Did Sean Hannity and Glenn disappoint the media by not throwing mud at each other?

Glenn joined Sean Hannity on Fox News Monday night to discuss the 2016 election and the global threats facing our country. From their straightforward online exchange leading up to the interview, some in the media might have expected a verbal sparring match to break out over their differences in opinion about Donald Trump.

In reality, the conversation remained extremely cordial. Instead of dwelling on petty differences, they instead focused on issues they could unite on, particularly the threat of radical Islam we see ravaging the Middle East.

"It's craziness!" Glenn said, referencing to a recent article in The New York Times, which told of ISIS members praying before and after raping their pre-teen victims, attempting to legitimize their actions by referencing passages in the Koran.

Hannity went on to compare radical Islam with the Nazis during World War II.

"I would argue that radical mullahs coupled with weapons of mass destruction equals a modern-day Holocaust," Hannity said.

Glenn said his latest book, IT IS ABOUT ISLAM, describes how ISIS has actually learned from the Nazis and they're even worse.

"This is the Nazis times ten," Glenn said.

Watch the full exchange below.

Glenn invited Hannity on his radio show Tuesday morning, where they continued the conversation, delving into their views on the current lineup of presidential candidates on both sides of the aisle.

"Now is the time to duke it out," Glenn said. "Now is the time to really lay it out on the table and say, this is who I think we should have."

Listen to the interview or read the full transcript below.

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

GLENN: I want to introduce you to a friend of mine. Mr. Sean Hannity.

SEAN: Mr. Glenn Beck, how are you, sir?

GLENN: Very good. How are you?

SEAN: You know, I think we disappointed people in the media if you asked a question about conservatives and Trump. And I answered. And we didn't throw mud at each other and call each other names. I think we disappointed them.

GLENN: Yeah. I think, you know, it's a good thing that conservatives -- now is the time to duke it out, you know what I mean? Now is the time to really lay it out on the table and say, this is who I think we should have. These are the principles I think wished have. Once you settle on a candidate, then you have to decide, I can either vote for the G.O.P. or I can't vote for the G.O.P. But the time to look at a candidate's makeup, any of the candidate's, is right now. And I don't agree with people who say, hey, you're going to tear the party apart. Fine. We have to have these discussions.

SEAN: No, I disagree. Yeah, listen this process is good for all of them. It will make the eventual nominee, I would argue, stronger. And they better be prepared because I don't care who the Democratic candidate is -- and it's looking more and more unlikely that it's Hillary every day, but the Democrats are going to say that you're racist and sexist and misogynist and War on Women and you want to poison the air and water and you hate children and you want to kill grandma. So you better be strong. And you better be prepared for the attacks that inevitably will come to whoever the eventual nominee is.

But you're right, we have five and a half months to vet these candidates. It's a process. And I think the process is healthy. It's the hardest job in the world.

GLENN: Do you think there's anything that Donald Trump could say that would slow this down? We were talking yesterday. He may be the one candidate who has so much out there that he's said and he handles it very well and says, yep. That's what I said. And if you don't like it, that's too bad.

SEAN: I know.

GLENN: Has he been inoculated?

SEAN: You know, it's hard to tell. But I use this term. He has been able to defy conventional political gravity more than any other candidate I've ever seen in my lifetime. Now, whether that continues, if he makes another unforced error. If he says something people don't like, it may be a point of no return for him. But he certainly up to this point have benefited from the controversies that he has started. Immigration, John McCain, et cetera. It hasn't hurt him at all. And I think people are finding him refreshing. You know, there's two reasons for this.

Number one, people are tired of political correctness. Obama has so destroyed the country that people are ready for a dramatic change, which I argue we also need. It's not a time for half measures. We need real conservatives. Liberty-loving, constitutional conservatives that will balance budgets, limit the size and growth of government, offer alternatives to Obamacare, secure the borders. All those things that you and I talk about every day. And I would argue that this is the time that we need this vibrant debate and discussion.

GLENN: It is.

SEAN: I don't mind that you don't like Donald Trump or believe Donald Trump. That's -- you know, you're a strong voice. I think people should hear your views. People should hear from Trump himself. I offer my views as warranted, you know, when I'm talking to my audience.

