This was President Trump in the State of the Union. But tonight, after just one year, I can say with dignity and pride that we have achieved a transformation like no one has ever seen before. And a turnaround for the ages. It is indeed a turnaround for the ages. Well, let's see. I guess the Democrats would obviously disagree, which is what they always do. But I want to bring in E.J. Antony. Of course, he is a guy well versed on all things your money and our economy. So, E.J., you've written and I enjoyed this very much. It was a commentary. I don't know where it originated, but our friends at the Tennessee Star, the commentary, quote, the economy is improving for Americans. And you wrote this along with Alan Mendenhall. So I want to just, you know, have a plain discussion about the economy. Of course, Donald Trump is talking up the economy, which is what a president does. And so I want to talk about the first year of the Trump administration and what he has been able to do, despite all of the issues with the Democrats and the Supreme Court standing in the way of tariffs. Let's just for now, just kind of broad brush, talk about what the president has accomplished economically in the first year. pretty remarkable dan on the one hand you have to acknowledge the fact that a lot of americans are still hurting right you have to acknowledge the fact that the economy is not yet working great for everybody there's no doubt about that we were basically imagine you're driving in the car down the highway and you realize uh-oh i missed my exit and i'm heading in the wrong direction right well you're going down at the highway at highway speeds you got to stop find a place to do a u-turn and head the other way. But what I think is really remarkable is the fact that in such a short period of time, the president has managed to do that U-turn and is now very quickly heading us back in the right direction. However, we still have lost ground to make up, if that makes sense. And I can give you a couple of things that I think illustrate that. One is the fact that if you look at what the average American can actually buy with his or her paychecks, not just the size of the paycheck, but what it can buy, it's up about 2% since Trump took office. Again, that's a reversal from Biden, where the size of your paycheck adjusted for inflation shrunk by about 4% over four years. So again, that tells you, number one, you've course corrected. You were heading in the wrong direction. Now you're heading in the right direction. But the second thing it tells you, which is also very important, is that you haven't yet made up all that lost ground from the Biden years. Well, and that's what I was going to say, EJ. And by the way, I didn't introduce you correctly. E.J. and Tony, of course, folks have seen you on Fox News, Heritage Foundation as well. We I don't think people understand how much ground we lost during the Biden administration. And the other day, I think it was yesterday, I even spoke about how there's a lot of people that spent a lot of money utilizing credit cards to simply buy groceries or keep the heat on. So even if you just want to narrow cast it into a credit card debt that people are still in because they had to use those credit cards during the Biden administration, the the consequences and ramifications of the four years of Joe Biden. I mean, people are still feeling that today, right? Well, exactly. Dan, that's such a great point. If you rack up, as Americans did, over a trillion dollars of credit card debt during the Biden years, that credit card debt doesn't magically go away just because Trump gets into office. And although we're not seeing the same worsening of credit card debt that we saw before, that also doesn't mean that the credit card debt magically goes away. No, it has to get paid down. And that's going to take time. And that's going to take rising incomes. And we're seeing that. But again, it's not going to happen overnight. I don't think that's a very realistic expectation. You know, Biden wasn't able to create the mess overnight. It took him and the big spenders in Congress from both parties, by the way, Republican and Democrat, created this mess. It took them four years to create all of these problems. It's going to take us some time to claw our way out. But I'm happy. It's the biggest game on the planet and nobody breaks it down like Jim Rome. Super Bowl run. Who do you think will be the last one standing this year? Fearless debate and the best callers in sports. Okay, what'd you say? Defense wins Super Bowl. That defense absolutely is Super Bowl caliber. The quarterbacking sure as hell wasn't. He's the spitfire of sports smack. A lot to get to, and I'm not sure you're going to like all of it. Honestly, I don't even care if you like all of it or not. I have a job to do. The Jim Rome Show. Get up in here. Follow and listen on your favorite platform. Happy to say, again, things are looking up. People's retirement accounts, the average 401k is up 15.8 percent. And that's after adjusting for inflation under this president. Things are looking up. Homes are becoming more affordable today, not less. Again, it's not all sunshine and rainbows, but we are heading in the right direction. The