Tillis seeks to build the post-Trump GOP | Hour 1

What's going on? Thank you so much for listening to this podcast. It is heard live every day from noon to three 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 the peak calendar show.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. Uh, so by the way, if I sound, um, somewhat superior to you today, it's because I, uh, I early voted yesterday. And so I got a sticker and, uh, I believe I've been wearing it ever since right on my forehead. So everybody knows that I am superior. I care. Um, but honestly, early voting is still going on. Get out and vote. Um, So there's that. Also, you know me. I'm a giver. I do things for you and the audience, for my Pete Knicks. I do things that I otherwise would not otherwise do, but I do it for you. I'm talking about watching city council meetings, watching school board meetings, watching County commission. Okay. Basically it's a lot of watching meetings and stuff. And, but that's, but you get the idea. It's a lot. Okay. It's a lot. So the latest thing I did for you people is, um, I, I watched the full interview. See, I'm, I don't need, I feel, I know what the, I know what happens. I know what happens on the text line. As soon as I say this, It's just going to go crazy. It's a triggering name. As soon as I say this name, it's going to trigger people in all sorts of different ways. But I kind of knew this when I decided to finally get around to watching the interview. Because the interview posted three days ago, I want to say. And mainly, I was really interested in it because... the interview was recorded, um, at the Carolina family restaurant. And I've driven by that thing two times a day for the last five years. And I honestly wasn't even aware they were open just because of the location it's on Wilkinson Boulevard, you know, the sort of the outer edge of West Charlotte's got bars on the windows and stuff. And so I wasn't really, uh, Like I drive past and I'm like, I need to go in there and check that place out. And so when I found out that this interview had been recorded at the Carolina Family Restaurant, which has been in business for 50 years this year, this is their 50th anniversary. Congrats to them. And after seeing the inside of the restaurant, I was like, I got to go over there. I got to eat. I got to eat some breakfast over there. Or lunch, I guess. Okay, so the interview occurred over what appeared to be over breakfast, which means I may have very well driven right past them on my way into work while they were doing the interview. The interviewer was Jonathan Martin, a.k.a. J-Mart. He was formerly, I believe, of Politico. And I think now he's with the New York Times or something. I forget where. But he's a he's a political reporter, longtime political reporter up in Washington, D.C. Well, what is he doing in Charlotte? Well, he was here to interview. U.S. Senator Tom Tillis. Okay, I know, see, I tried to slip the name past you, but you got it. Now people are going to be triggered about it. But I watched the entire interview, which only ran actually about 40 minutes. And they gave like, and he walked around at one point doing an interview with like the owner and the, you know, like the operations of it and stuff. So it's a great commercial. So like, I got to go check them out. But I had seen one clip. And I'm sure you've seen the clip. If you're on social media, you get political stuff put into your algorithm. You've probably seen the clip. But I will say, in watching the interview, if it's possible, okay, if it's possible to separate your feelings of Senator Tillis from I'm not saying they're right or wrong. I'm not trying to minimize them or anything, but if you, if you separate your personal feelings towards Tillis and just listen to what he is saying, there are a lot of things he is saying that I think are pretty valuable and insightful. Now, some of the stuff he says, I'm like, that was literally my reaction. And I, and I've already listened to it twice. once to watch it and record it, and then the second time to pull the sound bites. So this will be my third time, okay? But there are some things in here that even if you don't agree with what he's saying, right, he's laying out like his mindset and rest assured, this mindset and this thinking that he's got on like strategy and the future of the Republican Party and whatever, there are a lot of people who agree with him and think like him. So even if you don't agree, it's good to know what is that thinking, right? All right. The way Jonathan Martin, uh, promoted this on Twitter was so much of this is setting up the post Trump factional battles. That was, and, and, I don't know, Tillis did not use those words, but Jay Mart did in his promotion of this interview. But that is essentially, and this is also what I've been telling people, you know, that the fight that we are seeing, and I told you right after Trump got elected, that at some point there's going to be this fight that erupts inside MAGA, inside the Republican Party, inside the larger sort of conservative space because there's going to be a fight for who