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Ep. 14: Texas Democratic Veterans on Venezuela
84 Plays11 days ago
Richardson Area Democrats (RAD) invited Mission: Texas to moderate a special panel of Democratic veterans and military civilians running for office across North Texas for an urgent, in-depth conversation about Venezuela, war powers, and the future of American democracy.
Former service members and current candidates from Congress to the Texas House and Senate break down what’s happening, what it means for U.S. foreign policy, why congressional authorization matters, and how unchecked executive power puts service members, families, and global stability at risk — and what voters can do right now to change the trajectory.
In this episode, we cover:
- What led to U.S. military action in Venezuela and why it matters
- Why Congress has a constitutional role in declaring war
- How modern foreign policy decisions affect everyday Americans
- The real risks to service members and their families
- What’s at stake for global stability, democracy, and the 2026 midterms
- How voters can take action locally to protect democratic norms
We were joined by:
Kevin Burge - CD 24
Keenen Colbert - TX SD2
Milah Flores - CD17
Zach Herbert - TX HD112
Evan Hunt - CD3
Ernest Lineberger - CD26
William Marks - CD25
Nathan Smith - Tarrant County District Clerk
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Transcript
Introduction to Mission Texas
00:00:00
Speaker
Howdy. This is Mission Texas. A political podcast about winning Texas by 2032 or else we may lose the White House for a generation. I'm one of your hosts, Alex Clark.
00:00:13
Speaker
And I am Kate Rumsey. Other podcasts may focus on the day to day the next election. But we are keeping the eyes of Texas on the bigger prize.
Setting the Scene: US-Venezuela Military Event
00:00:23
Speaker
What happens after the next census?
00:00:27
Speaker
Welcome. I'm Jenny Laughlin, President of Richardson Area Democrats. Thank you for taking the time to to show up tonight. Saturday morning, we all woke up to news that the United States military had invaded Venezuela, bombing various points in and around the capital of Caracas, as well as ports and military complexes, which all sounded a lot like we had gone to war.
00:00:51
Speaker
Shortly thereafter, reports of having captured the president and his wife hit hit the air. This was all underlaid with reality that Congress had not given authorization to attack Venezuela.
00:01:04
Speaker
My head was spinning, and I figured I wasn't the only one who would benefit from some grounding. I wanted to hear from someone who knew more than me about military operations, so I reached out to a few candidates who observed.
00:01:18
Speaker
I wouldn't say it made me feel better, but there is value in knowing truth and facts. And so we bring this conversation to you tonight. If you have not already, please smash the subscribe button so that you can participate in the conversation.
Military Insights and Service Member Experiences
00:01:35
Speaker
For security reasons, only subscribers who have been subscribed for at least five minutes can ask questions and make comments. And we will be monitoring the comments.
00:01:46
Speaker
I'd like to introduce the moderator, yourself, former candidate and veteran, who currently serves in the Air Force Reserves as JAG. That stands for Judge Advocate General's Office, or in case you didn't know, like I didn't.
00:02:03
Speaker
Kate Rumsey, along with her co-host Alex Clark, have a podcast called Mission Texas about flipping Texas blue. We're thankful that they could help us out tonight. And without further ado, I'll ask Kate to take it from here.
00:02:17
Speaker
Thank you, Jenny, and thank you, Richardson area Democrats. We are so excited to be here again. My name is Kate. I have a co-host, Alex Clark, who's also on.
00:02:28
Speaker
As Jenny said, we are hosting a podcast called Mission Texas. It started this fall where we're interviewing people all over the state to talk about how we're gonna actually flip this place Because we need to by the next census or else we're going to lose the White House. We are gaining more congressional seats here in Texas because we've got more people coming.
00:02:45
Speaker
And that means we have more electoral votes and power. So we're trying to figure out how to do it, what the plan is, and also provide you information on how we are going to flip it and what you can do to be a part of it.
00:02:55
Speaker
But we both are people from the military. As Tony said, I'm still in the Air Force Reserves as a lawyer. And my co-host, Alex, is an Air Force veteran. So we are mission oriented, hence the name Mission Texas.
00:03:11
Speaker
I should say at the outset, as a lawyer, I have to have a disclaimer. we None of us here on this ah this Zoom call and on YouTube represent the viewpoints of our employers, and we do not represent the viewpoints of the Department of Defense or in my case, the
Veterans in Politics: Candidates' Introductions
00:03:25
Speaker
Air Force. I'm not in orders. This is all of our personal time.
00:03:29
Speaker
But one of our goals has been always to interview a bunch of service members, people who are veterans and also serve in a civilian capacity. So we are so excited that we were able to do this with Rad. So without further ado, I want before we so dive into what happened yesterday and what led up to that, to go around the horn and ask each of our candidates, because we've got a lot of them here tonight. ah to tell us where they are running, who they are, and also what is their service background. We got people who are also served in a civilian and military capacity. So I'm going to go in order of alphabetical ah order by the last name. And my first person is Kevin Burge, who's running in my neck of the woods. So Kevin, take it away.
00:04:10
Speaker
All right. Well, thank you so much, Kate. Appreciate the the introduction. And thank you, Jenny from RAD for hosting this. Again, my name is Kevin Burge. I'm running for Congress in the 24th District. That's Tarrant County and Dallas County, northern parts of it.
00:04:28
Speaker
I was in the Marine Corps for about eight and a half years. I have two tours in Iraq, in Altacadum and Fallujah. After the Marine Corps, I joined the Defense Intelligence Agency.
00:04:40
Speaker
And I had another tour to Kabul, Afghanistan. So and I've been I've worked with in for around nearly every three letter intelligence agency in Washington, D.C. as well. So thank you very much.
00:04:55
Speaker
Yeah. Running against Beth Van Dyne in my area, who has been doing nothing but reposting what Trump has said recently and about the Venezuelan conflict. So next person is Kenan Colbert.
00:05:06
Speaker
Pleasure for to be here. My name is Kenan Colbert. I'm running for Senator of District 2 here in Texas. My background in the military, I served in the Marine Corps, like Kevin, for a little over eight years.
00:05:19
Speaker
My first four years, I served as an infantry mortarman, and my last four years, I served as the commission officer, as a logistics officer. um i'm I'm truly honored and humbled to be in the presence of of such great fine folks that are trying to make a positive difference in our state and in our country, and I'm happy to be here.
00:05:40
Speaker
Amazing. And I should say, as you probably alluded to, that we're all Democrats and we've all got of this service history. And so I think that's pretty incredible, especially given all of our collective service to our country and all of us taking oaths to that, to the Constitution. The next person, Mila Flores.
00:05:58
Speaker
everybody. My name is Mila Flores. I am running for Congress in Texas District 17. So i'm I think I'm the one out here who's not in North Texas. I'm in the Waco area, the Round Rock area. So I'm excited to be here. I um was civilian personnel, GIA civilian, and and I have worked for the Army Air Force and Space Force, resigned last year, and I'm doing this to make a difference. I feel like I can make a bigger change on this side of things. So Amazing.
00:06:26
Speaker
Thank you, Mila. We love people from Waco, too. So ah Zach Herbert. Hi, I'm Zach Herbert. I'm running for House District 112 the Texas House of Representatives. I'm a Marine Corps veteran as well. I did almost four years in the Marines as a judge advocate. And my job was to defend Marines and sailors that were accused of crimes in courts martial.
00:06:51
Speaker
Another a lawyer. Yes. i love it. um Thank you, Zach. Evan Hunt. Thank you for having me on. Honored to be here. i am running for federal Congress, third district against ah we Republican incumbent Keith Self.
00:07:04
Speaker
That's all the way from McKinney all the way out to Mount Pleasant now. So it stretches across seven counties. I'm a 20 year force combat veteran. I flew in the back of B-1 bombers as a weapons systems officer, multiple combat missions and Operation Enduring Freedom, Operation New Dawn, Iraq and Afghanistan.
00:07:22
Speaker
i did mission planning and I ended up retiring as Lieutenant Colonel.
Congressional Oversight in Military Operations
00:07:25
Speaker
as a commander of a C-130 maintenance unit. Thank you. Wow. I'm wondering who's the highest ranking on this call. ah You might be beating us all, Evan, but thank you. I'm glad we have another Air Force person, sir, I should say. Next, Ernest Weinberger.
00:07:43
Speaker
Hi, I'm Ernest Lineberger, and thank you so much for having me. So ah I was actually a yeah preacher's kid, a chaplain's son, ah U.S. Navy. and We spent time on Marine Corps bases and ah and Navy bases while I was growing up.