monthly mortgage payment on a median price home is about 8 percent less now than it was a year ago. Again, I'm not saying we've made enough progress, but we are making progress. See, it's funny because you're doing, EJ, what I do, which is we're not done yet. We know there's still things that need to happen. We're not out of the woods yet, but we can, you know, we can see the clearing, you know, maybe 10, 15 yards in front of us. We do understand that there are still things that are too expensive. You know, one thing that I think that people, I don't know, maybe I don't know if they don't understand it or maybe they're just, you know, sort of hardheaded. But people will say, well, inflation is still too high. And I understand that. Explain the concept where inflation is getting better. It's not where we want it, but it is slowing down. And that's the important part to talk about that. Well, if I can go back to the driving down the road analogy, because I think it works very well for illustrating this point. Imagine you are driving down the highway. You're doing 60 miles an hour, and you see the mile markers on the side of the road. Well, that's 60 miles an hour. That's your speed. That's the rate at which you're going down the road, okay? Inflation is the rate of increase in prices. It's how fast prices are going up. That mile marker on the side of the road, that's the price level. That shows you where you are. Now, let's say traffic is heavy. You slow down to 30 miles an hour. Well, your rate of increase goes down to 30, right? Your inflation rate just got cut in half. But guess what? The mile markers on the side of the road are still going to go up. But now, instead of seeing one every minute, you're going to see one every two minutes. Because, again, your speed of increase, your pace got cut in half. Imagine traffic is so bad, you come to a complete standstill. Your speedometer falls to zero. That's like inflation falling to zero. The mile markers are not going up anymore. But guess what? The mile markers are not going down. To make that happen, you have to do what we said earlier. You have to make a U-turn and start heading in the other direction. That's what we call deflation. And fortunately, we actually have seen deflation in, for example, housing in certain markets. like Dallas, like Tampa, like Miami, like Phoenix, like Austin. We've actually seen rents come down in those locations There are certain consumer staples like gasoline like eggs where those prices are lower today than they were a year ago as well So again we making progress but it going to take time to fix this By the way Nashville was also on that list of cities where rent has been going down Talk about, if we could, real wages, because I think that that is also something that, number one, is really important. Number two, I bring this up all the time, but talk about real wages and how paychecks and how they relate to the inflation data? Well, when we talk about the size of people's paychecks, everybody wants to get paid more, right? That's a good thing. The problem that we saw under the Biden years, though, was the fact that although paychecks were increasing, although you had wage growth, inflation was outpacing the wage growth. In other words, prices were rising faster than paychecks were growing. And so a 20 percent larger paycheck over four years, that may sound like great wage growth. I'd be thrilled if I got 20 percent raises over the course of four years, cumulative pay increases. But guess what? Even that couldn't keep up with the price increases that we saw. And we should also point out that these are just the official price increases, which during Biden really underestimated the actual amount of inflation we had. For example, the median price home that we talked about earlier, the monthly mortgage payment on that median price home over Biden's four years actually went up a little more than 100 percent. It was like 104 percent. It doubled. Think of that. The cost to own a home literally doubled in just four years. According to our official inflation metrics that we use, their proxy for the cost of homeownership was only up about 20 or 25 percent during those four years. So a gross understatement of what really happened and how unaffordable life became. Now, again, fortunately, we are seeing in a lot of markets where rents and mortgage payments, monthly mortgage payments, have actually declined over the last year. So that's good progress. But we want to see even more progress. We want to go even further. We want to double down on the public policies that are making your paycheck go further, because that's how we're going to reverse the damage that made your paycheck not go as far. We want to reverse the policies that turned higher wages into a lower standard of living. We want your higher wages to actually be a higher standard of living for you. And E.J., let's talk about tariffs. We know that Donald Trump, he was the Supreme Court ruled against him on the way that he was implementing tariffs. And and so a lot of people say and there's a lot of debate about this, that the tariffs are essentially a tax on the American people because the companies that are experiencing the tariffs will simply pass along those