controls the future of the coalition, the mega coalition, the movement, if you will. My personal view is that there is only one Trump. And actually Tillis said this too, that there's only one Donald Trump. So nobody is going to be able to kind of hold that coalition together because they're not a, you know, billionaire that's been in the media and in the public arena for 50 years and has this larger than life bombastic attitude, right? This, this sort of radio host kind of a ad lib jibber jabber thing going on. There's just, there's not another person that I see at least in politics that, that comes close to matching what Trump is. So I, what becomes of his movement, what becomes of the party. And so you're going to have now these factions as J Mart calls them. And it's a fair title. You've got these factions that are now starting to sort of draw their lines and to make their case. And the concern that I have is that they, that all of these different factions are, they see the only way forward for them to be in control and power of the, the Republican party is for them to excise, for them to cut out anybody that disagrees with them. And this, this seems to be a common attitude among the different factions and tell us actually says this as well. So like you don't, You don't win by subtraction, right? You have to be able to grow the coalition. Now, Tillis wants to grow that coalition by first excising a lot of what he calls the maggots. Yeah, he uses the term which is used by the left, MAGA with a T. Lefties and Democrats have been using this slur for years, and he has adopted it. And he thinks that there's this opportunity after the November election. He's saying it's going to be, and this is the clip that everybody has seen, where he set a reminder on his calendar, on his phone, and he calls the election day whoop-ass. Ha, ha, ha. I'm on a countdown. And so he's rooting essentially for failure. Now, I think he would probably say that he's not rooting for it. He's probably of the mind that it's going to happen because of all of these things that were done. And it's inevitable, basically. And from there, you pick up the pieces and you rebuild the party in the mold of the previous iterations of the Republicans. Party when he saw it as more successful. And there was a record to kind of back that up, right? That Republicans had, you know, they won the presidency with George W. Bush. They won majorities in the Senate and the House. Now they've lost them, but we keep going back and forth, back and forth. But he does. In other words, he does not believe the MAGA coalition is durable. And so and I believe a lot of people in MAGA believe the same thing. They don't believe that this Republican coalition is durable either. So everybody is trying to jockey for position to kick out the unbelievers, to kick out. the people that they don't like, that they're not sufficiently on board with our agenda and we're the way forward and all of that. And so this is the fight that I said was going to happen. And Tillis is articulating it in this interview. Also, he's got a book. So he has this book. It's called How to Lose Friends and Antagonize Presidents. I have not read the book. Maybe I will, but probably not a I mean, I am a giver, but I'm not going to do that for you. I just generally don't read these types of books written by politicians or elected officials. I just generally don't. Maybe I should. Maybe I would like them. I don't know. I read a lot every day. So that well is pretty much tapped. It's dried up by the time I get off the air. I've read a lot. So I will bring to you some of these soundbites. Get your reaction. We'll discuss. And again, I understand people have very strong feelings about Tom Tillis. I get it. But I want to try to deal with what he is saying and whether there is any truth to some of the things that he says in this interview. Fair enough? All right. I'm going to go look at the text line and get my lashes in. 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Go to createavideo.com or visit them in Mint Hill just off I-485. Your photos and videos are your life told through the eyes of everyone around you and all who came before you. And they will tell others to come who you are. Visit createavideo.com. All right, as expected. From the text line. Let me read this one first. 980 number. I voted on Wednesday, so I guess I am superior to you, Pete. That's fair. That is fair. Also, coincidentally, when I went in to vote yesterday, the same kind lady that I talked to last year, I got to sit at her table again this year. Because last year she recognized me. And this year again, I sat at her table, I gave her my name, and she said, didn't I see you last year? I said, you did. And of all the tables they sat me at, they sat me at yours. All right, so Jennifer says, Tillis thinks he owns North Carolina politics. We have news for him. Is this EW3? Is that the name here? I can't tell. Pete, the challenge you have with people like me is that I clock out once you say Senator Tillis said. I know. That's why I gave the trigger warnings. And I'm asking to just deal with what he says