Morning Wire XX
[0] Donald Trump collects another Democrat endorsement.
[1] On the same day, he honored the 13 servicemen and women who lost their lives during the Afghanistan withdrawal.
[2] Plus is the presidential debate in jeopardy.
[3] The truth is they're trying to get out of it.
[4] She's not a good debater.
[5] She's not a smart person.
[6] She doesn't want a debate.
[7] I'm Georgia Howe with Daily Wire, editor -in -chief John Bickley.
[8] It's Tuesday, August 27th, and this is Morning Wire.
[9] Nearly two months after the attempt on former President Trump's life, much about the would -be assassin is still unknown.
[10] If you want to design investigation to raise suspicions and drive conspiracy theories, this is exactly how you do that investigation.
[11] And do voters trust legacy media?
[12] New polling shows they don't, including in the key swing states that will decide the election.
[13] Thanks for waking up with Morningwire.
[14] Stay tuned.
[15] We have the news you need to know.
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[23] Three years after the deadly Abbey Gate bombing that killed 13 U .S. service members, Joe Biden and Kamala Harris are under fire for their role in the debacle.
[24] Here to discuss is Daily Wire Senior Editor Cabot Phillips.
[25] Hey, Cabot, so a solemn day for our country that also has major political ramifications.
[26] First, what took place yesterday?
[27] Yeah, yesterday marked the third anniversary of the botched withdrawal from Afghanistan that cost the lives of 13 American service members, along with countless more Afghan civilians and other allies.
[28] Former President Trump took a break from campaigning to take part in a re -flaying ceremony at Arlington National Cemetery, where he was joined by a number of disabled Marines injured during the attack and family members of those killed.
[29] For their part, on Monday, President Biden and VP Harris issued statements commemorating the day and notably finally use the names of those 13 soldiers who were killed.
[30] For more on that, we spoke with Steve Nakui, whose son Kareem was killed at Abbey Gate.
[31] Steve was arrested at last.
[32] Last year, State of the Union, for famously yelling out from the crowd, telling Biden to acknowledge the soldiers killed under his watch.
[33] Here's what he had to say about the president finally using his son's name.
[34] I'm not going to downplay it or say it's too little too late.
[35] He did it, and I appreciate that, you know, but I wish he would have done it on his first state of the Union.
[36] I wish he would have done it the very first night that this happened.
[37] But it's worth noting, neither Joe Biden nor Kamala Harris appeared for any of the anniversary events taking place across the country.
[38] Joe Biden has been on vacation, while Kamala Harris had no public appearances for the day.
[39] The Trump campaign slammed that silence, accusing Harris of ignoring the tragedy for fear of drawing attention to the role she played in it.
[40] They issued a statement saying, quote, three years later, Kamala Harris still has not said the names of these 13 heroes out loud.
[41] Not even once.
[42] There still has been no accountability.
[43] By her own admission, Kamala Harris was a key player in the disastrous withdrawal.
[44] To that last point, the Trump camp has been sharing this.
[45] 2021 interview on CNN, where Harris has this to say about the debacle.
[46] He just made a really big decision.
[47] Afghanistan.
[48] Yes.
[49] Were you the last person in the room?
[50] Yes.
[51] And you feel comfortable.
[52] I do.
[53] Now, after taking part in that wreath -laying ceremony, Donald Trump appeared at another high -profile event in Detroit.
[54] What did we see there?
[55] Yeah, Trump addressed service members and veterans at the National Guard Association, where he again took aim at the Biden -Harris administration's failures in Afghanistan.
[56] and throughout the world for that matter, which he said is more unstable under their watch.
[57] He was then joined on stage by former Democratic congresswoman and presidential candidate Tulsi Gabbard.
[58] Remember, Gabbard famously sparred with Kamala Harris during the 2020 Democratic debates and has reportedly been helping Trump prepare for his own debate with Harris on September 10th.
[59] Here she is in Detroit.
[60] I'm committed to doing all that I can to send President Trump back to the White House where he can once again serve us as our commander -in -chief.
[61] Because I am confident that his first task will be to do the work to walk us back from the brink of war.
[62] So, RFK on Friday and now Tulsi Gabbard.
[63] Right.
[64] Now, you mentioned that upcoming debate.
[65] We've seen a lot of back and forth on that front.