00:07:58
Speaker
I joined a through ROTC to get through college. And then ah Currently retired as a naval officer, specialized in nuclear power, served tours on multiple warships and shore commands.
00:08:14
Speaker
I was also on the USS Nimitz. That might be my closest tour of duty to this attack that we' we're going to talk about. But I also did a lot of Caribbean anti-drug ops on a destroyer.
00:08:27
Speaker
multiple months coming down into the Caribbean and stopping ships. But ah that's that's me. I'm running for Congress in ah North Texas. It's CD26. That's Denton, Cook, and Wise Counties, north of DFW.
00:08:41
Speaker
Thank you, Ernest. And I see your sign in the back. I love that. Gotta always be hustling, I guess. William Marks. Hey, friends. My name is William Marks. I'm running for Congress in Texas, Congressional District 25. That's Arlington, Fort Worth and 12 additional counties to the West.
00:09:00
Speaker
I'm a 22-year Navy combat veteran. My final assignment was senior military spokesperson for the Defense Intelligence Agency. And I've been seeing this circus at a classified and unclassified level since about 2015.
00:09:17
Speaker
This circus. Okay. Thank you, William. And then our last person, last but not least, Nathan Smith. hello i'm Nathan Smith, um I am running for Tarrant County District Clerk, which is on all Tarrant County ballots. It's Tarrant County government position. Nobody knows what it is, so don't worry if you don't.
00:09:37
Speaker
um I am and a former army officer. I did seven
Planning and Intelligence in Military Operations
00:09:41
Speaker
years on active duty, one combat deployment to Afghanistan. and one operational deployment to Kuwait.
00:09:47
Speaker
um I got a Bronze Star from the first deployment. I'm from a three generation military officer family. My grandfather was World War II fighter pilot. My grandmother was a Navy nurse and my both of my parents were naval officers. That's pretty much me.
00:10:03
Speaker
Thank you, Nathan. Okay, well, I think that's everybody. Well, I wanted to just dive in to what happened ah yesterday, but we didn't just plop a bunch of people in the middle of Venezuela.
00:10:16
Speaker
I believe there is an escalation. Somehow we got people down to the Caribbean. And I'm wondering, Ernest, how, especially given your experience that you just told us about, like, how do you perceive how we got to yesterday, that escalation?
00:10:29
Speaker
yes Yes, and I'd like to go a little further back. So World War two ended about 1945. Then we had the Korean War, 50 to 53, the Vietnam War, 55 to 75.
00:10:42
Speaker
And we stopped drafting at about that point, drafting people. So in about the 1970s, our Congress had about 57% veterans in the U.S. House and about 70% veterans in the Senate.
00:10:58
Speaker
Today, both the House and the Senate are 18%.
00:11:03
Speaker
So I'm really excited to see this group of candidates. And I hope a lot of us have our seatbelts buckled and we're ready to flip these seats because we need this veterans perspective on a lot that's going on.
00:11:17
Speaker
There's been a lot, you know, from the Falklands War with Argentina and the British, there's been a lot going on. In the southern hemisphere, there's been a lot of drugs coming from the south to north.
00:11:27
Speaker
I spent a lot of time on a destroyer stopping just all kinds of vessels, fishing vessels, cargo vessels, executives with their families on a sailboat and searching them and and sending them on their way. We did not shoot one back in the day.
00:11:43
Speaker
I don't know why the executive branch decided that drugs coming from boats from Venezuela were fair targets for shooting.
00:11:56
Speaker
I don't know why. And I'm really, ah i don't know if the right word is, but I'm frustrated, I guess, that the Congress didn't do more to put a stop to it, that somebody, we didn't get more JAG involved. But clearly when DOGE first started taking hold at the at the beginning of 2025 after the inauguration, they got rid of all the inspector generals. They got rid of many people that look at what's going on and and can put a stop to things.
00:12:29
Speaker
and We've seen the Department of Defense has ah eliminated a lot of the news people that they they talk to, the news pool. And they only let people in there that are friendly to them now.
00:12:42
Speaker
And they talk a lot about loyalty and and they've been trying to, and they have been getting rid of a lot of ah flag officers and other people who might resist. Early in the attacks on these boats, we had a flag officer resign and say, I'm not going to be part of this. I think today we have attacked 35 boats and killed 115 people in those boats. Interestingly enough, some of those were in the Pacific.
00:13:10
Speaker
Venezuela has no Pacific coast. So that was not specifically anti-Venezuela, but supposedly anti-drug ops. When they sent a carrier battle group to the Caribbean, that's not entirely unusual because we do a lot of training in the Caribbean. We have ah places down there, particularly off of Cuba, that that have a lot of ah operation areas.
00:13:34
Speaker
But for it to go down there and stay and the other ships accompanying with so many additional forces, it was just pretty obvious something was going to happen very much like when of Russian President Putin amassed a large number of tanks and forces just outside of Ukraine in 1922. The escalation, I think it kind of surprised all of us what that this was actually going to be the capture of President Maduro.
00:14:03
Speaker
It seemed like there was more talk going on where President Maduro was trying to get some conversations going.
Legal Aspects of Military Actions
00:14:09
Speaker
I don't know if he saw it was happening more than we did. I do want to say for our armed forces seemed to execute professionally and extremely brilliantly, I am hurt that we killed more people in the apprehension of a fugitive in this legal matter. I i don't know why we justify that.
00:14:35
Speaker
And I feel when this first happened, and I actually got to talk to Jenny pretty soon after, but I had two thoughts. One, this is additional distraction from the Epstein files that keep dribbling out because ah the people that are worried about that are very big on distraction and oil.
00:14:55
Speaker
Oil is just huge. Yeah. Well, we'll get into the justification. Yeah. well I mean, I want to talk more about imminent threats and the escalate that ah the justification behind that. But I want to mention that, ah to your point, the second set of personnel that this administration fired was the the lawyers. Yeah. So they've hired the Joint Chief and then the lawyers, the head JAGs. So that just gives you a sense of what this administration is all about.
00:15:25
Speaker
um But as I understand it, just to give a sense of who's involved. um And I wanted to mention that we're representing nearly every service branch except for the Coast Guard. And almost nearly a service branch was involved in this this mission. And I want to say just as a We all representing the military, civilians, and also veterans, that we appreciate their service and that this decision is not being led by them. it is it decisions that are made by and for the military by civilian leadership, like the president and the secretary of defense. And we are commanded, we're obliged, we have to obey those orders. And so I want to make sure that we give due due regard to our service members that were involved um and not try to blame them.
00:16:09
Speaker
So, but who was involved? U.S. Army's Delta Force air support was, we believe, were F-22s, F-35s, B-1 bombers with the Air Force and Navy. We have Naval assets, destroyers, cruisers, and also a lot of the intelligence agencies, CIA, NSA. And so that's a lot of people. That's a lot of folks that were involved. And Kenan, given your background in logistics, I'm wondering, what how do you perceive all that? Like, how did we get all those people together?
00:16:37
Speaker
Thank you for asking that question. i would say to keep it
Impact on Individuals and Global Politics
00:16:40
Speaker
sort of short and sweet, I would say that it it it obviously comes with a lot of of training and rehearsal like this as as an operation, logistically speaking to what you were just saying, there were a lot like there were a lot of different moving parts involved. There were a lot of of.
00:16:59
Speaker
vehicles to include law enforcement to get, you know, to get their desired target even into New York City. Like you're talking armored vehicle, like armored vehicles from law enforcement. You're talking helicopters. You're talking naval vessels. You're talking, you're talking jets.
00:17:18
Speaker
This is not something that anyone, a part of that operation just woke up and decided to do. No, they, they had to, like, this took,
00:17:29
Speaker
a great amount of planning and rehearsal. It's no operation of that scale, especially to be done at that. You know, the the green light for this operation was given, you know, I think it was 1046 PM the night prior. So this all happened within a short span of hours.
00:17:47
Speaker
They were ready. All those elements for that operation were were ready well and far and advanced. before anything was ever given the green light. These just were fuel. these you know These teams were ready to go. the the the individuals that were operating on the ground, they had probably rehearsed that dozens and dozens and dozens of times over. So for them, um and again, I don't, I'm not putting the the blame on any of the troops that were, you know, simply executing orders like that's exactly what they're supposed to be doing.
00:18:23
Speaker
um But for them, that is not something that they just woke up and decided that they were going to do. They had planned for this. There there were phases of this exercise that, you know, logisticians and pilots and ground operators have, you know, dug through in every detail for, you know, months and months in advance.
