Michele Bachmann: Don't forget about the immigration bill

Congresswoman Michele Bachmann (R-MN) spoke with Stu and Pat on radio this morning, and she warned that the immigration bill is still being pushed through behind-the-scenes even though no one is paying attention to it right now. Rep. Bachmann warns that a flowery sounding bill will ultimately be presented, but she advised that no matter what is put forth it should be voted against.

Read a full transcript of the interview below:

PAT: Congresswoman Michele Bachmann joins us today. There's the debate still going on, and we forget about this sometimes because other things come up in our lives and we forget that the Senate has passed an immigration reform bill that is nightmarish and then, you know, so we let our guard down and then pretty soon you know it's coming up in the House and so we thought we'd check in with her and see where that stands right now. And earlier this week Congressman Bachmann congresswoman Bachmann, you spoke on the house floor and your one of your main points was seal the border first, then we'll work on amnesty afterward, which seems so incredibly reasonable to almost all Americans and yet it's not being considered. How did that go over? Where does all this stand right now?

CONGRESSWOMAN BACHMANN: Well, Pat and Stu, thanks for having me on because we really are at the crucial hour right now. It seems that some sort of a weird tack has been made between the ruling class and D.C. That's both Republican and Democrat. And it seems like they've made a decision that this is it. Everyone is going to help Obama achieve his number one political agenda item, which is to bring in tens of millions of new voters to support his agenda. Why in the world any self respecting Republican would want to get behind this effort is beyond me, but it seems like this is what they want to do. Their first worry is not border security. The Senate bill was a fake border security bill. We were betrayed and lied to by the Republicans in the Senate. So we don't have a border security bill. And the way that you pass a bill is you've got to get a bill through the Senate, a bill through the House and on the president's desk. Well, two out of the three are effectively done. We know that the president will sign a bill that has amnesty in it. The Senate already passed it. Now it's up to the House. So what is about to happen to the House is that we're going to get what I call a Trojan horse. It will be a bill that will sound great, it will be all about border security, and who couldn't get behind that? But if that bill passes with the help of conservatives out of the House, it goes to what's called a conference committee. Because the bill won't be the same as the bill that came out of the Senate. That's where the politicians get together behind closed doors and they figure out one compromised bill that goes back to the chamber. Well, the one must have for President Obama is legalization, and legalization equals amnesty, which equals citizenship, which equals tens of millions of new voters that will vote to forever cement in place his progressive agenda. This is where the whole thing breaks down. So we have not had one minute of discussion for the whole Republican conference in the House.

Now recognize we're the only backstop that can say no, and we haven't had a minute's worth of discussion. We're going to finally, this afternoon at 3:00 Eastern time, have our very first meeting on this issue of immigration and what the Republican establishment is planning to do is introduce their two bills, the one out of judiciary, and the one out of Homeland Security† the Trojan horse bill, which is what I call it† and they will tell us look at this bill and how great the bill is, but the fact is it will never, ever come back to us for final vote in that form. And what I'm going to do is not vote for any bill, no matter how good it sounds, because right now we're lacking the political will in the White House to ever support and ever enforce border security. We saw that this week with the president. He decided he didn't want to enforce parts of ObamaCare. So he's not going to. It's unconstitutional, but he's getting away with it. And so that's what's going to happen.

We already passed a bill to build 700 miles of fence in 2006 and we paid for it. And so my question is, if we already passed a bill to build a fence, where is it? Where's the money? Where's the fence? Where's the billions? I want my billions back. Either give me a fence or give me my billions back.

STU: Michelle, you're

CONGRESSWOMAN BACHMANN: So we've already done that seven years ago. And if 27 years ago we promised that we would build a fence, why when Barack Obama's president and when Janet Napolitano would be the chief enforcer of building a fence, I mean, on what planet would we ever think that this is going to happen? And so it's time to wake up and slap some reality on your face and recognize this has nothing to do about with border security. It has everything to do with giving Barack Obama tens of millions of new progressive voters to finally change the country once and forever so that constitutional conservatives will effectively be blocked out of the marketplace of ideas in the future because, just because of numbers. There won't be enough of us.