[66] What's the latest there?
[67] So quick refresher, at the start of the month, Kamala Harris accused Donald Trump of being afraid to debate her.
[68] In response, Trump agreed to all three proposed debates and even asked for more beyond that.
[69] that.
[70] Now, Harris only agreed to one of those debates on ABC September 10th, but has now since requested a number of changes to those rules.
[71] Reportedly, she wants notes and seats for each candidate, and also importantly, that neither candidate's microphones be muted at any point throughout the debate, which Donald Trump has also now agreed to.
[72] So for now, the September 10th debate on ABC is still a go.
[73] We'll have to wait and see if there are any more sticking points, though, that come up.
[74] Well, like the previous one, so much hanging on this upcoming debate, Kevin, thanks for reporting.
[75] Anytime.
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[83] Details are known about Thomas Crooks over six weeks after the 20 -year -old attempted to assassinate former President Donald Trump.
[84] The lack of information about the first assassination attempt of a president or former president in 40 years has raised suspicions about the federal investigation.
[85] Daily Wire reporter Tim Pierce is here to talk about the investigations into Thomas Crooks and why we still know so little about him.
[86] Hey Tim, so it's been over six weeks since Trump was shot and we still don't have any idea of a motive.
[87] What's going on here?
[88] Well, after six weeks of investigations, we still know remarkably little about the shooter.
[89] And that has really frustrated congressional investigators who say that the FBI won't cooperate.
[90] Here's Senator Ron Johnson of Wisconsin on Fox News over the weekend.
[91] All I can really tell you is the Secret Service of FBI are basically dragging their feet.
[92] They're still walling us.
[93] And we've gotten some transcribed interviews, but the documents we request are heavily redacted.
[94] They're delivered day of the interview.
[95] So we really can't use the documents to conduct the interviews effectively.
[96] So we're not getting squat from my standpoint from the Secret Service or the FBI.
[97] Johnson is also skeptical of how the investigation has been handled at certain points, such as releasing Crooks' body for cremation before an autopsy or toxicology report was made public.
[98] The FBI has said that while it did release the body, it followed all usual procedures.
[99] Republican Congressman Mike Walts of Florida is part of the congressional investigation on the House side.
[100] Here's what he said on Fox News about it last week.
[101] It's still shocking how little we know.
[102] They have not been able to get into all of those encrypted accounts, yet in the same breath, they're very quick to say he acted alone.
[103] How did he build those IEDs and not trigger any type of alerts with a remote detonator that was fully functional?
[104] Waltz told the Daily Mail that he is concerned that Crooks may not have acted alone here.
[105] We know that Crooks wasn't the only person who wanted Trump dead.
[106] The Iranian regime pushed another recession.
[107] assassination plot long before Crook took his shot.
[108] Yeah.
[109] What have we seen from the Secret Service since its director stepped down?
[110] According to real clear politics, at least five agents who worked on security for Trump's Butler, Pennsylvania rally, are on administrative leave.
[111] They all worked for the Pittsburgh Field Office, which was responsible for coordinating with local law enforcement.
[112] However, there are many more secret service officials who are involved in the Butler rally who have not been placed on leave.
[113] So it's not clear yet how much accountability has taken place.
[114] And because they were all placed on administrative leave, those agents still may be drawing a paycheck until the agency decides what to do with them.
[115] Right.
[116] On the other side of this, the parents of Thomas Crooks have reportedly hired legal counsel that specializes in criminal defense, among other issues.
[117] The Crooks has retained the services of Pittsburgh -based law firm Quinn Logue.
[118] And this is the FBI wants to know how much the parents knew about Crook's plans before he took the shot.
[119] All right, so the parents' lawyering up.
[120] How has the Secret Service handled the fallout since Ronald Rowe took over as acting director?
[121] Yeah, Dan Bongino, who used to work as a Secret Service agent himself, was asked that question at an event on Monday.
[122] Here's what he said.
[123] No, it's worse.
[124] And sadly, I'm glad this is all being recorded because when something else happens and I hope it doesn't, I pray to my Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, that I'm wrong.
[125] You think this is the last incident and you're out of your mind.
[126] At that same event, Eric Prince, a retired Navy SEAL and founder of the private military group Blackwater, said that the biggest problem here is an unaccountable bureaucracy.
