Nick Craig In For Pete Kaliner (03-17-2025--Hour3)

[00:00:04] What's going on? Thank you so much for listening to this podcast. It is heard live every day from noon to 3 on WBT Radio in Charlotte. And if you want exclusive content like invitations to events, the weekly live stream, my daily show prep with all the links, become a patron, go to thepetekalendershow.com. Make sure you hit the subscribe button, get every episode for free, right to your smartphone or tablet. And again, thank you so much for your support.

[00:00:28] It's my pleasure to welcome AP Dillon from the North State Journal to our airwaves this afternoon. AP, good afternoon. How are you? Hey, Nick. How are you doing? I'm doing great. There's been a lot of news over the last couple of days for folks, especially those that spend a lot of time on social media, specifically the X platform. There's been a whole bunch of swatting going on. Before we get into some of those details, can you walk us through what swatting is?

[00:00:52] It was pretty popular in the early 2000s. It seems to have risen back to prominence again over the last couple of weeks. Well, swatting is basically when someone calls the police anonymously and gives a tip that something violent is happening at your home. And they send police officers and often the SWAT team to your house to investigate the claim. This happened here in North Carolina over the weekend.

[00:01:17] Yeah. Walk us through that story. An individual who was not seemingly political back until about six months ago has risen to some national popularity. Walk us through what you're tracking there. There's a gentleman named Matt Van Swal. He's in the western part of North Carolina and he's been speaking up for the hurricane victims.

[00:01:34] And was particularly upset with the Biden administration's lack of activity in that area and has been very appreciative of the Trump administration's activity in that area, including FEMA clearing some of its calls. He's drawn a lot of criticism from various groups on X. Most of them appear to be left leading, but I wouldn't say all.

[00:01:59] And over the weekend, someone called in to the police anonymously that he had murdered his wife and was hiding in his basement. And that sent police to his door. Now, it's interesting that you bring that up. Not only was it his birthday when the SWAT team showed up to his door, but he posted earlier in the week, AP, that he had actually gone to his local police department because so many folks were SWATed through the early part of last week to inform them that he was likely to become a target of this.

[00:02:26] But I guess when 911 gets a call that somebody's murdered their wife and their whole family, I guess they respond anyway. Yeah, that doesn't always connect with the person's name and the actual call and the address that comes out. They often don't have a name to go with that address and the police are just dispatched. So, yeah, his kids were upstairs asleep. His wife happened to answer the door, luckily. And tensions were considerably brought down a latch once the wife answered the door who was supposed to be dead.

[00:02:58] So, he was fairly upset about it. And I've reached out to him a few times in the last couple days here since it happened and made sure that he was okay or see if he needed anything. Just, you know, human to human. And he said that he hadn't really heard anything from law enforcement about whether or not they had a suspect involved.

[00:03:19] But I do know that the director of the FBI, Cash Patel, has issued a statement on X about the SWATing attempts. And he said that the FBI is aware of this dangerous trend. And my team and I are taking action to investigate and hold those responsible accountable. So, I have a feeling that we might see some activity in that unless, you know, this happened through a burner phone, which is non-traceable.

[00:03:43] Well, and that's what we've seen when this really rose to prominence in the early 2010s using services like Skype and other sort of, like, virtual calling platforms. Sometimes out of the country, these calls are placed. AP, it's incredibly hard to track these individuals down. But there are examples where individuals have done this swatting. I hate to call it a prank, but that's essentially what it is, this swatting prank.

[00:04:07] The SWAT team shows up and they actually kill somebody because they're believing that they're walking into an armed situation going on. You've had people die at the hands of this. This is incredibly concerning. Well, yeah, they tracked a whole bunch of calls, hundreds of calls down to a California teenager just recently. And I think he was charged and actually sentenced. I'd have to actually go back and look at that. But, yeah, there was, you know, he was making calls to schools, bomb threats and things all over the country.

