RADIOMarch 05, 2025

Glenn Beck’s Reaction to Trump’s REVOLUTIONARY Speech to Congress

In his first speech to Congress as the 47th president, Donald Trump made it clear that America is back! And the polls reflect it, with CBS News finding that 76% of respondents approved of Trump’s speech. Glenn and Stu discuss why this number may be so high: maybe more Republicans watched, or maybe it was just a great, optimistic speech. But many Democrats in Congress and the Legacy Media still deny that Americans gave Trump a mandate to restore America in the 2024 election. So, Glenn and Stu review the data. Plus, they highlight some other big moments during the speech, including Trump’s decision to list out the many, many crazy things that DOGE found our government is funding.

Transcript

Below is a rush transcript that may contain errors

GLENN: Anyway, he came out and he said, it's unbelievable. America is back! And it just felt that way.

STU: Seems like the audience thought that too.

I mean, the polls. Every guest on the show has mentioned the CBS poll today.

GLENN: Mainly because it's very satisfying.

STU: Yeah. I would say usually those polls typically don't work well for Republicans. Like, who won the debate? It's almost always Democrats, even when it's obvious Republicans won the debate. That was one of the reasons you knew Trump won the debate against Biden so easily. Because the polling actually showed he won it.

Even when -- if it's -- if a Republican wins, it usually just shows Republicans still win those polls.

GLENN: I know.

STU: It's kind of the same feeling I had with this one. And I'm part of it. I think there's several factors. Let me run these by you real quick, on this.

GLENN: Yes.

STU: So one is one of the first things people saw in that speech, was Al Green disrupting it. And people hate that. They --

GLENN: They do.

STU: Yes. The hard-core super AOC fans will like it.

And Al Green will get lots of donations because of his, quote, unquote, bravery. Standing up. Resistance.

Blah, blah, blah. It will work for Al Green. But the incentives here are screwed up. It works against his party. And it works for Donald Trump as well.

GLENN: It had. It does.

STU: So I think part of the reason, a lot of people probably watched the first 15 minutes, and that's it.

And they saw that, and they were annoyed by him.

GLENN: Yeah, they were annoyed. It's the same crap.

STU: Let it go. Let's see what he says.

You're wasting my time!

GLENN: I feel like that on the applause.

I hate the applause. I rather have the cut version with all the applause out.

Because I get it. I get it. I get it.

Just please. I want somebody to say, ladies and gentlemen, the president of the United States. Please save your applause to the end.

STU: Yeah, I would like the first line of that speech to be from the President. To be like, look, I've got a lot to get through. Please, don't applause, but it's hard. It's a trapping of that thing.

GLENN: I know. I know.

STU: Secondarily, people are speculating, just like when we don't really want to watch the Biden State of the Union, maybe a lot of Democrats didn't tune in. So the group watching it were more Republican. CBS did this poll. They should be correcting for that. I have not gone through the methodology of that poll. It shouldn't be the factor. If it is the factor, it's a really sloppy job by CBS. The other thing though is I think what you're getting at, is that number one, it was pretty optimistic. It wasn't the American carnage speech from 2017. It was a really optimistic speech.

GLENN: Right.

STU: You know, as much as we -- you know, as jaded media members get a little tired of, oh, here's 19 people in the audience. Who will tell their stories.

I do think that connects with people. A lot of those stories are really compelling.

GLENN: Those did.

GLENN: And inspiring.

STU: Yeah. So I think it was -- I think he did a good job which was part of it. Maverick and also, I think the democratic opposition as it usually does, backfired.

GLENN: So -- in a big way.

Because this is one of the things they are saying.

This is what Al Green is talking about. He said, he didn't have awe mandate.

That's what he was shouting from the floor. Because I didn't know. Nor, did I know what he was saying.

You don't have a mandate. And I have my cane. And I will scream at the moon, any minute.