GLENN: Right.

SEAN: I'm not decided right now. And I don't have to decide for five and a half months. And I do have faith that the American people will pick a great candidate. I'm hopeful.

GLENN: I know you don't generally do this stuff. So I don't want to box you into a corner. So you don't have to have a name.

SEAN: Go ahead, I can handle it.

GLENN: Is there anybody there that you say I will not vote for? Out of the 18, is there anybody that you just wouldn't vote for?

SEAN: We can be honest. Lindsey Graham is not going to be the nominee. So is Pataki. I like the guy personally. He's not going to be the nominee.

GLENN: Yeah, I'm not saying that. For instance, Lindsey Graham, I could not pull the lever for. I just couldn't do it.

SEAN: I'm glad we're not going to have to face that. But that would be really hard for me because I think he's part of what's wrong in Washington.

GLENN: Oh, yeah, he's part and parcel of it.

SEAN: Think of the frustration though, Glenn. This is warranted. They made a promise this past election cycle.

GLENN: Oh, I know.

SEAN: They absolutely would not allow Obama's illegal executive amnesty -- unconstitutional amnesty to go through, and they ended up funding it.

GLENN: I didn't get a chance to talk about this yesterday. I'm going to talk about it today. I wrote a piece this weekend on Mike Lee. There was a --

SEAN: Yeah.

GLENN: There was a hit piece on Mike Lee in the New York Times this weekend where McConnell said, you know, he's out with his Tea Party buddies. And he's going to have to decide -- at some point he's going to have to face the music and choose. Well, he's already chosen. He's chosen the Constitution. And I wrote a deal about McConnell. He's part of the problem.

SEAN: Listen, I've been saying this for well over a year. Maybe even two years. I don't remember when I first said it. That Boehner needs to go. And that we need a clean sweep of leadership in Washington.

Now, I say this, I'm a registered conservative. I believe conservatism works. I believe we need a revitalized second party, as Reagan said. And when I look at the Republican Party as timid and weak and ineffective and afraid of their own shadow and afraid of getting blamed for a government shutdown, I'm disappointed.

Now, on the other hand, I see Republican governors -- and I'll mention names. Scott Walker was one of them. Rick Perry was one of them. And John Kasich has done some good work in the state of Ohio. And Rick Scott in Florida is another one. These guys have done great work, taking high deficits and turning them into surpluses. Getting their budgets balanced. And implementing, like Bobby Jindal in Louisiana, vouchers. And they've gotten people -- high unemployment rates down to low unemployment rates. John Kasich, I think since he's been governor, 300,000-plus jobs in the state of Ohio alone. These guys are working hard. Rick Perry, one and a half million jobs in Texas while he was governor.

GLENN: Why do you think Scott Walker was the guy and now has fallen off the map?

SEAN: You know, I don't think -- I don't think the polls really mean a whole hill of beans to be honest at this point. I think that we're going to have more debates. We're going to have more interviews. They'll have more time to interact with voters. And I don't think we can predict who the nominee is going to be.

GLENN: I agree with you on that.

SEAN: And one other point. Let's go back to the summer of 2007. I think it was --

GLENN: Let's not.

SEAN: Who do you think was leading the Republican field with 33 percent of the vote and who do you think was in second place with 20 percent?

GLENN: I don't remember. Probably like Newt Gingrich.

SEAN: Rudy Giuliani.

GLENN: That's right.

SEAN: Right? And those are big numbers.

GLENN: Yeah. We've been talking lately that we don't want our guy number one. I'm happy he's number two or number three in the polls right now. Cruz is the guy I really like.

SEAN: I like Ted Cruz a lot.

GLENN: Yeah, several I would vote for, but that guy I would walk through a wall of fire for. And I don't want him to be number one right now.

SEAN: What a hero he was when he stood up to his own party recently. What a hero he was in 2013, and every Republican had promised they would repeal and replace Obamacare and he stood alone in a filibuster to fulfill the promise that he made to his constituents and the rest of these guys not only caved, but then they turned on him for daring to do what they should have been doing.