So this is very big. This is very real. I'm not here to cry wolf. This is probably the most important vote that we're going to take in the next two years and, quite frankly, we haven't seen the phone lines melt yet in Washington. And so what I just want to encourage your listeners at Glenn Beck to do is that on the Senate side is hopeless. Give up on them. Don't even bother calling them on this. We've been betrayed. Focus only on the House because I will tell you, you would be shocked at the number of people who are Republicans, who call themselves conservatives, who are in favor of an amnesty bill. You would be floored. So we need these phone lines melted and quick because the establishment wants to get this bill passed out of the House before August. And so right now my message is simple: No bill. No immigration bill. Until we can certify and see it for ourselves that that southern border is secure, there's nothing to talk about.

STU: And Michele, you only need a couple dozen Republicans here, right? You only need a couple dozen Republicans to entertain these ideas to† because the Democrats are all, of course, going to vote for it. So it's not even the fact that you need to win everybody over. They only need to pull a couple dozen from the establishment and they can get this thing passed, right?

CONGRESSWOMAN BACHMANN: Thank you for saying that because that's what's going to happen with the Trojan horse. You're right. We passed this sweet smelling bill out of the house, it goes to conference committee, it comes back. Pelosi and all† and nearly every Democrat will vote for the bill. So just like you said, Pat and Stu, all the Democrats need are a few Republicans who think they are being magnanimous, a couple dozen, and we lose. And the country changes forever. So this is crucial. It's really gone under the radar because we've been kind of overhyped with news lately. You know, with everything from a plane crash, everything else going on, people just aren't paying attention to this issue and that's why we† again, I'm not trying to cry wolf. I'm just saying that this is it, and this is going to come up very quick. It's going to slide through without a lot of fanfare. The mainstream media certainly doesn't want to talk about it because they want it to pass and so this is it. I mean, we need base conservatives to call their members. And don't assume just because you have a Republican member of congress that they're good on this issue. Get them on the record. Make them tell you that they won't vote for any bill. Because President Obama's already proved it. He's not going to enforce a law that he doesn't agree with. He's an unconstitutional acting president. And so that's why this is so crucial.

PAT: Now, if they call† and they can call 202 224 3121. That's the Capitol Hill switchboard.

CONGRESSWOMAN BACHMANN: Yes.

PAT: Does it do any good, Michele, to call other people's reps, or are you suggesting they just call their own and make sure their own representative is on board with this thing?

CONGRESSWOMAN BACHMANN: Call your own. That's the most important†

PAT: Yeah.

CONGRESSWOMAN BACHMANN: -- for people to do. But people also have a contact list on their computer, their smart phone or their iPad, and what I'm saying too is send that, put out on your Facebook or put out a tweet or send out to your contact list just a quick, you know, one sentence or couple of paragraphs. You know, just trust me on this, you've got to call your rep and tell them don't vote for any immigration bill, not until we get a fence built. Because I don't want any more promises. I want to see an actual sense that's actually doing the job because otherwise the bill that we will get will be perpetual amnesty. Until never again be any effective deportation done ever, and we will have ongoing amnesty. And we are literally looking at letting more people in, in the next ten years than we did in the previous 40. And amnesty isn't cheap. It will be over $6 trillion. Half of that alone will just pay for retirement benefits for illegal aliens. So the worst possible time, when we're $17 trillion in debt, and that's just part of the debt. When we're $17 trillion in debt and baby boomers like me are about to draw down on Social Security and Medicare benefits that we've earned and paid in for, we're looking at tens of millions of new people coming into the country who've never paid in and yet they'll be drawing down Social Security. They'll be drawing down Medicare. And they will have the right to bring in their parents who can draw down from Social Security and from Medicare. And just so you know, one portion of Medicare is said to be bankrupt. The hospital portion will be bankrupt by 2017. That's four years from now. So the one thing seniors fear is going to the hospital because they want to know that their Medicare will pay for it. Well, it's broke in four years. And so we're going to swamp the system with tens of millions of new people who are sicker and poorer and have no means of paying their hospital bills? This is a disaster and that's why we've got to stop it in its tracks and so we are putting everything right now into this effort to let the public know that you cannot trust your own member of congress on this issue. You have to be adamant. You have to be insistent. You have to call, call, call. You have to get everybody that you know to call, call, call and say, look, we're not putting up with any state border security bills. We can't trust the president to enforce the border and so we are not going to take up anything right now until you build us a fence. Build me the fence. Where is my fence that I paid for in 2006? Give me my fence or give me my money back. That's my message.