[00:04:33] And they managed to track him down, so I have hopes that maybe they'll track this person down who's making these calls to different people. It sort of follows in the vein of some violent threats that have been happening around the state. This past week, last week, actually, Senator Tom Tillis released voicemails that went to his office and people verbally abusing his staff.

[00:04:59] I mean, we're talking about very liberal use of the F-bomb, death threats, a hatchet in your head, this kind of stuff. You know, and then, you know, at the end of the week, Congressman Edwards held a town hall, which completely went off the rails with people yelling F-bombs at him out in Nashville. And apparently Supreme Court race candidate Judge Jefferson Griffin has been getting all kinds of threats at his home. So there's, you know, I guess Allison Riggs also had some threats made to her.

[00:05:29] The North Carolina Judicial Branch Communication Director over there basically said that there's an investigation underway on both sides for Griffin and Riggs, and that the Marshals are looking into that there. So we'll see what happens. We're joined this afternoon on the Pete Calendar Show by A.P. Dillon over at the North State Journal. A.P., about 45 minutes ago, Senator Tillis released more voicemails. I can't play them on the air, of course. Every other word would have to be bleeped out.

[00:05:54] But the general thing of this call that he just released, the individual on the other line talking about caving the senator's head in as well as his kids and his grandkids. What do we do to ratchet this down at the national level? A.P., this is starting to get a little out of control. Well, I think these people will need to be prosecuted. I mean, these are death threats. These are not covered by free speech. And, you know, until there's consequences out there for these kinds of things, this is going to continue to happen.

[00:06:23] I know that Senator Tillis has received warnings, you know, during the nomination process as well that, you know, people were, you know, formulating threats against him. So this is, it's getting out of control. It's spiraling. Someone is definitely going to get hurt. I think law enforcement is going to have to step up and be proactive. And I think that these individuals who are receiving the threats are within their rights to up their security. There's no question about that.

[00:06:52] And, you know, I want to go back to something that you referenced, you know, the Chuck Edwards town hall that took place last week. That, of course, spiraled immediately out of control. And, A.P., I'm seeing calls on social media for other members of Congress. Of course, North Carolina has a majority Republican congressional delegation in the U.S. House. I'm seeing calls for these individuals to host town halls from individuals that are on the political left. Do they have any interest in actually listening to these people or do they just want to yell and scream and get their voice across that way?

[00:07:22] Well, even bad publicity is good publicity, right? A lot of these town hall protests are being organized by either Democratic parties in the area or that protest group Indivisible that was formed under Trump's first term there, where they would go out and, you know, organize protests. Some of them got a little bit out of control. But those are the two groups that I'm seeing right now in North Carolina that are pulling these together.

[00:07:50] The North Carolina Democratic Party held a big anti-doge protest just before Josh Stein gave his State of the State address last week. But at the same time, the Durham Democratic Party organized a protest at a Tesla dealership in northern Raleigh. So these things are happening all over the place. And I think so far those have remained peaceful. We haven't seen any violence there. But the rhetoric is definitely there.

[00:08:19] And it's definitely profane. AP, tell folks what you're going to be tracking over at the North State Journal this week and over at your substack, apdylan.substack.com. What are you going to be keeping an eye on this week? Well, obviously, Senator Tillis and his disclosure of his voicemails will be one of them. Right now, over at the substack, I've got just a few things going on there. Act Blue is getting investigated on the national level.

[00:08:47] Under the Biden administration, some of the ICE figures look to be, quote, cooked. And internal Democrat polling doesn't particularly look particularly good. Over at North State Journal, I've got articles about two House bills targeting immigration and ICE compliance, as well as one thing that went under the radar. USAG Pan Bondi ended investigations into parent protesting their school board.

[00:09:11] I think we all remember Merrick Garland's memo, which directed the FBI to investigate parents protesting. And he used domestic terrorism labels on them. Well, that's done. Yeah, nothing like showing up to voice your concerns with your local school board and being deemed a domestic terrorist by the attorney general. Pretty remarkable stuff. AP, tell folks again where they can keep track of you. Sure.

