

  • Fireplace with a wood supply
  • Tent
  • Generator with fuel supply
  • Go to the next level: fallout shelter

Money

  • Emergency cash savings
  • Precious metals

Medicine

  • Extra blankets
  • Basic first aid
  • Extra prescriptions
  • Extra glasses
  • Toiletries store
  • Trauma kit
  • Antibiotics
  • Basic surgery supplies
  • Potassium Iodate tablets

Transportation

  • Bicycle
  • Car
  • Extra fuel

Information

  • Birth certificates
  • Insurance cards
  • Marriage license
  • Immunization records
  • Mortgage paperwork
  • Car title and registration
  • House keys, car keys
  • Passports
  • Family emergency plan
  • Prepping/survival/repair manuals
  • Go to the next level: copy of the Bible, the U.S. Constitution, and other important books/sources

Skills

  • Cooking
  • Gardening
  • Sewing
  • First Aid
  • Basic maintenance skills
  • Go to the next level: farming/ranching
  • Self-defense training

Communication

  • Family contact information and addresses
  • HAM radio

Miscellaneous

  • Flashlights and batteries
  • Lamps and fuel
  • Hardware (tools, nails, lumber, etc)
  • Extra clothes
  • Extreme weather clothes and gear
  • Gas masks and filters
  • Spare parts for any machinery/equipment

Is Trump's prosecution NORMAL?  This COMPLETE list of ALL Western leaders who served jail time proves otherwise.

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Mainstream media is on a crusade to normalize Donald Trump's indictments as if it's on par with the electoral course. Glenn asked his team to research every instance of a Western leader who was jailed during their political career over the past 200 years—except extreme political turmoil like the French Revolution, Napoleonic Wars, Irish Revolution, etc.—and what we discovered was quite the opposite.

Imprisoning a leader or major political opponent is not normal, neither in the U.S. nor in the Western world. Within the last 200 years, there are only a handful of examples of leaders in the West serving jail time, and these men were not imprisoned under normal conditions. All of these men were jailed under extreme circumstances during times of great peril such as the Civil War, World War II, and the Cold War.

What does this mean for America? Are Trump's indictments evidence that we are re-entering times of great peril? Below is a list of Western leaders who were imprisoned within the last 200 years. Take a look and decide for yourself:

Late 1800s

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Jefferson Davis: The nearest occurrence to a U.S. President to serve jail time was in the case of Jefferson Davis, the first and only president of the Confederate States of America. Jefferson was captured in Georgia by Northern Soldiers in 1865 and locked up in Fort Monroe, Virginia for two years. He was offered a presidential pardon but refused out of his loyalty to the confederacy.

Early 1900s

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Eugene V. Debs: Debbs, a Midwestern socialist leader, became the first person to run for president in prison. He was locked up at a federal penitentiary in Atlanta having been convicted under the federal Sedition Act for giving an antiwar speech a few months before Armistice Day, the end of World War I. Many of his supporters believed his imprisonment to be unjust. Debs received 897,704 votes and was a distant third-part candidate behind Warren G. Harding, the Republican winner, and James M. Cox, the second-place Democrat. Harding ordered Debs’s release from prison toward the end of 1921.

Nazi sympathizers and collaborators: After the end of World War II in 1945, several European leaders who had "led" their countries during the Nazi occupation faced trial and imprisonment for treason. This list included Chief of the French State Philippe Pétain, French Prime Minister Pierre Laval, and Minister-President of Norway Vidkun Quisling. The latter two were also executed after their imprisonment. President of Finland Risto Ryti and Prime Minister of Finland Johan Wilhelm Rangell were also tried and jailed for collaborating with the Nazis against the Allied Powers.

Late 1900s

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The end of the Cold War: The fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 was one of the pivotal moments that brought the Cold War to a close and marked the end of Communist East Germany. With the fall of the wall and the collapse of the German Democratic Republic (East Germany), the former leaders were brought to trial to answer for the crimes committed by the GDR. General Secretary Erich Honecker and General Secretary Egon Krenz were both put on trial for abuse of power and the deaths of those who were shot trying to flee into West Germany. Honecker was charged with jail time but was released from custody due to severe illness and lived out the rest of his life as an exile in Chile. Krenz served 4 years in jail before his release in 2001. He is one of the last surviving leaders of the Eastern Bloc.

Lyndon LaRouche: Larouche was a Trotsky evangelist, public antisemite, and founder of a nationwide Marxist political movement, became the second person in U.S. history to run for President in a prison cell. Granted, he ran in every election from 1976 to 2004 as a long-shot third-party candidate. When he tried to gain the Democratic presidential nomination, he received 5 percent of the total nationwide vote. Even though in 2000 he received enough primary votes to qualify for delegates in a few states, the Democratic National Committee refused to seat his delegates and barred LaRouche from attending the Democratic National Convention.