00:18:46
Speaker
um It's, It seems like it happens suddenly to the average person that doesn't have any bit of military experience like all of us in this discussion have. But for the vote for those of us that have had that deep behind the curtain that have seen that have been a part of operations or complex operations or operations overseas,
00:19:08
Speaker
You didn't just wake up and suddenly deploy, right? You, you train for that deployment. You train to be, to even be qualified to perform in that deployment. You train for that operation. You probably had tape exercises.
00:19:26
Speaker
If you're on the ground and this just kind of, this is just from me speaking out of my perspective as a prior infantryman myself, but you're, even at the at the very ground level of it, at the very minimum, you're putting tape down and you're you're measuring out the the approximate space of the room you plan on breaching, right? Like, is there a door here or is there a wall here or is there a window here?
00:19:52
Speaker
Who's going to cover this? Who's going to be first in? It's all of these little details. Who's going to maintain security whenever you initially breach? it's It's this level of detail that I want to emphasize for everybody that's watching, it's not just something that suddenly happened that, you know, a group of highly trained professionals just woke up and decided to do They rehearsed, they practiced,
00:20:17
Speaker
Well, can I ask, you know, on that point, you know, and given like you're asking, like, is there a door? Is what kind of building are we in And I'm sorry, i didn't want to cut you off, Kenan, but thank you. um Because I wanted to loop in Kevin Burge from his intelligence background on that discussion, because, you know, what did we know, like, as we led into this, as we understand the Intel part of this?
00:20:42
Speaker
Yeah, so it's hard to say you know what what we know, um but you know the the trend here is that this was not something that happened overnight.
00:20:52
Speaker
um Exercises like this take a lot of time. They typically also take a lot of authorization. um And a question that I have is whether or not Congress was, at least the House Intelligence Committee was actually informed and We heard you know previously when Iran was struck um in coordination with Israel that only the Republican members of the House Intelligence Committee were actually notified of that strike. And so what you know what role did Congress have in the authorization of an exercise like this from the intelligence portion of it is a question that I think we need to be asking our representatives.
00:21:33
Speaker
um Now on the you know operational side of this, um again, it's hard to say you know what what was known, what wasn't known, but by and large, there's 17 intelligence agencies in the United States. um Two of these, the Central Intelligence Agency and Defense Intelligence Agency, are all source intelligence. So they typically would take the lead in something like this, especially with heavy military presence.
00:22:01
Speaker
heavy um you know civilian and embed intelligence from the ground. um And then in coordination with all the other intelligence agencies um and horde, a huge cohort of absolute specialists in um not just the region like South America, but specifically in Venezuela or specifically with extreme in-depth knowledge of Maduro as well and his whereabouts. And so a lot of this work of going into an operation like this is already mostly set up through, you know, very
00:22:41
Speaker
very talented, very professional analysts who have done, you know, hordes of research that um go to inform military missions or intelligence missions like what we saw here. So, but yeah, that's a really good question, Kate. Thank you.
00:22:58
Speaker
Yeah, well, to the first point that you made on Congress's involvement, I mean, we heard a lot about the justification of this and why Congress wasn't involved, right? That this was law enforcement, that this was really about an indictment against Maduro. And I can speak to that as a former DOJ prosecutor, that there was an indictment back in 2020. It was recently amended, I believe, out of the Southern District of New York. And normally we have people
Reclaiming Congressional War Powers
00:23:20
Speaker
when we have a national, foreign national, we use the extradition process, which means we ask a country through a treaty to get their person and then they bring them over. You may remember like in drug trafficking, like El Chapo or something like that.
00:23:32
Speaker
Here, there are sometimes ah countries that don't ah abide by those extradition treaties or we don't have one with them. For example, i like I had a case with a Chinese national and we had to wait until they were in Vegas on a floor of a casino at a conference before we could arrest that person. So here, though, we are entering a country. We've attacked part of their infrastructure. We've heard law enforcement, drug trafficking. We've also heard oil. We've heard that they had a stolen election. There's a lot of things going on. But it seems to me, like to your point, Kevin, that Congress should and ah potentially under law have been involved. And so I want to loop in Nathan on his perspective out there in Tarrant County.
00:24:14
Speaker
Yeah, I think like for me, that's the main point and or the main question. And it gets to, in my view, ah a longer running problem that we've had in this country that frankly is a bit of a bipartisan problem. um You know, we're all Democrats on this call. and And I think the Democratic Party has been much better on the war powers issues, especially in certain ah in recent years.
00:24:41
Speaker
um but But there has been about a 50 year um shift and weakening Congress's asserting its authority per the Constitution to declare war. Now, in the modern context, how we tend to declare war, how Congress declares war is through what's called an authorization for the use of military force.
00:25:04
Speaker
and So, for instance, Prior to the Iraq invasion in 2003, bad as that was as an idea and as catastrophic as it was for our country, um President Bush back then did go to Congress and get them to pass an authorization for the use of military force to invade Iraq. um That vote, if you look back into our political history, um a lot of ah lot of lawmakers came to regret that vote from both parties.
00:25:36
Speaker
um And so I think that the lesson that has been learned over the last 20 years from people, certain people in Congress has been avoid a vote on the author and on on an authorization for the use of military force whenever possible, because then you do not own the consequences when that mission goes bad down the road as the Iraq war did. right And on a political level,
00:26:01
Speaker
That's understandable. On a moral level, it is absolutely inexcusable because what we are asking our congresspeople to do is stand and be counted before they put our service members in harm's way.
00:26:16
Speaker
And that is not something that anyone who's taking that office should have a problem doing, in my opinion. um So this to me is a tragic, um,
00:26:30
Speaker
but also somewhat predictable result of a 50 year slide in Congress not doing what it's supposed to do to play a central
Veterans' Role in Advocating Peace
00:26:40
Speaker
role in war powers.
00:26:42
Speaker
and Because now we're in a situation where, i mean, Congress wasn't even notified, it it sounds like, before this went down. And then thought that only one party's leaders in Congress would be notified before the Iran strikes is also and just insane. Like, that's not how that works or should ever work. So and that's just kind of my viewpoint on that.
00:27:03
Speaker
Yeah, that definitely was a light bulb moment for me when you talked about. like I guess I didn't realize that people were avoiding votes like that. And especially here where I believe that there is supposed to be notification given to Congress and they're supposed to be looped in into a lot. And they were telling us, I remember was watching the Sunday morning talking heads and Marco Rubio saying, well, we just didn't want to tell Congress because we didn't want it to be leaked out or something like that.
00:27:27
Speaker
um But I'm wondering, based on other agencies' involvement, and Mila, I know your experience with Homeland Security, like how do you perceive it with them? I mean, what what is going on with Homeland Security with this operation?
00:27:40
Speaker
So one thing I would say, and I think a lot of us who are talking right now can really say, is we've seen this start to happen before January 3rd.
00:27:52
Speaker
ah the massive amount of boats that were there or the warships that were there. If you look at history, this is definitely a sign that something is about to happen. So I've been saying for a couple months um to my husband in particular, just this is going to turn into something bad. This really is going to turn into something bad. It was one thing after another. And then we had in December when they made fentanyl a weapon weapon of mass destruction.
00:28:19
Speaker
Right there, instantly in my head, I thought of Iraq, us going in there to get those weapons of mass destruction that were never there. And it's a fear tactic. Other countries use it. Other countries, of Russia, China, they use fear tactics to scare their people. When the people are scared, they'll immediately you know kind of bow down to the power that is there.
00:28:38
Speaker
um What the previous ah candidate just said really struck something with me too. um Congressional people not taking the stand to do that. um to say this is wrong. And I don't think they actually had much of a choice um when it comes to this.
00:28:55
Speaker
um So he mentioned the AUMF, but there's also the War Powers Resolution of 1973. And this requires the president president to consult with Congress at any moment possible before There's a war. There has to be prior notification. Not only did he not notify Congress unless he notified people from his own own party saying, you know, this is quietly going happen.
00:29:19
Speaker
he He announced in Mar-a-Lago. He announced via tweet. It's just so undiplomatic. ah But the prior notifications, the thing that's very worrisome in regard to that is there's the gang of eight.
00:29:31
Speaker
And this is a bipartisan group. This bipartisan group, if if something is going to be able to pass Congress, there needs to at least needs to be this gang of eight And the Trump administration administration reportedly never even spoke to them.
00:29:45
Speaker
So there are different loopholes that the government has made and the Department of Homeland Security instance has made to make things easier easier for what I would call this regime. Not only do they not obey the laws, but with Homeland Security, you have to go back and kind of look
Military Operations and Economic Stability
00:30:00
Speaker
at where did this originally start?