[00:09:36] I'm on X at AP Dillon underscore, and I'm at North State Journal, which is NSJonline.com. And I also have a substack more to the story, which is AP Dillon.substack.com. AP, thank you so much for the time. Greatly appreciated. Here's a great idea. How about making an escape to a really special and secluded getaway in western North Carolina, just a quick drive up the mountain. And Cabins of Asheville is your connection.

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[00:10:55] Call or text 828-367-7068. Or check out all there is to offer at cabinsofashville.com and make memories that'll last a lifetime. So obviously a lot of stuff going on nationally, internationally, across the state. As we were discussing with AP in the previous segment, it's been very interesting to watch the Democrat reaction to the second go-around of the Trump administration. Right? I made the point earlier, and callers disagreed with it,

[00:11:24] but I made the point that the Democrats can't win on issues. And it's obvious that they can't. Just look at the greatest example of this is the men and women's sports issue. Democrats had four years to take that argument, their great idea that it was okay for biological men to play in female sports. They had four years to convince the American people that was the case. That their idea was good. That it was the way that our country needs to operate and needs to be.

[00:11:51] They miserably failed in convincing the American people to do that. And within just a couple of days of this new administration, Trump holds an executive order signing. Behind him, dozens of young female athletes that have had serious health issues as it relates to this wacko, crazy policy that's moved forward by the left. And their idea is completely dismantled in real time. I mean, just completely gone.

[00:12:17] And so the Democrat Party right now is in a very precarious spot. As we covered earlier in the show today, these two new polls, the one out from NBC, the other from CNN, show very, very low approval ratings for the Democrat Party. And I think part of it is they're kind of struggling with an identity issue. What do they need to do going forward? Now, you know, this idea of burning Teslas in New York City or spray painting Teslas or destroying them,

[00:12:47] lighting them on fire, thinking that you're shoving it to the man. And I don't think that's a really good idea. Who knows? Maybe I'm off base on that. But I don't think when you look at the overall view of the American left, it's a good political strategy to have you be the party that is burning cars in streets. I'm not sure that's the best look, especially burning cars of a guy that you once idled. Right.

[00:13:14] The whole irony of the of the Elon Musk thing is that he was the darling of the left. Tesla and SpaceX, SolarCity, which he owns, took over from the federal government or bought and then took billions of dollars worth of subsidies from the federal government. He was the darling of the left. Tesla is the they completely revolutionized the EV game and forced every other manufacturer to have to seriously innovate in their electric vehicle offerings.

[00:13:44] Once a darling, now the enemy of the progressive radical left. So they're protesting him. They're standing up in support of Hamas on college campuses. They're standing with dangerous Venezuelan street gangs that are roaming the streets of the United States. And by the way, the streets of North Carolina, this gang, these 300 gang members that Trump deported on Saturday in defiance of a judge. They're part of that trend to Agra gang out of Venezuela.

[00:14:11] Two of those affiliated gang members have been picked up in North Carolina over the last 12 months. One in Charlotte over the summer of last year and the other in Raleigh back in February. Both of these individuals wanted on murder charges in other states. One in Chicago, one in Florida, I believe. The Democrats are standing up for those individuals.

[00:14:34] These are the people that they are siding with and I guess they believe have the best political ideology for them going forward. And so when you look at this overall Democrat approval number, it's not surprising that it's so low. Because it's truly a party that is dealing with an identity crisis. It's truly a party that is trying to navigate through the resistance phase once again. Right? They were la resistance in the first Trump term. They're trying to do it again.

[00:15:04] And I don't think it's going to have the same impact. I don't think marching around the state capitol in Raleigh screaming about Elon Musk, Doge, and Donald Trump is a great position for the Democrat Party to be in. And of course, the irony of that, they were protesting Doge on Wednesday.