costs to the American people. There have been studies that have shown contradictory ideas. There's some studies that show that, no, that is not the case. Other studies have shown, yes, it is the case. And so I guess my question to you is, what have we learned about how the president is going to respond to the Supreme Court telling him that the way that he was implementing tariffs was unconstitutional? What is next and the impact on people's wallets? Well, he's going to do exactly what we've been saying he's going to do, which is he's going to use one of a half a dozen other tariff authorities that have been granted to him by the Congress in order to reimplement all or nearly all of the exact same tariffs. And this is what was outlined, I thought, very articulately in Justice Kavanaugh's dissent. And I don't say that even necessarily because I agree with the entirety of his dissent and the fact that he would have ruled in favor of the president. It's not that. It's that I think he correctly pointed out the fact that the president, if he just checks a few more procedural boxes, can do the exact same thing anyway. And this is something I think the whole Wall Street Journal crowd really missed because they're just so anti-tariff. I think they refuse to see past that ideology. And they drummed up this narrative of if the court strikes down these tariffs, if they rule against the president, then tariffs are gone forever. No, tariffs are here to stay. And that's something I wish people could really wrap their heads around. Again, if the president just jumps through a few more legal hoops, which his team is now already doing, they can implement all or close to all of the same tariffs just with slightly different mechanisms, with other laws that are between 50 and 100 years old, and most of them have already been used before and have been held up in court. So it's not like you're going to get those overturned. And then the one thing I'll say about the companies and this whole narrative that the consumer is paying the tax, if that's the case, if it really is true, and I think it's true in certain instances but not in others, you've got to look at these things on a case-by-case basis. But if it was really true what the Wall Street Journal crowd says about all of these tariffs just get passed on to the consumer and the consumer pays higher prices, then why is it all of these importers right now are trying to sue to get a refund? If they actually pass the cost on to the consumer, then they're not going to be able to demonstrate in court that they bore any of the cost. Because I'll tell you what happened in reality. A lot of these importers either ate the cost themselves or they told the exporter in China, you're going to sell this to me for less or I'm not buying it because you're going to eat the cost of the tariff. Or they passed it on to the wholesaler and the wholesaler ate it or the wholesaler passed it on to the retailer and the retailer ate it. But when we look at the actual inflation data, when we look at the price data that we have, we are not seeing the full cost of these tariffs being passed on to the consumer. In certain instances, yes, I think there's evidence that there was a cost being passed on. But in most of them, I just don't find the evidence. It's not there. You know, we haven't even talked about the lower gas prices or the lower taxes that people are experiencing because of the one big, beautiful bill. We've only got about 90 seconds left. And so talk about what you call in this article, this opinion piece in the Tennessee Star, the legislative cornerstone of this economic moment is the one big, beautiful bill. Talk about that and how it's helping folks. Well, it's certainly helping a lot of blue collar folks who rely on on things like tipped income or overtime to make a lot of their income. you're going to have several, you're going to have, I think, several different classifications of workers whose families are now going to save literally thousands of dollars a year in taxes. In fact, the Trump State of the Union speech, he highlighted one family where they have both parents working, trying to, you know, make ends meet. Their federal tax liability just got cut in half because of the changes in this legislation. But on top of all those pro-work incentives that are in the bill, which are so important. It has pro-investment incentives. And that is already, we are literally already seeing the effects of that turbocharging investment, which is helping boost productivity. And that's so important because productivity is where you get the wage growth. It's where you get the rise in real incomes. It's where you get long run economic growth. That's what's in this bill. It is already helping us turn. The CJ Pearson Show. Every week, we'll take on the biggest cultural, political, and moral battles in America head on. CJ presents the most passionate voices in the black community When you going around and talking to people in actual communities you get to know what people actually care about As a black man why can I be the first one in my family to graduate from college Why can't it be me? Shift the way that I think about the world. Bold truth, real conviction, zero permission. This