00:30:02
Speaker
Our first speaker, Ernest, he did really well talking about how far back this goes. But when you look at Again, the weapons of mass destruction, they're they're using the same thing they did um in Iraq. And we've learned so much why they shouldn't have done that. You know, the most worrisome thing to me is that the service members who are going to be affected by this.
00:30:22
Speaker
ah There's always blowback. You guys may have heard that when ah this is a big worry for the Department of homes Homeland Security when you have people such as Russians and and Iranians who um are in cahoots.
00:30:34
Speaker
with Venezuela or have been very active in Venezuela, there's going to be blowback. We're already having issues with Russia. We're already having issues with Iran. This gives them more options to hurt American people and to involve service members more. So from a DHS standpoint, it is it's a little bit terrifying, I would say, because we're seeing the same patterns and we're not learning from history. We are, again, on the wrong side of history.
00:30:58
Speaker
Right. Trump's talking about Cuba, Colombia. Stephen Miller's wife is talking about Greenland. um But I wanted to bring in Evan here because and we'll talk about a little bit about foreign policy in a second. You know, we had some questions from the ah from YouTube and talking about the rot in our armed forces and how people can feel.
00:31:21
Speaker
Are they obligated to evaluate legality in these situations? And I i think from a lot of y'all's perspective, a lot of people deployed. And I understand that you probably got a lot of training on the rules of engagement and a law of armed conflict, probably from someone like me or Zach, who are ah our lawyers. But I'm wondering, do you have a perspective on that given, Evan, your background in deployment and as an officer to answer maybe John's question, but also the perspective of like, is this an imminent threat? How can you carry out these kind of commands, especially for someone who was at a higher level of a rank?
00:31:57
Speaker
Yeah, thanks, Kate. First of all, i mean, our founding fathers kind of established this standard where we have a nonpartisan military that reports up to civilian leadership, right, elected civilian leadership.
00:32:10
Speaker
And so at the end of the day, all of us that have been in uniform or who are in uniform ah are trained to follow orders and follow the orders of our civilian elected leadership.
00:32:24
Speaker
And there are some caveats to that in the Uniform Code of Military Justice where you know you you're you're supposed to disobey an unlawful order. And that can be very black and white if, for example, you are ordered to shoot a child.
00:32:40
Speaker
But in most cases, it's not black and white at all. Especially, I think, in this case in Venezuela, we're talking about all all this reframing of this conflict, this reframing of narco-terrorism and the instability of the region as somehow being a justification for war So now when you are in uniform and you are prosecuting missions like I did in Afghanistan, you have different rules of engagement that are set underneath that sort of higher level order that you're going to go prosecute your mission.
00:33:11
Speaker
And the rules of engagement define who can be targeted, you know, what level of force can be used and when when you're authorized to use that force.
Public Involvement in Democracy
00:33:20
Speaker
Sure. And so when I was flying, I did close air support missions, which meant when our troops were being attacked on the ground, I could respond and we we would actually drop munitions to protect them.
00:33:32
Speaker
In other cases, you had time sensitive targeting, which is preplanned. It goes through an approval process through JAGS and through senior leadership, and they actually allocate targets for you to strike.
00:33:43
Speaker
And you as a military operator have some leeway in how you prosecute those orders, but very rarely can you just turn them down. And so when we sent our troops into into Venezuela to prosecute this mission, I think they they they did an outstanding job. And it's pretty incredible that we we pulled off the kidnapping of a head of state with...
00:34:06
Speaker
so little ah death and destruction, but we really put them at in a huge amount of risk because everybody has one rule of engagement, which is pretty standard.
00:34:16
Speaker
That's if you are attacked, you can attack back. And so every troop that we sent into Venezuela, or all the all the ships we had along the border, frankly, if any of them had been attacked, if Venezuela had put up more of a fight, then we could have really found ourselves in a protracted and very ugly conflict that really for you know people will do what they need to do to defend themselves. And that is very much in the acceptable region of rules of engagement.
00:34:44
Speaker
So I feel thankful and I'm proud of our armed forces for doing such a good job. I also I think we put them in incredible amount of risk. And and for what? It's my question. For what? For oil? questions Yeah, Evan, is ah there must have been some in for like some people we had a question from, let's see, the people within Venezuela. Did they were are people in Venezuela helping out?
00:35:07
Speaker
And it doesn't seem like they could have done this The U.S. Armed Forces could have been doing this without Venezuelan support, or at least as you're saying, to fight back. um But I wanted to bring back Kevin on his perspective and the topic that Milo is bringing up, which is about foreign policy. And there's also a question about.
00:35:26
Speaker
ah from ah Jody Johnson for Judge about um taking over Greenland and Cuba and all these other things. And so put this in perspective, Kevin, on like foreign policy, because it seems like we're now in a land that is very much different as far as how we're approaching foreign policy and our involvement in other people's countries.
00:35:46
Speaker
Yeah, great. So ah after 2001, on 9-11, we entered the era of the global war on terror. Our national strategy was focused almost exclusively on taking out terror networks.
00:36:03
Speaker
um And we executed that for the past 20 years in Afghanistan, Iraq, in Africa, and and other places. So around 2017, 2018, there was a shift in our national security um from GWAT, Global War on Terror, to what's called Great Power Competition. Great Power Competition was kind of bringing us back to the pre-Global War on Terror era, of American hegemony and the agreements that we had at Bretton Woods after World War two which
Conclusion and Call to Action
00:36:40
Speaker
means that Americans would kind of take the lead. um You know, kind of it set up NATO, set the groundwork for the European Union. It really was a new type of American led alliances that would specifically help reduce global conflicts like World War I and World War two So we transitioned back to this great power competition, which was supposed to help limit China and Russia's influence growing influences around the world. um And it was huge national strategy shift.
00:37:16
Speaker
It went from, you know, light mobile units in the military to looking at battleships again and looking at tanks and modernizing our IT and um trying to use our intelligence apparatus to limit the effects of, you know, social media influence into the United States and and other Western countries. So, however, what it's looking like now and We're seeing this as and Venezuela, what, in my opinion, looks to be the first ah step in this is a return back to spheres of influence.
00:37:57
Speaker
um We're ret retreating back from the global stage and we're starting to look at the old Monroe Doctrine, which was before Bretton Woods. but Monroe Doctrine is now apparently being called the Donro Doctrine, and maybe we call it the Dumro Doctrine because we're taking American hegemony back from you know competing against the influence of Russia and China and focusing solely on the Western Hemisphere. Well, what does that mean? It means that when we focus on one portion of the globe, China and Russia,
00:38:31
Speaker
pick up that slack. So we're starting to see now that you know, we we went into a sovereign nation. Now Russia can justify going into Ukraine.
00:38:44
Speaker
All right. so China can now justify their continued buildup in the South China Sea and the potential takeover of Taiwan, because now those are in those power players' spheres of influence. um So again, we we don't know where it is. This could be a domino thing.
00:39:05
Speaker
Hopefully not. We could also continue to be aggressors in our hemisphere to include Greenland or Mexico or Colombia. And so but we're we're also not living in Monroe times. This is the modern era. Other countries have gained power and and influence. Brazil.
00:39:24
Speaker
is a growing economy, a growing powerhouse in the Western Hemisphere. Mexico is also a huge economy. And, you know, we're just, this is not Monroe Times. And it's not the, in my opinion, the national strategy that we should be going down as well.
00:39:43
Speaker
Thank you, Kevin. And I loved your joke. I didn't know Marines ah were so funny. um So we all like to make fun of each other here, Air Force versus Marines.
00:39:54
Speaker
So I'm getting a lot of questions and we thank you for them. If you want, if you have a question or comment, please subscribe to the channel and then you're able to provide a question and we're going to start answering a lot of them. But I wanted to loop it in William and then and also Zach on some questions because What has been the GOP response? Right. Like I heard a lot going on the Sunday morning talk shows. We see the jubilation from Venezuelans. They're also saying, hey, like we've had a regime change under Biden with Syria. So like how do we respond to that, William?
00:40:26
Speaker
Yeah, that was Kevin's response there just before me was such a brilliant summary. Folks, if you didn't if you missed any of that, go back and listen to what he said, because This is a global long-term threat, right? And we're used to the typical Republican short-term shot of dopamine distraction, like bulldozing the East Wing or renaming the Gulf of Mexico.
00:40:53
Speaker
We're used to that by now. But this is much, much, much worse. It's because this has upended decades, 80 years of precedent that has kept the United States and the world order safe.