[00:15:24] Later that night, Governor Josh Stein, who is a Democrat, indicated that he was going to be directing his budget office within the governor's mansion to construct some sort of Doge-style operation. I mean, don't they just look incredibly stupid with that? You've literally got the governor, your guy, as a Democrat, who's saying North Carolina needs a Doge too.

[00:15:48] Yet, they are spending their Wednesday afternoon aimlessly walking around Raleigh chanting, hooting, and hooting, and hollering about Trump and Elon Musk. All their fun songs and all the cool little things that they sing and their really neat signs that they walk around with. That's the current Democrat Party. This party is absolutely going through a rebirth right now. It has to. Their ideas are not working. Their ideas are not resonating with the American public.

[00:16:15] And yelling and screaming on street corners and burning cars, I don't think is the path forward for them if they want to have a successful midterm in 2026. Which, by the way, is theirs to lose. Midterm elections are always brutal for the party in charge. Meaning, currently, the Republicans. So if the Democrats want to secure victories and gain seats in both the House and the Senate in just less than two years from now, they'll have the opportunity to do that. But not if they continue down this path.

[00:16:44] I don't see how they're winning the favor of anybody but their far left progressive wing of the party with the things that they're doing. It seems completely detrimental to everything that they're trying to do. Something we'll keep an eye on. Alright, so spring is here. A time of renewal and celebrations. You've got graduations, weddings, anniversaries, and the special days for mom and dad. Your family's making memories that are going to last a lifetime. But let me ask you, are all of those treasured moments from days gone by,

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[00:18:11] where pretty much anything that Trump brings forward, anything that comes out of his administration, is just blocked by a district court judge. Temporary stays, temporary restraining orders, everything is just immediately blocked. And one of the callers mentioned last night, Newt Gingrich was on Mark Levin's Life, Liberty, and Levin program on Fox News. And Newt had a pretty good synopsis of this. What's going on right now and what needs to happen going forward? I just want to play a little bit of this from last night.

[00:18:40] This is Newt Gingrich on Fox News. Take a listen to this. His insights are pretty good. Sure, they look to have several kinds of power. First of all, though, the House and Senate Judiciary Committees should have two kinds of hearings. One, they should have sort of intellectual hearings, bring in smart people, legal scholars, lay out the case that the founding fathers never wanted to have these kind of radical judges

[00:19:03] seeking to interpose themselves between the elected officials of the American people and their own whacked out left wing views. And then second, I think it would be very educational to bring in the weirdest of the judges and have them under oath explain why they made the decision they did, what the source of that decision in the Constitution is, why it's a legitimate decision.

[00:19:26] And I think these judges would look really bad and you'd begin to understand that they really represent a radical worldview with no constitutional basis. Now, I'm going to stop Newt Gingrich right there and I'm going to play a little bit more from him. But what he's saying right there is the quintessential argument. Bring these judges in and have them explain where in the Constitution they have the authority to issue these temporary stays.

[00:19:51] Folks, again, it's important to note we're not talking about final decisions coming down from district court judges. We're not talking about them having a full hearing, hearing the merits of the case, hearing arguments from both sides and ruling. That's not what we're talking about. We are talking about temporary restraining orders that are being placed, temporary stays that are being put on the executive branch

[00:20:14] of the of the United States that is immediately stopping the agenda, immediately stopping the executive authority. Newt Gingrich, I think, is spot on here. Bring these jokers in and have them explain where in the Constitution does this exist? Where are you deriving your authority to do such such things? Where does it say that you have the authority to issue a temporary stay over immigration policy coming out of the executive branch?

[00:20:43] More from Newt Gingrich on Fox News' Mark Liberty and Levin last night. And then I think the Congress ought to look at two possible steps immediately. One, to either impeach certain judges or abolish their court. And two, to look seriously at the budget of the judicial system of the United States and simply cut it dramatically.