is The C.J. Pearson Show. The C.J. Pearson Show. Follow and listen on your favorite platform. Turn around the economy and get us going in the right direction. Okay. Give me your prediction. And I know that you people, you economists hate this, but give me your prediction. So midterm elections, November 3rd is when the midterms happen of this year. So where do you think the economy is going to be in 60 seconds? Tell me where you think the economy is going to be come November 3rd. I think we're going to be in a good place domestically. The big wild card right now, though, is overseas. Are we going to get dragged into another war in the Middle East? If that's the case, I'd say all bets are off and not in a good way. I don't see any positives from economic growth, for example, if we get, again, dragged into a conflict with Iran. If we can stay out of that whole quagmire, that whole morass that is the Middle East, I think we're going to see the economy growing faster six months from now. I think people's paychecks will be buying more than they do right now six months from now. And I think that's going to bode very well for the president. All right, E.J., always great to have you on the program to shine some light on what is typically a very divisive and, you know, but a very relevant subject to folks. How can people find you on X? The handle there is at real E.J. Antonio, and that's going to be the best place to find me is on X. All right, E.J., always great to have you on. Welcome on into the program. This is Ali Bradley, senior immigration and border correspondent for NewsNation. Ali, thank you very much for joining us. This headline was alarming. And I'm going to tell you why, because I am from Southern California. This is the headline. What is next in the fight against fentanyl? Fears grow that cartel violence could spread to Southern California. So let's talk about this. Ali Bradley, again, thank you for joining us. So Southern California, you're talking about San Diego. We're talking about perhaps Los Angeles. So tell me what your fears are. Yeah, so obviously when it comes to Southern California, you have the southern border right there, right across the way as Tijuana. So you obviously have the concerns that that could be a spillover flashpoint for the cartels. We've seen them battling each other very close to our southern border. We've seen all the firefighting happening, the blockades, all of the kind of chaos that they're orchestrating down there. And so there is that concern that it could spill over. But I don't want to fear monger either. And we need to be realist on this as well, because despite all the chaos that we're seeing down there, there's no confirmed cartel violence actually crossing into the United States as of right now. We know I can't dismiss this. So we know the cartel is present in all 50 states, but those aren't the ones having all out battles right now. That's happening south of our border. And instability in Mexico can obviously impact the border communities, travel, security. We know all of those things were impacted. We had airports shut down, things like that. So people were stuck over in Mexico. Right now, yesterday we saw in the Tijuana area, they were burning some vehicles, things like that were happening. So we did see that violence get dangerously close to our southern border. But authorities do say that that spillover cartel violence is pretty rare. We don't see that very often. And the Mexican embassy is saying security has stabilized in the country following those operations to take out El Mencho and Jalisco. So we're seeing those things kind of stabilize again. And we know that the Puerto Vallarta International Airport is reopened. So things like that are kind of stabilized. But the reality is the cartel is not stabilized. So when you cut off the head of the snake, when you take out Al Mencho, who was the most wanted cartel leader, he had a $15 million bounty on his head from the United States. When you take him out, the snake grows back several more heads. So when it comes to the flow of fentanyl, especially San Diego is one of those kind thoroughfares where they've regularly moved fentanyl into the United States. San Diego sector rivals the Tucson sector. Nogales, namely in Arizona, is the other area where we see fentanyl flow. So San Diego is an area they're keeping an eye on as well because fentanyl is going to continue to flow, according to experts, because the pipeline of drugs is not connected to just one singular figure is connected to the entire pipeline, right? So when it comes to that, you might take out the leader, but other commanders are likely going to step in to keep the distribution going because those pipelines weren't dismantled. Those road networks, how they're getting the drugs in, all of those things are still open and going to continue. So we're going to likely continue to see fentanyl come in. But the reality is we talked with a DEA administrator, a former DEA administrator who says that the drugs likely already are here because a lot of the chemicals likely came in when the border was open for four years. And now we have people with pill presses. As I mentioned, the cartel is present in all 50 states. You have people