00:41:09
Speaker
And that's what Kevin was getting to. i just want to add just a ah little bit of context to that. This world order that has brought us peace for 80 years was crafted by General Dwight D. Eisenhower after World War II with the Allies. through the United Nations, through the Geneva Convention, through the even through the War Powers Act. And it's saying that one nation cannot just invade another nation because their guy's a bad guy.
00:41:39
Speaker
And that precedent has kept... us all safe for 80 years. But what this is now doing, just like Kevin said, China's watching.
00:41:50
Speaker
And now China says, oh, well, guess what? I'm now looking at Taiwan and their semiconductor industry. I'm now looking at the chain of Filipino islands that create a barrier around China.
00:42:04
Speaker
North Korea is watching. Russia was watching. And up until Trump was held in check, And after Trump, we see they invaded Ukraine after Ukraine gave up their nuclear weapons.
00:42:16
Speaker
So all of this world order created by President Eisenhower after World War II has kept us safe and secure for 80 years. So, folks, this is not just another Republican distraction.
00:42:32
Speaker
They want it to seem like that. But this is much, much, much worse and much dangerous for to the peace and safety and security of the United States. Yeah, I think, you know, the question is also, does Trump also stand to benefit politically or is this harmful to him in this moment, especially as we gear up for this election? And so I want to bring in Zach and then maybe Evan, before we dive into some of these questions, which is like, how do we how do we talk to voters about this and give them some hope, how we can respond and also hopefully win? come this fall. We're all knocking doors. We're all talking to people. I'm assuming we've been all on message about affordability and what this means for us at home at at our kitchen tables. It's not some faraway place. It is real, like you're saying, William. But Zach, how would you say we should respond?
00:43:20
Speaker
Well, we we should respond by not sitting down and hoping that this all goes away. And, you know, I know there's a lot of ah voters out there. I've talked to them today that are scared. They feel helpless. They they they don't know what to do. um And that's one of the reasons why I'm running, because I felt the same way and I felt helpless and I felt like I was screaming into the void. And so I threw my hat into the ring for this election. This is why All elections matter. This is why local elections matter all the way up to the national ones. Because if we sit at home and we just hope it all is going to go away and we don't go out and vote, then that system of checks and balances that...
00:44:02
Speaker
You know, William is right. it seems to be eroding. It seems to be no response. There's no pushback up there in D.C. So if we're not out there protesting at the No Kings protest, voting at the ballot box and just sitting at home, that's the only thing you you shouldn't do, I guess. Anything but the sit at home. Anything but keep your mouth shut.
00:44:26
Speaker
Right. I mean, go out and knock some doors for these people on this call ah because we have to talk to people become a precinct chair, because if you listen to our podcast, like we don't have a lot of precinct chairs. Less than half of our state is represented by a precinct chair who's just a person talking into their community about what's going on. and some conversations and communications are better than none. and also support all these people in their endeavors, donate, donate your time. But Evan, like, is this good or bad for us? Like what, how do you perceive this? Because it seems like we're all in message affordability, affordability, like now we seem to be treading in a different box, right? Like I'm a West Wing fan. And the last season, Josh was talking about Santos' campaign. We're in the economic box and then we're in the security box and then we're in the like question mark box. Like, where are we?
00:45:16
Speaker
No, that's a great question. And look, I think we we need to be flexible and adapt to overcome. i mean, at the end of the day, we are going to be safe when we are defending the Constitution and not pagein's pages from Putin's playbook.
00:45:31
Speaker
yeah um You know, most Americans understand, I think, at a deep level, the things that Will and Kevin were talking about, that there's a world order that has worked in our favor since you know, paid for by the greatest generation after World War two And it's bought America incredible peace and prosperity. And that world order has come about through diplomacy and regional cooperation and targeted sanctions, not by acting like a bully in the Western Hemisphere and potentially trading Venezuela for Ukraine with the likes of Putin. um And so I think we, at the end of the day,
00:46:09
Speaker
We need to do what Abe Lincoln said to do, which is choose carefully where going to play on your feet and then don't budge. So we can respond with moral clarity. We can respond with...
00:46:21
Speaker
real dialogue like we're having on this call in the interests of 99% of Americans, not the 1%. I think Americans are tired of being ruled by the extremes. And certainly when you see all the chest thumping ah from the Trumpies online, it starts to feel like, oh, that's a lot of America. But recent polls show over 70% of Americans oppose any type of foreign war with with Venezuela.
00:46:49
Speaker
And the likes of Marjorie Taylor Greene have abandoned ship with Trump. And so we need to build a big tent that is welcoming and forgiving for people to the America First movement, ah the the true conservatives that are being let down by this administration. We need to welcome them with reasonable and open dialogue and debate um and give them a home.
00:47:15
Speaker
And then we will win. If it's okay, I'd like to add a little something to that. Evan, I agree with everything that ah that you just said. The thing that I would like to add for not just this group, for but for the people watching, another way to contribute to this is, number one educate yourself.
00:47:33
Speaker
And number two, care factual information with others. I personally am a firm believer that when you know better, you do better. But if you uninformed or misinformed, like,
00:47:47
Speaker
it It doesn't contribute well to the conversation because these sorts of conversations, whether people are having them at the kitchen table or they're having them in these sorts of forums, they should be grounded in something. Ideally, facts.
00:48:00
Speaker
we We talk from our perspectives because we have experience in the military. That's why we are all here. That's why you are all watching. You are hearing from people who have experience or in this arena.
00:48:16
Speaker
And then to another point that Evan just said, finding finding somewhere to plant your feet and don't move. Me personally, i find it a little weird that that our president pardons one president, like one former president that was felony convicted of you know trafficking 400 metric tons of cocaine while also pursuing another president for narco-terrorism.
00:48:42
Speaker
I don't even from his own message or even from the Republican Party's own message of America first. I personally don't find that that puts America first.
00:48:54
Speaker
Whether you are pro hardening President Juan Orlando Fernandez or pro capturing the president of Venezuela and his wife, find a place to plant your feet and stand there.
00:49:08
Speaker
Educate yourself. Share factual information with others and have a positive conversation about where you would want your country to go. Because I think that everyone here on this panel can agree from personal experience in the military that freedom isn't free.
00:49:25
Speaker
Freedom is not guaranteed. This thing that we have called democracy is not just something that is inherently bestowed and forever protected just because we're Americans. We serve to defend the freedom that we get to enjoy, the democracy that we get to participate in.
00:49:43
Speaker
If there's one thing that anyone here should not do is sit at home and do nothing. We have a democracy for a reason. You don't have to run for office. Some of us choose to because we believe we believe firmly in our democracy and we want to participate in that way.
00:50:01
Speaker
But if if your participation is going through the ballot box or it is educating yourself, or it is knocking on doors, or it's donating, or whatever it is that you have the capacity to do to participate in this democracy, i would encourage everybody watching, everybody on this panel to please, please, please,
00:50:22
Speaker
participate in our democracy. It is not guaranteed. It is not something that we that we are guaranteed to always have. It is fragile. And there are people that are in the in the uniforms that we have all worn that are risking their lives day in and day out, both on deployments and in training to make sure that we can uphold this democracy.
00:50:44
Speaker
Amen. Okay. So ah on our podcast, we're learning why we haven't flipped the state and so long. And one of the reasons is that people are apathetic and not voting. So we are not a Republican state. We're a low voter turnout state. And of the people who are turning out, it is Republican. So we got to turn out some voters, y'all. um And so, Ernest, I know you had a comment on what you think is the most effective action for us in our population. i think you commented in our chat function, but can you please share?
00:51:12
Speaker
Yes, yes. So I got to host some of these protests earlier, the Hands Off and the No Kings, and then just other protests sponsored by Democratic groups. And they make a big difference. They catch attention. President Trump has earned a nickname. Anybody remember? It's a food group.
00:51:30
Speaker
Taco. Taco. Yeah. So Trump always chickens out if he's if he knows that the people are against him and are against his action. And it's kind of like, you know, the kid that knows the parents are watching. We need to have that signal go out to those people and say, look, you know, so if you hear of a protest, whether it's a hands off,
00:51:54
Speaker
or a no kings, get out there and participate. We have learned that the Republicans are not the strongest, the ones in Congress are not the strongest at stopping President Trump from doing something. I don't know if they're afraid of threats to their themselves or their families or their careers or what, but they are not the strongest. The people are the strongest.
00:52:19
Speaker
Nonviolent protest, you know, dressing up in those dinosaur costumes and those frog suits or just having your signs and standing on the corner. It makes a big difference. So I would very much encourage people to pro to protest and participate.