[127] Our problem is we have a federal government that doesn't have any accountability in any way, shape, or form.
[128] And I push back on you in Congress to affect the bureaucracy the one way that they care, cut their damn budget, starve them out.
[129] nothing else will get their attention other than their starvation.
[130] Prince pushed back on suggestions that there could have been a grand conspiracy on the part of the federal government to assassinate Trump, but that doesn't mean its hands are clean here.
[131] Well, demands for more transparency and accountability just continued to grow.
[132] Tim, thanks for joining us.
[133] Thanks for having me. Recent polling in swing states shows that seven in ten voters say they don't trust the media to provide fair and accurate.
[134] political coverage, but the loss of faith isn't being felt equally across the political spectrum.
[135] Daily Wire reporter, Megan Basham is here now with more.
[136] So, Megan, we've covered the fact that Americans' faith in traditional media is rapidly declining.
[137] What's the latest numbers show?
[138] Yeah, so when we look at polling from Gallup, we see that trust in the media is now tied with that record low back in 2016, also a highly contentious election year.
[139] Now, as then, only 32 % of Americans say that they have a great deal.
[140] or even fair amount of faith in the media to provide fair and accurate coverage.
[141] But if you look at how many now say they don't have any trust in the media at all, then those numbers get really stark because that is at 39%, and it's 12 points higher than it was in 2016.
[142] You add to that the 29 % to say they only have a little trust in the media, and you can see why Gallup says that these are the grimmest numbers that they've seen spanning all the way back to 1972 when they first started polling on this issue.
[143] Now, in terms of partisan breakdown, presumably it's Democrats who still have somewhat good faith in the media?
[144] That's exactly right.
[145] So 58 % of Dems have at least a fair amount of trust, but that doesn't mean that there's no news there.
[146] So the numbers are still down for Democrats in the last couple of years.
[147] In 2018, Democratic trust in the media hit a high of 76%.
[148] So that means it's down 18 points in just over five years.
[149] Pretty significant.
[150] But there's also a big drop -off for independence too.
[151] In 2018, 42 % of independents had a good deal of faith in the media to be fair and accurate.
[152] Now, only 29 % of them do.
[153] Republicans, of course, were already low, but even that number has been cut nearly in half from 21 % to only 11%.
[154] And that goes to some recent polling from the Washington Post that found that seven and 10 voters in six key swing states say they don't trust the media to fairly cover politics in particular.
[155] Now, that's really important because these are the voters that the Post found are most likely to determine the outcome of the 2024 election.
[156] Instead, the Post says that a lot of these voters are now turning to independent media sources like podcasts or social media platforms like X. So does any of this analysis drill down into why voters are losing trust in the media?
[157] No, you know, it really doesn't, but I do think that some of the recent coverage of the campaigns does make it fairly easy to guess why.
[158] So we saw a quick shift in media tone when it came to President Biden's mental fitness, for example.
[159] For months, many legacy outlets were characterizing videos that showed his mental decline as cheap fakes.
[160] Yet when it was clear that the party apparatus wanted to switch candidates, that coverage also shifted pretty abruptly.
[161] And then in just the last couple of days, you're seeing a lot of conservatives pointing to ABC anchor Jonathan Carl seeming to run interference for Kamala Harris during an interview with Arkansas Senator Tom Cotton just a couple of days ago.
[162] And President Trump is going to draw a sharp contrast with Kamala Harris, who has supported things like decriminalizing illegal immigration or giving taxpayer -funded health insurance to illegal aliens or taking away health insurance on the job for 170 million Americans.
[163] What do you mean taking away health insurance?
[164] What are you talking about?
[165] She said when she ran for president that she wants to eliminate private health insurance on the job, 170 million Americans, John.
[166] Yeah, I mean, that is not her position now.
[167] How do you know that's not her position?
[168] How do you know this not her position?
[169] I mean, she says she knows what supports Medicare for all.
[170] She has not said that.
[171] So I think we can assume that this kind of thing is part of what's driving that lack of trust.
[172] Well, given that Republicans and independents combined represent well over half the country, this is a massive problem for the media.
[173] Yep, it sure is.
[174] Megan, thanks for reporting.
[175] Anytime.
[176] Thanks for waking up with us.
[177] We'll be back this afternoon with more news she needs to know.
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