PAT: Appreciate it, Michele. And thank you. Thank you for what you're doing. Thanks, and tell Steve king and Louie Gohmert, the three of you are spearheading this thing, thank you for what you're doing. And there's about 70 representatives who are on board with stopping any bill from being passed in the House for all the reasons that Michele just so eloquently outlined. Appreciate it. Thanks a lot. We'll talk to you again soon. 202 224 3121 is the number to call to get in touch with your representatives. That's the Capitol Hill switchboard. And then just ask for your representative. And if you don't know who your representative is, Google it. It's really not that hard to find. We can't tell you who your rep is because we're not positive where you're listening right now. So, you know, just find that out. Call your representative. Hopefully you voted for†

STU: Yeah.

PAT: or against your representative. So you know.

STU: You should probably know at this point, yeah.

PAT: But the number is 202 224 3121. And it is important. Because if they pass any bill, then they reconcile the Senate bill with the House bill and that's where the trouble comes in. It comes in, in the compromise and the reconciliation process and then you've got something that we can't live with. And it's amnesty without any border security.

STU: Yeah.

PAT: And it's going to turn out to be a nightmare.

STU: And two things to think about how important the left feels this is, and as well as Michele correctly pointed out over and over again, the Republican establishment. How important is this stuff to them? First of all, remember, the president of the United States wanted the DREAM Act so badly, as did many people who were in the Republican establishment and they tried so hard to get it and then they just did it because they couldn't get it voted in. So they just did it by executive order. And then the 2006 bill she talked about, that was a bill that was passed, 700 miles of fencing, and then they just passed something else the next year in part of another big bill that said, well, we don't really have to build that fence. This is what they'll do.

PAT: Yeah.

STU: They will do anything they can.

PAT: And they got the same provision in this new Senate thing, too, that Napolitano can call it off and, you know, she will again.

STU: Of course.

PAT: She just will.

Americans expose Supreme Court’s flag ruling as a failed relic

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In a nation where the Stars and Stripes symbolize the blood-soaked sacrifices of our heroes, President Trump's executive order to crack down on flag desecration amid violent protests has ignited fierce debate. But in a recent poll, Glenn asked the tough question: Can Trump protect the Flag without TRAMPLING free speech? Glenn asked, and you answered—thousands weighed in on this pressing clash between free speech and sacred symbols.

The results paint a picture of resounding distrust toward institutional leniency. A staggering 85% of respondents support banning the burning of American flags when it incites violence or disturbs the peace, a bold rejection of the chaos we've seen from George Floyd riots to pro-Palestinian torchings. Meanwhile, 90% insist that protections for burning other flags—like Pride or foreign banners—should not be treated the same as Old Glory under the First Amendment, exposing the hypocrisy in equating our nation's emblem with fleeting symbols. And 82% believe the Supreme Court's Texas v. Johnson ruling, shielding flag burning as "symbolic speech," should not stand without revision—can the official story survive such resounding doubt from everyday Americans weary of government inaction?

Your verdict sends a thunderous message: In this divided era, the flag demands defense against those who exploit freedoms to sow disorder, without trampling the liberties it represents. It's a catastrophic failure of the establishment to ignore this groundswell.

Want to make your voice heard? Check out more polls HERE.

Labor Day began as a political payoff to Socialist agitators

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During your time off this holiday, remember the man who started it: Peter J. McGuire, a racist Marxist who co-founded America’s first socialist party.

Labor Day didn’t begin as a noble tribute to American workers. It began as a negotiation with ideological terrorists.