00:52:34
Speaker
And if you don't get to, but you drive by and you see one, honk and wave and cheer and encourage those people. They need your support. But it's all going to come down to the elections in 26.
00:52:45
Speaker
Bottom line, it's going to come to that. The protests are going to be stopgap. yeah I know Mila wanted to say something, but I also want to get to a lot of these questions um and some of them you may be able to answer, Mila. um One was about like, you know, is this a risk to our troops, especially as other countries might be shutting down bases in response to us? We had ah one from Cameron. um And then also there's questions about congressional. If there's no congressional pushback, then how do we really check
00:53:19
Speaker
Trump and his expansionist action. So Mila, I know you wanted to chime in. um Yes. And actually, it's what I wanted to talk about what Congress is currently doing in regard to this.
00:53:30
Speaker
um So we do have people who are trying to fight against it. There is such apathy, I feel like, um in Congress right now. We do have Democrats who are fighting back, but there is a lot of apathy, and that's where the midterms come in. We need people who have experience with this ah to go in and do something. So there are two things, major things, that Congress is doing right now. We have the War Powers Resolution. This is an emergency vote that should take place next week.
00:53:57
Speaker
And this measure will mandate immediate withdrawal of U.S. forces from Venezuela because they went against Article 1. They had over 150 planes and over 1,000 troops there. That is war. It is not any type of military anything. It is war according to the constitution. So they are looking at that War Powers Resolution Act.
00:54:18
Speaker
The second is defunding efforts. um and We have H.R. 104, and that's the andi Unauthorized Military Action in Venezuela Act, and that aims to cut off funds for any author unauthorized hostilities. One thing we're seeing is wording matters.
00:54:34
Speaker
We were told it was a yeah ah a different thing than war police. I can't even think of the word that they use for it because it was just so out there. But instead of it being a war, it was a a police.
00:54:48
Speaker
I don't even know what they call it. Law enforcement. Yeah. Yeah. Law enforcement. So it definitely isn't that. So those little words that they use, what we're finding is those little words, oftentimes I'm seeing them sometimes push back with those little words, any hostilities that encompasses everything.
00:55:03
Speaker
So they are trying to push back. I feel like there could be harder pushback, but they are doing some things. um It takes people not being afraid for their families or for themselves, for their own lives. That's the point we're at in this country. And it needs we need strong people to do that. So we do have a little bit of pushback.
00:55:20
Speaker
um I expect more. And I plan on calling my representatives and reaching out to to people who are currently in office and saying, what more are you doing besides trying to defund and and enacting a resolution that the Trump regime is probably going to ignore?
00:55:35
Speaker
Yeah, I wanted to get back, maybe Nathan, if you had a perspective on congressional authorization. and we have a lot of questions on like notification that's required to Congress and like what were they were supposed to do prior to that? And as I understand it, to Mila's point, like they're they're characterizing this as a law enforcement function that was supported by the military, going back to what I was saying with extradition on the indictments.
00:55:56
Speaker
But like, you know, it seems to me also, this is not only about that. And so what, what was Congress's role? What was it supposed to be? What is the notification process? Do you know? I mean, I, I'm, I'm just asking as I believe you might.
00:56:09
Speaker
I know like the War Powers Act and there is a certain period that they have that, but they're supposed to be given notifications. I mean, they've shown, the administration has shown no respect to Congress at all. i mean, nothing, nothing that,
00:56:23
Speaker
they They could have the the way this would have normally worked is they would have gotten a blanket authorization for the use of military force like months out. So as that military buildup was occurring, they would have gotten an authorization for the use of military force to do regime change or whatever it was that they wanted to do there. They didn't bother to do that.
00:56:41
Speaker
Unfortunately, like with the Republican Congress that we have, like they're not. going to check this president, at least not until his poll numbers totally dive. Frankly, I think we need to start being realistic about some of this. And it you know you said, Kate, earlier on the call, and and and I've heard a couple people say that you know we have to we as military members, of course, most of us are not in anymore, we have to follow orders.
00:57:08
Speaker
we you have to follow lawful orders, right? That's that's what we have to do. um And we're getting to a point very, very quickly, and and and and you can make the argument that we've already passed that point, that that unlawful orders are already being being given, right? and And that is a check that remains, that there is not lawful order,
00:57:31
Speaker
authorization for wars that are being done without Congress's approval and in violation of our Constitution, those are inherently illegal operations and those are inherently illegal orders. And you are going to get to a point then where I would argue that you as a military member are then going to have an obligation, you're going to have an obligation to not obey those unlawful orders. So that's a very tricky road. And that's that's ah a lot to ask military members. Like, I don't wish that on them at all. But I just think, you know, we need to start being cognizant of things in in those terms, because we're just moving into very uncharted territory here.
00:58:12
Speaker
Ernest, I think you had a perspective, but and I also want to get other people. i know Zach is a former JAG and William is saying that he has a comment, if you don't mind trying to answer all these questions. So William, I'm going to kick this off to you and then I'd like to hear from Zach.
00:58:26
Speaker
Hey, thanks. i do get the sense from the public that there is frustration that Democrats in Congress aren't doing more to push back. My message is to everyone, no one's going to come and save you.
00:58:40
Speaker
No Democrat in Congress can save you because they don't have the votes, nor will they save you because they are politicians. You have to save yourself.
00:58:51
Speaker
So if Ted Cruz got 8 million phone calls yesterday morning, you better believe he would be voting against this. And if Cornyn had 5,000 people outside his office, you better believe he would be voting against this.
00:59:06
Speaker
Folks, Congress is not going to save us. We have got to take action. That is my message to you. Well, I just want to talk about refusing lawful orders. And the training that we as is JAGs got on this, it's not like ah for every single grunt thum that's on the ground, for them to stop and ask if there's congressional approval first before they walk into a you know war zone. it's It's not something that we can look at with hindsight. When we're talking about refusing lawful orders, i need everybody to hear it.
00:59:42
Speaker
You cannot... um You cannot even point fingers at 90 percent of the military members that are out there right now. Now, there are leaders that are in you know higher offices than than I've ever been in.
00:59:57
Speaker
And those are the ones that need to be looking at whether or not it's lawful to go into another country and kidnap the the leader of that country. That's who needs to be looking at it. Those are those are the people that are that are right now in the rooms. My fellow veterans here know that those people are concerned with lots of different things, including their own careers, but they have sworn that ah oath to uphold the Constitution.
01:00:24
Speaker
And as we've all sworn the same oath here, that's that's the same thing that I'm going to go into office with, and that is protect the Constitution regardless of whether or not it's good for my career. um And we need more leaders like like that. And that's why going the ballot box that we've already talked about is is paramount this next election in November.
01:00:46
Speaker
Ernest. Thank you. Yes, we all remember the Heritage Foundation created Project 2025. This document was supported by billionaires and pretty much adopted as the platform by the Republican Party, even though there was a lot of denial there. And it all points towards what the Bernie Sanders likes to call oligarchy or just authoritarian rule.
01:01:11
Speaker
And this is what we're seeing. When you take huge military action, and repeated military action without any kind of congressional approval, without the will of the people, without you know it's solely on the whims of the man in charge and the executive branch.
01:01:29
Speaker
That's what we're dealing with. If people ever wondered, what does that really mean, authoritarianism or oligarchy? It means they're attacking Venezuela, and the next thing you know, they might be attacking Greenland or somewhere else. And what can we do about it?
01:01:45
Speaker
Not much. ah Ernest, we had a question about cost. And I think you had a maybe an answer to that, which is, you know, it seems like and I'm looking on just my own little research is that the operation in Venezuela over the last couple of months has cost us hundreds of millions of dollars just operationally from fleets and personnel and everybody that's down there. So do an answer? And then i I'd also want to hear from Evan.
01:02:08
Speaker
Yes. Well, it all depends on what you include. If you just count rounds expended, fuel consumed, ah maybe the pay period of the people during their training or whatever, hundreds of thousands is probably right.
01:02:23
Speaker
But I think you can easily go up to billions of dollars. We had a the largest, newest aircraft carrier in the Caribbean for How long? A month or more. Many other ships, a lot of ah very expensive aircraft were used in these raids. Just some very, very highly trained military personnel.
01:02:43
Speaker
i I think it easily could be billions. evan And then Keenan, I know as a logistics person, and you probably have a perspective on that, too. Yeah, thanks, Kate. So I... In the military, we have a saying, hope is not a course of action.
01:02:57
Speaker
So i agree with William that we can't sort of hope that soldiers will start to define whether or not they're their orders are lawful. And we can't hope that something will happen to Trump. We have to sort of focus on what we can control and fight in our foxholes.