and try to divorce your feelings about him from some of what he says. Okay. Kevin says, with all the meetings that you watch and all of the books that you read, it begs the question, what is your favorite snack food during all of this? Um, Jameson. No, I'm just kidding. Um, Danny says this election is not about our pocketbooks. It's about the soul of the nation. We know that if the Democrats take over, this nation is going to suffer politically and morally. We must understand that and vote accordingly. Say what you will about Trump. He does care about this nation. Uh, Jefferson says, I've never been a fan of Senator Tillis. saw him as the lesser of two evils, but came to find out that he's a big fan of Iggy Pop, and so am I, so he's okay with me now. Again, I always tell people, never fall in love with your politicians. Okay? It's a transaction. Travis says, if Tillis could choose policy priorities going forward, what would they be? I'm not sure this current Henry Clay version of the Republican Party has the answers, but I think there are pieces we can build on. 704 number. says Trump himself helped split the MAGA movement. I seem to recall him saying he didn't want the support of those who were demanding the release of the Epstein files and a further split happened when he declared people not MAGA for daring to oppose the Iran war. Well, Donald Trump views MAGA as him. MAGA is what he says it is. That's what he has said. And he's not entirely wrong about that. Because again, once he exits the stage... There isn't another Donald Trump. So, uh, the hellion says, tell us explaining how the unit party will collect itself and come back is something else. He needs to shut up and go lobby. He actually said he is not going to be a lobbyist, like just bristled at the idea. Um, Andrew says, if I lived in Mecklenburg County, Pete, I would have written you in for sheriff. Thank you. I appreciate that. Um, I left it blank. Uh, nurse Frank says, Oh, the irony Tillis is the reason MAGA exists. Grumpy guy says, I think Tillis is just trying to prove that he can't be pushed around by Trump. Nobody tells me what to do. Uh, the title of his book suggests that too. Yeah. He definitely has a sort of a streak of oppositional defiance. Uh, he does give off that vibe. Now I don't know that, but that that's, That's what it seems like. He's he he seems to take shots at a lot of people, but he he promotes this as like I'm I'm about the team. I want the team to win. And that's how he frames his opposition. All right. Real quick. Every government number gets revised. Right. Every projection gets walked back. Gold does not file corrections like GovCo. Revelation Gold Group helps families hold physical gold and silver, including in a tax-advantaged gold IRA. It's real, it's in your name, and 10 minutes tells you if your retirement account qualifies. If you want to learn more, go to calendarmetals.com. That's calendarmetals.com. There is a link in the podcast description. Or if you want to talk to somebody, you can call 888-465-3049. All right. As threatened, here is some of the audio from the interview Tom Tillis did with Jonathan Martin. And I will tell you just my sense of this, how the conversation went, is that it all seems to be in sort of in a vein of I told you so. Like I warned you, like he showed up and he handed Jonathan Martin a letter that he had written to the Republican conference. Okay. Talking at where he said, like, if we're not careful, if we don't do these things, we need to do these things, whatever. And part of this letter was in his book. And so some of this comes across as like, I was right. I warned you not to overreach. And by the way, this idea of overreaching is also why he is often called the controlled opposition by a lot of conservatives because his idea of what is or is not possible is sometimes significantly lower than what Republican voters want or believe is possible. Does that make sense? He he may be more hesitant to do a lot of things that the Republican constituency. wants their leaders to do. And that's why a lot of them consider him to be, quote, controlled opposition. All right. So here's the first clip. Back in April of last year, I gave the first 90 days of the administration time to settle in. And then I wrote this letter to the conference in April of last year saying, guys, if we continue this trajectory, we're going to have an environment. Very similar to what I experienced in 2010 in reverse, the environment that made me Speaker of the House. Here in North Carolina. That's right. It was clear that the Obama administration was going to overreach. They did. And based on the trajectory from last April, I thought the same thing here. Now here we are. You're reporting. Everybody else is reporting a less than pleasant environment for Republicans in November. All right. Now, OK, fine. But like that is also true. Generally speaking, it's the second terms of presidents where they get into trouble. Because now they don't have to worry about reelection stuff from the first term now comes out in the second term. So they got more, you know, scandals or whatever to