In the late 1800s, factory and mine conditions were brutal. Workers endured 12-to-15-hour days, often seven days a week, in filthy, dangerous environments. Wages were low, injuries went uncompensated, and benefits didn’t exist. Out of desperation, Americans turned to labor unions. Basic protections had to be fought for because none were guaranteed.

Labor Day wasn’t born out of gratitude. It was a political payoff to Marxist radicals who set trains ablaze and threatened national stability.

That era marked a seismic shift — much like today. The Industrial Revolution, like our current digital and political upheaval, left millions behind. And wherever people get left behind, Marxists see an opening.

A revolutionary wedge

This was Marxism’s moment.

Economic suffering created fertile ground for revolutionary agitation. Marxists, socialists, and anarchists stepped in to stoke class resentment. Their goal was to turn the downtrodden into a revolutionary class, tear down the existing system, and redistribute wealth by force.

Among the most influential agitators was Peter J. McGuire, a devout Irish Marxist from New York. In 1874, he co-founded the Social Democratic Workingmens Party of North America, the first Marxist political party in the United States. He was also a vice president of the American Federation of Labor, which would become the most powerful union in America.

McGuire’s mission wasn’t hidden. He wanted to transform the U.S. into a socialist nation through labor unions.

That mission soon found a useful symbol.

In the 1880s, labor leaders in Toronto invited McGuire to attend their annual labor festival. Inspired, he returned to New York and launched a similar parade on Sept. 5 — chosen because it fell halfway between Independence Day and Thanksgiving.

The first parade drew over 30,000 marchers who skipped work to hear speeches about eight-hour workdays and the alleged promise of Marxism. The parade caught on across the country.

Negotiating with radicals

By 1894, Labor Day had been adopted by 30 states. But the federal government had yet to make it a national holiday. A major strike changed everything.

In Pullman, Illinois, home of the Pullman railroad car company, tensions exploded. The economy tanked. George Pullman laid off hundreds of workers and slashed wages for those who remained — yet refused to lower the rent on company-owned homes.

That injustice opened the door for Marxist agitators to mobilize.

Sympathetic railroad workers joined the strike. Riots broke out. Hundreds of railcars were torched. Mail service was disrupted. The nation’s rail system ground to a halt.

President Grover Cleveland — under pressure in a midterm election year — panicked. He sent 12,000 federal troops to Chicago. Two strikers were killed in the resulting clashes.

With the crisis spiraling and Democrats desperate to avoid political fallout, Cleveland struck a deal. Within six days of breaking the strike, Congress rushed through legislation making Labor Day a federal holiday.

It was the first of many concessions Democrats would make to organized labor in exchange for political power.

What we really celebrated

Labor Day wasn’t born out of gratitude. It was a political payoff to Marxist radicals who set trains ablaze and threatened national stability.

Kean Collection / Staff | Getty Images

What we celebrated was a Canadian idea, brought to America by the founder of the American Socialist Party, endorsed by racially exclusionary unions, and made law by a president and Congress eager to save face.

It was the first of many bones thrown by the Democratic Party to union power brokers. And it marked the beginning of a long, costly compromise with ideologues who wanted to dismantle the American way of life — from the inside out.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

Hunter laptop, Steele dossier—Same players, same playbook?

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The Durham annex and ODNI report documents expose a vast network of funders and fixers — from Soros’ Open Society Foundations to the Pentagon.

In a column earlier this month, I argued the deep state is no longer deniable, thanks to Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard. I outlined the structural design of the deep state as revealed by two recent declassifications: Gabbard’s ODNI report and the Durham annex released by Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa).

These documents expose a transnational apparatus of intelligence agencies, media platforms, think tanks, and NGOs operating as a parallel government.

The deep state is funded by elite donors, shielded by bureaucracies, and perpetuated by operatives who drift between public office and private influence without accountability.

But institutions are only part of the story. This web of influence is made possible by people — and by money. This follow-up to the first piece traces the key operatives and financial networks fueling the deep state’s most consequential manipulations, including the Trump-Russia collusion hoax.