But he said, you know, you don't have a mandate. This is something that the left is -- is trying out. That there was no mandate. Listen to Stephen A. Smith, as he schools The View on the mandate thing.

VOICE: And he's been going around with his cronies, touting his so-called landslide and blowout. When? When you get 1.5 percent popular vote, one of the smallest ever. And he won the general election by less than 15 percent. So what kind of mandate is this really?

VOICE: Oh, it is a mandate. And I am going to explain why, and I don't mind the -- I'm no supporter of Trump. I'm a supporter of truth and the facts. And here's the facts: The man won every swing state. He increased in terms of his voter turnout in his favor, from the standpoint of blacks, Latinos, and young voters. He increased his numbers in that regard from 2020. Eighty-nine percent of the counties shifted to the right. That's a mandate. We can sit around play around all we want to. In 2020, they didn't -- Trump didn't win the popular vote. He didn't win the electoral vote. As a matter of fact, the Republicans hadn't won the popular vote if I remember --

VOICE: Twenty years.

VOICE: -- since 2024. But they did this year. So 20 years after they last one a popular vote, they won the popular vote. They won the electoral college vote. The man won every swing state, and on top of that, 89 percent of the counties. Shifted gears. I don't understand how people can look at that and say, there's no mandate. There's a mandate.

VOICE: Well, it's a different definition of a mandate, I guess.

GLENN: It's my definition of a mandate. You know, you've got to go with mandate. We're The View. We make up our own definitions for words.

STU: I mean, I think two things can be true of this too. I think you can recognize, it was a relatively close election. It wasn't Reagan versus Mondale. It's not what it was.

GLENN: Correct.

STU: But it can still be a mandate.

He did shift all these democratic groups.

Firm correctly, every single state, shifted towards him.

Now, that doesn't mean he won all the states obviously.

But the states shifted towards Republicans.

So, you know, that's a big movement.

And I think a mandate is fair in this context.

He did win every swing state. Again, those swing states weren't blowouts.

It wasn't a 12-point victory in Michigan.

VOICE: 89 percent of the counties moved his way.

And look, you have to add one thing to this.

And that is, that's after an eight-year period of everyone, with any kind of voice or power, saying, he's a criminal. He's a sex abuser.

Whatever they could come up with.

That's all they said about him.

And his support grows!

STU: Yeah.

GLENN: Can you imagine if they would have just treated him, like they treated Ronald Reagan. Which they treated Ronald Reagan poorly. She's stupid. He didn't get it.

Blah, blah, blah. But he never did this. Nobody has ever gone through this. For that to move and him to grow. And him to have the whole thing just kind of switch over. Win the popular vote.
Win the electoral college. That is a mandate.

STU: I think that's totally fair.

You know, I think if you look at it. I think Biden won in 2020, the popular vote by something like four, four and a half percent, something like that. And it moved to 1.5 percent for Trump. Six-point move.

The current American system, which is pretty polarized when it comes to party. That is a massive shift. That is not a tiny little thing. And I think that totally qualifies as a mandate. That doesn't mean, it wasn't a close election.

Again, Trump had to win, one of those blue wall states. The biggest blowout of the blue wall states was 2 percent. We could have been stuck with Kamala Harris right now. That was not crazy. It was close.

That can said, what he's done here, and I think how -- the way he did it, which was as Stephen A. Smith points out, moving a lot of demographic groups, that don't normally consider Republicans, as part of that large move toward him. I think it would be silly to deny him. They want to do that because they want to deny that anything happening is supported by anyone, other than evil Nazis. But that's not the reality here.

GLENN: Yes. And it's not even Donald Trump. You know, you could say some of that movement came because the Democrats are so out of step with reality.

STU: Yeah. I think it's a big part of it.

GLENN: People are like, I can't vote for the other side.

STU: I think that's a huge part of it.

GLENN: I think that's huge, and they're just doubling down on it again.

STU: And we're talking about an election, where we have, what? A two-seat majority in Congress.