GLENN: So let me switch topics here. You said just a minute ago that you think it's looking less and less like Hillary is going to be the nominee.

SEAN: Yep.

GLENN: Does that put Bernie Sanders there? Or do you see -- Pat and Stu think Al Gore is going to ride in on a white horse.

SEAN: By the way, I think it could happen. I think there are four people to watch out for -- my thoughts -- Biden, Gore, Elizabeth Warren, and believe it or not, Comrade de Blasio, the mayor of New York. He has a huge ego.

GLENN: Yeah. De Blasio, I think he's considering it. Yeah, yeah.

So what do you think is going to happen? I think even if she goes -- which is not going to happen. But even if she went to jail, I think they would still vote for her. Might help because people would be like, I wouldn't have to listen to her. She's in jail.

SEAN: Yeah. I don't know what it is. Look, it's funny. We often get accused of being party people. I don't have any problem, and I've never had any problem speaking out against -- you know, I end up usually voting for the Republican because there's not a conservative party. I mean, it's a coalition party of conservatives, establishment. The Democrats have a coalition party. I don't ever see Democrats break ranks. I do see conservatives that will challenge the -- the establishment in their party. You do it. I do it.

GLENN: So you're saying that you don't think -- isn't that what's happening with Bernie Sanders right now?

SEAN: Yeah, I think so. Hillary is not going to -- Hillary is not a big enough socialist for them.

GLENN: I think this is -- I think this is actually a good sign -- I mean, a bad sign for America. But a good sign for the Democrats. At least they're recognizing they're tired of the same old crap where they're lying. They just want someone to come out and say, yes, I'm a socialist. What's wrong with that?

SEAN: I think the Scoop Jackson Democrats. The Reagan Democrats have almost become extinct in the Democratic Party.

GLENN: I agree on that.

SEAN: Hillary does not have the political skills of her husband. She does not have the speech-giving ability of Obama. I think she is intimately unlikable. I don't think she likes people. Which is why they have ponied up all of these public appearances of hers. And they keep on putting Democratic plants because she's not really capable of relating to real people. And I think she has nothing, but disdain and contempt for going out and eating pork chops and fried Twinkies and actually shaking people's hands and listening to what their real concerns are. I think she's an ambitious politician and a very poor to mediocre one, at that. And I think with all these recent revelations, she is in a heap of trouble, even with Loretta Lynch as the attorney general.

GLENN: Sean, you and I have talked off the air quite a bit. And the -- nobody in this audience would be surprised that when I'm on the phone, that it would go to very dark places. But I think people might be surprised that you also feel we are in life and death -- you can be as depressing as I am.

(laughter)

SEAN: Stu and Pat there.

PAT: Yes.

GLENN: They're not going to help you.

PAT: Nobody is as depressing as you, Glenn.

SEAN: By the way, I'm friends with all three of you guys. You're all good guys.

Here's my take. I vacillate back and forth. You know, we're a country. Think of what we've been able to overcome: The Revolution that founded this country. A civil war that tore us apart. A Great Depression. Two world wars. The '60s. Vietnam. Jimmy Carter. And we will overcome the disaster that is known as the Barack Obama presidency. We are a resilient people. We can bounce back.

What I'm most afraid of, the dark thinking that you're asking about, is that the numbers now don't add up anymore.

GLENN: Yeah. It's not the Barack Obama administration. It's -- it's the mistakes of the last really 70 or 90 years since we started giving away stuff for free.

PAT: Well, and we vacillate too between thinking, hey, we're going for make it, and there's no way out. We're done as a people. You can't help, but do that with the ebb and flow of this --

GLENN: And when you say we've made it. A, we didn't have the numbers that we have now. And, B, we had the moral backbone. I mean, Sean, do we even have the moral backbone now to pull out of this?

SEAN: Here's the problem. Is now decades of socialist indoctrination in our schools. People that come to this country that don't want freedom and liberty and opportunity and with it, responsibility. But too many people have been mentally conditioned to think that they have a right to health care. A right to housing. A right to dental care. A right to day care. And they think that it's the government's job to take from one group of people. They'll empower the government to take from one group of people and redistribute to another group of people.