01:03:14
Speaker
And so the real key to checking the power of this president is beating feet, knocking doors, and taking back the House in 2026. I think the expectation that we can effectively check the president, that our Congress people can check the president until we have a majority is is not a good expectation.
01:03:32
Speaker
So we have to get to work. And Part of that is reminding people that, look, money makes the world go round. So what does Trump talk about when he's talking about Venezuela? he says oil.
01:03:42
Speaker
And he makes it sound like it's a great thing for everyday Americans. But everyday Americans, he's got to do a good job explaining how us taking oil from Venezuela translates to making life more affordable for everyday Americans. Because it's actually just going to put a lot of money in the hands of already powerful people like Chevron and Halliburton and the people involved in the oil industry.
01:04:04
Speaker
We need to tie things back to business. What is really really good for business and especially small business is stability. Okay, so so got businesses plan five years out who they can hire, where to invest, what facilities, who their trading partners are. And what this administration is doing is destroying that planning capability.
01:04:25
Speaker
With tariffs and trade wars and now actual real military action that is disrupting the world order like we talked about, businesses can't plan and American businesses will suffer. And it is driving all of our global trading partners into the arms of China who's very different. China doesn't elect new leaders every four years. China works off a hundred year plan.
01:04:47
Speaker
So China's going around telling everybody, hey, we're your stable trading partner. And there's not, we've got three to four times the population that America does and we're and they're very serious. At the end of the day, we need to speak to people's interests, speak to people's needs um and, and,
01:05:04
Speaker
To your earlier question, Kate, these wartime actions, these sort of aggressive ah capture of of Venezuelan heads of state and and bombing boats, they do affect business.
01:05:18
Speaker
and And at the end of the day, we should be focusing on real business interests that make life um more affordable for everyday Americans, not just the top 1%. Preach, preach. um So i want to hear from Keenan on that. And then also then Kevin, and we had a comment earlier from Teresa that said that she had read that David Nunes, who's linked to Trump, made an unsuccessful bid of $10 billion dollars for petroleum. So anyways, Keenan, your perspective, especially from cost perspective and what might this mean, especially in potentially destabilizing this area. And then Kevin, please.
01:05:56
Speaker
Yeah, sure. So I think I look at the terms of costs as what it what does it mean to the the average American, right? Because we we can talk about the overall dollar figure and and how much it costs the country, but There's for for the average everyday person who's probably just focused solely on paying their rent or their mortgage or their bills or, you know, trying to find some so some form of stability in our current market, despite, you know, ah inflation and unemployment and all of these things.
01:06:30
Speaker
What does this. What does this mean for them when they're being served by an administration that makes so many promises like putting America first or that we're going into a golden age and all of these things that sound great, but we're not seeing it.
01:06:45
Speaker
Right. You want to talk about cloth. Like I want to talk about what what is the net benefit for ah for the United States to be moving in this direction for the for the civilian, for the average American, because that is what our our democracy is designed to support. It's for the people and it's by the people.
01:07:08
Speaker
How does this help us? And for the people that are watching, as well as the folks that are in the panel, I just want to remind everyone, you can you can all pick up the phone and call your representatives and ask them what they're doing about this or what, why they're not doing what you think they're supposed to be doing. Right. They all have phone numbers. They have emails. It's not hard to figure out or to look up the the contact information for your ah or your congressman or for your
01:07:42
Speaker
ah for your house rep. You can call these people. You can leave them a message. You can send them an email and say hey, what what are you doing about this, right? Again, i i encourage participation in the democracy at from the lowest to the highest level. i encourage everyone to engage, even if it's not currently, if you're not at the ballot box right now and you're concerned about this, communicating with your representatives to to start that dialogue, educating yourself, like I was saying before, because this is going to have cost to the everyday American. And if you don't know what that is, or you don't know where to start to find that information, start asking those questions of your representatives, because you might find that what they're what they're supporting or what they're not doing doesn't align with what you think your representative should be doing.
01:08:38
Speaker
I think ah and And to go back to your original question, Kate, I think this cost is easily well within the millions. And the the important question is, is why? Why did we make this this investment that doesn't seem to prioritize America. like I understand that we're but we're going back to a, they have oil sort of playbook, but that's not going to make groceries more affordable. That's not going to make houses more affordable. some we
01:09:12
Speaker
There's a lot of people in our country that is more concerned with the near-term issues than about the five-year plan of Exxon or Chevron or BP. And I've and Good for them. Billionaires can make even more money for themselves and not sure with the rest of us.
01:09:33
Speaker
But for the folks that's just trying to afford putting like school supplies or afford health care. If you don't know what this looks like for you, please, please, please.
01:09:47
Speaker
reach out to your representatives and enforce them to have that conversation. Let them know who you are, not just that it is it is a city or a district or reason. that like Let them know your name. Start that conversation.
01:10:04
Speaker
I mean, so to that point, my representative is Beth Van Dyne. I don't know if I called her office if she'd be picking up, Kevin. So I want to give... shoot this over to you. And then I think we're going to try to wrap up, but I think we've answered a lot of the questions. So thank you for those in our chat function. We, can all look us up on the internet. I'm sure all of us would welcome people messaging us. Janine knows how to reach us, but Kevin, can you give us your perspective on, on that, especially what Evan was saying? I know you were interested in responding to what he had to say, and then we'll wrap up and I'll, I'll take it over from there.
01:10:37
Speaker
Great. Thank you, Kate. And the answer is no, Beth wouldn't answer her phone. But I will say, you know, as far as, you know, one of the questions was, did somebody try to make a deal with Chevron and businesses? And, you know, this guy was trying to get this resource. And i would encourage everybody.
01:10:58
Speaker
It's a very short book. to go read it It's called War is a Racket. It is by i Marine Corps General and two-time Medal of Honor winner, Smedley Butler. This book is a really good representation of what happened specifically during the Monroe Doctrine era days when we were very concentrated on Latin America.
01:11:25
Speaker
At the time, it was mostly bananas and a lot of the banana wars and Chiquita banana was the corporation of the era. who are enforcing price-fixing schemes and business opportunities in foreign countries. um You know, that's a big part of the Monroe Doctrine. It's not just keeping, you know, foreign actors such as and mon Monroe Day's Europeans out of the Western Hemisphere. But it was also propping up ah big business where that you know goes into war is a racket, which after reflecting on his actions in Central America, Smedley Butler was like, I was just a henchman for big business. So, you know, I think it's worth really getting into if we're going to call this the Dunro Doctrine that
01:12:12
Speaker
This is part of it. This was the age of robber barons and monopolies and big business. And if that's where we're going, be prepared for it, because what happened after the Monroe Doctrine and monopolies and robber barons was the Great Depression. So, you know, I just want to make sure that we're all aware that i elections do have consequences. If this is our national national strategy and history repeats or at very least rhymes to be prepared for what comes next.
01:12:40
Speaker
Okay, lightning round, we're going to end with a minute or less for each person. We're going to go in and reverse alphabetical order. Nathan, I'm going to start with you under a minute. What is your last word on our podcast?
01:12:51
Speaker
We always end with the last word. Again, we're at Mission Texas podcast. People can find us on social media as well as all the places that you get your podcast. But we end with the last word. And usually on our podcast, it's about flipping Texas. how are we going to do it? But I'm wondering what is everyone's last word here on this topic and also how are you going to win?
01:13:11
Speaker
Nathan. Well, on this topic, and I just want to say I'm very happy that we have the congressional candidates on this call that we have, the five that we have, because the end of the day, um y all five are are going to be the ones that are going to have something to do with war powers in this national conversation. And i think we need to start making the point as Democrats more and that we are also a party that has a lot of veterans in it and a lot of people that have patriotism and have served and and all the people on this call can attest to that. Right. And for too long, the Republican Party has had this ridiculous mantle of being um the uber patriotic party or whatever. And that's just not true. So I'm excited that that we have all these people on the call that are going to be carrying that flag for the Democrats. And just as pertains to this conversation, I hope we really push that message in the election. election.
01:14:09
Speaker
Yeah, we're all patriots. i mean, we all love our country. We love our state. And we've all sworn an oath on this call. William Marks. Trump and Roger Williams really only have two strategies.
01:14:20
Speaker
One, billionaires getting richer. And two, blame minorities and immigrants. And attacking Venezuela checked both those boxes.
01:14:32
Speaker
Folks, don't fall for the distraction. This isn't going to make grocery prices go down. It's not going to make your health care better. It's not going to make your job better. It's not going to help you put food on the table.