You know, it's close, relatively close in the Senate.

This is -- you know, we're at a very divided time in government. And I don't mean that, as far as -- everyone is polarized.

I mean, like, it's close. We are in a close period.

And that's kind of one of the things, that's been remarkable about this first six weeks.

He's been able to get through a lot.

Maintained his popularity, generally. Even though, we're in a situation that is that divided.

And that's one of the most impressive parts of the first six weeks.

GLENN: Let me show you, again, one of the reasons why I think he was so effective last night.

He's not -- he's not vengeful.

He's not making enemies lists. He's not doing anything like that.

He's just speaking the truth.

Listen to this, where he's talking about Joe Biden.

DONALD: And we've ended weaponized government. Where as an example, a sitting president is allowed to viciously prosecute his political opponent, like me. How did that work out? Not too good. Not too good.

GLENN: I mean, that is fantastic. Fantastic.

He -- the other thing I think is -- was so good. And I want to play both of these on my sheet. It's cut 24. Trump lays out some of the waste DOGE is discovered. I want to play this. Because I think the guy could be a comedian, and a really good comedian.

His timing is so incredibly good. His ad libs are hysterical. Listen to him talk about the waste.

DONALD: Just listen to some of the appalling waste, we have already identified. $22 billion from HHS to provide free housing and cars for illegal aliens.

$45 million for diversity, equity, and inclusion. Scholarships in Burma. $40 million to improve the social and economic inclusion of sedentary migrants. Nobody knows what that means.

$8 million to promote LGBTQIA+ in the African nation of Lesotho, which nobody has ever heard of.

GLENN: This is so good.

DONALD: $60 million for indigenous peoples and Afro-Colombian empowerment in Central America.

GLENN: Afro-Colombian.

DONALD: $8 million for making mice transgender. This is real.

$32 million for a left-wing propaganda operation in Moldova. $10 million for male circumcision in Mozambique. $20 million for the Arab Sesame Street in the Middle East. It's a program. $20 million for a program.

$1.9 billion to recently created decarbonization of homes committee, headed up, and we know she's involved, just at the last moment. The money was passed over, by a woman named Stacey Abrams. Have you ever heard of her?

GLENN: I think they're going to investigate. I think she might go to jail.

DONALD: A 3.5-million-dollar consulting contract for lavish fish monitoring. $1.5 million for voter confidence in Liberia. $14 million for social cohesion in Mali. $59 million for illegal alien hotel rooms in New York City.

These are real state -- he's done very well. 250,000 dollars to increase vegan local climate action innovation. In Zambia. $42 million for social and behavior change in Uganda. $14 million for approving public procurement in Serbia. $47 million for improving learning outcomes in Asia. Asia is doing very well with learning.
(laughter)
I don't know what we're doing. We could use it ourselves. And $101 million for DEI contracts at the Department of Education. The most ever paid, nothing even like it. Under the Trump administration, all of these scams and there are far worse. But I didn't think it was appropriate to talk about them.

GLENN: It's -- it was an amazing, amazing list that common sense ruled the night, including when he talked about the border. Listen to this.

DONALD: The media and our friends in the Democrat Party kept saying, we needed new legislation. We must have legislation to secure the border.

But it turned out, that all we really needed was a new president.
(laughter)

GLENN: Unbelievable.

STU: The listing quickly of all of the different things went on and on and on and on. And it reminded me of Family Guy. You know the cartoon Family Guy? There's a scene where there's a dead frog in his room. He's trying to scoop it up, and push it out the window like a piece of cardboard. And every time he does it, the frog kind of flops off and keeps coming down. And it goes on and on and on and on. And after a while, it just becomes so funny, because it goes on so long. And that's how I felt in that moment. He could have used three of those examples, and made a point. But he just beat it into your head. This is insanity and it has to stop.