with pill presses that are able to crank out thousands of fentanyl pills in the interior of the United States. So you no longer have to get it across the border. So that's something that we're seeing as well. So we're definitely keeping a close eye on fentanyl seizures. They have dropped dramatically under the Trump administration. But again, that doesn't mean that it's not in the country because people don't die off interdicted drugs. And we're still seeing people die from fentanyl. Ali Bradley, senior immigration and border correspondent for News Nation. So there's a bunch of these ingredients already here and they came in under the Biden administration. Is it a silly question to ask, OK, so how much is here and how long till this supply runs out and what can we do? Yeah, I'm not really sure about how much could be here. Obviously, we knew for years that the precursor chemicals were coming in from China and then they were smuggling it across the border. Right. Well, now we know that that's in the interior of the country. The DEA administrator was talking about one single case where one guy had pressed one hundred thousand pills in an hour. And he was not a cartel member. He was just a regular guy who was pressing pills and distributing fentanyl. And the Postal Service was involved in that case as well. And so we do know that it's in the interior, 100,000 pills in an hour. That's substantial. And so when you're looking at one single individual being able to pull that off, you can imagine that he's not the only one and that that could be a real case scenario across the board if people have their hands on those chemicals. Is there still these chemicals coming across the border? I know that you said that a lot of it is here already and it came through during Biden. But, you know, Trump has effectively shut down the border from illegal immigration. As far as people goes, do we know how much of these drugs are still able to get through? They are still seizing fentanyl, meth and cocaine. And that's another thing is they've kind of pivoted a lot to methamphetamine because it's easier to get liquid. across the border than it is to get something in a pill form. So they've pivoted a lot to methamphetamine when it comes to smuggling. They've also pivoted to cocaine and are lacing the cocaine with fentanyl in order to get fentanyl into the U.S. So anything can be laced with fentanyl at this point. But when it comes to how much they're seizing, they're still getting loads of fentanyl pills in gas tanks in indiscriminate locations where they trying to conceal it throughout And again mostly And again mostly of that we seeing is in the Nogales area the Tucson sector of the Border Patrol. So that's what we see is still happening, that they're still seizing thousands of pills at the ports of entry. So they're definitely, you know, having those issues still come across the border, but they're catching it when they do see it. They have enhanced screening capabilities at these ports of entry, but lawmakers are pushing for even more. They're also pushing for higher penalties when it comes to drug traffickers. So we're seeing a couple of different things at play here that should, you know, cut down on the movement of the drug to the southern border. But again, if it's already here, being able to identify that and go after that is not really the priority, right? We're not really going around sniffing out pill presses. We're looking at the southern border for fentanyl being smuggled. So they might need to kind of pivot a little bit on how they're going after this drug being in the country already. Joan, Allie Bradley left. What? I had a great question all queued up, and I guess she thought that we were done. Oh, no. That's okay. Do we have the phone number? Can we call her back? Because I did. I had a great question all queued up and ready to go. That's a shame. That's why I said 15 seconds is all I needed. To check traffic, we got to stop doing the traffic at the quarters. But then people are stuck in traffic. So we have to continue to do traffic. Yeah. And I'm going to throw, I'm going to throw, beep, beep, beep. I'm going to throw Sam right under the bus. Hey, Sam, when we do interviews, tell him we got to take a quick 15 second look at traffic. And then we'll go back to them because that is essentially what happens. But that's okay. You know what I'm going to ask her? What are you going to ask her? I'm going to ask her. Let's talk about the impact of President Trump designating the cartels as foreign terrorist organizations. Ali, thank you very much for coming back with us. Apparently you thought that we were done and you're like, good, I don't want to talk to him anymore. No, I would love to stay and chat all morning. That's just usually my cue to cut. No, it's all good. We got to do a little traffic report there. Real quickly, President Trump designating these cartels as foreign terrorist organizations. How much has that helped in the battle against fentanyl and the drug cartels? So when it comes to the terrorist organization designations, that means that they have sanctions on them where they can go after their financial pipelines, go after their assets and things like that. Now, obviously, those