Architects and operatives

At the top of the intelligence pyramid sits John Brennan, President Obama’s CIA director and one of the principal architects of the manipulated 2017 Intelligence Community Assessment. James Clapper, who served as director of national intelligence, signed off on that same ICA and later joined 50 other former officials in concluding the Hunter Biden laptop had “all the classic earmarks of a Russian information operation” ahead of the 2020 election. The timing, once again, served a political objective.

James Comey, then FBI director, presided over Crossfire Hurricane. According to the Durham annex, he also allowed the investigation into Hillary Clinton’s private email server to collapse after it became entangled with “sensitive intelligence” revealing her plan to tie President Donald Trump to Russia.

That plan, as documented in the annex, originated with Hillary Clinton herself and was personally pushed by President Obama. Her campaign, through law firm Perkins Coie, hired Fusion GPS, which commissioned the now-debunked Steele dossier — a document used to justify surveillance warrants on Trump associates.

Several individuals orbiting the Clinton operation have remained influential. Jake Sullivan, who served as President Biden’s national security adviser, was a foreign policy aide to Clinton during her 2016 campaign. He was named in 2021 as a figure involved in circulating the collusion narrative, and his presence in successive Democratic administrations suggests institutional continuity.

Andrew McCabe, then the FBI’s deputy director, approved the use of FISA warrants derived from unverified sources. His connection to the internal “insurance policy” discussion — described in a 2016 text by FBI official Peter Strzok to colleague Lisa Page — underscores the Bureau’s political posture during that election cycle.

The list of political enablers is long but revealing:

Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), who, as a former representative from California, chaired the House Intelligence Committee at the time and publicly promoted the collusion narrative while having access to intelligence that contradicted it.

Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif) and Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), both members of the “Gang of Eight” with oversight of intelligence operations, advanced the same narrative despite receiving classified briefings.

Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.), ranking member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, exchanged encrypted text messages with a Russian lobbyist in efforts to speak with Christopher Steele.

These were not passive recipients of flawed intelligence. They were participants in its amplification.

The funding networks behind the machine

The deep state’s operations are not possible without financing — much of it indirect, routed through a nexus of private foundations, quasi-governmental entities, and federal agencies.

George Soros’ Open Society Foundations appear throughout the Durham annex. In one instance, Open Society Foundations documents were intercepted by foreign intelligence and used to track coordination between NGOs and the Clinton campaign’s anti-Trump strategy.

This system was not designed for transparency but for control.

Soros has also been a principal funder of the Center for American Progress Action Fund, which ran a project during the Trump administration called the Moscow Project, dedicated to promoting the Russia collusion narrative.

The Tides Foundation and Arabella Advisors both specialize in “dark money” donor-advised funds that obscure the source and destination of political funding. The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation was the biggest donor to the Arabella Advisors by far, which routed $127 million through Arabella’s network in 2020 alone and nearly $500 million in total.

The MacArthur Foundation and Rockefeller Foundation also financed many of the think tanks named in the Durham annex, including the Council on Foreign Relations.

Federal funding pipelines

Parallel to the private networks are government-funded influence operations, often justified under the guise of “democracy promotion” or counter-disinformation initiatives.

USAID directed $270 million to Soros-affiliated organizations for overseas “democracy” programs, a significant portion of which has reverberated back into domestic influence campaigns.

The State Department funds the National Endowment for Democracy, a quasi-governmental organization with a $315 million annual budget and ties to narrative engineering projects.

The Department of Homeland Security underwrote entities involved in online censorship programs targeting American citizens.

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The Pentagon, from 2020 to 2024, awarded over $2.4 trillion to private contractors — many with domestic intelligence capabilities. It also directed $1.4 billion to select think tanks since 2019.

According to public records compiled by DataRepublican, these tax-funded flows often support the very actors shaping U.S. political discourse and global perception campaigns.

Not just domestic — but global

What these disclosures confirm is that the deep state is not a theory. It is a documented structure — funded by elite donors, shielded by bureaucracies, and perpetuated by operatives who drift between public office and private influence without accountability.

This system was not designed for transparency but for control. It launders narratives, neutralizes opposition, and overrides democratic will by leveraging the very institutions meant to protect it.