THE GLENN BECK PODCAST

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The most INSANE Deep State story you've never heard

Was an NGO with deep government ties trying to RESTART the opium trade in Taliban-run Afghanistan while former Taliban members were on its payroll...only to be caught DESTROYING the evidence?! The State Department's Under Secretary for Public Diplomacy Darren Beattie joins Glenn Beck to expose what he found when he was made Acting President of the United States Institute of Peace. Plus, he debunks ProPublica’s claim that DOGE “targeted” an “Afghan scholar who fled the Taliban.”

Transcript

Below is a rush transcript that may contain errors

GLENN: Darren, welcome to the program. How are you? Darren, are you there? Is he there?

STU: Hmm.

GLENN: Okay. Check if he's there. Is he? Dick Cheney. Dick Cheney.

STU: Trying to shut him down. They don't want peace. They don't want peace.

GLENN: They don't. They don't.

He is -- he is a big-time anti-globalist. I've got to tell you, what we're doing with the State Department. I absolutely love. The State Department has been a big problem for this country for a very long time. It's what's gotten us into these global wars. These endless wars, and everything he is.

And, I mean, I don't know what happened to Marco rube, but he is tremendous.

And the way president Trump is appointing different people like Darren, it's fantastic. Darren, are you there? Darren.

STU: Something must be wrong with the lines. Because we are talking to him offline on the phone here. And it does seem to be working, but not coming through our broadcast board here for whatever reason.

GLENN: Well, let's see if we can get that fixed, and maybe let me just talk here for five, six minutes on something else. Then we'll take a break and come back and see if we can get him.

There's something else that I really want to talk about. And that is this flag-burning thing. Now, it's not an amendment.

This is something that the president is putting up in an executive order and has very little teeth to it.

But I -- I -- look, I understand. As a guy putting an enormous flagpole up at my house today.

I mean, an enormous flagpole.

I love the flag. I love it!

And there are a few things that make me more angry than see somebody you set our flag on fire.

For a lot of people, that's a punch in the gut, especially our military people. And it has been planted on distant battlefields. It's raced after victory. Saluted in the morning, or should be in our schools and folded and given to the hands of grieving families. It feels like spitting on every sacrifice, that ever made this nation possible. And the argument against flag burning is really simple: It dishonors the idea of all of that. Okay?

And it defends millions of people, including me. It disrespects, I think the veterans that bled. The families who mourned. The dream that binds us together.

However, here's the hard truth: Symbols only mean something, in a land where freedom is alive.

If you outlaw the burning of a flag, the you have placed the cloth above the Constitution that it represents. You have made the flag an idol.

We don't worship idols. If you can only praise the flag and never protest it, it just stops being a symbol of freedom. And starts being an idol of obedience.

Now, that's the argument for allowing it. At least to me.

Because the real strength of a free nation is -- is to -- it's -- it's how we protect, not the speech we love, but how we endure the speech we hate!

And the Supreme Court has already ruled on this. And, you know, they -- the line they drew wasn't an easy one. Freedom of speech, stops where it directly -- directly insights violence. And that's it same thing, kind of, in this executive order.

You can burn the flag. But if I'm not mistaken, but if it incites violence, then you're in trouble.

And that's true. But the bar of inciting violence is so incredibly high. And it's -- it doesn't have anything to do with speech that offends. It's not speech that stirs anger. Not speech that wants you to punch the speaker in the mouth. It's speech only, that provokes imminent and specific violence.

And unless it's that be with the government doesn't have any right to -- to get into the business of silencing speech. Ever. Ever. Ever.

It is a hard line. And that standard is really hard. It's painfully hard.

Because what our citizenship requires, this is civics. What our citizenships require, is that we defend -- oh, I hate this.

We defend the right of your opponent to mock everything that we hold sacred.

Now, I want you to think of this. You can burn a Bible. You can burn the Word of God. But some want to make it illegal to burn a flag. Where are our priorities? You can burn the Constitution. The words that actually are the ones that stir us into action. But you can't burn a flag.