01:14:44
Speaker
This is cruelty for cruelty's sake. This is helping billionaires get richer. Please don't fall for it. Thank you. All right. Ernest. Well, I'm horrified by the action that we're having to talk about the whole topic, but I am so honored to be part of this group of these ah men and women who served and are working so hard as candidates, as Democrats in Texas, trying to serve again.
01:15:14
Speaker
i know for my campaign, our ah mantra is putting people's needs first. And that is so much important about what we're trying to do here. We're trying to not start a bunch of wars. We're trying to maintain our international relationships, and we're trying to do things that help the people.
01:15:31
Speaker
What we're getting out of our current administration is chaos, corruption, cruelty, and a lot of consequences that we are left to pay So to the people watching and please spread to your friends and neighbors, please elect these watchdogs. Please bring more Democrats to Congress to where we can have oversight on this administration and we can do what needs to be done.
01:15:57
Speaker
So I've got my seatbelt buckled up and I hope everyone else does too, because we need to flip a lot of seats in North Texas. I'm Ernest Lineberger for Texas Congressional District 26.
01:16:07
Speaker
when he sits All right, Evan Hunt and then Zach Herbert. Thank you, Kate. I just want to say how proud I am to stand with with everybody on this call and be fighting for what's right in this country. I think we need to make it clear, no Democrat, especially nobody on this on this line, is scared of a fight.
01:16:27
Speaker
That's not what this is about. We're just not we don't want to be bullies. We want to stand up to real threats and plan for the long term interests of our country. And that is not what this is. This is about short term gains and about favoring the few over the many.
01:16:42
Speaker
And we need to get back to being a party. that is peaceful and patriotic, welcoming and forgiving, and loud and proud. And we can do that. Don't waste your time calling your reps. We're beyond it. Get behind a candidate that speaks to your heart and go support that candidate. And let's take our country back.
01:17:00
Speaker
Thank you all. Thank you, Zach. And then Mila. I like that. I love to see so many veterans that are running for office ah right now. it's it's It's really great, especially Democrat veterans. ah Great to be a part of this group. And I'll i'll tell everybody this. ah We're going to we are going to win in November and we are going to push that wave through the next presidential election and we're going to clean up this mess. ah That's that's what I plan on doing. ah That's my hope for everybody that right now what we're learning is all of the things that we need to put into place to enforce these checks and balances that apparently you can just ignore.
01:17:44
Speaker
And we're going to we're put those back into place. and learn and for the next generation and that after that, because think it's already been said a bunch of times, we are patriots. We are, we do love our country and we want to make it the best place to live for everyone, not just the billionaires.
01:18:04
Speaker
Yep. ela And then Kevin. All right. So I think everybody here on the call again, thank you so much for having this and to be part of it. I am very thankful to to be part of all of this with you. But my last thing I wanted to say to both the candidates and then also to the people is everybody who who is speaking um in this forum today came to be useful, not comfortable.
01:18:28
Speaker
We didn't come here to be comfortable. We came here because we felt like we could fight and make a change. We see what's going on in Congress. We see what's going on with the Trump regime. And there are people that are fighting for you who who do not want to be comfortable. As a matter of fact, being comfortable, I think maybe something's wrong at this point. But to to get out there and and to be as useful as we can for the people around us. I know several of us have children. We want this world to be better for them. We're parents. We're neighbors, you know, we're friends and we're fighting for you.
01:18:58
Speaker
um Just like what Kevin said, me it we can call our representatives. We definitely can do that. But the best thing we can do is to get behind candidates like all of us who are here who are willing to be useful and not be comfortable.
01:19:12
Speaker
um Thank you so much for having me today. it was wonderful to to join you all here. The next person I think, Emila, is Kenan and then Kevin. Number one, I'd like to say, and just to keep it 60 seconds like you requested, I'd like to say that I really appreciate being in the presence of such great people that are running to try and make a difference. Um,
01:19:32
Speaker
I would like to remind everyone on the panel and everyone that is watching that our government is designed to work for you. Please participate in our democracy. Please, whether it is voting, whether it is donating, whether it is knocking on doors, whether it's volunteering, however however it is that you can or you feel inclined or comfortable participating in our democracy, please, please, please participate.
01:19:58
Speaker
it It does not. It is a very fragile system that we have. We must protect it. There are people that protect this democracy with their lives and are honored to do so. It would be a shame, especially if you are not feeling comfortable with the way that ah with the way that our our country has been going, with the way that our affordability has been going, the way that our housing market has been going, it would be a shame if one day the next generation asked, what did you do? And you said nothing.
01:20:30
Speaker
Please, please, please participate. All right. Last person, last but not least. And Jenny's going to wrap up. Kevin. Right. Well, thank you so much. You know, first and foremost, thank you all on this call for your service to our country. And for anyone watching who has served as well, thank you so much for your service. um For those of you who were worried during listening to what was going on in Venezuela, it's completely understandable.
01:21:05
Speaker
um Know that the folks on this call, are here to stop the craziness as it seems like every day is a race to the bottom with the Trump administration. But we all have skin in the game here. And, and you know, my wife is in the Army National Guard. Kate is still serving. Her husband's still serving. You know, these are things that are impacting our families.
01:21:30
Speaker
And they're not impacting the people who are in Congress currently. They're so far detached, whether it's from service on the military side or even their families being impacted by the decisions that they make when it comes to how we use and authorize the use of our forces and the power that we have and the goodwill that we built up over the past 50, 80 years.
01:21:55
Speaker
So, you know, it's it's something that you need to also take into account when going to elect new representatives. When you're going to the ballot box, think about what it is you want to see in your representatives, because that is what will be affecting what happens to our country, what happens with our military and what happens with our families.
01:22:16
Speaker
So thank you all very much. CD24, looking forward to seeing you all at the ballot box and block walks and events and everything else. So thank you so much. Thanks, Kate.
01:22:28
Speaker
Yeah. Thank you, everyone, for listening. we are going to have this recording on YouTube as well as on our podcast feed if you want to hear it again or if we have new listeners. And we always I always say, you God bless Texas, but also God bless our troops. God bless our country. And I'll allow Janita have the last word.
01:22:45
Speaker
I said, wow, this is a great conversation, great discussion with everybody. And I think we could have gone on for another hour. Thanks for everybody for hanging in there. um One thing that I have gotten from this is not only are these guys like like great candidates, i'm I'm so proud that they're running and that we have the opportunity to to ah elect them, but also um it emphasizes again why people who have actually been in uniform, who have served our country and in in the military are so valuable as as as politicians, as as people who are governing.
01:23:33
Speaker
um And so I really would encourage you all that are listening to to to work for these guys. Find out which one of them which ones of them are running in your area and support them, support them. However you can, there's, there's lots of different ways that you can support them, but get in touch with them and, and you know, find out what they need and when, what you can do.
01:24:03
Speaker
um and but Thank you to the, to the, ah to Kate and ah Mission Texas for helping us out tonight. As you can tell, I am definitely not a moderator. So thank you very much for taking that on.
01:24:23
Speaker
um And thank you so much to the to the candidates for stepping out of the busy lives that you have in your campaigning to come and and and have this conversation with us. I think that it was really important. I feel...
01:24:38
Speaker
so much more um informed and and and sure of what the next steps should be for us. um For our part, Richardson Area Democrats, known as RAD, are a vibrant community just north of Dallas. We meet on the third Thursday of every month for really informative happy hour meetings, as well as several other meetings and special events during the month.
01:25:05
Speaker
um The big event we have coming up, I have to promote it We are going to co-hosting this month a Texas Attorney General Democratic primary debate at Richland College in North Dallas on the 22nd of this month. Be signed up through.
01:25:25
Speaker
Mobilize tonight. you'll get the opportunity to register for that debate as well as other events that we have coming up. So we'd like to see we'd love to see you you there. We'd like to meet you soon at some other events. So thank you again for joining us tonight. Thank you for to the candidates again.
01:25:42
Speaker
and I feel more strongly than ever that we need to get these guys elected. One more thing, thank you to my team.
01:25:54
Speaker
for helping put this thing together tonight. ah we It was pretty amazing what we were able to do so quickly. So thank you to my to my rad team too. This video will live on our YouTube channel. Share it out and let's keep working to save democracy.
01:26:14
Speaker
Take care.
01:26:17
Speaker
You can follow us on all socials at Mission Texas Podcast. Email us at missiontexaspodcast at gmail.com. This episode is edited by Juan Jose Flores.
01:26:29
Speaker
Our music bumper is by Adam Pickerel, and our cover art is by Tino Sohn.