My concern is this: I don't care who the Democratic nominee is. You can pretty much count on at least 47, if not 48, if not 49 percent of the American people that will vote for whoever the Democrats put up. For a Republican to win, you know, you start out without New York, New Jersey. Most likely, without Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Michigan. But you might be able to put Michigan and Wisconsin in play. I'll leave that open. On a long shot, maybe Pennsylvania. But you don't have California, Oregon, or Washington. And for a Republican to win, think about this, you have to take the purple state of Florida. You got to take the state of Ohio, which went for Barack Obama in the last election -- I think the last two. Then you have a battleground with North Carolina --

GLENN: See what I'm saying. I know. I know. I get it. I'm going to go load my gun now and blow my brains out.

But, Sean, we got to run. I thank you so much. And god bless you.

SEAN: All right. Love -- love the dialogue. Good to talk to you.

GLENN: Thanks. Good to talk to you.

SEAN: And you starting this was a good thing.

GLENN: God bless you. Thanks, man. Sean Hannity.

URGENT: FIVE steps to CONTROL AI before it's too late!

MANAURE QUINTERO / Contributor | Getty Images

By now, many of us are familiar with AI and its potential benefits and threats. However, unless you're a tech tycoon, it can feel like you have little influence over the future of artificial intelligence.

For years, Glenn has warned about the dangers of rapidly developing AI technologies that have taken the world by storm.

He acknowledges their significant benefits but emphasizes the need to establish proper boundaries and ethics now, while we still have control. But since most people aren’t Silicon Valley tech leaders making the decisions, how can they help keep AI in check?

Recently, Glenn interviewed Tristan Harris, a tech ethicist deeply concerned about the potential harm of unchecked AI, to discuss its societal implications. Harris highlighted a concerning new piece of legislation proposed by Texas Senator Ted Cruz. This legislation proposes a state-level moratorium on AI regulation, meaning only the federal government could regulate AI. Harris noted that there’s currently no Federal plan for regulating AI. Until the federal government establishes a plan, tech companies would have nearly free rein with their AI. And we all know how slowly the federal government moves.

This is where you come in. Tristan Harris shared with Glenn the top five actions you should urge your representatives to take regarding AI, including opposing the moratorium until a concrete plan is in place. Now is your chance to influence the future of AI. Contact your senator and congressman today and share these five crucial steps they must take to keep AI in check:

Ban engagement-optimized AI companions for kids

Create legislation that will prevent AI from being designed to maximize addiction, sexualization, flattery, and attachment disorders, and to protect young people’s mental health and ability to form real-life friendships.

Establish basic liability laws

Companies need to be held accountable when their products cause real-world harm.

Pass increased whistleblower protections

Protect concerned technologists working inside the AI labs from facing untenable pressures and threats that prevent them from warning the public when the AI rollout is unsafe or crosses dangerous red lines.

Prevent AI from having legal rights

Enact laws so AIs don’t have protected speech or have their own bank accounts, making sure our legal system works for human interests over AI interests.

Oppose the state moratorium on AI 

Call your congressman or Senator Cruz’s office, and demand they oppose the state moratorium on AI without a plan for how we will set guardrails for this technology.

Glenn: Only Trump dared to deliver on decades of empty promises

Tasos Katopodis / Stringer | Getty Images

The Islamic regime has been killing Americans since 1979. Now Trump’s response proves we’re no longer playing defense — we’re finally hitting back.

The United States has taken direct military action against Iran’s nuclear program. Whatever you think of the strike, it’s over. It’s happened. And now, we have to predict what happens next. I want to help you understand the gravity of this situation: what happened, what it means, and what might come next. To that end, we need to begin with a little history.

Since 1979, Iran has been at war with us — even if we refused to call it that.

We are either on the verge of a remarkable strategic victory or a devastating global escalation. Time will tell.

It began with the hostage crisis, when 66 Americans were seized and 52 were held for over a year by the radical Islamic regime. Four years later, 17 more Americans were murdered in the U.S. Embassy bombing in Beirut, followed by 241 Marines in the Beirut barracks bombing.

Then came the Khobar Towers bombing in 1996, which killed 19 more U.S. airmen. Iran had its fingerprints all over it.