things all contribute to the flow of fentanyl in the drug pipeline, because if they're not making money, they don't have money to then shell out to, you know, create the drug, make the drug, and move the drug, because all of that takes time, effort, and money. But they don't operate like we do in the States. They have all the time, effort, and money under the sun right now. So when it comes to sanctioning them, I don't think that it's doing much to cut down on the drug flow. But I think that it is doing something to the cartels for them being operational, if that makes sense. Because when it comes to the drugs, they have so many people that are moving that drug. Like I said, you cut off the head of the snake, you kill Almencho. That does not mean that the drug is going to stop moving. And that's their MO is to make money. Right now, the border is essentially secure. So they're not moving people across the border nearly as much. We are still seeing a little bit of that, but we are not seeing it to the levels that they were. They were making $13 billion a year just moving humans into the United States. And now they're just focused on drugs once again, which was their original kind of MO. And so when it comes to making money, they're going to do everything that they can to move drugs into the United States. So they're still operating. They're still doing that. The Trump administration, though, does say that the secure border is why we're seeing fewer seizures. Again, they have experts that say, well, we also have the drug in the interior. So I don't think that the terrorist designation is as heavy as a lift or a weight on them as I think the American people think it is. We also aren't really seeing when, say, when they arrest a TDA member, Trendy Aragua, or when they arrest a CJNG member. We're not seeing like terrorism charges with that. We're just seeing them deported, right, or removed from the country. So you don't have that additional layer of enforcement either. And I'm not really sure why. I think that the terrorist designation is more so so that it opens the door so that they can go in and kind of go after them when the time is right. like Al Mencho, when they were able to kind of provide Mexico intel and share information and go in and kind of assist with their takedown of that cartel boss. So I think that the sanctions are more so just to open the door for the U.S. if and when the time is right to go after some of these leaders. I got to ask. So there have been some people within Mexico, within Mexican, Mexico's government, a senator, if I'm not mistaken, accusing the president of Mexico, So Scheinbaum of really cooperating, acquiescing to the cartels is pretty serious accusation in your reporting. Have you noticed, do you have an opinion on whether or not she is anti cartel working with the cartels or essentially just trying to stay alive? You know, I think that there's always a level of kind of a state sponsored cartel, if you will. There's always a cartel that kind of has favor from the administration. AMLO had, you know, some kind of favoritism with cartels as well. I think that there's a combination of having kind of being working with the cartels so that they don't kill you or so that they don't make things worse. I think there's a level of that. But I also think that there's a level that she knows exactly what's going on and how these cartels operate. and she could do more to prevent them from moving drugs and people into the country. She could do more to prevent them from all out attacks on each other and its people. But I don't but I don't think that she is. And so that begs the question as to why. Right. And so I don't want to take off my journalism hat and say I believe that she is working with the cartels because that's not the case. But I do believe she knows how to stop them and she's not. very good ali i i really appreciate uh your your analysis on this and your reporting on this and uh you have a great week thank you so much god bless you guys god bless you that's a that's a first first blessing you've had that's the that's the you know it's so interesting that's the first time uh reporters actually said god bless you to me and i didn't even sneeze and you didn't sneeze no yeah why am i was i was taken aback by that i love that that She said, God bless you guys out there. That was pretty cool, actually. Allie Bradley. Well, she knows we work with crappy phone equipment. Is that what it is? We need all the blessings we can get. We do. Well, it's not just the phone equipment. It's the computer equipment. It's all kinds of equipment. Occasionally the host brain. Man, why are you hating? I've had a good show today. Yeah. Sam. Touch my knobs. Excuse me? Moving right along. Mike Trott. You ready? Let's do it. Hosted by former Navy SEAL Mike Ridland. It's unfiltered. You know, when you go to the sound of the gun, bam, you're gone. It's weird. I mean, I've had so many near-death experiences. It's raw. I love this country. I offered my life to serve this nation and protect its people. The question, you know, what's the meaning of life? And to me, it just boils down to one single word, which is purpose. Mike Trott. Follow and listen on your favorite platform. Mike Trott.