deal with. Oftentimes they lose control of the House. Now they're getting investigated and whatnot. And yes, that's that generally is like the overreaching occurs. And I would submit part of the reason why the overreaching occurs is because this pendulum that swings back and forth, like people think that, Oh, well it'll eventually kind of like lose momentum and swing and kind of just like rest into the center. And I don't see it like that. I see it like it, it is swinging way out to the left and then way back to the right. Right. And, and it's going to get worse and worse. It's like building momentum. It's not losing momentum. He he does believe, though, he said that he sees the Republican Party holding on to the Senate, losing the House and the Senate. He thinks maybe a 50 50 split or a 51 seat majority for the GOP. And that'd be my preference. My goodness. Why? Because we've got to do everything we can to help this administration and maybe have people that can recognize the value of getting some bipartisan work done. There will be no chance for bipartisan work, I believe, if Congress is controlled by Democrats. Both chambers. You know what they're going to do? Both chambers. Here's what's going to happen. The Democrats are going to do exactly what I said the Republicans were going to do. They're going to. Read it as a mandate to be against everything Trump does versus try to find a way to work together. So I'm glad that you brought me this because in congressional parlance, this is a dear colleague. But, you know, a lot of the dear colleagues are basically press releases gussied up as letters. This actually was a dear colleague. It didn't leak, so you put some of it in the book. What's amazing to me is all of the communications I've made to the conference that have never leaked. I would never leak any reply to it, but this is my document. What I'm trying to do is remind people of the opportunity we had last year to really help the administration by pushing back when we didn't think it made sense. Okay. So we could have helped the administration by blocking it on certain things. Like that's, but I don't know if that's actually helping the administration or if that's helping the Republican party. Right. And again, I, I point out like Donald Trump has not been a lifelong Republican. He was a Republican, like, about a minute before he ran for president, you know, a decade ago. But also he has this idea that, oh, well, we can get the Democrats, you know, what the administration needs to do is to kind of shift and work with Democrats on some bipartisan legislation. And he said one thing there about the, later on in the interview, he talks about codifying the border security stuff. And look, he's he's up in the Senate. He's in D.C. So he's talking to his Democrat colleagues, I assume, up there about these things. I like I am at a loss to understand why he would think that the Democrats are going to work with Trump on anything, particularly anything immigration related. And even if he is correct and some Democrats did, that you peel away 9, 10, 11 Democrats or something in order to avoid a filibuster, how do you get that through the House? Who's leading that? Who are these moderate Democrats in the House? I keep having this thought as I'm watching this interview. I keep having this thought. Does he know what time it is? This just feels like a throwback to a time that is gone. And maybe I'm wrong. I consider that more likely the possibility. He's been up there. He's been up there for 12 years. Maybe there really are a bunch of Democrats that would go along with bipartisan legislation with the Trump administration on immigration. I can't even imagine that. But Maybe he's correct. He also said he's not a never-Trumper. If you say no all the time, then you get drowned out and nobody, even your colleagues who may like you, want to listen to you. So you're striking. That balance too. I wasn't going to be a never-Trumper because I'm not a never-Trumper. I support most of his policies. You come back to this time and time again in the book, which is you really feel strongly about you don't want to be seen as a never-Trumper. You say, I'm not Liz Cheney. I also want to be seen as somebody who's trying to protect and promote the Republican Party, of which I've been a member my entire adult life. I don't want to be viewed as that person who's standing on the outside and casting away a party that I worked hard to get established here in North Carolina for good effect. Right. See, again, this is the MAGA coalition, the Republican Party, that is now about to fracture, right? The different elements that came together for Donald Trump and to the benefit of Republicans looks a lot different than... the Republican Party that, you know, I grew up watching and Tom Tillis grew up in. So he wants to go back to that. And again, this is why I keep thinking, does he know what time it is? Because I don't think there's any going back to that. I don't. I don't know what it looks like in the future, but I don't think it's going to look like it used to. Because we, I mean, we didn't see Like massive success