In Iraq and Afghanistan, Iranian-backed proxies killed hundreds of American soldiers. From 2001 to 2020 in Afghanistan and 2003 to 2011 in Iraq, Iran supplied IEDs and tactical support.

The Iranians have plotted assassinations and kidnappings on U.S. soil — in 2011, 2021, and again in 2024 — and yet we’ve never really responded.

The precedent for U.S. retaliation has always been present, but no president has chosen to pull the trigger until this past weekend. President Donald Trump struck decisively. And what our military pulled off this weekend was nothing short of extraordinary.

Operation Midnight Hammer

The strike was reportedly called Operation Midnight Hammer. It involved as many as 175 U.S. aircraft, including 12 B-2 stealth bombers — out of just 19 in our entire arsenal. Those bombers are among the most complex machines in the world, and they were kept mission-ready by some of the finest mechanics on the planet.

USAF / Handout | Getty Images

To throw off Iranian radar and intelligence, some bombers flew west toward Guam — classic misdirection. The rest flew east, toward the real targets.

As the B-2s approached Iranian airspace, U.S. submarines launched dozens of Tomahawk missiles at Iran’s fortified nuclear facilities. Minutes later, the bombers dropped 14 MOPs — massive ordnance penetrators — each designed to drill deep into the earth and destroy underground bunkers. These bombs are the size of an F-16 and cost millions of dollars apiece. They are so accurate, I’ve been told they can hit the top of a soda can from 15,000 feet.

They were built for this mission — and we’ve been rehearsing this run for 15 years.

If the satellite imagery is accurate — and if what my sources tell me is true — the targeted nuclear sites were utterly destroyed. We’ll likely rely on the Israelis to confirm that on the ground.

This was a master class in strategy, execution, and deterrence. And it proved that only the United States could carry out a strike like this. I am very proud of our military, what we are capable of doing, and what we can accomplish.

What comes next

We don’t yet know how Iran will respond, but many of the possibilities are troubling. The Iranians could target U.S. forces across the Middle East. On Monday, Tehran launched 20 missiles at U.S. bases in Qatar, Syria, and Kuwait, to no effect. God forbid, they could also unleash Hezbollah or other terrorist proxies to strike here at home — and they just might.

Iran has also threatened to shut down the Strait of Hormuz — the artery through which nearly a fifth of the world’s oil flows. On Sunday, Iran’s parliament voted to begin the process. If the Supreme Council and the ayatollah give the go-ahead, we could see oil prices spike to $150 or even $200 a barrel.

That would be catastrophic.

The 2008 financial collapse was pushed over the edge when oil hit $130. Western economies — including ours — simply cannot sustain oil above $120 for long. If this conflict escalates and the Strait is closed, the global economy could unravel.

The strike also raises questions about regime stability. Will it spark an uprising, or will the Islamic regime respond with a brutal crackdown on dissidents?

Early signs aren’t hopeful. Reports suggest hundreds of arrests over the weekend and at least one dissident executed on charges of spying for Israel. The regime’s infamous morality police, the Gasht-e Ershad, are back on the streets. Every phone, every vehicle — monitored. The U.S. embassy in Qatar issued a shelter-in-place warning for Americans.

Russia and China both condemned the strike. On Monday, a senior Iranian official flew to Moscow to meet with Vladimir Putin. That meeting should alarm anyone paying attention. Their alliance continues to deepen — and that’s a serious concern.

Now we pray

We are either on the verge of a remarkable strategic victory or a devastating global escalation. Time will tell. But either way, President Trump didn’t start this. He inherited it — and he took decisive action.

The difference is, he did what they all said they would do. He didn’t send pallets of cash in the dead of night. He didn’t sign another failed treaty.

He acted. Now, we pray. For peace, for wisdom, and for the strength to meet whatever comes next.


This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

Globalize the Intifada? Why Mamdani’s plan spells DOOM for America

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If New Yorkers hand City Hall to Zohran Mamdani, they’re not voting for change. They’re opening the door to an alliance of socialism, Islamism, and chaos.