With the Durham annex and the ODNI report, we now see the network's architecture and its actors — names, agencies, funding trails — all laid bare. What remains is the task of dismantling it before its next iteration takes shape.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

The truth behind ‘defense’: How America was rebranded for war

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Donald Trump emphasizes peace through strength, reminding the world that the United States is willing to fight to win. That’s beyond ‘defense.’

President Donald Trump made headlines this week by signaling a rebrand of the Defense Department — restoring its original name, the Department of War.

At first, I was skeptical. “Defense” suggests restraint, a principle I consider vital to U.S. foreign policy. “War” suggests aggression. But for the first 158 years of the republic, that was the honest name: the Department of War.

A Department of War recognizes the truth: The military exists to fight and, if necessary, to win decisively.

The founders never intended a permanent standing army. When conflict came — the Revolution, the War of 1812, the trenches of France, the beaches of Normandy — the nation called men to arms, fought, and then sent them home. Each campaign was temporary, targeted, and necessary.

From ‘war’ to ‘military-industrial complex’

Everything changed in 1947. President Harry Truman — facing the new reality of nuclear weapons, global tension, and two world wars within 20 years — established a full-time military and rebranded the Department of War as the Department of Defense. Americans resisted; we had never wanted a permanent army. But Truman convinced the country it was necessary.

Was the name change an early form of political correctness? A way to soften America’s image as a global aggressor? Or was it simply practical? Regardless, the move created a permanent, professional military. But it also set the stage for something Truman’s successor, President Dwight “Ike” Eisenhower, famously warned about: the military-industrial complex.

Ike, the five-star general who commanded Allied forces in World War II and stormed Normandy, delivered a harrowing warning during his farewell address: The military-industrial complex would grow powerful. Left unchecked, it could influence policy and push the nation toward unnecessary wars.

And that’s exactly what happened. The Department of Defense, with its full-time and permanent army, began spending like there was no tomorrow. Weapons were developed, deployed, and sometimes used simply to justify their existence.

Peace through strength

When Donald Trump said this week, “I don’t want to be defense only. We want defense, but we want offense too,” some people freaked out. They called him a warmonger. He isn’t. Trump is channeling a principle older than him: peace through strength. Ronald Reagan preached it; Trump is taking it a step further.

Just this week, Trump also suggested limiting nuclear missiles — hardly the considerations of a warmonger — echoing Reagan, who wanted to remove missiles from silos while keeping them deployable on planes.

The seemingly contradictory move of Trump calling for a Department of War sends a clear message: He wants Americans to recognize that our military exists not just for defense, but to project power when necessary.

Trump has pointed to something critically important: The best way to prevent war is to have a leader who knows exactly who he is and what he will do. Trump signals strength, deterrence, and resolve. You want to negotiate? Great. You don’t? Then we’ll finish the fight decisively.

That’s why the world listens to us. That’s why nations come to the table — not because Trump is reckless, but because he means what he says and says what he means. Peace under weakness invites aggression. Peace under strength commands respect.

Trump is the most anti-war president we’ve had since Jimmy Carter. But unlike Carter, Trump isn’t weak. Carter’s indecision emboldened enemies and made the world less safe. Trump’s strength makes the country stronger. He believes in peace as much as any president. But he knows peace requires readiness for war.

Names matter

When we think of “defense,” we imagine cybersecurity, spy programs, and missile shields. But when we think of “war,” we recall its harsh reality: death, destruction, and national survival. Trump is reminding us what the Department of Defense is really for: war. Not nation-building, not diplomacy disguised as military action, not endless training missions. War — full stop.

Chip Somodevilla / Staff | Getty Images

Names matter. Words matter. They shape identity and character. A Department of Defense implies passivity, a posture of reaction. A Department of War recognizes the truth: The military exists to fight and, if necessary, to win decisively.

So yes, I’ve changed my mind. I’m for the rebranding to the Department of War. It shows strength to the world. It reminds Americans, internally and externally, of the reality we face. The Department of Defense can no longer be a euphemism. Our military exists for war — not without deterrence, but not without strength either. And we need to stop deluding ourselves.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.