all the time for Republicans. Again, it's the pendulum. And I think it's just it's swinging harder and harder. And I don't know, again, if you got Democrats that are going to back away from the ledge that they're on. I just don't I don't think so. John on the text line says ready for Tillis to be gone should have helped pass the save America act. Instead, this guy's just looking for his post Senate job on the view or CNN, et cetera. And I voted for this clown. He does talk. He does make, well, he hints, let me say, he hints at what it is that he's going to do after he's done in the Senate. He says, he's not going to be a lobbyist. He doesn't say specifically, but it involves going after all of the Republicans who, as he calls it, are performers, not producers. We'll get to that in the next hour. Because that's really like I'm trying to I'm trying to like build up your immune system. to the Tillis audio here first, before we get to the, before we get to the, the, um, some might say the more incendiary comments. Um, Stan says, uh, you may want the team to win, but aren't Protestants with all their denominations and Catholics supposedly all on the same team. Nothing incendiary has ever happened there. 803. Oh, this is Alan. Thank you for giving us the name Alan. Allow me to enter your name into the contact field, and now we have your name in perpetuity. Alan says, regarding Tillis, I am a veteran and conservative. J6 made me very angry, and Trump, Hegseth, have no idea how to deal with Iran. I would have voted for Tom Tillis if I lived in North Carolina. I will not read his book. Bill says he's not buying Tillis, a useful idiot for the left, big ego, small brain. I don't think Tillis is dumb. I don't agree with that. Mandy says Tillis is delusional if he thinks the Democrats are going to work with Republicans. And the Hellion says, is this today? Yes. Okay. Again, Hellion, you're like the worst offender with the shotgunning of these texts, because it just comes down in all of these texts, and then I can't figure out where your thoughts are starting and Like, just put it in a single text if you can. Thank you. I appreciate it. I love you. You're killing me, Smalls. I think I read that one already. Zero difference between Tillis and Cornyn. Squishy and spineless. Trying to show spines now. These sort of people wear me out. I'm sorry. It's already fractured. Thune won't do anything. This is rehab. Eric says Trump fractured the 24 coalition all by himself with Epstein and Iran war. Skyrocketing. When is this? Uh, not sure if you're going to, okay. Yeah. If you have, okay. Just a word. If you're starting your text message with something like, I don't know if you're going to talk about this today. All right. I'm not, I'm like, I'm talking about what I'm talking about right now. So like, he just, it's just delaying me. It's eating up valuable broadcast time. Um, would so love for the 17th amendment to get repealed. Uh, that's for the senators, uh, popularly elected. Um, This is from Bebop in Rock Thrill. So Tom Tillis, the current face of the Uniparty, is going to expose the Uniparty? Is that what I'm supposed to believe? No. He's going to go after maggots. Maggots. That's who he's going to go after. You'll hear it from him. I've got the audio. I'm not trying to misrepresent anything that he is saying. And some of the stuff that he has said in this interview, I agree with. Some of the things that he's identifying and different strategies, you know, where he's talking about members of Congress or members of the Senate, you know, who are they're not courageous. They disagree with Trump on something, but they don't want to cross MAGA. They don't want to cross Trump. So they keep their mouth shut. And some of them, and he said, like, I understand if you're running for reelection in 26, you shouldn't be out on the front line, but you're running in 2030 and you won't say anything like, give me a break. That's his assessment. I understand that assessment. He was asked then if Trump has been good for the party. I thought it was good in Trump one, but in Trump two, I think he's lost sight of what he's done is created a coalition that in my opinion will not stay with Republicans once we go back to traditional Republican platform. Priorities, you know, limited government, free. Market, get out of this market manipulation, these other things that we're doing now that make no sense to me and make no sense to traditional conservative Republicans. That's not going to survive tough personality, don't think. No, I don't think so. I think it was popular. A lot of the elements of the populism that Trump created to expand a base that made him successful running for president. I don't think that stays with the party long term. Yeah. So you hear what he said there. Once we go back to the traditional conservative Republican ideas. And again, like, I don't know if the Republican party is ever going back to that. 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 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.com. Again, Thank you so much for listening, and don't break anything while I'm gone.