[00:21:05] The point that Hamilton makes in the Federalist Papers is that the courts, in the end, cannot win a fight with the elected officials of the legislative and executive branches because the money and the power comes from those two branches. These judges, I think, are in grave danger. This is a test, as Lincoln said at Gettysburg, of whether this system or any system so conceived can long endure.

[00:21:32] I mean, if the American people are electing the people they want and they've given the Republicans the House, the Senate, and the White House, if they can't then enforce their views and they can't represent the American people, then our whole system's in trouble. At the America's New Majority Project, we just did a poll last week. 81% of the American people believe the federal government's corrupt. 81%.

[00:21:57] This is an enormous danger to the survival of freedom when you have eight out of every ten Americans believing that the core system is corrupt. The House and the Senate have an obligation to bring these judges in, to interrogate them, to understand the normal constitutional boundaries, to look at the historic precedent, and then, if necessary, just abolish their courts and cut them out of the game or cease paying for them so that they just sit there and can't do anything.

[00:22:25] But the current situation, and you were exactly right in your opening, the current situation is intolerable and is a direct threat to the system of self-government that is at the core of the American model. You can't really summarize it any better than that, can you? I mean, Newt Gingrich just firing on all cylinders there. The options I think he lays out are perfect.

[00:22:48] Haul them in front of Congress and have them explain to the duly elected members of our government, the House and the Senate, why they are operating in the manner that they are, where they are deriving the authority that they are operating under. I think that would be very eye-opening. And then, as Newt Gingrich said, then there's two options. You either drastically cut their funding so they essentially can't do anything, or you just abolish their courts. And you hate that it's come to this point.

[00:23:18] You hate that we've come to the end of the road where this is what's being discussed. But what do you do when progressive activist judges, who do not have the authority to operate in the manner that they are, continually shut down the administration, the duly elected administration of this country? It is a very precarious situation that we're in. It's not a good situation either. I don't want the district court system essentially to be flushed down the toilet.

[00:23:48] I don't think that's a good thing for America. But unfortunately, due to the actions of these judges, the actions of these left-wing groups that sue till blue, find a Democrat judge that will side with us, find a Democrat judge that will be friendly to our case, find a Democrat judge that will issue a temporary stay or a restraining order, this is the animal that the Democrats have created. You know, I always find this so ironic with the left.

[00:24:16] They are constantly changing the rules of the game. And then they get upset when Republicans, when the GOP, when conservatives want to play by those same rules. You guys are the ones setting the rules here. You guys are the ones setting the playing field. So we're going to play on it too. You don't get to just run around and judge shop and get everything that you want or everything that you don't like thrown out out of the executive branch from district court judges before due process. That's not how our system works.

[00:24:45] If you guys want to play that game, then it's time for Republicans to take drastic measures. There's just no other way around it. All right. If you're listening to this show, you know, I try to keep up with all sorts of current events. And I know you do too. And you've probably heard me say, get your news from multiple sources. Why? Well, because it's how you detect media bias, which is why I've been so impressed with Ground News. It's an app and it's a website and it combines news from around the world in one place. So you can compare coverage and verify information.

[00:25:15] You can check it out at check.ground.news slash Pete. I put the link in the podcast description too. I started using Ground News a few months ago and more recently chose to work with them as an affiliate because it lets me see clearly how stories get covered and by whom. The blind spot feature shows you which stories get ignored by the left and the right. See for yourself. Check.ground.news slash Pete.

[00:25:41] Subscribe through that link and you'll get 15% off any subscription. I use the Vantage plan to get unlimited access to every feature. Your subscription then not only helps my podcast, but it also supports Ground News as they make the media landscape more transparent. I'm Nick Craig, host of the Carolina Journal News Hour. I also host the Nick Craig Show, which you can find in your favorite podcast app or at nickcraig.com. In for Pete Callender this afternoon on News Talk 1110 and 99.3 WBT.