You can't burn a Koran. Can't burn them. Can't. Can't.

You will -- you will quickly come to a quick end, not legally. But you will come to a quick end. I don't ever want to be like that. Ever!

You burn a Bible. I think you're a monster. What is wrong with you? What is wrong with you?

But you have a right to do it. Why are we drawing a line around the flag? It -- the reason is -- is because we feel things so passionately. And that is really a good thing, to feel love of country so passionately. But then we have to temper that. My father used to tell me, that I think this country needs to hear over and over again, every day. My father -- we would talk to somebody. And we would walk away. And he would go, I so disagree with everything that man just said. But, Glenn, son, he would say. I will fight to the death for his right to say it. He used to say that to me all the time. Which now lees me to believe, I know where I've got my strong opinions from. Because dad apparently would disagree with a lot of people all the time.

But that was the essence of freedom. That is the essence of what sets us apart. Standing for universal, eternal rights like free speech. It's not easy. It means you have to take the size of those people that offend you. It means -- it doesn't mean you have to disagree with it. You can fight against it. You can argue back and forth.

But you -- can you tolerate the insults to the things that you love most. That is so hard, and that is why most of the world does not have freedom of speech. It's too hard! But our Founders believed people are better than that. Our citizens can rule themselves!

And the only way you can rule yourself is if you don't have limits on freedom of speech. So the question is, do we want to remain free? Or do we want to just feel good? It really is that simple. It's why no one else has freedom of speech. It's too hard! I think we're up to the task. Okay. Give me 60 seconds. And then we will try again.

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(music)
All right. Let me -- let me bring Darren in. Darren, are you there now?

DARREN: Yes!
GLENN: Oh, God. Thank goodness.
Thank you for putting up with us. I don't know what happened with the phone system. But, first of all, tell me what the US Institute of Peace is. I've never even heard of it.

DARREN: That is a fantastic question. And I'll try to give the abbreviated answer, because I know we don't have several hours.

GLENN: Good. I know.

DARREN: But US Institute of Peace is one of lesser known, but quite important member of the NGO archipelago, that was created in the '80s. It belongs to the same cohorts as national endowments for democracy.

GLENN: Oh.

DARREN: And some other -- some other better known NGOs that really in the broad context of things. In kind of the sweep of things, was created as a kind of reorganization of the government structure in the aftermath of the church type committee hearings that expose a lot of the dirty dealings of government agencies such as the CIA, and so sort of a broader response to that government lie was to create this NGO layer of governance, with an armed distant plausible deniability, a kind of chameleon character of not exactly being government, not exactly being private, in order to fulfill some of those more sensitive functions that had been exposed in the course of the church hearings.

And so US Institute of Peace is one of those NGOs that had particular focus on conflict regions. But, of course, as I think you -- you suggested earlier, peace requires at the very least, an asterisk. Because there involves a lot of things, that conventional, most American citizens would not think should belong as part of the portfolio of something calling itself an institute of peace.

GLENN: So what was the thing with the -- with this Taliban member that was getting money from us?

DARREN: Right. So this is an interesting case. So there's a whole saga of a takeover of the US institute of peace under -- under DOGE.

And that's really a fascinating story unto itself. Just to give you a sense of what these characters were like. They barricaded themselves in the offices.

They sabotaged the physical infrastructure of the building. There were reports of there being loaded guns within the offices.

GLENN: Wow!

DARREN: There was one, like, hostage situation where they held a security guard under basically kind of a false imprisonment type situation. It was extremely intense.

Far more so than the better known story of USAID. And in the course of all of that, they tried to delete a terabyte of data, of accounting information that would indicate what kind of stuff they were up to.

What kind of people they were paying. And in the course of that, DOGE found that one of the people on their payroll. Was this curious figure, who had a prominent role in the Taliban government. And then seemed to kind of play a bunch of angles across each other.