It only took 25 years for New York City to go from the resilient, flag-waving pride following the 9/11 attacks to a political fever dream. To quote Michael Malice, “I'm old enough to remember when New Yorkers endured 9/11 instead of voting for it.”

Malice is talking about Zohran Mamdani, a Democratic Socialist assemblyman from Queens now eyeing the mayor’s office. Mamdani, a 33-year-old state representative emerging from relative political obscurity, is now receiving substantial funding for his mayoral campaign from the Council on American-Islamic Relations.

CAIR has a long and concerning history, including being born out of the Muslim Brotherhood and named an unindicted co-conspirator in the Holy Land Foundation terror funding case. Why would the group have dropped $100,000 into a PAC backing Mamdani’s campaign?

Mamdani blends political Islam with Marxist economics — two ideologies that have left tens of millions dead in the 20th century alone.

Perhaps CAIR has a vested interest in Mamdani’s call to “globalize the intifada.” That’s not a call for peaceful protest. Intifada refers to historic uprisings of Muslims against what they call the “Israeli occupation of Palestine.” Suicide bombings and street violence are part of the playbook. So when Mamdani says he wants to “globalize” that, who exactly is the enemy in this global scenario? Because it sure sounds like he's saying America is the new Israel, and anyone who supports Western democracy is the new Zionist.

Mamdani tried to clean up his language by citing the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, which once used “intifada” in an Arabic-language article to describe the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. So now he’s comparing Palestinians to Jewish victims of the Nazis? If that doesn’t twist your stomach into knots, you’re not paying attention.

If you’re “globalizing” an intifada, and positioning Israel — and now America — as the Nazis, that’s not a cry for human rights. That’s a call for chaos and violence.

Rising Islamism

But hey, this is New York. Faculty members at Columbia University — where Mamdani’s own father once worked — signed a letter defending students who supported Hamas after October 7. They also contributed to Mamdani’s mayoral campaign. And his father? He blamed Ronald Reagan and the religious right for inspiring Islamic terrorism, as if the roots of 9/11 grew in Washington, not the caves of Tora Bora.

Bloomberg / Contributor | Getty Images

This isn’t about Islam as a faith. We should distinguish between Islam and Islamism. Islam is a religion followed peacefully by millions. Islamism is something entirely different — an ideology that seeks to merge mosque and state, impose Sharia law, and destroy secular liberal democracies from within. Islamism isn’t about prayer and fasting. It’s about power.

Criticizing Islamism is not Islamophobia. It is not an attack on peaceful Muslims. In fact, Muslims are often its first victims.

Islamism is misogynistic, theocratic, violent, and supremacist. It’s hostile to free speech, religious pluralism, gay rights, secularism — even to moderate Muslims. Yet somehow, the progressive left — the same left that claims to fight for feminism, LGBTQ rights, and free expression — finds itself defending candidates like Mamdani. You can’t make this stuff up.

Blending the worst ideologies

And if that weren’t enough, Mamdani also identifies as a Democratic Socialist. He blends political Islam with Marxist economics — two ideologies that have left tens of millions dead in the 20th century alone. But don’t worry, New York. I’m sure this time socialism will totally work. Just like it always didn’t.

If you’re a business owner, a parent, a person who’s saved anything, or just someone who values sanity: Get out. I’m serious. If Mamdani becomes mayor, as seems likely, then New York City will become a case study in what happens when you marry ideological extremism with political power. And it won’t be pretty.

This is about more than one mayoral race. It’s about the future of Western liberalism. It’s about drawing a bright line between faith and fanaticism, between healthy pluralism and authoritarian dogma.

Call out radicalism

We must call out political Islam the same way we call out white nationalism or any other supremacist ideology. When someone chants “globalize the intifada,” that should send a chill down your spine — whether you’re Jewish, Christian, Muslim, atheist, or anything in between.

The left may try to shame you into silence with words like “Islamophobia,” but the record is worn out. The grooves are shallow. The American people see what’s happening. And we’re not buying it.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

Could China OWN our National Parks?

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The left’s idea of stewardship involves bulldozing bison and barring access. Lee’s vision puts conservation back in the hands of the people.