[00:26:09] 704-570-1110 is our studio hotline. If you'd like to chime in on the program this afternoon. Something that's going to be an interesting thing to watch over the next couple of days. Have you been following anything about this auto pen issue that's come to light? So the auto pen is something that is used within the White House to sign the president's signature.

[00:26:32] Well, apparently all of the pardons that Joe Biden issued for members of the House January the 6th select committee were signed via auto pen and not via the president's actual hand. He didn't actually sign it himself. Well, President Trump put a post on Truth Social a couple of hours ago saying, quote,

[00:26:54] the pardons that Sleepy Joe gave to the unselect committee of political thugs and many others are hereby declared void, vacant and no longer and no further force or effect because of the fact that they were done by auto pen. In other words, Joe Biden did not sign them. And more importantly, he did not know anything about them. The necessary pardoning documents were not explained to or approved by Biden.

[00:27:23] So the U.S. Constitution claims that the president has no authority, however, to overturn his presidential, his predecessor's pardons. However, there is some questions about an actual signature that is playing out as an auto pen is an electronic signature that allows those pardons to be signed without physically being there. And it's exactly what it sounds like. It mimics the handwriting of the president.

[00:27:52] It's an auto pen. However, there are some questions as to can a pardon be issued without the president actually being in the room? Because we don't know whether Joe Biden was or wasn't when these pardons were signed. Caroline Leavitt was asked about that during the White House press briefing that has taken place while we've been on the air this afternoon. Let's take a listen to what she had to say about this. She was asked a question about it.

[00:28:18] The president was begging the question that I think a lot of journalists in this room should be asking about whether or not the former president of the United States, who I think we can all finally agree was cognitively impaired. I know it took people some time to finally admit that. But we all know that to be true, as evidenced by his disastrous debate performance against President Trump during the campaign. I digress on that.

[00:28:42] But the president was raising the point that did the president even know about these pardons? Was his legal signature used without his consent or knowledge? And that's not just the president or me raising those questions, Caitlin. According to the New York Post, there are Biden officials from the previous White House who raised those questions and wondered if the president was even consulted about his legally binding signature being signed onto documents.

[00:29:08] And so I think it's a question that everybody in this room should be looking into, because certainly that would propose perhaps criminal or illegal behavior if staff members were signing the president of the United States autograph without his consent. But was he on the record talking about issuing preemptive pardons to these people? But was he aware of his signature being used on every single pardon? That's a question you should ask the Biden White House. Is there any evidence on that, that he wasn't aware of it? You're a reporter. You should find out.

[00:29:37] Caroline Levitt's phenomenal. I mean, isn't she just great? She's not taking the bait from the media. Is there any evidence that this may have been happening? Do you have any evidence, Caroline, whether this was happening or not? Do you have any evidence of that? I don't know. You're the reporter. You're the one getting paid to track stories down. Why don't you go figure it out? It's not my job. I'm the White House. I'm the current White House press secretary. You guys are the journalists in the room, right? You guys are the ones that are keeping democracy free, right?

[00:30:06] What's the Washington Post headline? Democracy dies in darkness. You guys are the ones that are supposed to be doing this. Why is it taking Trump posting on Truth Social about auto pen signatures? Why is it a bunch of guys, a bunch of bros on Twitter or X combining all of the pardon documents together indicating that they're their exact same signature indicating it's an auto pen? Why is it some random guy on X that's figuring this out?

[00:30:33] Why is it not the actual media establishment in our country that's supposed to be protecting us from losing our democracy, which, of course, Trump and the Republicans are going to steal away as we always hear from them. So that'll be interesting to watch over the next couple of days to see if who knows, how does this play out in regards to the president's pardons? All right, that'll do it for this episode. Thank you so much for listening. I could not do the show without your support and the support of the businesses that advertise

[00:31:03] on the podcast. So if you'd like, please support them, too, and tell them you heard it here. You can also become a patron at my Patreon page or go to the Pete Calendar Show dot com. Again, thank you so much for listening and don't break anything while I'm gone.