Sort of one of these sixer types in the middle of Afghanistan.

The question is, what the heck is an organization like this, having an individual, who is a former Taliban member on their payroll.

It underscores how incredibly bizarre the whole arrangement is. And to just reinforce that. I think even more bizarre than having this former Taliban guy on the payroll is the kind of schizophrenic posture exhibited by the chief -- one truly bizarre thing is that one of the US Institute of Peace's main kind of policy agendas was basically lamenting the fact that the opium trade had dissipated under Taliban leadership. They had multiple reports coming out, basically saying, this is horrible, that the opium trade is diminished under the Taliban. Meaning, finding some way to restore it. How bizarre is that!

GLENN: What was their thinking?

DARREN: Well, it's -- it's very strange, and it depends on what kind of rabbit holes you want to go down. But the whole story of opium and Afghanistan and its connection to, you know, government entities, is a -- is a very intricate and delicate and fascinating one. But it seems very clear that the US Institute of Peace was involved in that story to some degree because their public reports. They had a full-the time guy of basically lamenting the fact that the opium trade dissipated under the Taliban. And, meanwhile, they're funding this former Taliban guy.

GLENN: Unbelievable. Now, ProPublica got this. And you have released the statement on it. And ProPublica just completely white-washed this -- said this guy was a victim, and his family was taken hostage. Was his family ever taken hostage because he was exposed?

And correct the ProPublica story, would you?

DARREN: Yeah, I mean, the ProPublica thing, as usual and as expected was a total joke.

GLENN: Yes.

DARREN: I mean, this guy, I'm not an expert on this particular person's history. But what's very clear is he was a former Taliban guy, and he was probably one of these people, who was playing all sides, made a lot of enemies. I know that there were several kind of attempts on his life by the Taliban, in the course of various -- various decades.

This has nothing to do with -- with DOGE.

I mean, he's a known quantity in the region.

And somebody who has made a lot of enemies.

And he was not -- he was on the payroll of the US institute of peace.

And nobody is expecting something like that. So then, and, again, there's this sort of hostile takeover situation.

Where the people are barricading he themselves in. Trying to delete all this data.

And sure enough, what's in the data, is stuff like this.

These random former Taliban guy, making his contract with $130,000.

GLENN: You know, this is the -- this is the real Deep State stuff, that I think bothers people so much.

Look, we expect our CIA to do stuff, we don't necessarily want to do it. We expect it.

When it's in the State Department.

When every department is pushing out money to NGOs to overthrow governments and everything else.

It's out of control!

It's just completely out of control.

And who is overseeing all of that.

DARREN: That's a great question.

I think part of the NGO -- UCEF was almost a cutout of a cutout.

A fourth of its money came from USAID.

In many ways, it was a cutout of USAID. Which itself was a cutout.

So there are many layers of distance. Plausible deniability.

And UCEF, I think institutionally really perfected this chameleon structure of being able to plausibly present itself as government. When that was convenient for what they were doing.

And also to present itself as a private organization, when that was convenient.

It's a very intricate setup that they had, that was truly optimized for this chameleon character of plausible denial operations. In conflict zones. Doing God knows what, with American taxpayer money.

And it's just an absolute hornet's nest.

We have recovered that terabyte that they tried to delete. And once we get things settled in the building itself, I intend to do a kind of transparency effort, whereby we release all of this material to the public.

GLENN: Good. Good.

DARREN: Just like I'm doing at the State Department. I'm currently acting as secretary at the State Department. And doing a transparency effort here. After I eliminated the global engagement center, which was sort of the internal censorship office within the State Department, decided, we've got to -- we've got to air this out to the public.

So within the next couple of weeks.

We'll have our next tranche of helps you of thousands of emails, documenting what this were doing.

GLENN: I would love you to go back on, through those emails.

I think you guys in the State Department are doing an amazing job. Thanks for being on.