The media wants you to believe that Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) is trying to bulldoze Yellowstone and turn national parks into strip malls — that he’s calling for a reckless fire sale of America’s natural beauty to line developers’ pockets. That narrative is dishonest. It’s fearmongering, and, by the way, it’s wrong.

Here’s what’s really happening.

Private stewardship works. It’s local. It’s accountable. It’s incentivized.

The federal government currently owns 640 million acres of land — nearly 28% of all land in the United States. To put that into perspective, that’s more territory than France, Germany, Poland, and the United Kingdom combined.

Most of this land is west of the Mississippi River. That’s not a coincidence. In the American West, federal ownership isn’t just a bureaucratic technicality — it’s a stranglehold. States are suffocated. Locals are treated as tenants. Opportunities are choked off.

Meanwhile, people living east of the Mississippi — in places like Kentucky, Georgia, or Pennsylvania — might not even realize how little land their own states truly control. But the same policies that are plaguing the West could come for them next.

Lee isn’t proposing to auction off Yellowstone or pave over Yosemite. He’s talking about 3 million acres — that’s less than half of 1% of the federal estate. And this land isn’t your family’s favorite hiking trail. It’s remote, hard to access, and often mismanaged.

Failed management

Why was it mismanaged in the first place? Because the federal government is a terrible landlord.

Consider Yellowstone again. It’s home to the last remaining herd of genetically pure American bison — animals that haven’t been crossbred with cattle. Ranchers, myself included, would love the chance to help restore these majestic creatures on private land. But the federal government won’t allow it.

So what do they do when the herd gets too big?

They kill them. Bulldoze them into mass graves. That’s not conservation. That’s bureaucratic malpractice.

And don’t even get me started on bald eagles — majestic symbols of American freedom and a federally protected endangered species, now regularly slaughtered by wind turbines. I have pictures of piles of dead bald eagles. Where’s the outrage?

Biden’s federal land-grab

Some argue that states can’t afford to manage this land themselves. But if the states can’t afford it, how can Washington? We’re $35 trillion in debt. Entitlements are strained, infrastructure is crumbling, and the Bureau of Land Management, Forest Service, and National Park Service are billions of dollars behind in basic maintenance. Roads, firebreaks, and trails are falling apart.

The Biden administration quietly embraced something called the “30 by 30” initiative, a plan to lock up 30% of all U.S. land and water under federal “conservation” by 2030. The real goal is 50% by 2050.

That entails half of the country being taken away from you, controlled not by the people who live there but by technocrats in D.C.

You think that won’t affect your ability to hunt, fish, graze cattle, or cut timber? Think again. It won’t be conservatives who stop you from building a cabin, raising cattle, or teaching your grandkids how to shoot a rifle. It’ll be the same radical environmentalists who treat land as sacred — unless it’s your truck, your deer stand, or your back yard.

Land as collateral

Moreover, the U.S. Treasury is considering putting federally owned land on the national balance sheet, listing your parks, forests, and hunting grounds as collateral.

What happens if America defaults on its debt?

David McNew / Stringer | Getty Images

Do you think our creditors won’t come calling? Imagine explaining to your kids that the lake you used to fish in is now under foreign ownership, that the forest you hunted in belongs to China.

This is not hypothetical. This is the logical conclusion of treating land like a piggy bank.

The American way

There’s a better way — and it’s the American way.

Let the people who live near the land steward it. Let ranchers, farmers, sportsmen, and local conservationists do what they’ve done for generations.

Did you know that 75% of America’s wetlands are on private land? Or that the most successful wildlife recoveries — whitetail deer, ducks, wild turkeys — didn’t come from Washington but from partnerships between private landowners and groups like Ducks Unlimited?

Private stewardship works. It’s local. It’s accountable. It’s incentivized. When you break it, you fix it. When you profit from the land, you protect it.

This is not about selling out. It’s about buying in — to freedom, to responsibility, to the principle of constitutional self-governance.

So when you hear the pundits cry foul over 3 million acres of federal land, remember: We don’t need Washington to protect our land. We need Washington to get out of the way.

Because this isn’t just about land. It’s about liberty. And once liberty is lost, it doesn’t come back easily.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.